Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Quick Takes. Tim Stinovic from Bloomberg Radio. Hey, everybody, Uh,
Speaker 1: this is the third most read story on the Bloomberg
Speaker 1: It's about the HSBC manager's heart attack, what was going
Speaker 1: through his head and what it says about being overworked.
Speaker 1: It is an unbelievable story and another fascinating piece of
Speaker 1: reporting from Lenan new And she's financial reporter at Bloomberg News.
Speaker 1: She is with us on the phone in New York City. Lenin,
Speaker 1: I'm so glad we were able to get you on
Speaker 1: to talk about this. So tell us about Johnny frost Ick. So,
Speaker 1: Johnny is um, someone who is a sort of regulatory
Speaker 1: I T guy at HSBC. He's a contractor and a
Speaker 1: couple of Sundays ago, he had a heart attack and
Speaker 1: the first few things he thought about were work related
Speaker 1: and it wasn't until the fourth thought he had was oh,
Speaker 1: what about my wife? Maybe she'll find me dead? Um.
Speaker 1: And so he wrote this viral LinkedIn post that has
Speaker 1: just completely caught fire on LinkedIn because you know, everyone
Speaker 1: is thinking about overwork and burnout right now, and it
Speaker 1: just really touched a chord not just in finance, but
Speaker 1: just around the world in terms of people who are
Speaker 1: getting ground down by work. Right now, all right, Well,
Speaker 1: first of all, Johnny's doing okay. Correct, Yes, he's doing okay. Thankfully,
Speaker 1: he's doing okay and well enough to have given an
Speaker 1: exclusive interview to us. So, um, he's very philosophical and
Speaker 1: you know, very very much re reprioritizing his life. Right now, Well,
Speaker 1: talk to him a little bit more about the conversation
Speaker 1: you have, because what's interesting is he actually chronicled right
Speaker 1: his near death experience, as you write, in a viral
Speaker 1: LinkedIn post that has been viewed almost seven million times.
Speaker 1: That's as of Tuesday, so I'm sure it's higher than that.
Speaker 1: He what did he write about and what did you
Speaker 1: want to talk to him about? So, first of all,
Speaker 1: he wrote in very colorful language. So when you read
Speaker 1: our story, we do include a link to the original
Speaker 1: post because it is very much worth reading on its own. Um,
Speaker 1: he talks about the fact that you know, he kind
Speaker 1: of prioritized all of these things like being on zoom
Speaker 1: calls for twelve hours and just you know, working and
Speaker 1: putting up with a lot of crap at work. He
Speaker 1: honestly did not wanted to put up with anymore just
Speaker 1: really going to overboard in terms of not taking care
Speaker 1: of his own life and health, and you know, just
Speaker 1: going too far in and too deep into work without
Speaker 1: really taking care of his own health. And he also
Speaker 1: talked about the isolation of remote work, which is something
Speaker 1: I feel like, Lennon, we are talking a lot about,
Speaker 1: have talked about a lot over the past year, especially
Speaker 1: for people we know in New York who lived alone
Speaker 1: or felt really isolated. It can be after a while
Speaker 1: not so much fun. Yes, exactly, And I think that
Speaker 1: was one of the points he made when we were talking.
Speaker 1: He said, you know, normally when you go to work,
Speaker 1: you have a kind of wind up when you go
Speaker 1: in your commute and you kind of prepare for work
Speaker 1: and get ready getting work mote, and then when you
Speaker 1: come home you decompress. And right now those boundaries are
Speaker 1: just completely obliterated, and so people are just finding themselves
Speaker 1: working all the time and not setting their own boundaries,
Speaker 1: not saying okay, now it sounds to shut off, do
Speaker 1: other things, you know, and take care of your life. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's interesting too, And listen, you've been covering this as
Speaker 1: many of the members of our Bloomberg News team, you know,
Speaker 1: just writing about whether it's investment bankers on Wall Street.
Speaker 1: We know it's not easy, especially if you're starting out
Speaker 1: in the industry. If you're a junior investment banker, you know,
Speaker 1: you're working around the clock, you're working weekends. We are
Speaker 1: hearing increasingly where workers are speaking up and that senior
Speaker 1: executives are looking at ways to maybe ease the situation.
Speaker 1: Is there really a change going on? Well, I think
Speaker 1: certainly in Johnny's case, he really wants to drive this conversation. He's,
Speaker 1: you know, what I think would be a middle manager.
Speaker 1: You know, he runs a team of maybe twenty plus people.
Speaker 1: We don't manage people. And one of his priorities in
Speaker 1: discussing this was to really talk about this, you know issue,
Speaker 1: to talk about the fact that people are not taking
Speaker 1: care of themselves and that they're not good workers either.
Speaker 1: If you don't take care of yourself, um, and you
Speaker 1: can't really be particularly productive either. And so he's just
Speaker 1: trying to open up this conversation about work, about flexibility
Speaker 1: and about making sure that people are sort of balanced,
Speaker 1: balanced individuals and balanced workers. You know, it's interesting too
Speaker 1: and I feel like we are having a more broader
Speaker 1: conversation too about companies, CEO s leaders who say, let's
Speaker 1: deal with you know, in equities in society, let's deal
Speaker 1: with racism. Let's talk about people being overworked. And I
Speaker 1: do wonder how much of it ultimately leads to actions
Speaker 1: and a real change and how we do it or
Speaker 1: once we get back to quote unquote normal after the pandemic,
Speaker 1: do we all be like, yeah, yeah, yeah, that work
Speaker 1: life balance. I gotta get this project done. You know,
Speaker 1: it's a tough one, Carol, And I think it's it's
Speaker 1: down to individuals, but of course it's down to companies
Speaker 1: as well to understand that people have changing expectations that
Speaker 1: you know, young people for instance. You know, I'm stunned
Speaker 1: by the fact that, you know, young Goldman associates it
Speaker 1: would be so bold as to write a deck that
Speaker 1: says they're overworked in their mental health is suffering. Right,
Speaker 1: That's not something we would have seen even maybe a
Speaker 1: year ago. And so this is a huge conversation. You
Speaker 1: know the fact that almost eight million people now have
Speaker 1: have read this post. There are two hundred thousand likes.
Speaker 1: You know, this is really driving a conversation. All of
Speaker 1: our main competitors have picked it up and have cited
Speaker 1: our reporting as well, so it's definitely touched a nerve
Speaker 1: thanks to Johnny's post, not to our story. It's it
Speaker 1: really just did grab people. And uh, it's a really
Speaker 1: colorful read as well. I wasn't able to use the
Speaker 1: expletives that he didn't post to go and read the
Speaker 1: original source. Darn. Anyway, it is among the most read.
Speaker 1: As I said, this is what people in the financial
Speaker 1: community are reading big time. Lenin great reporting is always
Speaker 1: lenan new in finance reporter here at Bloomberg News.