Speaker 1: When you sit down at your desk in the morning,
Speaker 1: what's the first task that you usually find yourself seduced by?
Speaker 1: For most people, you sit down and can very quickly
Speaker 1: find yourself answering emails, and before you know it, the
Speaker 1: day has taken off. But is that really the best
Speaker 1: way to enter your day? What if instead you were
Speaker 1: to spend a few minutes pondering what you were going
Speaker 1: to release, what you were grateful.
Speaker 2: For, and what you were going to focus on.
Speaker 1: This just so happens to be the morning ritual of
Speaker 1: Michael bungay Steiner. He's the author of The Coaching Habit,
Speaker 1: which has sold over one million copies worldwide, and spent
Speaker 1: twenty years as the CEO of Coaching, an innovation consultancy,
Speaker 1: Box of Crayons, and he's also the host of the
Speaker 1: two Pages podcast. He is a huge advocate for doing
Speaker 1: work that's not just good but great, which he covers
Speaker 1: in his new book How to Begin, which you can
Speaker 1: currently pre order ahead of its release in January twenty
Speaker 1: twenty too. So how does Michael make sure that a
Speaker 1: new project is worthy of saying yes to? Why does
Speaker 1: Michael set goals in six week chapters? And why should
Speaker 1: you be creating an operating manual to use with new
Speaker 1: colleagues or clients. My name is doctor Amantha Imber. I'm
Speaker 1: an organizational psychologist and the founder of behavioral science consultancy Inventium,
Speaker 1: And this is how I work, a show about how.
Speaker 2: To help you do your best work.
Speaker 1: Hey, Michael, So you've done so many podcast episodes over
Speaker 1: the years. How do you use those few minutes before
Speaker 1: you hit record, Like when you're trying to build rapport
Speaker 1: really quickly with a guest.
Speaker 3: You know, I scream at them and I say, if
Speaker 3: you don't perform at a really high level in this podcast,
Speaker 3: you're dead to me. That's what I do exactly. I'm like,
Speaker 3: I'm terrified about how this podcast is going to go.
Speaker 3: You know, I'm going to cut things I try and do.
Speaker 3: And it's varied over the years, but for the podcast
Speaker 3: that I have at the moment, I am trying to
Speaker 3: disrupt the usual conversation that people have, particularly authors, because
Speaker 3: if the author is on a bit of a podcast
Speaker 3: tour because they're talking about a boat, they're kind of
Speaker 3: locked and loaded into a couple of stories and a
Speaker 3: couple of key messages. Yes, And I'm always interested in
Speaker 3: trying to get something else from there. So my podcast
Speaker 3: is called two Pages with MBS, and it's where brilliant
Speaker 3: people read the best two pages from a favorite book.
Speaker 3: And I know my first ten minutes of that podcast
Speaker 3: is to try and get my audience to feel a
Speaker 3: connection to that person, and then the rest of the
Speaker 3: podcast is them reading the book and then us talking
Speaker 3: about the ideas and that. So in that before we
Speaker 3: hit record, I'm like, first of all, permission to permission
Speaker 3: to muck up because it is a produced podcast, so
Speaker 3: my producer can take out gaps and pauses and stumbles
Speaker 3: and the like. And then I say, look, here's roughly
Speaker 3: how the structure of the calls going to go, so
Speaker 3: you'll you'll know roughly the kind of the milestones. You know,
Speaker 3: ten to fifteen minutes, we moved from your story to
Speaker 3: asking about the book. And then I go, look, I'm
Speaker 3: really interested in the slightly unexpected. So if you see
Speaker 3: a story, tell me the story. If there's a left
Speaker 3: hand turn you can take in the conversation, take the
Speaker 3: left hand turn, because I love trying to keep up
Speaker 3: with you and engaging with you in the moment, because
Speaker 3: for me, I'm trying to invite people in my podcast
Speaker 3: who the type of people who if you sat next
Speaker 3: to them at a dinner party, you'd be stoked. Sometimes
Speaker 3: you sit next to people and a dinner party or
Speaker 3: at a conference or something, and you're like, you know what,
Speaker 3: it was a perfectly pleasant conversation, but I'm not feeling
Speaker 3: totally nourished by it. And sometimes you get lucky and
Speaker 3: you sit next to somebody and you're like, oh my god,
Speaker 3: you are so interesting. I'm trying to get people to
Speaker 3: be that person on my podcast.
Speaker 2: That's so cool.
Speaker 1: Now, if we were to start working together on a
Speaker 1: new project, I know that there's something really important that
Speaker 1: you would have me do and that you would do too.
Speaker 2: Can you tell me what that is?
Speaker 3: Yeah? I call it building our operating Manual. So the
Speaker 3: origin of this comes from a guy called Peter Block,
Speaker 3: who if you're in the world of kind of organizational
Speaker 3: change and stuff like that, you may have heard his name.
Speaker 3: And he talks about something called a social contract, and
Speaker 3: the bottom line is it's good to talk about how
Speaker 3: we're going to work together before we talk about what
Speaker 3: we're going to work on together. So this is a
Speaker 3: conversation that's helpful if you're you know, you have somebody
Speaker 3: new coming on your team, or you start working with
Speaker 3: a vendor or a contractor or anybody. Really you got
Speaker 3: a relationship where you like, we want this to be
Speaker 3: really good. The temptation is always to go, let's talk
Speaker 3: about the project, what needs to be built, what are
Speaker 3: we starting, what are our KPIs, and what are our
Speaker 3: es or whatever, And that pressure to an excitement to
Speaker 3: get stuff done often kind of sweeps you into that
Speaker 3: type of conversation. And you're in the honeymoon of this
Speaker 3: relationship with this new person, just like you're awesome, and
Speaker 3: I'm awesome, and where awesome? This project awesome? What could
Speaker 3: possibly go wrong? And the thing is something will go
Speaker 3: wrong every because it always goes wrong. It always goes
Speaker 3: off the rails a little bit. So I'm really enamored
Speaker 3: and try and have the discipline to have a conversation
Speaker 3: about let's let's talk about our operating manual. And I've
Speaker 3: just got a few questions or and I don't ask
Speaker 3: all of them all the time, but a few questions
Speaker 3: that I feel like help us having a conversation to go,
Speaker 3: let me tell you how to get the best out
Speaker 3: of me, and I want you to tell me how
Speaker 3: to get the best out of you. So I'll say
Speaker 3: things like, you know, Samantha, when you've worked with somebody
Speaker 3: like me before and in a project like this and
Speaker 3: it's gone really well, tell me what happened? What did
Speaker 3: you do? And what did the other person do? And
Speaker 3: then I'll answer the question myself. You know, when I
Speaker 3: worked on somebody like you and Mantha on a project
Speaker 3: like this and it went really well, here's some of
Speaker 3: the stuff that happened, and I'll go and when you've
Speaker 3: worked with somebody like me on a project that's kind
Speaker 3: of been a bit of a disaster or just kind
Speaker 3: of mediocre, what happened? You know, what did you do
Speaker 3: and what did they do? And we're building up understanding
Speaker 3: about one of the contexts in which we flourish and
Speaker 3: one of the contexts in which we struggle. You know,
Speaker 3: a great one is, and this is a question directly
Speaker 3: from Peter Block, how do you feel about the amount
Speaker 3: of power you have in this relationship? That's a that's
Speaker 3: a really hard question to ask. It it's it always
Speaker 3: takes people are back, but it's it's it's really good
Speaker 3: at kind of going how who has control here? And
Speaker 3: how do you feel about that?
Speaker 2: I love that.
Speaker 3: I'll give you one one more question and then we
Speaker 3: can we can ask me about it if you want another.
Speaker 3: One is when things go badly wrong or go off
Speaker 3: the rails a little bit, because they always do, what's
Speaker 3: your unilateral act? How do you respond? And you know
Speaker 3: I can always tell people, Look, I'm not that great
Speaker 3: a conflict, So you'll move into you'll just stop hearing
Speaker 3: from me, and this is both and this is the
Speaker 3: way to pull me out of that. So we actually
Speaker 3: have a conversation about this is what I look like
Speaker 3: when I'm behaving badly or under stress, and here's how
Speaker 3: you can manage me best to get me out of
Speaker 3: that doom loop. And I'll get them to tell me
Speaker 3: the same.
Speaker 2: That's really interesting.
Speaker 1: So at Inventium we have a very similar strategy. Whenever
Speaker 1: we have a new starter on the team, we get
Speaker 1: them completing We call it the OP on the one
Speaker 1: page operating manual and screen.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: For us, the way we think about it, it's like
Speaker 1: software hardware. All that stuff comes with a manual about
Speaker 1: how to use it. But I mean humans are far
Speaker 1: more complex, but we don't come with manual, and so
Speaker 1: we try to create one. So I'm really interested in
Speaker 1: those questions that you ask. Something else that we ask
Speaker 1: is what are your pief points? Like what are the
Speaker 1: things that just really frustrate you? And we find we
Speaker 1: get some interesting answers. What do you do though, if, like,
Speaker 1: if you're working with someone and maybe there like their
Speaker 1: insight into themselves and particularly you know, their shadow side
Speaker 1: their weaknesses is.
Speaker 2: Not that good?
Speaker 1: How do you draw those responses out more effectively?
Speaker 3: I'm not sure. I try and do it in the
Speaker 3: moment because for me it is the process of having
Speaker 3: gone through this allows us to come back and have
Speaker 3: this conversation again. So more important to me than the
Speaker 3: answers is the fact that I've said this, by the way,
Speaker 3: we have these type of conversations when we work together.
Speaker 1: So would you then have those conversations at regular intervals,
Speaker 1: like where you're not talking about the project and the
Speaker 1: work per se, but you're talking about the relationship and
Speaker 1: all the time relational things really all.
Speaker 3: The time, like I would say with you know, on
Speaker 3: my immediate team, so I have I kind of am
Speaker 3: part of two companies at the moment. I own a
Speaker 3: training company, that's run by a CEO, and I talked
Speaker 3: to her monthly but formerly on her performance quarterly. And
Speaker 3: then I have a little small kind of startup company
Speaker 3: where I have one employee, and with Ainsley every six
Speaker 3: weeks we'll have a conversation around has this going? And
Speaker 3: it's not about the work, It's about how is it
Speaker 3: going for you as a human being? How has it
Speaker 3: going for me as the person who's your your nominal boss?
Speaker 3: What do we need to do differently to do that?
Speaker 3: One of the questions that both with Shannon who's the
Speaker 3: CEO of Boxer Crayons, and Ainsley, who is kind of
Speaker 3: she works at MBS dot works. One of the questions
Speaker 3: that is most powerful in this is what needs to
Speaker 3: be said that hasn't yet been said, because that just
Speaker 3: creates space for us to go, ah, you know that
Speaker 3: thing that's hard to talk about, or I've been looking
Speaker 3: for the moment to sneak it into the conversation and
Speaker 3: I haven't quite figured out how to say it because
Speaker 3: it's a bit confronting to me or a bit confronting
Speaker 3: to you or whatever. What needs to be said that
Speaker 3: hasn't yet been said is just a permission to lay
Speaker 3: down the as yet unspoken, and that is a great
Speaker 3: cleanser and builder of resilience into the relationships.
Speaker 2: Oh, I'm gonna take that.
Speaker 3: One that I stole it from somebody else. I can't
Speaker 3: remember who, so steal away because it is it is
Speaker 3: a beauty. On another note, a man, I end my
Speaker 3: podcast at the moment that's the final question. I always
Speaker 3: ask people, and it's it's great. Sometimes people go, I
Speaker 3: got nothing. Some people times people go, that was a
Speaker 3: good conversation, thank you, And some people go, here's the
Speaker 3: thing I really wanted to tell you. I'm like, brilliant
Speaker 3: and we'll have a bit of a chat.
Speaker 2: That's cool.
Speaker 1: Now, I know that you think a lot about what
Speaker 1: to say yes to and what to say no to.
Speaker 1: I mean, why is that such an important thing that
Speaker 1: we should really think more deeply about.
Speaker 3: Yeah, look, I haven't listened to absolutely every episode of
Speaker 3: everything you've ever on this show, Amantha Michael.
Speaker 2: I'm very disappointed to hear that.
Speaker 3: I've had to say no to that. So I can
Speaker 3: say yes to having a life. But I can't be
Speaker 3: the first person who have mentioned this as just a
Speaker 3: foundational thing to get clear on. And I believe that
Speaker 3: at a certain point in your life you just get
Speaker 3: more opportunities than you can actually cope with. And there's
Speaker 3: a wiring that I've certainly carried on or taken with me,
Speaker 3: and other people might have taken it too, which is
Speaker 3: like when you start your career, you kind of say
Speaker 3: yes to a lot of things because you're just trying
Speaker 3: to build up experience and stories and to taste things.
Speaker 3: It's like, do I like the taste of this? Can
Speaker 3: I do it? You're trying to find that sort of
Speaker 3: sense of this is who I am in the context
Speaker 3: of work. Because I don't know about you, Manthon, but
Speaker 3: the first two or three years I spent working, I
Speaker 3: was just learning how to work. I was just learning
Speaker 3: who am I in the work context because it was
Speaker 3: different from being a university student or whatever. At a
Speaker 3: certain point you can actually do, you know, technically, you
Speaker 3: can do more than you actually have time for. So
Speaker 3: now it's about going, well, what are the choices that
Speaker 3: I can make that are thrilling to me and important
Speaker 3: and that they serve a bigger goal. And in organizations,
Speaker 3: there is a hunger for people to be more strategic,
Speaker 3: you know, they're like, ah, we said we need we
Speaker 3: really want people to be more strategic and everyone's like, yeah,
Speaker 3: I need to be more strategic, and everyone's like, yall,
Speaker 3: what does that mean? Because it's one of those anodyne
Speaker 3: words that gets bounced around and can mean you know
Speaker 3: everything and nothing. I think that one way to think
Speaker 3: about what does it mean to be strategic and therefore
Speaker 3: valued and therefore influential and an important person in a setting,
Speaker 3: in a context is to have the courage to say
Speaker 3: no to things? Who can say yes to what matters?
Speaker 3: And it's scary, and it's confusing, and it's fear of
Speaker 3: missing out, and it's what if I take the wrong choice,
Speaker 3: and the guilt and the anxiety that comes with making
Speaker 3: a choice. But it is also an adult act, and
Speaker 3: it is a choice to say, look, I'm committing to
Speaker 3: something that feels right. You can't control the outcome, but
Speaker 3: a full commitment of the process gives you a better
Speaker 3: chance of something amazing happening.
Speaker 2: So what is your process for what you do say
Speaker 2: yes to?
Speaker 3: Well, it kind of happens on a range of different levels.
Speaker 3: So I have regular invitations to do things beyond podcasts
Speaker 3: or contribute to a project one way or another, and
Speaker 3: for those short term, kind of shorter, kind of one
Speaker 3: off experiences. I have a number of different things. I
Speaker 3: kind of test one as I just do a kind
Speaker 3: of gut is it a hell yes or is it
Speaker 3: a no? So people will probably know that from Derek Sivers,
Speaker 3: and I think he's actually got a book out called
Speaker 3: Hell Yes or No. Now it's just one really helpful
Speaker 3: way of going, look, just work with my gut instinctive
Speaker 3: says it hell yes or no. Second, I'll actually do
Speaker 3: a little test for criteria, so, you know, to take
Speaker 3: an example that we're living at the moment. For podcast invitations,
Speaker 3: I've got somebody in my team to do a tiny
Speaker 3: bit of research around you know, what's the podcast about?
Speaker 3: How many people listen to it? Do I know them?
Speaker 3: And there's a kind of mix of a criteria I
Speaker 3: might say yes or no to there. And then there's
Speaker 3: the third point is me. It's a bit more existential, Amantha.
Speaker 3: It's just me going why am I filling up my space?
Speaker 3: And one am my you know, kind of one of
Speaker 3: my running from and why am I so uncomfortable with
Speaker 3: space and silence and you know, non busyness, and so
Speaker 3: part of it is just to kind of check into
Speaker 3: what the bigger the bigger things are that I do.
Speaker 3: So I've got that as a kind of immediate response
Speaker 3: to a request. Then there's a bigger context, which is
Speaker 3: what's the big project that I'm working on at the moment.
Speaker 3: So again, you know, Manthri, I stand on so many
Speaker 3: people's shoulders to talk about this stuff. But a writer
Speaker 3: called Kevin Kelly gave me the idea many years ago
Speaker 3: of figuring out your death date. So basically, with with
Speaker 3: statistical tables from actuaries, you can kind of figure out
Speaker 3: statistically when you're likely to die. And I know my
Speaker 3: death date. It's September fifteenth, twenty forty three, and Kevin
Speaker 3: Kelly and you can look this up at kk dot
Speaker 3: org if you're you're interested in finding this article. You guys, look,
Speaker 3: you basicly got five big projects, one big project every
Speaker 3: five years. So twenty twenty one, twenty forty three, I
Speaker 3: basically got five and a half four and a bit
Speaker 3: project left in me, which is quite sobering. It's like
Speaker 3: to write a book and get it out into the
Speaker 3: world and really kind of have that be a thing.
Speaker 3: Is about a five year project. Maybe that's a bit long,
Speaker 3: but it's about right. It's a good useful rule of thumb.
Speaker 3: So for me, there's also the bigger picture around, so
Speaker 3: what's my worthy goal right now? That's the language I
Speaker 3: use around how do I set that big project that
Speaker 3: I want to commit to that feels like the best
Speaker 3: expression of something that lights me up, something that serves
Speaker 3: the world, something that stretches and grows me. And then
Speaker 3: against that It's not as complicated as it sounds. I
Speaker 3: work in these kind of six months six week cycles around.
Speaker 3: I do a burst of work and then I stop
Speaker 3: and I pause and I kind of re evaluate where
Speaker 3: I am and re orient and decide what the next
Speaker 3: six weeks are going to be. And that structure also
Speaker 3: helps me figure out what I'm saying yes to and
Speaker 3: what I'm saying though to.
Speaker 2: Hmmm, wow, okay, there's so much that I want to
Speaker 2: dig into.
Speaker 3: There, so much there.
Speaker 1: So it's like because I'm I'm sort of an interesting
Speaker 1: point at the moment, and I know that your new
Speaker 1: book how to Begin really takes the reader through this,
Speaker 1: But I've my big project at the moment, which I
Speaker 1: guess a book is probably about a three year project.
Speaker 1: I find and I find this when I talk to
Speaker 1: writers of business books, there's kind of there's the the
Speaker 1: year of research and prep, there's a year of writing
Speaker 1: and editing, and then there's a year of promoting it,
Speaker 1: and you know, and obviously like you still just ter.
Speaker 3: There's a six month period of self loathing in there
Speaker 3: as well, but that's often overlapping the other.
Speaker 1: Parts, possibly longer than six months.
Speaker 3: But it's three years. It's three years of self loathing.
Speaker 3: That's okay, that's right.
Speaker 1: And so I'm at the part of the process where
Speaker 1: literally a week ago today, I submitted the final draft
Speaker 1: of the manuscript to my editor and so now.
Speaker 2: Thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1: And it's weird because we're in lockdown in Melbourne, I think,
Speaker 1: where we've just passed two hundred and fifty days or
Speaker 1: something crazy.
Speaker 3: Like world record.
Speaker 2: I hear, I know, I.
Speaker 1: Know, something to not be proud of. And I and
Speaker 1: someone said, hey, are you going to celebrate? I'm like,
Speaker 1: that hasn't even crossed my mind. But in the next
Speaker 1: few months they'll be editing and stuff. But I feel
Speaker 1: like the bulk of the work is done.
Speaker 2: If you like it.
Speaker 1: Now, I'm like, okay, I've got quite a lot of
Speaker 1: free time because it took a long time to write
Speaker 1: seventy thousand words, and I'm kind of hunting around for
Speaker 1: what will that next creative project be that I'll sink
Speaker 1: my teeth into.
Speaker 2: So how should I go about working that out?
Speaker 3: Michael, You know, the first thing I would say is
Speaker 3: just to allow yourself some time not to figure that out.
Speaker 3: I wish I could follow this advice as easily as
Speaker 3: I give it, because I'm not that great at doing it.
Speaker 3: But if this feels like it's done, and honestly, having
Speaker 3: having written a few books myself, even having got that
Speaker 3: final draft into your editor, there's still quite an immersive
Speaker 3: amount of work to be done if you want to
Speaker 3: make it. A part of your focus around well how
Speaker 3: does this book end up looking and going through the
Speaker 3: type setting and then getting it out into the world
Speaker 3: and then committing to marketing it and stuff.
Speaker 1: So absolutely yes, and I acknowledge that definitely yes.
Speaker 3: But I think for particularly for people who are smart, ambitious,
Speaker 3: and have a track record of success, so in otherwise
Speaker 3: you that there can be a little bit of pressure
Speaker 3: to go or let's say it, I've had twelve hours
Speaker 3: off since I submitted my book, I should I should
Speaker 3: have my next project underway, and what's wrong with me?
Speaker 3: I don't want to be slacking. I don't want I'm
Speaker 3: trying to be a role model to my team here
Speaker 3: and a role model to myself. And I'm like, you
Speaker 3: know what it is worth being fallow for a little
Speaker 3: bit to kind of go what matters to me now
Speaker 3: and to kind of open yourself up to the to
Speaker 3: the world to go, how can you bump into stuff
Speaker 3: that might spark you and have you think about new
Speaker 3: possible projects. Because the process of kind of figuring out
Speaker 3: a project, I can talk about it and I will
Speaker 3: talk about it in just a second, but there is
Speaker 3: an experience that it's like the recency effect, which is
Speaker 3: we we're so influenced by what we've just recently done
Speaker 3: that sometimes it can be hard to shake off what
Speaker 3: the next project might be. That's not just kind of
Speaker 3: like it's just it's almost it's kind of the same
Speaker 3: as the last big project that you finished, because you're
Speaker 3: still walking the value of writing a book and writing
Speaker 3: a book about you know that particular topic. I read
Speaker 3: an article in The Guard on the weekend by Tim Minchin.
Speaker 3: It's an interesting article about ambition about how he made
Speaker 3: his name as a comedian and then stop being a comedian,
Speaker 3: and people may not have fully noticed it, but he's like,
Speaker 3: I didn't want to get sucked into that label. And
Speaker 3: he's he talks about his ambition now to be unpigeonhole able,
Speaker 3: if that's even a word, and I personally admire that
Speaker 3: because it's like he's been a willingness to kind of
Speaker 3: slow down and go let me stay open to what
Speaker 3: shows up, and let me stay open to what other
Speaker 3: projects he might not just move towards success, but actually
Speaker 3: be something that stretches and grows you in an unexpected way.
Speaker 1: We'll be back with Michael in a moment, hearing about
Speaker 1: why he recommends setting goals in six week chapters and
Speaker 1: how he gets himself back on track when he's not
Speaker 1: feeling his best. And if you're keen to consume more
Speaker 1: of the stuff that I'm putting out into the world,
Speaker 1: more tips and tactics and tools. I release a lot
Speaker 1: of stuff through social media, So you can find me
Speaker 1: on LinkedIn. Just search for Amantha Imba. I think I'm
Speaker 1: the only one there, and you can also find me
Speaker 1: on Twitter at Amantha and on Instagram at Amantha.
Speaker 2: I you talk.
Speaker 1: About setting goals in six week chunks or I think
Speaker 1: you use the language six week chapters.
Speaker 2: I believe that's right.
Speaker 1: Can you tell me, like why six weeks? Why is
Speaker 1: that a good amount of time?
Speaker 3: Well, you know, people are learning. I'm a bit of
Speaker 3: a magpie, so I'm always on the lookout for other
Speaker 3: people who had good ideas, who've tested stuff, and I
Speaker 3: came to the region that went this is particularly helpful
Speaker 3: in the conversation of setting out a worthy goal. And
Speaker 3: this worthy goal, which is part of this book how
Speaker 3: to Begin, It's like you want a goal that is
Speaker 3: thrilling and important and daunting, so something that is a
Speaker 3: bit nerve wracking as you take it on. You know,
Speaker 3: I was talking to Liz Wiseman the other day, who
Speaker 3: has a new book out, and she's like, it's like,
Speaker 3: you know how to start the project, but you don't
Speaker 3: know how to finish it, Like exactly, there's a goal
Speaker 3: like that, So the kind of right weight to it.
Speaker 3: And this isn't something that you've done before. You might
Speaker 3: not have done it technically, or you just might not
Speaker 3: have done it at this scale or at this level
Speaker 3: of ambition or something. So it's there's unknown, and it
Speaker 3: means that you can't just map out a you know,
Speaker 3: a three year project of a water fall going this
Speaker 3: and this and this and this. It is emergent. It's
Speaker 3: going to evolve. Even what might be the goal, the
Speaker 3: bigger goal that you have made, change and evolve as
Speaker 3: you begin the work on it. So this idea of well,
Speaker 3: here's another metaphor. It's not like you set you find
Speaker 3: your worthy goal and then you go right, I'll just
Speaker 3: type in the Destiny Nation addressing to my Google maps,
Speaker 3: and you know, it's like seventeen minutes, five corners eighteen
Speaker 3: minutes if you stop at the coffee shop. You know,
Speaker 3: it's more like you. You're in front of you is
Speaker 3: a kind of misty valley, and on the on the
Speaker 3: other side of the valley is that kind of a
Speaker 3: peak which you think is your peak, but you're not
Speaker 3: entirely sure, and you've got to find your way forward
Speaker 3: and you've got to navigate your way through the wilderness
Speaker 3: that's in front of you to get to your destination.
Speaker 3: So you know, I can claim inspiration from something like orienteering.
Speaker 3: So you're like map and compass, You're like, okay, this
Speaker 3: is where I'm trying to go. So you set your
Speaker 3: compass and you set a destination. I've got to get
Speaker 3: to that gum tree, and then you run to that
Speaker 3: gum tree and then you pull out your map and
Speaker 3: you re orient and you get your compass out and
Speaker 3: you get to the next gum tree or rock or whatever.
Speaker 3: But it's the same pattern you see in things like
Speaker 3: Agile in terms of how they think about working in bursts.
Speaker 3: They figure out what the important thing is, they work
Speaker 3: hard on it, and then they stop and they go, now,
Speaker 3: what if we've done this or we' to do this,
Speaker 3: where do we what feels most important now? And it
Speaker 3: also is a process talked about by the former chief
Speaker 3: tech officer of base Camp, and he's got a book
Speaker 3: called I can't remember what the book is called, but
Speaker 3: it's basically about how they ship product in base Camp.
Speaker 3: And he says said, look, we tested it, and it
Speaker 3: seems that six weeks is long enough to make real
Speaker 3: progress on something, but short enough that if you've just
Speaker 3: been spent six weeks working on the wrong thing, the
Speaker 3: opportunity cost isn't that great, So you can get really
Speaker 3: committed to it, you can go far. And also, if
Speaker 3: it's been a complete bust. It's only six weeks in
Speaker 3: the big scheme of things. So I was like, you
Speaker 3: know what, that's a good thing. That's I'm going to
Speaker 3: steal that. So six weeks it is.
Speaker 1: Now, can you tell me about the session that you
Speaker 1: did with Aaron Wig, which I believe was to help
Speaker 1: you find your way forward?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Aaron Weed? So wait, how do I spell that?
Speaker 3: It's literally like a weed weed?
Speaker 2: Got it?
Speaker 3: So like not a flower but a weed. But she
Speaker 3: is a total flower. So two years ago or a
Speaker 3: little longer now, I stopped being the CEO at Box
Speaker 3: of Crayons. Now, this was a company that I'd founded
Speaker 3: twenty years earlier or thereabouts, and it had, to my surprise,
Speaker 3: grown into a pretty big, pretty successful learning and development company.
Speaker 3: But not to my surprise, I just found out that
Speaker 3: I just wasn't a great CEO. Like I didn't suck,
Speaker 3: but nor was I really wonderful at it, and nor
Speaker 3: was I super excited about that as a job. So
Speaker 3: how to coach? I kind of hired or no, I
Speaker 3: kind of tapped Shannon, who's working for the company. I said,
Speaker 3: you're around, next CEO. We spent a year preparing for
Speaker 3: the handover, and then on a certain date I stepped aside,
Speaker 3: she became CEO, and we had another year being coached
Speaker 3: to basically stopped me screwing up the founder transition because
Speaker 3: founders always medal and their beard and their prima donnas
Speaker 3: and blah blah blah. So it's basically to keep me
Speaker 3: out of the kitchen. So that all went pretty well.
Speaker 3: But I'm on the other side going, and you know, Mantha,
Speaker 3: this kind of connects to your you know, what's my
Speaker 3: next project question from earlier on. I'm going, well, who
Speaker 3: am I?
Speaker 1: Now?
Speaker 3: What am I doing? And you know, am I am
Speaker 3: I anything? Now that I'm not the CEO of Box
Speaker 3: of Crayons? And it wasn't exactly an existential crisis, but
Speaker 3: I was really struggling to figure out what the next
Speaker 3: thing to do because I had literally spent like fifteen
Speaker 3: years investing time and money and everything into being known
Speaker 3: as a guy who talked about curiosity and coaching and
Speaker 3: the coaching habit and all of that stuff. And now
Speaker 3: that wasn't my thing to talk about anymore. That was
Speaker 3: Box of Crowns and I was going to be separate
Speaker 3: from that. So somebody mentioned erin we work to me.
Speaker 3: She calls it the dig dog, and she's like, well,
Speaker 3: here's what happens over two three hour processes. You will
Speaker 3: tell her your story, she'll listen to it, and in
Speaker 3: real time, she will create your your ecosystem, your kind
Speaker 3: of operating system using language. It'll be you know, somewhere
Speaker 3: between one and five different words. And Amanda, I can't
Speaker 3: tell you how skeptical I was about this. I was
Speaker 3: just like, you know, first of all, I'm a pretty
Speaker 3: good facilitator, and I'm like, Okay, you're gonna have to
Speaker 3: be a really good facilitator because I'm very impatient with
Speaker 3: poor facilitators and I'm not that good with the kind
Speaker 3: of woo woo stuff either. So I'm like, ah, man,
Speaker 3: this sounds like it's it's a combination of bad facilitation
Speaker 3: and woolness. But I was a bit stuck. And you know,
Speaker 3: she actually there are two people who've gone through her
Speaker 3: process that I knew and admired. I was like, well, okay,
Speaker 3: she's got social proof that is actually of value to me.
Speaker 3: So I caught her up and we did this remotely
Speaker 3: because there was COVID times or maybe it wasn't. Maybe
Speaker 3: well it doesn't matter, did it remotely? And Manta, it
Speaker 3: was amazing because I was so sure what my three
Speaker 3: my words were going to be. They're going to be
Speaker 3: something around possibilities and curiosity and coaching and questions and
Speaker 3: creativity and making a bit zany or whatever. And I
Speaker 3: just was like, I know, I know what this is about.
Speaker 3: And the three words that came back were actually none
Speaker 3: of the above. One was confidence, one was forward as
Speaker 3: in kind of looking forward and progress. And the root word,
Speaker 3: the kind of the core word, and my setup is power,
Speaker 3: particularly disrupting power kind of how do I how do
Speaker 3: I play a role to disrupt and decenter the norms
Speaker 3: of power that show up. I was very excited to
Speaker 3: get those three words because I because they offered me
Speaker 3: a way out of the box that I built myself,
Speaker 3: the box of crayons kind of definition and cloak that
Speaker 3: I was finding it hard to shed. And you know,
Speaker 3: the power word became the kind of the origin of
Speaker 3: what the work that NBS do works is about, which
Speaker 3: is to help people be a force for change, where
Speaker 3: I'm like, I'm going to help other people give them
Speaker 3: the tools and the confidence and the resources in the
Speaker 3: community to claim power and disrupt power in whatever their
Speaker 3: sphere happens to be. So as yeah, it's super exciting.
Speaker 3: I was surprised, and you know, I know, I actually know.
Speaker 3: Eron's just starting to launch a course now I think,
Speaker 3: so if people are interested in their state, can go
Speaker 3: check her out. I really recommend it.
Speaker 2: That's so cool.
Speaker 1: Now, I want to know, if you're not working at
Speaker 1: your best, how do you get yourself back on track?
Speaker 3: Well, the first thing I try and do is I
Speaker 3: just try not to beat myself up for not working
Speaker 3: at my best, because there's nothing more miserable than going,
Speaker 3: what's wrong with me? I'm not being able to work
Speaker 3: at my best? And then you kind of get into
Speaker 3: this Shane spiral of what you know, I'm a you know,
Speaker 3: I'm a privileged white man and I'm at my peak,
Speaker 3: which is not actually true, but let's pretend it is.
Speaker 3: And I'm like, why can't I grind it out or
Speaker 3: blah blah blah. So there's a way to be to
Speaker 3: be kind of kind about it. I try and follow
Speaker 3: the science, Amantha, and that means nap and go for
Speaker 3: a walk and get into nature a little bit. And
Speaker 3: I'm not always convinced that I can tell the difference
Speaker 3: that it feels better, But I'm just trusting that actually
Speaker 3: I'm just the same as everybody else, and that lying
Speaker 3: down and taking a twenty minute nap or going for
Speaker 3: a thirty minute walk outside is just going to help
Speaker 3: me help me get better. And you know, there's all
Speaker 3: the good stuff we know about you know, make you know,
Speaker 3: doing the tasks that you feel that are appropriate to
Speaker 3: your level of energy right now. So there are sometimes
Speaker 3: I'm like, man, I couldn't create a creative spark if
Speaker 3: if my life depended on that. So I'll say I'm
Speaker 3: just going to go, right, I'm just going to see
Speaker 3: if I can do forty minutes and get my inbox
Speaker 3: down to less than twenty eight thousand inbox messages or
Speaker 3: something something like that. So there's there's a way of
Speaker 3: kind of setting context around that. But you know that,
Speaker 3: I think probably the final standard I give myself it's
Speaker 3: says to go, well, what is good enough? Because there
Speaker 3: I find what's really pernicious Amantha is a driving level
Speaker 3: of quality that is not always required. So a big
Speaker 3: thing is says to go, if I had to guess
Speaker 3: what good enough was for this little piece of work, right,
Speaker 3: now what would that be and is that within reach?
Speaker 3: Right now?
Speaker 1: I've heard that you do something call and I hope
Speaker 1: I'm getting this name correct. That this not that exercise.
Speaker 1: Can you tell me about that?
Speaker 3: I can? And sorry, I do do this. Yeah. This
Speaker 3: is also what I do is I forget some of
Speaker 3: the tools that my dispose.
Speaker 2: Of until a podcast host reminds you.
Speaker 3: Thank you, thank you, Mantha. You did it very very
Speaker 3: graciously as well. So one of my early jobs was
Speaker 3: in the world of kind of branding and particularly new
Speaker 3: product development. And you know, some a company would go,
Speaker 3: you know, Michael and your your organization, we need you
Speaker 3: to invent a new thing for us, but it has
Speaker 3: to be it has to fit with our brand. And
Speaker 3: the challenge is that it's really hard to get people
Speaker 3: to talk about what a brand is and what it
Speaker 3: really means beyond just kind of the obvious. So you
Speaker 3: have to come up with a way of thinking about
Speaker 3: describing a brand. And I first came across as tool
Speaker 3: this not in the context of describing a brand, and
Speaker 3: then I moved it into the world of personal development
Speaker 3: and self growth and self management. So here's how I
Speaker 3: think about it. I come up with pairs of words,
Speaker 3: somewhere between five and seven pairs of words, and I'm
Speaker 3: trying to articulate what I'm like at my very best
Speaker 3: and also what I'm like not when I'm at my worst,
Speaker 3: but when I'm just when I'm off my game, you know,
Speaker 3: like I'm ten percent off my game or fifteen percent
Speaker 3: off my game. And I find that's a really helpful Chok.
Speaker 3: So let me give you an example of some of
Speaker 3: the pairs of words. Step forward, not step back, hold
Speaker 3: it lightly, not take it seriously, be generous, don't be greedy.
Speaker 3: And the way I manage it, Amantha, is if I'm
Speaker 3: feeling understress, and I particularly feel this if like I'm
Speaker 3: I'm about to give a speech in front of a
Speaker 3: kind of important audience, or I'm having a meeting with
Speaker 3: somebody and it feels like there's a lot on the
Speaker 3: line and I want my best public version of myself
Speaker 3: to show up. This is particularly when I use this tool,
Speaker 3: because what I will often do is I will notice
Speaker 3: how I am playing small or shutting down or kind
Speaker 3: of manifesting some of those behaviors that are in the
Speaker 3: not that column, and I'll need to go into the
Speaker 3: this column to remember what I'm like at my very best.
Speaker 3: So as an example, I was down in Detroit, you know,
Speaker 3: the home of all the big car manufacturers, some years ago,
Speaker 3: and I was giving a talk and it was basically
Speaker 3: a whole bunch of senior folks from like all the
Speaker 3: big car manufacturers, and it was just like this gathering
Speaker 3: of alpha males. I mean, honestly, they were all six
Speaker 3: foot four. They all had white teeth and short gray hair,
Speaker 3: and gray suits and white shirts and red ties and
Speaker 3: really firm handshakes. And this isn't my natural setting at all.
Speaker 3: And I could just feel myself shrinking because I'm like,
Speaker 3: oh man, these are my people, this is my audience.
Speaker 3: And you know, my usual speech or workshop thing is
Speaker 3: kind of a bit provocative, a bit performative, a very interactive,
Speaker 3: and I could just have I have all these doubts,
Speaker 3: you know, like, oh man, this is bad. I should
Speaker 3: shut it down. I should behave I should conform to
Speaker 3: what's going to be expected of me. And then I
Speaker 3: noticed that and I was like, oh, and one of
Speaker 3: my pairs of words is provocative, not sycophantic, you know,
Speaker 3: sycophantic meaning basically sucking up to somebody. And I could
Speaker 3: just feel myself becoming sycophantic, and I'm like, Okay, I'm
Speaker 3: going to remember that. Actually part of me at my
Speaker 3: best is to be a little bit provocative. And it
Speaker 3: kind of gave me permission and got me reconnected to
Speaker 3: how I wanted to be on stage with these people,
Speaker 3: how I wanted to be the best version of myself.
Speaker 2: That's great.
Speaker 1: Something I've noticed, like, you're so well spoken, Michael, And
Speaker 1: I've noticed when I ask you a question, I feel
Speaker 1: like you're sort of taking a deep breath in and
Speaker 1: then you'll like come up with these incredibly wise words.
Speaker 2: What is your process?
Speaker 1: I'm really I'm curious about what's going on for you,
Speaker 1: Like when you're sort of taking that breath in and
Speaker 1: then responding.
Speaker 3: I appreciate you you noticing that. You know, some years ago,
Speaker 3: I read a book called The Advice Trap, and the
Speaker 3: message and the advice trap is your advice is not
Speaker 3: nearly as good as you think it is. And I
Speaker 3: was like, you know, authors often write books for themselves.
Speaker 3: I'm like, Michael, this one's for you. Your advice is not
Speaker 3: nearly as good as you think it is. And I've
Speaker 3: just tried to build a practice of you know, taking it, honestly,
Speaker 3: taking a bit of a breath to think, what's the
Speaker 3: best answer to this that I might be able to offer,
Speaker 3: rather than what's the first answer that comes to mind?
Speaker 3: Because I'm now, you know, I'm in my somebody once
Speaker 3: said that I'm in my early mid fifties. So I've
Speaker 3: just been around long enough now, I just I know stuff,
Speaker 3: and I know alternatives, and I know options. You know,
Speaker 3: I've just been around enough that enough settlement has sunk
Speaker 3: to the bottom of this particular lake, and I'm like,
Speaker 3: how do I how do I find an answer that
Speaker 3: feels most decisive right now that could be of best
Speaker 3: service to the audience right now rather than just the
Speaker 3: first thing that comes to mind.
Speaker 2: I like that a lot.
Speaker 1: My natural inclination when I'm being interviewed somewhere or doing
Speaker 1: Q and A off the back of a keynote or
Speaker 1: something is to feel that silence. The silence is so scary.
Speaker 1: I feel like, you're incredibly good. It's just been comfortable
Speaker 1: with that silence. And it's been interesting for me as
Speaker 1: interviewing you, and I mean, you know, we've we've met,
Speaker 1: we've hung out up before.
Speaker 2: It's been a really interesting experience. I'm as sign Michael,
Speaker 2: thank you.
Speaker 3: There's a great there's a great example of me sounding
Speaker 3: like I'm comfortable with silence whilst not being comfortable at all.
Speaker 3: A couple of months ago, I was on Brene Brown's podcast,
Speaker 3: which was a big treat. You know, I was super
Speaker 3: excited to get invited to be part of that, but
Speaker 3: I didn't know. She didn't give me any preparation for
Speaker 3: what it was like. I didn't have an interview with
Speaker 3: a producer or anything, so I had no idea what
Speaker 3: we were going to be talking about. And forty minutes
Speaker 3: into it, forty five minutes into it, she guys, okay,
Speaker 3: so coach me. I was like, oh my god, I'm
Speaker 3: coaching Brene Brown. Try not to panic. And I would
Speaker 3: ask Brene a question and there just be this silence.
Speaker 3: And I'm not sure how long that it goes on for,
Speaker 3: because I'm not that good at listening to myself and me,
Speaker 3: but it felt like it was like a twenty minute
Speaker 3: silence up between me asking a question, her answering at
Speaker 3: and inside my head is like, oh my god, fill
Speaker 3: the silence, fill the silence, ask another question. But you know,
Speaker 3: experience was like you know what, just hold the silence
Speaker 3: because it's such a precious gift to give people a
Speaker 3: bit of space to think.
Speaker 1: It.
Speaker 3: Also, you know, if you're asked a question and you
Speaker 3: take a beat or two to figure out a good
Speaker 3: answer and somehow shows a respect to the question and
Speaker 3: also gives a weight to the answer that might not
Speaker 3: come with a really fast response.
Speaker 2: So true.
Speaker 1: Now for people that want to consume more of what
Speaker 1: you are putting into the world, Michael, and also get
Speaker 1: their hands on a copy of How to Begin. What
Speaker 1: is the best way for people to do that?
Speaker 3: Thank you? How to Begin It's pub date is January eleventh,
Speaker 3: But if you go to how to Begin dot com,
Speaker 3: you know you'll get access, you'll get ways to buy
Speaker 3: the book if you want that. You also there's a
Speaker 3: kind of free staff and download. So how to Begin
Speaker 3: dot com is a place for the book. If you
Speaker 3: want a more general introduction to the work that I do,
Speaker 3: MBS dot Works is where you'll find my podcast few
Speaker 3: pages With MBS, We've got this wonderful free year long
Speaker 3: course called The Year of Living Brilliantly, which was meant
Speaker 3: to be like a marketing thing. You know, I get
Speaker 3: people into this course and upsell them to stuff. But
Speaker 3: it's a terrible marketing thing because it's literally a year
Speaker 3: of brilliant teachers teaching people new stuff, like a new
Speaker 3: six minute video every week. So by the time people
Speaker 3: are done, they're like, we're exhausted. There's been so much
Speaker 3: good work here that we don't want to buy anything.
Speaker 3: So terrible marketing idea, but a great course if people
Speaker 3: are interested in that.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much, Michael.
Speaker 1: I've just loved this chat. I feel like I've taken
Speaker 1: so many notes and it's been one of those interviews
Speaker 1: where it's like, I'm going to go back and listen
Speaker 1: to this like a few more times because there's yeah,
Speaker 1: I can't wait to share it with listeners.
Speaker 2: So thank you so much for your time.
Speaker 3: Meantha, thank you. You're a wonderful host. It's hard to
Speaker 3: believe this has been an hour. It's gone really quickly.
Speaker 1: I hope you liked my chat with Michael. I just
Speaker 1: feel like whenever I catch.
Speaker 2: Up with Michael, I learn so much.
Speaker 1: This is one of those episodes where I will be
Speaker 1: going back over and taking even more notes.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: If you are not a subscriber or follower of how
Speaker 1: I work, now might be the time to do so,
Speaker 1: because next week I have got playwright David Williamson on
Speaker 1: the show. David Williamson is someone who I absolutely idolized
Speaker 1: as a teenager and throughout my twenties when I was
Speaker 1: a massive theater geek, so I was so excited to
Speaker 1: get the chance to chat to David. How I Work
Speaker 1: is produced by Inventium with production support from Dead Set Studios.
Speaker 1: The producer for this episode was Jenna Kota, and thank
Speaker 1: you to Martin Nimba, who does the audio mix for
Speaker 1: every episode and makes everything sound better than it would
Speaker 1: have otherwise.
Speaker 2: See you next time.