Speaker 1: Hello there, it's Amantha. I'm currently on a break, so
Speaker 1: I've handpicked a bunch of my favorite episodes from the
Speaker 1: last year to share with you. Okay, on with today's
Speaker 1: best of episode. When you sit down at your desk
Speaker 1: in the morning, what's the first task that you usually
Speaker 1: find yourself seduced by? For most people, you sit down
Speaker 1: and can very quickly find yourself answering emails and before
Speaker 1: you know it, the day has taken off. But is
Speaker 1: that really the best way to enter your day? What
Speaker 1: if instead you were to spend a few minutes pondering
Speaker 1: what you were going 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 Stainer. 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 home 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 two. 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 really
Speaker 1: 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, you're.
Speaker 4: Dead to me.
Speaker 3: That's what I do exactly. I'm like, I'm terrified about
Speaker 3: how this podcast is going to go. You know, I've
Speaker 3: got a couple of things I try and do, and
Speaker 3: it's varied over the years, But for the podcast that
Speaker 3: I have at the moment, I am trying to disrupt
Speaker 3: the usual conversation that people have, particularly authors, because if
Speaker 3: the author is on a bit of a podcast talk
Speaker 3: because they're talking about a boat. They're kind of locked
Speaker 3: and loaded into a couple of stories and a couple
Speaker 3: of key messages.
Speaker 4: Yes, and I'm always.
Speaker 3: Interested in trying to get something else from there. So
Speaker 3: my podcast is called two Pages with MBS and it's
Speaker 3: where brilliant people read the best two pages.
Speaker 4: 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.
Speaker 4: Going to go.
Speaker 3: So you'll you'll you'll know roughly the kind of the milestones.
Speaker 3: You know, ten to fifteen minutes, we moved from your
Speaker 3: story to asking about the book, and then I go, look,
Speaker 3: I'm really interested in the slightly unexpected. So if you
Speaker 3: see a story, tell me the story. If there's a
Speaker 3: left hand turn you can take in the conversation. Take
Speaker 3: the left hand turn because I love trying to keep
Speaker 3: up with you and engaging with you in the moment.
Speaker 3: Because for me, I'm trying to invite people in my
Speaker 3: podcast who the type of people who if you sat
Speaker 3: next to them at a dinner party, you'd be stoked.
Speaker 3: Sometimes you sit next to people and a dinner party
Speaker 3: or at a conference or something, and you're like, you
Speaker 3: know what, it was a perfectly pleasant conversation, but I'm
Speaker 3: not feeling totally nourished by it. And sometimes you get
Speaker 3: lucky and you sit next to somebody and you're like,
Speaker 3: oh my god, you are so interesting. I'm trying to
Speaker 3: get people to be that person on my podcast.
Speaker 2: That's so cool.
Speaker 1: Now, if we went 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 4: Yeah?
Speaker 3: I call it building our operating Manual. So the origin
Speaker 3: of this comes from a guy called Peter Block, who
Speaker 3: if you're in the world of kind of organizational change
Speaker 3: 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 or anybody. Really you
Speaker 3: got a relationship where you like, we want this to
Speaker 3: be really good. The temptation is always to go, let's
Speaker 3: talk about the project, what needs to be built, what
Speaker 3: are we starting, what are our KPIs, and what are
Speaker 3: our c's or ocr or whatever, And that pressure to
Speaker 3: an excitement to get stuff done often kind of sweeps
Speaker 3: you into that type of conversation. And you're in the
Speaker 3: honeymoon of this relationship with this new person, just like
Speaker 3: you're awesome, and I'm awesome, and where awesome? This project awesome?
Speaker 3: What could possibly go wrong? And the thing is something
Speaker 3: will go wrong everything, because it always goes wrong. It
Speaker 3: always goes off the rails a little bit. So I'm
Speaker 3: really enamored and try and have the discipline to have
Speaker 3: a conversation about let's let's talk about our operating manual.
Speaker 3: And I've just got a few questions or and I
Speaker 3: don't ask all of them all the time, but a
Speaker 3: few questions that I feel like help us having a
Speaker 3: conversation to go, let me tell you how to get
Speaker 3: the best out of me, and I want you to
Speaker 3: tell me how to get the best out of you.
Speaker 3: So I'll say things like, you know, so, Amantha, when
Speaker 3: you've worked with somebody like me before in a project
Speaker 3: like this and it's gone really well, tell me what happened?
Speaker 4: What did you do?
Speaker 3: And what did the other person do? And then I'll
Speaker 3: answer the question myself. You know, when I worked on
Speaker 3: somebody like you and Mantha on a project like this
Speaker 3: and it went really well, here's some of the stuff
Speaker 3: that happened, and I'll go and when you've worked with
Speaker 3: somebody like me on a project that's kind of been
Speaker 3: a bit of a disaster or just kind of mediocre,
Speaker 3: what happened? You know, what did you do and what
Speaker 3: did they do? And we're building up understanding about one
Speaker 3: of the contexts in which we flourish and one of
Speaker 3: the contexts in which we struggle. You know, a great
Speaker 3: one is and this is a question directly from Peter Block,
Speaker 3: how do you feel about the amount of power you
Speaker 3: have in this relationship. That's a really hard question to
Speaker 3: ask it it's it always takes people aback, but it's
Speaker 3: it's it's really good at kind of going how who
Speaker 3: has control here?
Speaker 4: And how do you feel about that?
Speaker 2: I love that.
Speaker 3: I give you one one more question and we can
Speaker 3: 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?
Speaker 4: How do you respond?
Speaker 3: And you know I can always tell people, look, I'm
Speaker 3: not that great a conflict, so you'll move into you'll
Speaker 3: just stop hearing from me, and this is by and
Speaker 3: this is the way to pull me out of that.
Speaker 3: So we actually have a conversation about this is what
Speaker 3: I look like when I'm behaving badly or under stress,
Speaker 3: and here's how you can manage me best to get
Speaker 3: me out of that doom loop. And I'll get them
Speaker 3: to tell me the same.
Speaker 2: That's really interesting.
Speaker 1: So at invent here we have a very similar strategy.
Speaker 1: Whenever we have a new starter on the team, we
Speaker 1: get them completing We call it the OP on the
Speaker 1: one page operating Manual And yeah, for us the way
Speaker 1: we think about it, It's like software hardware, all that
Speaker 1: stuff comes with a manual about how to use it.
Speaker 2: But I mean humans are far more.
Speaker 1: Complex, but we don't come with a 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 not that good? How do you draw
Speaker 1: those responses out more effectively?
Speaker 4: I'm not sure.
Speaker 3: I try and do it in the moment because for
Speaker 3: me it is the process of having gone through this
Speaker 3: allows us to come back and have this conversation again.
Speaker 3: So more important to me then the answers is the
Speaker 3: fact that I've said this, by the way, we have
Speaker 3: 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 the.
Speaker 3: Time, Like I would say, with you know, on my
Speaker 3: immediate team. So I kind of am part of two
Speaker 3: companies at the moment. I own a training company that's
Speaker 3: run by a CEO and I talk to her monthly
Speaker 3: but formerly on her performance quarterly. And then I have
Speaker 3: a little small kind of startup company where I have
Speaker 3: one employee, and with Ainslie every six weeks we'll have
Speaker 3: a conversation around has this going?
Speaker 4: And it's not.
Speaker 3: About the work, It's about how is it going for
Speaker 3: you as a human being? How has it going for
Speaker 3: me as the person who's your nominal boss. What do
Speaker 3: we need to do differently to do that? One of
Speaker 3: the questions that both with Shannon who's the CEO of
Speaker 3: Boxer Crayons, and Ainsley, who is going to of she
Speaker 3: works at MBS dot works. One of the questions that
Speaker 3: is most powerful in this is what needs to be
Speaker 3: said that hasn't yet been said, because that just creates
Speaker 3: space for us to go, ah, you know that thing
Speaker 3: that's hard to talk about, or I've been looking for
Speaker 3: the moment to sneak it into the conversation and I
Speaker 3: haven't quite figured out how to say it because it's
Speaker 3: a bit confronting to me or a bit confronting to
Speaker 3: you or whatever. What needs to be said that hasn't
Speaker 3: yet been said is just a permission to lay down
Speaker 3: the the the as yet unspoken, and that is a
Speaker 3: great cleanser and builder of resilience into into the relationships.
Speaker 1: Oh, I'm gonna take that.
Speaker 4: One that I stole it from somebody else.
Speaker 3: I can't remember who, so steal away because it is
Speaker 3: it is a beauty. On another note, a man, I
Speaker 3: end my podcast at the moment. That's the question I
Speaker 3: always ask people, and 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.
Speaker 4: I'm like, brilliant, and we'll have a bit more of
Speaker 4: 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 4: I've had to say no to that.
Speaker 3: So I can say yes to having a life, but
Speaker 3: I can't be the first person to have mentioned this
Speaker 3: as just a foundational thing to get clear on.
Speaker 4: And I believe that at a certain point in.
Speaker 3: Your life you just get more opportunities than you can
Speaker 3: actually cope with. And there's a wiring that I certainly
Speaker 3: carried on or taken with me and other people might
Speaker 3: have taken it too, which is like when you start
Speaker 3: your career, you kind of say yes to a lot
Speaker 3: of things because you're just trying to build up experience
Speaker 3: and stories and to taste things.
Speaker 4: It's like, do I like the taste of this? Can
Speaker 4: I do it?
Speaker 3: You're trying to find that sort of sense of this
Speaker 3: is who I am in the context of work. Because
Speaker 3: I don't know about you, Mantha, but the first two
Speaker 3: or three years I spent working, I was just learning
Speaker 3: how to work. I was just learning who am I
Speaker 3: in the work context, because it was different from being
Speaker 3: a university student or whatever. At a certain point you
Speaker 3: can actually do, you know, technically, you can do more
Speaker 3: than you actually have time for. So now it's about going, well,
Speaker 3: what are the choices that I can make that are
Speaker 3: thrilling to me? And important and that they serve a
Speaker 3: bigger goal. And in organizations, there is a hunger for
Speaker 3: people to be more more strategic. You know, they're like,
Speaker 3: we said, we need we really want people to be
Speaker 3: more strategic. And everyone's like, yeah, I need to be
Speaker 3: more strategic, and theyrey's like, hell, what does that mean?
Speaker 3: Because it's one of those anodyne words that gets bounced
Speaker 3: around and can mean you know, everything and nothing. I
Speaker 3: think that one way to think about what does it
Speaker 3: mean to be strategic and therefore valued and therefore influential
Speaker 3: and an important person in a setting, in a context
Speaker 3: is to have the courage to say no to things?
Speaker 3: Who can say yes to what matters? And it's scary,
Speaker 3: and it's confusing, and it's fear of missing out, and
Speaker 3: it's what if I take the wrong choice, and the
Speaker 3: guilt and the anxiety that comes with making a choice.
Speaker 3: But it's also an adult act and it is a
Speaker 3: choice to say, look, I'm committing to something that feels right.
Speaker 3: You can't control the outcome, but a full commitment to
Speaker 3: the process gives you a better chance of something amazing happening.
Speaker 1: So what is your process for what you do say
Speaker 1: yes to?
Speaker 4: Well?
Speaker 3: It kind of happens on a range of different levels.
Speaker 3: So I have regular invitations to do things, you know,
Speaker 3: beyond podcasts or contribute to a project in one way
Speaker 3: or another. And for those short term, kind of shorter,
Speaker 3: kind of one off experiences, I have a number of
Speaker 3: different things. I kind of test one as I just
Speaker 3: do a kind of gut is it a hell yes
Speaker 3: or is it a no?
Speaker 4: So people will probably know that from.
Speaker 3: Derek Sivers, and I think he's actually got a book
Speaker 3: out called Hell Yes or No. Now it's just one
Speaker 3: really helpful way of going, look, just work with my
Speaker 3: gut instinctive says it hell yes or no. Second, I'll
Speaker 3: actually do a little test for criteria, so, you know,
Speaker 3: to take an example that we're living at the moment.
Speaker 3: For podcast invitations, I've got somebody in my team to
Speaker 3: do a tiny bit of research around you know, what's
Speaker 3: the podcast about? How many people listen to it?
Speaker 4: Do I know them?
Speaker 3: And there's a kind of a criteria I might say
Speaker 3: yes or no to there, and then there's a The
Speaker 3: 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 what am I you know, kind of what am
Speaker 3: I 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, Amantha, 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 and you're likely to die.
Speaker 4: And I know my death date.
Speaker 3: It's September fifteenth, twenty forty three, and Kevin Kelly, and
Speaker 3: you can look this up at kk dot org if
Speaker 3: you're interested in finding this article. You guys, look, you've
Speaker 3: basically got five big projects, one big project every five years.
Speaker 3: So twenty twenty one, twenty forty three, basically got five
Speaker 3: and a half four and a bit project left in me,
Speaker 3: which is quite sobering it's like to write a book.
Speaker 4: And get it out into the world and really kind
Speaker 4: of have.
Speaker 3: That be a thing. It's about a five year project.
Speaker 3: Maybe that's a bit long, but it's about right. It's
Speaker 3: a good useful rule of thumb. So for me, there's
Speaker 3: also the bigger picture around, So what's my worthy goal
Speaker 3: right now? That's the language I use around how do
Speaker 3: I set that big project that I want to commit
Speaker 3: to that feels like the best expression of something that
Speaker 3: lights me up, something that serves the world, something that
Speaker 3: stretches and grows me. And then against that it's as
Speaker 3: complicated as it sounds. I work in these kind of
Speaker 3: six months six week cycles around. I do a burst
Speaker 3: of work and then I stop and I pause and
Speaker 3: I kind of reevaluate where I am and reorient and
Speaker 3: decide what the next six weeks are going to be.
Speaker 3: And that structure also helps me figure out what I'm
Speaker 3: saying yes to and what I'm saying no to.
Speaker 2: Hmmm, wow, Okay, there's so much that I want.
Speaker 4: To dig into 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 your
Speaker 1: new 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 year
Speaker 1: of research and prep, there's a year of writing and editing,
Speaker 1: and then there's a year of promoting it and you know,
Speaker 1: and obviously like you're still just up.
Speaker 3: There's a six month period of self loathing in there
Speaker 3: as well, but that's often overlapping at the other parts,
Speaker 3: possibly longer than six months.
Speaker 4: But it's three years. It's three years of self loathing.
Speaker 4: 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 4: 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. If you
Speaker 1: like it, how I'm like, Okay, I've got quite a
Speaker 1: lot of free time because it took a long time
Speaker 1: to write seventy fous and words, and I'm kind of
Speaker 1: hunting around for what will that next creative project be
Speaker 1: that I'll sink 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 sometime 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: written a few books myself, even having got that final
Speaker 3: draft into your editor, there's still quite an immersive amount
Speaker 3: of work to be done if you want to make it.
Speaker 3: Part of your focus around well how does this book
Speaker 3: end up looking and going through the type setting and
Speaker 3: then getting it out into the world and then committing
Speaker 3: to marketing it and stuff.
Speaker 2: So absolutely yes, and I acknowledge that definitely.
Speaker 3: Yes, 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 we there can be a little bit of
Speaker 3: pressure to go right. Let's say it, I've had twelve
Speaker 3: hours off since I submitted my book. I should I
Speaker 3: should have my next project underway, and what's wrong with me?
Speaker 4: I don't want to be slacking.
Speaker 3: I don't want I'm trying to be a role model
Speaker 3: to my team here and a role model to myself.
Speaker 3: And I'm like, you know, what it is worth being
Speaker 3: fallow for a little bit to kind of go what
Speaker 3: matters to me now and to kind of open yourself
Speaker 3: up to the to the world to go, how can
Speaker 3: you bump into stuff that might spark you and have
Speaker 3: you think about new possible projects. Because the process of
Speaker 3: kind of figuring out a project, I can talk about it,
Speaker 3: and I will talk about it in just a second,
Speaker 3: but there is an experience that it's like the recency effect,
Speaker 3: which is we were so influenced by what we've just
Speaker 3: recently done that sometimes it can be hard to shake
Speaker 3: off what the next project might be. It's not just
Speaker 3: kind of like it's just it's almost it's kind of
Speaker 3: the same as the last big project that you finished,
Speaker 3: because you're still walking the valley of writing a book
Speaker 3: and writing a book about you know that particular topic.
Speaker 3: I read an article in The Guardian on the weekend
Speaker 3: by Tim Minchin. It's an interesting article about ambition, about
Speaker 3: how he made his his name as a comedian and
Speaker 3: then stop being a comedian and people may not have
Speaker 3: fully noticed it, but he's like, I didn't want to
Speaker 3: get sucked into that label, and he's he talks about
Speaker 3: his ambition now to be unpigeonhole able, if that's that's
Speaker 3: even a word, And I personally admire that because it's
Speaker 3: like he's been a willingness to kind of slow down
Speaker 3: and go let me stay open to what shows up,
Speaker 3: and let me stay open to what other projects might
Speaker 3: not just move towards success, but actually be something that
Speaker 3: 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 about.
Speaker 1: Setting goals in six week chunks or I think you
Speaker 1: use the language six week chapters.
Speaker 4: 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 4: Well, you know, people are learning.
Speaker 3: I'm a bit of a magpie, so I'm always on
Speaker 3: the look at for other people who had good ideas,
Speaker 3: who've tested stuff, and I came to the region that
Speaker 3: went This is particularly helpful in the conversation of setting
Speaker 3: out a worthy goal. And this worthy goal, which is
Speaker 3: part of this book How to Begin, It's like you
Speaker 3: want a goal that is thrilling and important and daunting,
Speaker 3: so something that is a bit nerve wracking as you
Speaker 3: take it on. You know, I was talking to Liz
Speaker 3: Wiseman the other day, who has a new book out,
Speaker 3: and she's like, it's like, you know how to start
Speaker 3: the project, but you don't know how to finish it,
Speaker 3: Like exactly, it's a goal like that.
Speaker 4: So they 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 the the goal,
Speaker 3: the bigger goal that you have made change and evolve
Speaker 3: as you begin to work on it. So this idea
Speaker 3: of well, here's another metaphor, it's not like you set
Speaker 3: you find your worthy goal and then you go right,
Speaker 3: I'll just type in the destination address into 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're 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 peak,
Speaker 3: which you think is your peak, but you're not entirely sure,
Speaker 3: and you've got to find your way forward, and you've
Speaker 3: got to navigate your way through the wilderness that's in
Speaker 3: front of you to get to your destination. So you know,
Speaker 3: I can claim inspiration from something like orienteering. So you're
Speaker 3: like map and compass. You're like, okay, this is where
Speaker 3: I'm trying to go. So you set your compass and
Speaker 3: you set a destination. I've got to get to that
Speaker 3: gum tree. And then you run to that gum tree
Speaker 3: and then you pull out your map and you reorient
Speaker 3: and you get your compass out you get to the
Speaker 3: next gum tree or rock or whatever. But it's the
Speaker 3: same pattern you see in things like Agile in terms
Speaker 3: of how they think about working in bursts. They figure
Speaker 3: out what the important thing is, they work hard on it,
Speaker 3: and then they stop and they go, now, what if
Speaker 3: we've done this or we've tried to do this, where
Speaker 3: what feels most important now? And it also is a
Speaker 3: process talked about by the former chief tech officer of
Speaker 3: base Camp. And he's got a book called I can't
Speaker 3: remember what the book is called, but it's basically about
Speaker 3: how they ship product in base Camp. And he says said, look,
Speaker 3: we tested it, and it seems that six weeks is
Speaker 3: long enough to make real progress on something, but short
Speaker 3: enough that if you've just been spent six weeks working
Speaker 3: on the wrong thing. The opportunity cost isn't that great,
Speaker 3: So you can get really committed to it, you can
Speaker 3: go far. And also if it's been a complete bust,
Speaker 3: it's only six weeks in the big scheme of things.
Speaker 3: So I was like, you know what, that's a good thing.
Speaker 3: That's I'm going to 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 eron, how do we 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 was 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 a higher or no.
Speaker 3: I kind of tapped Shannon, who's working for the company.
Speaker 3: I said, you're around next CEO. We spent a year
Speaker 3: preparing for the handover, and then on a certain date
Speaker 3: I stepped aside. She became CEO, and we had another
Speaker 3: year being coached to basically stop me screwing up the
Speaker 3: founder transition because founders always medal and their weird and
Speaker 3: their prima donnas and blah blah blah. So it's basically
Speaker 3: to keep me out of the kitchen. So that all
Speaker 3: went pretty well. But I'm on the other side going,
Speaker 3: and you know, Mantha, this kind of connects to your
Speaker 3: you know, what's my next project question from earlier on.
Speaker 4: I'm going, well, who am I? Now? What am I doing?
Speaker 3: And you know, am I am I anything? Now that
Speaker 3: I'm not the CEO of Box of Crayons? And it
Speaker 3: wasn't exactly an existential crisis, but I was really struggling
Speaker 3: to figure out what the next thing to do because
Speaker 3: I had literally spent like fifteen years investing time and
Speaker 3: money and everything into being known as a guy who
Speaker 3: talked about curiosity and coaching and the coaching habit and
Speaker 3: all of that stuff, and now that wasn't my thing
Speaker 3: to talk about anymore. That was box of crownses and
Speaker 3: I was going to be separate from that. So somebody
Speaker 3: mentioned Aaron Weed's work to me. She calls it the
Speaker 3: Dig Dig, and she's like, well, here's what happens over
Speaker 3: two three hour processes. You will tell her your story,
Speaker 3: she'll listen to it, and in real time, she will
Speaker 3: create your ecosystem, your kind of operating system using language
Speaker 3: it'll be you know, somewhere between one and five different words.
Speaker 3: And Amantha, I can't tell you how skeptical I was
Speaker 3: about this. I was just like, you know, first of all,
Speaker 3: I'm a pretty good facilitator, and I'm like, okay, you're
Speaker 3: gonna have to be a really good facilitator because I'm
Speaker 3: very impatient with poor facilitators. And I'm not that good
Speaker 3: with the kind of woo woo stuff either. So I'm like, ah, man,
Speaker 3: this sounds like it's it's a combination of bad facilitatation
Speaker 3: and woolness.
Speaker 4: But I was a bit stuck.
Speaker 3: And you know, she actually there are two people who've
Speaker 3: gone through her process that I knew and admired. I
Speaker 3: was like, well, Okay, she's got she's got social proof
Speaker 3: that is actually of value to me. So I caught
Speaker 3: her up and we did this remotely because there was
Speaker 3: COVID times or maybe it wasn't maybe well it doesn't matter,
Speaker 3: did it remotely, and Manton, it was amazing because I
Speaker 3: was so sure what my three my words were going
Speaker 3: to be. They're going to be something around possibilities and
Speaker 3: curiosity and coaching and questions and creativity and meeting a
Speaker 3: bit zany or whatever. And I just was like, I know,
Speaker 3: I know what this is about. And the three words
Speaker 3: that came back were actually none of the above. One
Speaker 3: was confidence, one was forward as in kind of looking
Speaker 3: forward and progress. And the root word the kind of
Speaker 3: the core word, and my setup is power, particularly disrupting
Speaker 3: power kind of how do I how do I play
Speaker 3: a role to disrupt and decenter the norms of power
Speaker 3: that show up? And I was very excited to get
Speaker 3: those three words because I am, 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.
Speaker 4: And you know, the power word.
Speaker 3: Became the kind of the origin of what the work
Speaker 3: that NBS do works is about, which is to help
Speaker 3: people be a force for change, where I'm like, I'm
Speaker 3: going to help other people give them the tools and
Speaker 3: the confidence and the resources in the community to claim
Speaker 3: power and disrupt power in whatever their sphere happens to be.
Speaker 3: So as yeah, it's super exciting. I was surprised, and
Speaker 3: you know, I know, I actual. You know, Eron's just
Speaker 3: starting to launch a course now, I think, so if
Speaker 3: people are interested in their stay, can go check her out.
Speaker 3: I really recommend it.
Speaker 1: That's so cool. Now, I want to know, if you're
Speaker 1: not working at your best, how do you get yourself
Speaker 1: 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 4: What's wrong with me?
Speaker 3: I'm not being able to work at my best And
Speaker 3: then kind of get into this Shane spiral of what
Speaker 3: you know, I'm a you know, I'm a privileged white
Speaker 3: man and I'm at my peak, which is not actually true,
Speaker 3: but let's pretend it is. And I'm like, why can't
Speaker 3: I grind it out or blah blah blah. So there's
Speaker 3: a way to be to be kind of kind about it.
Speaker 3: I try and follow the science, Amantha, and that means
Speaker 3: nap and go for a walk and get into nature
Speaker 3: a little bit. And I'm not always convinced that I
Speaker 3: can tell the difference that it feels better, but I'm
Speaker 3: just trusting that actually I'm just the same as everybody
Speaker 3: else and that lying down and taking a twenty minute
Speaker 3: nap or going for a thirty minute walk outside is
Speaker 3: just going to help me help me get better. And
Speaker 3: you know, there's all the good stuff we know about,
Speaker 3: you know, make you know, doing the tasks that you
Speaker 3: feel that are appropriate to your level of energy right now.
Speaker 3: So there are sometimes I'm like, man, I couldn't create
Speaker 3: a creative spark if if my life depended on that.
Speaker 3: So I'll said, I'm just going to go right, I'm
Speaker 3: just going to see if I can do forty minutes
Speaker 3: and get my inbox down to less than twenty eight
Speaker 3: thousand in box messages or something something like that. So
Speaker 3: there's there's a way of kind of setting context around that.
Speaker 3: But you know that, I think probably the final standard
Speaker 3: I give myself is just to go, well, what is
Speaker 3: good enough? Because there I find what's really pernicious, Amantha,
Speaker 3: is a a driving level of quality that is not
Speaker 3: always required. So a big thing is just to go.
Speaker 3: If I had to guess what good enough was for
Speaker 3: this little piece of work right now, what would that be?
Speaker 3: And is that within reach?
Speaker 4: 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 4: I can? And sorry, I do do this. Yeah. This
Speaker 4: is also what I do is I forget some of
Speaker 4: the tools that my dispose.
Speaker 2: Of until a podcast host reminds.
Speaker 3: You, thank you, thank you, Mantha. You did it very
Speaker 3: very graciously as well. So one of my early jobs
Speaker 3: was in the world of kind of branding and particularly
Speaker 3: new 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: had 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 that in the context of describing a brand,
Speaker 3: and then I moved it into the world of personal
Speaker 3: development and self growth and self management. So here's how
Speaker 3: I 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 tool.
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 under stress, and I particularly feel this if like
Speaker 3: I'm I'm about to give a speech in front of
Speaker 3: a kind of important audience, or I'm having a meeting
Speaker 3: with somebody and it feels like there's a lot on
Speaker 3: the line and I want my best public version of
Speaker 3: myself to show up. This is particularly when I use
Speaker 3: this tool, because what I will often do is I
Speaker 3: will notice how I am playing small or shutting down
Speaker 3: or kind of manifesting some of those behaviors that are
Speaker 3: in the not that column, and I'll need to go
Speaker 3: into the this column to remember what I'm like at
Speaker 3: my very best. So as an example, I was down
Speaker 3: in Detroit, you know, the home of all the big
Speaker 3: car manufacturers, some years ago, and I was giving a
Speaker 3: talk and it was basically a whole bunch of senior
Speaker 3: folks from like all the big car manufacturers, and it
Speaker 3: was just like this gathering of alpha males. I mean, honestly,
Speaker 3: they were all six foot four. They all had white
Speaker 3: teeth and short gray hair, and gray suits and white
Speaker 3: shirts and red ties and really firm handshakes. And this
Speaker 3: isn't my natural setting at all. And I could just
Speaker 3: feel myself shrinking because I'm like, oh man, these are
Speaker 3: my people, this isn't my audience. And you know, my
Speaker 3: usual speech or workshop thing is kind of a bit provocative,
Speaker 3: a bit performative, a very interactive, and I could just
Speaker 3: have I have all these.
Speaker 4: Doubts, you know, like, oh man, this is bad. I
Speaker 4: should shut it down.
Speaker 3: I should behave I should conform to what's going to
Speaker 3: be expected of me.
Speaker 4: And then I noticed that and I.
Speaker 3: Was like, oh, and one of my pairs of words
Speaker 3: is provocative, not sycophantic. You know, sycophantic meaning basically sucking
Speaker 3: up to somebody. And I could just feel myself becoming sycophantic,
Speaker 3: and I'm like, Okay, I'm going to remember that. Actually
Speaker 3: part of me at my best is to be a
Speaker 3: little bit provocative. And it kind of gave me permit
Speaker 3: and got me reconnected to how I wanted to be
Speaker 3: on stage with these people, how I wanted to be
Speaker 3: 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 4: I appreciate you you noticing that.
Speaker 3: You know. Some years ago I read a book called
Speaker 3: The Advice Trap, and the message and the advice trap
Speaker 3: is your advice is.
Speaker 4: Not nearly as good as you think it.
Speaker 3: Is, and I was like, you know, authors often write
Speaker 3: books for themselves.
Speaker 4: I'm like, Michael, this.
Speaker 3: One's for you. Your advice is not nearly as good
Speaker 3: as you think it is. And I've just tried to
Speaker 3: build a practice of, you know, taking it honestly, taking
Speaker 3: a bit of a breath to think, what's the best
Speaker 3: 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 a long enough now. I just I
Speaker 3: know stuff, and I know alternatives, and I know options.
Speaker 3: You know, I've just been around enough that enough settlement
Speaker 3: has sunk to the bottom of this particular lake, and
Speaker 3: I'm like, how do I how do I find an
Speaker 3: answer that feels most decisive right now, that could be
Speaker 3: of best service to the to the audience right now,
Speaker 3: rather than just the 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 side silence. The silence is
Speaker 1: so scary. I feel like you're incredibly good. It's just
Speaker 1: been comfortable with that silence, and it's been interesting for
Speaker 1: me as interviewing you. And I mean, you know, we've
Speaker 1: we've met, we've hung in up before, but it's been
Speaker 1: a really interesting experience.
Speaker 4: I'm as sign, Michael, 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.
Speaker 4: A big treat. You know, I was super excited to
Speaker 4: get invited to be part of that, but I didn't know.
Speaker 3: She didn't give me any preparation for what it was like.
Speaker 3: I didn't have an interview with a producer or anything,
Speaker 3: so I had no idea what we were going to
Speaker 3: be talking about. And forty minutes into it, forty five
Speaker 3: minutes into it, she guys, okay, so coach me. I
Speaker 3: was like, oh my god, I'm coaching Brene Brown, trying
Speaker 3: not to panic, and I would ask Brene a question
Speaker 3: and there just be this silence and I'm not sure
Speaker 3: how long that it goes on for because I'm not
Speaker 3: that good at listening to myself and me, But it
Speaker 3: felt like it was like a twenty minute silence between
Speaker 3: me asking a question, who are answering at and inside
Speaker 3: my head is like, oh my god, fill the silence,
Speaker 3: Fill the silence, ask another question. But you know, experience
Speaker 3: is like, you know what, just hold the silence because
Speaker 3: it's such a precious gift to give people a bit
Speaker 3: of space to think.
Speaker 4: It.
Speaker 3: Also, you know, if you 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 5: Now for people that want to consume more of what
Speaker 5: you are putting into the world, Michael, and also get
Speaker 5: their hands on a copy of How to Begin, what
Speaker 5: is the best way for people to do that?
Speaker 4: Thank you? How to Begin.
Speaker 3: It's pub date is January eleventh, But if you go
Speaker 3: to how tobegin dot com, you know you'll get access,
Speaker 3: you'll get ways to buy the book if you want that.
Speaker 3: You also there's a kind of free stuff and downloads,
Speaker 3: So how to Begin dot com is a place for
Speaker 3: the book. If you want a more general introduction to
Speaker 3: the work.
Speaker 4: That I do.
Speaker 3: MBS dot works is where you'll find my podcast two
Speaker 3: pages With NBS, We've got this wonderful, free, year long
Speaker 3: course called The Year of Living Brilliantly, which was meant
Speaker 3: to be a like a marketing thing, you know. I
Speaker 3: get people into this course and then I upsell them
Speaker 3: to stuff, but it's a terrible marketing thing because it's
Speaker 3: literally a year of brilliant teachers teaching people new stuff,
Speaker 3: like a new six minute video every week. So by
Speaker 3: the time people are done, they're like, we're exhausted. There's
Speaker 3: just so much good work here that we don't want
Speaker 3: to buy anything. So terrible marketing idea, but a great
Speaker 3: course if people 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: some and it's been one of those interviews where it's
Speaker 1: like I'm going to go back and listen to this
Speaker 1: like a few more times because there's yeah, I can't
Speaker 1: wait to share it with listeners. So thank you so
Speaker 1: much for your time.
Speaker 3: Meanta, thank you, You're a wonderful host. It's like hard
Speaker 3: to believe this has been an hour. It's gone really quickly.
Speaker 1: I hope you liked my chat with Michael.
Speaker 2: I just feel like whenever I catch up with Michael,
Speaker 2: I learn so much.
Speaker 1: This is one of those episodes where I will be
Speaker 1: going back over.
Speaker 2: And taking even more notes.
Speaker 1: How I work is produced by Inventium with production support
Speaker 1: from Dead Set Studios. The producer for this episode was
Speaker 1: Jenni Koda, and thank you to Martin Nimba who does
Speaker 1: the audio mix for every episode and makes everything sound
Speaker 1: better than it would have otherwise.
Speaker 2: See you next time.