Speaker 1: You know, the first step before you leave anyone, or
Speaker 1: before you make any big moves, is to dive into
Speaker 1: the psychological underpinnings of your own happiness. So stop making
Speaker 1: lists about sort of do I want to work from home,
Speaker 1: what city do I want to be in, what kind
Speaker 1: of money do I want to make, and really try
Speaker 1: to understand the psychological underpinnings of why you're miserable.
Speaker 2: Here today we have the NYU professor Tesso West on
Speaker 2: the show. Doctor West studies the nature and dynamics of
Speaker 2: social perception. She's the author of the book Jerks at
Speaker 2: Work and more recently job Therapy, Finding work that works
Speaker 2: for You. In this wide ranging discussion, we discuss how
Speaker 2: to deal with jerks in the workplace, the different types
Speaker 2: of jerks, and five common sources of career frustration. We
Speaker 2: also discussed some great lessons she has learned from collecting
Speaker 2: data from people who hire, promote, and fire people, such
Speaker 2: as how to make a resume more appealing. It was
Speaker 2: so great to finally have doctor West on the show,
Speaker 2: and there's such a wealth of information in this episode
Speaker 2: that you won't want to miss. So with that further Ado,
Speaker 2: I bring you doctor Tessa West.
Speaker 3: Welcome Tessa West to the Psychology Podcast.
Speaker 1: Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2: Some ground rules. If you ever feel anxious or need
Speaker 2: any mindfulness are grounding during the show. You can borrow
Speaker 2: my chill pill.
Speaker 1: Amazing.
Speaker 2: It's two hundred and fifty milligrams. So so glad to
Speaker 2: have you here. Congratulations in your new book, job Therapy,
Speaker 2: finding the work that works for you?
Speaker 3: Is it? Okay?
Speaker 2: Before we get into the nitty gridy of your new book,
Speaker 2: can we talk about some of your older works. Since
Speaker 2: this is your first time ever on the Psychology Podcast,
Speaker 2: I never had a chance to nerd out with you
Speaker 2: about like jerks at work for instance.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, yeah, I love that research.
Speaker 2: So you wrote an earlier called jerks at Work Toxic
Speaker 2: co workers and what to do about them? First of all,
Speaker 2: do you think nowadays it's kind of calling everyone toxic
Speaker 2: is maybe starting to get overused a little bit, because
Speaker 2: now I'm noticing a trend on like TikTok or like
Speaker 2: every you know thirteen year old is they're like everyone
Speaker 2: around me's toxic.
Speaker 1: Absolutely. Even when I wrote the book, I sort of
Speaker 1: hated the subtitle.
Speaker 3: That's funny.
Speaker 1: You know, it's really easy to call someone toxic if
Speaker 1: they do something that you don't like or they give
Speaker 1: you negative feedback. I think toxic is overplayed, and it's
Speaker 1: also just a word we use anytime we feel uncomfortable
Speaker 1: in a social interaction. We immediately label the person toxic,
Speaker 1: and it's really hard to actually have a counter to that.
Speaker 1: Someone calls you toxic and you say, while I was
Speaker 1: trying to give you honest feedback, that makes you look
Speaker 1: even more toxic, right, And so yes, I do think
Speaker 1: it's problematic, and I will be the first person to
Speaker 1: throw that part of my book title under the bus.
Speaker 2: Okay, so that said, there are legitimately toxic, legit toxic
Speaker 2: people at work. Yeah, what are some of the main characteristics,
Speaker 2: because I know you wrote a cool article saying they're
Speaker 2: different types of toxic people. I think you outlined five
Speaker 2: or so. Yeah, could you maybe like go through some
Speaker 2: of that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think most of the kind of most dangerous
Speaker 1: toxic coworkers have some pretty enviable skill sets. And so
Speaker 1: one of my favorites is the kiss up kick downer.
Speaker 1: So this is that person who is just really good
Speaker 1: at making the boss happy. They tend to be pretty
Speaker 1: talented at work, and they tend to have a skill
Speaker 1: of reading the room well, so they know who in
Speaker 1: power they need to impress. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: you know, they're pretty mean to the people who work
Speaker 1: for them or the people who work at the same
Speaker 1: level as them. So their skill set is really knowing
Speaker 1: who to impress and who to kind of throw under
Speaker 1: the bus to help get ahead at work. So they're starfuckers,
Speaker 1: absolute starfuckers, and we all know, we all know that
Speaker 1: we know these people stars. They are fucking have no idea.
Speaker 1: They fall victim to flattery very easily, and I think
Speaker 1: for good reason, because these people tend to be actually
Speaker 1: pretty good at their jobs.
Speaker 2: Yeah for sure. Okay, so then what's another type. What's
Speaker 2: your favorite? What's your favorite type would you like to avoid?
Speaker 1: I think the gas lighter is the most Oh, they
Speaker 1: are on kind of a different level. I like to
Speaker 1: say that jerks at work are kind of made. They're
Speaker 1: not born. You know, we grow them out of certain
Speaker 1: kind of systems in the workplace. But gas lighters there
Speaker 1: are their own category, and I think they have some
Speaker 1: kind of personality issues. They're also really motivated to destroy you,
Speaker 1: whereas I think most jerks are actually not the work.
Speaker 1: Jerkury is kind of a consequence of their actions, but
Speaker 1: it's not the real goal. Gaslighters. They lie with the
Speaker 1: intent of deceiving on a grand scale, and they tend
Speaker 1: to be very careful and get away with it because
Speaker 1: they can pull you into all kinds of, you know,
Speaker 1: unethical behavior that you don't actually see coming.
Speaker 3: That's true.
Speaker 2: I wrote an article for Psyicoloto Day where I outlined
Speaker 2: the asshole circumplex where I looked. I showed the agency
Speaker 2: versus communion, and then on every single one of the
Speaker 2: eight I listed what type of asshole it was.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Cool, it's really nerdy, and I knew you would appreciate
Speaker 2: it because of that, So I'll send you that article.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's like scientific. I validated it and everything,
Speaker 2: so amazing. Yeah, so I think maybe you could slot
Speaker 2: some of your toxic people into into your asshole this. Yeah,
Speaker 2: the quadrants, that's exactly. I have like the quiet asshole,
Speaker 2: then I have the arrogant asshole, then I have like
Speaker 2: the manipulative asshole, you know, and like all sorts of.
Speaker 1: Things, all the nice shades of asshole.
Speaker 3: Exactly. That's exactly. That's exactly.
Speaker 2: I see a new book title coming of new fiction
Speaker 2: book title. Okay, so what can you do at work
Speaker 2: if you really like, can you avoid them? Like there's
Speaker 2: a power dynamic there and that puts you in a
Speaker 2: really tough situation. It's like, what do you do if
Speaker 2: you feel like you can't say no to requests that
Speaker 2: are unethical?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I think you know, most people who are victims
Speaker 1: of gas lighters, their instinct is to be really inward
Speaker 1: and try to fight the battle alone. And that's part
Speaker 1: of what got them there, right, So gas leaders tend
Speaker 1: to cut you off socially. In fact, that's the biggest
Speaker 1: red flag that you're being targeted by one of these
Speaker 1: high status people is they're taking you out of important meetings.
Speaker 1: They're telling you no one respects your likes you, or
Speaker 1: the kind of more interesting and dangerous one is the
Speaker 1: one who makes you feel special. You're part of this
Speaker 1: special new thing and we can't tell anyone about it yet,
Speaker 1: so keep it secret. So that's the real battle that
Speaker 1: they're fighting. I think for them, they need to start
Speaker 1: networking with people who are at their level, and not
Speaker 1: to throw their gaslight or to the bus or to
Speaker 1: gossip about them, but to get a sense of how
Speaker 1: they're actually perceived by others at work to get some
Speaker 1: reputational information about what other people actually think of them.
Speaker 1: You know, So most of these people have no idea.
Speaker 1: They're living under some illusion that they're either people are
Speaker 1: afraid of them or you know, people think they're incompetent
Speaker 1: and they need to do some reality checking before they
Speaker 1: can do anything about the actual you know, gaslight or
Speaker 1: asshole boss that they're dealing with.
Speaker 3: What category would you put Michael Scott in?
Speaker 1: Oh, gosh, you know, he's interesting because he has flavors
Speaker 1: of all of the different types, including my favorite kind
Speaker 1: of new research topic, which is just awkwardness in inappropriateness
Speaker 1: in the workplace. But yeah, yeah, he definitely kind of
Speaker 1: does all these little things micromanagement, misperceiving status ques, all
Speaker 1: the things.
Speaker 2: Well, it is awkwardness always the same thing as inappropriate. Like,
Speaker 2: I feel like there are a lot of people in
Speaker 2: the nerdivergent spectrum, myself included, who you know, maybe sometimes awkward,
Speaker 2: But does that always mean it's inappropriate? Like because someone
Speaker 2: else is uncomfortable with your with your different social style,
Speaker 2: is does that necessarily make it inappropriate in the workplace?
Speaker 1: I love that question. I actually think we're starting to
Speaker 1: think about awkwardness more is something that people do with
Speaker 1: another person, less about kind of being a personality trait,
Speaker 1: like you are an awkward person, I'm an awkward person.
Speaker 1: But more awkwardness is a dance that we do together,
Speaker 1: and a lot of that comes out of uncertainty around
Speaker 1: how to handle certain social situations. So it takes two
Speaker 1: to be awkward, and it takes two to actually resolve
Speaker 1: that awkwardness in the moment. And often, you know, the
Speaker 1: reason why it doesn't get resolved is because neither party
Speaker 1: know exactly what to do. Should I make a joke,
Speaker 1: should I apologize? And so it's really kind of an
Speaker 1: interpersonal dynamic more than it is a trait that someone has.
Speaker 3: I love that.
Speaker 2: I mean, like, there's nothing better than when I'm around
Speaker 2: a fellow awkward person because then we can have fun.
Speaker 2: Like people who aren't awkward boring, you know, and so.
Speaker 1: They're super boring. And I think awkwardness isn't something that
Speaker 1: is objective anyway, It's something that is subjectively perceived.
Speaker 2: Yeah, love that I just kind of talked over you. Noow,
Speaker 2: I'm self conscious that I'm toxic cause I just talked over.
Speaker 1: Talking over each other is actually signed their conversations going.
Speaker 2: Well, oh good souch asn't always it's not always an
Speaker 2: indicator that the person's starting Okay, good who I'm not
Speaker 2: just thinking very self consciously now looking at your five
Speaker 2: list the micromanager. The problem with okay, this is a
Speaker 2: cool topic. I really like being too nice at work
Speaker 2: because I I I created this, like the scale pathological
Speaker 2: altruism scale that I call it now, I call it.
Speaker 2: Intrusive helping is the phrase I use in my do
Speaker 2: so do you do? You do you think does that
Speaker 2: link to some of that work that you've ran about,
Speaker 2: like intrusive helping or the excessive helping?
Speaker 1: Excessive helping is kind of a form of micromanagement, I think.
Speaker 1: I think when I think about people who are too nice,
Speaker 1: I tend to think of and I'd be curious what
Speaker 1: you think about this feedback that is generic but nice.
Speaker 1: So the less specific it is, the less useful it is. Nice.
Speaker 1: Specific feedback is fine. But what we tend to do
Speaker 1: at work when we feel on comfortable is we smile
Speaker 1: through our gritted teeth and we say, you're doing so
Speaker 1: great here in an effort to kind of avoid being
Speaker 1: called toxic. And I think some of that kind of
Speaker 1: toxic altruism comes from this workplace culture of everybody is
Speaker 1: really nice here, we should insult people instead of teaching
Speaker 1: people how to give useful, critical feedback in a way
Speaker 1: that doesn't feel harmful. We're just layering on the niceties
Speaker 1: after niceties, and they're not actually improving or getting any better.
Speaker 3: Do you nice guys really finish last?
Speaker 1: Not in my age group, Scott. When women are in
Speaker 1: their forties, we are happy with the nice guys. But
Speaker 1: in your twenties, I think, Baby, I think, yeah, nice
Speaker 1: guys finish first as you get older.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, let's talk about your new book. Okay, let's
Speaker 3: talk about your new book. Wow, it's really good.
Speaker 2: First of all, I feel like it should be on
Speaker 2: every organizational psychology's bookshelf psychologist's bookshelf as well as obviously
Speaker 2: people in general public as well. You talk about five
Speaker 2: common sources of career frustration in this book. I found
Speaker 2: each one really interesting. So if we could double click
Speaker 2: on each one, I think that would selfishly be really
Speaker 2: interesting to me. So identity crisis. Is this something that
Speaker 2: is age dependent or is there no expiration date? To
Speaker 2: when you can have an identity crisis.
Speaker 1: I don't think there's an expiration date for an identity
Speaker 1: crisis or any of these crises. I think, you know,
Speaker 1: I frame this chapter around people who have spent some
Speaker 1: time becoming good at something enough time where they have
Speaker 1: sunk their identity into that career, into that part of
Speaker 1: their job, and questioning it is existential, it's uncomfortable, and
Speaker 1: you know, there is a bit of a cost that
Speaker 1: goes along with people who've been working in one profession
Speaker 1: for a long time. But you could also have just
Speaker 1: spent some time training in that profession, getting a degree
Speaker 1: and then realizing it's not really for you, you know,
Speaker 1: or just spent a lot of kind of psychological investment
Speaker 1: in that, or even investing by moving or breaking up
Speaker 1: with someone, or you know, taking a pay cut. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of ways we can psychologically invest identity wise
Speaker 1: into a career that it then becomes costly. And I
Speaker 1: think years spent on the job, is it necessarily the
Speaker 1: only way that we can do that. There's lots of
Speaker 1: other ways.
Speaker 2: Wow, Well, what first of all, don't panic, right if
Speaker 2: it's happening to you, Like, what's some advice like let's
Speaker 2: someone's listening this episode right now and they really are
Speaker 2: having this identity crisis and they feel like they should
Speaker 2: and maybe they're feeling even shame. I feel like all
Speaker 2: year five, there's I could see a case where you
Speaker 2: have a meta cognition where you have shame over having
Speaker 2: the thing. Yep, you know I was thinking about that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think, you know. The first step for identity crisis,
Speaker 1: and really for all of them, but really for this
Speaker 1: one is to first just do a little bit of
Speaker 1: a self assessment, like how bad is it really and
Speaker 1: on what component are you really suffering from that identity lass?
Speaker 1: Are you, you know, de identified entirely with this thing?
Speaker 1: Are you just not satisfied with this particular workplace that
Speaker 1: you're having, And then I think you want to ask
Speaker 1: yourself a couple questions of how upset would I be
Speaker 1: if I could never do this thing again, had to
Speaker 1: let this goal go? You know I've done. I surveyed
Speaker 1: a lot of people for this book, and you know
Speaker 1: what I found is a lot of people are still
Speaker 1: highly identified with careers that don't make them happy. We
Speaker 1: see this in healthcare a lot where there's a lot
Speaker 1: of burnout and that's just a really rough psychological place
Speaker 1: to be in. It's very depressing to feel highly committed
Speaker 1: to something that makes you miserable. But I think anyone
Speaker 1: who's ever been in a relationship or a crappy marriage
Speaker 1: knows what it's like to commit to something that you hate,
Speaker 1: you know, that makes you unhappy. And so think about
Speaker 1: this through the Yeah, well I'm on my second marriage,
Speaker 1: so I definitely went through that first stage. You know,
Speaker 1: I think this husband is in the room and he's
Speaker 1: giving me. He's giving me major side eye right now.
Speaker 1: He's also quoted in the Identity Crisis, I interviewed Dave.
Speaker 1: I'm be able for that. He's the identity expert. But
Speaker 1: you know, we talk a lot about hating something that
Speaker 1: you that is still a part of you, and I
Speaker 1: think a lot of people can identify with that rough psychological.
Speaker 2: Experien Well, usually if I hate something about myself, I
Speaker 2: don't identify it with it.
Speaker 4: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: That money, right, it's paying you a lot of money.
Speaker 1: Or you spent fifteen years into to learn how to
Speaker 1: remove this one thing out of the gall bladder, and
Speaker 1: that's all you're good at but you no longer want
Speaker 1: to operate on the gall bladder. Then that's that's going
Speaker 1: to lead to some kind of identity crisis, right, especially
Speaker 1: if you're really good at it and other people are
Speaker 1: relying on you to be that expert. You know, you're
Speaker 1: the only brain surgeon in town. You're the only dentist
Speaker 1: who can really do a good root canal. You know,
Speaker 1: leaving it, you're going to let a lot of people down.
Speaker 1: And I think that's that's something that a lot of
Speaker 1: people suffer with IM just thinking about all my life
Speaker 1: choices don't don't get to existent.
Speaker 3: Let's move to the next one. So drifted apart? Woll?
Speaker 2: I mean, look, I see a correlation between some of these.
Speaker 2: It's not like they're complete orthogonal. They're not in the
Speaker 2: factor analysis, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: You know what I'm like factor analysis humor. Okay, So
Speaker 3: you know.
Speaker 1: It's gonna make a very Max's rotation. That would be lost.
Speaker 2: I was gonna say these all god of team players
Speaker 2: on the principal component analysis.
Speaker 3: Okay, our audience, it's completely lost.
Speaker 2: No I can value jokes. Okay, So do you drifting apart?
Speaker 2: You know, do you do you recognize this as part
Speaker 2: of yourself anymore? And I and obviously that's right to
Speaker 2: the identity crisis one, but it does, you know, partially separate,
Speaker 2: like what is that?
Speaker 3: What does that feel like?
Speaker 1: First of all, it feels like I used to love
Speaker 1: this thing in front of me and I don't really
Speaker 1: recognize it anymore. And it's not that I don't want
Speaker 1: this career, you know, and I will I have to
Speaker 1: tell you slip into relationship language a lot when I
Speaker 1: talk about stuff. So you look at the person sitting
Speaker 1: next to you in bed, and who are you? You know?
Speaker 1: You used to be this fun, engaging, interesting person, and
Speaker 1: I don't you're frank to yourself or yourself or or
Speaker 1: I'm looking at him? Who are you? Who is this
Speaker 1: man who tweeting all the time? I don't record know
Speaker 1: he was always that person, you know. And it's not
Speaker 1: that you want a new career, you want the old
Speaker 1: thing back. And I think the problem is knowing whether
Speaker 1: that old thing exists in another place, and whether the
Speaker 1: changes you've experienced are due to kind of structural, top down,
Speaker 1: hard to see, hard to control things about the organization
Speaker 1: or the field or the economy or whatever. Or something
Speaker 1: kind of more local about your team or your boss.
Speaker 1: So knowing the level of change is important for these folks.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that drifting apart is that can be
Speaker 2: so tough. You're drifting apart from yourself. We just don't
Speaker 2: talk about that enough. I mean I do because I
Speaker 2: love Carl Rogers and I love the idea of self
Speaker 2: connection and the idea of existential loneliness that they were
Speaker 2: the Humanistic Psychologist wrote about. Yeah, but I'm not everyone,
Speaker 2: you know, most you know, I think that this idea
Speaker 2: needs to be talked about more, especially in the workplace,
Speaker 2: you know, and people shouldn't be ashamed for you know,
Speaker 2: there are people who go forty years, right, and it's
Speaker 2: like I almost you'd almost expect after forty years you'd
Speaker 2: get like word with something aspect of you know something.
Speaker 1: Yeah, all of a sudden you wake up and it
Speaker 1: doesn't do it for you anymore, and you look in
Speaker 1: the mirror and you're like, who am I? Who is
Speaker 1: this job? Which one has changed? Is it me? Or
Speaker 1: is it the career? And so a lot of their
Speaker 1: soul searching is figuring out how much of it is them,
Speaker 1: you know, And that's a tough conversation to have with
Speaker 1: yourself how.
Speaker 2: Much work have you done in the field of job crafting,
Speaker 2: because they often say in the organizational psychology literature that
Speaker 2: if that happens, then you should job craft yourself out
Speaker 2: of it.
Speaker 1: What do you mean by job I love jargon, and
Speaker 1: I love making people explain jargon.
Speaker 2: Well, changing the role in a way that matches who
Speaker 2: the new you. You know, like if you're a teacher.
Speaker 2: Let's say you're a teacher, but you're really feeling like
Speaker 2: you want to be an actor, you know, you reframe
Speaker 2: your job as like, I'm not a teacher anymore. I'm
Speaker 2: like going to be like, you know, performing for my students.
Speaker 1: I'm a performer of knowledge. Yeah, I mean there's some
Speaker 1: kind of mental gymnastics you can do. But I think
Speaker 1: you want to be honest with yourself about whether you've
Speaker 1: now fallen into what I call passion roles, which are
Speaker 1: just things you love to do, but no one's going
Speaker 1: to give you a RaSE for that. You know, you
Speaker 1: can become the teacher who also runs the drama club,
Speaker 1: but that's probably just some extra side gigage that you're
Speaker 1: not getting paid for, So be careful of that kind
Speaker 1: of slippery state of job crafting yourself into roles that
Speaker 1: people don't respect as much as you think they ought to.
Speaker 1: I tend to be very cynical about all these kinds
Speaker 1: of things if people will still pay you the same grade.
Speaker 3: Okay, good?
Speaker 2: Yeah, because I was gonna say, like, you shouldn't always
Speaker 2: care what other people think, right, And sometimes it takes
Speaker 2: some big risks, you know, to comsplutely change professions. Yeah,
Speaker 2: h torn in between places?
Speaker 3: Are you taking on too many roles at work?
Speaker 2: Switching tests or stuck between What does it mean to
Speaker 2: be like stuck between two paths at work?
Speaker 1: Yeah? So I think when I think of someone who's
Speaker 1: torn between places, there's like two things. There's I'm taking
Speaker 1: on way too many roles like official job titles, and
Speaker 1: my research has shown that like the average person has
Speaker 1: like ten, you know, and a lot of these they're
Speaker 1: doing for visibility purposes because they think they will get
Speaker 1: a raise and they don't actually to raise for it.
Speaker 1: But then there's this the daily low level task switching
Speaker 1: problem that we all suffer from, where we don't know
Speaker 1: how to organize our work into like the right kind
Speaker 1: of spheres, or we're being you know, phone calls or
Speaker 1: text messages from the boss pulling us away from our work,
Speaker 1: which is different than the kind of structural role based problem.
Speaker 1: And I think people probably suffer a little bit from both,
Speaker 1: but they're very different kinds of problems with different solutions.
Speaker 4: Attached to them.
Speaker 2: Can you elaborate what are the different solutions attached to them?
Speaker 1: For sure? I think you know for the first one.
Speaker 1: Taking on these roles, there's often this mismatch between what
Speaker 1: people in power who give you raises and promotions think
Speaker 1: you ought to be doing and the roles that you
Speaker 1: take on because a colleague or a collaborator tells you
Speaker 1: they're a good idea, And I think you really want
Speaker 1: to kind of square that circle, close that communication gap
Speaker 1: when you're hired, when you're actually interviewing and talk about
Speaker 1: those different roles. There's a lot of slippage going on
Speaker 1: at work and a lot of increase in high Yeah,
Speaker 1: sounds really gross when I say it that way. Goolipage.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of roles with fancy titles, you know,
Speaker 1: cheap Happiness officer and things like that, a lot of
Speaker 1: c suite titles, lots of kind of Yeah, that is
Speaker 1: a dying role sorry, CDOs, you know that are in
Speaker 1: the moment that people are taking on that don't maybe
Speaker 1: have the prestige or their career growth that they think
Speaker 1: that they should have, and they're lured into taking these things,
Speaker 1: so they need to have real conversations like is that
Speaker 1: actually are those roles worth it? Also, stop the volunteer work, folks.
Speaker 1: My research shows that people spend about twelve hours a
Speaker 1: week doing volunteer work that they are not getting paid
Speaker 1: to do at work. And this isn't like fun volunteering
Speaker 1: on the side. These are roles that someone else is
Speaker 1: probably getting paid to do that you're now volunteering and
Speaker 1: stepping in. And I think that is a little bit
Speaker 1: of a disease we all have in the workplace right now,
Speaker 1: this business of volunteering for other people's jobs in an
Speaker 1: effort to get visibility for it.
Speaker 3: Is that maybe like, is that related being too nice?
Speaker 1: It is? Everything's related. It's got to being too nice
Speaker 1: if we're all just bigger assholes.
Speaker 2: Now wait, but there's truth to that. In my opening
Speaker 2: New Year and New episode, remember Michael, I said my
Speaker 2: New Year's resolution this year is too over my agreeableness
Speaker 2: levels thirty You do I think I'm doing a pretty
Speaker 2: good job this way.
Speaker 1: When you're too agreeable, you over promise all kinds of
Speaker 1: totally it actually ends up biting you in the.
Speaker 2: Ass was too high, it was too something had to change,
Speaker 2: you know. So how about the under oh no, let's
Speaker 2: go to runner up?
Speaker 3: Runner up?
Speaker 2: Do you always feel like you keep coming in second?
Speaker 3: Wow? That one hit, right, ship, that one hit, that
Speaker 3: one hit Okay, So that's it. That's the thing the
Speaker 3: kids say these days.
Speaker 1: They hit hit Yeah, that was emotional things hit yeah.
Speaker 3: Wow, personally resonant. Okay. So what do you do if
Speaker 3: you feel that way at work? What can you do?
Speaker 3: I mean, you can't like force your way to number one.
Speaker 1: You can't, but you probably peace with it, you know. So.
Speaker 1: So I surveyed hires and promoters and then also runner
Speaker 1: ups for that chapter, and there are these huge kind
Speaker 1: of gaps between them, and one of the big reasons
Speaker 1: why people fall into the runner up category is because
Speaker 1: they missed a role like two roles ago that they
Speaker 1: ought to have taken. And a lot of them are
Speaker 1: what are they get what's called battlefield promotion in the
Speaker 1: moment when there's a crisis at work, they were promoted
Speaker 1: to a position that they probably weren't quite ready for
Speaker 1: and it was super flattering and they took it, and
Speaker 1: then they can't climb up from that role, in part
Speaker 1: because they haven't filled in the sort of back roles
Speaker 1: that they needed to even get to that spot. And
Speaker 1: so they think, because I have the role, now I
Speaker 1: need to get promoted to the next role. They're qualified,
Speaker 1: but everyone looking at their resume is going there's a
Speaker 1: bunch of gaps. There's a bunch of things they needed
Speaker 1: to do about four steps ago that no one told
Speaker 1: them was necessary because they wanted them for this battlefield promotion.
Speaker 1: That is, that's kind of a terrifying thought, because now
Speaker 1: should I go back in time and fill in those
Speaker 1: roles or what exactly should I do to kind of
Speaker 1: fix that? That's the tough conversation.
Speaker 2: Definitely, Well, this seems very related to the next one,
Speaker 2: the underappreciated star. I mean, sometimes you keep coming in
Speaker 2: a second, but you know that you're the best, right,
Speaker 2: you know, and like, what do you do if you're like,
Speaker 2: what do you do if you're you are crushing it
Speaker 2: and no one's noticing?
Speaker 1: Yeah, now you know this is diagnosing yourself as an
Speaker 1: underappreciated star is really tough, and I have a pretty
Speaker 1: high bar of like, are you actually a star? No? Really, no, really,
Speaker 1: you know, these folks tend to know that they're stars
Speaker 1: and they're under appreciated, and they're not just runner ups.
Speaker 1: Because there's a lot of carrot dangling. There's a lot
Speaker 1: of people are dangling a carrot in front of them,
Speaker 1: going carrot dangling.
Speaker 3: Or dangling Karen dad dangling.
Speaker 1: I'm a California and I have a weird non you know,
Speaker 1: regional dialect accent. Yeah. So they often work for companies
Speaker 1: that say, once we get the next amount of investment,
Speaker 1: we'll be able to promote you, or will be able
Speaker 1: to give you that you know, share of whatever, or
Speaker 1: will be able to hire the staff that you need.
Speaker 1: So a lot of these folks are actually working for
Speaker 1: startup companies. You know, they want to do something new
Speaker 1: and exciting, and then they're kind of handed five hundred
Speaker 1: different things and it never actually comes to fruition, and
Speaker 1: so they sort of realize, I'm a star here, but
Speaker 1: I'm underappreciated in the sense that they can never compensate
Speaker 1: me exactly for what I want. Or they work in
Speaker 1: an industry where you know, there's just so few resources
Speaker 1: at the top that there's a whole bunch of undappreciated
Speaker 1: stars kind of at the middle level, and only one
Speaker 1: or two can never actually climb up. Oh boy, that yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, I think we all know what it feels
Speaker 1: like to see a colleague get raised, get a raise
Speaker 1: of promotion because they got an offer elsewhere.
Speaker 2: And well, what if they get a razor promotion because
Speaker 2: they steal all your work?
Speaker 1: Then they need to go back to my first book
Speaker 1: and read the chapter on the credit stealer. You know,
Speaker 1: I wrote these so that they could talk to each other.
Speaker 2: They really are in tandem, and they are they are yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: And that's true because you raised a point like you're
Speaker 2: wary of people's self diagnosing as the under pursuing star,
Speaker 2: because that isn't a type of toxic person who constantly
Speaker 2: feels underappreciated. That's vulnerable narcissism, you know. So how do
Speaker 2: you know if you're a vulnerable narcissist or you actually
Speaker 2: are being underappreciated.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I really think the only way to do that
Speaker 1: is to actually put yourself out there and find out
Speaker 1: who the relevant social comparison. Other is, we often pick
Speaker 1: the wrong people. We pick the person who's in the
Speaker 1: office next to us who seems to get more than
Speaker 1: we do, but we don't actually know who's in the
Speaker 1: real pool of talent we're being compared to. So you want,
Speaker 1: you know, a lesson in humility and a reality check
Speaker 1: about your starhood. Put yourself out there, network with people
Speaker 1: who hire in your field, show them your resume, and
Speaker 1: find out who those others actually are that you're being
Speaker 1: compared to. And most of us are pretty off base.
Speaker 1: I mean, I know my grad students compare themselves to
Speaker 1: others in our program, not to the thirty other people
Speaker 1: who are going to be applying for jobs at the
Speaker 1: same time as then, because they don't even know those
Speaker 1: folks exist. Layer onto that the complexity that there is
Speaker 1: no static pool in the job market. It's iterative. It's
Speaker 1: constantly changing, and even hirers don't know who's in it
Speaker 1: all the time. It's like, you know, a slime mold
Speaker 1: that goes in weird directions. So it is very difficult
Speaker 1: to know whether you're a star relative to the right people.
Speaker 1: But that should be a question you should be asking yourself.
Speaker 3: That's a little self reflection doesn't hurt.
Speaker 1: It's hard though people don't like you know, Okay, am
Speaker 1: I really a star? Let me compare myself to people
Speaker 1: who hold my roles at the top organizations. You know,
Speaker 1: what do they look like on paper? Do? I? Am
Speaker 1: I really as good as those people?
Speaker 3: It's a really good point. It's a really good point.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Okay, Well, you talk about a lot of situations
Speaker 2: where people really want to change their jobs, They want
Speaker 2: to get out of there, but they want to find
Speaker 2: something that's more in line with their values. And I
Speaker 2: actually see your research as fitting within a larger umbrella
Speaker 2: of research called meaningful work, which I is really hot
Speaker 2: right now. And as you know obviously, but I consider
Speaker 2: as I was reading your book, I was like, this
Speaker 2: fits nicely with that gene dot ins and all that.
Speaker 2: So what's your own spit on this? How people really
Speaker 2: can find things they're more in line with their values?
Speaker 2: And how do you know when it's time to quit
Speaker 2: and time to grit?
Speaker 3: Whndy grit? And when do you quit?
Speaker 1: Yeah? The question right, I think you have to stop
Speaker 1: thinking about your job is something that happens to you,
Speaker 1: and stop using this passive language when you talk about
Speaker 1: the work place like my boss did this to me,
Speaker 1: or this happened to me, and think about it like
Speaker 1: you would any other relationship. And you know, the first
Speaker 1: step before you leave anyone or before you make any
Speaker 1: big moves is to dive into the psychological underpinnings of
Speaker 1: your own happiness. So stop making lists about sort of
Speaker 1: do I want to work from home, what city do
Speaker 1: I want to be in, what kind of money do
Speaker 1: I want to make, and really try to understand the
Speaker 1: psychological underpinnings of why you're miserable here. I also think
Speaker 1: you need to dive into what makes you stressed out
Speaker 1: at work. And in this book, I have this daily
Speaker 1: stress test where I have people think about what are
Speaker 1: they anticipating stressing them out, and then at the end
Speaker 1: of the day write down what actually stresses them out.
Speaker 1: Most of the time, what we anticipate is not the
Speaker 1: thing that stressed us out at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: because we're good at planning for those things. It's the
Speaker 1: unanticipated stressors that actually eat away at our psychological wellbeing
Speaker 1: and our physical health. So if you collect a little
Speaker 1: bit of data on yourself, you're going to know what's
Speaker 1: actually triggering your stress responses and harming your sleep and
Speaker 1: making you yell at people at home. You know, you
Speaker 1: need to collect that data to understand why, and then
Speaker 1: think about your career as you want any other type
Speaker 1: of relationship where you have to ask these tough questions.
Speaker 1: I think in terms of when is it okay to stay?
Speaker 1: When is it okay to go? You need to collect
Speaker 1: some data on your ups and downs before you make
Speaker 1: that decision. And most of us, our memories are pretty
Speaker 1: bad when it comes to what makes us happy at
Speaker 1: work and for how long are we happy? We need
Speaker 1: to collect that data daily, as if we were in
Speaker 1: any other kind of relationship. Intermittent reinforcement that can really
Speaker 1: keep you kind of anchored to something, being embedded in
Speaker 1: the workplace, having an easy commute, you know, friends at work.
Speaker 1: Those things keep you embedded. So you've got to pull
Speaker 1: apart all of those things before you make the decision,
Speaker 1: and don't just make it about listing what you want
Speaker 1: and what you don't have, and you know, and get
Speaker 1: over the grass is greener thing. Grass is never greener.
Speaker 1: Grass is usually grass. You know, it's the dimensions on
Speaker 1: which you need to learn that you want to satisfice
Speaker 1: on that a lot of people don't do the soul
Speaker 1: searching on on Instagram.
Speaker 2: I keep seeing the same thing over and over again,
Speaker 2: which is supposed to make people feel better, but it
Speaker 2: actually does make me feel better. It says a lot
Speaker 2: of people want what other people have, but they're not
Speaker 2: willing to do what it takes to be that person,
Speaker 2: or they wouldn't even like it, you know, the rest
Speaker 2: of the person's life they had it, you know, something
Speaker 2: like that. And I think there's there's a really large
Speaker 2: grain of truth to that.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean I looked at people who are promoted
Speaker 1: and people who just narrowly missed a promotion, and I
Speaker 1: ask those that second group, you know, what does this
Speaker 1: other group have that you want? And I ask the
Speaker 1: same of that group, and they always think their lives
Speaker 1: are much better than they actually are after promotion. They
Speaker 1: even think they're getting more work life balance and more
Speaker 1: free time after a promotion, which is crazy to me.
Speaker 1: But I think people think they're just going to get
Speaker 1: more of all the good things after they get the
Speaker 1: new job, after they get the promotion, and they're not
Speaker 1: actually asking themselves, what am I willing to give up?
Speaker 1: Should I take on this role? And what are the
Speaker 1: ways in which I would fail at this new role?
Speaker 1: And do I have what it takes to make sure
Speaker 1: that doesn't happen. Those are questions you should be asking
Speaker 1: in the interview stage as well. But this loss frame
Speaker 1: is really important. What are you willing to give up
Speaker 1: if you change careers or if you're to go for
Speaker 1: this new company? You know, if you want me to
Speaker 1: take on this new role that means saying no to
Speaker 1: my coworkers. How am I going to protect myself from
Speaker 1: the social repercussions of that, the status loss of that?
Speaker 1: Would I now have to say no to people who
Speaker 1: are used to hearing yes from me. Walk through those
Speaker 1: kind of lost frame questions before you think that it's
Speaker 1: just going to be much better to have that higher
Speaker 1: status role or that new job in that new organization.
Speaker 2: It feels like no matter what your fantasy, your dream
Speaker 2: is like, if you get it in reality, you're it's
Speaker 2: never quite like you imagined it, you know. Like I
Speaker 2: keep thinking of like all these famous people, like who
Speaker 2: they dis like. I'm trying to think of some examples.
Speaker 2: What's the guy from a well.
Speaker 3: Al write it?
Speaker 1: Then?
Speaker 3: What's his name?
Speaker 1: Oh god, Jim Carrey carry Jim Carrey.
Speaker 2: You know, I saw an interview with him. He's like, wow,
Speaker 2: fame is totally not Yeah, yeah, it's not where it's
Speaker 2: at now. He's trying so hard to deprogram and.
Speaker 1: To just be an exist He became an artist, right.
Speaker 2: I don't know what he's he's he's no self now.
Speaker 2: Apparently he's like I saw an interview. He's like, I
Speaker 2: am nothing now, I am nothing. I am not Jim Carrey,
Speaker 2: and I do not identify with Jim Carros.
Speaker 1: It's very existential.
Speaker 3: So anyway, I think there's a deep truth there. It
Speaker 3: just doesn't.
Speaker 2: It's it's never quite what it seems. And then and
Speaker 2: then like the day after you get it, like it doesn't.
Speaker 2: It's like okay, now what you know. It's like you're
Speaker 2: still living, just moving on.
Speaker 1: You have to eat lunch and get coffee. We also
Speaker 1: think we're all going to get better over time, and
Speaker 1: we pretty much just stay the same. We just get different,
Speaker 1: you know, we don't become more moral or more interesting hotter, No,
Speaker 1: because you break up, we don't get I also, but
Speaker 1: I think it's just my makeup game is improving. It's
Speaker 1: like you make my makeup is not improving. Your hair
Speaker 1: is good though whatever your I got a haircut todays
Speaker 1: just today slid. Some of us, like you do, get
Speaker 1: hotter over time, but most of us do the same
Speaker 1: or get worse.
Speaker 2: I feel you, you know, well, but okay, not just
Speaker 2: not just that demean of life, but just like it
Speaker 2: just feels like, I mean, don't people grow more? Like
Speaker 2: you said morally for instance, And that just shocked me
Speaker 2: that you, like you had a very cynical view of that.
Speaker 2: You're like, You're like, yeah, most people don't grow more,
Speaker 2: they stay the same.
Speaker 3: Is that true? Like, I mean, I would think of
Speaker 3: my own self. I think, like I cringe when.
Speaker 2: I think of some of the things, you know, things
Speaker 2: the way I treat the things I've said when I
Speaker 2: was nineteen years old, you know, like I hope I.
Speaker 1: Because the downwards social past self comparisons are salient, right,
Speaker 1: It's easier for us to think of all the ways
Speaker 1: in which we've gotten better. It's hard for us to
Speaker 1: think of all the ways in which we've gotten worse.
Speaker 1: And I actually think when it comes to job change,
Speaker 1: think about parallel changes you work. You know, I used
Speaker 1: to have X and now I want why or I
Speaker 1: used to be x and now I want to be hy.
Speaker 1: People will just be super aspirational in ways that are
Speaker 1: actually pretty tough to live up to those standards.
Speaker 3: Oh that's interesting.
Speaker 1: You know, I think our day to day lives pretty
Speaker 1: much stay the same. You get up, you have coffee,
Speaker 1: you write your tweet, you go to work. At no
Speaker 1: point in there are you thinking to yourself, I'm just
Speaker 1: going to completely change all my moral foundations. You know,
Speaker 1: we're not that deep at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: and I think we just go about our lives and
Speaker 1: we're pretty consistent. We're much more consistent over time than
Speaker 1: I think we think we are in terms of what
Speaker 1: irritates us, what makes us happy, what tastes good, what
Speaker 1: tastes bad. You know, how motivated we are to exercise,
Speaker 1: It takes a lot to really disrupt that flow and
Speaker 1: to make us completely different people.
Speaker 2: Is that why we really gravitate towards these aberrant people
Speaker 2: that they get so famous and yeah for their like
Speaker 2: yeah for.
Speaker 1: Their ice baths or you know, in Silicon Valley we
Speaker 1: used to call them weekend warriors. You know, they would
Speaker 1: go all in on these crazy things. I think they're
Speaker 1: fascinating to watch because most of us could never actually
Speaker 1: do that, or we try it for five minutes and say, yeah,
Speaker 1: there's a reason why I don't, you know, have an
Speaker 1: ice tub in my backyard. It's actually quite uncomfortable and painful.
Speaker 4: Also change his heart.
Speaker 3: But there is an idea that those people are better humans.
Speaker 1: They're not better humans.
Speaker 2: I don't think they are, but there's this, there is
Speaker 2: this that's how we treat them on Instagram right where
Speaker 2: we treat these examples of people who like extremely focus
Speaker 2: on changing their bodies, you know, as like the paragon.
Speaker 2: You know, I would almost go so far to dare
Speaker 2: I use the phrase bro culture. Yeah, it's like I
Speaker 2: feel like there is a culture on Instagram of like
Speaker 2: treating that.
Speaker 3: And that's not moral development. That's you wake up at
Speaker 3: five am.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, that's and you're you think you're better than
Speaker 2: everyone else because you woke up at five and all
Speaker 2: the suckers are still sleeping.
Speaker 1: It's the new status dimension. Actually, so I study sartorial
Speaker 1: cues of status, so the clothes we wear. It's kind
Speaker 1: of fascinating. So the new version of showing off that
Speaker 1: you're wealthy is having a six pack, It's not having
Speaker 1: a Louis Vuitton bag because you know, can like anybody
Speaker 1: can buy that with a credit card. So the minute
Speaker 1: it becomes mainstream, it's no longer dimension of status. You know,
Speaker 1: certain brands of clothing that have no labels on them
Speaker 1: are recognized by one percent of the population as being
Speaker 1: high status. So that's the whole thing. But now having
Speaker 1: an incredible fitness, especially into your fifties, is a status
Speaker 1: symbol because that's very difficult to achieve if you don't
Speaker 1: have money. We are misaligned on what actually matters, but
Speaker 1: we pay attention a lot to these kind of visible
Speaker 1: cues of status that aren't, you know, legitimate cues of status,
Speaker 1: but it's just it's rare and it's associated with having wealth.
Speaker 2: Well, you kind of nailed by just even seeing the
Speaker 2: word status. I mean, we don't even need to be
Speaker 2: focused so much like who where's the role saying that
Speaker 2: that is what you have to be obsessed with? But
Speaker 2: that is what humans are obsessed with. How are you
Speaker 2: familiar with Jeffrey Miller's work on virtue signaling products? He
Speaker 2: wrote a whole book called Spent. I know that I
Speaker 2: really liked the book Spent, and not many people.
Speaker 3: I don't know I have read it. I don't know
Speaker 3: if it was a.
Speaker 2: New York Times bestseller or anything, but I remember reading
Speaker 2: it when it came out, and it really tickled my
Speaker 2: nerdy side, you know, and it explained a lot, you know,
Speaker 2: like college degrees, like, yeah, we want we want to
Speaker 2: do things that are hard to fake, you know, for
Speaker 2: for for meeting signals or whatever. We're obviously talking about
Speaker 2: more than just meeting signals right now. But but yeah,
Speaker 2: and then God sad I think he used to write
Speaker 2: about that.
Speaker 3: Do you did you have a homo? Was a homo something? Uh?
Speaker 1: Yeah, No, I'm like drawing, like I.
Speaker 3: Think all of this money.
Speaker 1: Do you know that book? It's about status? I mean, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's fascinating how we cycle through different status cues over
Speaker 1: the history of humanity. So it used to be skinny,
Speaker 1: and then it was fat, and then it was skinny
Speaker 1: and then it was fat again.
Speaker 3: When was it When was it fat?
Speaker 2: You mean during like maybe like the the Renaissance era
Speaker 2: it was, but it's.
Speaker 1: Still fat in some cultures where there's very little food,
Speaker 1: you know, so it's very much trully determined. But what
Speaker 1: is rare, what is hard to actually achieve?
Speaker 2: Well, people in America are horrible about that. You know,
Speaker 2: just watching celebrities who've lost a lot of weight, and
Speaker 2: even the hate they get for like selling out their
Speaker 2: fat you know, audience, you know, it's like, how dare you?
Speaker 3: I saw this.
Speaker 2: I was recently just reading this article about this famous
Speaker 2: celebrity who did that. She lost like thirty pounds and
Speaker 2: she showed her new body. She got hate for that.
Speaker 2: You get hate for every but of course you get
Speaker 2: hate for being fat too, right, So it's like, you
Speaker 2: can't if you're in the public eye, you can't You
Speaker 2: almost can't win, you know, right.
Speaker 1: You can't win. And so it zimp. It was a
Speaker 1: status thing because it's very expensive to get ozempic unless
Speaker 1: you actually have diabetes. But now and so a lot
Speaker 1: of celebrities are taking ozempic or something like it to
Speaker 1: lose a lot of weight. And that was high status.
Speaker 1: Now one in eight Americans are on something like ozempic. Really,
Speaker 1: so now it's actually being knocked down. Is like a
Speaker 1: low status thing to do to lose weight. So with
Speaker 1: just in the past twelve months, we've seen weight loss drugs.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you remember this during COVID, if
Speaker 1: you were able to have a COVID test early on
Speaker 1: in the pandemic, before they were common, and you showed
Speaker 1: the results of your COVID test. I mean, Heidi Klum
Speaker 1: got completely destroyed on Instagram. I believe it was her
Speaker 1: because she showed she had taken a COVID test and
Speaker 1: people were like, those aren't widely available. Stop flexing with
Speaker 1: your your legitimate COVID test. You know, so if it's rare,
Speaker 1: it counts as status. That's the only dimension that determines
Speaker 1: its humans. Humans.
Speaker 2: You conducted a massive study. I mean we're talking like
Speaker 2: forty thousand or.
Speaker 1: Something how many people for job therapy. Yeah, for job therapy,
Speaker 1: thousands and thousands of people. I lost track of how many.
Speaker 1: I don't think it was forty, but each chapter had
Speaker 1: you know, thousands at least.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I know, I'm like, Holy week. That's like
Speaker 2: just so our listeners know. That's a lot for scientific studies.
Speaker 2: My yeah, just PhD districs.
Speaker 1: For this book too. I haven't even published those findings
Speaker 1: elsewhere yet.
Speaker 3: It almost doesn't matter anymore. Yeah, yeah, that's true. The
Speaker 3: book is, you know, that's what matters.
Speaker 2: I mean, obviously, a tenure committee would disagree with that,
Speaker 2: but luckily and past that. But luckily you can do
Speaker 2: whatever you want and you could call it a joint
Speaker 2: right now on the psychology podcast like they do in
Speaker 2: Rogan and you wouldn't get fired.
Speaker 1: Fine.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, so uh, because you studied data from people
Speaker 2: who hire, promote, and fire people, so a wide range
Speaker 2: of things. So let's here's some secrets that you found. One,
Speaker 2: how can you make a resume more appealing?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I think this one's pretty easy. First off, if
Speaker 1: you have a bunch of overlapping dates on your resume,
Speaker 1: which people have they're doing gigage, you have to let
Speaker 1: those different roles talk to each other. You need to
Speaker 1: explain how this role at this job is related to
Speaker 1: this role at this other job. And people think that
Speaker 1: more is more when it comes to these things. Just
Speaker 1: say how leading this team was related to this other role.
Speaker 1: I think, you know, showing role overlap and just using
Speaker 1: that language is really important. You know. I think people
Speaker 1: debate over whether or not you want to use a
Speaker 1: photograph or not. Most people say no, you know, have
Speaker 1: those dates on your resume, show the languages that you speak.
Speaker 1: People are not doing this really weirdly, They're not actually showcasing,
Speaker 1: you know, all the languages that they have spoken over
Speaker 1: various parts of their lives. There there's been a lot
Speaker 1: of whitewashing of resumes, and I think that might be
Speaker 1: why that's happening.
Speaker 3: Washing.
Speaker 1: I think it, well, there it is now, because was
Speaker 1: it if I'm not going to get canceled. Okay, luckily
Speaker 1: it was in a published paper, So I will say that,
Speaker 1: you know, just kind of showcasing all those things. I
Speaker 1: think you know, there's certain things you don't want to
Speaker 1: keep on your resume, all of those gigages that aren't
Speaker 1: related to your actual job. Hires are very cynical about
Speaker 1: side hustles, and so if you have a side hustle
Speaker 1: that overlaps with your main employment, you better explain that
Speaker 1: hustle and how it's actually.
Speaker 3: Related, especially if it's only fans.
Speaker 1: Especially or depending on your industry, that might be the
Speaker 1: thing that gets I share a name with a dead
Speaker 1: porn star, so I have to say that again. Yes,
Speaker 1: Tessa West was a porn star, but not you, not me,
Speaker 1: just another Tessa West.
Speaker 2: I almost I thought you're saying you.
Speaker 1: She used to be a porn star. And it was
Speaker 1: a joke that fell very flat and the people came
Speaker 1: up to be a conference once and said I'm so
Speaker 1: proud of you for owning your truth. And that was
Speaker 1: just a different test. She was born days apart from me.
Speaker 1: She died of a heroin overdose, but there was some
Speaker 1: overlap there.
Speaker 2: But I will say that when I google Tessa Wes,
Speaker 2: you are the first thing that comes up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, did a lot of work together together?
Speaker 3: You've done somewhere.
Speaker 1: Her death date used to be on Google with my photos.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, we took some of that.
Speaker 2: Oh okay, I'm glad I made my joke because I
Speaker 2: found out a lot more about you. So networking, whom
Speaker 2: to network?
Speaker 3: Okay?
Speaker 2: So can you have a good social sense about that? Like,
Speaker 2: isn't it bad to network with like dark triad people,
Speaker 2: for instance, even if they're going to help you.
Speaker 1: Oh that's a good question. I think you might not
Speaker 1: know they're a dark triad when you first start out networking.
Speaker 1: But I would actually say there's no one way to network.
Speaker 1: You know, every chapter is about a different type of goal,
Speaker 1: and so should you network within your industry or whatever?
Speaker 1: But I think I would say that if you have
Speaker 1: systematic questions for those dark triad people for which they
Speaker 1: will give you useful answers, then why discount them entirely.
Speaker 1: They can share parts of the hidden curriculum with you.
Speaker 1: If they can tell you what nobody told them, what
Speaker 1: happened at work, you know, you can learn dark triad
Speaker 1: people exist at work, and so if they have a
Speaker 1: certain kind of experience it's interesting, or people have worked
Speaker 1: with them. I say, don't discount the evil people from
Speaker 1: your networking because evil people are at work, So why
Speaker 1: not learn from them in some capacity? And I'll be
Speaker 1: able to avoid them once you take the job, So
Speaker 1: why avoid them in the networking phase.
Speaker 2: Okay, let's show dark tried people some more love. Is
Speaker 2: what you're saying. They kind of they're underappreciated.
Speaker 1: Or allow them to have utility For us, it sounds
Speaker 1: much more center.
Speaker 3: They're underappreciated.
Speaker 2: Well that's funny, yeah, because they're very very utilitarian, and yeah.
Speaker 1: They're your kiss up kicked downers at work, so you
Speaker 1: might encounter them.
Speaker 2: So like dark tried people, they tend to love networking.
Speaker 2: You know, they just love it. It's like it's like breakfast
Speaker 2: for them. You know, they coffee and then networking, you know,
Speaker 2: and who and alliances they think very strategically. That doesn't
Speaker 2: come as naturally to me and to kind of I
Speaker 2: don't think like oh if I, but I know people
Speaker 2: who are there, like oh if I. If you everything
Speaker 2: as a everyone is a Pallen and in their chess game,
Speaker 2: like if I friends with this person, then now that'll
Speaker 2: unlock this person after two more. The celebrity you know, Yeah.
Speaker 1: They're the ones that give networking a bad reputation and
Speaker 1: make us feel dirty and cringey by doing it, doing
Speaker 1: it for that purpose, not to actually learn real things
Speaker 1: about a potential.
Speaker 2: Job, but we can gain from that from being friends
Speaker 2: with them. Yeah, what about white triad people? This is
Speaker 2: a I don't know if you're familiar with my construct, tell.
Speaker 1: Us all about white triad and I.
Speaker 3: Will tell you whit whit triad?
Speaker 1: WHOA wait did you say white?
Speaker 3: I'm saying right. You know.
Speaker 2: It's interesting though, some people actually say it's racist to
Speaker 2: do the wark light verse dark and I'm like.
Speaker 3: How is that racist?
Speaker 1: Light?
Speaker 3: How is hight?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 3: How's the contract the contrast of light versus dark?
Speaker 1: Like it all the presence of Twitter.
Speaker 3: People are like, that's racist.
Speaker 2: You should rename rename your construct it shouldn't be the
Speaker 2: light triad.
Speaker 1: It's like tele a physicist to rename that, well yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: the cosmos.
Speaker 2: Actually me get that out of my But we call
Speaker 2: it the light triad and to contrast it with the
Speaker 2: dark triad, and it includes the three components of the
Speaker 2: three members of the Light Triad are Contianism, which treating
Speaker 2: people as an end in themselves, not as a means
Speaker 2: to an end. It's a nerdy sort of counterpart to
Speaker 2: machivalianism on the Dark triad. And then we have faith
Speaker 2: in humanity, really believing in the fundamental goodness of humans.
Speaker 2: And then we have humanism treating every individual with dignity
Speaker 2: and respect. And it has been catching some traction in
Speaker 2: terms of research. A lot of research studies have extended
Speaker 2: our work and replicated it. That's important, No, it's pretty exciting.
Speaker 2: Actually we're replicating all over the place. And secondly, a
Speaker 2: lot of people are taking our work into appoint in
Speaker 2: the organizations to say, how can we have more Light
Speaker 2: Triad leaders because there really is a gender difference. In
Speaker 2: our research. We found striking, striking gender differences in the
Speaker 2: light versus Dark triad. Whereas like we're when I say striking.
Speaker 2: I mean like striking, like you can't like dark tride
Speaker 2: are men d percent of high we're talking about the
Speaker 2: high white triad group or women?
Speaker 3: Yeah, what is going on?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I mean do you think there's a selection that
Speaker 1: if you're a dark triad and you're man, it's just
Speaker 1: much easier to get ahead.
Speaker 3: Oh, interesting point.
Speaker 1: It's very tough if you're a dark Triad woman to
Speaker 1: climb to the top and become a CEO. To be
Speaker 1: really you know, I think you're going to get punched
Speaker 1: down so many times it's not impossible. But by the
Speaker 1: time you get I think that we we select out
Speaker 1: for people who are kenter stereotypical. Especially there's a lot
Speaker 1: of research on this in gender. You're going to face
Speaker 1: a lot of backlash if you're a woman doing those
Speaker 1: things in ways that men do not face that same backlash.
Speaker 1: So I think there might be a bit of a
Speaker 1: selection bias just who's able to climb up to the
Speaker 1: top with those trades, And you might find equal in
Speaker 1: high school kids or something like that, like before people
Speaker 1: become careers. I'd be curious to see if those gender
Speaker 1: differences exist in the youth or is it just once
Speaker 1: you're within an organization and you look to see what
Speaker 1: people are selecting on. It's interesting to think about. I
Speaker 1: just did a podcast on personality hires and if you
Speaker 1: would say that light tryad people are more likely to
Speaker 1: be personality hires because they're the glue that can bring
Speaker 1: teams together. We need people engage, we need more people
Speaker 1: like this around. But you know, they also obviously have
Speaker 1: to have those hard skills or they're going to go
Speaker 1: through that kind of imposter syndrome and you know, kind
Speaker 1: of feel low status at work. But yeah, I think
Speaker 1: that we under emphasize the importance of having those traits
Speaker 1: and to see that people are realizing that it's important
Speaker 1: for leaders to have them and to not be snakes
Speaker 1: in suits is great to see.
Speaker 3: That was a good book.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you've brought up imposter syndrome, and it's interesting
Speaker 2: there's two types of imposters. Of people with impostors who
Speaker 2: who report having imposter syndrome, they're actually dark triad imposter
Speaker 2: syndrome reporters who they only use it as a strategic
Speaker 2: presentation strategy. Yeah, to regulate your view of them so
Speaker 2: that they can get away with more crap because you
Speaker 2: have a empathy for them. Oh you you didn't do
Speaker 2: anything at work.
Speaker 1: Self deprecation can be used in very interesting strategy.
Speaker 2: But then and then there are the types who are
Speaker 2: more genuine low self esteems, you know. But anyway, we
Speaker 2: identified in research these two different types.
Speaker 3: So I just wanted to bring up that little nuance.
Speaker 1: We should collect some data. I feel like I tried
Speaker 1: with my stuff and see where people are kind of falling,
Speaker 1: you know, in these kind of career trajectories.
Speaker 3: Honestly, love, that's just a twelve item scale.
Speaker 1: Give it to me. I'll put it on my website.
Speaker 1: I'll add it right now to my call tricks as
Speaker 1: I'm live, collecting data on the type. Get more data
Speaker 1: all out, my lab manager, do the modification for the
Speaker 1: I r B right after this.
Speaker 3: You serious, you're not going to get like my hopes
Speaker 3: up here?
Speaker 4: Right?
Speaker 1: You're not sent it to me?
Speaker 3: Because that's really exciting. Yeah cool.
Speaker 2: We would love to collaborate with you. Yeah, that's that's amazing.
Speaker 2: Any sort of as we in the interview today, any
Speaker 2: sort of last secret advice you can give people trying
Speaker 2: to have a competitive doing yea, or find more meaning
Speaker 2: at work.
Speaker 1: Take it slow more is not more. If you're applying
Speaker 1: for fifty jobs a week, you're doing it wrong. Everything
Speaker 1: needs to be careful and strategic and send in those
Speaker 1: tailored resumes and cover letters. I think the number one
Speaker 1: mistake people make is they hit the easy apply button online.
Speaker 1: No one's reading those applications, by the way, like that
Speaker 1: is just a thing that One thing I learned from
Speaker 1: hiring managers and also just professional recruiters is they often
Speaker 1: have a quota of how many people they need to
Speaker 1: apply for a job for them to get paid. And
Speaker 1: that quote is pretty arbitrary. So if you see something
Speaker 1: that seems very easy to apply for, you're probably not
Speaker 1: going to get interviewed. You need to take the kind
Speaker 1: of longer wind your road of networking, tailoring, taking your time,
Speaker 1: and you should be applying for, like, you know, two
Speaker 1: to five jobs a week. That's the right way to
Speaker 1: do it, and it should feel much more bespoke when
Speaker 1: you're doing it, so you know, slower is better, take
Speaker 1: your time, and if you're having an existential crist since
Speaker 1: you're in good company, it's okay. Doesn't mean the world
Speaker 1: will end. Do a little soul searching. I got lots
Speaker 1: of quizzes at the front end of all of these
Speaker 1: chapters to see if it helps you kind of figure
Speaker 1: out if this is me. A little bit of self
Speaker 1: labeling I think also helps too, But but don't feel
Speaker 1: bad about it. We all go through this. I mean,
Speaker 1: I've had like fifty career crises, so it's okay.
Speaker 2: Last question, which is everyone wants to know, how do
Speaker 2: you still look like you're twenty five years old?
Speaker 1: I think lights Okay, is.
Speaker 3: It the baby face? What is it like? How do
Speaker 3: you still like two year old woman?
Speaker 1: I'm saying you have one hundred and five on the inside.
Speaker 3: I know what.
Speaker 2: I get that, I get that. I re resonate with that. No,
Speaker 2: I'm so appreciative that you came on the Psychology podcast
Speaker 2: today and.
Speaker 1: Now I feel like you need to hug your chill
Speaker 1: people at the end. Yeah, I feel it's like a
Speaker 1: rite of passage for it is it is? I need
Speaker 1: to get one of these from my office too, when
Speaker 1: everyone comes and cries and I can just tell them
Speaker 1: to take a chill post.
Speaker 2: Yes for your students, Yes, yeah, yes, thank you so much,
Speaker 2: thank you.
Speaker 4: What's what? What's what?
Speaker 1: On?
Speaker 4: What what what what