Welcome to the new manager podcast.
I'm your host, Kim nickel. Hello and welcome.
I am so excited for you to meet my guest today.
His name is Adam. Hey, she's a friend.
He'll tell you all about his perspective and some great
stories about leadership and management.
And one of the reasons I was excited to invite Adam on to
talk with you is because he's had an experience in leadership
across a lot of Organizations from very tiny, very new
startups to Global Technology organizations to the military,
to the dance floor. And we talked a lot about
beginner's mind and he just has had this very rich set of
experiences working with humans and with teams and I am really
excited for you to hear from him.
So, let's get to it. Well, welcome Adam, I'm so glad
that you're here. Thanks.
You tell us a little bit about who you are.
I am a guy who shows up and tries to engage with what he
finds. My standard career answer is I'm
a Navy veteran. Who grew up in Albuquerque, New
Mexico. I'm very interested in
creativity. That's probably my number one
value professionally and I have always tried to find ways to
integrate that professionally. And so I Departed the Navy and
wanted to work in Tech. So I bought a one-way ticket to
San Francisco. Worked at a drone startup for a
year worked at Facebook for a few years.
Went back to working for government on a software
development team. And now I'm working two jobs at
the same time, one doing government work and then the
other working and I guess you would call it consumer insights.
And you, and I have known each other for several years and we
are friends. And we've also worked together.
And one of the reasons I was really excited to have this
conversation with you is in part because of your perspective.
And, and what I've heard you say in the past, about your thoughts
around, what it means to be a leader, what it means to work
with people and because of your perspective, both in Industries
and also what you experienced in the Navy and how you've brought
some of those insights and stories into your own work Life
as a people leader. And, and also, I'm super curious
to know to and we'll talk about this, you know, how, like, what
is it mean to manage people when you don't have like direct
authority over them? Mmm, right?
Like when you're managing by influence, or you're managing a
product, or you're managing like a with a customer relationship,
or you're managing up and I would be interested in anything
that like Sparks a thought for you.
Around any of what I've just shared.
Well, I don't know if this, I don't know, let's see how this.
Let's see, how this turns out. I really enjoyed the experience
of being a beginner and cultivating a beginner's mind
set because when you're the new person on a team you tend to see
all the flaws easier than people who've been there for a while.
But but you also see opportunities.
I think I was working at Facebook on a team that had
nothing to do with product development per se.
I was on like the corporate security team that managed You
know, the safety of the employees and building security
and badges and cameras and such, although we did manage, we did
manage operations for a product for Amber Alerts.
When kids go missing, if you're in a certain zip code and you
have your setting set as such, when the government issues, an
amber alert Facebook will do the same thing and When I discovered
this a, I thought it was amazing and be I had an idea, but I
thought surely someone has thought of this like already,
there's no way this couldn't be the case.
So this was in 2016. I discovered this Amber Alert
product about four years earlier.
Facebook had bought Instagram and I thought surely like,
where's the Instagram version? I'm like searching in on the
internal database stuff and I'm like, it's the same format, you
know, scrolling through a feed. There's some level of
geolocation. Both companies, although
Facebook bought Instagram, both companies have a socially
oriented Mission. And like, I did a ton of
research and nobody had thought about it.
So I wanted to pitch an idea to To pursue it.
And I did work in product management.
I was not a software engineer. I was at Facebook, not
Instagram. Like there's there's no way any
of this should have been successful but I get really
energized when a vision kind of takes control of me and like,
I'm like this needs to be a thing or it's you know how
amazing would it be? And then I sort of informally
started networking in the company.
I was doing a volunteer program in East Palo Alto with with
kids. Like not daycare because they
were middle schoolers, but middle schoolers, who had time
after school before the parents, get home.
So, it was called the spark program.
And there were some Instagram product managers there.
So you know, I got to know one of them and sort of asked,
Ginger, Ginger questions about how they have, their process
works for new products and so forth.
I share this idea and she's like, that sounds really cool.
You should meet someone so and so I'm sort of a natural
networker and I really just genuinely enjoy meeting people
hearing her story, so I met the right people, Instagram.
And I also think like when you don't know what you're doing or
you're new to something. There's like this youthful
energy that you can bring no matter how old you are.
That gets people like excited, I forget the name of it but
there's a phenomenon. I think it's like like the
college student phenomenon. Like there's this, like let's
say you're working for like Johnson & Johnson if you're a
college student and you're really excited about some
consumer packaged Goods or whatever.
And somehow you get, Email address that Co you say, hey,
I'm a junior at Cornell. I'm super interested in learning
what it's like to be a CEO. We be my podcast, like you'll
get a reply as a college student, and then if you join
and you're like a low-level assistant product manager, you
email the CEO. He's not going to respond to
you. So, there's this weird Paradox
where when you show up from a youthful perspective, like
people something about that. Engages people.
And I think it's an energetic thing.
And so I and so I basically put together a pitch deck Jack and I
was like, I don't really know crap about pitching, I don't
know crap about software, but I'm pretty good at Google and
I'm pretty good at Microsoft Paint and I think those are two
skills and those people can do. So I did open source.
Research you know, other other technologies have used Amber
Alerts, the driving application ways uses it.
If there's a kid missing it'll give you look.
So I did research on software other products, I took
screenshots of what they look like.
I figured out their functionality, I learned what a
wireframe. I put together like a wire frame
of what it should look like in the Instagram app by just
copying, like, zero technical skill, but like, I was, I was
into it, and I believed in it, I guess.
And so, I put together this pitch deck, I and then, I moved
up the chain. I shared it with some peers and
then I shared with my manager and then I shared it with the
initial people, I met Instagram, and by that point, it had gotten
super polished, I got a meeting with the team and Instagram to
this social good and then pitched it.
And they were like, they were super excited about it.
So for me, it was Sharing, if you're working on something that
you really believe in. I think belief, you know, the
more I learn about Carl, Jung, and religion, and mythology, and
philosophy, and I'm just a dabbler, I'm not an expert in
any of that, but the more wisdom I find in these Ancient Ancient
traditions, and I think that like, I'm like a metaphysical
level having like belief about something that you can't prove
is terribly attractive and it takes a lot of Courage because
we live in such a science focused Society.
Like, you know, don't make any claims about anything until you
can prove it, but we're not wired that way as humans we want
to feel caught up in the energy of someone who really believes
in something and we want to be a part of that.
So, by introducing that energy and then getting feedback from
People and like, bringing them on my side and being a part of
it. You know, I people it seemed
like they were pretty attracted to that.
What I love about what, I just heard there were two things, and
one is that when you have this, genuine belief and energy,
people are drawn to that and actually want to help like part
of what you were saying in your story is about not just being a
networker, but you kept meeting people who wanted to help, hmm,
right. Because you were in so much.
Easy as mm. And so much belief about it
while you're like, yeah, like there are things, I don't know.
But this is what I do know. Hmm.
And this is what I'm excited about.
We need to make this happen, that's one thing and then kind
of related to that. But you said this at the
beginning which was how you have enthusiasm when you're new at
something. Hmm and I think that's so key
because one thing I see with you know, with The work I do is that
when people are moving into new manager roles or they're, you
know, taking on more responsibility, there's the
enthusiasm. But then there's often with it
often a lot of fear or anxiety because they realize oh like
managing you know, managing a team of designers is different
than being an amazing designer or realizing like, oh, there are
things that I haven't realized that will be required of me, in
this new role as a people manager.
And what I heard from Is that being new is great.
Not knowing everything. Also great being enthusiastic
and being in belief, it all comes together, it all works.
Yeah. Yeah.
I hope new managers who listen to this are excited by the
potential of being a manager because if well done design is
exciting. And Well, Done engineering is
really interesting and exciting. When you make something super
efficient or whatever your manager, you're like, in this,
you have the privilege of Of being surrounded by amazing
humans, who produce all that magic.
So that enthusiasm is like, is there anything better?
Is there anything cooler? Now it's, you know, if you're if
you're someone who's drawn to being the individual contributor
building the widget, of course, that's going to be somewhat of a
challenge. But if your Blinds To how
amazing human beings are, then you're doing yourself a
disservice. I think by locking out the
enthusiasm that should come naturally for being in a
management position. Who has been the best manager
you ever had? The best manager I ever had was
probably my last boss. I got named Mark who I guess
checks. All the wickets in things that
get me excited. He started two different
Ventures that. I was a part of and both both
had no guarantee of success. They were kind of both startup e
organizations and the first was a hardware startup trying to use
drones for a humanitarian Aid delivery and I get really jazzed
around technology and like Civil Society trying to trying to
help, I don't know, make the world a better place to take a
Say, praise. And So, I met him, he want to
pitch competition and he just had a really compelling vision.
And then I stayed in touch with him all his a Facebook and he
brought me back onto my last team and what was compelling to
me about him as a manager is like I think one of the most
empowering feelings is when someone hired its kind of when
someone hires you and then they like get out of the way they're
like, hey, we hired you for a reason.
Like you've got my full trust in permission to just go.
And just go. And so it's sort of this like,
Greenfield Blue, Sky, Blue Ocean.
Like I get I get to do that. I can just do whatever I want.
So I worked for him, like I said on two different Ventures and in
both cases, I didn't have a job description.
He never once told me what to do, he trusted that I was the
kind of person who kind of has a Seek and Destroy mentality on
problems and in efficiencies, and Drops and morale and stuff
like that and that I naturally want to make things better and
make the organization better. So both for small teams, the
first was about 10 people, the second there was like 16 of us
and it just felt like, I guess I felt seen like that.
He saw the best that I had to offer and I was able to leverage
all the skills that I had and all the things that I'm good at
and both in both cases, how did you see him do that?
At like, what can you point to something specific that made you
feel seen and trusted? well, so I first met him at a
pitch competition in 2014 and was very intimidated because he
was working on his Ph.D, he was a software engineer and I was
like, no way is this dude going to you know and I was working on
my own confidence no way is this dude going to hire a bozo like
me to help out and as I as I was skipping ahead and trying to
come up with like advice It's to Future managers.
And one of them is like to show up, don't overthink it don't,
don't have to have a whole plan fair.
I just show up and see what happens because I emailed them
like, kind of just showed up a few months later.
I was like, hey, I saw you with this pitch competition.
I don't know how I can contribute, but I'm confident
that I can find a way. Will you?
Let me be a part of your team and submitted phone call?
He's like, he's like, yeah, sounds good.
He's like, there's a lot of challenges and a lot of
ambiguity. But why don't you just join a
meeting and see what you find? And I said yeah how about I
joined the meeting and I'll come up with a list of notes of
opportunities and challenges that I see and how plan to go
about solving them and if that sounds good to you that will
just proceed. So I jumped on a phone call it
was a it was a distributed team this isn't 2015 and we were
doing some crowdfunding for an initial pilot project and I said
nobody here really has a vision for the crowdfunding campaign.
We're not leveraging, a lot of, you know, head of just a bunch
of different ideas around how to decide in the campaign and so
forth. And I'm the kind of person who,
when I propose an idea, I try to make it, well, thought out and
organized, rather than like the good idea Ferry, which gets a
bad rap, who just doesn't think through ideas.
And so I propose ideas. He's like the sounds awesome,
like go for it. And then so I came up with a
media outreach campaign. I got to speech, read it fast.
Company magazine. I designed our Indiegogo and
like I would come up with a plan and With him and he's like,
yeah, it looks awesome. I'd come up with a plan, I would
check in with him, he should say looks awesome.
And there's a leadership principle in the in the military
called command by negation. And what it means is if you're a
commander and you're in charge like you fully empower the
people under you to like do what they need to and command by
negation is like you let them run with it and all you do is if
you don't want them to do something, then you speak up.
But otherwise, they have full trust and authority to go forth
and Execute so I felt like I had this command by negation
relationship and then on the second team, he got a big chunk
of money from the government had to recruit a bunch of software
engineers and I never was formerly a recruiter.
But during my own career search I became familiar with Angel
list, a little bit with stackoverflow and some other
platforms. And as we stayed in touch, when
he started his second Venture, he knew that I was a prolific
networker that I knew the career services.
Chad interviewed a bunch of startups.
He had a team of Engineers and technicians and had all these
soft skills needs. And the ball was being just
dropped left and right. He's like, hey, we need help
recruiting, we need help briefing.
All these VIPs that come in, we need help with all this stuff.
I think you're the right person for it, and I want to bring you
back and I didn't think twice and moved back out there.
And again, I didn't have a job description.
I don't have whatever. He said, you know, one of you
sit down. See what everyone's up to see
what we're working on. What problems, you can identify
in your plan and And and so I did and I, you know, I built a
recruiting pipeline. I probably interviewed 500
candidates and just created systems around how to bring in
Talent how to how to communicate, what we were
building and so on and so forth. So it was a little bit
open-ended, maybe the downside it was is it was probably too
open-ended and I did share feedback with him like came in.
There's a lot that I could do, I need to better know your vision
and maybe we can negotiate together, but with someone who's
open and receptive to feedback, that's something you can work
through. Thank you for sharing that
story. I loved I loved all of those
pieces and and I think one of the things I hear people feel
challenged with is they'll say, well I know that I want my
people to feel seeing and supported, but I don't know how
to how to make that be true. I don't know what I need to do
in the manager seat, in order to do that and the story that you
just shared was filled with so many of these examples that, you
know, might sound like kind of little things.
Actually, they're really big things.
The idea of giving you all of this room to bring your ideas
and just say, yeah, go for it, go for it.
And recognizing that, even though it, you might not have
had a formal recruiting background, but you had the core
skills, you're good at meeting people.
You are had a great relationship building and networking skills,
you knew where people were and being able to see all of that
and invite you in to create. Something new.
But she then did I'm interested to what you shared about the
concept of command by negation what other stories or what other
Concepts did. You learn during your time in
the Navy that have been also applicable in the work that you
do now? That's a good question me six
years ago with I joke me 6 years ago, would hate who I am now,
because I'm guilty when I was in the Navy, there was no shortage
of challenges, and there was a lot of things that I did not
enjoy about it, but I think it's easy to take for granted the
positive benefits of an organization.
There is a TED Talk that I understand turned into a book
that went viral called like the checklist, Manifesto by a
surgeon who talks about how Seeing your thinking into a
checklist improves the quality of surgery which is great.
We all want to be on the receiving end of a surgeon who's
calm and collected and organized.
But when I heard it was a TED talk in a book that went viral.
I was like what's the big deal? Like we use checklists
everywhere in the military. It's like so common sense
because there's so many moving parts and like, you simply don't
have the creative capacity to track everything you need to
track. And so there's checklist.
Be wearing for everything. And what I think, I took away on
a meta level from the military is, how important structure and
routine is and how much structure and routine you can
build out even if you're a three-person startup.
Like I said, I'm working two jobs right now and so one of
them is this small for person startup.
And when I joined, it was just like there was no Direction.
There was no routine. And although there's
Extraordinary amount of ambiguity, and we're still
building our sales pipeline. We're still building a product
Market fit. You can say, hey, every Tuesday,
we're having a weekly team sink. Hey, here's going to be the
agenda, every Tuesday, we're going to go over New Leads.
We're going to go over current engagements.
We're going to go over Tech stack development, we're going
to see if anybody has any questions.
So you can always inject process and routine and I think, you
know, we're cyclical creatures. You know, my niece and my
nephew's. I'm a proud uncle and like kids
need routine. Teen.
And although we get better at it as adults if we're removed too
much routine. I think it's really bad for us
and routine and structure. You can always build routine and
structure. And it doesn't I totally, I
think it's a complete lie that that gets in the way of
creativity, like, no, it doesn't at all whatsoever.
In fact, you can, you can make creativity a process, it's like
James L teacher says, come up with ten ideas a day.
There's a repeatable process that is always going to be
challenged you to be thinking. Outside the box.
So I think routine and routine and process and structure and
the tremendous value that has on being a human on a team.
And I think more I have other ideas but I don't want to keep
jabbering. You're here.
I mostly want to get all of the ideas in your brain.
Get the other. We can hear them know them too.
Yeah. The other thing that I've been
thinking about a lot recently is and I say this with a little bit
of tenderness because I guess, maybe, I'm maybe this is
somewhat countercultural. What people talk about nowadays,
but the concept of a military and even government.
That's an institution philosophically that's been
around, for a long, long time. A number of religions out there
have been around for a long, long time.
And while the negative news of both is what makes it on CNN,
you know, the my background is Catholicism and it's a faith
tradition that I went far away from and him slowly.
Turning to and like discovering all this value that I was like
blind to and in the military, when I left, I was very
disheartened over a bunch of the negative aspects of it.
And I'm certainly not. You can do well all day on our
on our shortcomings, from a foreign policy perspective, but
there's these Noble aspects and stories that nobody knows about.
Like I think the military is going to wrote.
The US military is the number one provider of humanitarian Aid
in the world. Old.
What story doesn't make it to cnn.com.
You know, you look at the nobler aspects of of the Christian
tradition, it's a tradition that tries to focus on.
How do you love people better? How do you engage with Faith and
Hope? How do you allow Grace and
Redemption to enter into your life and people around you.
And so What's interesting to me, is the parallels between the
Christian tradition and pick any pick, any religion really pick
any Traditions, been around for a couple thousand years and
you'll find these Trends and think of military and government
and they all have an articulated ethos that kind of describes
what's really important to them. And so, you know, in the
military, you have, like, if you're in the Navy of like the
sailors Creed, if you're a Navy SEAL, they have their own
specific, ethos, you know, if you're there Different
statements of Faith from different religions.
So, like an articulated, ethos, that guides who you are seems to
be ever present in the Richer traditions of human
organization, which is really interesting to me.
And then like ritual, like, there's all these fun traditions
in the Navy, like once every two months, you do what's called a
hail and farewell you welcome the new people and you say
goodbye to the old people and it's a very positive experience
that wishes people. Well who Are heading out and
welcomes the new people and they're like, we're glad you're
here. You're part of the team were
thrilled to have you. And I took this for granted and,
you know, you think, you know, every great religion has these
Traditions, like, I believe Muslims, pray five times a day
and the direction of Mecca. And so there's these embodied
rituals that are part of the organization to me that seemed
to exist across organizations. And so I think there's a lot of
wisdom in that. A third thing that came up is
symbology. Like it in your dress, uniform.
In the Navy, you have like a Crest on your hat.
That's been around for, you know, since the Inception of the
US Navy, the Royal Navy has the same thing from the UK, which is
where our tradition comes from. That's a little bit different,
but it's a little bit similar, even our adversaries.
You look at the uniforms of Russia and China and like, they
have symbolism woven into what they wear.
And so, do spiritual leaders across different ritual
Traditions. They have embroidery and
different colors, mean, different things, and And so I
think any human who's managing people and leading people.
I think somewhat I think people have a vision maybe of starting
a start-up and kind of have the long-term game in mind.
These are interesting things to think about and I don't think
you can just show up on day one and say, here's our symbols.
Here's our ethos, let's go. But rather, it's like it's in a,
it's small. It's kind of like the idea of an
inside joke. It's like the intimacy there
with like a Or a friend or a small group.
There's little Traditions, that kind of naturally emerge and
it's like, who I really enjoy that.
Whoo, that was really funny who we really had a good time
grabbing beers after work Monday.
Let's do that. Every first Monday.
And these rituals in these symbols and these Declarations
of what Define you somewhat mysteriously, emerged
organizations that believe in what they're up to.
And so that was a lot but it's very interesting to me and I
think people who are interested in shepherding, humans should
keep an eye out for these. These little pockets of meaning
and cultivate that, and encourage that, because that's
what keeps people together. I think an oriented towards
something really meaningful. I think that's an interesting
idea to, in light of how much the pandemic has influenced, how
people work. And by that, I mean people are
remotely on-boarded, they might never meet their team in person.
So, the ritual of, how do you bring somebody into our
organization when we are fully distributed?
For the rituals and the, you know, like what does it mean to
have symbols, or to have ideas? That kind of connect us all when
we are all over the world, because I think it's, you know,
part of what you're mentioning. And I think part of the way that
functions when you have a physical location, that
everybody goes to that, you can physically design the space so
that everybody's seeing this like the same literal thing when
they walk in. It can provide a message or
reminder of why we're all here and what we care about.
And I think that will look different in a world of work
where everything is always distributed.
Because I think that your point to is that humans function in a
certain way we can look across all these traditions and notice
some, some common functional, things about how you respond,
and what does that mean for? Or us as people who work
together and as in the manager seat, what does that mean for
you? As you think about how to create
a sense of team and connection and cohesion given the
parameters? Not working.
Yeah, yeah, that's that's a tough one.
That's a tough one for sure. I think, I think of what would
be interesting to me to think more about other historical
examples of organizations that have been distributed, like, the
special forces in the military. They have a very distinctly
different in some, in some ways. A different is distinctly
different Outlook and attitude, you know, they, they get
permission to grow these big old beards and they don't get
haircuts and, and Anyway, I would have to think more about
that, but that's a really, it's a really interesting idea of how
to get people to still feel connected and like they belong
in a way where you're distributed and kind of out
flying solo, which is tremendously difficult.
What is your current people manager situation?
Look like like, do you have direct reports right now?
I probably shouldn't answer that for one of my team's.
That's they're actually I we don't know.
It's and it's and it's a, it's a secret, it's private, it's
private. Yeah, yeah I can, I can fill you
in later why? It's yeah, I feel.
I'm sorry. That I can't tell you more on
why that's okay. The other startup that I'm at
where this loose gaggle of humans trying to prevent the
boat from sinking. Mmm.
Yeah. Well, so this is interesting to
me, too, so you worked in very early stage startups.
Hmm, you've also worked in global technology organizations.
And you've also worked with in the military which as you
mentioned is like an institution.
That's been a long around for a really long time.
So these are All different kinds of organizations of people doing
work together. Mmm.
Yeah. Certainly what, what have you
observed to be like in your own experience of working with
people and managing people what has been the most difficult
lesson for you to learn? It was I think I think it was a
well I'll tell you what comes to the surface right now is You
know, I have challenges with my ego like we all do and you know,
I want to be seen, I want to be successful and competent, but I
think the best leaders and managers I think you have to
realize that the deliberate as opposed to its being something
that happens to you. The conscious choice to become
invisible to me, feels deeply true.
Where you want to elevate the people you influence and the
people who are in charge of and it's like praise in public and
criticize and private and behind-the-scenes be an advocate
for their promotion, to the next level.
You know, I think about the deliberate decision to be
invisible which is totally contradictory to your ego, but
it comes but it comes from a recognition that you have a
great responsibility as a manager and as a leader and it's
no longer about you. It's like A parent and now that
I'm a parent, but from what I hear, it's no longer about you,
you know, it's about how can you desire the best for others and
try to act on that? For me?
That was hard because when I was just getting my feet wet you
know went to Military College and you get put in these like
simulated leadership environments.
And I mean it's not simulated, it's real leadership and
management but it's while you're at school within a student body,
and I really had a lot of shortcomings and really, I don't
know, I wanted attention, and I wanted recognition that I wanted
to be seen as a good leader, and I think that can lead you down
the wrong path. But I think when you're able to
realize that the calling of a great manager, and a great
leader is to elevate the people either, you're in charge of
formally or the people, you have influence over informally, the
joy that comes from that is when you actually make that
connection and to me, it feels like dancing and it feels to me
like, you know, we all Different mental models for describing the
world. One mental model is like,
masculine energy and feminine energy and for a while I was
really big into swing dancing and salsa dancing and learning
how to lead, like, literally lead on a dance floor.
And you know, the best followers have this really inspiring
expectation that you'll take care of the leadership business.
They're not there to make a decision per se.
They're there to, to build On the base and the structure
you've provided to to to make the show and so women, who and
this isn't to get stereotypical per se.
But it's hard to describe how satisfying that is because when
you're dancing with a woman who's really, really good,
follower who totally trust. Like, you could just, you could
feel it in a frame of someone, you're dancing with, there's
women, who and meant, it could be meant to write, like, I'm
really trying to avoid stereotype, but there's people
who even as a follower there, a little bit rich, It and they
think you're going to do this move and they like move into
that move. And you're like, ah, crap.
Like, is it me? Is it them?
There's some clashing. But then there's some followers
for just like, I'm so here, like let's see where this goes and
you gently nudge them in One Direction.
Like ooh, that feels good, like let's see where that goes.
Let's see where that goes. And then it's like magical
dance, he emerges. And as the lead, you're just
building the groundwork the infrastructure.
Now, of course there's some exceptions but the fall Follows
get the joy of the fancy footwork and the spinning dress
and making it just look good. And so I think when you can when
you can be invisible, So does when you can choose to be
invisible deliberately, it's easy for one's ego, to think
that you won't be able to shine. But you shine in a subtler way
that is really meaningful and really rich when the people that
you're supporting and that you're leading, then get to be
the star of the show and you Like, you are lucky to be a part
of that. Love that example.
Oh, that's a fun one and it's a terrible feeling to feel
invisible and not seen when it feels imposed on you. but in
make, but in realizing the upside in that and making others
feel seen and drawing back, you realize, I don't know, it feels
Noble, you know, when you're driving a shit when you're
driving a ship, You know, there's a ton of sensors on
those things and there's a lot going on.
You have to make sure you don't run aground.
If the area is shallow, you have to make sure that the fluid
levels are distributed. So the thing doesn't topple
over, you have to make sure you know, the status of The Radars
and there's a lot going on and so the kind of the highest
qualification you can you can get for driving.
It takes a long time is called officer of the deck where you're
like a representative of The captain, you're kind of running
the show. There's nothing more gratifying
than when you can. You have prop.
It depends on the kind of ship but you have roughly eight.
People, one person's literally driving up the steering wheel.
Another person's controlling the throttle.
Another team of two or three people is consistently, charting
your location. You have look outs who are using
binoculars to augment your electronic sensors so it's this
Orchestra and when you can step back and the orchestra is just
performing you're like this is this is amazing.
I heard a great quote in college that never left me.
Which is you've succeeded as a leader when your team can
perform as well with you as they can without you.
That's your job. You mentioned before to, what
advice would you give to a new manager?
And at the time just a few minute moments ago, you said oh
you know I'd tell them to just show up and I'm curious as we've
been talking. What if anything else has
emerged around the advice that you would give to a new manager?
The story that comes to Makino. David Goggins, he's like a super
athlete is ultra marathons and stuff.
He's a Intense guy. He's on Instagram and so forth
and the reason he comes to mind is, well, I'm going to weave
together a couple different stories.
There is a book I was reading recently to had such great
advice. I wish I had heard like 10 years
ago, which is Be careful who you share.
Good news with Because some people can see it as a threat to
their relationship with you, or their career, or whatever, and
also be careful who you share bad news with, because you don't
want to be caught up in gossipers for people who think
they're better than you. But the best humans out there
only want the best for you, in both cases.
And so David Goggins is really, really talented.
I think he's a former Navy SEAL and I just saw the most
positive, you know, he answers questions sometimes.
And I think there's a feeling sometimes because of the
negative people in our life, that people who are successful,
don't want to see you succeed or like they're hoarding the
success, or like it's a limited pie.
And that's not true at all of the best humans.
The best humans, realize that like, your success is my
success. And my success is your success.
I failed spectacularly as a manager and a leader and it was
extraordinarily challenging, but the moments, I think that I
learned and grew and had a positive impact, made those
challenges worth it. And so showing up is my
invitation because you're going to get knocked down and you're
going to Ruffle feathers or you're going to feel insecure.
You're going to make a bad decision.
And it's the showing up the next day and trying.
Again, we're all the values to be gained from the experience I
think. And so when I was a runner in
high school, I was always trying to get people to run.
Cross-country, of course, it was difficult and hard, but that's
not where the value was. So I was not interested in
telling people how hard it was. I was interested in telling them
like how it worthy it was how fun it was, and how awesome team
dinners were and the joy of finishing a race and putting all
your energy into it, you know. So like being manager can be
super difficult. But like that's not to
intimidate anybody. And so I would say keep showing
up and then for your team, the other phrase that comes to mind
for me, is be consistently present because people need to
be able to rely on. You not to have the right
answers, but to be there with them in the Foxhole, so to speak
and to say like, hey we can figure this out together.
Hey, like, I have total faith in your skills.
I'm lucky to have you on my team and people need, I think
consistent presence in their life of people.
They're depending on thank you so much for being with us today
and sharing your stories and your perspective.
I love all of these different nuggets that you drop throughout
our conversation and I know that sometimes you also write online
and you share your thoughts and things.
So if any of our listeners wanted to follow you or find any
of your writing or if you have a presence online, where would
they go? I have very little presence.
I like you're like no. No, no, I haven't written a have
so many Unwritten essays inside of me.
I haven't I haven't written in a very long time.
I don't write consistently as much as I would like to, but if
anything resonated or people want to connect on anything that
seemed interesting. I'm on LinkedIn and I check that
regularly. Can you tell us how to spell
your name? Yeah.
But just so people. Yeah.
I mean sure my LinkedIn URL is just, you know, linkedin.com, /i
n /a h, e SC, h, a Heche. Amazing.
They can send me a message. If anything it's interesting or
whatever. I'm happy to connect with
people. Thank you so much.
It's been yeah this is to have you.
Yeah, it was my pleasure. Thanks for the invitation.
Do you want personal confidential?
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