Welcome And Market Banter

SPEAKER_00 0:14

Welcome back to Corporate Strategy, the podcast that could have been an email. I'm Anthony, your host, joined today by my co-host. Thank you. Welcome back to the show. Uh this week we're gonna take a look at the Dow Jones Index and make some predictions uh based on what we think businesses need to adjust to uh during the downturn of the stock market. Now, you know, we we saw index predictions go up last week, Michael, as we always do.

SPEAKER_01 0:46

We did.

SPEAKER_00 0:47

And uh, you know, it I'm sure it impacted your portfolio the same way it impacted mine. Um, how are you responding to the most recent uh news?

SPEAKER_02 0:57

Yeah, I'll be honest, I've been pretty bearish with this market. I've uh I've definitely seen a couple points come off the top, but it doesn't scare me. I I think you know, I'm just gonna keep on holding. I'm not gonna invest in anything too deep. I'm gonna hold on to my assets and maybe even dive deeper into some of the indexes that I've uh diverted some of my portfolio into. And I think I'm I may even decide to double down on my quarterly investment track with my portfolio manager, just because I think the market's doing that good. What do you think?

SPEAKER_00 1:29

I I couldn't agree more. Although you are bearish, I'm feeling a little bit bullish this week. After talking to my own hedge fund advisor, I uh took some of the latest stats back to him, had him analyze those. And uh I'm I'm making quite a few investments. I'm increasing my portfolio, and uh I feel that these decisions are sound in the logic applied to make them.

SPEAKER_02 1:54

I was watching, I was watching the quadratic index based on what you were telling me, and I was like, Anthony's gonna be so excited that his hedge fund and the uh venture capital that he's put out into the market is really appreciating. And I think you should be so proud of yourself and the investments that you have put together and the team you have structured, you're really just going to be a hockey stick growth.

SPEAKER_00 2:16

It's it's really parabolic. And uh the more I think about it, the more I realize that all of the investments I've made in the last two quarters have really rebounded in so far as uh I have walked away with more capital gains than I would have lost had I not invested in these funds themselves. So ergo vis-a-vis concordedly, I am winning the capitalism.

SPEAKER_02 2:44

I'm probably gonna have to have you send me over your investment advice and I'll kind of analyze that against my portfolio and see if I can see uh similar or parallel gains to what you've been seeing on your side. And I'll be honest with you, the poly market is wrong. The people are listening to this, and this is people, some people say some people say that the market is falling apart and the world is crumbling. I think the world is in the best place it's ever been. And this is by all means investment advice. So please dump all your money into everything we're saying right now, uh, because it will help you thrive in your towards your financial goals.

SPEAKER_00 3:24

You got me. All right, I I lose. You

Corporate Nonsense In Meetings

SPEAKER_00 3:28

got me.

SPEAKER_01 3:28

Uh we are not in the middle of one of your statements. I just lost it.

SPEAKER_00 3:35

You kept it together. The second you said polymarket, I was done. You you got me. You got me. Good job. Good job. You win. I'll give it to you.

SPEAKER_02 3:42

Sometimes, I'll be honest, there's sometimes in corporate where when you're speaking like this, it kind of just feels like you have no idea where you're going. No, and you don't think anybody really understands a word that's being said, but somehow you just keep on going and going and going. And you try to think of the most ridiculous words, and everyone's just nodding their head. They're just like, wow. And all the freshers are like, holy cow, Anthony knows his stuff. Like, I gotta start looking up all these terms, and they're writing it down. And then you get out of the meeting and you're like, that was complete and utter nonsense of what we were just talking.

SPEAKER_00 4:13

Yes, correct. And I I think the the real irony in in this is there's always one person in the room that is just sighing so loudly, so deeply, eyes rolled to the back of their head, because they know better. And that's the person you want to make friends with. The best advice I can give you. Find the person in the room that is looking at all these smart people talk. And if they're like just like head and hands, heavy breathing, eye rolling, like that's that's your new best friend. That is your mentor. Study under them because you will go far.

SPEAKER_02 4:52

Yeah, that's the person who's actually going to be doing things and is successful. The other people are just talking, saying random crap that you're just like, what are we doing here?

SPEAKER_00 5:02

I I mean, I mean, maybe this is maybe this is very mean statement, but I I find the people that talk the most in meetings provide the least value. Uh, I feel like there's probably a strong correlation there.

SPEAKER_02 5:14

It's funny, early in my career, I thought that by speaking in meetings and and getting notice that it was valuable because I'd be perking up and I'd be like the one who they'd like attribute those things to. And like later on in my career, I realized actually it's better to say less and only speak when you're actually going to provide value. And those are the leaders who are actually the ones who are being impactful and not wasting everybody's time. If you're the one who's always trying to chime in and be like, I gotta have my voice heard, it's gonna hurt you because everyone's just gonna be like, Yeah, this person's gonna talk. Let's just not invite them to these meetings. I think it's better if we just do this without them.

SPEAKER_00 5:54

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Uh it's that is corporate 101 for all of our freshers out there. It it doesn't get better. Good luck. Good luck.

SPEAKER_02 6:06

No, it gets way worse. It gets so much worse.

AI Wins And Automation Failures

SPEAKER_00 6:10

Hey, Michael Vibecheck. How are you doing?

SPEAKER_02 6:13

I threw the pinky up for you. How am I doing? How's this? How's this week going? That's a good question. It's one of those weeks where I haven't really had a second to think about how it's going. It's just been go, go, go. Had a couple of client deployments, new software that we built, a new AI tool that we built. And there, it's almost today. We had one where it was our first day away from the client. Like, and they were on their own using the tool for one of their processes that they do every day. And we're just like, we're watching from home on the dashboard, and we're just sitting there like, it's five minutes past when they usually do this. Is everything okay? And like no phone calls came through. So we're like, okay, okay. And then you see it actually like the dashboards start to fill up. Okay, okay, it's running, things are happening, people are doing what they're supposed to be doing, and we're not there. Our baby is out in the world, it's being used by the client, they don't need us to hand hold them, they figured it out. It was good. It was a lot of fun.

SPEAKER_00 7:08

Yeah, I I love that too. Hey, you know, you'd be proud of me. I actually uh I finally got access to uh a clot account for work, and I built a basically a project, a system that allows me to apply all of the rules and all of the nonsense I created over the last four years uh as a as a guide and a check. And I started running documents through this. Like my prompt ended up being a pretty long and it I fed it a lot of content. But the thing like I really wanted it to come across with was like, don't explore, don't go outside of the rules here, stay within what I've given you. And it it works great. Uh, it actually did a really good job. I fed it uh a really I fed it a good document basically to see like what can it find wrong with something good? And it like it was quoting me like in the review synopsis, because it was like a four-tier review system that I created. It was very funny, like pulling rules directly from like Anthony's style guide and all this. Like, this is awesome. This is great. So uh, you know, one of the things I don't like doing is reviewing other people's work simply because like I I'll review it once, but after that, nah. So my hope is that this allows me to just review someone's work once because it'll have gone through this process.

SPEAKER_02 8:29

So that's great.

SPEAKER_00 8:30

Look at me using AI effectively.

SPEAKER_02 8:32

First of all, proud of you. I'm really impressed that you did that. Second of all, I love that you took the time to set it up and to do it right. I was meeting with someone uh this week that we talk always talk about AI stuff and tools, and he was telling me all the cool stuff that he's been up to. I'm like, man, the last two weeks, I just haven't had a moment to to like build a process in a system. It's just been go, go, go, go, go. But there's so many things that if I invested an hour up front in the beginning of the week to build the process, to build the prompt for the AI, I probably could have saved myself like 10 hours this week of doing just ridiculous nonsense that could have been automated.

SPEAKER_00 9:08

Now, I I I gotta tell you, I did have AI completely fail on me, which is weird because I've had the opposite happen in the past. Um, you know, I'm a big fan of Jira, big fan of Confluence, and I love their rovo AI. I use a lot of Jira automations and uh I automate a lot of Jira processes. So when tickets go to certain tickets, like you can hold dog park back there. Yeah, they're they're not happy about it either. Uh when tickets go to certain statuses, I'll kick off certain automations and it'll do certain create new tickets and not even all the things, like I do all the things. I love it. I actually love automating in Jira because it's such a visual language is like to feel like I'm like a coder, but I'm smart. And I used Rovo previously to basically take one of my automations I made and apply it to a different uh project, and it worked great. And then I tried it again like just two days ago, and it does not work anymore. Like, what the hell? Like, that's weird. I've never seen something get like actively less functional as it improved. And then they they've switched their thing into studio mode now, and I'm like, I don't, I don't know about this. So I was a little disappointed in that. I went and created it by hand. Still got it. That's what matters, is I can still create these automations like nobody's business. I know what I'm doing. Oh yeah. Oh yeah, I'm the Gerald Whiz. Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:27

You're the master. I am the master. You vibe checked me. Now I'm gonna vibe check you. Did you survive this week?

SPEAKER_00 10:33

It's been a whirlwind. It's been a whirlwind of a week. I did not survive, sadly. You're talking to my force ghost. So just like Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda Badota, I am uh a force ghost and now uh in one with the force. So it's cool, it's cool in here.

SPEAKER_01 10:51

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:52

I just show up wherever I am with like, you know, a blue, I mean, blue outline.

SPEAKER_02 10:56

It's kind of awesome. I'm not gonna lie to you. It sounds like a relief. Like, I actually wish I was a ghost. Yeah. So you might have to coach how to get there.

SPEAKER_00 11:03

It kind of made me realize like, why would anyone even want to be, you know, alive in the Star Wars universe? Because being a forced ghost, you get so much more ability and power. And just I just show up when I want. I just offer a couple of sage words of advice. There's no money here in the force. There's no money. I don't have to worry about rent.

SPEAKER_01 11:22

Worry about it.

SPEAKER_00 11:23

I don't have to worry about toilets. Don't get hungry.

SPEAKER_01 11:25

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 11:25

No, it's it's great in here. Become a forced ghost. That's what I highly recommend.

SPEAKER_02 11:30

Good. Good. I'm happy you're giving this very practical advice to everybody listening. So that way we can take, you know, follow in your footsteps and have the same amount of happiness that you've gained and achieved in your life.

SPEAKER_00 11:41

Strike me down now. I'll become more powerful than you can ever imagine. I mean, who knew? Those were the truest words ever spoken. Honestly. Obi Wan was just ahead of the game. Uh it's just I'm just, I'm, I'm, I'm dead.

SPEAKER_02 11:55

Yeah, fair enough.

SPEAKER_00 11:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:56

I get to a point today where I'm just like, my brain is so fried at the moment. I can't, I just can't look at a computer and do even simple things of like, oh, I gotta log in and like send this report. Like, I still have to do it. I just really, really don't want to. You know, you know the moon you get to, like, I've done this a hundred times. I can do it quick, I can do it easy. I just don't want to. That's where I'm at today.

SPEAKER_00 12:19

Yeah. Dude, dude. I wish I could be there. I don't have a choice, sadly. My deadlines are all you know me. I've talked about this before. I'm big on starting the work early. So I have plenty of time to pivot before the deadline. Sadly, my deadlines uh like on Wednesday were Monday. So it's like, oh, oh, I would have loved, I would have loved more time or you know, any kind of warning. So it's just been it's been a whirlwind. But I will serve as always. I mean, I am the best. I will survive.

SPEAKER_02 12:50

You are.

SPEAKER_00 12:51

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:52

You are. Great song, by the way.

SPEAKER_00 12:54

Yeah. I yeah. Gloria Gainer. Classic. Classic. Uh, I think it's actually a good segue into our topic this week,

Decisions Made In Vacuums Defined

SPEAKER_00 13:02

believe it or not.

SPEAKER_01 13:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:03

Surviving. Um, because I have a question for you. I have a problem.

SPEAKER_02 13:08

A question.

SPEAKER_00 13:09

I have a problem that I need a product manager to solve.

SPEAKER_02 13:12

Oh boy. Listen, this is a big moment. You don't usually go and seek help from product management. So I'm kind of proud of you for this.

SPEAKER_00 13:20

You're familiar with decision making, I'm sure. You've heard about it before, right? Like you've made a decision or two in your life. Right. Maybe once or twice. Sure, sure, sure. So that sounds about right for a product manager, actually. So when decisions get made, what do you usually take into account for that decision?

SPEAKER_02 13:42

There's a lot of context that I'm missing here. But if I say general thing, yeah. General of thumb, if you're if you're making a decision, you need to understand who it's going to impact. You know, I think the who is one of the most important things. And then the what kind of comes after that. Of like, hey, if we if we change this, is it going to change anyone else's process? If we do this, what is it going to break? Is there going to be any downside from doing this? Do we need to tell anybody that we're making this decision? Or do you just rip the band-aid and be like, no, we're making the decision, decision made, we're moving on. And then you kind of deal with the effects later. But typically I try to do the former.

SPEAKER_00 14:24

I have to take back every bad thing I've ever said about product management because you just you hit both of the points that I'm leading up to on the head is is who does this impact and what does this break? Right. So the topic for today is decisions made in vacuums and how to deal with them. Because this is a this is a everyone who works in corporate will run into this one day. And the challenge really is once you realize the decision's been made, how do you deal with it? Especially when it's abundantly clear that decision did not consider who it impacts and what it breaks. We've all been there. And I figured you and I should talk through how we deal with this.

SPEAKER_02 15:10

Yep. Yeah, it's I've been on the receiving side of decisions many times where I was not invited or my thoughts were not considered, or my team was not considered when something was taken on. From a product management sense, even when I was at Universal, I can say there are many times where my boss made a decision, even though I was kind of the expert of a certain product area, and they informed me later, like, hey, I made this decision with these people, like, this is what we're going to be doing for the next quarter. And I'm like, okay. And I always kind of I hate it because I just pretty good.

SPEAKER_00 15:48

Is that the face?

SPEAKER_02 15:49

I have a pretty good focus. But like when that happens and it's like derailing everything, like your brain just starts to spiral a little bit. It's like, okay, what does that mean for me? What does that mean for my team? I think it's a stupid idea. What we're working on right now is so much more important. Did they even consider these things? And so I think naturally you get on the defense mechanism train of, okay, well, we are currently driving this strategic initiative for the company. Do we stop that to proceed with this? And you kind of just have to rationalize and make sure things were thought of because you were the expert in the area. So like you come to them, you say, like, well, did we consider this? And hopefully, the answer is yes, we considered it, and we decided to pivot away from the thing you're working on and move on to this. But that's a hard pillow to swallow because you're like, Well, why?

SPEAKER_00 16:45

Yeah, go ahead. Can I stop you there? How often has that happened? Where you said, Have you considered this? And they said, Yes.

SPEAKER_02 16:54

Surprisingly, it has happened a time or two. Oh, I should say time or two. I would say there were definitely many times where they didn't understand the full impact of their decision. The worst part about it, this is the worst part, Anthony. Even if they didn't, they're like, Well, I already made the decision, so we're moving forward with it. And you're just like, it's not really an acceptable answer, but I guess I don't have a choice.

SPEAKER_00 17:21

So and and that is really where I think we can have a discussion to help people because when the decision is made and you have that information now, hey, this is going to confuse customers. This is going to cause work disruptions, this is going to break our product. How do we deal with that? Like, and that's that's really the crux of a bad decision is the people who make that decision in the vacuum are generally not impacted by it in any meaningful way. But it's all of the people associated with how it gets executed and those that receive the product of the decision that uh that tend to suffer.

Positivity Versus Protecting Yourself

SPEAKER_02 18:05

Yeah. Before I even start on some of the tips that I would give, I'd say one of the most critical things you can do in your career is be adaptable and positive. Especially depending who made the decision, right? If it's your boss, if it's a very high-up executive, sometimes you just have to bite the bullet and be like, oh, okay, gotcha. Like I would have loved to have been included, but like that's totally okay. How can I help? And even though everything inside of you, every single part of your body is like, I need to revolt against this. I need to tell them all the reasons that this was stupid, I need to tell them why it's not going to work. Here's X, Y, and Z reason. I'm telling you right now, fight against that urge and approach it positively. If you're always that person who is the negative Nancy, you will always, you will, you will never be the person to actually make the decisions. They will essentially look at you and say, Anthony's just going to complain about everything. I'm not going to promote him or bring him to these conversations ever because he's always the negative Nancy. But if you approach it positively, they're going to be like, oh, you were really receptive. I was kind of worried you would be concerned about this. Great. Now they're going to be more open to inviting you to those types of conversations in the future where you can actually provide your two cents.

SPEAKER_00 19:20

So I have a I have a counter, I have a counteropinion to you here because I do agree. Positivity for 99.9% of the time is always a good attitude and energy to bring in the corporate space. You'll make friends, people will like working with you. We've talked about this multiple times in the last few episodes. Like being seen, being positive, it's a good look, it's a promotable feature. But I would caution on just adjunct positivity for the sake of being positive, when that bad decision could come back around and be like, well, Anthony, I mean, this is your space. Why did you not bring up any of these concerns when we told you this is this was the case? Right. Like there is that that rebound impact where six months from now, when the bad decision is now in front of the customer and they're all upset, and then execs are looking for fingers to point to. Just curious. And hopefully they have a response to that. But if they don't, and they're like, no, actually, we're going to proceed anyway. We don't think that's a problem. At least you've done the due diligence, right? And you're not going to fight, you just say, hey, I just curious, right? Like, you're not fighting it. You're not being aggressive about it. You're just asking a question because you are always entitled to ask a question. It's different when you say, you guys are making a huge mistake. This is going to destroy customer reputation and trust. Why would you do this? You're a bunch of idiots. Like, no. You ask a question. Hey, what about X impacting Y? See if they have an answer. If they don't, whatever. You brought it up. You asked the question. So when Y falls apart six months from now, you can be like, Well, I did bring up in that meeting, you know, it's not me. I'm not the one you want to fire, right? Like, I I asked about this.

SPEAKER_02 21:30

Yeah, it's a little bit of CYA. It's like, at least you brought up those things. And I think if you if you can vocalize it or illustrate it in the right way, then it will be well received.

SPEAKER_01 21:42

Yes. Positivity. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:45

Positivity is a huge part of that. We all know that person, especially if you've worked with engineers, that everything you bring up, they're just like negative thing, this is why we can't do it. This is why it's not possible. Well, this is stupid. Nobody likes exactly. No one likes working with that person. Yeah. And typically they don't survive. Very long because they're not going to be put on the best projects. They're not going to be working with the best teams. It just doesn't, even if they're the best engineer, it doesn't matter. That energy is not wanted.

SPEAKER_00 22:08

Well, what's funny is they're generally right. And that's the problem, right? Like the negative naysayer is almost always right. And they've nailed the problem perfectly, but that's not how decisions are made in corporate. Like you can't just be assertive, this is what it is. In fact, you should never say this is what it is in corporate because that just offends people for some strange reason. You know, we talked about in the past, and we even have a really good Patreon exclusive about uh Americans and how they deal with problems versus Europeans and how they deal with problems and just different cultures. And it's so interesting. It's a very, I feel like this is a very American issue, but like you just cannot be direct. You cannot ever be direct, especially when talking upwards, especially when talking to the executive layer. Like, do not be direct. Ask questions, ask leading questions that force them to think about how they answer it. I think that's the safest path to CYA.

SPEAKER_02 23:10

Yeah, absolutely. And I I love, and this has probably been said to you too, like, oh Anthony, we should have included you in this meeting. Sorry you weren't there, but like this was the decision. Don't you love when you get that? I get brought into a conversation. It's like, oh yeah, we had a meeting, like, should have you should have been there, but we made a decision anyway. And you're just like, what?

SPEAKER_00 23:30

I legit have responded to that before with, oh, that's okay. I guess I'm not needed to work on it then. And uh, oh my gosh, the response was perfect. It's like, it's okay, I have enough work on my plate. Y'all have this covered. And like when they realized they meant I'm not doing this, then suddenly they're like, oh, but we I we need your help. I'm like, well, I mean, did you though? And it really forces them to come to terms and see, I can do this because I am the a-hole who is the most important person at the company, so I can get away with my bad behavior. But it it was

Saying No And Managing Up

SPEAKER_00 24:05

very satisfying, let me tell you.

SPEAKER_02 24:06

That's hilarious. The one big caveat I put around this, it all depends who is making that decision without you. To me, if it's a peer, if it's someone else who has no decision power over me getting promoted, I approach the situation way differently.

SPEAKER_00 24:25

Let's hear it.

SPEAKER_02 24:25

And a lot of the times I go into that and they're like, oh yeah, we made this decision, and like the team is gonna start going down this path. A lot of the times I love just going, no. Because it's just hilarious. Because you the unfortunate part about this is there's a pattern with people, and usually that is not the first time that's happened where someone is trying to make a decision, they don't really know what they're doing, and they've got their bad taste in their mouth for how you reacted last time, and then they try to do it again, and you're just like, No, we're not doing that. We're we're gonna have to go down this path. We already have a and I can tell you from a product management perspective, this happens to me all the time. People will start to come up with product ideas and roadmap ideas, and like, I'm gonna pull the whole team together, like not even on our team, just a random person. I'm gonna pull the whole team together and we get the engineers and we get everybody involved, and we're gonna start talking about this new initiative. And I just responded like, hey, cancel this meeting. Like, if you have something you want to prioritize, bring it to our intake meeting next week and we'll talk to it as a team. We're not spending our valuable engineers and quality assurance engineers time talking about this thing that's not even on the roadmap. But it depends. If it's a leadership, if it's someone high up in leadership, even if they're outside my team, I'm not gonna say no to that. I'm gonna send them a nice note, be like, hey, really just want to kick this meeting off with like, hey, what are your objectives? Why do you think this is more important than X, Y, and Z? And like, how can we help? And so it all just depends on who is coming to you with this.

SPEAKER_00 25:50

Do you feel the same way? I I absolutely feel the same way. Now, I do have a question for you. Got a follow-up question of the question. Six months have gone by. The decision was terrible, by the way. Oh, we're they were in so much trouble. Things are falling apart, Michael. People are on fire, actually. Like we're having to put out fires, the people they're running around. Their hair is burning. It's on fire. It smells terrible. It's just awful. Burning hair. The hair, it's hair dryers. We're selling hair dryers. And uh you're burning people's hairs off. We tried to warn them. We tried to warn them. And now we have a problem, which is our hair dryers burn people's hairs off. What do we do? Do we this is do we go tell Mr. Executive? Because we know it's a mister. Do we go tell them? Told yourself. Is that is that this is the first step?

SPEAKER_02 26:54

This is the fork in the road where you have a decision to make. You can go, you can go gather all the evidence and be prepared to smack it down in their face when they're like, Yeah, here was my plan on how we could have avoided this six months ago. Wham, right on the table.

SPEAKER_00 27:11

Told you everyone's hair was gonna be on fire.

SPEAKER_02 27:14

Yeah. Or taking one step back, you could have said, Hey, no worries, we proactively put a failover over in the system that is going to trigger anytime the heat goes over, X percentage. I know it was scope creep, but we were worried this might happen. So don't worry, it's all good.

SPEAKER_00 27:30

Wow. One of those approaches is like wartime promotion. And one of those approaches is like field marshal.

SPEAKER_02 27:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:41

There's some. I think that is how you have to balance it. If a decision is made and it's out of your control and it's done.

Disagree And Commit With Safeguards

SPEAKER_02 27:50

You're not going to get, you're not going to convince anybody to change their minds, especially when it goes high enough off the chain, especially if your boss tells you, listen, you need to do this, then you have to disagree but commit. Yeah. And by commit, it's how do you do everything in your power to make the situation better while still staying on their timeline and still achieving the goal. And I think that's, I've actually done this in software development before from a product management perspective, where we put a feature flag on because I was like, I think this feature is a really bad idea. So we're going to feature flag the whole feature. And if it starts tanking our NPS scores, we're just going to tell them, hey, no worries, we can turn it off. And it actually happened exactly like that. We launched the thing, wasn't going well the week after. And they're like, hey, we got to do like a release really fast. We got to turn this off. And like we got to adjust a few things. That's going to make it so much better. It's like, hey, no worries at all. We'll just flip the flag. Like we can do that tomorrow. And they're like, you can do that? And you look like a hero.

SPEAKER_00 28:46

You look like a hero. Yeah. And that's exactly what I was hoping you'd say. And listen, you know, at the end of the day, we are much smarter than the execs. I think that is uh just a unspoken fact in corporate is the lower you are in the totem pole, the smarter you are. And you know this is a stupid idea and it's going to break everything. Being able to come in as that hero, like Michael said, that is truly the chip on your shoulder, the I stay employed for four more years. Like people look at that as, oh, we can't do we we can't do anything without Michael. Michael's crucial to everything we do here. Look at how he saved us from this stupid decision that was made at the middle management level. And let me tell you, if you're in middle management, when a bad decision gets made, I promise you you will be the one who feels the wrath of that. That's just yeah. It ain't it ain't the top. The top never takes responsibility because as we established, the dumbest layer. The bottom layer is the smartest layer, and the middle layer doesn't know how to deal. So that's really who's going to face the brunt of the negative attention and finger pointing.

SPEAKER_02 29:56

To be successful in corporate, you have to learn how to react and respond in the most amicable and kind and friendly way you possibly can, even though you might hear the most asinine and ridiculous things come out of people's mouth. If you can handle that with grace, you will succeed in your career. I attribute a lot of my soft skills to why I've done well in corporate is because I'm able to stay calm under pressure, I'm able to stay composed, and I'm able to react to things in a way that people feel like, even though I said no, that they were heard, that they appreciate my consideration for their topic, that you know, we'll be entertaining whatever they wanted to accomplish in the future. And so being that trusted partner and being able to respond in a way to your boss that's like, hey, I'm you know I'm not happy with this decision, but you know I'm going to get it done for you. It will take you far in your career.

SPEAKER_00 30:51

Moving forward, how do we stop this from happening in the future?

SPEAKER_02 30:57

Unfortunately, and I don't know if you have better tips than me, Anthony. Unfortunately, there's no way to avoid this. It happened to me, it happens to me all the time. And the reality is things are gonna happen above your head, things are gonna happen without you being involved, and you're just gonna have to deal and respond. And I don't know that there's a great way, other than establishing your presence and showing that you're the person who knows things and knows how to get them done and that you'll be a good partner. That's how you reduce it because then they're like, Oh, yeah, we can't have this meeting without Anthony. Like, we've got to invite Anthony. And when your boss starts doing that, of like, hey, cancel the meeting. Like, you didn't invite Anthony to this, he's the expert in this. That's when you know, like, yeah, you're doing great on your team and you're gonna get the next promotion. But unfortunately, it still will happen. You know, a lot of corporate is still done on handshake deals and hallway conversations, and you can't be involved in everything.

SPEAKER_00 31:51

I know, I I would say, um, and if you're an IC,

Middle Management Shielding The Team

SPEAKER_00 31:55

it's very hard. But what I what I would suggest, if you're an IC, individual contributor, have a conversation with your manager and say, like, hey, look, you know, we were ready for this and we we had a response. But perhaps in the future, when it comes to planning and making these kind of decisions, we can do some kind of either skip level uh group discussion or something where we're involved in the pre-planning process. Maybe even do a retrospective on where this fell apart. Make it your boss's problem to solve, right? Like don't try and take it on yourself, message the VP and say, hey, I know you screwed up, but don't worry. I've got to fix in the future. Just include me in your meetings. Don't do that. But I do think you could have a conversation with your manager who probably reports to the person who made the bad decision or reports to the person who person made the bad decision and say, like, look, you know, this could have been avoided had we done, you know, a skip level or just a general sort of organizational meeting and discuss this as a group. You know, we are ready this time, but next time, who knows? So I do think pushing that pressure upward and letting your leaders deal with that is a completely reasonable way to go about doing this. Now, if you are a leader and one of your ICs comes to you and says, Hey, y'all kind of messed this up. Can we like be involved next time? It really is on, like I said, middle management. They're gonna take the brunt of it because the bottom, the top is gonna be pointing down saying, why did you mess this up? And the bottom is gonna be pointing up saying, why did you mess this up? It is really your responsibility to facilitate both directions as a middle manager and and like say, Hey, you know, big boss, uh miss VP, I would really like to have my team show up to the next time we do one of these strategic planning meetings. I think they have a lot of insight that can help. Like that is your job, is to facilitate upward for your team. And if they can't be there, pre-plan. Uh, give your team some insight. Like, even if it's, hey, this is top secret, we can't talk about this, be hypothetical. Say, hey, what if the company was gonna go in this direction? What would your guys' immediate response to that be? Ain't no rules in HR saying you can't use hypotheticals. Show me a rule book.

SPEAKER_02 34:04

I like that, right? I like the proactive conversation with the team to start thinking through scenarios when you know you know a little more detail. But you're like, hey guys, I can't tell you everything, but I can tell you there's gonna be an impact uh to our product roadmap or to a decision that's gonna be made. I want to start thinking about what are you guys concerned about? And then that makes you prepared to, as a manager, figure out, okay, how do I say this in the most eloquently? I'm on board, but I'm not happy with the decision way. And I can go to my like you got me thinking as a manager. I can go to that big boss and I can say, when they're like, hey, we didn't invite you in the meeting, but this decision was made, you can then go to them with all that information. You could say, Okay, got it. You know, we'll be prepared to respond and like we we will get this done. Question for you. I gotta pull Carol off of this because she's the only one that can lead it. Are you okay with that? And like, if they're like, Oh, I actually never considered that. Uh, Carol actually needs to keep working on the thing. It's like, okay, well, who's gonna cover this gap? Because Carol's our subject matter expert. You know, can I hire somebody? How are we gonna react to this? And by facilitating that conversation, you're showing I've proactively thought about this scenario. I am prepared to give you options. And I can tell you, I have received responses that I don't want Carol to stop doing what she's doing, and she has to do this. And I've had bosses tell me that before, where I'm just like, but Carol's maxed out. And they're like, I think we need to stretch her for the next role. I've gotten those responses before, and I'm just like, I don't think that's fair to Carol. Exactly. I'm like, we can't overwork Carol. She's got kids, she's got a family, she's going on this vacation in two weeks. Like, I'm not gonna pull her off that vacation. And that's when, as a manager, you have to be the bad guy and probably make yourself look bad in front of that boss to protect your team. You've got to be a shield sometimes, and it sucks.

SPEAKER_00 35:54

Right, because it's either you or Carol at this point. And what would you rather have? Carol leave and now you're still, you know, filling in for Carol, or you take a you take a bad look uh with your boss, but you keep your job and you keep Carol independent and happy. So like it's a very good point.

SPEAKER_02 36:13

And as a manager, if you let your team get bulldozed and you don't protect them for the sake of your own skin, you will not you will not be a good manager. And nobody will want to work with you because they know you will sacrifice them when you know everything they have going on, and you are just doing it for yourself, not for them.

SPEAKER_00 36:31

I I truly believe, and I've never been just a manager, right? Like I'm a I'm a servant leader. I do just as much work as the rest of my team, and I manage my team. And I can't imagine just being a classical, I don't do work, I just manage manager. I I feel like that disconnects you. We've talked about this before in another episode, but like I feel like that disconnects you in a way that will not ever allow you to understand the way your team feels, how they operate, why they're such a good uh team underneath you. Like you just can't understand that if you're not in the trenches digging with them. And sadly, I I feel like a lot of bad decisions made in vacuums happen because those HR managers who don't really know what the team's up to and what the team's doing, go and make a decision in a vacuum with their leader without ever consulting the team or understanding the fundamental why and what behind it.

SPEAKER_02 37:27

Yep, absolutely.

Exit Plans And Ethics Lines

SPEAKER_02 37:29

And if you are an individual contributor who a decision like this is made on your behalf and you're not involved, quit. I think for that's what I was gonna say. I think, well, one, you know, make sure you have another job lined up, but yes, I think it's plan E. You gotta exit at some point. But I think you go the quiet quitting way of just saying, like, okay, got it. Like, uh, but this thing's gonna kind of fall behind. I'll try my best, but you know, I'm only one person, you know, sure, whatever. And like kind of just go with it. And when it fails, it's like, hey, I tried, I told you I was worried about my capacity, like there wasn't much I can do. And yeah, that may end up looking bad for you, but the reality is you're escaping a bad situation. And I think that's what you need to keep in mind of the macro of it, is if that keeps on happening to you and you just keep on accepting it and allowing it, you are allowing that behavior to continue in your company and to you. You cannot be the doormat for people coming to you over and over again and not considering how you feel, your manager not standing up for you. You that means you are in a bad environment, in a bad culture, and you need to pull plan E. Get out of there.

SPEAKER_00 38:32

You know, you never brought up the one thing I expected you to, you know, given your track record and history. Uh, I really thought you were going to tell us that we should take our insider information to the press and leak very early on. Hey, we're building a hairdryer that sets people's hair on fire. And our executive leadership knows this and they don't care. And then give them confidential documents. Like, I mean, that really was the answer I was expecting you to bring up from the start, and you never did. I'm a little disappointed that she didn't go that direction.

SPEAKER_02 39:04

I mean, especially since that's like my history at three different companies. I'm not your master of it, yeah. I mean, to be honest with you, like that has happened. Disgruntled employees do go to the media and they do share how they feel. You see this all the time. Like, meta employee says this about tracking data. And it's like, it's it is true, is you can react that way. I will tell you, you will not be a savior or a martyr to the company or make any real impact if you do that.

SPEAKER_00 39:36

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:36

It it's only bad for you.

SPEAKER_00 39:38

It really is just bad for everybody. Uh, I I mean, I don't want to I don't want to diminish whistleblowers, and I definitely don't want to diminish like actual good leaking and uh concern for concern citizen type situation. Like, hey, actually, you know, Meta is capturing data illegally and selling it to uh nation states so they you know can get information on the citizens that with the country they serve. That's okay. You're allowed to do that. Just be aware they will probably JFK you. But uh, you know, once you, I mean, you know, your name will be in a history book somewhere, I'm sure. Do that, because obviously, you know, we need we need martyrs and we need heroes. But if it's if it's non-consequential and it doesn't impact the lives of others, I mean maybe the hair on fire is a bad example because you actually should stop that. But, you know, if it doesn't tan, you know, if it doesn't like tangibly impact uh the lives of others in a negative way, I would say don't go to the press and leak all of your secrets.

SPEAKER_02 40:40

Yeah, absolutely. It's unfortunately not helpful really to anybody and they're just gonna keep on doing what they're doing and potentially even sue you for employee contracts that you put in place. If you are asked to do something unethical, like go to HR immediately. If you don't agree or don't feel comfortable, do not do it. No matter what anyone tells you. It's like if it sits wrong with you, then it's wrong. It doesn't matter how much it sits wrong with you. It's like don't rationalize it, don't say, well, Anthony's a really nice manager, like I can help him out with it. Don't do that. Go to HR, report it. And then if HR says, I don't care, do it, you have to quit.

SPEAKER_00 41:13

Yeah. Well, and and here's the good news is if you go to HR first and say, hey, we're collecting data illegally and we're selling it to countries and we're breaking all kinds of US law by doing this. You tell HR this, and HR tells you, yeah, I know, go pound sand. Now you actually are within legal jurisdiction to like say, hey, we're breaking the law and go tell people and be protected because you've told HR. So, you know, there are there are actually probably in those scenarios.

SPEAKER_02 41:39

I would probably recommend, sorry to catch you off. I would recommend go to your lawyer first.

SPEAKER_00 41:44

Legal, yes. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 41:46

Go to a legal representative, somebody who, you know, you pay for outside can counsel, have them review your employee agreements, have them have everything and say, hey, listen, this is the meeting I'm going to have. It's on this day, it's at this time. Here's my agenda. I'm worried they are not going to listen to me and they are going to uh react badly to the way I propose this. Am I safe? How do I make sure I have the right documentation? Do I send an email before? Like, what is going to protect me as the employee? And do that all secretly before you go do something big like this, please.

SPEAKER_00 42:19

And and the reason why you want to go to an attorney is because they're gonna have dollar signs in their eyes the second you say, hey, we're this company's doing something wrong and I'm looking to uh fix this course corrects this decision that was made in a vacuum, it's very bad. Uh, they will love to help you because that's that's what you call a slam dunk case, especially if you have data to back it up. So uh if it impacts the lives of others, go to an attorney. That's good advice, Michael's. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 42:46

Yeah, absolutely. But yeah, if it's like an inconsequential, they made a decision and the next three months for you are gonna kind of suck in your job because you're not working on the thing you want to. The reality is if you want to survive in corporate, if your goal is to climb the ladder, you've got to be positively adaptable to whatever situation is thrown at you, even if you disagree. And then you have to find the ways to articulate the information back to them, to tell them the risks, the trade-offs that it's doing, but saying, hey, I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm I'm fully on board. We're gonna get this done on time and on budget how you want. But these are the things that I'm considering. How do you want me to handle? And by putting it back in their court of saying, like, Carol can either work on this or work on that. You then brought them with the foresight of yourself of what the impact will be. So they aren't unexpected, unexpectedly angry at you for, well, Anthony, dropped the ball on this. Like, what happened? It's like, no, no, I told you up front, you chose this thing over that thing. Like, we we had that discussion. You're protecting yourself, you're protecting your team, and you're looking like a thoughtful leader because you put the foresight into this conversation and you helped.

SPEAKER_00 43:45

And that's the that's the way it should be. Great job, Michael. I think you did it again.

SPEAKER_02 43:50

It's hard though. You solved it. Anthony, it's difficult. You saw my face. Like, I've had that many times, and like working with a boss for long enough, they know your reaction. To things and they could tell when you don't agree. They'll be like, I know you're not gonna like this. And then you they say it and you're just like, Yeah, but hey, I'm gonna figure it out with you. Like, we're gonna get it done.

SPEAKER_00 44:10

For for all of our audio listeners, this is not gonna mean anything. But if you're watching on YouTube, which you should uh check out our YouTube channel, just give them one of these. Trust me, gets the point across. That way it doesn't show up on the recording. It's just like, oh, he gave me up. Oh. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 44:30

Uh well, great time, it was a lot of fun. Hey, it hit home. It hit home for me because I've been on the receiving end of the way too many times as a manager, as a leader, as an individual, and it's not fun for anybody. But I think these are the practical tips, depending on what your goals are. If you're willing to sabotage your career and like stand up for what you believe in and protect your people, by all means do that. But I can't tell you if your goal is to climb the ladder. You have to be positively adaptable to anything that's thrown at you and act like you're on board.

SPEAKER_00 44:56

You know what's funny?

SPEAKER_02 44:59

What's that?

SPEAKER_00 45:00

Never happened to me. Not even once, certainly not right now. Um, didn't bring it up because I was thinking about it or anything. Just like, oh, you know, we should talk about this. Like, honestly, never happened in my life. So just thought, you know, good topic. It's a you problem, really. Like it's something you would deal with. Yeah, I don't it's I don't have those kind of problems ever.

SPEAKER_02 45:17

Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely something that we had a conversation about, and you you gleaned it from my conversation, from my personal situation. By no means did you bring this up today because you were feeling it personally.

SPEAKER_00 45:27

Never, and I never have either. So, you know, just let the record show for all the lawyers out there.

Discord And Patreon Chaos Closing

SPEAKER_00 45:33

Speaking of uh, if you're a lawyer, uh, we would love to have you in our Discord. Uh, it's a great place to hang out, talk law, have all them legal eagles get in there and get nerdy. And hey, if you're not a lawyer, guess what? We have a Discord full of them. So if you want free legal advice, join our Discord. You can do that by checking the show notes. Uh, if you're on YouTube, it's in the description. If you're on a podcast player, cool, it's in the description. So you've got options, but please join. Great conversations, tons of free legal advice. Like I said, like you're missing out if you're not in there. It's so much better than having a real lawyer. Check it out. What else can they do, Mike?

SPEAKER_02 46:09

Well, if you usually skip our banter at the very beginning, and this time you really missed out if you did that, because we gave some really sound financial advice and investment advice. And by all means, we want you to dump all the money into the strategies that we talked about for the first five minutes of this podcast. So please do free legal advice, free investment advice. You will become a millionaire, you will be legally protected in doing it, and it will be easy, quick, and free. Click the link down below, join our Discord.

SPEAKER_00 46:34

Join our Discord. Uh, hey, join our Patreon because we're giving you all of this free legal and financial advice and corporate advice. I mean, why not? Let's throw that in there too. We might have done that a little bit. You should join our Discord, you should give us money. And by giving us money, you'll feel good about yourself. Trust me, I give money. I feel good about myself. You should do the same. It's it's better than therapy, it's better than drugs. Join our Patreon today. You'll get free content that's paid for by you. So, what's not to love?

SPEAKER_02 47:03

What is not to love? Share with your friends too. Uh, share if you share with three friends, we'll give you $10, but all your three friends have to pay $10 to us first. So that is how this works. It's just think about all the money you can be raking in by building people underneath you. And I guess what? Guess what, Anthony? It gets even better. Tell me about it. If you are a friend of a person who recruited you, and then you recruit another three friends who all give ten dollars, that person will get five and you'll get a kickback of five as well. I love that.

SPEAKER_00 47:35

But Michael, uh, I keep telling my friends to listen to corporate strategy and give money, and they say, nah, not for me. Well, we have the solution for you. If you sign up today for our Patreon, the $10 tier, we will send you a one-of-a-kind VHS tape that if you put into their VHS player, it will summon a Japanese ghost that will kill them in seven days if they don't show the tape to one of their friends. I'm telling you, this is a deal of a lifetime. You do not want to miss out on this. Join the Discord, join the Patreon, Corporategy forever.

SPEAKER_01 48:09

1-800 Corp Strat. Remember that. 1-800 corp Strat.

SPEAKER_00 48:13

Corp Strat. Remember, if when the rats are fleeing the ship, 1-800 corpstrat got you quick. All right. So there you go. That's that's there's, I mean, we're just giving deals away. Free legal advice, free financial advice, free corporate advice, free Discord, free VHS tape for $10 a month. Uh sign up today. Sign up today.

SPEAKER_02 48:35

Sign up today.

SPEAKER_00 48:36

And if you don't sign up, we will see you next time on another episode of Corporate Strategy. As always, I'm Anthony.

SPEAKER_02 48:46

And I'm Michael.

SPEAKER_00 48:48

And you have seven days to send that tape to the next person to watch it. I'm not kidding. It is dangerous, like really dangerous.