Young and Profiting with Hala Taha - Kim Scott: Radical Candor, How to Say What You Mean Without Being A Jerk | E227

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Starting point is 00:01:02 and that's true no matter what your role is, but it's especially true for managers. It gives you an opportunity to lead by example, to prove that feedback really is a gift, and to show people how to respond well to it, how to reward the candor when you get it by either fixing the problem or explaining why you disagree. Buyers, prejudice and bullying are three different things, but we tend to conflate them as though they're the same thing.

Starting point is 00:01:29 Buying is not meaning it. Pregidists is meaning it. And bullying, there's no belief conscious or unconscious going on at all, it's just being mean. For me, just sort of breaking it apart has offered different kind of responses that we can make. breaking it apart has offered different kind of responses that we can make. What is up, young and profitors? You're listening to YAP, Young and Profiting podcast, where we interview the brightest minds in the world and unpack their wisdom

Starting point is 00:01:59 into actionable advice that you can use in your daily life. I'm your host, Hallitaha. Thanks for tuning in and get ready to listen, learn and profit. Cam, welcome to Young & Profiting Podcast. Cam, thank you so much. It's great to Young Inprofit Podcast. Thank you so much. It's great to be on the show. I am really excited.

Starting point is 00:02:27 We've been wanting to have you on Young Inprofit Podcast for a few years now. Yap fam, we are joined by Kim Scott. She's an experienced CEO who worked for a variety of Silicon Valley companies, including Twitter, Dropbox, and Google. She's a former faculty member of Apple University and the current CEO of C Candor Incorporated,

Starting point is 00:02:45 a company she co-founded to write, more resources for managers and bosses in need of support. She's also the best-selling author of two books, Radical Candor and Just Work. In this episode, Kim and I will talk about how to instill Radical Candor in a workplace environment both as a boss and an employee. She'll teach us what it means to care personally

Starting point is 00:03:03 and challenge directly while avoiding toxic behaviors. And we'll also discuss her latest book, Just Work and how we can get shit done fast and fair. So Kim, I'm super happy you're here. Let's jump right into it. You have a very impressive corporate background. You've made an aim for yourself in Silicon Valley as a business leader and tech executive. But some people may not know that before that, you worked at a diamond cutting factory in Russia when the Soviet Union collapsed.

Starting point is 00:03:29 And so I'd love to understand how that job played a pivotal role in your future career and how it led you into career management ultimately. That was such an important experience for me because I, in college, studied literature, and I thought business was sort of boring, intellectually uninteresting. I thought the only thing was you paid people and they did work, but reading books and writing books doesn't pay.

Starting point is 00:03:53 So I wound up taking a job for this diamond cutting factory, this diamond cutting company, and they wanted me to start up a factory in Moscow. And so I had to go and hire these Russian diamond cutters. And I thought it was going to be really easy because the rubble was collapsing, the dollar was really strong. This was in 1992. And I thought I would just pay them and they would come. And so I offered them the salary that was like 15 or 20 times what they were currently making. But it didn't

Starting point is 00:04:22 immediately take the job. They wanted a picnic. So I thought, huh, well, I can do a picnic too. And so we went out into the outskirts of Moscow. And by the time we got finished with a bottle of vodka, I realized that what I had to offer, that the state did not have to offer, was not just money. It was to give a damn. It was to understand that they were worried about an unstable situation,

Starting point is 00:04:48 and they wanted to know that they had a boss who cared enough about them to get them and their families out if things went sideways in Russia. So as you can imagine, since the invasion of Ukraine, I've been thinking a lot about these folks. That was the moment when I realized management matters and it's interesting and it's a big part of what I care about. It's a big part of creating environments in which we can all love our work in each other.

Starting point is 00:05:17 I love that. And how did you make your way to Silicon Valley eventually? Yeah, it was a circuitous path. After about four years living in Russia, I went to business school and after business school, I took a job at the Federal Communications Commission. I was definitely the only person in my class at business school who took a job working for the federal government. But I was really interested in communication and how we as a world could communicate better.

Starting point is 00:05:45 After about a year working in the federal government, I realized it had been designed to do nothing in the absence of a compelling reason to do something and I found that very frustrating. So I went the opposite direction and took a job for an Israeli startup that was doing voice over IP. And I spent about a year working for this company called Delta 3 and working actually with no embarking who wound up starting

Starting point is 00:06:11 ways later on. Wow. Yeah, small world. And then I decided that I had made enough money, I had saved up enough money, the company did well to write a novel, which was what I always wanted to do. I never, my whole business career was a giant plot to subsidize my novel writing habit. So I took 1990, the year 1999 off and I wrote a novel and then I ran out of money. So I joined another startup and while I was at that startup, I had an idea for my own startup. So I wound up starting this company called Juice Software. And it was collaboration software that ended basically our biggest, some of our biggest customers were in the world trade center. So that company basically ended on 9.11.

Starting point is 00:07:00 Although we limped along for a little while and sold the company, selling a very generous term for what actually happened. And then I took a job at Google. That worked out a lot better than failed startup. And after about six years at Google, I realized that the thing that got me out of bed in the morning was not so much cost per click. That was going very well at Google. not so much cost per click, although that was going very well at Google, but building a team. And creating the structures so that the team would, to the maximum extent, possible sort of self-organize, but being present and available to be thought partners for each of the people on the team, each of my direct reports anyway. And that was interesting to me, like creating those environments,

Starting point is 00:07:45 it sort of goes back to that diamond cutting story where what they really wanted was a boss who cared and it would set up a good environment. And I wanted that to be my full-time job, not leading ads since YouTube and double-click sales and operations, which was what I spent most of my time doing. And there wasn't really a role at Google for me to do that,

Starting point is 00:08:05 but my favorite professor from business school had become a member of the faculty at Apple University. And at that point, he called me up and he said, you know, Steve Jobs has decided he wants to throw away all of Apple's management training and start from a blank piece of paper. And he said, those of us at Apple University were professors.

Starting point is 00:08:25 We haven't actually managed anything. So why don't you come and help us? So I did that for a couple of years. And then I wound up becoming a CEO coach in writing medical candor. It's a really interesting career journey. And what I really like about your career journey is how even though, like, for instance,

Starting point is 00:08:43 with writing novels, you weren't making money doing it, but it was something that you decided to still get the experience. And now you are a best-selling author. Mind you, it's non-fiction, business books, but you get to utilize that passion in a different way and make money doing what you love. So it sounds like you really designed a career that you really enjoy. So I respect that a lot. Well, thank you.

Starting point is 00:09:03 I don't really feel like I designed it. I feel like it kind of emerged. But I'm very happy with where I am. Yes. Yeah, that's awesome. Okay, so let's talk about when you were ahead of Google at AddSense. You worked under Cheryl Sandberg. She's the author of Lean In, very popular book. And after you gave a presentation to Google Sponders and CEOs one day, she asked you to come back to the office and she gave you some like pretty hard advice. Talk to us about that story and how it sort of, I guess, inspired you to write the book Radical Candor. Yeah. So I had on that day to give a presentation about how the Edson's business was doing to

Starting point is 00:09:39 those founders and the CEO. And I walked, I'll never forget it. I walked into the room. And there in one corner was one of the founders on an elliptical trainer kind of stepping away wearing tow shoes and a bright blue spandex unitard, not what I was expecting. Or frankly wanting to see in the room like super tight. And there in the, it was like something from the circle. And there in the it was like something from the circle and there in the other corner of the room was the CEO doing his email and it was like his brain had been plugged into his machine and probably like all of your listeners in such a situation I felt a little bit nervous. How is I supposed to get these people's attention luckily for me the at-tense business was on. And when I said how many new customers we had added over the last couple of months, the CEO looked at me and he said, this is incredible.

Starting point is 00:10:31 What do you need? Do you need more marketing dollars? Do you need more engineers? So I'm thinking the meeting's going all right. In fact, I now believe that I am a genius. I walked out of the room. I walked past Cheryl and I'm expecting high five, a pad on the back, and instead she says to me, why don't you walk back to my office with me?

Starting point is 00:10:50 And I thought, oh wow, I messed something up in there and I'm sure I'm about to hear about it. But I was open to hearing about it because Cheryl had already done the work of soliciting feedback for me and rewarding my candor and like proving to me that feedback was a gift. But you know, it's a gift, but are you sure you really want a gift? So I was a little reluctant and she began starting the conversation by telling me what I had done well, not what I had done wrong, not in the feedback sandwich. I think there's a less polite term for that. I don't know if I'm allowed to curse on your podcast, but really seeming to mean what she said.

Starting point is 00:11:26 And so that was fine, but all I wanted to hear about, of course, was what I had done wrong. And eventually she said to me, you said I'm a lot in there, were you aware of it? And with this side, the huge sigh of relief, and I kind of made a brush off gesture with my hand, because if that was all I had done wrong, he really cared.

Starting point is 00:11:43 I said, yeah, I know it's a verbal take, it's no big deal, really. And then she said to me, I know this great speech coach, I bet Google would pay for it, would you like an introduction? And once again, I made this brush off gesture with my hand. And I said, no, I'm busy. I don't have time for a speech coach. Didn't you hear about all those new customers? And then she stopped. She looked me right in the eye and she said, I can tell when you do that thing with your hand, I'm gonna have to be a lot more direct with you.

Starting point is 00:12:11 When you say every third word, it makes you sound stupid. Now she's got my full attention. And some people might say it was mean of her to say that I sounded stupid, but the fact of the matter was, if she hadn't used just those words with me, and by the way, this is a really important point, she never would have used those words

Starting point is 00:12:31 with other people on her team who were perhaps a better listener than I was. But she knew me well enough to know that if she didn't use just those words with me, I wouldn't go visit the speech coach. And when I did, I learned that Cheryl was not exaggerating. I literally said every third word. And this was news to me because I'd raised money,

Starting point is 00:12:53 millions of dollars for two different startups, giving presentations, I thought I was pretty good at it. I realized I felt like all of a sudden, I had been marching through my whole career with a giant hong hunger spinach between my teeth. And nobody had had the common courtesy to tell me it was there. And this really got me to thinking, you know, what was it about Cheryl that made it so seemingly easy for her to tell me, although of course it wasn't easy.

Starting point is 00:13:21 And why had no one else told me? Like, I could get the spinach. I could fix the on problem if anybody had had the common courtesy to tell me. And as I thought about Cheryl's management style, I realized it boiled down to two pretty basic, seeming things. She cared personally and she challenged it directly. I knew that she cared about me not just as an employee, but as a human being, because she would do things like when I moved from New York to California to take the job. I got out here, and I was lonely because I didn't know anyone out here, and she could tell I was lonely, and she introduced me to a book group. I'm still friends with a number of those people

Starting point is 00:13:59 to this day. When a couple of months after I started the job, my father was diagnosed with late-stage cancer. And I was devastated. And she could tell that I was devastated. And she said, Kim, you need to go to the airport right now, fly home to Memphis, be with your family, your team and I will write your coverage plan. That's what great teams do for one another. We've got your back. And those were the kinds of things she did do just for me. She did for everyone who worked

Starting point is 00:14:29 directly with her. She couldn't of course do those kinds of things for all 5,000 people in her organization because no matter how talented you are, relationships don't scale. But culture does scale. And when a leader treats their direct reports with that kind of care, it's much more likely that their direct reports are in turn going to treat their direct reports with real care. And that builds a caring culture and culture does scale. But it wasn't all sunshine and roses. I also knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that if I screwed up as I was bound to do from time to time, Cheryl would tell me in no uncertain term, she would challenge me very directly.

Starting point is 00:15:11 And care personally challenged directly, that doesn't really sound so radical that combination. And yet, everyone I've ever worked with, including myself, has struggled with feedback. I'd work in my personal life as well. That's why I call that combination radical candor because it's rare. So when it comes to caring personally, I just want to point something out. It's going beyond just caring about somebody's career trajectory or their career dreams. It's actually caring about their life, is that right? Yeah, caring about like building a real relationship. A relationship between a boss and an employee is it's not a friendship, better not be a romance,

Starting point is 00:15:51 but it is a human relationship. And I think sometimes because it's not a friendship, because it doesn't fall into the usual categories of relationship, we pretend as though it's just professional, that it's not a real relationship, but that is a big mistake because it's more than professional. It's very deeply human. And there's increasingly, there's evidence that shows that command and control just doesn't

Starting point is 00:16:18 work very well, especially if you need to innovate, but any kind of industry, actually, command and control doesn't work very well. And so you really, basically, that most fundamental part of being a good boss is a good relationship with each of your direct reports. That's how you get stuff done. And I think that has been under, I think it's more and more these days appreciated,

Starting point is 00:16:44 but I think traditionally and traditional management more these days appreciated. But I think traditionally and traditional management training that was underappreciated. Yeah. So earlier you mentioned that Cheryl used to solicit feedback from her team. And because she did that, it actually made you more receptive to the feedback she was giving you because I guess it made you feel less attacked because she was open to getting feedback herself. Could you explain to us why that's important as a manager to solicit feedback from your team? Yes. There's an order of operations, Serbada Colcander, and it all starts with soliciting feedback, and that's true no matter what your role is, but it's especially true for managers.

Starting point is 00:17:19 Because there's a power imbalance, if you're a manager, and there are a few things that are more damaging to a good relationship than a power imbalance. And so when you have the power to the maximum extent possible, you need to lay it down and get on a level playing field with your people so that you can build that relationship. And soliciting feedback is part of that. S listening feedback is also important because it gives you an opportunity to lead by example to prove that feedback really is a gift and to show people how to respond well to it, how to reward the candor when you get it.

Starting point is 00:17:58 It's also really important because in Amy Edminson who sort of coined the term psychological safety and I have written about this, it's also true because when a leader solicits feedback, it creates the conditions for psychological safety where people feel that they can speak up. Let's hold that thought and take a quick break with our sponsors. Young and profitors, do you have a brilliant business idea but you don't know how to move forward with it? Going into debt for a four-year degree isn't the only path to success.

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Starting point is 00:21:21 That's trinom.nom.com slash app for 50% off, trinom.nom.nom.com. For 50% off, trinom.com slash yap. Yeah, that totally makes sense. You have an acronym that you write about in your book called H-H-I-I-P-P and it's a helpful reminder for how to give good guidance. Can you break that down for us? Yeah, so after you have solicited feedback and after you've given praise, it's time to give criticism and for both giving praise and criticism,

Starting point is 00:21:53 it's really useful to keep this H-H-I-I-P-P. Actually, it's hippy corn. I'll explain more about what I mean by that in mind. So H is for humble, and it's also for helpful. I call it candor and not truth, because to me, candor implies, here's how I understand the situation. I also wanna know how you understand the situation so that we can get on the same page. So candor implies more of a dialogue.

Starting point is 00:22:20 If I say, I'm gonna tell you the truth, I'm kind of implying like, I've got a pipeline to God and you know, no shit from Shionola. And that's not a great way to start a conversation. So you want to make sure that you're being that you're being humble, that you state your intention to be helpful. The purpose of praise is to help people know what to do more of the purpose of criticism is to let them know what to do

Starting point is 00:22:42 less of. So you want to state your intention to be helpful. You also want to make sure that you're not trying to establish dominance or coercion with your feedback or to like kick someone in the shins to humiliate them. Your goal here is to really help them succeed. And it's worth it to like keep that top of mind and actually state your intention. Again, the sudden have to be a long, I'm explaining it in a long way. But what I mean by being helpful is I can tell you really care about this project. I've got an idea that'll help it get better. Or I can tell you really care about this project. There's something you're doing that's great that you

Starting point is 00:23:21 may not be aware of that you should do more of. So that's what I mean. So that's age. I is for immediate. Again, why wait? And the more you hang on to stuff, the more it kind of builds and the the weirder the conversation is when you finally have it. And it's also in the before times I used to say, had these conversations in person. That's often now not possible in a hybrid work environment. So what I say is, if you can't have the conversation in person, have it synchronously. And what I mean by that is pick up the phone and call the person. If you send a text, you can't take the next step, which is to gauge how it's landing. So you want to make sure that that you're having a real back-and-forth two-way conversation. That's not a text, not an email. Slack is a feedback train wreck waiting

Starting point is 00:24:13 to happen. There's Slack is good for a lot of things. It is not good for feedback. And so you want to make sure that you're talking to the person. You're having a real conversation. Like at its core, that you're talking to the person. You're having a real conversation. Like at its core, the idea of radical candor is to be able to really have a two-way conversation. So that's I. And then P is praise in public, criticize in private, and don't make your feedback

Starting point is 00:24:40 about someone's personality attributes. Really hard to change personality attributes. So one of the things that, but it's hard to know how to make it not about personality. One of the things that helps is the corn acronym. So you want to offer, and this is true for praise and criticism, context, observation, result, next step. In the meeting, when you offered both sides of the argument, you won credibility, do more of that. Or in the meeting, when you said, every third word it made you sound stupid, go see the go visit the speech coach. Yeah, so it's more about in this corn acronym. It's more about actually giving feedback

Starting point is 00:25:23 about the actions they took rather than the person and their personalities. Is that correct? Yes, absolutely. Cool. So let's talk about radical candor for employees. Why is it not only just for bosses and managers? Because the whole idea of radical candor is that it helps you improve. And also, I think it's important to acknowledge that your your boss may be human and may be imperfect and may be reluctant to give you feedback. My mother used to tell me of not that I'm comparing your boss to a snake, but she used to say when we were on a hike, I was very afraid of snakes. And she would say, Kim, those snakes are more afraid of you than you are of them. And that is often true of your boss. Your boss

Starting point is 00:26:06 is afraid, maybe afraid to give you feedback. Or maybe your boss gives you feedback that is what we call obnoxiously aggressive. So maybe they remember to challenge directly, but they're not showing the care personally. So how can you make sure that you can receive, that you can get feedback that is actionable from your boss? Again, there's an order of operations. You want to start by soliciting it and really drawing it out of your boss. Think about your go-to question. Think about how you're going to embrace the discomfort, like sit with the silence. Think about how you're going to prepare yourself to listen

Starting point is 00:26:45 with the intent to understand not to respond. And then you got to reward the cantor by either fixing the problem or explaining why you disagree. That last thing is pretty tough, but this is about radical cantor. Don't pretend to agree when you disagree. That's so interesting. So you're saying there's a point in this conversation where you can kind of feel like,

Starting point is 00:27:06 well, I appreciate your feedback, even though I requested it, but I don't necessarily agree. Yes, because if you can't do that, then you get wedged, right? You ask for the feedback, you disagree with it, and you're like,

Starting point is 00:27:19 and that's often why people fail to solicit feedback because to avoid that awkward situation. So what do you do if you disagree with your bosses feedback? Look for that five or 10% of what your boss said that you can agree with, and give voice to that, and then say, as for the rest of it, let me, can I think about it and process it, and then can we have another conversation?

Starting point is 00:27:44 And then you've got to get back to them. Some of my best professional relationships started with a good respectful disagreement. And you can't argue endlessly. You can say, look, I, you know, before you disagree, say, look, I will do it your way. But I want to explain to you why I have some questions about this way. So, So you want to make sure that you're communicating your willingness to listen, challenge, commit. But don't skip that challenge part because it's when you challenge that you give your boss the opportunity to explain to you why you may be wrong. I'll give you an example of how this worked out another story from early on in my experience at Google. And if you think about radical candor, radical candor is caring and challenging at the same time,

Starting point is 00:28:33 you're going to watch me go to a dark place here. So where I challenged, but I didn't show I cared, so I wound up in what I call obnoxious aggression. And then when I realized what I had done, I went to an even worse place, manipulative insincerity, where I was neither caring nor challenging. So I got into an argument with one of the founders about an ad-sense policy. And I sent an email to him and about 30 other people. So first problem was it was an email.

Starting point is 00:29:03 I didn't have a conversation with him. Criticism in public. Broke the rule. Yeah. In public and not synchronously. I was breaking two rules. It was public and over email. And I said, Larry claims he wants to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful. But if it'll make us a buck, he's willing to create clutter sites that muddle the world's information, not by most politically astute moment. So let's pause for a moment. Think about why I did that, because I bet a bunch of your listeners have made the same mistake. I think I did that because I believe, like I bet you do, that there's a special place

Starting point is 00:29:40 in help for people who kiss up and kick down. But that doesn't mean doing the exact opposite as such a brilliant movie, either, right? And so that was sort of why I sent that obnoxiously aggressive email. That was a bad way to disagree. And then a friend called me up and said, why did you do that? That was incredibly obnoxious. And I realized it was. And the next time I saw Larry, I said to him, Oh, Larry, I'm really sorry about that email. You're right. I'm wrong. Two problems with him, oh Larry, I'm really sorry about that email, you're right, I'm wrong. Two problems with that. First is that I was lying. I did not think that I was wrong. So that's why I was going the wrong way on the challenge directly to mention. And the second problem is that Larry, like most people, has a pretty good BS meter and he could

Starting point is 00:30:22 tell that I was lying. And he kind scowled at me and stalked off. It was one of those cringe moments. The guy sitting next to me said, I think he likes it better when you disagree with him. It's really important when you get some feedback or you're having some kind of disagreement with your boss that you don't pretend to agree because if by pretending to agree with him, not only was I lying, I also was depriving him of the opportunity to explain to me why I was wrong. And he may have explained it, and I may not have agreed.

Starting point is 00:30:55 But at that point, I probably would have said, well, thank you for listening. I'm still not sure I agree, but we'll do it your way. Yeah, that totally makes sense. And I'd love to try to understand some of these bad behaviors that we can fall into if we don't know how to give feedback in a constructive way. And we don't do, you know, the two principles that you mentioned, which is to challenge directly and to show that you care. So one of them, you just went over obnoxious aggression.

Starting point is 00:31:18 Then there's runeous empathy and manipulative insincerity. Can you tell us what this mean? Yes. So obnoxious aggression, you can think of as front stabbing. Manipulative insensarity, you can think of as back stabbing. Or like the false apology, like what I did to Larry, after my friend pointed out, I had been obnoxious. Like, oh, I'm sorry, you're right, I'm wrong, but I didn't think that. That was classic manipulative insincereity.

Starting point is 00:31:44 And the problem with manipulative insincereity is that it really erodes trust. The problem with obnoxious aggression is that it hurts other people. It's also a waste of breath because when you've hurt someone, they go into fight or flight mode and then they literally can't hear what you're saying. So why talk? And the other problem with obnoxious aggression is that most people really don't want to land there. But it's their instinct, at least it's my instinct, and I've noticed a lot of other people

Starting point is 00:32:12 make the same mistake. When I realize I've landed there, I do exactly what I did in that story about the email I sent to Larry. I zoomed the wrong way on challenged directly instead of going the right way on care personally. So don't make that mistake. But the thing about sort of obnoxious regression

Starting point is 00:32:31 and manipulative insincerity is that these are sort of where the drama is. But it's not where most of us make most of our mistakes. The vast majority of people make the vast majority of their mistakes when they do remember to show that they care personally, but they're so worried about not hurting someone's feelings that they fail to tell them something they'd be better off knowing in the long run. And that's what I call ruin a sympathy. To explain what I mean by ruin a sympathy, I'm going to tell you about probably the most painful moment

Starting point is 00:33:05 of my career. I had just hired this guy, we'll call him Bob. And I really liked Bob a lot. He was smart, he was charming, he was funny, he would do stuff like we were at a manager all-site playing one of those endless get to know you games. And he was the guy who had the courage to raise his hand and to say, I can tell everybody's really stressed out and

Starting point is 00:33:26 I've got an idea it'll help us get to know each other and it'll be really fast and Bob says let's just go around the table and confess what Candy our parents use when potty training is really weird, but really fast Weird or yet. We all remembered Hershey kisses right here and or yet, we all remembered Hershey Kisses right here. And then for the next 10 months, every time there was a tense moment in a meeting, Bob would whip out just the right piece of candy for the right moment. So we all loved Bob. He was a little quirky, but he brought some levity to the office. One problem with Bob, he was doing terrible work.

Starting point is 00:34:01 I was so puzzled because he had this incredible resume, but he was doing very detailed work and he would hand stuff into me with a million sloppy mistakes. I learned much later that the problem was that he was smoking pot in the bathroom three times a day, which maybe explained all that candy that he had on hand at all. But I didn't know any of that at the time. All I knew is he was handing in stuff to me, brittle to a sloppy mistakes. And I would say something to him along the lines of,

Starting point is 00:34:32 oh, Bob, this is a great start. You're so awesome, you're so smart, we all love working with you. Maybe you can make it just a little bit better, which of course he never did. And so let's pause for a moment and think about why I said that to Bob. Part of it was truly really an assembly.

Starting point is 00:34:49 I really did like him and I really didn't want to hurt his feelings. But if I'm honest with myself, there was also a little bit of manipulative insensarity going on there. Because Bob was popular and Bob was sensitive. And I was afraid that if I told Bob in no uncertain terms that his work wasn't nearly good enough that he would get upset, he might even start to cry. And then everybody would think I was a big, you know what? The part of me that was worried about my reputation as a leader was the manipulative

Starting point is 00:35:19 insensarity part. The part of me that was worried about Bob's feelings was the ruin or sympathy part. And this goes on for 10 months and eventually the inevitable happened. And I realized that if I didn't fire Bob, I was going to lose all my top performers because they were frustrated. They were unable to do their best work because their deliverables were late when Bob's deliverables were late. They couldn't spend as much time on their work because they were constantly having to redo his work. And they were fed up. They were gonna go someplace

Starting point is 00:35:49 where they could do their best work. And so I realized I had no choice, but to sit down and have a conversation with Bob that I should have started, frankly, 10 months previously. And when I finished explaining to Bob where things stood, he sort of pushed his chair back from the table. He looked me right in the eye and he said,

Starting point is 00:36:09 why didn't you tell me? And is that question was going around in my head with no good answer? He looked at me again and he said, why didn't anyone tell me? I thought you all cared about me. And now I realize that by not telling Bob, thinking I was being so nice, he's

Starting point is 00:36:27 getting fired as a result of it, not so nice after all. It's one of the worst moments of my career. But even Bob at this point agreed he should go because his reputation on the team was just shot. All I could do in the moment was make myself a very solemn promise that I would never do that again. And that I would do everything in moment was make myself a very solemn promise that I would never do that again and that I would do everything in my power to help other managers avoid making that mistake because that mistake is the most common mistake that we all make. Not just managers, all of us in all our different relationships. And I feel like this is such an important point because if people don't hear the feedback,

Starting point is 00:37:05 they're not going to know how to get better. And you basically let him like, fester in his ways for so long and it ruined his reputation at work. So it is in their best interest, even if it hurts in the moment, it's good for the long term. Even if they don't stay at this job for their future, it's good for their future. Yeah, it was good for him if I had told it was by not not telling him, not only was it bad for him, got him fired. It was bad for the whole team.

Starting point is 00:37:29 It frustrated them. It was bad for their relationship with him because they were frustrated by him. And it was bad for our results. It was just bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, all the way down. Yeah, make sense. Okay, so one of my last questions about radical candor then we can get into just work. It's about understanding motivations of people.

Starting point is 00:37:47 So in your book you say there's a difference between superstars and rock stars, and it's important to know the difference. I always thought they were one of the same. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this. Me too. So, and I tried to say superstar mode and rock star mode because we're all in these two different modes

Starting point is 00:38:02 at different points in our career. And I learned this when I was working with a leader at Apple who said, well, you know, you have to manage people in superstar mode very differently from people in rock star mode. And like you, I was like, what's the difference? She explained to me that people when they're in superstar mode, you should think of them almost like a shooting star. They are growing really quickly. They want to continue to grow really quickly.

Starting point is 00:38:29 They want the next challenge. They want to learn new stuff. They probably want to get a promotion. They may want to leave the company and start their own company. They have great ambition. It's your job to give them the opportunities to fulfill those ambitions, those ambitions. But a person who's in rock star mode

Starting point is 00:38:51 is a person who's great at the job. They're doing excellent work, just as good a work as the person in superstar mode, by the way. But they don't have that ambition to take the next step, to get the next job. Maybe they have something else in their life, like maybe they're writing novels on the side, but they're still great at their job. They don't want your job, they don't want to be Steve Jobs, they just want to do their job. And if you don't screw it up for them, then they will keep doing that job often for a long time and be

Starting point is 00:39:22 sort of like the rock of Gibraltar on your team. I love that. And so it's important to understand what motivates each team member so you can get the most productive work out of them. So how should you treat a rock star versus a superstar? So if you have someone who's in superstar mode, again, you don't want to label people, rock stars and superstars because it changes over time. But if you have someone who is in superstar mode, you want to make sure that they know what their path to promotion is, you want to make sure that you're giving them new things to learn, that they're on a steep learning curve. They want to be on a steep learning curve. They often are pouring a lot of their energy, most of their energy into their job.

Starting point is 00:40:06 Whereas a person in rockstar mode, they don't necessarily want the next promotion. But they do want to be respected and honored. And I think very often the mistake that managers make is either they clip the wings of people who are in superstar mode, or they disrespect people who are in rockstar mode. So you want to make sure that a person who is in rockstar mode gets recognition for the work they do, the expertise they have. If they like to teach, you want to give them opportunities to teach others.

Starting point is 00:40:40 You also want to make sure that you're giving fair ratings. A mistake that a lot of managers make is they save all the highest ratings for the people who are in superstar mode. And then they give unfairly low ratings to people who are in rock star mode, even though in that job, they're both doing equally great work. And the financial reward that people who are

Starting point is 00:41:04 in superstar mode get should come after they get promoted and they get a bump up in compensation and equity and all of that sort of thing. Whereas the financial reward that people who are in rock star mode get should be a good bonus, a great rating. So you want to make sure that you're not hoarding all your top ratings for people in superstar mode. I totally know what you're saying right now. So I'm I'm the CEO of a company that has about 60 employees and we definitely have our like as you're saying it, we definitely have our rocks, we definitely have our superstars and superstars just call

Starting point is 00:41:37 out more attention because they're just so much more ambitious and things like that. But then there's people that are doing really good work who've been there for a long time who are keeping the organization running and you need to retain your employees to have a successful organization. Those people are very important. So you've got to call them out, make sure you respect them, reward them.

Starting point is 00:41:54 So it makes a lot of sense. I also think it's really important not to allow your organization to get promotion obsessed. So I actually wouldn't, I mean, unless somebody, when they got promoted, they changed their jobs and everybody needed to know. But I wouldn't send out the big email, woohoo! So-and-so got promoted.

Starting point is 00:42:13 The promotion comes with plenty of extrinsic motivation in terms of compensation and equity. But you want to celebrate great work, not promotions. And so you want to make sure that you're publicly celebrating people who are in rock star mode as much as people who are in superstar mode. Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. Okay. So Steve's job is somebody who you talk about his management style a lot. And you say he led people apple flawlessly, but he did doing, he did that without actually telling people what to do.

Starting point is 00:42:45 I don't think I said flawlessly. He's a flawed man, but he was a great leader. So how did he get people to get stuff done without actually telling them exactly what to do? Yeah, I mean, he, he said, and he really meant this. This was true, I think it Apple. He said, at Apple, we hire people who tell us what to do, not the other way around. So he was very focused on, for example, making sure that there were directly responsible individuals, they were called DRIs. And the DRI had full autonomy over there, over what they were working on. If Steve, for example, had a question about something that a DRI was working on, some feature,

Starting point is 00:43:30 he would go, he would show up at that person's cube. Even if that person was a very recent inexperienced employee, he wouldn't talk to the person's manager who would talk to there, you know, he would go directly. And that, I think, was really important. Allowing people a lot of autonomy, not over everything, but over their sphere of work was important.

Starting point is 00:43:56 And I think another thing that he did that was really important was he really, he didn't just encourage, he demanded that people would challenge him. And so, for example, when Apple was making the decision whether or not to launch iTunes on the Windows platform, when Max had like 3% market share. And initially, the purpose of the iPod and of iTunes was to convert people from Windows to Apple, from Microsoft to Apple. That was the thought. But as the iPod and iTunes became very successful, that team wanted to launch it on the Windows

Starting point is 00:44:42 platform because the Apple only had 3% market share for obvious reasons. And at first Steve was very opposed to this idea. And he realized that if he always argued for his side that he would win because of who he was. And because he had a very, I mean, even if he hadn't been the founder of the company in the CEO, he had very strong personality. And so he would switch roles. And he encouraged this argument.

Starting point is 00:45:14 He called it, he likened a debate on a team to a rock tumbler. And he said, you throw these ordinary stones in three days later, outcome these beautiful polished stones. And he said, you know, there's a lot of noise, a lot of friction and the rock tumbler, same thing with debate on a team. But he knew he had to keep the debate going. And eventually, he allowed himself to be overruled.

Starting point is 00:45:38 If a team backed down too soon, there was another time when he was in an argument with one of his direct reports about a feature. The direct report argued once, he argued twice, he argued the third time, and then he did sort of what I was saying, listen, challenge, commit. But he committed too soon. So they did it Steve's way, and it emerged that Steve was wrong, and this guy was right. And Steve came charging into his office, and he said, why did we do it this way? And he said, well, it was your idea. And Steve looked at him and he said, yes, and it was your job to convince me, I was wrong, and you failed. So not like the kindest, most gentle way to make sure that people were

Starting point is 00:46:20 arguing with him, but he tended to hire people who had strong personalities, so that kind of style worked for most of them. We'll be right back after a quick break from our sponsors. You hear that sound, young and profitors? You should know that sound by now, but in case you don't, that's the sound of another sale on Shopify. Shopify is a commerce platform

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Starting point is 00:49:22 She's been a guest on YAP. She was a former social client. She's a podcast client. And I remember when she came on Young and Profiting and she talked about her conviction marketing framework. It was like mind blowing to me. I remember immediately implementing what she taught me in the interview in my company and the marketing efforts that we were doing. And as a marketer, I really, really respect all Kelly has done, all Kelly has built. In the corporate world, Kelly secured seven promotions in just eight years, but she didn't just stop there. She was working in nine to five. And at the same time, she built her eight figure company as a side hustle and eventually took it and made it her full-time hustle. And her strategic business goals led her to win the prestigious Inc. 500 award for the fastest growing business in the United States.

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Starting point is 00:50:46 Yet media blew up so fast. It was really hard to keep everything under control. But things have settled a bit and I'm really focused on revamping and improving our company culture. I have 16 employees. So it's a lot of people to try to rally and motivate. And I recently had best selling author Kim Scott on the show. And after previewing her content in our conversation, I just knew I had to take her class on master class, tackle the hard conversations with radical candor to really absorb all she has to offer.

Starting point is 00:51:15 And now I'm using her radical candor method every day with my team to give in solicit feedback, to cultivate a more inclusive culture, and to empower them with my honesty. And I can see my team feeling more motivated and energized already. They are really receptive to this framework, and I'm so happy because I really needed this class. With Masterclass, you can learn from the best to become your best, anytime, anywhere,

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Starting point is 00:52:58 That's masterclass.com-profiting for 15% off an annual membership. Masterclass.com slash profiting. I love it. Thanks for sharing that. Let's move on to your latest book, Just Work. Get you done fast and fair. It's a really important one. What was the genesis of writing this book? So if you write a book about feedback, you're bound to get a lot of it. And indeed I did. And so I was giving a radical candor talk at a tech company in San Francisco. And the CEO of that company had been a colleague of mine for the better part of the decade.

Starting point is 00:53:34 A person I like and respect enormously, and also one of two few black women CEOs in tech. And after I finished the radical candor talk, she pulled me aside and she said, you know, Kim, I'm really excited to roll out radical candor. I think it's going to help me build the kind of culture, the kind of innovative culture that I want, but I got to tell you, it's much harder for me than it is for you to roll

Starting point is 00:53:57 out radical candor. And she went on to explain to me that as soon as she would offer anyone, even the most compassionate, gentle criticism, she would get anyone, even the most compassionate, gentle criticism, she would get slined with the angry black woman stereotype. And I knew this was true. And as soon as she said it to me, I realized that I had not fully considered how often biased prejudice and bullying taint our feedback and make us shut down to feedback that we need to hear. And I realized that that was

Starting point is 00:54:27 a failure of the book and I needed to write a whole new book. That was kind of the genesis of just work, starting to work on just and when I say just work, I mean work justly or justice at work, not just work all the time. Yeah, when I first started, I was thinking only work and then I realized it meant just fair work, right? So now I get it. Yes, the title, I would say just didn't work. When we lost the paper back, we're gonna have a different title. What are some examples of these injustices

Starting point is 00:54:58 that we can find in the workplace? So I think that part of the reason for much of my career, I didn't recognize bias prejudice and bullying when they were happening to me or to other people like my colleague Michelle So one of the things that I tried to do is I tried to sort of break the problem apart into its component parts So I think bias prejudice and bullying are three different things But we tend to conflate

Starting point is 00:55:25 them as though they're the same thing. So bias, I'm going to offer you some overly simple definitions. Bias is not meaning it. It's usually unconscious thought, whereas prejudice is meaning it. It's a very consciously held belief, usually reflecting some kind of unfair and inaccurate stereotype. And bullying, there's no belief, conscious or unconscious, going on at all, it's just being mean. So for me, that just sort of

Starting point is 00:55:51 breaking it apart has offered different kind of responses that we can make. So whether you're the upstander, hopefully not the silent bystander, or the leader, or the person to whom this is happening. I think if it's biased, you can respond to it with an eye statement. So a great example of that comes from a story that Aline Lee told me. She's the founder of Cowboy V.C. and she told me about going into a meeting with two colleagues who are men. And they sat down at a long conference room table and Aline sat in the middle because she had the expertise that was going to win her team the deal. And then the other side filed in the first person sat across from the guy to Eileen's left, the next person sat across from the guy

Starting point is 00:56:38 to his left, and then they filed on down the table leaving Eileen kind of dangling by herself. And that's often how bias shows up. Just who sits next to him? Alene started talking and as soon as the other side had questions, they would direct them at her two colleagues who are men. And it happened once, it happened twice. You're shaking your head. You've noticed this happening. It happens all the damn time. The third time it happened, her colleague, who was a man stood up and he said, I think Elaine and I should switch seats. That was all he had to do to totally change the dynamic in the room.

Starting point is 00:57:12 And why did he do that? Why did he use an ice statement? An ice statement sort of invites other people in to notice what's happening. Notice what they're not noticing. Notice what they were unconscious of. It doesn't call them out. It doesn't say you all are a bunch of sexist racist jerks. It's just, I think, alien and I should switch seats.

Starting point is 00:57:34 When, as soon as he and alien switch seats, everybody recognized what was going on and they started involving, including alien in the conversation. And he did that. He wasn't upstander, not a silent bystander, for a couple of reasons. involved, including Eileen in the conversation. And he did that. He was an upstander, not a silent bystander, for a couple of reasons. One, he cared about Eileen, and he didn't like Singer, get ignored, so there was sort of an

Starting point is 00:57:52 emotional moral part of it. But he also did it. There were practical reasons. He also did it because he wanted to win the deal, and he knew if he couldn't get them engaging with Eileen, they wouldn't win the deal. And I think that is a good example of an upstander using an eye statement to point out bias. Yeah, kind of holding up a mirror. There's so much to unpack here. Let me start with this. Why isn't it important that he took that situation with compassion? It didn't shame everyone for being biased in that moment.

Starting point is 00:58:24 So shaming people is kind of a form of obnoxious aggression. It puts them, as soon as we're in shame, brain, where our lizard brain kicks in. When we feel ashamed, it, the parts of our brain that feel physical fear for our safety light up. And I can tell you, in fact, it's useful to recognize in your body where you feel shame. When I feel ashamed, and I, you know, I'm human, when someone points out to me that I've said or done something biased, I do sort of feel ashamed.

Starting point is 00:58:55 There's no way for you to tell me that I've done something that is biased without invoking a little bit of shame in me. But you want to try to minimize it because I feel shame in the backs of my knees. It's like the backs of my knees tingle. It's the same physical sensation that I have if my children walk too close to the edge of a precipice. It's real fear. It was really important that he tried to minimize that,

Starting point is 00:59:24 that he didn't sort of shame them intentionally. At the same time, he didn't say nothing because he was afraid they might feel ashamed if he said something. That's kind of a nuance that I think gets lost often. So something else I wanted to ask you about that I found really interesting that I never really tied this together until reading your book. You mention that bullying will become harassment once somebody has power and prejudices can become discrimination once somebody has power. So I never really put those two together and it was just so interesting. So I'd love for you to explain that to us. Yeah, I mean, an example of, I guess this is not so subtle, but a way that bias becomes

Starting point is 01:00:07 discrimination is obviously in performance reviews and then promotions. And so one time I was working with a CEO, I was a coach to a CEO who noticed that there were no women on his team. And to his credit, he figured the problem was probably the promotion process, not the women at the company. And so he invited me to sit in on a promotion meeting. And there were two people up for promotion, a man and a woman. In the promotion conversation in that committee, they referred to the man as a great leader, and then they referred to the woman as a real mother hen. And I was like, oh, my God. Back the train up. And at first, they were a little bit defensive. They're like, oh, Kim, it doesn't mean anything. It's no bit. And I said, it is a big deal. Because who are you going to promote? Are you going to promote

Starting point is 01:01:00 the real mother hen or the great leader. And they acknowledged it. And they changed your language and the woman wound up getting promoted. And so I think that sort of learning how to quantify your bias, learning using tools like textio to figure out how bias is showing up in performance reviews that are written.

Starting point is 01:01:24 But also if you're having an unkind of a committee and it's a homogeneous committee, hire a bias bluster. I mean, it was so much easier for me to speak up because they were paying me to do exactly that. Then if they had, they had brought in someone from HR who's, who happened to be a woman to sit in on the meeting. So really give people the opportunity to point your biases out to you when they may be impacting decisions like who you're hiring, who you're promoting, that sort of thing. Yeah. So when it comes to bias, I know that a lot of it is unconscious. Or bias technically means it's something that you don't really know that you're doing. But once you are aware of it and you continue

Starting point is 01:02:10 to do it, it becomes prejudice. And if you have a power, that could then become discrimination, right? So how can we become aware of our biases then? So one of the things that I recommend, and by the way, just because you're aware of a bias, doesn't mean it's going to change automatically. You have to be patient with yourself, but also persistent, because very often these are deeply ingrained patterns of thought. Another CEO who I was coaching, I pointed out to him that he tended to refer to people at the company as you guys when he was addressing the whole company. And 30% of the people, they were trying to get it.

Starting point is 01:02:49 50% of the people were not guys. They were women. And that's not the biggest deal in the world to call people you guys. But and it didn't annoy all the women, but it annoyed about half the women. And so he agreed that he would try to change it. But this was a deeply ingrained pattern of speech. So I wouldn't say that he was guilty of discrimination because he couldn't change this right away. But it took a lot of effort for him to change it. And one of the things

Starting point is 01:03:19 that I recommend that teams do is a technique called bias disruption. There's three parts to disrupting bias. The first part is to sit down with your team and to come up with a shared vocabulary. What are we gonna say when we notice bias? This is a really important follow-up, I think, to something like unconscious bias training. Because the danger of unconscious bias training is that it leaves everyone feeling helpless, like, oh my gosh,

Starting point is 01:03:52 I'm doing this terrible thing, and I don't know what to do about it. I'm not saying unconscious bias training is bad. I think it's a great thing to do, but it's a first step. It's not the last step. The other thing about that's risky, about unconscious bias training that you don't follow up with an action is that it kind of boils the ocean. It's like there's all these biases in the world and it can feel overwhelming. And what I want to encourage teams to do is to just deal with the biases that are present in the room with the group of people in the room. You don't have to boil the ocean.

Starting point is 01:04:26 Let's deal with what's actually showing up with whatever group we're in. And so the first step is to sit down with the team and to say, what are we going to say? What's the word or phrase that we're going to say when we notice bias? Because it's really hard to know what to say when you notice bias. And if you have a shared vocabulary, it makes it much easier. And I think it's really important not to impose words on your team and not to ban words on your team, but to talk about this and to flag it as it shows up.

Starting point is 01:04:58 So I wave a purple flag, which I usually, there's my purple flag, moved on my desk. Here it is, here's my purple flag. So I like to wave a purple flag, which I usually, oh, there's my purple flag. Here it is. Here's my purple flag. So I like to wave a purple flag when I notice bias. If I've had the conversation with my team, so that's what I'll do. But other teams hate the purple flag. One team I work with would throw up a peace sign. Another team would say, yo, another team would say, bias alert, the important thing, there's no right magic words that are going to make this more comfortable. This is going to be uncomfortable. And it's not going to feel safe.

Starting point is 01:05:32 What you want to do is to encourage your team to feel free to disrupt bias. And that a shared vocabulary can be free. So come up with your shared vocabulary. Can you give us some examples of common biases that show up in the workplace? Sure. One very common bias. I'm going to speak from an American centric point of view. Different, like I also am coaching a Turkish CEO of a Turkish gaming company. And he has a whole different set of biases. But I'm going to talk from an American point of view. One example is the one that Michelle, my colleague, pointed out.

Starting point is 01:06:11 A black woman says something and someone says, you seem angry. And I think it's important to recognize that maybe she did, maybe she didn't. Probably if my husband, who's a white man, spoke exactly the same way that Michelle did, who's a black woman. He would have been called a great guy, so easy to work with, you know? Yeah. And if I as a white woman, it said exactly the same thing

Starting point is 01:06:35 and exactly the same way. Maybe I would have been called a badass, which is like a little good and a little bad. But I wouldn't have been called a great guy really easy to work with. And so I think it's important to recognize that there are certain tropes, like angry black women that we need to eliminate.

Starting point is 01:06:55 So I would tend to wave the flag there, especially if she didn't seem angry. I think another one is abrasive. Guys are called aggressive, but sure he has to be to get the job done, whereas women are often called abrasive or lacking in executive presence. Executive presence is like a super highway for bias, I find. Another common one is Asian women are expected

Starting point is 01:07:22 to be sort of docile. And if they're not, then they get criticized unfairly. And so those are examples of biases that might show up. Another bias, I asked someone to have lunch and someone weighed the purple flag. And I had no idea what I had done wrong. And I said, which brings me to the second part

Starting point is 01:07:46 of biased disruptors, I said, thank you for pointing it out, but I'm not sure what I did wrong. Can you tell me after the meeting? And that was important because normalizing, making sure that everyone understands, it's gonna happen that we're gonna say or do something wrong, we're gonna mess up, but we don't even know what we did wrong. And I felt really ashamed.

Starting point is 01:08:08 I was like, not only had I hurt someone, I was ignorant of what I had done wrong. And so teaching people to say, thank you for pointing it out, but I'm not sure what I did wrong. Can you tell me after the meeting, this is the second part, sort of norms of responding to when you're the one who's, who's bias is being not accused, but whose bias is being called in. Although it probably is going to feel like an accusation. By the way, what I had done wrong, it was Ramadan.

Starting point is 01:08:37 This person was fasting. And so I just, I was not aware. I was making an assumption that the person could have lunch and I was wrong about that. And then the third part of bias disruption is, you wanna create a commitment. If you get through a meeting, so we should do this. Let's commit to doing this. If we get through a conversation

Starting point is 01:09:00 and nobody is flagged, anybody else is biased, then it probably doesn't mean nobody is showed off in that meeting, because bias is, these are very pervasive habits of thought and speech. But it probably means either we didn't notice something or we didn't feel comfortable pointing it out. And so let's give 30 seconds at the end to sort of say, what do we miss here?

Starting point is 01:09:23 Yeah, I love that. I feel like these are really great actionable steps that teams can take to kind of unpack their bias, having a secret word for your team to kind of raise awareness and then talk about it after the meeting. So I think that's great. So we're going to close out this interview. Came it was so lovely to chat with you. The last two questions I ask all of my guests are what is one actionable thing our young and profitors can do today to become more profitable tomorrow? One thing is to solicit feedback

Starting point is 01:09:51 and specifically come up with a go-to question. Don't say, do you have any feedback for me? You're wasting a breath. I can already, oh no, everything's fine. So you wanna ask a question that demands an answer. What could I do or stop doing that would make it easier to work with me is my question. But you got to come up with your question. Because if you sound like Kim Scott and not like yourself, then people won't believe

Starting point is 01:10:15 that you really want the answer. That's great advice. And what is your secret to profiting in life? And this can be beyond financial. My secret and profiting in life is to figure out what I love to do and to give myself time to do it. I love to write. Even when I was working at Google and I was super busy, I would block time in the morning and time in the evening at work to write.

Starting point is 01:10:43 It was my writing time. I treated this like my most important meeting of the day. Right now I get to write all the time and my new hobby is weeding. So figure out what you love to do, what gives you strength and do it. Block time in your calendar to do it. I love that advice. Kim, where can everybody learn more about you and everything that you do? Radicalcandor.com or justworktogether.com. I am less and less on Twitter, although it's at Kimball Scott, and I'm more and more on LinkedIn. Oh, awesome. We love LinkedIn here. Yes. So do I. Well, thank you so much for your time. Really appreciate it all your wisdom. Thank you so much.

Starting point is 01:11:25 Love our conversation. Yeah, fam. I hope you enjoyed this conversation with Kim as much as I did. And I really appreciated it because this year I'm focusing on shaping our company culture at Yat Media. I've done tons of exercises around this, it's a huge focus for me, and I can't wait to introduce some of Kim's philosophies to my team. I think the biggest takeaway from this interview is that practicing a radical can or means

Starting point is 01:11:55 that you care personally and challenge directly. You take interests in people's personal lives, but hold them accountable for the mistakes they make. And this means you care about your employees and coworkers as people. The relationship between a boss and employees is deeply human. Now, it's not quite a friendship, but developing deep relationships with your employees is key to building a foundation of trust and honesty. When it comes to challenging directly, you want to make sure that you're soliciting feedback as much as you're giving it. If not more, radical candor starts with asking for feedback.

Starting point is 01:12:28 This is especially important if you're a leader because asking your employees for feedback puts you both on a level playing field, which makes it easier to form genuine, honest connections with your team. After you ask for feedback, embrace the discomfort, sit with the silence and listen to your feedback with the intent to understand and not necessarily to respond. And if you don't agree with your feedback, don't pretend like you do. Respectfully explain why you disagree. And finally, fix your problems. Remember Kim's motto, listen, challenge, commit. And some other tips from Kim.

Starting point is 01:13:02 You want to make sure that you're not giving feedback in an obnoxiously aggressive way because that puts people in fight or flight mode. And on the flip side, you don't want to withhold your true feelings for the sake of the other person's feelings. That's ruinous empathy. And that can keep people from hearing what they need to hear in order to grow. Sometimes you've got to have those tough conversations for the better of everyone. And finally, keep in mind that these conversations should take place in private and never give somebody feedback about their personality. I recently had Seth go to the show again and this is something he emphasized as well. In order to cultivate safe, positive company cultures, you relentlessly need to criticize

Starting point is 01:13:39 the work, but never the worker. Thanks so much for listening to this episode of Young & Profiting Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to share it with your friends and family, and drop us a five star review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcast. That's the number one way to thank me and everybody who works hard on this show. If you like watching your podcast videos, you guys can find us on YouTube. We upload all of our full episodes to YouTube. You can also find me on Instagram at Gap with Hala or LinkedIn by searching my name,

Starting point is 01:14:08 it's Hala Taha. I want to shout out my amazing and hardworking Gap team you guys are so on fire right now. Thank you for all that you do. This is your host, Hala Taha, signing off. Are you looking for ways to be happier, healthier, more productive and more creative? I'm Gretchen Ruben, the number one best-selling author of the Happiness Project. And every week, we share ideas and practical solutions on the Happier with Gretchen Ruben Podcast.

Starting point is 01:14:49 My co-host and Happiness Guinea Pig is my sister Elizabeth Kraft. That's me, Elizabeth Kraft, a TV writer and producer in Hollywood. Join us as we explore fresh insights from cutting-edge science, ancient wisdom, pop culture, and our own experiences about cultivating happiness and good habits. Every week we offer a try this at home tip you can use to boost your happiness without spending a lot of time, energy, or money. Suggestions such as follow the one-minute rule. Choose a one-word theme for the year or design your summer. We also feature segments like know yourself better where we discuss questions like

Starting point is 01:15:22 are you an over buyer or an under buyer? Morning person or night person, abundance lever or simplicity lever? And every episode includes a happiness hack, a quick easy shortcut to more happy. Listen and follow the podcast happier with Gretchen Rubin. That was a great dinner. So great. Wait, where'd you park the car? Oh, the one I just sold to Carvana. What? When did you do that? When you were still looking at the menu, I went on Carvana.com, and all I had to do was under the license plate or vinn, answer a few questions, and got a real offer in seconds. They picked up the car already?

Starting point is 01:15:51 No, I parked around the corner. But they are picking it up tomorrow and paying me right on the spot. Oh, no wonder you picked up the check. Yeah, about that. Uh, don't forget to have these. Sell your car to Carvana. Visit Carvana.com or download the app to get a real offer in seconds. Sell your car to Carvana.

Starting point is 01:16:04 Visit Carvana.com or download the app to get a real offer in second. [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪

Young and Profiting with Hala Taha - Kim Scott: Radical Candor, How to Say What You Mean Without Being A Jerk | E227

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