Real Job Talk

On this episode, we’re learning more about traveling for work. Despite most of us not travelling now, we all have had to travel before, and some of us are slowly starting to travel again for work. Our guest, Stephen Andert, has taken business travel and turned it into an art form. His book, Surviving Business Travel, helps others get the most out of their business travel. (Use code REALJOB for 15% off on the book. (https://survivingbusinesstravel.square.site)) Stephen is an introvert who has learned about public speaking and found ways to enjoy being out of his comfort zone. He is a technical person who helps with sales, and learned skills needed to share his technical knowledge by doing Toastmasters. His first travel role had him supporting sales world-wide. He thought the job was going to be only 25% travel, but it ended up being 60%, with long global trips. Stephen is a "checked bag" person, as he brings enough running and business clothes to make sure he’s ready for any extensions or situations that may arise. Why write a book? He was always being asked questions about business travel from his social media posts. He wanted to write for the people who glamourized business travel as well as those who were burnt out by it. Stephen's tips for surviving business travel: Experience the world through food. Stephen asks his driver what he can’t leave without eating. You never know when it’s the last time you’ll see a place, so Stephen makes sure to plan time to experience at least one special thing from each place he visits. He does a Google search looking for races and other events he can participate in when he’s there. Stephen looks for things that recharge him and that fulfill him when traveling, since being an introvert makes business travel extra exhausting. He doesn’t watch TV, but instead reads and walks. Growing up in Ecuador gives Stephen a different perspective on different cultures, and using that helps him show others how alike different cultures really are. How does Stephen handle time zone and climate changes? Stephen uses noise cancelling headphones on planes, and starts adjusting his body before he leaves to go overseas. When he lands, he exercises a bit and gets to bed early to get plenty of sleep so he can also run in the morning. What’s Stephen’s health kit look like? For one thing, it includes supplements. Melatonin to fall asleep on his first night, and a bunch of meds that work for him in different situations so that you don’t have to navigate foreign drug stores. Stephen’s on the road tech kit includes personal and professional laptops and chargers, and he has a list of anything else he might need, again so that he doesn't have to navigate emergency electronics purchases in other countries. He does walking and photography tours to learn about the city he’s in. He does think that business travel will change during the pandemic and afterwares, especially in how we build relationships, but it will be different with masks. A lot of the in-person events will by necessity say virtual. Surviving Business Travel: What do do if business travel is killign you by Stephen Andert. On Amazon (https://www.amazon.com/Surviving-Business-Travel-business-killing-ebook/dp/B089FTHZZF) and survivingbusinesstravel.square.site (https://survivingbusinesstravel.square.site/) - use code REALJOB for 15% off Stephen on Twitter: @FlowingDesert (https://twitter.com/flowingdesert) Stephen Andert on Linkedin (https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephenandert/)

Welcome to RJT, Carla Birnberg! Carla is a friend of both Kat and Liz, and today we’re talking with Carla about her fascinating career journey as a solo-prenuer, marketer, writer and blogger. Carla has SO much information to offer, and she’s a wonderful example of someone who hustles and creates opportunities through talent, grit and ingenuity. Carla’s career was never planned. At the beginning of her career, she thought she would go into academia, and she landed a job at the University of North Carolina. Unfortunately, that job got eliminated before she even started! This forced Carla to think about what she liked to do, which revolved around training and fitness. Shethen became a certified personal trainer, and has had a series of entrepreneurial adventures ever since. Carla opened af fitness studio, but then moved to Austin, so she needed to ask herself what she wanted to do in the new city. Should she open a training studio or should she do something else? The key questions Carla asked herself were: * What do I like that I can take with me and what do I want to change? * Why am I doing this? * Who do I want to help? * Who is my target person? That's when Carla started blogging under the name Mz Fit . She worked at the Austin American Statesman during the day to make money, and then worked on the the Mz Fit blog at night and on weekends until it could become her full-time gig. Carla found her niche and defined her audience in each iteration of her career. For her blog, it was for women getting into fitness. She was really clear about who she was aiming her writing at. Everything Carla’s done as an entrepreneur is something she’s passionate about, and something she’s healed in herself. The understanding and drive helps her help others. Mission statements: they drive where you are and where you’re going. You can have them for fitness, business... anything that needs you to find your “why.” Why are we here? What do we stand for? Why are we doing this? Carla saw niches that needed filling and created spaces for herself in the fitness world. She reads landscapes, works with brands she loves, and is able to keep her fingers on the pulse of what’s coming. As an influencer, she pivoted to do more content creation for others vs herself and showed up consistently. By doing a little every day, whether it’s with fitness or writing, Carla had no hard and fast rules and does everything on a case-to-case basis. She looks at the opportunity in the big picture and takes risks that have potential payoff later vs pay today. Even today, as Carla has a traditional day job, she defines herself by her side hustles because they define her entrepreneurial nature. Carla is now the CMO of an RPO company, and she’s learning a whole new skill set, while also using her core competencies of seeing how to make things work better, being quick thinking, creative and taking risks to be successful. The value-add that Carla brings is being unafraid of her creativity. She is “unapologetically herself” and believes that age and thick skin allows her to take risks. She works through her ideas and thinks through businesses whether they’re viable. Carla asks herself if she wants to make something the focus of her career. If the answer is no, she doesn’t go through with it. However, if she enjoys a project, like being the show note writer for Esther Perel, she holds on to it, boh because she loves doing it, and also because she doesn't know where it will lead. Carla talks about searching for jobs and how to tie experiences together to explain where you are now. She was also able to anchor her job search with the desire to be part of a consistent team. It wasn’t a stretch to take all of her freelancing success and showing how she could have the same success in-house. We asked Carla how she gets her freelance gigs. She is part of communities (mostly women) where they want to help each other out: she helps other women and they help her. She mentions a Facebook group called “The Binders” for freelance writers. It’s about vulnerability, being human and real, and reaching out to people and building relationships. We also talked with Carla how she engages in her Facebook groups in order to build relationships.

This episode, we caught ourselves; we talk a lot about interviewing, but we forgot to talk about how to prepare for an interview. Get out your notebook and listen closely …. this episode will teach you how to be prepared for your interviews. Behavioral Interviewing became popular about 25 years ago, and is based on the assumption that past performance will predict future performance. It’s usually based on competencies that come out of the responsibilties of the job, and the interviewers will each cover a different part of those competencies with you. The key to behavioral interviewing, as our old boss J. Mike Smith used to teach us, is to tell a story. Be ready with examples of: * Success * Failure * Teamwork * Leadership: taking a leadership role, taking the lead when you weren’t the manager * Turn-arounds and pivots * Working cross-functionally: how do you navigate diversity of mindset? of skillset? * Taking risks It’s beautiful to learn, adapt and change, and take risks. When talking about mistakes, talk about the learning. Don’t be afraid of failure; talk about what went wrong, what you did to try to save it (or what you wish you had thought to do in the moment). The key here is to avoid the blame game and to take responsibility when appropriate, but also acknowledge when you were not the decision maker. How do you get your examples together? Set aside a few hours and go down memory lane -- but not too far back -- to remember projects and teams to get you ready to tell your story. Write down your examples, read them over and practice them. Make sure that your examples are recent; someone who gives examples from 10 years ago, but no current examples, makes the interviewer wonder if you’re past your heyday. Unless it’s something really “once in a career,” try to keep your examples in the last 5 years. Use examples that share a story that help you show that you could be successful in that job. Look at the job description and build your examples around it that show that you are going to be strong in that role. Some companies give examples of questions they may ask. It’s more important to be prepared for those answers, since they aren’t a surprise. If you’re not confident, ask for help from a coach or colleague or your Board of Advisors. Or use your recruiter to ask what they will ask you. If you can use the product the company makes, do it! Have an opinion and talk about your experience. Have your numbers; be able to show your impact in a factual way. If you saved your company money, tell that story with facts. Have your “whys” ready to go. Why did you switch careers? Why did you leave your last company? Be able to share logically why you made the decisions you made. If you've been part of a layoff, you want to show as much as possible that it wasn’t aboiut you and your performance. “It was a down economy and they laid off my whole division.” Be able to tell your story and what you learned, even if it involves unfortunate situations. If there is a gap, don’t over explain. Say what you did in that time, and answer with a direct question. If they want to know more, they’ll ask. Let the interviewer be in charge of the interview. Be strategic and don’t be afraid to take a moment to compose your answer. It’s better than being a motormouth or saying, “That’s a great question.” A lot of companies ask situational questions, which you can't really prepare for. Take a minute, think it through for a minute, and then talk and ask qualifying questions. If you go down a certain path but you to back away from, come back to ask a clarifying questions but then pivot. Many situational questions are asked to see how you inquire and learn more. There’s nothing wrong with following up after the question, and realizing that this new information leads you to a different answer. Listen to what your interviewer is asking. When someone asks, “Have you thought about this….?” they are leading you to understand what they are trying to elicit as an answer. Listen to the first question, but also the follow-ups to see where they may want you to go. Always ask questions, both job- and culture-related, and make sure you know how the company aligns with your own must-have list. "What do you like about working here?" is a good question. And "What would you change if you could?" is a great question to get to the truth of working there. Do your research; they’re going to want to know what you think about them. Look at their website, Glassdoor, Google them, and search Linkedin for emploiyee profiles. By doing all this, you avoid the "blank brain" problem, and you will go in confidently and prepared for your job interview.

We recorded this episode to help people ask for what they need at work, without also feeling like they are asking for too much, impairing their career, or being high maintenance. We start with the request, which we hear coming up quite a bit, to continue to work from home because of health or childcare concerns with the virus when your company wants you to come back to the office. Many companies are built around having junior employees learning from more senior ones, and the expecation in many companies have been that employees will return as soon as they think conditions are safe enough. Of course, there are some jobs that can’t be done from home (service and healthcare, as well as anybody that has to work with people (food service, healthcare) or making or moving physical things. Here are some tips: * Be clear on what you are asking for. * Go directly to your boss and state the honest facts, being as flexible as possible. * Show you’re bending to accommodate as much as possible * Tell them your plan: for example, how you are going to get your work done, showing any anticipated problems and your solutions to them. * Don’t rely on your boss to come up with solutions. Bosses: if you are managing a team that is coming back to the office, you can anticipate who will have issues and talk to them 1:1 to talk about their situations. If the accommodation is around health issues, you may need to share your personal situation with them, like a compromised immune system, to explain why you need to stay home. If you are doing great work in quarantine, your need to stay home will like not be an issue. Sharing this may feel private. It may take vulnerability. If you are interviewing and need to ask for anythijng, even when we're not ijn a pandemic, what should you do? Bring your strengths and flexibility into the beginning part of the process, and have the conversation about accommodations you want or need. Once a company has expressed interest, you should talk with the recruiter and tell them what you need (whether it’s a vacation, a standing desk, or anything else). Then keep talking about moving forward and express your interest. You have to read the room, though. You don't want the hiring manager and recruiter to feel like you've held back an important fact. For instance, if you have a vacation trip planned in a few months, and it turns out that's a time when they're going to need you at work and not on vacatio, you may need to call it out earlier in the process. on and if they are going to need you at the time you’re gone, you may need to call it out earlier. Here's how you ask for something you need at work . We call it "the golden rule of requests": This the problem. This is what I need. And this is how I’m going to hande any issues that come up.

Deep listening affects every area of your life, including creating stronger relationships at work and at home. Our guest, Oscar Trimboli, is a former technology exec who has dedicated his life to helping over 10M people become deep listeners. Growing up an immigrant, Oscar had to learn how to listen to different languages by paying attention to body language and other ways to understand what people were saying. In his corporate gigs, Oscar became known for asking “Have we asked a customer?” Had the company actually listened? Oscar is trying to get 100M deep listeners around the world, helping people to learn to listen to what’s not said out loud. Deep listeners can even help a speaker make sense, because they listen to the meaning in how the speaker is speaking. What’s the nirvana of deep listening? Reducing the chaos of confusion. Hearing what people and customers are saying. Wasting less time from not paying attention or not knowing what you’re supposed to be doing. It’s about impact beyond words and fixing relationships We need to listen to those who don’t speak up-- sometimes they arre the ones who can best cultivate ideas. In bringing ideas to the table, it often helps to have people from different backgrounds and expertise bring their ideas to the table. Leaders need a mindset for listening to what is said and unsaid in conversations. If you are hosting a meeting, you needsto make sure everyone has a voice, so that good ideas are not lost. Why have someone at a meeting if they aren’t going to be able to contribute? Ask people what they are noticing or what they are thinking vs asking for a direct answer. Talking about recruiting... Oscar always hired quickly because he had his job requirerments sorted out, he had an understanding of customers, and he attracted people to the team. He would ask people who were interested in working for him to talk with customers and tell him something he didn’t know. He was interested in the ones who did, and who showed thoughtful customer conversations and thoughtful follow-through after. He looked for productivity and ability to give feedback when there is an opportunity to tell truth to power. Oscar says that we’re in an imagination economy where we need to learn, unlearn and relearn -- all of which require listening and abandoning old assumptions. In Oscar’s book, he talks about 4 villains of listening. They are the dramatic listener (loves your story becomes it becomes a theater where they can be an actor), the interrupting listener (they jump in from a place of purposeful problem solving, but don’t listen completely), the lost listener (they drift in and out of the conversation and are distracted), and the shrewd listener (hearing you and trying to be the smartest person in the room). Be aware of what yourpersonal listening villain is. And to be a good listener, switch your phone off (no buzzes or beeps) and make sure distractions are minimized. You can’t task switch at the front of the brain where processing is done. The minute you task switch at the front of your memory, there is a cost to productivity. 85% of people think they’re above average listeners…. Physical tips: Drinking water helps us be more productive- a hydrated brain is better at listening. The deeper the breath, the deeper the listening. Productivity paradox: Oscar talks about pragmatic presence, which means talking about the chaos around that’s off screen. Once again, this is about making the implicit explicit. If you listen to absolutes, you miss the real meaning. You are amazing. Let your clients see more of you. Your biggest goal is to be more of you. We also talked about silence, a pause allows the speaker’s thoughts to catch up. That silence helps us synchronize and realize what needs to come next. Oscar's best advice to people who want to be better listeners: pause, take a drink of water and hear what people are saying and practice being a deep listener. Oscar Trimboli on Twitter: @oscartrimboli (https://twitter.com/oscartrimboli?lang=en) Oscar's site: oscartrimboli.com (https://www.oscartrimboli.com) Oscar's latest book: Deep Listening: Impact Beyond Words (https://www.amazon.com/Deep-Listening-Impact-Beyond-Words/dp/099537774X/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=oscar+trimboli&qid=1580336785&sr=8-1)

We’re excited to talk in this episode about reverse management, or managing up. We’re going to get into it, and talk about how to work with a manager, how to talk with your manager, and how to excel even when your manager isn’t very good at managing... We discuss how sometimes people don’t manage up well because they don’t want to be a burden, but rule #1 is to communicate and sometimes over-communicate. A CC on an email is an FYI, and it helps your boss have the information they may need. When a manager doesn’t know what is going on, they ask questions and ask for data to prove work. When they don’t see proof of work, it gets uncomfortable. The point of information is clarity. If you manage up well, the executive team will hear more about you and your projects, and it will benefit your career. If you don’t show your boss your good work, they can’t share it with their boss and therefore you won’t get recognition. Same with if you aren’t doing good work and you need help. Your manager can can help you learn and can cover for you to others... If you look at your week and your goals based on what you think is expected, you can share that with your boss to make sure you are doing what they need you to do. A quick touch-base at the beginning and end of the week ensure alignment. Regular updates help your manager know you, how you work, what you do and what’s on your plate. By setting expectations, you open up lines of communication for hard discussions around expectations. It’s important to mention long-term projects periodically to make sure your manager knows that it’s on your radar. We don’t all remember everything going on, so a reminder is a good paper trail to keep them posted. Sending the email is a CYA -- whether or not your manager opens the email is up to them. We think it’s so important to have 1:1 meetings between employees and managers to build trust and communication. As an employee, you want to be prepared and your weekly update can be the basis for that meeting. Managers need to have a “manageable” number of direct reports so that they can meet regularly. When managers get regular status reports, they can have fewer 1:1s and use them as career mentorship, expectation setting, and other high-level uses of that time vs communicating status updates. What should you do when your manager is a 1:1 canceller? If you’re a manager who is unsure of yourself as a manager, read some books like Dare to Lead by Brene Brown. Educate yourself with podcasts, books and articles so that you feel more confident. To report what you've been doing to your manager, you can reflect at the end of the week, or add to your report during the week so that the end of the week email is really easy. When working remotely, you don’t have face time with your manager and they don't see you working hard in the office. Be available, communicate when you are and aren’t available, and make sure your manager has what they need when they need it. Never forget the power of the cc!! It's great for visibility, especially when working from home. Use it as an FYI to show your boss what you’re doing and to keep them informed of your work. You can ask your boss how they want you to use the cc. You can adapt your cc to your company culture. What about using the cc when you are complimented? You can always cc on your “thank you” or your can forward them. The easier you make it for your boss, the better. And, if you want to make sure you’re traceable, cc your boss so that when the absent hiring manager says you haven’t found any candidates, your boss has seen that you sent an “I’m here when you’re ready to respond” email, and can have your back. Sometimes the hardest time of managing up is when you are coming back from a negative performance perception. People who are open to feedback and are curious about feedback are the ones who get themself off performance plans. When on a PIP, those “what I’m working on” emails are critical. CYA, clarify and make sure you’re on the right track. Be transparent and ask for feedback.

We welcome Katrina Kibben in this episode of Real Job Talk to talk with us. We're always glad to find another Kat! Katrina is a writer and recruiting professional who has built Three Ears Media around her interests in communication and marketing to teach companies how to excel around employment branding, writing for recruiting, and representing themselves with authenticity. Katrina came into recruiting by accident after an executive met her while she was tutoring his daughter. She took her writing background and wrote copy around recruiting. Now she spends the majority of her time teaching recruiters to write in a way that will resonate with candidates. Katrina’s realness drives her consultancy in helping her clients also be real in how they describe themselves to potential employees. When we’re real with our current and potential employees, we keep them and attract the people who will thrive within our companies. Katrina respects recruiters, but admits that most recruiters don’t know the role past the job posting. So here are some of her tips for resume-writing. Recruiters are busy; they spend 4 seconds on your resume to see if it matches. If you're a job seeker trying to get to that busy recruiter and have them notice your resume, make the words in your resume match as closely as close to possible to their job posting. Resumes are marketing tools; they need to look like the job description for the role you are looking for. When writing a job description or resume, use Google Trends to make sure your titles match what ever title has the most search volume. People often go WAY too far back on their resume. Those college jobs aren’t necessary, and length is important. A concise resume shows that you know how to tell a story. A long resume makes you look like a job hopper. Also, no need to point out that you know MS Word or other skills that are obvious in the job you’ve done. If you have a 10 page resume, it reads like you have a hard time editing, and when being able to be precise is a necessary skill, a rambling resume hints that you won’t be able to be concise in your job. Big tip: use a wordcloud to identify top keywords in a job description and make sure all of those top words stand out in your resume. Get someone to give you an extra 15 seconds by having the words stand out. Recruiters tend to look at the beginning of the resume, at your job titles, and then also the weird stuff you list at the bottom…. We talk about Katrina’s own job searches. In her last search, she thought of different roles around her core areas -- writing, branding, marketing, and recruiting. She started with creating a basic marketing resume, pulling words and concepts from other job descriptions and postings out there to create her base resume. Then from the marketing resume, she took the base and tweaked it for content marketing, and then again tweaking it for all the related roles she was interested in. Don’t feel like a good writer? Steal from job descriptions. Do voice to text talking about the work you’ve done, and think about what you’re most proud of. You want your resume to reflect you and your voice and to represent you authentically. Get the words out even if you don't think you're a good writer. Starting a new job search? BLS.gov shows you what sectors are hiring and can help you figure out where to look in a tough job market. You can go to a job board or Facebook group and search for “now hiring” and see who is hiring. We talked about new grads doing customer service and how it’s a great new job. Work your network. Call people who have worked with you and who you would consider working with again and check in. Ask them what they remember about you and who is out there who they would want to work with again. It will lead to your next role. You can’t make those calls in panic mode. If you’re panicked, call your friends, not your network. Fake it until you make it if you are scared, because nobody wants to put someone in crisis out to their network. Do your research about companies: look at Glassdoor, evaluate your fit against their “about us” page and see if you can see yourself there. If you're a hiring for a role, how to you create a great job posting? Write a pitch: "You help (blank) do (blank) by (blank)ing. Write your must haves; e.g., "Don’t apply if you don’t have these 3 things." Take the “about us” marketing language of your company's web site and then make it about people. Then write what the person is doing now that will make them prepared for taking on the role you're trying to fill. Katrina’s book: The Job Post Writing Workbook (https://www.threeearsmedia.com/free-job-ad.html) She also teaches on-demand courses about writing to get promoted and job descriptions and more. Find Katrina everywhere at Katrinakibben (she’s the only one!). * Three Ears Media (https://www.threeearsmedia.com) * @KatrinaKibben (https://www.twitter.com/katrinakibben) on Twitter * Katrina Kibben (https://www.linkedin.com/in/katrinakibben/) on LinkedIn

Jason Treu talks with Liz & Kat about building teams, trust, social wealth, and his game, Cards Against Mundanity. This week Liz and Kat welcome Jason Treu, author of the book Social Wealth, whose goal is to help teams get to know each other. He gives us his advixe to building a career with real connections, including telling us about his game that's designed to help you start making those connections, Cards Against Mundanity, . Jason started his career in Silicon Valley, working with companies like Apple and eBay. He saw great leaders doing all types of things, and now does executive coaching, leadership training, teamwork and communications, building trust. He also works on the HR side on collaboration and teamwork. He was working as a VP of Marketing when he started coaching and proving out his model for building great teams, and eventually he scaled the business and set out on his own. We asked what Jason believes makes a great team. His answer: building connections build trust and great teams. Unfortunately, many leaders who have built great teams don’t know how they did it, and don’t know how to do it again. People all need to build better relationships. Great performances come from teams that have worked to build trust. We ask about socialization at work, and Jason feels that people today look to connect with people from work, make friends there, and have a purpose. It's not the perks at work that attract people. We discuss soft skills and practicing them. Great leaders need strong soft skills, but people don’t spend time developing them. Leaders need to be held accountable for their own soft skills as well as developing in them in other and upholding the team culture. Jason has introduced his game, Cards Against Mundanity, to over 30,000 people to create bonds and trust with people which can be done at any level. People crave connection. and they make those connections with other people who they have gotten to know and trust. That's when they can take their armor off. You can use the cards with anyone who you want to get to know better. If you show you care, people will assume you have their back. They will want to work with you if they know they can count on you. Introverts love Jason’s game because it cuts the small talk and gets to the meat of the conversation where they want to be and where they can create those meaningful connections. “Your job as a manager/leader is for someone to take your job because then you’ll have somewhere to go.” Jason’s book Social Wealth is a blueprint to making connections, inspired by Keith Ferrazzi’s book How to Never Eat Alone. Jason wanted a quick and dirty guide to helping people get results learning how to meet people, go to conferences, andget to know people from front to back. You have to meet a lot of people to find your own tribe. Jason Treu on Twitter: @jasontreu (https://twitter.com/jasontreu) Cards Against Mundanity (http://cardsagainstmundanity.com) Social Wealth: How to Build Extraordinary Relationships By Transforming the Way We Live, Love, Lead and Network (http://www.amazon.com/Social-Wealth-Extraordinary-Relationships-Transforming-ebook/dp/B00N9CA1QY/)

Can you find a "career peer" - a partner for deep work - at work? Emily Kurze and Nate Kartchner met at work and began to collaborate on projects, on personal and professional growth, and eventually came together with a business collaboration. They combine personal and business growth in their own podcast, Good. Working. Order. This week Emily Kurze and Nate Kartchner talk with Kat. Emily and Nate are colleagues and friends who met at work and now collaborate as business partners. Nate: Has been working for 15 years in marketing, mostly in digital. Emily: A recovering field biologist who has been in marketing for 9 years in program, campaign and content marketing. Nate and Emily started working together about 5 years ago. At first, their different styles caused friction: Nate had been getting results by doing his own thing, and Emily was there to instill process. They began to work more closely and effectively together over time at that workplace, and after leaving, they now collaborate on consulting and other side projects. One aspect of Nate and Emily’s effectiveness at collaboration is that difference in styles. They complement each other, which helps them with decision-making by seeing other angles. Although Nate and Emily both have full time jobs, they started a “think tank for ideas,” OSA Ventures, to work on projects that are interesting to them. Their first projects are a podcast, Good Working Order, that is growing into a podcast network, Megamouth Radio, alongside a marketing consultancy, Megamouth Marketing. Because they have “day jobs”, Nate and Emily only take consulting jobs that bring them joy and challenge. Their business has a fluid roadmap based on their availability, their interest and their passions. Nate and Emily’s podcast, Good Working Order, focuses on self-improvement and growth without sacrificing yourself. They always want to be better -- emotionally, psychologically, professionally -- and the podcast helps them make each other better. Another key to Emily and Nate’s success is that they stay in very close contact, so when they do meet, they don’t have to catch each other up. They have achieved greater depth in their relationship and in their problem solving because they don’t have to deal with minutia. Nate and Emily often do a “walk and talk,” where they talk on the phone and think while in motion. They also have a book club together, where they read the same books and then discuss them. These books now provide a common language and frame of reference for them to use when working together. This is especially true around uncomfortable conversations and negotiations; it helps formalize the space to be safe and discuss tough things. They try to end every conversation, even the tough ones, feeling better about things. Two book recommendations: * Never Split the Difference (https://www.amazon.com/Never-Split-Difference-Negotiating-Depended-ebook/dp/B014DUR7L2) by Chris Voss * Dare to Lead (https://daretolead.brenebrown.com) by Brene Brown Nate shares that his friendship and relationship with Emily has definitely helped him to be better, especially the way Emily pushes him and helps him think through problems. Her insights and their differences help him see things from a different side of marketing, and that creates a lot of value. Emily fashions herself a work clairvoyant -- she sees patterns in the workplace, and Nate helped her see how she could be decisive based on that gift. Like any relationship, Nate and Emily’s is built on trust, and that trust is built every day. They found that trust while working on a huge project. They didn’t want the other to be alone without resources in that project, and they came together to collaborate and support each other. “Here’s someone pulling for me as much as I’m pulling for them.” They say to look for a mirror who pushes you, stands up for you, and listens. Knowing each other’s worlds well enough to be able to cheer each other on from a knowledgeable place is what makes a career peer relationship work. When your peer knows your job, they can give you better, deeper feedback. A peer also needs to respect your work and respect and like you as a person. Nate always found Emily to be smart and respected her feedback. Howegver, someone who is just a cheerleader, and who doesn’t challenge you and hold you accountable, isn’t going to push you to make you stronger and better. As Nate and Emily have supported each other in stretching, they have really realized that they had something special together that they need to help others discover. How did they figure out how to go into business together? They had to talk about a lot of things -- money, expectations, thoughts and hopes, and vision -- and then had to keep having those conversations with each other. They had to change their vision and ideas to find product-market fit -- with themselves. Emily and Nate's projects: * Good. Working. Order. (https://www.megamouthradio.com/shows/good-working-order/) Being your best self takes work. * OSA Ventures. (OSA-Ventures.com) A digital lab exploring new concepts in marketing and growth.

In this episode, Liz and Kat tackle some questions about communications with coworkers in this session with Vince Wood, a Houston-based IT professional and podcaster. Vince brought to the session a few questions and scenarios around effective communication within a team, taking into account their different and unique perspectives and experiences. We also talk about the general challenges of working with others and how to optimally communicate with others in this episode. Vince framed his overall problem this way: bringing people to work together effectively is a challenge, specifically getting a team to gel to accomplish their shared goals. People come into a team with different perspectives, different experiences, and different styles. We talk about building teams and setting expectations inside htem. Knowing the people on your team and how they like to interact, and knowing how to set expectations is critical to working with different people. The leader of the team must set expectations, giving the lay of the land, setting goals, and telling everyone how their role contributes to the overall picture. This sets the team up for success. One of the challenges with being a manager, of course, is that often new managers don't receive training, and this forces them to learn how to manage teams by trial and error. And even if they are trained, we've all met managers who don't seem very good at managing. Vince came to Liz and Kat with three challenging scenarios that he's seenat work, and wanted feedback from Liz and Kat on how to tackle these tricky challanges. Challenge #1: you want to support a fellow team member in a challanging meeting, so you quietly slip them a message with some tips, but then they get offended. What should you do? Kat's take was that, first of all, you apologize and explain yourself and that you weren't meaning to offend; then you have conversation around what they would want from you in the future. Explaining why you stepped in when someone was asked to answer something you didn’t think they knew will help them understand your mindset and why you did what you did. Vince then asks about strange reactions when people DO know each other well. And Kat and Liz point out that there may be previous air to clear, and that even if people work together every day, they may not feel safe with each other. Vince’s Challenge #2: around coming into work, teammates with differing work schedules, and asking teammates for help immediately as they enter the office, without giving them a chance to get settled. Kat and Liz point out that it's important to respect people’s rhythms, understand that they may have different schedules, constraints, work priorities, and cycles of productivity. You should ask when they are available to help, not just grab them as they enter the office in the morning. Organize group work around when everyone is in, and also trust that people can rise to the occasion when they are called upon. As adults, we can ask people for what we need, such as saying “can this wait 5 minutes and then I’ll be all ears?”. Vince’s 3rd challenge was around having a coworker who is always talking about the way they did things at their last job, without regard to how that fits with the current situation. We talk about how to approach them to see if they're willing to reexamine how they're seeing the situation. Liz also muses that this situation could be because someone is trying to feel knowledgable or less insecure about their current role, and we encourage Vince to kindly point out the differences and ask the coworker to problem-solve in this new environment. How do you help someone with problem solving? Maybe recommend a good book that helped you, but come from a place of caring and helping vs telling and commanding. Vince recommends Mark Manson’s “The Subtle Art of Not Giving An F” to colleagues when he senses they are burning out. Vince finally shares with us his 3 general take-aways for difficult interpersonal situtions: (1) communicate, even overcommunicate; (2) learn to listen; and (3) have patience. Liz and Kat confirm that lots of communcation - and paying attention to individual styles and preferences of communication - as well as recapping conversations are all great ways to make sure things get heard. Recap emails after a meeting, including deliverables and assignments, allow people to ask questions outside of the big room. This keeps everyone on the same page and also helps people who learn in different ways to ensure understanding. Thanks, Vince, for coming on the show and posing some challanging scenarios for Liz and Kat to tackle. Vince Wood is @mvwood (https://twitter.com/mvwood) on Twitter Vince's IT Reality Podcast: website (https://itr-it-reality.zencast.website) and @ITRealityUS (https://twitter.com/ITRealityUS) on Twitter If you would like to have a live coaching session with Liz and Kat on the podcast, just contact us. We have a lot of fun with these.