the single greatest lesson i ever

learned in my career that profoundly

changed the course of my life was

multiple time best selling author third

most watched ted talk of all time the

return of simon sinek thank you very

much plus 30 40 years we've doubled down

at how do i find love how do i find

happiness we've doubled down on

selfishness but now in a complicated

messy world we haven't been practicing

and developing the skills of taking care

of each other and that's what we need

now more than ever do you ever give up

on someone um

[Music]

i have a fear i've never expressed this

openly gen z are the least resilient

generation they're really good at

presenting a confidence

that they don't have this young

generation seems less capable to deal

with stress than previous generations

that is true going from relationship to

relationship to relationship from job to

job to job there's no stigma to quitting

flash forward five years and what's

going to happen is an employer is going

to look at them be like

i can't take the risk everything we're

talking about today comes right back to

those human skills that we are lacking

how to listen how to give and receive

feedback how to have a difficult

conversation and the thing we have to

deal with more than anything is fear

fear that is the underlying thing why we

don't have honest conversations

let me give you some honesty then

what is the greatest fear you have about

how you're currently living your life i

was very insecure about admitting that

i was crying

you know as we were talking about it

that was that was hard

without further ado i'm stephen bartlett

and this is the diary of a ceo i hope

nobody's listening but if you are then

please keep this to yourself

[Music]

simon good to see you again yeah good to

be here um i i have to thank you first

and foremost and i many reasons you know

i'm a huge fan of all your work but the

conversation we had when we're over in

l.a was received so unbelievably well by

the listeners on this podcast it did

millions and millions and millions of

downloads in such a short space of time

that i had to argue to get you to come

back again when you're here in the uk so

well it's nice to be back and it's nice

to do it on your home turf yeah

literally in my home literally in your

home um

there's so many things i want to talk to

you about but one of the things that i

was curious about because i've been

thinking a lot about this in my life is

this idea of our whys evolving

what is your why and has it evolved over

the last decade at all

uh so my why

[Music]

is to inspire people to do the things

that inspire them

so together each of us can change our

world for the better and it's why i wake

up every morning every day it is the

greatest compliment someone can pay me

when they say to me that was inspiring

or you were inspiring like that feeds me

you know um and the interesting thing

about hawaii is because it is not it is

objective

a y is the sum total of how we were

raised

it's born out of the patterns and the

lessons we learned from our parents from

our teachers when we're young and our

why is fully formed by the time we're in

our mid to late teens and you only have

one wife for the rest of your life it

doesn't change

you ha you are who you are based on how

you were raised now you may not be

acting

as your true self you know people say

that to us all the time you know it's

like i don't know who you are anymore

you know but when you are at your

natural best you're wise front and

center but we're not always acting at

our natural best and sometimes we make

decisions out of selfishness we shake we

take the job that pays us that offers us

the most money and turn down the one to

work for somebody who would probably be

a better mentor you know we do these

things all the time and so

you know can you tweak the words of your

why of course you know but that's that's

semantics um can we find better ways to

to bring a why to life yes that's the

evolution but the why itself is fixed

when you talk about the why being

influenced by the things that happened

in our life our experiences our

upbringing

does that mean that our trauma can

influence our wife for better or for

worse always for better always for

better yeah a why is always positive

um

uh and i'll give you a real life example

of somebody's why discovery that i did

and you know one of the things i do when

i do somebody's my discovery i asked

them about you know happy experiences

when they were kids and this person said

i didn't have a very happy childhood i

had a really bad childhood

and i said okay so tell me tell me a bad

memory then you know

and

she talked about a lot of abuse in the

household and a very abusive alcoholic

father who would beat

her mother and the kids

and she told a story of a repeated

pattern of when the father would be

drunk and come looking for the kids that

she'd be hiding

in the cupboard

protecting her brother with her arms

wrapped around him so to shield her

brother

and she goes through this whole story

and at the end

i pointed out to her that she's a

protector

that in the in these traumatic

experiences it was her instinct

to to protect her baby brother and she's

lived her life if you look at all of the

times that she's really thrived and

where she's her her best self she's

usually in a in a position of protection

of other of other people and that's

where she finds joy in taking care of

other people and so the the experiences

mold us into who we are um and the

effects

you know the impact will be positive

regardless of where it comes from so

yeah i mean

a horrible childhood that made her a

wonderful human being

i was going to use me as an example

there to try and rebuttal that somewhat

but i remember having a very similar

conversation with a very good friend of

mine a week ago

upstairs who talked to me about their

childhood there they've talked about

this publicly as well so i'm not letting

the cat out of the bag but their their

father used to beat their mother up

really really severely and she was

telling me literally just a few days ago

upstairs

that she her memories of trying to hold

on to her dad's arm as it swung for her

mother when she was five years old and

when you look at the pattern of what

those early experiences have caused

and a few other experiences she's

obsessed with

with with helping others

and she's you know building these

amazing businesses she's unbelievably

successful it's like frighteningly

successful at a very very young age

however

that

forcing her to help others

has meant that she's compromised

sometimes helping herself

and

of everyone i know in my life

she is the most successful woman i know

but she's also the woman that is most

unsuccessful in all of the personal

aspects relationships boyfriend

uh mental health all of these things

so when we say you know i understand the

positive side of it but

the negative side of it seems to be

um of this unbelievable i guess why

she's got seems to just honestly for me

not be worth it

[Music]

because this is not this is not someone

that is that would say they're happy

this is someone that is in therapy and

is every day

in tears and upset while serving the

world in an unbelievable way

so is that a positive is that a positive

why so

so

the

the rub about the why you know a y is

basically the thing we give to the world

it's the value we have in other people's

lives her friends would say of her that

she is our protector

um you know uh

that is the role we fill in their lives

which is why they love us because we're

br we're giving them our why it is our

value the rub

the most difficult thing about the why

to understand is the the thing that we

give to to the world is also the thing

that we need the most

it's it's always balanced

and so i would argue that

you know

she

it's not that she's unable to take care

of herself

it's that she needs to find friends

colleagues whatever it is who are

committed to taking care of her

and that's where the change happens

and

you know

we were talking about this you know

before the show started you know there's

an entire section of the bookshop called

self-help and there's no section in the

bookshop called help others

and i believe what we need is the help

of this industry

um i'll tell you uh something uh

something that happened to me a friend

of mine was going through a really

rough patch in her life um her marriage

was

struggling her career was struggling she

was unhappy like just

none of the boxes were getting checked

you know

and she knows what i do i mean we've

been friends for forever and she asked a

favor can you help me

you know of course of course i said and

every week we had a standing

90-minute meeting

where she'd come over and she would tell

me what's going on

and i would give her some advice and i'd

point out some patterns and she'd feel

fantastic she would leave on a high and

she'd feel amazing for like two days and

then it'll go right back again and she'd

come back the following week and this

went on for months two days three days

and then back down again right

and then it occurred to me like i

remember my own work

in leaders eat last i talk about

alcoholics anonymous where they have 12

steps to help an alcoholic beat this

disease

and alcoholics anonymous knows

that if you master 11 of the 12 steps

you're going to probably slide back and

succumb to the disease but if you can

master the 12th step as well

you will more likely beat the disease

the 12th step is to help another

alcoholic

it's service

and so i remembered my own work and i

decided to do a little i decided to

change things up right and so i said to

her look

i love that you come and see me every

week and i love helping you every week

but you know i struggle with things too

and i don't have anybody to talk to

would you be willing to help me maybe we

can split the time and she said of

course yes and what started to happen is

every week we got together and i was

genuine i wasn't faking it like i would

unload and tell her what i was going

through and what i was struggling with

and it ended up that we wouldn't split

the time it ended up that she would

spend 90 minutes talking about my stuff

right and she was the advice giver and

she was the one looking for the patterns

and she would leave on a high and that

high would stay until the following week

it was only when we reversed

the scenario where that she was

had the opportunity to take care of

someone she loved that she was able to

find the solutions to her own challenges

and i'm a great believer that that we

have to remember we're social animals

we need each other and this is the great

paradox of being human at every moment

of every day we are both individuals and

members of groups

you know and there's a there's a there's

a debate do you take care of yourself

first or do you take care of others

first and there's a whole school of

thought that says you have to take care

of yourself first because if you're not

healthy you can't take care of others

and there's a whole school of thought

that says no you have to take care of

others first so that when you're in need

they'll be there for you and the answer

is you're both right and you're both

wrong it's a paradox it's a struggle and

every day we're faced with sometimes big

but often small choices

do i prioritize myself at the sacrifice

of the group or do i prioritize the

group at the sacrifice of myself

and you know folks like um

uh uh

maslov like maslow's hierarchy of needs

maslow made him a huge mistake in that

hierarchy which is

his his baseline our basic need is food

and shelter right

i've never heard of anyone dying by

suicide because they were hungry i've

heard of people dying by suicide because

they were lonely

right and yet social relationships in in

maya's law's hierarchy is number three

but that kind of that doesn't sound

right

it seems like there's something more

important to human beings than just food

and shelter and then the top of the peak

is self-actualization which sounds the

most selfish thing in the world like i

am so self-actualized that i would

literally sit on top of a pyramid and

look down at all of you unactualized

people because that's my goal to be

self-actualized

he's half right the mistake that maslov

made he's the only thought of us as

individuals

and as individuals yes i need food and

shelter first but as a member of a group

i need friends and i need love

and self-actualization is not the thing

i'm actually in pursuit of as a member

of a group it's shared actualization

that i'm looking for

and unfortunately for various reasons

which we don't have to go down that

rabbit hole

the past 30 40 years

especially in the west we have doubled

down on on individualism we have doubled

down on

my own career we've doubled down at how

do i find love how do i find happiness

we've doubled down on selfishness

and it worked for a while it worked when

the economy was really good like in the

80s and 90s and 2000s so awesome

selfishness was great because it worked

but now in a complicated messy world

where the economy isn't great and

everything's not roses

all that self-interest is now

not working except we haven't been

practicing and developing the school

skills of taking care of each other

and that's what we need now more than

ever

and so

i don't know your friend and so i can't

make any i'm not i can't make any

conclusions

but we are we are animals in balance

right and nature

abhors a vacuum

and so whenever i hear about these

things my question is always about the

balance so for example every single good

thing that happens in our lives

everything comes at a cost

there's nothing for free somebody with

an incredible career has no relationship

with their kids right everything comes

at a cost but at the same time

everything we struggle with has

opportunity and lesson that goes with it

it's always balanced

right and so

whenever anybody tells me this great

thing i was like yeah but at what cost

and was the cost worth it sometimes the

answer is yes and sometimes the answer

is no and when something horrible

happens in someone's life or something

goes sideways i always ask but what did

you learn

you know i mean my career and yours is

the same you know

the whole the golden circle and the

concept of why came out of

me losing my passion and hating work

i went through depression i never want

to go through that again but i'm really

glad it happened

because it

look what it's it's given me an entirely

new life view

and i think of strengths and weaknesses

the same way you know i think it's

hilarious when people say what are your

strengths and what are your weaknesses

well it depends

life is balanced and it's always

contextual and everything that we have

that's a strength has liability attached

and every weakness we have has strength

that's attached

i can imagine because of the books

you've written and the you know the

channels you have and the content you

produce that a lot of people come to you

um on a personal level friends family to

help solve some of the problems that

they're having in their lives i i find

myself in somewhat of a similar position

maybe they're not coming to me maybe i'm

inserting myself into the problem to try

and solve it because that's my nature

but do you do you ever do you ever give

up on someone

something i've thought about and i'm i'm

reflecting on my friend a little bit

here yeah and friends i've had from my

childhood who i've i've i remember

offering a guy

i was like if you can just do one month

working in

subway where he was working i'll pay for

your rent so you can move out of that

city yeah and go get a job he didn't do

the one month in subway yeah and at one

point there's part of me he's like you

know everyone's solvable the optimism

the optimistic in me and the other part

of me goes at some point you have to

give up on people

um so the single greatest lesson i ever

learned in my career that profoundly

changed the course of my life and it

comes right before

the the realization and the articulation

of why

i learned

how to ask for help and i learned how to

accept it when i was offered

okay

and i think that it's not about giving

up on someone it's that it's a it's that

it's a

that helping someone is a team sport

success is a team sport and if you find

that you're the only player in in their

life

when they should be the primary player

you can only be you can only do the

assists you'll never be the one making

the baskets that's their job

right

but if they won't take the pass

then at some point you stop throwing the

ball

and um

it's not about giving up on people

it's it's that they have it's about

accountability to take responsibility

for oneself and and giving up on

somebody is don't ever call me again you

don't take my advice this is over

right that's giving up on someone

for i think the other way to do it is

like listen

i i cannot help you if you cannot be

involved to help yourself

and i will want to sit down with them

and i will want to i won't criticize and

be like you're not doing this you have

to follow my advice you have to do this

you got to go work at subway for the

week like that that's not what i want to

sit down and understand what the

blockage is there's something else

that's the blockage that i can get to

hopefully but at the end of the day i

will say to them point blank listen

if you're not going to be involved in

this then there's no point to me to be

involved you know you have to

like this is a team and i'm the only

player here

so i will always be here

and when you are ready maybe it's just

bad timing i don't know what else is

going on in your life and maybe this is

not the right time or maybe i'm a bad

fit

but when you are ready i will still be

here no matter what but you have to call

me

there's no more there's no more me

throwing you the ball like you're gonna

have to call me and then they call you

and then sometimes you do sometimes they

don't sometimes they do sometimes they

don't in my case they call me and and

then they say it's time i'm willing to

accept the help and then the same cycle

happens over and over again and you go

you go you know five years of them

calling you then you then then then it's

then they're lying

but they don't think they're lying they

always think this time is going to be

different i'm going to do it on monday

i mean

like i said i want to know what else is

the blockage you you when there's that

kind of repeated pattern

then there's something else and i think

i think you know our mistake in those

situations is repeating our pattern

which is okay i'm going to give you the

same advice i'm going to do the same

thing you're going to do the same thing

i'm going to tell you the same thing i'm

going to give up on you i'm going to go

like

we're we're actually repeating a pattern

as well and so

you know we know this as entrepreneurs

which is you got to try something

completely completely different

um and i think you know this goes back

to what we were saying a moment ago you

know which is we we are we are not

teaching the skills of how to help

others and part of one of the biggest

skills of learning to help others is

learning how to listen

and most of us are really crap at

listening

right we confuse um listening with

hearing the words that were spoken

you know you're sitting watching tv

and you know someone you love is trying

to tell you something and you're like

uh-huh uh-huh and you're still watching

you're not even listening to me and we

turn around and repeat all the words

back to them that's not listening that's

hearing the words that were spoken to

you

you listening is when the other person

feels heard

right

and where you are in pursuit of meaning

not the word spoken you're not so

literal right

and

i think in the cases of of like your

friend

the the

is to go from an advice giving mode and

men suffer from this more than women

which is we our intention is to fix

everything right all we want to do is

fix fix fix fix we see the problem

here's the solution but sometimes that's

not what people need people need to feel

seen and heard and understood and maybe

just maybe you're going too quickly to

fix and he doesn't feel seen or heard or

understood yet and in this particular

situation

and again i don't know the person but um

i would i would go to an extreme

listening you know give the kid the

opportunity to empty his bucket like and

there's only three terms you're going to

use in the conversation go on tell me

more what else

because there's it sounds like there's

it's whatever you think the thing is

you're fixing it's probably something

entirely different and until you can get

to that um you're going to give up them

somebody who maybe

um it's just that we had the wrong

strategy

it wasn't until these examples surfaced

in my life where i had friends asking me

for this kind of help that i started to

consider that maybe mindset itself is a

privilege one that if you don't

acknowledge and understand you'll end up

giving advice from a very privileged

place you know you know i might say well

just work harder or just yeah just cheer

up yeah these kinds of things come from

like a a misunderstanding that my brain

is fortunate enough to to think and be a

certain way yeah um but i've never heard

someone people talk enough about this

idea that our mindset in and of itself

is a privilege and that you know

that's interesting that mindset is a

privilege

is that true if we think about the early

upbringing in childhood then yeah so

that was maybe you know some people have

monetary privilege from their childhood

one thing that your parents or your

experiences might have given you a real

psychological privilege

so let me just think out loud for a

second right let's try let me try and

unpack that

you know

there are

many stories of people

who

when the odds were against them whether

they came from extreme poverty or abuse

rose up to have successful and happy

lives

right and when

when we read about them or talk to them

or meet them or hear interviews from

them

they talk about mindset they talk about

my mother taught you usually the mother

like my mother taught me that to never

be a victim

my mother taught me that i was capable

of anything and so they had a mindset

they you know where some people have a

victim mindset and then they

that's that's the life they continue to

live

some people have a might a different

mindset and it can lift them out of what

we would consider unprivileged

circumstances right so

you know it makes me question then is

mindset a privilege and

we both know people that have every

privilege afforded to them you know

every one of them

and yet for whatever reason

their mindset is the wrong one and they

can squander all of that opportunity

all of those advantages that they've

been afforded you know

um

and make a mess so i i question whether

mindset is a privilege there are a lot

of privileges in in in life

mindset i think is one of the ones that

is is there for the taking

i

i think about so i was 18 years old

dropped out of university shoplifting

food to feed myself and in that moment i

was entirely convinced that i was going

to be a millionaire what did i do

what did i what did i actively do you

just you're just counting your own point

that mindset is not a privilege no i'm

saying because i think that that i i

have the privilege that that mindset was

given to me by my experiences and maybe

by my biology

i'm wondering why in that situation if

you'd put me and my best friend that i

talked about with the subway example in

the same situation one of us would have

catastrophized and me i just saw it as

this wonderful stepping stone to the

point that i went around my house

videoing my dispatch videoing my dire

situation opening the fridge there's

nothing in it

my first page of my diary on facebook

knows which i kept says i'm keeping this

diary because the tv production company

have asked me to

i liked my own diary because i and i

look back and go this kid was sure yeah

that he was getting out of here well i i

mean i played tricks and games with

myself as well

you know um

i mean i remember i mean some of them

are hilarious but i i did the same thing

you know and and i said i i go back to

the concept of why which is which is

it's the experiences we had when we were

young that formed us into who we are it

wasn't the shoplifting alone it was your

parents it was your friends it was your

teachers like is that a privilege

i mean at what point

everybody has a y and everybody's why is

affirmative

you know

and and so

like i told you about the abuse story

you know

something really positive and someone

really positive came out of that trauma

um

so

you know

i'm struggling to call you use the word

privilege to mindset

because what you're saying is anyone

that anyone who's

had any kind of luck

or turnaround

or

has privilege where anyone who hasn't

and has failed it's because of their

lack of privilege like there's too many

other factors

involved in that in those in those

comparisons

to to to oversimplify it and call it

privilege i'm sure there are privileged

components sometimes involved in that

for sure but

you know when we're if we're

strictly talking about mindset i i i

i think it's uh

it's

i'm not sure i don't think so it doesn't

because

the control of our minds

is the one thing that we own

it's the one thing that

is not

like we we can change the way we view

ourselves and how we treat others um

and i think what's important

and

it's a hard conversation right i think

one thing that's important is

i think we have to have love in our

lives it's from someone

you know like even people who like i

have a friend who came from a very

abusive household

um he he found his grandmother stabbed

to death and the knife was so deep that

she was attached to the bed like that's

how bad it was right

um and yet he had a coach who believed

in him

and so

i think i think

to have someone believe in us

to have one person see a spark in us

helps us recognize that it helps us see

the spark in ourselves

you know uh

it just i think it takes one with only

one person whether it's a friend or a

coach or a parent

a boss sometimes you know who says who

takes a liking to us and almost all of

us

almost all of us

can remember one person in our lives

where it's a coach or a teacher who took

us under their wing and saw something

that we didn't see

uh and every single successful person on

the planet has that person

but i think most of us do most of us

have somebody who

who saw something in us and we are who

we are in part because of that person

having someone in our lives um kind of

links back to something you were talking

about earlier about trying to be less

individualistic in our approach to our

lives and our careers lots of your work

and i was on your video subscription

library and lots of your work has that

as a through line about connection and

people and teams and yeah um

in the in the backdrop of the remote

working world we're living in

um

i guess my first question would be how

do you think that this postcovid world

has been impacted in terms of connection

community teams

and that unity that

should be on the bottom level of our

maslowy and hierarchy of needs well i

mean

obviously it took a step back

you know um

though there are again i always think of

things in terms of balance right and

cost so it's not good or bad it's both

right and so let's weigh both of course

we have freedom of schedule now that we

didn't have we have freedom to live

wherever we want which we didn't have

we have freedom to pick our kids from

school or go to the dentist where we

used to have to ask permission or take

time off we have that freedom now that

we didn't have

um we have

for people who are for people who are um

introverted

they like that they can get their work

done

in the privacy of their own home you

know there are many advantages to remote

working

um

the sharing of ideas is much more

difficult like a brainstorming like

really

really hard to do in a virtual scenario

because it's hyper polite

right you can't interrupt somebody as

easily like when you have a real

brainstorming it's messy it's loud you

step on each other's words you interrupt

each other you have to be like no no and

nobody cares it's the it's the mess it's

the joy of it

right in an online scenario

it gets you literally can't hear people

if everybody's talking at once and

you're constantly apologizing and it's

your turn and you don't have that

wonderful energy i and so i think

brainstorming's suffered

um

and then the obvious one which is

um

which is for a lot of people and i think

if it dramatically affected younger

people more

um

but for for all of us

you you know

when you're done with work

you go out with your friends for a bite

to eat or at the pub and you about

work

and you about your boss

totally healthy and you and you do it in

the with with the friends that whether

it's a good job or a bad job it doesn't

matter you have a you have a place

separated from work

that's your friends that you go and get

it all out right super healthy and you

feel supported and loved and hurt and

all that good stuff that went away

completely

completely and so what ended up

happening and again if you didn't have a

family if you were living alone it's all

these things just get more and more

exaggerated right

so

um what ended up happening was and again

especially young people but for a lot of

other people too

is

we started looking to the people we

spent more time with people now at work

on the on zoom with them all day and

sometimes into the into the evening we

now started spending more time with

these people we didn't have somebody to

go out with afterwards and so we started

looking to work to be that therapeutic

outlet

right and so

what so many people did is first of all

gossip starts to swirl a lot more

because we're now venting and bitching

to each other as opposed to our friends

right so especially if somebody's young

or susceptible like gossips

can take off much quicker

which is very dangerous to a culture

but

what what i've what i've seen is that we

find one empathetic person a the good

listener on the team right and we call

them up and we about our job we

about our boss

but then he keeps going like i don't

know what i didn't what i don't want to

do with my life you know i hate my

boyfriend i hate my girlfriend

i don't know if i should break and all

of a sudden you're dumping all of your

life's problems

on somebody from work who just happens

to be a good listener

and what we're doing is we're increasing

the stress on that person

so

we suffered it in our company i've heard

it from many other companies which is

those people those empaths they're

quitting

and if you ask them why are you quitting

they go because i'm burnt out and you're

looking at their workload and be like i

don't understand like how you burnt out

they're burnt out from taking on all of

everyone else's stress because they're

empathetic everybody else's stress

becomes their stress

right

that's the problem with this which is

and it's good that someone like as

covetez is up like going out with our

friends

and having that

that safe space to vent away from work

is really important so in a cultural

standpoint it's very hard to control for

that like i can't interrupt it i can't

tell them they can't you know they don't

want to go to their boss to talk about

those things but what what

again particularly young people but

others as well but particularly young

people

they're they're recognized that there

are boundaries at work

and you by dumping on one person that

they should take on all your problems

and they listen and they listen and they

listen and they listen and sometimes

they give bad advice but they listen and

listen we're doing a great disservice to

that other person to make ourselves feel

better for a few minutes

i've it's one of the first times in my

life that i've started to think again

about culture design and it's funny

because i ran a business post covered

for seven years we had almost a thousand

people i then left in the middle of

covid and i'm launching businesses after

covert and it seems that not all of the

rules apply and a lot of that's because

of comparison now so that a modern

employee is comparing the

working culture that they're seeing on

tick tock right and linkedin right to

their own and it's almost as an employer

we're competing with a false tick tock

social media narrative that

is um

and people never really know what they

actually want i think as it relates to

culture even me

so when if you ask someone what they

want from their working culture would it

meet their fundamental needs probably

not yeah

um so

my question to you is how are you on a

practical level

what changes have you practically made

or believe are necessary in a

post-covered world

that you wouldn't have maybe stated in a

pre-covered world if any

let me come out to it let me come at it

from a slightly

so if you go back a bunch of years

um

our lives look very different than they

do now

obviously um

we got our sense of

purpose

from church

we got our sense of community

from

you know

whatever bowling league

we hung out with our neighbors they came

over and on the weekends and had

barbecues with us and

work was a place that we

went to make money to pay for our lives

pay our bills and it was also a

different time where we were super loyal

to the company and the company was super

loyal to us

right

and that was

that was life

and then

church attendance started to decline

bowling leagues basically are gone

they've disappeared we don't uh go to

community centers anymore we don't have

our neighbors over on a weekend basis

and so we've our sense so all of those

things we started to look to work to

replace so now we say to work you have

to give me a sense of purpose you have

to give me my social life you have to

give me a sense of community and

belonging

um

and now it's we've added things to that

list now since coverage was like and you

have to agree with all of my politics

and by the way you also have to be my

therapy now you have to be my place for

therapy which is what we were just

talking about right and it is an

impossible standard to put on any

culture that they can do all those

things for you just like

um we've put impossible standards on

romantic partners that they have to be

my intellectual equal they have to be my

they have to be sexually compatible with

me they have to be emotionally

compatible with me they have to share

all of my interests all of my politics

you know we have to vote it for all the

same like these are impossible standards

to put on another human being and we're

literally setting people up to fail

we're setting up business cultures up to

fail as well like literally no culture

can can can live up to that standard and

so

um in pursuit of that

the grass is always greener

you have people who are going from

relationship to relationship to

relationship

worse from job to job to job to job and

when i was younger you know if you

didn't like your job or if you didn't

like your boss the bad news was you had

to stay there for a year because if you

left in anything less than a year you

would hurt your cv they would be like

why did you leave in under a year you

know and now young again particularly

young people

there's no um there's no stigma to

quitting

um and it happens sometimes too quickly

like if your confrontation avoidant and

i've seen it happen confrontation

avoidant i'm too afraid to ask my boss

for a raise so i just quit

i've seen it happen right

or

um i've been here for four months i

don't like the culture i quit

right or i got in trouble at work i hate

my boss i quit like and so people are

quitting so much my fear my fear like i

don't mind if something's super toxic

get the heck out of there most places

are not super toxic imperfect yes

but toxicity is like a like there's a

standard you know and it's a high bar

and

um

uh

or this doesn't fit my values or this

disagree with my politics i quit my fear

is that if you go if we flash forward

five years there's going to be a

disproportionately high number of people

who have eight jobs in five years and

what's going to happen is an employer is

going to look at them be like

i can't take the risk that you're going

to stick around i'm not hiring you

you're you sound like an amazing

candidate but you're too high risk for

me or or and

because you've had so many jobs over

such a short period of time you actually

haven't stuck around long enough to

build up a skill set or know what it's

like to manage a storm

because you've stuck around in the good

times and bailed on the bad times and so

you have now been in the workforce for

five years but you don't have five years

of work experience you have four months

of work experience and so

i don't want you either because you

don't you've never been through a battle

you know and i and i and i see it

happening um

a young person who's been at a company

for eight months

uh goes to their boss and says

i want to raise i want a significant

raise because i'm doing the same job as

those people um those people have been

in the workforce for 10 years i know but

i'm doing the same work as them and i'm

doing good work

that's true you are doing the same work

as them and you are doing good work the

difference is i'm not paying them just

because they've

obliquely been in the workforce for 10

years i'm paying them because

you know how to hoist a mainsail in calm

waters and you can hoist a mainsail in

calm waters as well as they can hoist a

mainsail and calm waters the difference

is they also know to hoist a mainsail in

a storm i don't know if you can always

do main sail in a storm i pay them more

because i know that if if we run into

hard times i know that they know what to

do and i can trust that we can navigate

and i also know that they will teach you

how to hoist a mainsail in a storm

it's like the same reason i buy

insurance i don't expect my house to

burn down but i pay

just in case i'm paying them more for a

skill set that i hope they never have to

use

that's why they get more you know one of

my fears at the moment which is

perfectly linked to what you're saying

is i have a fear and i've never

expressed this openly so this is the

first time so don't all come for me at

once i have a fear that gen z are the

least resilient generation um that i've

ever seen and a lot of it and this

sounds so stupid and not evidence-based

but if you look at what tick-tock is

telling this generation work is and

there was a video that went viral on

twitter the other day out in silicon

valley where it shows like a facebook

employer one of the big tech companies

she arrives at work in the morning she

takes a latte all this free muffins she

goes over and has the free muffin it

shows her in a tick tock literally doing

like 30 seconds of work then she's out

doing some like pottery making class

that work i've put on she comes back to

the desk doesn't have 30 seconds of work

then she's off to a work social

and

i

i reflect on the storms that my father

went through at work

and i i just know so deeply inside of me

that there's no way

some of these younger gen zed people

could weather such a storm without

quitting

um

reporting doing a long linkedin post to

criticize their employee then quitting

employer then quitting and i just i just

fear that

gen z when when i'm hiring people that

are in that generation i almost need to

to go to an extra length just to check

that they can cope with a high-intensity

culture where demands might come on a

saturday

because the world doesn't stop on

saturdays and sundays

so i wanted to get your take on that

um so let's examine both sides right

let's again let's let's think of it

what's the balance and what are the

costs right

um it is a generation

that already was starting to ask these

questions but coveted forced the rest of

us ask these questions too which is what

is the definition of work right like

what does a full-time job mean and these

these are unanswered questions so i

don't have an answer as to what the

future of work is because it's right now

everything's in flux and

we don't things are have not landed yet

right so what is the definition of a

full-time job if i don't come to work

the definition used to be i come in at

eight or nine and i leave at five or six

that was the full-time job now how much

work i did between those hours you know

it was it was face time and we know that

because we've all had jobs where we

stuck around until seven so we got face

times our bus liked us right we've all

done it

right

but facetime is not a thing anymore

and so i have a full-time job and i'm

offered another full-time job and i took

it

and we've seen we see this like

employees who like have productivity

issues and then they say that they're

burnt out and like i know how much work

you have you shouldn't be burnt out how

do they have a second job

and why shouldn't they have a second job

well we pay them benefits so what

like as long as they're getting their

work done do we care when people all

have side hustles even people who've got

full time come to work everybody's got

some sort of little side hustle

so the definition of what full-time

employment is

is up for is up for debate and i think

young people feel

in particular that why shouldn't i it's

my time i can do what i want with it or

i only work 40 hours because those are

my those are my limits respect my

boundaries right

um and

uh

the problem is is i think all of it is

so literal

which is

yes boundaries are important but

the edges of the boundaries are fuzzy

right and it's not like i don't work on

saturdays well i i agree with you i

don't want you working on weekends

this one weekend i really need your help

to finish this project so we can get it

out the door

or you know just i'm i i don't take

meetings after five o'clock i agree with

you i think we should have that life

balance but today i just need you to

work till six to get this one project

done

to recognize that you know so one of the

things they're getting right

is that we're married to work and we

take our phones on holiday you know we

take our computers on holiday with us

and that work has ultimate say on our

time i agree that should be we should

that should go the way of the dodo but

the extreme is not to put these hard

lines everywhere and say i don't do this

as an aside the irony is you know they

demand that we respect their boundaries

and yet they seem to step on every other

boundary about bringing you know

emotional professionalism at work and

dumping all of my problems onto my

colleagues which is

emotionally unprofessional it's like

that's a boundary you can't cross

um

uh but there is good evidence to your

assertion that this young generation

seems less capable to deal with stress

than previous generations that is true

um they are good at

curating you know they've grown up in an

instagram facebook you know tik tok

world where i'm really good at showing

you the life i want you to think that i

lead

and so they're really good at presenting

a confidence

that they don't have

they they sound they sound like they

have all the answers when they don't but

then i see you presenting that live to

me if you're a fellow gen z yeah and i

go

what are my my life's stressful and

difficult and my i had to work really

late and you're having a frappucci lotto

latte whatever yeah at 3am doing pottery

lessons i need to quit yeah it raises

the question what do you want from your

life and what do you want from your work

like why do you have this job

you know

um

if it's just to pay the bills

i mean i i hope we've

i know that is the case for a lot of

people that i have to have a job to pay

the bills and i hope that employers are

good enough that even survival jobs are

a nice place to work you know

uh uh trader joe's great company where

people who have survival jobs is still a

nice place to work you know

but i think the question is is what is

the life that you're trying to build

and if you want a job simply to pay your

bills

and you know there's this concept of

quiet quitting have you heard this one

quiet quitting i've heard this time but

i've maybe i heard you talk about it

well i i i mean it's been written about

right um it's not my concept um but

quiet quitting is this thing where um i

don't quit the job

but i basically will dial back my effort

and give you the minimum so you pay me

to do this job and i will do

the basic minimum amount to do the job

where you can't really fire me because

i'm not really doing anything badly or

wrong

but i'm also not going above and beyond

at all

right so there's this concept of quiet

quitting where people are coming to work

and they're just doing the minimum doing

their hours doing their job

not volunteering or raising their hands

or going and that's it

and

and

it raises the question is that bad

you know and i and i'm a great believer

that

that it's all about expectation

management you know um

like i get asked about amazon a lot like

do i disagree with how amazon has run

and my answer is always the same which

is they never lied

they didn't tell you it's a magical

place to work where it's all kumbaya and

we all like you know we all hang out

with you know unicorns every day it's

really amazing

they're very up they're very open about

it

that it's very very aggressive and very

rough and very competitive

and even the people who love it only

last two years because they burn out

um and so because they don't lie

you know what you're going to get if you

go work there and if you like that kind

of culture then go work there if you

don't like that kind of culture then

don't work there but don't take the job

and then say i didn't know because you

did like apple you know people say well

steve jobs used to drive his people

really hard like but you ask the people

who loved working there

they will tell you yes it was hard and

there was a lot of pressure but i did

the best work of my life and i'm glad i

worked there because i never would have

been able to work to that standard if i

didn't work at apple back in the day

right so the important thing is that

companies are honest about the kinds of

cultures that they have

right it's the lying it's the look how

everything's come by and like and look

no culture's perfect even good ones have

problems and even bad ones have

advantages right but i think it's it's

about managing expectations and i think

it's okay

for somebody to say of themself

look

i'm not a careerist

i am okay with the fact that i will

never be an owner or a senior manager

i want to be paid fairly

i want to do decent work

um but i want work to fit neatly in my

life and not overwhelm it

and i'm going to look for a job where

that is possible and i don't think we're

at the point where we have total honesty

on both sides yet i hope we can get to

the point because there's still stigma

because the older generations like you

and me are looking at if somebody would

say to us i only want to work 40 hours

i'm

i'm willing to push my boundaries

occasionally but really this is just

we would be like well you're not working

here

you know

so i it hasn't normalized yet yeah but i

think it's just a question of being

honest with oneself

and you're allowed to change your mind

as well

like i've decided i do want to be a

little harder driving and i do want i do

have more ambition than i thought you

know

or less but i think i think it's just

about honesty

um

and

this this this point of view is as true

in personal relationships as it is in

our professional relationships

so

i had a conversation with somebody with

somebody recently and i found absolutely

fascinating

and

she

is polyamorous

she has

four boyfriends

right

and

she is very open about it

and

one of the things that that she explains

is

you have to be very honest with

everybody so that everybody knows

what the deal is

you know we're thinking i think what a

lot of people do

is they're dating somebody it's new it's

casual and they're dating somebody else

that's doing casual but they don't tell

them about each other so they both think

that they're more special than they are

or they both are driving towards

something that may or may not be true

because you know you're dating two or

three people and you're to wait and see

which one works out

this in the poly world what i'm learning

is

you tell everybody everything so

everybody knows

and it's very open and honest everybody

knows where they stand you can you can

say i'm not into this i want to be the

soul or i'm okay with this and maybe

something will develop maybe it won't

but the point is it's on the table and i

admire the level of

communication

what i'm hoping

is that we do the same thing

in our professional lives so you sort of

have poly work if you will you know i

have two full-time jobs you know i have

i have three things going or i only want

this kind of relationship and it works

if both parties are really open and

honest

because it's all about managing

expectations

hold on i thought that you were going to

give me all of your attention and all of

your effort and all of your ambition and

you're telling me you only want to work

you want to treat my job as a casual job

like just replace relationship with job

all the same rules seem to apply but if

i knew that i would be fine with that it

would have given you a different job and

had different expectations it wouldn't

have pushed you really hard i would have

given that work to someone else

because i i'm assuming you want to live

your career like i live my career

like i assume that i'm getting into this

relationship and you're getting into it

for the same reasons as me because we

never had a conversation

we are nowhere near that

in terms of social acceptance for that

kind of conversation but i aspire for

that that somebody sits down and says a

part of your cv and part of your

interview says

you know what kind of work-life balance

do you aspire for and how do you view

work

even if you change your mind and then as

if expectations are managed then what's

the problem you've answered one of the

the actual number one questions i wanted

to ask you about today because when i

read your book um the infinite game

one of the big things that changed in my

life was i remember i was on a plane i

read the book started writing some stuff

came back to our office in the uk and i

did a big presentation to all my teams

about how we create a sustainable

company because if what you know if what

you're talking about in the book is is

true then

um and and we're not playing a finite

game here how do we redesign the

business from the ground up so that it

is fundamentally sustainable yep i came

up with this thing called www.work

welfare and world which is the three

reasons why we exist we made um 2020

goals so this was in 2019. 20 goals

before uh 2020 for each of these areas

and i'm thinking about it again a lot

now which is like if i was to design my

business in a way where my team members

would stay working here forever how

would i go about that you've just

answered it by saying the point about

honesty yeah expectations so sitting

them down and saying what you want from

your life because i've never asked that

yeah i'm as you quite rightly identified

i'm presuming they want what i want

exactly um so honestly i've wrote it

here as a question to ask you how do i

get my employees to stay forever okay so

why not like a dictator that sounds

awful but i understand yeah but why

should a

it's

you want to create a place in which

if people want to stay it'll be an

enjoyable place that they can make a

career and and grow within the

organization right

like and for some people who don't have

aspirations for leadership that they can

come and do good work every day and sort

of get fair

raises on you know on a on a regular

basis so that they would you know with

cost of living adjustments etc that they

want to stay there even if it's a middle

level like not everybody aspires to like

be a hard driving you know owner you

know and i think it's about making it a

conversation we we never treated work

like a conversation

you know we treated it like a like a

speech this is how it's going to be

and i think so one of the good things

that's coming out of you know covet and

young people is they're they're asking

questions about why does work have to be

that way and

employers are rebelling against it

because it doesn't fit the way we grew

up and doesn't fit our understanding of

relationships you know and it's just a

conversation that's all it is

and by being honest up front

then

you can say i don't think this is going

to be a good fit for us i don't think

you'll enjoy working here and so if i

employ you

knowing what i know now we will both get

frustrated and

i will either ask you to leave or you

will just tell me you're going to leave

that's how this will end

you know

um

because of misaligned expectations and

so i think

being honest about what you want and who

you are and what your ambitions are even

if they change in the middle you can

knock on the door and say i've changed

my mind

i think i want to stay here forever i

told you i didn't but i really love it

here

you know and i know this from the

military you know some people join the

military because it's a steady job in a

bad economy or because the military will

pay for you to get a college education

and they didn't have the money to get it

without it

so they join the military and then when

there they fall in love with it they

never came in for service they

discovered the service and the

brotherhood and the sisters and decided

to stay you know and some people might

have come in for the service and

realized this isn't for me

so

work should be the same

but uh

i i think i think there needs to be

honest conversation about and like i

said i i've had debates even with my my

partners my work partners you know um

you know

when they say well if we're paying them

a full salary and giving them benefits

they shouldn't have another job and my

question is why not as long as our work

product doesn't suffer as a result like

if they're phoning it in missing all the

meetings then yes absolutely

right like we're paying for certain

expectation of performance but not

necessarily of when they get it done

and so

why shouldn't they have two jobs

uh

but i think again there has to be

honesty

which is we have an expectation that

that

of x and and if somebody says i don't

want to meet that expectation because i

want to have two jobs and

you can adjust for salary that way you

can be like all right then how about we

pay you less and you can have all the

freedom you want

and again it's a conversation

we don't make these things conversations

we make them one way come and by the way

that's from the employee to the employer

too i demand x you know somebody asked

me recently how do i you know i want to

ask my boss for a raise how do i do it

and i said the problem the way most

people ask for a raise is like

i want a 20 raise

i did my research and my job the average

salary on my job you know is x my friend

gets paid x my my friend gets paid x i

know somebody who i work with you know

i'm doing the same work as them so i

want to be compensated equally and i

want a 20 raise

right and so they're positioning

the question

that leaves the employer no choice but

to say yes or no

right it's and even if it's

i can help you get that but this is how

it's going to be like you're going to

have to have certain targets it still

comes across as a no

right because the the request was binary

right and so the advice that i gave to

this person was

stop thinking of your job as an event

and think of your job as a career think

of your job as a continuum

and go to your boss in the middle of

this continuum

um i've worked here for two and a half

years

i've been here through

high times and low times you know i'm

loyal

and my aspiration is to stay here and

grow with the organization

um

uh can you help me figure out a path

that gets me to this salary

it's not a yes or no now now it's like

absolutely i can i can give it to you

today yeah no path necessary

or

absolutely i can we're going to set some

target goals that i want you to hit and

if you can hit them then you'll

absolutely work to that salary but again

it's it's giving it's allowing for

conversation and it's allowing somebody

to to recognize that you view your own

career with the organization as a

continuum that i've been here and i want

to continue to be here so can you invest

in me

take bet can you take a bet on me

rather than meet my demands

and so i think a lot of these things

fail

um because they're poorly presented amen

and this goes once again to you know

this younger generation

who seem to lack the skills for coping

with stress

um not very good at asking for help

um very confrontation avoidant like i

said

so afraid sometimes to have the question

the ask the boss can i have a raise that

they would rather just quit

and it's often with an email that says

you don't appreciate me you don't pay me

enough i was like what you just had to

ask me i would have given you a raise

you know

um

uh

and i think part of it is also that

you know when somebody is anxious about

something

they do poorly present they do make

things binary because there's fear

or anxiety or stress or fear of

rejection what if my boss says no

right can i handle that like all of

these things that come into these very

sort of binary aggressive things and i

always equate all of these challenges at

work to personal relationships like you

can't go to your the person you love in

your relationship

and say i demand this

it's just not going to go well

right but you present a situation you

say i i want us to move through this and

how do we work through this together

and i think that's how these difficult

work conversations need to happen they a

work

a work relationship is a relationship

like any other relationship

you know there's there's trust there's

anger there's uh care there's um

good days and bad days and all of the

same nonsense

a messiness in our personal

relationships are at work as well

you know there's slightly different

standards of professionalism and

emotional professionals and things like

that but

but in terms of it's a relationship like

any other relationships you have to

treat it like a relationship and in fact

go read relationship books if you want

to fix things at work

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when i read about our history as sapiens

or homo sapiens or whatever it appears

that we weren't with one one partner

we're with multiple partners we've now

lived in the society where we're

in arizona told to be with one partner

um is that natural is it human does it

work the stats seem to suggest it's not

really working so well

i mean if i bought a tv and 50 and they

said oh by the way there's a 50 of these

are going to break yeah i wouldn't buy

the tv right i'd maybe you know rent one

right

[Music]

that's funny

uh

esther perel who's

wonderful if you don't know her work

uh

you know she talks about the changing

definition of monogamy monogamous used

to mean i'm in one relationship for my

whole life

now monogamy means i'm in one

relationship at a time

right so

even that definition has changed where

monogamy and people who consider

themselves strictly monogamous

have 15 monogamous relationships

right

over the course of ten how many clothes

i've had six close you know

relationships

they were all monogamous right so these

these definitions are evolving anyway

right

that's number one

number two i

like

that we are having conversations about

the health of relationships like we're

having conversation about the health of

work

and

these things have always existed the

difference is now the stigma of talking

about them

seems to have dissipated

at least in the united states where i

live like it's amazing how many people

are talking about open marriages open

relationships polyamorous relationships

consensual nog monogamy like i don't

even know what all the differences of

all these words are if i'm honest like

they it's there's so many words that

seem to mean similar things

i don't understand the nuances but the

point is is like it's amazing to me how

many people are raising the question

of what is a healthy relationship and i

think one of the things

that boils down for me is it goes right

back to what we're talking about which

is

it base it's based on both parties and

they both get a say and so if you say i

want to live this kind of lifestyle and

you're upfront about it and somebody

says

i'm cool with that then great but if you

lie and say i want to have this kind of

i want to be a strictly monogamous

but you don't really

because you like the person a lot and

you think that if you tell them that you

want a different kind of relationship

you're going to lose them like we're

it's the relation the conversations we

have are largely born out of fear

you know if i tell her what i really

want she won't like me and then i won't

get another date

that's true that is that is a

possibility but if i tell her exactly

who i am and what i want and she likes

me for who i am

then isn't that better

and i think it's the same thing that

we're just talking about work

so i don't think it's right for us to

say

we should be strictly anything

because some people want

one kind of relationship

let me let's rephrase that both people

in that relationship want that kind of

relationship and both people in the

other kind of relationship both want

that kind of relationship

then we just have to respect that we

have different points of view about what

brings happiness as long as you're happy

and it's kind and it's consensual

i i think

we're done

and usually the problems arise when

somebody

has most of these decisions most of

these problems are born out of fear fear

of loss right insecurity in a

relationship jealousy for example this

is the other thing um that friend i was

telling you about who who's super open

and honest about her her life i was

talking to her the other day and she