104. 2024 Go Away, CACC is Here to Stay

Speaker 1: 0:00

Nice Sounded more aggressive. He did. He's tired.

Speaker 2: 0:04

He's ready for 24, unlike the rest of us.

Speaker 1: 0:07

He's ready for the rest of the year. The over the 12 hours we have remaining. 12 hours remain.

Speaker 2: 0:17

Welcome back to Corporate Strategy, the podcast. That could have been an email. I'm Bruce and I'm Clark, and it's the final stretch of 2024 for Clark and I. This episode will be up on the first of the new year, but we're here closing it out. We're going to finish it up. So, rather than do a vibe check for the holiday, clark, let's just do a vibe check for the year. What's your final 23 vibe?

Speaker 1: 0:43

We're the year. Oh man, so much has happened this year. I'm like a work front on a personal front on like a world front. How do I vibe check the whole year 365 days of vibes.

Speaker 1: 0:56

I mean, oh man, I hate to say it, but it was good. I don't think it was great, but it was a good year. You hate to say that it was good. Well, I mean, I wanted to say it's great and on a really positive note, but I would say just good, I would say it wasn't great, it wasn't like a fantastic year. And that's just in culmination of my vibes, your vibes, the world's vibes, everything going on. I think that could do good for this year, in comparison to previous years, for sure.

Speaker 2: 1:29

This year. Yeah, I'm going to say good with an asterisk, because this year I learned something very valuable.

Speaker 1: 1:40

You learned it huh With a T at the end.

Speaker 2: 1:43

I learned with a T. To make all the educational folks out there so happy. I learned it real well. I made more and this is not a break. In fact, I want to preface this by saying this is not a brag, this is not me trying to throw anything in anyone's face or to everyone their own right. I made more this year than I've ever made in a year of work, just because of my position. Yeah, OK, so more than I've ever made in any position.

Speaker 2: 2:11

I paid very well for my location, Literally. I couldn't ask for more. People tell me to, I refuse, I already make too much. I don't want to make more money. This is the year I truly learned that I don't value that as much as I value my independence, my free time, my free will, and I think we'll talk about some of this during the actual topic of the pod today. But it was an eye-opening moment this December where I worked more than I think I've ever worked any December ever, Like we used to. I'm used to December's being slow in dev, in sales, in marketing. December's the time where you kind of catch up, plan for the new year. That was not the case for me and I truly learned this year I can't do this. So I'm now in the position of hey, I'm willing to take a lot less money, to work a lot less and to be a lot happier. So it's a good year, but I think it's more of an educational year than anything.

Speaker 1: 3:12

Yeah, that's fair.

Speaker 1: 3:13

Yeah, I think it's a unique perspective to look at and it's a great vibe to have. I think it's realistic because people think money solves problems, which it does. It definitely rides you a great perspective of living. But you hit a point, I think, where you're making a good amount of money and you have to sacrifice other things because of the level of the job, the compensation for the job and the expectations of the job, and you have to really evaluate exactly what we're talking about. Like you said a hinted editor at the beginning of what you were going on, you have to evaluate whether that's what you want or not, because yeah, it's great Having more money, financial freedom, not worrying so much about the bills that are coming in or when you go grocery shopping, anything like that. It's awesome. It takes a lot of stressors out of life, but it comes with other sacrifices and you've got to evaluate if it's worth it.

Speaker 2: 4:03

Yep, that's exactly it. I think the only thing I fear in my new pursuit for a better work-life balance and an enjoyment of what I do is, honestly, it's not the money so much as the benefit, the health-genre benefit and I think that's more of a problem that our country has than anything. Right, agreed, I'm just scared that I'm going to get hit with some kind of medical thing that I'm not going to be able to afford or my insurance isn't going to be able to cover, and that's really what keeps me up at night. But outside of that, I am content with the idea of making less and working less.

Speaker 1: 4:39

Right, you know what's crazy Speaking of health care.

Speaker 1: 4:41

I was just catching up with a friend A couple of friends, and they actually just had a child and they were talking to me about the bill and they're like it was like $42,000. And luckily insurance covered a lot of that, but they still were like it was crazy how much it costs just to have a child, mm-hmm, and how much people have to pay out of pocket to have a kid in the US, because this is all based out of the US. So, yeah, I 100% agree with you. It's like it's a little bit of like OK, you want to have that extra cushion because you just are wanting to be prepared for an emergency situation where it's going to cost you an arm and a leg financially to get out of a health issue which is awful to have to worry about in the US. But it's so true.

Speaker 2: 5:23

It's absolutely insane to me that I can pay less for my dog. I have three dogs and I can pay less for them to have invasive surgeries and heart medications and all kinds of stuff than I do for my minimal amount of health care I've received this year and it's just broken. It's a broken system. I don't think either party is taking it seriously. But the fact that that is my biggest fear now is what if I get hit with something that I can't afford even making as much?

Speaker 1: 5:53

as I do.

Speaker 2: 5:54

If I decided to focus more on me, then it's definitely a concern. So it's great. Yeah, it's great, it's great.

Speaker 1: 6:00

What a great vibe, I know, and we're kind of getting into a depressing angle of the last year, but to your point, I mean I saw this last year. I mean, obviously coronavirus happened, so that was just a shock to the world and the amount of deaths is just it's a world phenomenon that happened and the amount of people impacted is just absolutely insane. But also this year I've seen more unexplained random deaths to people around me, like just randomly, somebody who's in their 30s or 40s, early 40s, would die and it'd be like what just happened and it was just people around me. I know two people who got cancer. Like it's just crazy how the world and the it's probably just all the things that we do to this earth that are finally catching up with us and the stuff we put in their bodies and it is scary and it's a very real concern with our health care system. Is the amount of incidences that are popping up are going to just continue to get worse?

Speaker 2: 6:55

most likely, yeah, I had more family death in the last three months than I've had in the last three years, which is wild.

Speaker 1: 7:02

It's wild. Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 2: 7:04

What a great, what a great way to end the year, fantastic.

Speaker 1: 7:08

On a positive note, I think the world is on an upturn. We had Alex on talking about late stage capitalism and things aren't economically as bad as people were predicting they were going to be, which is good. The coronavirus it's still around, but the preventatives are working and we see less causes of that. I think. Still with the economy, even though it is hard to find jobs, in comparison to previous decades, there's more money going around than ever, and that's worldwide, and I think the opportunity is bigger worldwide, and so I would say generally, things are looking up, even given everything we just said.

Speaker 2: 7:43

Yeah, I think a lot of our problems, clark, are uniquely American. I was actually, and I would love to do some more research on this Maybe this is a project for a later episode but I was reading about how China is finally starting to have a very interesting economic turnaround for the middle class and they may soon outpace us when it comes to middle class happiness than ourselves, which is just really interesting to think about, because we don't usually associate China with a middle class at all, and I just thought that was unique to read and something I'm going to have to do some more research on and keep my eyes peeled for Maybe there's changes that will happen there that can reverberate here. Who knows, yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 1: 8:28

It would be interesting to see, with the economic shifts of the world and new theories, new things that are happening, I wonder how the wealth is going to be shared or distributed. Yes, it would be interesting to see what happens.

Speaker 2: 8:41

Speaking of news of the world, I think you've got some news. I want to share a real quick one, because you've got the actual news.

Speaker 1: 8:48

Yeah, you go first, because I'm going to go on a tangent and I don't know if you could save mine's actual news. But yeah, you go first, sure, sure.

Speaker 2: 8:54

So I posted in the corporate strategy a little LinkedIn thing that I was reading, and it's 34 predictions for 24, which some of them are really interesting. But the one that stuck out to me that I really liked was Gen Z bosses to face off in 2024. And it's in the year 2024, the year Gen Z and their bosses will finally reach a compromise. It's basically saying that the great negotiation is on the horizon. So we had the great resignation in COVID and now we're about to have the great negotiation, and this is simply because of the fact that Gen Z are becoming like poly workers they're having to work in multiple jobs, build a meat means, but they're also incredibly focused on work-life balance, which I can now relate to intensely. So it's funny. I'm all in Like let's go. If Gen Z wants to lead this fight, I am happy to scream in their wake and support them in any way that I can. But yeah, I think that's a positive and I'm looking forward to seeing if that comes true and how I can help.

Speaker 1: 9:58

And obviously with time the workforce changes. You have a new age coming in the workforce and I think that is going to based on how that demographic was raised and the different perspectives they have, and they're going to start taking over the workplace and pushing the older generations out. I think it will change how we work and probably for the better.

Speaker 2: 10:19

To your point.

Speaker 1: 10:20

Everybody who's younger that's coming in has a different perspective of not living to work but working to live and at least in the US, obviously internationally I think it's been like that in spots for a long time, but in the US I think that's a really good perspective to have, because over the last millennia it's always been about work.

Speaker 2: 10:40

I hate that it has yeah it makes me sad yeah. I love that you're it's gonna be a really good change in the wind, though I'm digging it out Well.

Speaker 1: 10:48

I love that you did this, like the 34 things happening in 2024, Offalington, by the way. You need to get Offalington. You're on there way too much. I'm worried about you Don't.

Speaker 2: 10:59

No, you just think that I am. I only log in before this podcast and once day for work to check on if I have any responsibilities. I hate that platform.

Speaker 1: 11:09

Because the Discord and us are worried about you and we were thinking about having to do some sort of retrospective with you or get you on something else. We want you to have those positive vibes and we know LinkedIn is not that.

Speaker 2: 11:20

I have like 24 unresponded to messages from people that are not trying to recruit me. They're just like, hey, how's it going? And I'm just ghost them.

Speaker 1: 11:30

So no, I'm not anywhere socially, I refuse.

Speaker 2: 11:35

I refuse to plant my flag except in our Discord. That's the only place I'll plant it.

Speaker 1: 11:40

And when we come up with our totally legit certification of being a corporate strategist on there, then I'll be all about it, of course. Well, my news is just about as serious as yours, as in not real news. But you know how the Simpsons have predicted all this stuff like Trump becoming president, like Lady Gaga playing at the Super Bowl. They predicted like the submarine thing to go through that Titanic that unfortunately imploded. They predicted a disaster like that when people were taking, like private submarines, like crazy amounts of these predictions. And they also predicted like Cybertruck and stuff like that. So I thought it'd be funny to look at what things are they predicting for 2024 or could come true in 2024. And I looked up. I found this article and one. I just need to watch the Simpsons again because I will watch this show in forever and it's hilarious, you don't.

Speaker 2: 12:31

The Simpsons are not being good after season eight, unfortunately.

Speaker 1: 12:34

The first eight in the greatest television ever made.

Speaker 2: 12:36

But after that yikes.

Speaker 1: 12:38

Well, I kind of want to go back to that and like watch the original seasons, because after reading through this, I was like man, this is bringing me back, so I'll just read a few. I won't read all of them We'll have to share this article but some of them are totally real AI robots taking over. So they were talking about AI robots taking over factory jobs. People like losing their jobs, right, because I win. Like what episode? Episode 17, series 23.

Speaker 1: 13:01

What that means it's not relevant to me at all, because I have zero idea how many seasons there are in the Simpsons.

Speaker 2: 13:06

I can give context. This is in like the really like the show was tanking the era of the Simpsons.

Speaker 1: 13:12

Yeah, a lot of these virtual reality food. They said there's actually a company I love this article because they talk about companies who are trying to do something like this so they said, like in this episode I guess they were eating like virtual fudge through a straw that was on their headset there's a company called aero banquets RMX not sponsored and they literally are doing that, where they're trying to like like Reinforce your brain that you're getting some sort of food or having that feel as you're you experiencing virtual reality, which is crazy. So some of this stuff is like coming real baby translator. Episode 24, series 3. They talk about how you know there was like this way that you could have a baby talking to this machine and it would be able to Determine. You know what they're saying. There's a company doing that sound dream, claims to have developed a product that somehow uses AI to determine what babies want when they cry.

Speaker 2: 14:01

Oh my gosh, I know it's a little crazy, I think that's, that's totally fake.

Speaker 1: 14:09

I know there's no way.

Speaker 2: 14:09

That's real right babies, I mean like they're. They're like animals. They don't have community. There's no communication there. This is if you're, if you're saying you understand what a baby is saying. Yeah, look at the face like well.

Speaker 1: 14:22

I think what it's happy it's going to use AI by using you know sounds, by using their face, to determine what they need in that moment, based on your reinforcement training to the algorithm. So you could be like, oh, this sound was associated with feeding my baby, and then they were fine, and then what is going? To be smart for you.

Speaker 2: 14:39

Oh my gosh.

Speaker 1: 14:40

Yeah, that's, that's what we need.

Speaker 2: 14:41

That's what we need a society. I can't even raise children anymore.

Speaker 1: 14:44

Be honest, I had kids, would I try this? No, I mean, I probably would.

Speaker 2: 14:49

I'm interested. Monster, you monster. What else did?

Speaker 1: 14:54

Simpsons get All right. Let's see, ai goes rogue. They had an AI leader, which we talked about this as part of a company. That a Leader became a, you know, a face of a company and the face, I think, of the nation. Yeah, robots take over a theme park and then they basically wreak absolute havoc. It's like the Santa Claus movies. That was the Aegean scratchy theme park yeah that's one great. It's in scratch a land, yep, yep, and then music induced mind control and apparently during World War two they did some more than anything something's like this, and then World War three.

Speaker 1: 15:25

They predicted so some crazy stuff. I would say not a lot of positive stuff, though yeah that's pretty negative.

Speaker 2: 15:31

I mean Simpsons, simpsons I have. So Simpsons is just between you and me, clark, and everyone listening One of my. It's my birth show, so it came out the year of my birth, but also it's my favorite show, just like. It's perfect television Until it falls off into a ravine because Homer Homer tries to jump over it with a skateboard to follow Bart in In season nine. Nine, ten is when it starts to get bad.

Speaker 2: 15:56

It's really sad because at one point in time it truly was like the mark twain of our modern age. It was satire, it was biting, it was so smart and well-written. And I think the reason a lot of these predictions came true, at least the ones earlier on, are because the people writing that show were deeply tuned in to America and its growth is a concept. Now I think as a show evolved, it became more Simple, it just became easy vehicle, for if you do enough episodes about things, the Shakespeare monkey's keyboard theory comes true also. I think you will eventually just crank out nonsense. South Park, you know, has like 20 something seasons and they predicted a lot of things too. And I think a lot of that just comes down to you're looking at trends, you're making predictions, you making fun of it before it happens. But, man, the golden age, love that you found.

Speaker 1: 16:47

This just reminded me of some great episodes the golden I just hit me when I was looking through some articles and like trying to find some decent news and I was like man, they predicted a lot, like it'd be really interesting to see like things that they've said for the future that you know Could potentially happen this year. So but to your point, it is really just you kind of throw. If you throw enough stuff out there, eventually one of them is gonna land and that's what they've done over the yeah 30 something seasons They've done so 33.

Speaker 2: 17:11

I think they're up to you, and I've heard I've heard rumor that in the last two seasons it's been on an uphill, which I would love, but I'm not brave enough to try. I watched, I think I watched up to Season 24 and then I just I enough was enough, I could. I'm surprised you made it that far.

Speaker 1: 17:29

I love. That really is play the hips. That's the way I look at it. It's like you know, if you know it's good stuff, watch the good stuff, Don't soil with bad stuff. I'm gonna disclose something to you. I don't know if I've ever told you this I hate music videos. Oh, no, I probably have told you this. I hate music videos because it ruins the song for me. You have told me that before, um.

Speaker 2: 17:46

I Get that for me. I can separate the two.

Speaker 1: 17:51

Yeah, it's like that really like the Jurassic Park series. I love Jurassic Park when my favorite series of all time, but when it goes into you know, the newest, whatever the last movie was. Last couple I was just that's world. This sucks it. I haven't even seen the last one. I haven't seen the last one. I was like I refuse, it's gonna ruin the whole thing for me.

Speaker 2: 18:10

Yeah, you gotta learn, and this I think this is like this is something that it took me a while to get on board with. I used to feel that I was very Critical of media because I experienced a lot of it. I've seen a lot of movies, I've watched a lot of shows, listen to a lot of music. I try to I heard I never watched the same thing over and over again, except for the Simpsons, which I've seen like five times. Um, you have to Acknowledge the creators of the thing, not the thing itself. So Jurassic Park a perfect example.

Speaker 2: 18:41

First movie directed by Steven Spielberg. It's co-written by Michael Crichton pretty much masterpiece like. I cannot label a single flaw on the creation of that movie. But the second one, it's okay. It's a bright, good enough movie. It was produced by Spielberg. Crichton helped pen the story, so there's still a little bit of that magic there. And then by the third one, you can see they've. They've really stepped away from the people that made the first movie great. Then all you really have is good-looking dinosaurs at this point, and that's the pattern for what follows. So if you look at the creatives and not the creation, suddenly you become a lot less disappointed in things. That's my advice on that.

Speaker 1: 19:17

You did tell me once, like as long as you this was very wise of you at the time. You said as long as you set your expectations accordingly, then you can't be disappointed. Like if you just go into something thinking it's gonna be Awful, then yeah, actually, when you get into it you know it's like okay, it was better than I thought it was gonna be. And you're Completely you know, okay with the result of it, because it could be a little bit better than the worst thing you thought of. So I think that's a good perspective.

Speaker 2: 19:40

Look at it. But my biggest disappointments are not when, like a, like a Marvel movie is bad. My biggest disappointment is when a director or a writer or a creative I like puts out something that is not up to their typical standards.

Speaker 2: 19:56

That's when I get like, oh why, why did you let this happen? Because you know like, yeah, it's the same person, right? And I think it's funny because I kind of ties into. I think our, our bigger topic today is People make things. You know, things don't make things. People make things and people care about certain things when they're doing their work. So the interesting lead in it's just a lead in all.

Speaker 1: 20:23

I'm gonna say it is. And should we start? Are you ready to jump in? I'm ready. If you are, clark, okay. So let's go all the way back.

Speaker 1: 20:31

Let's rewind our clocks back to March of this year and you and I set out on a mission. We said we have invented this thing called cac, which, for anybody now tuning in its culture, autonomy, challenge, compensation not necessarily in that order. And Back in March we're like you know what would be a really interesting experiment for us in our workplace, since this is not our full job, let's put a score of how much we care about those things culture, autonomy, challenge, compensation and then from there let's essentially rate, hour by hour, day by day, what our scores would be, and we Will literally built a spreadsheet to calculate what would our daily score be in those categories. So every single hour we kind of say, okay, 9 am, I was a 3 in culture, I was a 3 in autonomy and I was a 1 in challenge, and we kind of went like that for I think it was like two weeks or something like that. That was two weeks, and I thought it would be really interesting we hinted at this in our last episode for us to look back at this score and one assess of culture, autonomy, challenge, compensation, what do we value, which you hinted at a great lead in of I think your values have shifted a bit.

Speaker 1: 21:37

And then lastly, looking at what those scores are, do we think they're still accurate from March of last year and how would we like to shift those things moving into this next year? How can we kind of improve into that? And we'll see if we can do this on one episode. It could turn into some long tangents about how we break things down, how we improve and so on. So we'll see if we actually get there.

Speaker 1: 21:55

But we thought it'd be really fun to kind of take people through what these scores are and we're even thinking, depending on what you guys tell us, maybe we'll release this tool to you so you can also see what your scores are and you can use this to make intelligent decisions about what can I do differently at work. Is it time to leave my current workplace? I have my values shifted where I'd want to be in a different position or a different role. So we thought what? This would be a really interesting way to kind of pull yourself out of the weeds, look down on everything and say Okay, this is how things are actually going and this is what I need to do to improve.

Speaker 2: 22:24

I love it, and I just want to do a little bit more preamble, because just give me the first episode of our new year I'll start a new season and the way we count these things, just to really lay the groundwork for what cat is. Before we talk about Everything, we think about it. We did not Invent this with any specific reason in mind. I think it actually started, if I remember correctly and you know someone who listens to the episode can then come tell us we're wrong. In the discord it was like, hey, what are the fundamental things of you at work that you care about? And we boiled it down to culture, autonomy, challenging compensation, and what ended up happening was we came back to this concept over and over again throughout the pod, just naturally.

Speaker 2: 23:12

It was just sort of this lightning strike of a Mechanic that we've used for, I believe, over a year now, and we have not really found any Singular fault with it as a concept, like it's not something we have to do a cacti, oh, and add in a new letter because we realized that we didn't have Charisma on there. You know like it's. It works really well, and I think we did this experiment Back in March. It was very eye-opening for us at the time, based on the place we worked, like what we valued and how our days played out, and I think it tied very well into our vibe checks, which we didn't do at the time. Like it was a really interesting way to think about, like how this mechanism Defines how we feel at work and me personally.

Speaker 2: 23:58

I would love to see this mechanism become something that Not just people like our listeners yourself Use throughout your day-to-day life to figure out if you're happy but we've teased us in a previous episode eventually, like talking about writing a book, building this out so companies can use it as a way to engage Employee happiness and what their employees value. Because, like you'll find later on in the episode we talk about it, clark and I value very different things, as do many people, and I think learning how to work around People's cacts is going to produce the best version of them, and that's my hypothesis and I think we might set out to prove that this year.

Speaker 1: 24:35

No, I think you hit the nail on the head and unfortunately, and this is just the way it is your work. You work the majority of your life. Yes, the amount of time you spend doing work for the average person in the world is a majority of your life. It's more than you spend, or equal to the amount of time that you spend with your family, with your loved ones, with your friends. And so you have to really take this seriously, because your overall happiness in life will be determined, more often than not, by how you're experiencing work, because it takes up so much time.

Speaker 1: 25:03

It's impossible I wouldn't say impossible, I'd say for the average person, it's nearly impossible to separate those two things completely and just like close the books and be like all right, I'm done, and not think about it again, like until the the next day. And so your cact score matters, because it's not only how happy you are at work, but it bleeds into the rest of your life, and that's just a fact. And so I think it's super interesting to be able to use this as a tool, like you said, to kind of think about ways that you can, you know, improve that score so that your overall life is better.

Speaker 2: 25:31

I completely agree.

Speaker 1: 25:32

Yeah, I love it. Should we jump in? Cac is my favorite. I want to jump in. Do you want to start with yours? You want me to read you the results and you can tell me.

Speaker 2: 25:41

Yeah, let's do it.

Speaker 1: 25:42

Maybe we start with scoring how we valued those things first and then we go into actual the average rating and if it feels right in what we could improve, let's do it. You have to think about this in two major churches and I'm looking at it because we haven't actually shared it you of course have to score each one of those things Culture, autonomy, challenge, compensation. For this experiment we didn't include compensation because we're scoring it on an hourly, daily basis. Really, your compensation is not changing at that variable, so it doesn't really impact your CAC. For some professions maybe it does, depending how many tips you get.

Speaker 2: 26:16

It did for me in the last quarter of the year, which was wild, fair, fair, absolutely. Maybe that's a car. I'm sorry for a different day Exactly.

Speaker 1: 26:23

But I think it's interesting to look at this because you have to take that score of each thing you score and then, through the spreadsheet of 8 AM to 5 PM, you rate your hour by hour and then you basically have to do a little equation to figure out well then, what's your average If each of those things scored? What's the average for the day out of 100? If you were to get a perfect score for perfect day, it would hit all those things exactly where you need them to be for each of those vectors, if you will. So now, further ado.

Speaker 2: 26:51

I was mentioning just oh, yeah, please. It's not something where you want to have 100% culture, 100% challenge, 100% autonomy, 100% compensation. It truly does vary every single person to every single person, and you'll see this in how we graded things at the time, and I think about this as I'm grading things now. It's you don't have to get a full 100% score to be 100% happy. I think it's what do you need, what do you want and are you achieving that in your work? And that's a very different kind of math you have to do, but that's it, yeah 100%.

Speaker 1: 27:30

So now let's jump into yours. You want me to read you your scores and then we can see what you think. Yes, please, all right. You had culture 25%, autonomy 50%, and then challenge was 25%. So of the things you valued, autonomy was your highest, by a significant margin of just having the autonomy and trust to do your job really well. Does that still feel accurate to you, or does that feel like it's changed in this past year? I guess nine months, because we started March.

Speaker 2: 28:01

Jeez, yeah, I think, if anything it's gotten a little more extreme, I would almost, I would almost say for me autonomy is 75%. Wow 75.

Speaker 1: 28:17

Yeah, woo.

Speaker 2: 28:20

All right, and it's because I've been, I have seen what true autonomy looks like and I have had it taken away and now I know what I value most in my work. Fair enough, fair enough. Ok, it's an experience, right Like I had to go through something to realize like how much I value the ability to do the work I need to do and I'm willing to take on more challenge in a potentially worse culture if it means I get to operate in a way that I see fit. Fair enough.

Speaker 1: 28:54

And it kind of. I mean, maybe that does bleed into challenge a little bit, because I think you'd be bored, you know, if you were just doing like menial work, even if you had autonomy. I mean, maybe not because you would always strive to do great work, just by the nature of you, you know.

Speaker 2: 29:08

Yeah, I think a little bit menial work with a low challenge would also mean low autonomy at that point, because it's just fair, you're just doing trivial nonsense. I'm going to just say data entry, right, I don't. Some people may really enjoy that. I'm not trying to insult you if you do, but, like, for me that would be trivial and non-enjoyable and I would have very little autonomy outside of enter that data.

Speaker 1: 29:32

Yeah yeah. It's funny because, like my wife and I go through this all the time. I suck at like trivial things like that, like data entry or something that's just like it's the same thing over and over again, but that like gives her energy. Like she does that. She knocks it out, she's like all right, what's the next thing? Like she gets momentum from getting that rhythm. I'm like the opposite. I do it like five times and I'm like I got to write code to automate this because this is a pain in the butt Me.

Speaker 2: 29:57

I'm just questioning the whole thing Like why are we doing this?

Speaker 1: 29:59

What's the point of this. What are we looking at here? You're up in the clouds Culture challenge. What do you think? You've got 25% left.

Speaker 2: 30:10

I'm willing to let challenge go entirely. I don't care if you're giving me the hardest problem on the planet that I have to solve, and I think that will levy itself slightly with culture. So I'm going to say just autonomy and culture are what matter to me, and challenge either way.

Speaker 1: 30:30

I'm going to find a way to make that problem Okay fair enough, and I know compensation wasn't on this for the experiments, or obviously that factors into it. I think, if anything, your compensation has dropped really low as well. Yeah, and in terms of what you value like, you'd probably be willing to make less, to do far less work than you're doing now.

Speaker 2: 30:48

Yeah, or far less work or far more autonomous work. Yeah, fair enough.

Speaker 1: 30:52

May, I could factor in either. Okay, that's good man, that's so interesting. So when you look at so your old scores 25 at culture, 50 at autonomy, 25 at challenge, after this exercise, you know, for the two weeks or whatever we did it, your overall score at those ratings was a 67%. So you were, you know, high D obviously, but it's passing, that's what I got to college with. Yeah, like it's really not a bad score as you think about. Okay, it's work, you got to do it. It's not the reason. You know you want to be on this earth to do whatever you want, but 67% isn't bad.

Speaker 2: 31:26

No, it's passing great to your point, it's not, and I remember your score, so I'm going to take my. I'm going to take my win where I can take it.

Speaker 1: 31:34

Hey, fair enough. I kind of curious if I were to like plug in your new numbers, if that would actually immediately change the score. Can't do it, let's see. So if you were to take your ratings, it actually works. Wow, I mean, I can't believe I set something up that holds the test of time like this.

Speaker 2: 31:51

Cap maybe it works.

Speaker 1: 31:53

It works. This formula works. So, based on your work last year obviously only until we only did it in March if you were to take your scores now, you would have been at 83%, and you know what's funny.

Speaker 2: 32:07

Oh, I was really happy last year in March.

Speaker 1: 32:09

You were, that was like the best time.

Speaker 2: 32:12

How things?

Speaker 1: 32:13

have changed Exactly. So it's like in the beginning of the year you were 67% of that point, which wasn't like it wasn't great but it wasn't bad, right. And then this year, if you, because of the way your perspective has changed in your work, it actually has shifted to, if you use those score, if you felt this that way, with these scores at that time, it would have been 83%, which is actually great, like that is a really good score, but your work, like, has completely shifted over the last nine months not to make you depressed and it seems like it isn't a much worse place than it was.

Speaker 2: 32:42

Yeah, With the new focus on autonomy. Just thinking about December alone, I would be in the less than 50 easily now. So yeah, good stuff, good stuff.

Speaker 1: 32:59

Man, sorry to end the year, but this is good. This is why we're doing this.

Speaker 2: 33:02

This is why we're doing this. They sure reflect where you were. It's making me think about what I want to do for 24 and how.

Speaker 1: 33:07

I want to do it. Exactly Because you know, I think you and I are both believers of, before you just jumped ship, you've already invest a lot of time where you're at it's like how can you change things, can you make things better for you and the people around you? And before you, just, you know, pull Plannie, which is plan access. So 100% agree.

Speaker 2: 33:23

Ooh, that is so interesting.

Speaker 1: 33:26

All right, should we jump to me and then we'll talk about next year. Let us jump, okay For me. Yeah, we do value these things so differently, which is interesting. I had 15% at culture, 35% at autonomy and 50% at challenge.

Speaker 2: 33:43

Now, why do you do that?

Speaker 1: 33:47

Was that like a pointed, like question of like why would you do that?

Speaker 2: 33:51

No, it's just for I'm not doing the Tom Cruise. I gave you an interview. I legitimately asking for our listeners. Why do you value challenge so highly? I already explained autonomy for me, so why do you value challenge?

Speaker 1: 34:06

So for me and this is a stage of life thing, and we talked about this in a previous episode is, for me at least, the last you know over you know 12, whatever years I've been in the workforce. Like it's been about progressing further, improving myself, getting better at what I do and honing in my craft. And when I'm not challenged, I get bored and I hate to say it, like sitting around doing menial work or sitting around doing less work. All I would do and I've done this, I haven't dropped the secret yet, but maybe one day I will is I want to start something else. Like I just can't sit still.

Speaker 1: 34:41

It's just kind of my nature, like I always want to be doing something, I always want to be working on something that I enjoy and so, like, if the challenge isn't there, if I don't feel like I'm being challenged and learning from what I'm doing or being challenged by the people around me, I get bored and it doesn't provide value to me. So I look for other sources to provide that value and dive in. I would say I've got like a driven not in addicted personality, because I don't really get addicted to things. I can drop things pretty quick, but whatever I'm doing. I always give it my all and I always am like I can't halfway in do something. When I'm in, I'm in.

Speaker 1: 35:16

I do it all the way. So I think that's why for me, at least in this period of life, it's like I'm finding that fulfillment of working and getting better and all that in work, and if challenge is not there, I get bored and that's why it's still so high I that makes sense.

Speaker 2: 35:34

I love that reason, yeah it, for for you, the fact that challenge is associated with boredom and your little, your little restless brain not being able to handle that. Firstly, I love it, respect to it. But secondly, I think that perfectly explains what you need in a workplace. It is so different from what I need. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I also think this is it's probably why we work really well as podcast co-hosts.

Speaker 2: 36:05

I'm gonna make an assumption and you can tell me to shut up if I'm wrong, but I think I'm a far more Right-brained person and you are a far more left-brained person to use the really basic general realization of how brains work. But I think that's also reflective in our cacks, would you agree?

Speaker 1: 36:24

I I'm gonna agree with you Okay, it's, you're definitely more creative and a dreamer, as, like I say, I'm like more Not not realist, because you could put that in other sense but like I'm like, okay, what's the next step? Like we got to do it now. We can't do this fancy thing you want to do or like do something so overly complicated. We got to do it now and what's the first step to do it? And let's do that first. And so I think that's exactly why our partnership work Looks, works really well, because you've got great ideas and kind of paint, the vision for where we want to go, and I can help think about okay, how do we immediately get there? What's the next step?

Speaker 1: 36:57

And I think that's why our relationship works really well. This and I'm looking at these. So 15% of culture, 35% of autonomy and 50% and challenge. I Hate to say it. I think I double more into autonomy and challenge. Like I think I reduce culture lower. I don't think it's significantly off, though. Say that again, repeat what you said. So I think culture would go down for me, culture, culture, oh yeah, sorry. So culture probably down to 10. I'd say autonomy, probably the same 35%. I'd say challenge is gone up to 55.

Speaker 2: 37:32

Can I make a Hypothesis and you can prove me wrong. Do it Do. Is it possible that you and I do not care so much about culture because you and I are at the upper end of leadership and we don't spend time with teams as much as we would? I think so because I would. I would, my culture would be so much higher if I was a developer. Yeah, in the olden days I would. I would give a crap about autonomy and challenge as long as I have good culture on my team. That's what matters. But here we are.

Speaker 1: 38:04

It's actually a really good point, and I love how we always say these are therapy for us, because it makes you think about, like okay, I Personally to your point, because I'm not working day-to-day with large teams. I'm kind of, you know, driving the direction we're heading and making sure everything's going in the right way. I Think I care more about culture for my team than I do for myself. You know what I mean. Like I, I hope my team is building a good culture and I coach them to build good cultures, but I don't necessarily care about culture. Maybe that's a bad thing.

Speaker 2: 38:37

I don't, hmm, hmm, actually that's a good point. I'm not sure on that because, yeah, it is. Is cack? Is cack something that individuals should want for their team or themselves? Yeah, and is the placement of people and their cacks something that needs to be considered, based on their positions?

Speaker 1: 38:59

Yeah, hmm, it's also like cack for the individual contributor right and then cack for the leader the organization. Yeah, and because a leader has to think about how is it, how is the the cack for my individuals and then how is my cack overall? Hmm, it's very insightful. Hmm, I like it. Chapter you?

Speaker 2: 39:22

yeah, cack for me, but not for you.

Speaker 1: 39:28

Just throw electric Google on there, that's it All right. Yeah, there you go. But, yeah, I think that's true because and it's not that I don't care, like about my people and my team and like their culture, but like I'm much more interested in the work details than like making small talk with my team yeah, and so I think that's why it is that way. I'm like, okay, the work is the most important thing to me. So how do we, how do we actually get there? But there is a factor as a leader, you have to balance that, because people have different needs and they look at they're cack differently. So you have to make sure you're tying into that and doing things you know they'll care about too. So I think this is a really good insight.

Speaker 2: 40:06

It is very funny that you and I are the exact same in that regard. The work is what matters, not the way you feel. Yeah, as a team or culture, I just think.

Speaker 1: 40:15

I just take emotion out of it. I just take emotion like it's not about emotions, it's it's. It's a business decision. And even though I worked a hundred hours on something, I don't personally associate you that. If someone's like that idea is stupid and here's why, and I'm like, oh shoot, you're right, that was really dumb, because I didn't understand this, like to me I don't take a lot of personal like now I've got to defend this even though I was wrong. It's like it's a business decision, let's do what's smartest.

Speaker 2: 40:41

Yeah, I totally understand the business decision. I think my challenge comes from when the business takes away your ability to make decisions. Yeah, that's that's where it falls apart for me. But continue, let's keep learning, All right?

Speaker 1: 40:58

let's keep. Let's keep going down this path, all right. So with those scores, after the two weeks, you know, looking hour by hour, day by day, of what my score was. It was a lousy 53 percent. Lousy in March, lousy, that is a bad score. That is just on failing. That's a bad cat. How are you today? It's a good question. So if we were to rerun the numbers at 10, 35, 55, it's not gonna be drastically different, but it is gonna be lower for sure. So this one stays the same. This one goes to 55. It's yeah, it's 1% lower. It's 52. You know what?

Speaker 2: 41:34

stability.

Speaker 1: 41:35

I know that's not bad you guys in the work world stability and knowing what you expect. This is where I think compensation comes in of like. At least I know what to expect, at least I know the situation and I get compensated. Well, I can live with us.

Speaker 2: 41:52

That's the way I kind of look at it. I. I think that's exactly where it comes in. That's very astute because for me it the compensation I have received is not Not Adequate for the hit I have taken on my cat to make me think, oh, this is worth hanging around for.

Speaker 1: 42:11

Exactly because I think about it. I think about the things that I weigh, and I have done this. Actually, over the past years I've had a couple job offers and I really thought about I'm like I've invested some time in this company, I know what to expect, I know the leadership, I know how things work, I have influence, I have pull, I Do my job well and I think about, you know, jumping into a place. I've got to work hard to then reestablish myself and, as I said, I'm a whole-ass kind of person, not a half-ass. So If I find a new place, I'm gonna work extra hard to earn those things back, which is just putting more time into something that I don't get a ton of fulfillment out of. So is it worth it? Or I'm okay where I'm at, and I think that's where I've settled in this past year of just saying, like you know what, I'm okay with it right now, I'm okay with it and I'm putting my focus in other areas challenge you on that.

Speaker 2: 42:58

Well, I'm gonna throw it. I'm gonna throw a little gauntlet your way because, out of the two of us, I've changed jobs more recently than you and I Think there might have been a little fear of that on my end. Maybe not, I don't, I don't actually recall. So I'm actually gonna say no, there wasn't. But yeah, that's, that doesn't register to me and that's why I want to challenge that for you, because you, out of the two of us, like just just between you and me and no one else listening, so everyone stop listening.

Speaker 2: 43:28

You much smarter than I am Clark.

Speaker 1: 43:33

You are.

Speaker 2: 43:34

I think out of the two of us you land somewhere new, you're gonna immediately Just wow their pants off in the first month, because I know that's what I did when I landed on my new job and I'm like 50%.

Speaker 1: 43:50

I Was in the room. Okay, fair enough, I, I could see that. Say that. Even though I love that, you said that because that is so kind. I Also think it's only because I have, I fulfill those things that you aren't the best at and you fulfill things from me that I'm not the best at. So I think when we look at each other, we see those strengths. You know what I mean and that's why I think we think we have those positive you know things and we're gonna do really well whatever we do, because we have the things each other don't right, it's just an emotional Retrospective therapy for us, maybe, maybe.

Speaker 2: 44:29

I mean I, I yeah, I just Clark, I know you, I know you, you can, you could land and expand anywhere With. Question is do I want to do all those things?

Speaker 1: 44:41

again. That is the question. Or am I okay with the compensation I'm at doing the things I have so that I can put focus into Other things, like this podcast, that I'm more excited about? So here's.

Speaker 2: 44:53

Here's a question, and this is something that I see a lot in just the corporate world right when, when someone new at your level or higher shows up, it's always I got to bring in my people. I got to implement my policy. My strategy Because and I think to your fear they might be acting on a little bit of this is if they show up and they don't make some Big, big impression of, hey, I, this is, this is my authority. This is why I need to respect me. This is my value. Everyone love me, which I think a lot of you know.

Speaker 2: 45:22

Execs and leaders fear and have. This is why they fall into those like hard-hitting changes that occur. New management comes in. Gotta do total new problems. It comes in, gotta do total new process of doing things the way we used to do things in my old company, which is funny considering. But new job, you're the new guy, let's do things the old way. Is this a fallacy on the corporate leadership end? Like, are you actually afraid because the way people act in businesses is wrong and you thinking, hey, I have to show up and prove value instead of hey, I have to show up, find what works and hone that knife instead of throw the knife away and start over? Yeah, cuz, I've never seen that personally, I've never seen someone come in and say, hey, I'm not gonna do things my way, I'm gonna do things the way that works for this group. We're gonna figure that out together and we're gonna be better. I Think that's the right way to come in.

Speaker 1: 46:25

I've never seen that. I've seen I have seen a mixture of it, because I to your point, I've seen the come in, bring your own people change everything Exactly how it was, because I've done it successfully before and I think that works sometimes because things could be in a really bad spot. But I also think the company matters, the people matter and that's going to factor into the success of whatever strategy that you want to do, if that makes sense, like you can't just blanket pop a new strategy and you've got to evaluate the context of the situation and say, do I have the same skill sets that I had previously? Do we have the same culture that we had previously when this worked?

Speaker 1: 47:06

And I think this is another reason why AI's got a long, long way to go, because, yeah, those are very human things of being able to evaluate that and humans only Really can understand humans and that evolves over time. And I think that's where you know that's that's where it all depends. But I've seen a mixture of that of like people coming in and just One not doing anything, being like let's just keep doing the things the way we are, and that never really goes anywhere. And then I've seen, you know, people come in and change everything and sometimes that works Because whatever they were doing before was bad and so it's some sort of significant improvement. But I think there's a middle ground there of Observing for a while and then being like, okay, this is different, what can we do to improve this, and how do we do it together? I think that would be the most ideal way to handle the situation.

Speaker 2: 47:49

I agree, because you could hire for your expertise, but your expertise does not make the team.

Speaker 1: 47:55

Yeah. I like that I agree. Very well said better, more concise than I had. So yeah, I might hasn't changed much. I think I'm kind of in the same situation, but I think I'm more accepting of it. You know, for better or for worse, you're a little lucky in that way. Yeah, at least at least I haven't had drastic shifts to your point.

Speaker 1: 48:14

It's like yeah at least it's been stable, which in some sense, even though it's 53 from a culture autonomy challenge, I think the compensation brings it up to something more manageable, probably, let's say like 70 fish, maybe a little less, maybe a little more, but I think, because I'm finding my fulfillment outside of work, it's making it being like okay, this is just you know to pay the bills, which is okay, there's nothing wrong with that.

Speaker 2: 48:37

There's nothing wrong with that, unless everything is wrong with it. But that's why cat exists.

Speaker 1: 48:42

It's to evaluate, just that Exactly, and I think that's the one factor we don't have here is like what's the compensation curve, mm-hmm, how much is that factor into the score? Because even though you know you might be at a 53 in culture, autonomy and challenge your compensation, bring you up to near 70, like in my case, and in that case I'm good.

Speaker 2: 49:00

What if compensation is an offset Mm-hmm, so I can actually culture autonomy challenge. And then compensation ends up becoming the offset that multiplies, or is like a bonus to your cac, because I could almost see those three being a Group. And then compensation is its own little multiplier column where, if you're under compensated but you're, you're completely in love with the jog. That could force you to look elsewhere because, yeah, in a perfect scenario where you're not paid enough to get by and enjoy your life outside of work, that may force you to sacrifice the cack, whereas you might have amazing compensation and a crap cack and you'd be like I'd be willing to give up 25% of this if it pushed my other numbers in the right direction.

Speaker 2: 49:52

So like it's almost this yeah, it's a sliding scale that buffs the other three pillars.

Speaker 1: 49:58

Yep, I agree, because I think if my compensation was bad, this 53 would get worse and I wouldn't be as happy to your point.

Speaker 2: 50:06

Yeah, I kind of like that.

Speaker 1: 50:10

I like that.

Speaker 2: 50:10

If we do change cack, that needs to be the change, as compensation is an offset.

Speaker 1: 50:15

Agreed. Yeah, I think that's the right way to look at it. Ooh, this book is writing itself. It is chapter three, how compensation affects your cack. Write that down. Write that down. We released this book. When we released this book, we got to release merch with it. I'm telling you, we need big cack energy out there.

Speaker 2: 50:37

Yeah, we have mascot like khaki Khaki who just laughs and he's like I'm khaki.

Speaker 1: 50:48

Here's my scores.

Speaker 2: 50:49

I got a good score for you. You're miserable.

Speaker 1: 50:55

That's a terrifying voice that haunts my dreams.

Speaker 2: 50:57

Whatever you did right there Good I hope khaki shows up and your khaki is just like this weird little bar graph with eyes he shows up in your dream and says you're pretty miserable, aren't you fella?

Speaker 1: 51:10

He's the reason you can't sleep.

Speaker 2: 51:12

I'd fix your problems, but I'd have to pay you more.

Speaker 1: 51:16

You know, you've got the angel in one shoulder, the devil in the other, and then khaki just sits right above your head, occupying that head space.

Speaker 2: 51:23

Khaki, just there pulling your hair ratatouille style, but not to like help guide you. Rather, it's to be like you're gonna die if you continue down this path.

Speaker 1: 51:34

So he can be good, but he can't be evil. This is taking a weird dichotomy, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2: 51:39

And this is what happens when you use compensation as an offset. I'm just saying.

Speaker 1: 51:43

Great job team.

Speaker 2: 51:43

We did this.

Speaker 1: 51:46

All right, so 2024. I mean, we don't have to break it down in this episode. I think we've been going like nearly an hour. We could do a second episode. Yeah, even though this is the first of the year, we could do a part two and we kind of take this week to evaluate what we learned on this one and then thinking about next year. How do we fix some of this stuff, like what were the big takeaways of things that have shifted and how do we move into the better scores?

Speaker 2: 52:10

I love this is a two-parter because it allows me to walk away, experience the next week of work, which, yeah, and then we can reevaluate and really like late something out, not just for us as professionals, because here's you know, I had a funny thought If we were millionaires, if we were rich, this podcast wouldn't exist because we'd have nothing to offer anybody. Very true, in some ways our misery creates content and allows us to respond to the things Squid Boy posts. So that's true, we have to be slightly miserable to be successful.

Speaker 1: 52:43

And that's kind of depressing. That means there's no way we're quitting our jobs and keeping this podcast going at the same time, right?

Speaker 2: 52:49

Right, well, or we start a company and then all our company's focus is to make other ideas successful and evaluate what works and what doesn't work as we continue to refine scientific method way, how to make work better. That's the only way I see it working. So, corporate strategy, the business. But what have we stepped away, because we are coming up on an hour and I want to burn through all of our pod credits in a single episode. We think really long and hard about what we said in this episode today. Yeah, sure, we started the new year with a downer kind of, but the next one is the what are we going to do about it and what should you do about it? And we also think about what does the pod do about it, because if you look at that list of the 23 things that are predicted for 24, there's a lot of stuff in there that we need to think about and we need to be ready to talk about in this next year.

Speaker 2: 53:38

A lot of AI, a lot of workforce changes, a lot of medical changes. Like there are things coming in the pipe. There was one about how new. There was less IPOs last year, in the year prior, than there should have been, and they expect a lot of IPOs this year. What does that mean? What does an IPO mean for your CAQ right? So like?

Speaker 1: 53:56

how's the change? Thanks, I agree. I think the context changes your CAQ scores to such a point you got to evaluate that as part of that and think about other things coming up. How do I want my CAQ score to be? Because that could impact it for sure. I 100% agree.

Speaker 2: 54:10

So let's do that, let's meditate on it. Lay a big old egg, a big old CAQ egg. Come back and hatch that sucker and see what's inside. Let's do it, I'm in, I'm all in. Hey Clark, do you know what that means? What does that mean? Does this?

Speaker 1: 54:26

mean we're out of hands.

Speaker 2: 54:26

It means it's time to play our favorite game show.

Speaker 1: 54:30

Oh, lower to lower to lower. Okay, this time you've got to be up, right.

Speaker 2: 54:34

I think so, I think so I think this is how it's used. You did the last one, so it is my turn. It's time to play. What Do you Mean, clark? Give me instructions on how we play the game.

Speaker 1: 54:41

All right, what do you mean? It's been a staple actually for many, many of our episodes. Now that at the end of it we always do something fun, we go to our Discord and if you're not in there yet, get in there. We'll talk about how to in just a bit. But this is our favorite game show, what Do you Mean? Everybody hop in to the what Do you Mean channel and you can post a meme and we're going to explain it in words because this is a podcast, so you get to visualize it in the Discord, but then you get to hear us try to horribly explain it. So Bruce is up and there's a spicy one in there which is going to be fun. I actually don't know. There's two, so it's going to be really interesting.

Speaker 1: 55:16

There's three yes.

Speaker 2: 55:16

I got three. Oh, you can do all three. Yeah, why not? Why the heck not? I think I can handle it. You know we've given you all the hard ones, so I'll take three. That way, you know it all sets See the hard ones that you have to do. So first one comes from our absolute favorite individual contributor. I think individual contributors like our longest topic submitter. Member of the Discord.

Speaker 1: 55:38

I think the first to ever own a mug. There was a shout out on.

Speaker 2: 55:41

LinkedIn Shout outs to individual contributor. We love you. Continue to stay with us and be as awesome as you are. They posted, ironically, linking back to your news. They clicked for a Good Simpsons episode with Mojo the Monkey. So Mojo the Monkey is on the ground in a pillow in a I think he's actually drunk in the sea. He's a drunken stupor and he types into Clark a speaking spell and he says pray for Mojo because he has. He has been partied out and Mojo cannot handle any more.

Speaker 2: 56:16

Party and individual contributor posted this on 12 27 after our last episode posted. So I can only assume Mojo is just. He's holidayed out, he's ready for the end of the year. He needs more vacation than what he's going to get, but it ain't coming. Which leads us right into meme number two. It's a gingerbread man kicking a Honda Civic and in the top right hand corner is a flashing Honda sensing icon. The Honda is sensing the rage of the gingerbread man because he's frustrated that Honda has dropped their quality over the last few years. Honda used to be a name when it came to auto manufacturing from Japan, but recently and I speak as an owner their car quality has dropped tremendously. This is just. I think quality control is not a thing that used to be when it comes to automobiles and they should never added computers to these stupid things. But they did and it's ruined everything and that's why the little gingerbread man is kicking the tires.

Speaker 1: 57:10

He says I hate you car, I hate what you become, and what I can't tell if he's breaking his leg off on it or if a piece is falling off the car. I think his leg is intact. So to your point about the quality, I think it's the Honda.

Speaker 2: 57:23

Yeah, it's definitely the Honda. You kick a Honda and a part will fall off. It's just a sad state of the the fair. So last one, and I think this is the most relevant to the previous episode, mr Restrepo also posted Boomer Corpo's post, corpo Carol, which is our last episode about the three visiting ghosts that haunt every corporate on Christmas Eve. Gruge is popping out of his window. The snow is falling from the sky. It's Christmas morning. He's literally just been berated by three ghosts for the entire night's Eve. He's sleep deprived. He's possibly opiated. He's smiling, he's looking at the window and he says pizza, pizza for everyone. And that's all you're going to get this year, because that's the most you can expect out of an exec. When they've been showed, the worst time line Is they're going to show up and they're going to think they're going to do good and they're going to give you a pizza, because compensation is not for you, it's for them. They're the ones who need to be compensated.

Speaker 1: 58:20

Oh, you knocked that out of the park. So many awesome explanations and now you know you've done. You've done your justice. You've gotten some snowballs knocked on the lights and you got some easy ones, and these three were rather difficult and you've crushed them all. We got it.

Speaker 2: 58:34

We got it. It was a lightning round, we did it. We got there, hey.

Speaker 1: 58:38

Clark, how do you? How do you do this? Can you tell me? How do I get in there? How do I get you to explain a meme?

Speaker 2: 58:43

because I'm up next so you guys can post some gnarly ones, that's that's what I was wondering too, if you wanted to get in on this game, and I just checked. There's actually there's. There's a couple of ways. You can go to our website, corporate strategy. That's dot B I Z, or the easiest way Just on this episode. You're listening to look at your podcast show notes. There is a join the discord link right in there. Tap that with your greasy thumb and it'll put you right into the chat. I know it's greasy because you had olive oil earlier today. Don't ask how I know.

Speaker 1: 59:14

I just did I know I know what's going on.

Speaker 2: 59:19

So tap that, join the discord. It's a great group of people, like we shouted out. Individual contributor Restrepo and Squid Boy. It's actually full of amazing folks. We have so many good peeps in there. Shout outs to all of them, wishing you the happiest new year. Get in this discord. That's my goal for the next year is to make this place the coolest hangout on earth. So get in there, get part of the conversation and also give us feedback. Let us know we can do better, and we take that very seriously.

Speaker 1: 59:48

Yep, I agree with you. It is going to be an awesome 2024. And if you join the discord, it's going to be even better for you. So get excited.

Speaker 2: 59:58

Hey, how do you stay up to date on all things? Corporate strategy Clark.

Speaker 1: 1:00:00

There's so many different ways to stay up to date. One you can follow us on socials. Two, if you want to be notified every single time we drop a new episode we do have the same way you can sign up on the website to be notified, so you can get a notification in your inbox. The second we drop one of these episodes. So definitely do that and it will pay off big time.

Speaker 2: 1:00:17

Hey, how else we got speaking of paying off big time. There may be ads in this episode. There may be ads in a previous episode you've heard there may not be, and that's because we're trying to figure out how we can make this podcast self sustaining. Right now we spend a whopping hold on I had it up, dang it, I lost it, my account, my billing, my billing. We spend $22 a month to keep this podcast afloat and right now we make $0 a month. So our goal for 2024 is this is a sad goal Podcasts self efficient. It doesn't come out of my bank account. Instead, it comes out of yours, if you want to.

Speaker 2: 1:00:59

We used to do there and the previous episode we talked about a way that you can go through our podcast provider and donate through there, but that was utterly confusing and made no sense to anyone. So we now have buying me a coffee setup and we have not made it perfect. Right now you can just do a dollar donation If you'd like. There's like you can donate five times if you want to give $5. I don't fully understand the platform yet. I'm learning I will figure it out by the next episode of a much better description. That is in the show notes, just like the discord, just like our LinkedIn, like everything else Clark has talked about. If you want to support the show, you can go there and you can actually see exactly how much we've earned, and we're just aiming for that self sustaining. We're not looking to make this profitable, we just want to make the best podcast we can for you and not take it out of our bank account. So if you feel like giving, that's the place to do it. So thank you if you do, and just thank you for listening.

Speaker 2: 1:01:55

Most importantly, more than money, more than anything, your listenership is the reason we do this. We posted in the discord some of our metrics we hit last year. We're growing, we're getting more. We really appreciate it. We know it's not possible without you and your support and your sharing of the pod. So, more than anything, share this with everyone who needs to hear it. We try to make the content that is the most helpful and appropriate for you, the listener. If you have feedback on the things we create, like I said before, we want to hear it. We want to make this podcast the best it can be for you, so let us know. You can DM us on discord. You can reach out to us on LinkedIn. You can email us. There's so many ways. But share this with your friends. Let us know what you like, let us know what you don't like, and we're here for you.

Speaker 1: 1:02:39

Any other thoughts? Clark, here's to 2024. By 2023, 12 hours count it down into 2024, big things for corporate strategy.

Speaker 2: 1:02:49

Hey, don't reinvent the wheel in 2024. What do you say? Play vets? I'm Bruce and I'm Clark and you're on mute. We'll touch base with you in the next year, see you next year.