The Breath Hold Cold Open

SPEAKER_01 0:17

I'm running out of breath.

SPEAKER_00 0:23

I wanted to see how long you'd go.

SPEAKER_01 0:27

I was starting to get scared. I'm not gonna lie to you. I was starting to get a little scared.

SPEAKER_00 0:31

The theme song ended 10 minutes ago.

SPEAKER_01 0:33

That was good to know.

SPEAKER_00 0:35

That was a test. I wanted to see how long you'd hold your breath.

SPEAKER_01 0:37

So congratulations, you've I thought you were just hitting the button over and over again. I was really concerned that something wasn't gonna happen.

SPEAKER_00 0:44

No, I just wanted to see. I wanted to see what would happen. I I'm you know, a malicious, I'm a malicious little sprite that just lives to pull pranks on you.

SPEAKER_01 0:55

You know, that's you're the worst kind of person. You know, the person that just plans and figures out how can I cause them pain? Yeah, how can I get a reaction from them? You know, you know, you know what I'm talking about.

SPEAKER_00 1:08

I mean the biggest waste of my skill set truly in my job. I'm a big believer uh in subverting expectations. I like to surprise people. I love the act of like giving you the old, hey, you think I'm going this way, but I'm going that way. Because I like that myself. I love being surprised. There's nothing I love more. Uh, there's a there's a genre of like films, books, games. It's called uh secret love craft. It's where like three-quarters of the way through the story you realize, oh, actually it's a it's a love craft story all along. We gotcha. We gotcha. You thought it was this, but it is actually this. Like um, well, I can't really I can't list things that are secret love because that spoils the surprise. But there are there are things. Um, there are things. I'll list an old Does it end abruptly? I think the thing crash. No, it just does it crash at the end, or it continues the story. Let's just let's just pretend that you're you know watching some kind of police procedural, and it's a very standard police mystery procedural, and you're like, oh, who is the murderer? Who could they be? But then like six episodes in, turns out they're actually following the king in yellow, and it's a whole secret log graph. Yay! Elder Torer. But like, I I love any time, any kind of media.

SPEAKER_01 2:28

I don't understand a word you're telling me right now. I don't I don't even understand what you're talking about. It does show a little bit of media illiteracy, just a little bit, but uh it's just like a thing that like I mean, I know the classic, like one, two, the the little switcheroo that happened. The twist like, oh, that was so unexpected. The twist. Yeah, but I have no idea what you're talking about with secret love craft.

SPEAKER_00 2:54

I mean, it's it's it's just secret love craft is a type of twist. Basically,

Why Surprises Feel So Good

SPEAKER_00 3:00

I and here's the thing like I I do enjoy a twist, but it's gotta be good, right? Like it has to be really well constructed and conceived. There's some really good ones. I can't list them because they're spoilers. I mean, uh, classic is actually the curious case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, which at this point everyone knows. But if you read that short story, um, or the novella, excuse me, you it it it actually presents it as like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde are two different people. Like, you don't know until you know, oh, whoa, that's the reveal. Like, I love that. I love any time you can surprise a reader, you can like you can fool them, give them the old I fooled you. I love getting fooled, love uh, love a good surprise. That's my favorite. So I myself try to push this onto other people with the things that I do.

SPEAKER_01 3:50

Fair enough. I I think I understand it now, but I think I'm struggling with one core component of this. It's like fight club. Like you don't talk about fight club. Yeah. So how do you know it's a love crowd? How do you find a list or a niche or a genre of these things without giving away that it is?

SPEAKER_00 4:08

You must watch broadly, you must read breadth, you must find, seek out, and and search for. Uh, there are usually telltale signs, uh, I will say, like when you think you're you're leaning into some media that might surprise you. Um, certain creators, right? Like I there are certain directors and writers and game designers that just naturally sort of do this kind of thing more. So you follow them because you never know if they're going to surprise you. Sometimes they don't. And that's that's a surprise in itself, is when I expected a surprise and there wasn't one. The surprise was there was no surprise. It's just like I think it makes it makes things interesting. And it also, I don't know, it feels like life is that way, right? Like you're always expecting one thing, and then the other thing happens. And it I feel like the media that you know that really embodies this is a is a great refraction, reflection of life. You could never expect the unexpected, which is such an obvious statement, but it is true. And I think this this kind of uh material prepares us to expect the unexpected ergo vis-a-vis concordantly. That's why I do it, is to help you be ready for the unexpected.

SPEAKER_01 5:22

Yeah. You know, you had me thinking

Secret Lovecraft And The Twist

SPEAKER_01 5:25

about you have me thinking about like work and like where does this happen? Do people actually do this? Oh, yeah. So beyond just you, the the unique human being that you are, Anthony. Beyond you, how does this happen in the workplace? I'm thinking about like, imagine in the sharehold, oh, this would be so fun. Imagine you're doing a shareholder report for your your publicly traded company, and you're like, oh, this quarter has been just so bad. Like, we're really gonna have to like do a major layoff, like you're doing your whole earnings report, and then halfway through you're like, psych, we're getting better than ever.

SPEAKER_00 5:58

See, but that's like that's a trick. I don't think that is that's not a subversion of an expectation, right? Like, that's just give me some examples. That's a mean prank. Um, I think actually a great one in in recent history is an advertisement that Anthropic put out that I actually saw in a movie theater of all places. Uh it was a it was a student, it was it was a college professor talking to his class, and the student comes up to him afterwards and basically he tells her, like, hey, I was looking at your report, and you know, he's kind of talking the way like chat, like, hey, I would you know, like, if you really want to break into the next ground, you have to do this. But then, like halfway through his his response, he just goes straight into an ad for like a jewelry store or something. Oh, I think that's like, oh, that's such a good ad. Like it was a good twist because you kind of feel like he's kind of talking like a chat bot, yeah, which is you know, maybe that's a commentary on college professor, but then it's like he goes into the ad, and then you realize it's an anthropic ad talking about how AI is gonna start serving you ads to can you trust it? I'm like, that's really good because it subverted my expectations of what I thought was going to be the message here, but that wasn't the message, the message was something else. Um, I think it's a great example of advertising. I think I like that in the workplace, also that one is really good.

SPEAKER_01 7:15

I actually I really appreciated that one because one, it just was a direct point like we're not doing what they're doing, which I also loved. So, like I love when companies hopefully they stick to it because if they ever do an ad in their platform when you're in the middle of chat, like egg on their face, they're going to crash and run. But by doing that, they're kind of making a company promise to say we're not going to do this. And I hope they stick to that.

SPEAKER_00 7:41

I mean, I don't know if you've kept up with the whole uh PlayStation

Ads That Flip The Message

SPEAKER_00 7:45

uh absolute travesty that is happening right now. Have you seen any of this? I have not. So Sony, I mean we might have even talked about this a little bit. Sony basically announced the PlayStation 6 uh will not have discs and they're gonna stop producing discs for the PlayStation 5, I think at the end of next year. And it's just caused absolute uh hatred, vitriol, and vile to be thrown their way, appropriately so. I think it's a terrible move on their part. Um oh yeah, terrible. Everything's digital. I'm a digital only person, and I'm telling you, like this is bad for this is bad for digital only people because it's one less place to buy and sell goods, which means digital prices will go up. And it also means that uh if for whatever reason I lose access to the digital thing, maybe I could go to the library, I could go to GameStop, I could go somewhere and buy a disc and then have a copy of that thing that I've lost the license to. That's gone now. But truly egg on face, I bring this up because Sony put out a video about seven years ago, eight years ago. Uh, it was their, I think it was their CTO and some other guy at the time. Right after Microsoft announced for their new Xbox Series X, there would be no disk drive. Sony put out this video of two of their execs holding a PlayStation disc, and they're like, here's how you share a disc on PlayStation 5. And it he hands the CD to the other exec. He's like, thanks. And that's the entire video. It's 30 seconds long, but it was so powerful of an ad because it just spit in the face of Microsoft and their stupid decision to remove a disc. And for them to do this now, it's just like, y'all, internet's written in ink. We could see your history here. Like, do you not see? So I really hope my secret hope is Microsoft. I mean, you weren't talking about subverting expectations. Microsoft should remake that video, right? And do it with the new Xbox. 100%. And how insulting would that be back to Sony? But you know, it's that's good marketing, right? That's how you recapture an audience that kind of fell off your platform. So I don't know. There's a lot, I think there's a lot of good examples of surprises and uh unexpected ways. It's harder to do like in corporate. I don't know, you don't really want to be the surprise. I mean, I guess like one thing, you know, if you get a surprise raise or promotion, you don't expect, but uh that's all right. For the most part, you kind of want to give uh a roadmap of plan and expectation rather than hey, surprise, there's more things for you.

SPEAKER_01 10:18

Hey Anthony, uh, this is your quarterly performance report. You've been absolutely crushing it. I can't wait to give you this big bonus at the end of the quarter. Just kidding, you suck. You're getting on a pip, son.

SPEAKER_00 10:33

See that just a mean, cruel trick. Everything I like, the surprise always feels good. A trick is just I mean, that's juvenile. It's it's unconstructive and juvenile. It requires little pretty funny. Is that an HR is funny? It'd be devastating. You'd probably get beat up. You'd get beat up. You want to know how to be justified.

SPEAKER_01 10:59

You want to know how to get a workplace harassment that you have claim put against you? Do that. Do that to one of your employees. Oh, I'm sorry I went there. I just it came to mind, I just couldn't get out of my head of that situation happening and like how it would end for the manager.

SPEAKER_00 11:18

Uh, I do have to make a correction as I've been I've been corrected in the chat. It was 12 years ago in the PlayStation 4, which I don't know what time is anymore. Uh, that makes me feel like too many years have passed since I saw that video, which feels like it was five years ago. So something.

SPEAKER_01 11:35

You know what's nuts too is like by doing that as a company, you have to put in your 10 commandments of the company to never go against that. Like you've just made a permanent product decision to say we will always support discs for the rest of time. Yes, and the fact that they went back on that is insane. Like, if you make a bold claim like that, you better stick by it.

SPEAKER_00 11:56

It's it's kind of wild to me because I think we see this a lot. It's not just with like physical media, although physical media is coming back in a huge way, and this just feels completely off market based on the uptick in book sales, in manga sales, in Blu-ray sales, like all of this stuff is going up, like vinyl. People are buying vinyl at numbers that I've they've never bought before. Like it's just it's very weird to ditch this based on market trend. But again, I don't work there, not my problem. You can hire me if you'd like, and I can I can solve this problem very easily for you. You keep producing discs. Um, you just do it in limited batches. You make you make discs like an exclusive thing, it'll drive up the price of the disc, it'll be they'll become more collectible. You can sell them for more and make more money because people who want them will buy them. Like, look at me. Look at me solving your problem, making you more money. I am not available to be hired unless you want to offer me a lot of money, in which case I am. There's always a price. There's always a price. Everyone's got a price in mind's pick. Uh it's just to your point, like I don't know. It it feels like today companies have no scruples whatsoever. And it's like if if five years ago Albert said, We're gonna sell the best shoes you've ever worn in your life, made of recon recycled material. Now now we're an AI company and we destroy the planet. Like, it just doesn't matter. Companies do not matter, they have no morals, they have no scruples, uh, they're hypocritical. Like, you can't trust them. You certainly can't trust them. Best thing you can do, know where they are, just know where they are located around you. Just, you know, in case there's ever some kind of uprising, you're ready. You know, you know what I'm saying? Like you're ready, and you know, you know what I love. Understand, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:45

You know what I love? I love the commercials that are just like the local homegrown. They're always gonna stick by their morals, they're gonna use the same catchphrase, and it's never going to change. And one of those, we all know it. If you didn't buy direct, you paid too much. But that dude, that dude gets on the commercial, it's the same commercial every time, but he does it unique. 30 years, and like his like eye is like falling out of its socket. And he's like, Peter, you didn't buy direct, you paid too much. And I'm gonna let you know. Don't say that. I'm just saying, like, that dude is sticking with the message, he is sticking with what he believes, and he's gonna do it rain or shine. And that is what I love in a company.

SPEAKER_00 14:32

Do you know what that is, though? That's human investment. That's human investment, right? Like that dude owns that company, he will probably pass it on to his children who are also in those advertisements. There is care and love for the business, and it's like I hate to say like care and love in business in the same sentence because it just feels so I don't know, monetarily weird. But like the mom and pop shops, they exist for one reason. They exist because they believe they are able to offer a business or a service or a product or something that they care about that they want to serve to their community at a price they think is fair, uh, and that's their business operating model. The issue is the second you become a corporation with shareholders and executives and boards, it doesn't matter anymore. All that matters is next quarter and your scruples go out the window. Like you would never see appliance direct as a big corporation because hold on.

SPEAKER_01 15:37

I'm gonna I'm gonna throw, I'm gonna pull a whole entire exactly what we talked about, a switch of room. You gotta switch a room, appliance direct. Their long-term strategy is they're going to populate the world with these appliances. And guess what? AI can run on that hardware in there. No way, and they're gonna switch to be an AI and then boom, take over the world, just like that. Appliance direct is building many data centers and all of our homes. That's great. That's great. Or every single one is a transformable robot, and at the moment he decides to snap his fingers, we're done.

SPEAKER_00 16:10

You know, the pursuit of wealth is really the issue in all of this, is I can't be satisfied unless I'm a hundred millionaire, right? Like, I can't just be comfortable and have enough money to live the rest of my life. I have to live like a pharaoh in ancient Egypt. Otherwise, are you really making it if you don't have a yacht in Miami? Uh what kind of peasantry are you? Like, if we were all just comfortable being comfortable and not pursuing disgustingly growth amount the gross amounts of money that you can't spend in your lifetime, I don't think we'd have any of these problems. You the the the PlayStation would continue to have discs. The the the the Samsung and Google phones did have headphone jacks, because who cares? It costs 15 extra cents a thing. 15 cents is nothing, but it is everything when you're trying to get that next big million dollar bonus so you can compete with your little millionaire buddies. Like it's just disgusting in principle because it means nothing to to nobody except for like the world's most petty people, they're just the most petty people on the planet. And meanwhile, the rest of us are just like, hey, I liked I liked the headphone jack. Uh, you know, I did like having the option to buy a disc. That was nice. I guess the company doesn't care about me. They don't. In fact, if you dropped dead, the company would not care. They would spit on your bones and and then burn your grave. That's that's what every company thinks about you. Just, you know, throwing it out there.

SPEAKER_01 17:39

I think the moral of the story is if you didn't buy direct, you pay too much.

SPEAKER_00 17:43

You pay too much. You pay too much.

SPEAKER_01 17:48

Not sponsored, by the way.

SPEAKER_00 17:50

Not sponsored, but might as well be.

SPEAKER_01 17:52

I would love to be sponsored.

SPEAKER_00 17:54

Here's your mission. Go find that guy, get him on here. Reach out. I'm sure he has some kind of uh on Steam.

SPEAKER_01 18:09

Yeah, no, no, he doesn't. No, you call his number, it's going right to his phone, it's picking up night or day. That's his personal self.

SPEAKER_00 18:15

Yeah, okay. Well, get him on here.

SPEAKER_01 18:17

Get him on here. He's a stake. You want to just direct call him from Discord? You know, find his account, just direct call. He might phone in.

SPEAKER_00 18:25

You know, like the appliance direct showroom. That place is has a portal to the backrooms in it. Just FYI. Like be careful going in there. You will end up in the back rooms.

SPEAKER_01 18:36

I need to see that movie. That's that's one of the next ones on the list.

SPEAKER_00 18:39

You need to see it. It's so good. It's so good.

SPEAKER_01 18:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:42

See Spider-Man yet?

SPEAKER_01 18:44

Oh, yeah, we saw that this week.

SPEAKER_00 18:45

That was good. It's good.

SPEAKER_01 18:47

I liked it a lot. It felt like old school Spider-Man, which I which I appreciated. I like Spider-Man. It was a lot of fun.

SPEAKER_00 18:53

Yeah. Yeah. It's a good series. He does whatever a spider can. Can you imagine if Spider-Man's like, you know, actually, I'm done uh being a superhero and helping people. I'm just gonna produce web and sell it online because the silk, you know, we can take this. The web that I produce actually is worth more than me saving lives in the street. So Spider-Man's incorporating uh web web shooters, Inc. eh, F all y'all New Yorkers. I'm I'm just selling web. Like, we would be furious if Spider-Man did that, but somehow it's okay when the billionaires do it. I'm just throwing it out there, like, you know, there's a little bit of hypocrisy uh in the way we look at things, but you know.

SPEAKER_01 19:30

You know, the economics were not explained to me in this movie. No, does he have I mean this is his job? How did he earn money? You know, he didn't work a day job.

SPEAKER_00 19:41

Where does he get his money?

SPEAKER_01 19:42

I'm just saying something to think about. Where did he get his money from? I mean, sure, he was living in like a rat nest, you know, he was living in a rat nest, yeah. But he also had crazy. I mean, he was in he was fabricating his own tech, but the man had to eat. Where's the money coming from? Yeah, where is money coming from?

SPEAKER_00 19:58

Where is money coming from?

SPEAKER_01 19:59

I mean, I'm just saying, you know, I had a still stretch of the podcast that could have been an email. Uh Bruce.

SPEAKER_00 20:04

Uh Bruce, who the hell? I'm Clark. Uh, you know, you know, it's it's it, I think that's all good, by the way. It it always feels good to go back to the old names. Uh, the old blood. I think Iron Man probably set him up with a little bit of a will, you know, like because he was kind of his pseudo dad. I feel like that money, he's like, hey, you'll never want, I gotta trust in your name. You get like two grand a month. You'll be able to survive in New York City with two grand a month, no problem. Got you, got you, kid. Because I bet you Iron Man, another out-of-touch billionaire, just has no idea. You ask that dude how much a banana costs, he's probably like what, like 30 bucks? 30 bucks for a banana?

SPEAKER_01 20:45

I was gonna say the irony of everything we just talked about is Spider-Man's actually a secret billionaire and he just saves crime but doesn't like solve the major hunger crises and everything else in the world. Yes, yes, you know, as does whatever.

How Much Detail Is Enough

SPEAKER_01 21:02

Do you want to talk corporate stuff? I guess I'm gonna do it. I need to use your brain, I need to get your thoughts, I need to get your experience. Okay. Um, oh, also a quick side note before we jump into this. I watched some some re-story streams, somebody actually like repairing the little electronics on YouTube. Oh, yeah, dude, it was so good. It just looks like but it's funny. I don't want to play it, I just want to watch it. Is that weird?

SPEAKER_00 21:28

That is very weird. You're you're part of that group, but I think it's very weird. Yeah. No, I think less of you.

SPEAKER_01 21:33

I think that's me.

SPEAKER_00 21:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:35

Oh, okay, good. Well, anyways, back to uh corporate topics. What do you want? What do you want to help with? Hear me out. I have been thinking a lot about how do you get the right level of detail when you are asked to do a project, to put together a report, to Send an email of a synopsis of a root cause analysis. How do you balance the level of detail? And the reason I ask is because obviously now, you know, I'm uh I run my own company. So a lot of my work is like, I have to try to overexceed their expectations. Thanks, Apple, for throwing the thumbs up. I have to try to exceed their expectations while also making sure that they understand I hit the core things they were hoping for if I'm pitching for a new project or something like that. But I also thought back to my time at Universal, where I my life was putting together like decks and understanding the end audience that is going to be seeing these. But I think a lot of the extra detail came from the middle layer of people I had to get approvals from versus what was actually needed at the end. And so I thought we'd pick your brain, Andrew. Yeah, we'd we'd open it up, we'd we'd see how do you balance this? How do you do it?

SPEAKER_00 22:57

Very easy, Michael. Very easy. If I'm talking down, if I'm talking to someone who's uh hierarchically under me, I don't believe in hierarchies, but we know what I'm saying. The individual contributors. Talking to an individual contributor, I just ask them because they're gonna tell me and it's gonna be really obvious and simple. They're gonna give me every detail I need because they know their stuff. And if it's if I'm trying to do some like crosswork with a couple of different individual contributors, I just ask them. I just ask them. It's that simple. If I'm going up, I will create a PowerPoint presentation that gives them three different ideas, one of which that I've made intentionally terrible. Uh always put that one in the middle, and I will let them choose what they want. Because let's be real, they have no freaking clue. And they've they've got an eye, they've got to quote uh the concepts of an idea, but they don't actually have any idea on how to execute it, despite the name uh, you know, executive. Uh that's usually how it goes. If I'm working with someone, you're a feedback guy.

SPEAKER_01 24:02

Yeah, you want that quick feedback. You're like, hey, put together some concepts, which one's hitting the mark?

SPEAKER_00 24:07

Well, it's not even it's not even feedback. I know they don't have good feedback. So what I need to do is basically present them with three different things, make them think it's their idea, get them to really dump on one so they like one or the other, and then I might be able to proceed. Because it's it's all reverse psychology. They didn't get there because they were smart, they got there because they had money. So I'm just I'm just playing the game to get ahead of the frustration I'm going to experience. Because I've actually sat down and said, hey, what do you want to accomplish? What's the general goal here? They got no idea. The goal is to make money, and they don't really have an exit uh an executive strategy or tactical strategy on how to do it.

SPEAKER_01 24:44

Yeah. Yeah, it's it's always so tough, especially when you're you're bidding, let's say, on a on an RFP or something like that. Like for me, we get projects, and what's nice about an RFP or an RFI is like they have a very defined set of criteria that they've given you. And so it kind of forces like that process when you're building one of those, I've been on both sides, it's laborious. But the nice thing is, is it makes it fair for the vendors to have the right level of detail. But when you're in an organization or you know people or your the stakes aren't that high, or it's not like an RFI, you don't really know like what level of detail they're looking for. So, to your point, the executive comes to you, they give you like one sentence. They're like, Yeah, I really need to articulate uh this friction point in our product to the customer to our executives. Like, can you help me do that? And you're like, Yeah, sure. And then your brain just has to like cycle through did they want it in PowerPoint? Did they want a document? Did they just want an email? And so you're kind of left with more questions on like, unless it's a standard process, right? You're like, this is a new creative thing. How do I meet and achieve what they were hoping for while also not killing myself and spending a bunch of time doing and spending wasted efforts? Because you've been there, I've been there. I to a very high executive at Universal. We had an issue with our mobile app that my team introduced, and they asked me, like, hey, can you put together like a synopsis of what happened? I'm gonna email it out to all the big bosses just to make sure they understand the impact. I'm like, yeah, sure. I spent a day crafting an email because I'm like, I want to make sure it has all the details, I want to make sure it's clear, it's concise. And I put like 10 paragraphs in that thing, but it was nicely broken down. There was a table, it was it was beautiful. I get a response back, okay, thanks. Then sent a note out to everybody, BCC on me, to say, hey, sorry, we messed up. The impact's minimal, you're good. That's what he sent out to everybody. You didn't give them a choice, and that's the problem. Yeah, yeah. I be I mean, like, but why do you think that happened? Like, why do you think did they actually need all that information? Did they not? Did they read it and then understand uh the impact didn't really matter? So I'm just gonna send out a note. It's tough.

SPEAKER_00 26:57

You gotta know, you gotta know the executive audience, which like treat them like a baby, right? And and truly, they do want a choice at the end of the day. Executives do not want to be told what to do. That's why they're executives. There's a little bit of narcissism, Machiavellianism, like there are megalomania, like there are traits that are exclusively for the executive. And sadly, like you will never be able to tell them this is the right path, this is the right play. You have to give them choice, they have to feel like I'm the one who is deciding what we're doing. The trick is to convince them that the best idea is the best idea. You gave them everything, which is terrible. You never do that. What you need to do is give them little tastes, help them get there themselves, and then they'll feel like they did the work and to pat themselves on the back because that's what executives do. Like if you give if like you could give them the perfect thing and they would reject you outright because they don't feel like they have skin in that game. It's I'm telling you, give the people it's a psychological profile.

SPEAKER_01 28:07

You gotta give the people, you gotta give the people the tips on how you do that, where you are also not going to have them lose confidence because you did not like let's say they expected a level of detail and you brought them

Three Options And Hidden Appendix

SPEAKER_01 28:20

like a rough draft. How do you set the right expectations? Like, Anthony, like, dude, I wanted like a whole detailed report. You gave me three bullets.

SPEAKER_00 28:28

Build more than you plan to show. That's one thing. Like, uh, when you do build your presentation, build way more than you plan to show. Have slides with graphs, details, whatever the extraneous information is that you don't think is worth sharing, put that in additional slides. So if they ask that question or if they want to get in that conversation, you can jump to it. Never show that slide willingly. Only go there if like the conversation turns data driven, or they're actually interested in some of the how the sausage got made, then you need that. But I would not suggest showing your entire presentation. Instead, hit I I think three is perfect. Three choices. When you give them two choices, it just feels like good and bad. When you give them three choices, it really feels like they're making a meaningful decision because it's like, well, I'm rejecting two things. So that means the thing I'm picking is definitely the best of the bunch. Make sure when you present those choices, you are brief, but you give data and enough information to get to the point across. Never make it obvious that one of them is the bad choice, but always include a very bad choice, right? And you could even say that like this is not my recommended approach, but I wanted to include it just as an option. This is what other uh individu or other businesses are doing. I think we can do better. You can lead with that. But uh again, you're you're playing, you're basically playing like emotional badminton with uh, you know, someone who has the the uh emotional equivalent of a two-year-old. They might have a high IQ but very low EQ. So you really want to get them thinking intelligently about the decision, speak intelligently, and understand that they are not going to be empathetic or sympathetic with you. Uh it that's just the way the game works.

SPEAKER_01 30:24

I I like these tips. So if I had to summarize, I guess, what you said as well. It's if you're asked to produce something or to provide something with an ambiguous amount of detail and you're unsure of the format, start with how thinking about how you get the feedback fast, but how you structure in a way so that they don't lose confidence in your approach. And so, like a great example would be okay, I was asked to provide this or to build this slide for this presentation. So I'm going to send a note that clearly says, draft, just wanted to get your thoughts. Or I'm going to put a 15-minute meeting and say, hey, just want to run you through three options and then leverage, you know, a mechanism that we talked about as like a manager if when you're managing your people, is like a one-three-one approach of saying, here's what my objective was as I understood it from you. Here are three options of how I would present this data and my recommendation. So that's my one at the end. So one problem, I clarify the problem, make sure I understood it right. Because then if they tell you, oh no, that's not exactly what I was thinking. I actually think it was as like, okay, I'm so happy you told me that. I'm gonna leave this meeting now and I'm gonna go work on the thing because I went in the wrong direction. But that's not a bad thing to say. That's being respectful of their time.

SPEAKER_00 31:38

So I think that approach should work. Yeah, I think there's another, there's another layer to this too, which is they never want to be positioned as the one who messed up, right? So, like, because they never mess up, they're perfect human beings, angels falling from the sky. If you put them in a position where they would have to admit they did not give you enough information or they failed to get the point across, they won't say it. Because again, like they don't want to be accountable or responsible for failure. They're sociopaths. So you can build around that. The reason why I like the one, three, one, I think the one and the three are the important part, the problem and the three solutions. I don't like going with the recommended because again, it's their decision at the end of the day. I like saying, hey, this one has the least amount of backing, in my opinion. I think they're all workable, but this one's my least favorite. Let them pick the favorite because it again, it gives them that like that psychological high of I'm doing my job as a decision maker. I'm making decisions. They might even pick the bad one in spite of you, but that's not your problem to solve. Yeah, your job is just to go off and give them the the options at the end of the day. And I do realize I'm a very jaded and cynical person, but if I haven't lived this for like the last 17 years of my life in corporate and seen it happen and have now mastered this skill set, I wouldn't be saying it. 100%.

SPEAKER_01 33:05

Yeah, it's it's so hard to play the psychological game, but you have to leverage your soft skills and understand their motives behind it. And sometimes you got to flex the brown noser a little bit to be like, yeah, and I remember we had this conversation. I really like the way you formatted this slide. So I tried to do the same thing because that makes them feel good. They're like, oh, they listen. They're telling me they like something that I did, they took inspiration from that. Obviously, this is the right choice, and so I think that's another really good way if you know the person to be able to, you know, try to provide something they're gonna be happy with every time.

SPEAKER_00 33:40

Callbacks to things they've done, yeah, like Michael just suggested. Huge, huge. Hey, this one I actually based around uh something you've done before that I thought was really effective. Yeah. Oh, you're gonna you're gonna sparkle in their eyes because you just stroked every uh inch of their ego, which is what they live for.

SPEAKER_01 34:01

Absolutely. Yeah, we have some thoughts in the chat. People were already saying the one three one, so I love that. That people are already like, oh yeah, we know the one three one. That's a great tip. Another thing was uh talking about um having like a lot of appendix slides or like a live slide deck where they can see like exposing your cards a little bit to be like, hey, here's the live slide deck. There's a lot in there, but like a lot of the details in the appendix. I pulled up the main slides, but if you think we need something more detailed, you have an option. It's in the appendix. What do you think? And so you give them, like you said, the optionality to choose which level of detail do you want. Um, I think the hardest thing I'm really struggling with this is how do you not spend just so much time cycling through this? I mean, you sure you can prepare and and you can have quick, I think the quick meetings are the trick. It's quick notes here and there. If you guys have Teams or Slack or whatever, it's like just sending them a quick note. Hey, here's directionally where OF's thinking. Am I on the right track? If you can get feedback like that, that is the best way to ensure you're gonna hit the mark.

SPEAKER_00 35:04

It also gets sometimes you don't get that. Yeah, no, I I sometimes you don't get that then. The meeting is really for the decision making. Yeah, the information gathering phase, that's for email and Slack. Um, you could do an individual chat like a one-on-one or get a group together to do a little bit of discovery. The risk with that is and maybe this is just me. I find when you get decision makers in a room and ask them questions verbally, they tend to dance around it because they don't want to be responsible for a bad idea, right? Like it's very nebulous. So

Getting Fast Feedback Without Pain

SPEAKER_00 35:45

you have to then go to them offline in writing and ask them questions. Now, sometimes they're smart enough, they know like I'm not gonna respond to this in writing, that makes me responsible for the bad idea. Um, but I do, I I think if you can get it in email, if you can get it in Teams, and again, uh this is something this is something that uh if you ever want to do engagement bait on YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitter, anything, if you ever really want to get engagement on something, throw out a wrong idea intentionally. Say the wrong thing, because there is nothing, there is nothing an intelligent human loves more than telling someone they're wrong. Uh so you might intentionally know, hey, here's the here's the solution I found for this approach. Send it over, send like the slide over in a Slack message, knowing this is a hundred percent the wrong thing. But what it will do, and this does require a little bit of prep and planning, send them the wrong thing that forces you to them to tell you what the right thing is, because they would love to correct you. Oh, they dream about correcting you in their sleep. They're gonna feel so good after they do it, they're gonna be like, oh, I got to correct that individual contributor today, and it felt so good. Do my job because I am an executive. They live for it. So if you throw out a wrong thing, they will respond with what you are actually looking for.

SPEAKER_01 37:05

I think this is such a careful balance, though, to ensure you don't make yourself look bad. But I think there's ways that you can phrase it to stay in the good graces and ensure that you're you're also making yourself look good. So for example, you could say, Hey, uh, I think this was the set I was looking at. It was like two percent, you know, of our users actually use this product. But I remember you saying sometime that this was used very well. Like, what do you think the percentage is? Or do you have any other data? Or like is and so if you phrase it that way of like pointing it back to them to say, like, but I remember something you said that contradicts my bad idea, it then makes you look good because you're listening, you're pointing it back to them and saying, I heard you, Anthony, when you said this. Can you please correct me?

SPEAKER_00 37:50

The the caution I would give with that is, and and you'll never believe this, Michael. But leaders lie and you could tell them, Hey, you said this, or you can even say, Hey, I got this in writing, and they will say, That's not what I meant. And then they will berate you in front of your peers. It's never happened to me. Um, you gotta be careful with that, especially when you're calling them out for something they've said. Like this is a hard lesson I've learned is I've worked with some absolute maniacs. Let me tell you, it doesn't matter what they said, it's what they're thinking right now that you need to squeeze out of their head. Like what they said 24 hours ago no longer matters. What they're thinking right now, which you don't know, because it's in their head, that's the only thing that matters. You have to fall on your sword. And like that's the thing at the end of the day. Yeah, I will say there's a redemption arc that happens here. And again, that's something that I've just lived and learned. Being wrong, but growing into rightness, even though you know you were always right all along, being able to say, like, hey, thank you so much for the mentorship and helping me get this across the line. I couldn't have done it without you, even though you absolutely could and did do it without them. That's where success comes from. Because again, at the end of the day, none of this actually matters. Like, it's all nonsense. The people who are actually solving the problem are solving it right now. You're just placating egos. So be stupid, be wrong. Oh, look how much I learned working with you. You really helped set me on the right path. They're not gonna look at you and be like, wow, that Anthony's a moron. They're gonna be like, that Anthony is trendy.

SPEAKER_02 39:33

I like that guy.

SPEAKER_00 39:34

I like that guy. I like him. I like that guy. He listened to me and did exactly what I wanted. Wow, what a guy! And again, I only say this because I've lived it, I've lived it with some incredible personalities. It works. Trust.

SPEAKER_01 39:50

Yeah. Yeah, I think the last two things I'd say is unfortunately, leaders don't know, some leaders don't know what they want. And they have an idea in their head, but they don't know how to articulate it or put it down. And so just accept the fact that sometimes you're going to be wrong no matter what you try. You can do a hundred variations, and at some point they're probably just gonna say, hey, don't worry, like I'm gonna do it myself. Like, don't worry about it. And I used to take that as it's discouraging, right? Because I was hoping to help them, I've failed them. Like, that's what it feels like. The reality is a few, it could be a few things. One, the leader doesn't really know what they want, or they have a control issue. Like, I guess it could be a mix of either, like they just don't want to give up control of something, even though they seem like they needed help. Or two, they just have no idea what they really want. And then once they start actually putting pen to paper, they realize I have no idea what I actually am trying to do. And then they're gonna be able to refine the idea more and come back to you, who actually knows the detail to be like, oh, actually, you were kind of on point with uh the slide you put together together. Can I use that? I've had that happen to me once

Perception Beats Perfect Execution

SPEAKER_01 41:00

or twice.

SPEAKER_00 41:00

Yeah. Uh just looking at some of the messages in the chat, I think a good way to deal with specifically handling the executive layer, especially when they are the way that they are, do not become attached to the idea of data-driven success. Become attached to the idea of the perception of success. Because it doesn't matter at the end of the day if the project that they're ideating is a success or failure. It's if they feel that they were successful working with you, because that's what they're gonna remember. Uh, it could be a ginormous fireball of a failure, and you could have known it from the start. But if they feel that you and them worked well together and you helped create success, and they're not gonna get fired, uh you're you did great. You did great work. That's the real corporate strategy, is like being able to step away from the idea like this did not make the company money. It was a ginormous waste of time. We could have done something so much better. I had the right solution from the start. None of that matters. Like in corporate, none of it matters. What matters is the perception of you. Did you come out of this looking better than you did before? Because, oh, I did everything the executive wanted me to do and they felt great about the whole experience. I gave them a mental massage and now they love me more. That's the real goal.

SPEAKER_01 42:18

You are 100% correct. If you're trying to climb the corporate ladder and you're in a big organization, that is the answer. It sucks. But I think you have to embrace like that's the reality of like I think a lot of people lose the plot. They lose the plot of like, did this actually help our business? And they're just stuck in the middle management game of trying to impress and trying to put words on paper that make sense when or shape a message that actually isn't true. And they just waste a ton of time, you know, reformatting and changing and doing all these things. So, like we talked about in the last episode, realize who you need to spend time with to actually reach your goals. If it's a promotion, if it's you know, happiness in your career and your role and the team you're on, like realize who the important people are to spend time doing that. Make sure you don't get stuck with a leader coming to you who has zero impact, always asking you to help them and you spending a lot of time being like, Well, Anthony, I don't know what you want on this. Like, I've tried three different variations. If that person cannot help you to your personal goals and has never helped you, stop wasting your time. And I like what uh uh I think uh Elmer Futurino said in the chat. Sometimes just info dump dump them and then they get off your back. Just like keep on rambling and then they'll stop asking questions. And I think if you realize that person can't help you in your career goals, that's the right answer.

SPEAKER_00 43:36

And I mean it shows that you are someone who is going to go off and get the right information, right? Like you are not trying to set them up for failure. Info dumping somebody. And I will say, like, the only risk is again, like executives, they like colors. I'm not even joking. Like they like slides with colors on them. Info dump in a very pretty way, please. Don't just give them tables, don't give them tables of like And white text, uh do colors, do for up formatting, use graphs, please. Um, because they love that stuff, they absolutely love that stuff. So I think it's uh it's really stupid. It's really stupid. I think in your case, because you get to work with companies that reach out to you because they want your expertise, they want your knowledge. Uh it's a very different thing for you versus me in corporate, where I know in order to stay employed, I have to continue to be liked. We talked about this a lot in the recent series of episodes we've done. Being liked is the most important thing. And you will never be liked if you're Mr. Know It All, Mr. Right Guy. What you have to be is Mr. People Pleaser. And it's it's just an exceptionally difficult uh mental uh strength exercise to humble yourself to please the executive layer.

SPEAKER_01 44:57

A hundred percent. Couldn't have said it better.

SPEAKER_00 45:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 45:01

Well, thank you. I appreciate the tips and I appreciate everybody in the chat who has been chiming in. I think everybody kind of shares this sentiment. It kind of makes you sad when you realize that everybody has been in this boat and been in this situation. But remember, we're all people, and you can be the change that you want to see in the corporate world. So if you get to that level, you don't do that to people. Just remember that. You can be a good person at the top. You're like, remember, you can make a change, you can make it less terrible for someone else. That's what it's all about.

SPEAKER_00 45:30

That really is like, my God. I I hope. I hope the listeners of the pod, the viewers, the video, the people we know who work with us realize that one day we will be in the seats of those who drive us crazy and that we don't repeat the state the mistakes that were made before us and are willing enough to listen to those we see as inferior because actually that's where the intelligence comes from.

SPEAKER_01 46:00

Yeah, remember where you came from. We all started there.

SPEAKER_00 46:03

That's right. That's right. Good job, Michael. You did it.

SPEAKER_01 46:09

You did it. We did it. It's a team. Us in the chat, we

Discord Patreon And Sharing The Show

SPEAKER_01 46:15

solved another one. I'm so happy we did it again.

SPEAKER_00 46:17

Hey, if if the chat wanted to continue to chat, where would they go?

SPEAKER_01 46:22

Oh man, there's a great place. Can you give me three options? I can give you more than three options. There's a great place that you can come and chat with us at any time, at your convenience, whenever you'd like. And it's a great community of people that have also joined us. It's a wonderful place. Whoa. A place that can fulfill your dreams, your passions, everything but provide you monetary support in your life. And it's our Discord. You can join our Discord. Ton of great topics, ton of great people talking about things. People have shared jobs in there, success stories. If you want to hear us talk about something, you can do that, which is great. So that's one. How much does it cost? It's totally free, which is just fantastic.

SPEAKER_00 47:00

We'll never make money on this.

SPEAKER_01 47:03

No, but we will never make money in our lives. So we'll just keep pouring back into the people all around us. What's option two? Option number two. We have a Patreon that you can join, which is another place where you can, it is it is paid. You can pay a dollar or you can pay ten dollars a month, and you can receive exclusive content, access to exclusive videos that should leave out, which we are so delinquent on. I promise you, if you join, we're gonna do it soon. Anthony's been putting together a storytelling kind of through PowerPoint presentation. We're going to do. I've got an onboarding one that I'm gonna do for a generic template of how you onboard people and build an actual usable onboarding thing. So we're gonna be doing a little bit of that. Um, and we're gonna have plenty more stuff too. So Patreon will be a great place to connect. And what about option three? Option three. If you didn't buy direct, you pay too much. Oh, we're at a blind spot. I'm gonna give you Anthony's phone number. It is 654. Just call him directly. Call him directly at these digits, and he will answer the phone anytime, day or night.

SPEAKER_00 48:10

We've got a link tree in our notes. You can catch us on Instagram, on LinkedIn, you can catch us in all the places where social be mediaing, and we invite you to follow us there for all things corporate strategy. And we thank you for your listenership. Hey, if you liked what you heard and you don't have a dollar to give, share this podcast with your friends. Truly, the most important thing you can do is help us continue to grow as far as viewership and listenership is concerned. So if you know someone's struggling with this, why not send them this episode and uh have them come to the realization that none of this matters. So we we're we're happy to help them get there. Invite them to the Discord to continue the conversation and uh continue to listen. We appreciate your listenership as always. Uh, and that's all we've got for you today. So until next time, I'm Anthony. I'm Michael, and you're on