1 00:00:04,400 --> 00:00:06,760 Speaker 1: Welcome to How I Work, a show about the tactics 2 00:00:06,760 --> 00:00:08,920 Speaker 1: he used by leading innovators to get so much out 3 00:00:08,960 --> 00:00:11,760 Speaker 1: of their day. I'm your host, doctor Amantha Imbach. I'm 4 00:00:11,760 --> 00:00:15,600 Speaker 1: an organizational psychologist, the founder of innovation consultancy Inventium, and 5 00:00:15,640 --> 00:00:18,320 Speaker 1: I'm obsessed with finding ways to optimize my work date. 6 00:00:18,920 --> 00:00:22,479 Speaker 1: This episode is another my favorite Tip episode. The titles 7 00:00:22,520 --> 00:00:25,680 Speaker 1: probably pretty self explanatory. It's about my favorite tip from 8 00:00:25,680 --> 00:00:28,680 Speaker 1: each of the interviews I conduct. So my guest today 9 00:00:28,760 --> 00:00:31,960 Speaker 1: is Marcus Buckingham. Marcus is the author of a stack 10 00:00:32,000 --> 00:00:35,560 Speaker 1: of best selling books, including First, Break All the Rules, Now, 11 00:00:35,640 --> 00:00:38,440 Speaker 1: Discover Your Strengths, The One Thing You Need to Know, 12 00:00:38,720 --> 00:00:41,400 Speaker 1: and stand Out, to name a few. His latest book, 13 00:00:41,479 --> 00:00:44,600 Speaker 1: Nine Lies About Work, a free thinking leader's guide to 14 00:00:44,640 --> 00:00:48,840 Speaker 1: the real World, published by Harvard Business Publishing, takes an 15 00:00:48,880 --> 00:00:51,879 Speaker 1: in depth look at the lies that pervade our workplaces 16 00:00:52,159 --> 00:00:54,920 Speaker 1: and the core truths that will help us change it 17 00:00:54,960 --> 00:00:58,040 Speaker 1: for the better. Marcus has appeared on Larry King Live, 18 00:00:58,160 --> 00:01:01,000 Speaker 1: The Today Show, and The Oprah Winfrey Show and now 19 00:01:01,080 --> 00:01:05,280 Speaker 1: leads people in performance research at the ADP Research Institute 20 00:01:05,280 --> 00:01:08,880 Speaker 1: and remain CEO of the Marcus Buckingham Company. In this 21 00:01:09,080 --> 00:01:12,679 Speaker 1: extract of our chat, Marcus explains why work life balance 22 00:01:13,080 --> 00:01:16,360 Speaker 1: is a really unhelpful concept and how he thinks about 23 00:01:16,400 --> 00:01:17,160 Speaker 1: things instead. 24 00:01:18,200 --> 00:01:21,160 Speaker 2: We've got really significant data that shows do what you 25 00:01:21,280 --> 00:01:25,880 Speaker 2: love is really not terribly helpful advice. Find love in 26 00:01:26,000 --> 00:01:31,959 Speaker 2: what you do is actually really helpful advice. We know 27 00:01:32,040 --> 00:01:37,760 Speaker 2: from significant male clinic data that if you have if 28 00:01:37,800 --> 00:01:39,959 Speaker 2: you're a doctor, and you've got less than twenty percent 29 00:01:39,959 --> 00:01:43,199 Speaker 2: of your activities in work are things that you love, 30 00:01:43,319 --> 00:01:46,679 Speaker 2: with each percentage point below twenty percent, there's a commensurate 31 00:01:46,680 --> 00:01:49,080 Speaker 2: at one percentage point increase in burnout risk. So we 32 00:01:49,120 --> 00:01:54,240 Speaker 2: actually know causally that there's a really strong negative relationship 33 00:01:54,880 --> 00:02:00,520 Speaker 2: between doing things that you love and burn If you 34 00:02:00,680 --> 00:02:03,160 Speaker 2: do less and less and less activities that you love, 35 00:02:03,200 --> 00:02:05,240 Speaker 2: your burnout risk goes up and up and up and 36 00:02:05,320 --> 00:02:08,920 Speaker 2: up and up. Now funnily enough, but beyond twenty percent 37 00:02:10,440 --> 00:02:13,239 Speaker 2: you don't see a commensurate decrease in burnout risks. So 38 00:02:13,280 --> 00:02:17,080 Speaker 2: if you're twenty five percent thirty half of the activities 39 00:02:17,120 --> 00:02:18,880 Speaker 2: on your job with things that you love, you don't 40 00:02:18,880 --> 00:02:21,880 Speaker 2: get a commensurate at increase in resilience and decrease in burnout. 41 00:02:22,080 --> 00:02:23,720 Speaker 2: So it almost seems as though a little love goes 42 00:02:23,760 --> 00:02:26,040 Speaker 2: a long way. We don't need to fill our entire 43 00:02:26,080 --> 00:02:27,800 Speaker 2: week with activities that we love, but if we get 44 00:02:27,840 --> 00:02:30,840 Speaker 2: below twenty percent, we got a problem. So twenty percent 45 00:02:31,040 --> 00:02:33,639 Speaker 2: I called them in chapter eight of the book red threads. 46 00:02:34,040 --> 00:02:37,160 Speaker 2: Everybody's work life has got these different threads, some black, 47 00:02:37,240 --> 00:02:40,200 Speaker 2: some gray, some white, whatever, Lots of different activities, lots 48 00:02:40,240 --> 00:02:43,359 Speaker 2: of different situations and contexts and people. But some of 49 00:02:43,440 --> 00:02:48,560 Speaker 2: those contexts and situations and people have a different valence 50 00:02:48,680 --> 00:02:53,160 Speaker 2: and different emotional valance to them. They're made of different material. 51 00:02:53,800 --> 00:02:57,200 Speaker 2: They lift you up, they invigorate you. You lean into them, 52 00:02:57,240 --> 00:02:59,400 Speaker 2: Time goes by faster while you're doing them. Before you 53 00:02:59,440 --> 00:03:01,000 Speaker 2: do them, you look forward to them. When you're done 54 00:03:01,000 --> 00:03:02,240 Speaker 2: with them, you kind of want to do them again. 55 00:03:02,480 --> 00:03:06,000 Speaker 2: And everyone's weirdly different. Nobody's we call them red threads. 56 00:03:06,440 --> 00:03:10,840 Speaker 2: Everyone's got red threads. Activities or situations of people that 57 00:03:10,880 --> 00:03:15,920 Speaker 2: they find that actually invigorate, bring strength into you. And 58 00:03:15,960 --> 00:03:19,080 Speaker 2: everyone's just different. Not a function of gender, it's not 59 00:03:19,120 --> 00:03:22,760 Speaker 2: a function of race, certainly not a function of age. 60 00:03:23,919 --> 00:03:26,040 Speaker 2: Every one of us, just because of our own idiosyncrasy, 61 00:03:26,040 --> 00:03:29,200 Speaker 2: are drawn to certain things and repelled by others. And life. 62 00:03:29,200 --> 00:03:31,400 Speaker 2: What's so beautiful about life is that life does have 63 00:03:31,600 --> 00:03:35,120 Speaker 2: so many multitudes of different activities and situations and actions 64 00:03:35,120 --> 00:03:39,640 Speaker 2: and people. It's almost it's set up to invigorate us 65 00:03:39,720 --> 00:03:43,240 Speaker 2: if we bothered to really pay attention to the particular 66 00:03:43,280 --> 00:03:47,160 Speaker 2: activities that we really love. And so when you think 67 00:03:47,160 --> 00:03:51,080 Speaker 2: about work life balance the problem initially there, of course, 68 00:03:51,120 --> 00:03:54,080 Speaker 2: and it's not really it's not something to believe in 69 00:03:54,240 --> 00:03:57,040 Speaker 2: or not believe in. We simply have to look at 70 00:03:57,080 --> 00:04:01,200 Speaker 2: the real world. The categories of work life balance or wrong. 71 00:04:02,120 --> 00:04:05,600 Speaker 2: There is no work, there is no life on other side, 72 00:04:05,640 --> 00:04:08,040 Speaker 2: on the other end of the scale. Work is part 73 00:04:08,080 --> 00:04:11,600 Speaker 2: of life, just like family is part of life. Community 74 00:04:11,680 --> 00:04:15,360 Speaker 2: is part of life. There's life. There's not work in life. 75 00:04:15,400 --> 00:04:17,599 Speaker 2: There's life. And it's not like life is good and 76 00:04:17,640 --> 00:04:19,040 Speaker 2: work is bad and you have to balance out the 77 00:04:19,080 --> 00:04:20,679 Speaker 2: bad of the work with the good of the life. 78 00:04:20,680 --> 00:04:25,120 Speaker 2: That's false categories. What we have is life and in life, 79 00:04:25,520 --> 00:04:28,960 Speaker 2: whether it's work or family or community or whatever, there 80 00:04:29,000 --> 00:04:32,840 Speaker 2: are a lot of different aspects, actions, context, people, and 81 00:04:32,920 --> 00:04:34,320 Speaker 2: some of them we lean into when some of them 82 00:04:34,320 --> 00:04:36,920 Speaker 2: we are repelled by. Whether it's being a mother, whether 83 00:04:36,960 --> 00:04:39,880 Speaker 2: it's being a friend. Everybody gets a different kick out 84 00:04:39,880 --> 00:04:42,920 Speaker 2: of different aspects of being a mother or being a friend, 85 00:04:43,440 --> 00:04:46,080 Speaker 2: being a worker, and so the categories we should really 86 00:04:46,120 --> 00:04:51,479 Speaker 2: look at aren't work and life and balancing them. It 87 00:04:51,520 --> 00:04:55,640 Speaker 2: should be love and love and deliberately imbalancing. We should 88 00:04:55,640 --> 00:04:58,560 Speaker 2: strive in life as desperately as we can for imbalance. 89 00:04:59,240 --> 00:05:03,840 Speaker 2: We should be desperately always imbalancing our life toward more 90 00:05:03,880 --> 00:05:06,320 Speaker 2: activities that we love to invigorate us and away from 91 00:05:06,320 --> 00:05:08,720 Speaker 2: those we loathe. And so, for me, one of the 92 00:05:08,800 --> 00:05:11,400 Speaker 2: rituals that I have we do this again. We actually 93 00:05:11,440 --> 00:05:13,719 Speaker 2: have technology tools and apps and so and to help 94 00:05:13,760 --> 00:05:16,520 Speaker 2: us do this, but we do something called love it 95 00:05:16,600 --> 00:05:20,080 Speaker 2: loath it every week when I do that check in 96 00:05:20,160 --> 00:05:22,800 Speaker 2: that was talking about, where we talk about what are 97 00:05:22,800 --> 00:05:24,839 Speaker 2: the you know, one of my priorities for this week? 98 00:05:24,880 --> 00:05:27,560 Speaker 2: And whose help do I need? The other two questions 99 00:05:27,600 --> 00:05:30,000 Speaker 2: we ask us. And this sort of prompts us to ask. 100 00:05:30,160 --> 00:05:33,640 Speaker 2: The technology prompts us to ask this of ourselves, which 101 00:05:33,680 --> 00:05:35,880 Speaker 2: activities did you love and which did you loath? Every week? 102 00:05:35,920 --> 00:05:37,640 Speaker 2: Which you love, which you loath, Which you love, which 103 00:05:37,640 --> 00:05:39,920 Speaker 2: you loath, which you love, which you loath? Fifty two 104 00:05:39,960 --> 00:05:43,360 Speaker 2: weeks a year, just so that it puts everybody in 105 00:05:43,360 --> 00:05:46,880 Speaker 2: the driving seat, and myself certainly in the driving seat 106 00:05:47,279 --> 00:05:52,840 Speaker 2: for being responsible for how much love do I put 107 00:05:52,880 --> 00:05:57,360 Speaker 2: into a week? So for me, that's super helpful. I 108 00:05:57,400 --> 00:06:00,800 Speaker 2: love finding patterns in data. I love trying to make 109 00:06:00,880 --> 00:06:03,240 Speaker 2: sense of something and putting it into a presentation of 110 00:06:03,279 --> 00:06:09,320 Speaker 2: putting it into a book. I love time spent really noodling. 111 00:06:09,480 --> 00:06:14,080 Speaker 2: I love being by myself. I love being put under 112 00:06:14,080 --> 00:06:17,080 Speaker 2: pressure to have a chance to share something I loathe. 113 00:06:17,120 --> 00:06:19,480 Speaker 2: And then's a whole bunch of loads. And I don't 114 00:06:19,480 --> 00:06:21,240 Speaker 2: have to have, as I said with the Mayo Clinic THEATA, 115 00:06:21,320 --> 00:06:23,400 Speaker 2: I don't have to have eighty percent of my week 116 00:06:23,440 --> 00:06:26,280 Speaker 2: filled with loves. But if I, boy, if I get 117 00:06:26,279 --> 00:06:29,760 Speaker 2: below twenty and some weeks I've had below twenty, and what. 118 00:06:29,680 --> 00:06:32,080 Speaker 1: Do you do, Like, what do you do in those weeks? 119 00:06:32,080 --> 00:06:35,040 Speaker 1: Like when you've got your load list, do you how 120 00:06:35,080 --> 00:06:37,440 Speaker 1: do you decide what to delegate and what to just 121 00:06:38,200 --> 00:06:41,159 Speaker 1: suck up? And I guess what to just stop doing? 122 00:06:42,560 --> 00:06:45,320 Speaker 2: Well, there's some strategies that you can use that I 123 00:06:45,360 --> 00:06:48,760 Speaker 2: can use. One of the strategies for the things that 124 00:06:48,800 --> 00:06:52,880 Speaker 2: you loathe is stop doing it and see if anyone cares. 125 00:06:53,360 --> 00:06:55,760 Speaker 2: I mean, it's good strategy to stop it. Like, there's 126 00:06:55,760 --> 00:06:57,159 Speaker 2: a whole bunch of stuff that we do that we 127 00:06:57,200 --> 00:06:59,320 Speaker 2: think we should do, and you stop doing normal. Notice, 128 00:07:00,120 --> 00:07:03,120 Speaker 2: you know, for me, I am, I'm an entrepreneur, so 129 00:07:03,120 --> 00:07:07,680 Speaker 2: I'm building business, but I don't like asking people for 130 00:07:07,720 --> 00:07:12,080 Speaker 2: the clothes. I don't like it. And what I figured 131 00:07:12,120 --> 00:07:14,080 Speaker 2: out is if I stop asking people to clothes, people 132 00:07:14,120 --> 00:07:18,000 Speaker 2: still buy things. They just persuade themselves. It doesn't if 133 00:07:18,520 --> 00:07:20,880 Speaker 2: I don't need to get better at closing, I actually 134 00:07:20,920 --> 00:07:22,880 Speaker 2: need to get better at doing things that make people 135 00:07:22,880 --> 00:07:26,440 Speaker 2: want to close themselves. You can actually think of the 136 00:07:26,440 --> 00:07:29,000 Speaker 2: acronym stop is pretty useful. The T the S is 137 00:07:29,000 --> 00:07:31,760 Speaker 2: stopped doing it. So if anyone cares, T stands for 138 00:07:31,880 --> 00:07:34,440 Speaker 2: team up with people, Well that the I hate. I 139 00:07:34,440 --> 00:07:37,560 Speaker 2: don't like confrontation, but there's other people on my team 140 00:07:37,600 --> 00:07:40,480 Speaker 2: that do. I don't like problems, there's other people on 141 00:07:40,520 --> 00:07:43,120 Speaker 2: my team that do. There's a bunch of activities that 142 00:07:43,160 --> 00:07:44,520 Speaker 2: I love. Some of the things I loa that I'm 143 00:07:44,520 --> 00:07:45,640 Speaker 2: going to have to do, but there are some of 144 00:07:45,680 --> 00:07:48,280 Speaker 2: the things I load that other people love, and that's 145 00:07:48,360 --> 00:07:54,080 Speaker 2: kind of that's that's cool. I mean, then the O 146 00:07:54,360 --> 00:07:57,239 Speaker 2: you can think about is offer up one of your 147 00:07:57,520 --> 00:08:01,560 Speaker 2: strengths and it might make gate the thing that you loathe. 148 00:08:01,720 --> 00:08:06,240 Speaker 2: So I don't like mingling. I hate mingling. I hate 149 00:08:06,240 --> 00:08:11,080 Speaker 2: the pressure of it. But I love interviewing. I love 150 00:08:11,120 --> 00:08:13,800 Speaker 2: interviewing people. I love asking questions and shutting up. So 151 00:08:13,920 --> 00:08:16,600 Speaker 2: if I have to go to a couple of parties 152 00:08:16,720 --> 00:08:18,920 Speaker 2: or meet and greets and I have to do a 153 00:08:18,920 --> 00:08:21,520 Speaker 2: fair bit of that in my job, I just deliberately 154 00:08:21,600 --> 00:08:23,800 Speaker 2: change my view of it from mingling, which I hate, 155 00:08:24,440 --> 00:08:27,360 Speaker 2: to interviewing, and I'll just pick. If there's twenty people there, 156 00:08:27,400 --> 00:08:29,840 Speaker 2: I'll pick three of them. I'll pick them out almost 157 00:08:29,880 --> 00:08:32,240 Speaker 2: before I go in. I'll pick them out, and I'll 158 00:08:32,240 --> 00:08:35,280 Speaker 2: deliberately interview them. Take twenty minutes, talk to that person, 159 00:08:35,320 --> 00:08:37,680 Speaker 2: twenty minutes, talk to that person twenty minutes, talk to 160 00:08:37,720 --> 00:08:41,760 Speaker 2: that person, and then leave. And so I've sort of 161 00:08:41,840 --> 00:08:45,560 Speaker 2: used a strength to mitigate a weakness. And then lastly, 162 00:08:45,559 --> 00:08:48,480 Speaker 2: the p stands. But can you change your perspective on something? 163 00:08:49,480 --> 00:08:51,720 Speaker 2: Can you change your point of view on it so 164 00:08:51,800 --> 00:08:54,640 Speaker 2: that it doesn't And this is more mind games, But 165 00:08:55,800 --> 00:08:59,000 Speaker 2: if you, oh, I don't know. I mean I've run 166 00:08:59,040 --> 00:09:01,640 Speaker 2: a business a while, so sometimes you have to fire 167 00:09:01,679 --> 00:09:04,960 Speaker 2: people if you have to do that in the course 168 00:09:04,960 --> 00:09:06,040 Speaker 2: of the week, and you know you're going to have 169 00:09:06,040 --> 00:09:07,520 Speaker 2: to do it with a couple of people, because folks 170 00:09:07,559 --> 00:09:09,559 Speaker 2: are complicated and sometimes you move them into a job 171 00:09:09,600 --> 00:09:11,760 Speaker 2: that they shouldn't have and so on, and that happens, 172 00:09:11,760 --> 00:09:16,680 Speaker 2: and oh, it's horrible. Rather than steaming myself up about it, 173 00:09:16,720 --> 00:09:18,440 Speaker 2: can I change my perspective on it to see that 174 00:09:18,520 --> 00:09:21,400 Speaker 2: actually having someone stay in a job that is not 175 00:09:21,520 --> 00:09:23,240 Speaker 2: right for them every single day and they know it 176 00:09:23,240 --> 00:09:25,120 Speaker 2: and you know it, that's not caring. So can I 177 00:09:25,240 --> 00:09:29,559 Speaker 2: change that conversation to think about moving this person out 178 00:09:29,559 --> 00:09:34,520 Speaker 2: of the job as actually genuinely, authentically a caring thing 179 00:09:34,600 --> 00:09:37,920 Speaker 2: to do for the person. So for any of your 180 00:09:37,920 --> 00:09:40,680 Speaker 2: listeners that are struggling with things that they loathe but 181 00:09:40,840 --> 00:09:45,599 Speaker 2: have to do, that acronym stop is actually kind of 182 00:09:45,640 --> 00:09:47,000 Speaker 2: a useful way of thinking about it. 183 00:09:48,160 --> 00:09:52,120 Speaker 1: Hello again, I really love Marcus's take on the topic 184 00:09:52,120 --> 00:09:55,240 Speaker 1: of work life balance and how to instead think about 185 00:09:55,280 --> 00:10:00,080 Speaker 1: finding love in what you do. I've definitely taken onboard 186 00:09:59,840 --> 00:10:03,920 Speaker 1: a about using a strength to mitigate doing something that 187 00:10:04,080 --> 00:10:06,679 Speaker 1: I loathe, as I could definitely relate to what he 188 00:10:06,800 --> 00:10:10,559 Speaker 1: said about networking because I hate networking that like Marcus, 189 00:10:10,559 --> 00:10:13,199 Speaker 1: I love interviewing. So now when I'm at an event 190 00:10:13,240 --> 00:10:16,319 Speaker 1: and feeling nervous, I just imagine myself as a detective 191 00:10:16,400 --> 00:10:19,640 Speaker 1: trying to uncover interesting things about the person that I'm 192 00:10:19,679 --> 00:10:23,600 Speaker 1: chatting to. So I find that this approach dramatically reduced 193 00:10:23,600 --> 00:10:27,600 Speaker 1: my nerves and actually made me enjoy the events that 194 00:10:27,679 --> 00:10:31,320 Speaker 1: I'm at far more than I expect to. So that 195 00:10:31,480 --> 00:10:33,599 Speaker 1: is it for today. If you like this excerpt, you 196 00:10:33,679 --> 00:10:35,640 Speaker 1: might want to listen to my full chat with Marcus, 197 00:10:35,640 --> 00:10:37,199 Speaker 1: which I link to in the show notes. 198 00:10:37,720 --> 00:10:39,120 Speaker 2: And if you're enjoying. 199 00:10:38,840 --> 00:10:41,680 Speaker 1: How I Work, why not tell other people about it? 200 00:10:41,760 --> 00:10:43,400 Speaker 1: So word of mouth is one of the big ways 201 00:10:43,400 --> 00:10:46,640 Speaker 1: that this podcast has grown so much, and thank you 202 00:10:46,679 --> 00:10:49,200 Speaker 1: if you've told other people about it, And if you haven't, 203 00:10:49,280 --> 00:10:51,199 Speaker 1: maybe think about someone in your own life that you 204 00:10:51,240 --> 00:10:53,080 Speaker 1: think could benefit from some of the things that I 205 00:10:53,120 --> 00:10:56,160 Speaker 1: cover on How I Work. So that is it for 206 00:10:56,200 --> 00:10:58,080 Speaker 1: today and I will see you next time.