There is a historic cemetery near me; Walt Whitman is buried there. In its office there is a large vault, with paper records going back to the 1800s. It’s a treasure trove for archivists and historians. It also has some weird stuff.
Glued to the inside of the vault door is an ancient piece of paper with some type on it. Here it is:
I don’t really have anything to add here, except that humans are so gloriously weird that you would never reach the bottom.
It’s a mistake to view rules as something friends don’t need to have with one another.
People will say, “You don’t need to make up rules, if you can’t agree on where to go for your weekly girls’ night out, just discuss it with your friends!” And… what do you think rules are, exactly? It’s “discussing it with your friends” one time instead of every week. It’s setting reasonable expectations people can plan around. It’s respecting everyone’s contribution, not just whoever has the most energy for a discussion in a given week.
In other words, rules are friendship.
A colleague of mine said something off the cuff that I thought was incredibly insightful, and I scrambled to write it down: “Anyone can come in and just talk about what’s wrong. Those are the cheap seats.”
Her point was clear: It takes very little intelligence and almost zero investment to just list the problems. Actually coming up with solutions and doing the hard work to implement those solutions both require a lot more.
People without skin in the game, or who are unwilling to get in the game, are very rarely a good source of helpful wisdom when solving a problem. In other words: don’t take your advice from the peanut gallery.
People frequently misdiagnose their own troubles. One of the most common flavors is this: “The reason I can’t do [whatever] is because [something everyone else does].” For example: “I can’t get promoted at my job because nobody can handle how real I am,” or “My podcast won’t take off because everyone’s too dumb to appreciate my takes.”
And here’s the thing: this can be a misdiagnosis even if it’s factually accurate, because it puts the onus to change on exactly the people who have nothing to gain by doing so.
You want to get promoted? Then you have to reframe “nobody can handle how real I am” into something that puts the responsibility on you. You don’t even have to change your opinion – yet. You just have to look at things with your own agency as the primary lens. “I can’t get promoted because I don’t censor myself around the suits,” is still a belligerent take. But at least it presents its own solution! It becomes an active trade-off you’re choosing to make, instead of an immutable fact of the universe. And once it’s framed that way, it might become a little harder to defend.
You can’t change other people. You can only change how you interact with them. Some trade-offs are worth making and others aren’t, but the choice is always yours.
People don’t like to be accused of bias. We want to think of ourselves as fair and rational, making decisions only with our higher brains. And if you genuinely believe you can do that, then it feels very natural to bristle at rules meant to correct bias by favoring a particular outcome over another. Such rules, when they’re well-intentioned, are trying to figure out which outcome is already being (unfairly) favored because of bias, and adjust in the other direction.
I’m also against those rules, generally. But for different reasons.
You see, I know enough about how the brain works to know that bias is absurdly unavoidable. You can’t avoid being biased, and most of the biases that affect your thinking are happening without you ever realizing it. Since I also value being correct as often as I can, I also think it’s a marvelous idea for you to personally create rules for your decisions that help you correct for your own biases.
To be clear: “Just don’t be biased” doesn’t work. You couldn’t if you wanted to. That’s not me accusing you of being irredeemably racist or sexist or anything. Often it’s much more subtle than that.
And that’s why I’m generally against the broad rules. See, everyone is biased, but everyone is biased differently. About different things, in different amounts, and even in different directions. Broad rules, by their nature, have to be aimed at a limited number of these biases, adjusting them in the same direction and in a specific amount. And that would be fine if everyone was biased in exactly the opposite direction, in exactly the same amount, on that subject.
Not only is that not true, but it also doesn’t allow for change. One of the best ways to decrease the impact of your bias on your decisions is to be aware of it. Just the awareness lets you calibrate at least a little, and continue to do so as you make that category of decision again and again. But if the rule adjusts you toward a given outcome 20% every time, then soon the rule is no longer lining up to the problem it tries to correct. Sometimes people will even start biasing back the other way to correct for the inaccuracy of the rule!
Individually, we all have a responsibility to use tools in our decision-making that diminish the impact of bias. Consulting with others, adding time to our decisions, writing explanations, etc. There are plenty to try! But blanket, “one size fits all” rules are crude tools. Don’t outsource your brain’s improvement.
Of course, that might just be my bias – which is why I’m writing my explanation and sharing it with you.
I’ve talked before about how the SMART goal system (making sure your goals are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound) is great for leadership when assigning goals to others.
But it’s also fantastic when others are assigning goals to you, though you’re going to use it a little differently in that case.
Have you ever had a manager give you frustratingly abstract or unclear goals, only to discover later that their expectations were very different from what you understood? It happens all the time. Unless you can convince your manager to take a course in using SMART goals effectively (or start reading this blog), you may just have to “manage up” a little. Here’s how to do it.
Whenever you get a task tossed your way, send a response asking a series of clarifying questions. As a strategic consideration, you should do your best to always ask these questions in a consistent way; the same format, the same tone, even use the same questions as long as they’re applicable. This will help train your manager to expect these questions as standard procedure, not to interpret them as you being argumentative.
Let me give you an example of how this might look in practice:
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From: The Boss
To: Awesome Employee
I need to put you in charge of client updates for the project. Thanks.
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From: Awesome Employee
To: The Boss
Okay, let me check a few details with you and then I can see where this fits in with my current workload. Just a few questions for clarity, as usual:
Thanks!
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From: The Boss
To: Awesome Employee
CC: Project Lead
The client has called me multiple times to ask about weekly spend and build progress versus the original timeline. They didn’t request regular updates specifically, but the calls aren’t painting the best picture and I think they’ll be more confident with weekly snapshots. Mary is the project lead, I cc’ed her so she can add you to the dashboard access; dashboard has all info. Use your best judgement on the rest, get the first update out ASAP.
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From: Awesome Employee
To: The Boss, Project Lead
BCC: Myself
Thanks for that info! Just to summarize everything: I’m going to create a weekly client update with a template similar to the dashboard (thanks for the access, Mary!) to summarize the weekly spend, progress percentage, and time to completion. I’ll briefly add supporting details, making sure to give them enough information that they don’t think they’re in the dark and feel the need to call in with too many questions. If they do, you’ll let me know what they asked so I can incorporate it into the deck, and I’ll add my own contact info so they can reach out to me directly and we can take that off your plate. We’ll call it a success if the client stops calling you for updates, and I’ll have the first one go out this Monday. I’ll bcc Mary so she can stay appraised of what data the client is seeing directly and offer any insights or adjustments to future updates.
Have a nice day!
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By asking those SMART questions, the employee turned “send the client updates” into an actual assignment with all the supporting details necessary to do a great job. Note that in the response from the boss, several of the SMART questions didn’t actually get answered fully, but rather than ask again, the employee filled in the missing details themselves. This is something I rarely see people do, but it’s important; if the manager didn’t answer a question, then they most likely don’t have a specific answer, and filling in the details yourself is the best way to go. They informed the boss of what their plan was with confidence, but still made sure to send that summary. Absent any objections or changes from the boss, that’s the assignment. Importantly, they defined success when the boss didn’t: As long as the client gets accurate information and stops bothering the boss for random updates, then the Awesome Employee is doing an awesome job. Even though this is a relatively simple assignment, it’s always important to have both a definition of what “good performance” looks like, and an objective way to show that you’re giving it.
Try this out the next time you get a nebulous task thrown your way, and watch yourself become the rock star on your team.
A few weeks ago, I was put in the unfortunate position of getting a report of one of my kids’ very bad behavior at a relative’s. They had been there for a while, and when I picked them up, I was informed that they had been something of a nightmare. This is quite out of character for any of my kids, at least while they’re with me. I was so shocked that my instinct was to ground the kid or otherwise punish them, but I considered it for a bit and did something else instead.
First, I had a talk with them about behavior, specifically about how it was more important that they behave well when I’m not around than when I am. I said that when I’m around, I can be there to help them consider their actions or redirect. When I’m not there, they’re on their own – and they’re also my representative. Their behavior speaks to how our family operates, and I don’t want bad reflections on our family name.
After the talk, they were very apologetic. I accepted the apology, but also explained that apologies aren’t enough to make up for certain behavior. You have to do more than apologize; you have to make amends. You have to put in genuine effort to fix things, to make the other person’s life at least as much better as you made it worse in the first place.
To that end, I didn’t punish with grounding or anything like that. Instead (after consulting with the relative in question), I took my child back over to their house and had them do chores. Lots of chores. Anything that relative needed, and I explained to my kid that they were never to ask “Am I done yet,” but instead to say, “I finished that chore, what else can I do for you?”
Today, that same kid spent a few hours at that same relative’s house without me. When I showed up, I got an absolutely glowing report. They were more than just “not bad,” they were a helpful and pleasant joy, so I’m told.
I showered my kid with gratitude and praise, telling them how happy they made me. They said they liked it better this way.
The kids are all right.
Imagine that you hear someone say something very insulting and offensive to you. You get angry or upset, but have the wherewithal to ask if you heard them correctly. They repeat themselves, and you discover that you didn’t hear them correctly – in fact, they said something totally benign and you misheard them. The benign thing they actually said makes much more sense in context and you have no reason to believe they’re lying, so you realize the error was entirely yours.
Now, the question: For how long are you still mad?
People seem to vary wildly on this. For some people, the second they realize there was nothing to be upset about, they stop being upset. For others, the residual emotion takes a lot longer to dissipate. I’ve even seen people react with suspicion or accusations that the speaker is in fact being manipulative or shady, even though there’s no evidence to support this, simply because they’re still mad – and if they’re mad, then the other person must surely be the cause of it.
All of our “negative” emotions can be turned to our benefit. Anger can be a way to give you the confidence to speak up and advocate for yourself. Jealousy can inspire us to work harder and achieve our goals. Sadness can help us open up to others about what we need in times of grief. But all of these positive effects require us to truly understand and be honest about the sources of those emotions.
It can be harder when there is no real source. If anger gives you the confidence to speak up, but it turns out that the thing you wanted to speak out against is imaginary in the first place, it can be very difficult to get the catharsis we need to process that emotion. The chemicals rattle around in your brain whether you want them to or not.
There are other ways to process emotion, of course – different directions you can move. Anger doesn’t have to lead to advocacy; it can instead be managed with meditation, nature walks, listening to good music, or even mitigated by laughter. If you have to change direction like that, do so. Don’t double down on an emotional error.
A lot of working professionals have a tendency to skip breaks and even meals as they work. They don’t take pit stops, instead just pushing themselves to the point of burnout. There are a ton of reasons for this, but the overall gist is that they think of breaks as being counter to productive work, instead of an essential part of it.
It’s hard to change deeply-seated views like that. But it might be easier to just engineer around them.
My first thought: Don’t call them “breaks.” The type of hypervigilant, A-type workaholics that I’m talking about here don’t like taking “breaks” where they aren’t working. I genuinely think a lot of people would go for more 10-minute walks outside during their workday if you called them “Cognitive Realignment Meeting for Increased Productivity” or something. Packaging helps.
But another thought is this: breaks are unguided, and that same type of professional I’m talking about tends to not like unguided time. Heck, I see a lot of professionals use their breaks from their main work specifically to do secondary work! They’ll say, “Okay, 15 minutes where I don’t have scheduled meetings. I’ll use that to check emails!” Ugh. So instead – block that off too! Make a different 15-minute calendar entry that says “Check emails.” If you need to do it, schedule it.
But then make sure you have your Cognitive Realignment Meeting, too.
We often do a bad job of telling other people how to communicate with us.
In the modern era, there are so many ways to get in touch with someone, whether at work or in your personal life. And I see people frequently get frustrated by the way other people use those channels, never realizing that they’re the ones creating the situation.
Here’s a simple example: At work, people can email you or they can use some kind of chat function like Teams or Slack. Those two options exist in most companies – plus, of course, picking up the phone or coming to see you in person if that’s an option. And folks will constantly complain about “meetings that could have been emails” or email chains that should be chat messages or chat messages that would be better resolved as a call, etc.
But… have you told people how to do that stuff? Do they know what things you’d prefer to resolve in a chat versus an email versus a meeting?
I know one professional who started a group chat with his team called “Emergencies.” He leaves the notifications on for that one, and off for everything else. And it takes so much stress off his plate! Many professional managers I know obsessively check their chats and emails every five minutes because anything could be an emergency, but most of the hundreds of messages they get in a week aren’t. But not this guy! He’s able to do real deep work and only check his messages a few times a day, because he took the radical step of actually explaining the proper channel for urgent matters.
Take the time to explain to people how you’d like to be connected. You can even put automatic responses in various channels directing them to other ones. In your email, you could put an auto-response up that says something like “Hello, I check my email twice a day to avoid distractions. For matters more urgent than that, feel free to reach me on my cell phone.” That simple adjustment will give people peace of mind that a non-response from you isn’t a problem, and give you peace of mind that you aren’t missing anything urgent when you want to actually focus.
This is a small intervention, but it pays dividends. Try it out!
The Opportunity Machine 