Transcript
00:00:00 The following is a conversation with Simon Sinek,
00:00:02 author of several books, including Start With Why,
00:00:06 Leaders Eat Last, and his latest, The Infinite Game.
00:00:11 He’s one of the best communicators
00:00:12 of what it takes to be a good leader,
00:00:14 to inspire, and to build businesses
00:00:16 that solve big, difficult challenges.
00:00:21 This is the Artificial Intelligence Podcast.
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00:00:31 at Lex Friedman, spelled F R I D M A N.
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00:03:45 And now, here’s my conversation with Simon Sinek.
00:03:50 In the Infinite Game, your most recent book,
00:03:53 you describe the finite game and the infinite game,
00:03:56 so from my perspective of artificial intelligence
00:03:58 and game theory in general, I’m a huge fan of finite games
00:04:03 from the broad philosophical sense,
00:04:05 it’s something that in the robotics,
00:04:07 artificial intelligence space, we know how to deal with,
00:04:09 and then you describe the infinite game,
00:04:11 which has no exact static rules,
00:04:13 has no well defined static objective,
00:04:17 the players are known, unknown, they change,
00:04:19 there’s the dynamic element,
00:04:21 so this is something that applies to business, politics,
00:04:26 life itself, so can you try to articulate
00:04:30 the objective function here of the infinite game,
00:04:33 or in the cliche, broad philosophical sense,
00:04:39 what is the meaning of life?
00:04:41 Go for the, start with a softball.
00:04:44 Yep, easy question first.
00:04:48 So James Kars was the philosopher
00:04:50 who originally articulated this concept
00:04:52 of finite and infinite games,
00:04:54 and when I learned about it,
00:04:56 it really challenged my view of how the world works, right?
00:05:00 Because I think we all think about winning
00:05:02 and being the best and being number one,
00:05:04 but if you think about it,
00:05:06 only in a finite game can that exist,
00:05:07 a game that has fixed rules, agreed upon objectives,
00:05:11 and known players, like football or baseball,
00:05:14 there’s always a beginning, middle, and end,
00:05:15 and if there’s a winner, there has to be a loser.
00:05:17 Infinite games, as Kars describes them,
00:05:20 as you said, have known and unknown players,
00:05:22 which means anyone can join,
00:05:24 it has changeable rules,
00:05:26 which means you can play however you want,
00:05:27 and the objective is to perpetuate the game,
00:05:29 to stay in the game as long as possible.
00:05:32 In other words, there’s no such thing
00:05:33 as being number one or winning
00:05:34 in a game that has no finish line.
00:05:36 And what I learned is that when we try to win
00:05:40 in a game that has no finish line,
00:05:42 we try to be number, we try to be the best
00:05:44 in a game that has no agreed upon objectives
00:05:46 or agreed upon metrics or timeframes,
00:05:49 there’s a few consistent and predictable outcomes,
00:05:51 the decline of trust, the decline of cooperation,
00:05:54 the decline of innovation.
00:05:57 And I find this fascinating because so many of the ways
00:06:01 that we run most organizations is with a finite mindset.
00:06:04 So trying to reduce the beautiful complex thing
00:06:06 that is life or whatever, politics or business,
00:06:09 into something very narrow,
00:06:12 and in that process, the reductionist process,
00:06:14 you lose something fundamental
00:06:16 that makes the whole thing work in the long term.
00:06:20 So returning, not gonna let you off the hook easy,
00:06:24 what is the meaning of life?
00:06:26 So what is the objective function
00:06:28 that is worthwhile to pursue?
00:06:31 Well, if you think about our tombstones, right?
00:06:34 They have the date we were born and the date we died,
00:06:36 but really it’s what we do with the gap in between.
00:06:39 There’s a poem called The Dash.
00:06:41 You know, it’s the dash that matters.
00:06:44 It’s what we do between the time we’re born
00:06:45 and the time we die that gives our life meaning.
00:06:47 And if we live our lives with a finite mindset,
00:06:50 which means to accumulate more power or money
00:06:52 than anybody else, to outdo everyone else,
00:06:54 to be number one, to be the best,
00:06:55 we don’t take any of us with us.
00:06:56 We don’t take any of it with us.
00:06:58 We just die.
00:06:59 The people who get remembered the way we wanna be remembered
00:07:04 is what kind of people we were, right?
00:07:06 Devoted mother, loving father,
00:07:08 what kind of person we were to other people.
00:07:10 Jack Welch just died recently,
00:07:13 and the Washington Post,
00:07:14 when it wrote the headline for his obit,
00:07:18 it wrote, he pleased Wall Street and distressed employees.
00:07:23 And that’s his legacy.
00:07:24 A finite player who is obsessed with winning,
00:07:27 who leaves behind a legacy of short term gains for a few
00:07:32 and distress for many.
00:07:33 That’s his legacy.
00:07:34 And every single one of us gets the choice
00:07:37 of the kind of legacy we wanna have.
00:07:39 Do we wanna be remembered for our contributions
00:07:41 or our detractions?
00:07:43 To live with a finite mindset,
00:07:45 to live a career with a finite mindset,
00:07:47 to be number one, be the best, be the most famous,
00:07:53 you live a life like Jack Welch, you know?
00:07:56 To live a life of service, to see those around us rise,
00:07:59 to contribute to our communities, to our organizations,
00:08:01 to leave them in better shape than we found them,
00:08:04 that’s the kind of legacy most of us would like to have.
00:08:07 So day to day, when you think about
00:08:09 what is the fundamental goals, dreams,
00:08:17 motivations of an infinite game,
00:08:20 of seeing your life, your career as an infinite game,
00:08:24 what does that look like?
00:08:26 I mean, I guess I’m sort of trying to stick
00:08:29 on this personal ego, personal drive,
00:08:32 the thing that the fire, the reason we wanna wake up
00:08:35 in the morning and the reason we can’t go to bed
00:08:37 because we’re so excited, what is that?
00:08:39 So for me, it’s about having a just cause.
00:08:41 It’s about a vision that’s bigger than me,
00:08:44 that my work gets to contribute
00:08:45 to something larger than myself, you know?
00:08:48 That’s what drives me every day.
00:08:51 I wake up every morning with a vision of a world
00:08:53 that does not yet exist, a world in which the vast majority
00:08:55 of people wake up every single morning inspired,
00:08:58 feel safe at work and return home fulfilled
00:09:01 at the end of the day.
00:09:02 It is not the world we live in.
00:09:03 And so that we still have work to do
00:09:06 is the thing that drives me.
00:09:08 You know, I know what my underlying values are.
00:09:10 You know, I wake up to inspire people
00:09:12 to do the things that inspire them.
00:09:13 And these are the things that, these are the things that I,
00:09:16 these are my go tos, my touch points
00:09:20 that inspire me to keep working.
00:09:21 You know, I think of a career like an iceberg.
00:09:24 You know, if you have a vision for something,
00:09:27 you’re the only one who can see the iceberg
00:09:28 underneath the ocean.
00:09:30 But if you start working at it, a little bit shows up.
00:09:33 And now a few other people can see what you imagine,
00:09:35 be like, oh, right, yeah, no,
00:09:36 I wanna help build that as well.
00:09:37 And if you have a lot of success,
00:09:39 then you have a lot of iceberg
00:09:40 and people can see this huge iceberg
00:09:41 and they say, you’ve accomplished so much.
00:09:43 But what I see is all the work still yet to be done.
00:09:47 You know, I still see the huge iceberg underneath the ocean.
00:09:49 And so the growth, you talk about momentum.
00:09:52 So the incremental revealing of the iceberg
00:09:56 is what drives you.
00:09:58 Well, it necessarily is incremental.
00:10:00 What drives me is that, is the realization,
00:10:03 is realizing the iceberg, bringing more of the iceberg
00:10:06 from the unknown to the known,
00:10:08 bringing more of the vision from the imagination to reality.
00:10:12 And you have this fundamental vision of optimism.
00:10:15 You call yourself an optimist.
00:10:17 I mean, in this world, I have a sort of,
00:10:20 I see myself a little bit as the main character
00:10:23 from The Idiot by Dostoevsky,
00:10:25 who is also kind of seen by society as a fool
00:10:29 because he was optimistic.
00:10:32 So one, can you maybe articulate
00:10:35 where that sense of optimism comes from?
00:10:37 And maybe also try to articulate your vision of the future
00:10:41 where people are inspired, where optimism drives us.
00:10:46 It’s easy to forget that when you look at social media
00:10:48 and so on, where the word toxicity and negativity
00:10:51 can often get more likes,
00:10:53 that optimism has a sort of a beauty to it.
00:10:56 And I do hope it’s out there.
00:10:58 So can you try to articulate that vision?
00:11:00 Yeah, so I mean, for me, optimism and being an optimist
00:11:04 is just seeing the silver lining in every cloud.
00:11:08 Even in tragedy, it brings people together.
00:11:11 And the question is, can we see that?
00:11:12 Can you see the beauty that is in everything?
00:11:15 And I don’t think optimism is foolishness.
00:11:20 I don’t think optimism is blindness,
00:11:23 though it probably involves some naivete,
00:11:27 the belief that things will get better,
00:11:29 the belief that we tend towards the good,
00:11:33 even in times of struggle or bad.
00:11:39 You can’t sustain war, but you can sustain peace.
00:11:42 I think things that are stable are more sustainable,
00:11:46 things that are optimistic are more sustainable
00:11:49 than things that are chaotic.
00:11:53 So you see people as fundamentally good.
00:11:54 I mean, some people may disagree
00:11:56 that you can’t sustain peace, you can’t sustain war.
00:12:00 I mean, I think war is costly.
00:12:03 It involves life and money,
00:12:06 and peace does not involve those things.
00:12:08 It requires work.
00:12:09 I’m not saying it doesn’t require work,
00:12:11 but it doesn’t drain resources,
00:12:14 I think the same way that war does.
00:12:17 The people that would say that we will always have war,
00:12:19 and I just talked to the historian of Stalin,
00:12:22 would say that conflict and the desire for power
00:12:27 and conflict is central to human nature.
00:12:30 I concur.
00:12:32 But something in your words also,
00:12:34 perhaps it’s the naive aspect that I also share,
00:12:38 is that you have an optimism
00:12:39 that people are fundamentally good.
00:12:41 I’m an idealist, and I think idealism is good.
00:12:44 I’m not a fool to believe that the ideals
00:12:46 that I imagine can come true.
00:12:48 Of course, there’ll never be world peace,
00:12:50 but shouldn’t we die trying?
00:12:53 I think that’s the whole point.
00:12:54 That’s the whole point of vision.
00:12:55 Vision should be idealistic,
00:12:56 and it should be, for all practical purposes, impossible.
00:13:02 But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try,
00:13:03 and it’s the milestones that we reach
00:13:06 that take us closer to that ideal
00:13:09 that make us feel that our life and our work have meaning,
00:13:12 and we’re contributing to something bigger than ourselves.
00:13:14 You know, just because it’s impossible
00:13:17 doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try.
00:13:19 As I said, we’re still moving the ball down the field.
00:13:21 We’re still making progress.
00:13:23 Things are still getting better,
00:13:24 even if we never get to that ideal state.
00:13:27 So I think idealism is a good thing.
00:13:30 You know, in the word infinite game,
00:13:34 one of the beautiful and tragic aspects of life,
00:13:37 human life at least, at least from the biological
00:13:39 perspective, is that it ends.
00:13:43 So sadly, it’s.
00:13:44 To some people, yeah.
00:13:46 Fine, it’s tragic to some people, or is it ends, it ends?
00:13:50 I think some people believe that it ends on the day you die,
00:13:53 and some people think it continues on.
00:13:54 There’s, and there’s a lot of different ways
00:13:56 to think what continues on even looks like.
00:13:58 But let me drag it back to the personal.
00:14:01 Sure.
00:14:02 Which is, how do you think about your own mortality?
00:14:06 Are you afraid of death?
00:14:07 How do you think about your own death?
00:14:10 I definitely haven’t accomplished everything
00:14:12 I want to contribute to.
00:14:15 I would like more time on this earth
00:14:17 to keep working towards that vision.
00:14:20 Do you think about the fact that it ends for you?
00:14:22 Are you cognizant of it?
00:14:23 Of course I’m cognizant of it.
00:14:24 I mean, aren’t we all?
00:14:27 I don’t dwell on it.
00:14:30 I’m aware of it.
00:14:32 I know that my life is finite,
00:14:33 and I know that I have a certain amount of time left
00:14:36 on this planet, and I’d like to make that time be valuable.
00:14:40 You know, some people would think that ideas
00:14:42 kind of allow you to have a certain kind of immortality.
00:14:46 Yeah.
00:14:52 Maybe to linger on this kind of question.
00:14:54 So first to push back on the,
00:14:56 you said that everyone’s cognizant of their mortality.
00:14:58 There’s a guy named Ernest Becker who would disagree,
00:15:02 that you basically say that most of human cognition
00:15:05 is created by us trying to create an illusion
00:15:09 and try to hide the fact from ourselves,
00:15:11 the fact that we’re gonna die,
00:15:13 to try to think that it’s all gonna go on forever.
00:15:17 But the fact that we know that it doesn’t.
00:15:19 Yes, but this mix of denial.
00:15:21 I mean, I think the book’s called Denial of Death.
00:15:24 It’s this constant denial that we’re running away from.
00:15:30 In fact, some would argue that the inspiration,
00:15:33 the incredible ideas you’ve put out there,
00:15:35 your TED Talk has been seen by millions
00:15:37 and millions of people, right?
00:15:38 It’s just you trying to desperately fight the fact
00:15:41 that you are biologically mortal.
00:15:45 Your creative genius comes from the fact
00:15:48 that you’re trying to create ideas
00:15:49 that live on long past you.
00:15:52 Well, that’s very nice of you.
00:15:53 I mean, I would like my ideas to live on beyond me
00:15:57 because I think that is a good test
00:15:59 that those ideas have value in the lives of others.
00:16:03 I think that’s a good test.
00:16:05 That others would continue to talk about
00:16:08 or share the ideas long after I’m gone,
00:16:12 I think is perhaps the greatest compliment
00:16:16 one can get for one’s own work.
00:16:20 But I don’t think it’s my awareness of my mortality
00:16:23 that drives me to do it.
00:16:25 It’s my desire to contribute that drives me to do it.
00:16:30 It’s the optimist vision.
00:16:32 It’s the pleasure and the fulfillment you get
00:16:36 from inspiring others.
00:16:38 It’s as pure as that.
00:16:42 Let me ask, listen, I’m rushing.
00:16:43 I’m trying to get you to get you into these dark areas.
00:16:47 Is the ego tied up into it somehow?
00:16:50 So your name is extremely well known.
00:16:54 If your name wasn’t attached to it,
00:16:56 do you think you would act differently?
00:16:58 I mean, for years, I hated that my name was attached to it.
00:17:02 I had a rule for years that I wouldn’t have my face
00:17:06 on the front page of the website.
00:17:09 I had a fight with the publisher
00:17:10 because I didn’t want my name big on the book.
00:17:14 I wanted it tiny on the book.
00:17:15 Because I kept telling them it’s not about me,
00:17:17 it’s about the ideas.
00:17:18 They wanted to put my name on the top of my book, I refused.
00:17:20 None of my books have my names on the top
00:17:22 because I won’t let them.
00:17:25 They would like very much to put my name
00:17:26 on the top of the book,
00:17:27 but the idea has to be bigger than me.
00:17:30 I’m not bigger than the idea.
00:17:32 That’s beautifully put.
00:17:32 Do you think ego?
00:17:34 But I also am aware that I’ve become recognized
00:17:38 as the messenger.
00:17:39 And even though I still think the message is bigger than me,
00:17:41 I recognize that I have a responsibility as the messenger.
00:17:45 And whether I like it or not is irrelevant.
00:17:47 I accept the responsibility, I’m happy to do it.
00:17:53 I’m not sure how to phrase this,
00:17:54 but there’s a large part of the culture right now
00:17:58 that emphasizes all the things that nobody disagrees with,
00:18:03 which is health, sleep, diet, relaxation,
00:18:07 meditation, vacation, are really important.
00:18:10 And there’s no, it’s like,
00:18:11 you can’t really argue against that.
00:18:13 In fact, people.
00:18:14 Less sleep.
00:18:16 Less.
00:18:16 Just, I’m joking.
00:18:17 Yes, well, that’s the thing.
00:18:18 I often speak to the fact that passion
00:18:23 and love for what you’re doing and the two words hard work,
00:18:28 especially in the engineering fields,
00:18:30 are more important than,
00:18:32 are more important to prioritize than sleep.
00:18:35 Even though sleep is really important,
00:18:38 your mind should be obsessed with the hard work,
00:18:40 with the passion, and so on.
00:18:41 And then I get some pushback, of course, from people.
00:18:44 What do you make sense of that?
00:18:46 Is that just me, the crazy Russian engineer,
00:18:49 really pushing hard work?
00:18:50 Probably.
00:18:52 I think that that’s a short term strategy.
00:18:55 I think if you sacrifice your health for the work,
00:18:57 at some point, it catches up with you.
00:19:00 And at some point, it’s like going, going, going,
00:19:02 and you get sick.
00:19:03 Your body will shut down for you
00:19:04 if you refuse to take care of yourself.
00:19:07 You get sick.
00:19:09 It’s what happens.
00:19:09 Sometimes, more severe illness
00:19:12 than something that just slows you down.
00:19:14 So I think taking, getting sleep,
00:19:17 I mean, there have been studies on this that,
00:19:20 executives, for example, who get a full night’s sleep
00:19:24 and stop at a reasonable hour,
00:19:26 actually accomplish more, are more productive
00:19:29 than people who work and burn the midnight oil
00:19:31 because their brains are working better
00:19:33 because they’re well rested.
00:19:35 So, you know, working hard, yes,
00:19:37 but why not work smart?
00:19:41 I think that giving our minds and our bodies rest
00:19:45 makes us more efficient.
00:19:47 I think just driving, driving, driving, driving
00:19:49 is a short term, it’s a short term strategy.
00:19:52 So, but to push back on that a little bit,
00:19:54 the annoying thing is you’re like 100% right
00:19:57 in terms of science, right?
00:19:58 But the thing is, because you’re 100% right,
00:20:02 that weak part of your mind uses that fact
00:20:07 to convince you, like what, so, you know,
00:20:10 I get all kinds of, my mind comes up
00:20:12 with all kinds of excuses to try to convince me
00:20:14 that I shouldn’t be doing what I’m doing.
00:20:16 To rationalize. To rationalize.
00:20:18 And so what I have a sense,
00:20:21 I think what you said about executives and leaders
00:20:23 is absolutely right, but there’s the early days.
00:20:26 The early days of madness and passion.
00:20:29 For sure.
00:20:29 Then I feel like emphasizing sleep,
00:20:33 thinking about sleep is giving yourself a way out
00:20:37 from the fact that those early days,
00:20:39 especially, can be suffering.
00:20:42 As long, it’s not sustainable.
00:20:45 You know, it’s not sustainable.
00:20:46 Sure, if you’re investing all that energy in something
00:20:50 at the beginning to get it up and running,
00:20:52 then at some point you’re gonna have to slow down.
00:20:55 Or your body will slow you down for you.
00:20:57 Like, you can choose or your body can choose.
00:21:01 I mean.
00:21:02 So, okay, so you don’t think, from my perspective,
00:21:04 it feels like people have gotten a little bit soft.
00:21:07 But you’re saying, no.
00:21:08 I think that there seems evidence
00:21:11 that working harder and later have taken a back seat.
00:21:16 I’ve taken a back seat.
00:21:21 I think we have to be careful with broad generalizations.
00:21:24 But I think if you go into the workplace,
00:21:28 there are people who would complain
00:21:29 that more people now than before,
00:21:33 you know, look at their watches and say,
00:21:34 oops, five o clock, goodbye.
00:21:36 Right?
00:21:37 Now, is that a problem with the people?
00:21:39 You’re saying it’s the people giving themselves excuses
00:21:41 and people who don’t work hard.
00:21:42 Or is it the organizations aren’t giving them something
00:21:45 to believe in, something to be passionate about?
00:21:46 We can’t manufacture passion.
00:21:48 You can’t just tell someone, be passionate.
00:21:51 You know, that’s not how it works.
00:21:52 Passion’s an output, not an input.
00:21:55 Like if I believe in something
00:21:56 and I wanna contribute all that energy to do it,
00:21:58 we call that passion.
00:22:00 You know, working hard for something we love is passion.
00:22:02 Working hard for something we don’t care about
00:22:04 is called stress.
00:22:05 But we’re working hard either way.
00:22:07 So I think the organizations bear some accountability
00:22:10 and our leaders bear some accountability,
00:22:11 which is if they’re not offering a sense of purpose,
00:22:13 if they’re not offering us a sense of cause,
00:22:15 if they’re not telling us that our work is worth more
00:22:17 than simply the money it makes,
00:22:19 then yeah, I’m gonna come at five o clock
00:22:21 because I don’t really care about making you money.
00:22:23 Remember, we live in a world right now
00:22:24 where a lot of people, rather a few people,
00:22:26 are getting rich on the hard work of others.
00:22:29 And so I think when people look up and say,
00:22:33 well, why would I do that?
00:22:34 I’ll just, if you’re not gonna look after me
00:22:36 and then you’re gonna lay me off at the end of the year
00:22:38 because you missed your arbitrary projections,
00:22:40 you know, you’re gonna lay me off
00:22:41 because you missed your arbitrary projections,
00:22:43 then why would I offer my hard work and loyalty to you?
00:22:47 So I think, I don’t think we can immediately blame people
00:22:50 for going soft.
00:22:51 I think we can blame leaders for their inability
00:22:56 or failure to offer their people something bigger
00:22:59 than making a product or making money.
00:23:02 Yeah, so that’s brilliant.
00:23:04 And start with why, leaders eat less, your books.
00:23:07 You basically talk about what it takes to be a good leader.
00:23:13 And so some of the blame should go on the leader,
00:23:15 but how much of it is on finding your passion?
00:23:19 How much is it on the individual?
00:23:21 And allowing yourself to pursue that passion,
00:23:24 pushing yourself to your limits,
00:23:26 to really take concrete steps
00:23:30 along your path towards that passion.
00:23:33 Yeah, there’s mutual responsibility.
00:23:34 There’s mutual accountability.
00:23:35 I mean, we’re responsible as individuals
00:23:37 to find the organizations and find the leaders
00:23:39 that inspire us.
00:23:41 And organizations are responsible for maintaining
00:23:43 that flame and giving people who believe
00:23:46 what they believed, you know, a chance to contribute.
00:23:50 Sort of to linger on it,
00:23:51 have you by chance seen the movie Whiplash?
00:23:54 Yes.
00:23:56 Again, maybe I’m romanticizing suffering.
00:23:59 Again. It’s the Russian in you.
00:24:00 It’s the Russian. Yeah.
00:24:01 The Russians love suffering.
00:24:03 But for people who haven’t seen,
00:24:07 the movie Whiplash has a drum instructor
00:24:10 that pushes the drum musician to his limits
00:24:16 to bring out the best in him.
00:24:18 And there’s a toxic nature to it.
00:24:20 There’s suffering in it.
00:24:21 Like you’ve worked with a lot of great leaders,
00:24:24 a lot of great individuals.
00:24:25 So is that toxic relationship as toxic
00:24:29 as it appears in the movie?
00:24:30 Or is that fundamental?
00:24:31 I’ve seen that relationship,
00:24:33 especially in the past with Olympic athletes,
00:24:36 especially in athletics, extreme performers
00:24:39 seem to do wonders.
00:24:40 It does wonders for me.
00:24:42 There’s some of my best relationships,
00:24:44 now I’m not representative of everyone certainly,
00:24:47 but some of my best relationships for mentee and mentor
00:24:51 have been toxic from an external perspective.
00:24:56 What do you make of that movie?
00:24:57 What do you make of that kind of relationship?
00:25:00 That’s not my favorite movie.
00:25:04 Okay, so you don’t think that’s a healthy,
00:25:06 you don’t think that kind of relationship
00:25:08 is a great example of a great leader?
00:25:11 No, I think it’s a short term strategy.
00:25:13 I mean, short term.
00:25:13 I mean, look, being hard on someone
00:25:15 is not the same as toxicity.
00:25:18 If you go to the Marine Corps,
00:25:21 a drill instructor will be very hard on their Marines.
00:25:26 And then, but still, even on the last day of bootcamp,
00:25:29 they’ll take their hat off and they’ll become a human.
00:25:32 But of all the drill instructors,
00:25:34 you know, the three or four main drill instructors
00:25:38 assigned to a group of recruits,
00:25:40 the one that they all want the respect of
00:25:42 is the one that’s the hardest on them.
00:25:44 That’s true.
00:25:45 And you hear, you know,
00:25:47 there’s plenty of stories of people
00:25:48 who want to earn the respect of a hard parent
00:25:50 or a hard teacher.
00:25:53 But fundamental, that parent, that teacher,
00:25:55 that drill instructor has to believe in that person,
00:25:57 has to see potential in them.
00:25:58 It’s not a formula,
00:25:59 which is if I’m hard on people, they’ll do well,
00:26:01 which is there has to still be love.
00:26:04 It has to be done with absolute love.
00:26:05 And it has to be done responsibly.
00:26:08 I mean, some people can take
00:26:09 a little more pressure than others,
00:26:11 but it’s not, I think it’s irresponsible
00:26:13 to think of it as a formula
00:26:15 that if I’m just toxic at people, they will do well.
00:26:20 It depends on their personalities.
00:26:21 First of all, it works for some, but not all.
00:26:23 And second of all, it can’t be done willy nilly.
00:26:27 It has to still be done with care and love.
00:26:29 And sometimes you can get equal or better results
00:26:36 without all of the toxicity.
00:26:37 So one of the, I guess toxicity on my part
00:26:41 was a really bad word to use,
00:26:43 but if we talk about what makes a good leader
00:26:46 and just look at an example in particular,
00:26:49 looking at Elon Musk,
00:26:51 he’s known to push people to their limits
00:26:54 in a way that I think really challenges people
00:27:01 in a way they’ve never been challenged before
00:27:03 to do the impossible.
00:27:04 But it can really break people.
00:27:07 And jobs was hard and Amazon is hard.
00:27:11 But the thing that’s important is none of them lie about it.
00:27:15 People ask me about Amazon all the time.
00:27:16 Like Jeff Bezos never lied about it.
00:27:18 Even the ones who like Amazon don’t last
00:27:20 more than a couple of years before they burn out.
00:27:22 But when we’re honest about the culture,
00:27:25 then it gives people the opportunity
00:27:26 who like to work in that kind of culture
00:27:28 to choose to work in that kind of culture,
00:27:29 as opposed to pretending and saying,
00:27:31 oh no, this is all, it’s all lovey lovey here.
00:27:34 And then you show up and it’s the furthest thing from it.
00:27:37 So, I mean, I think the reputations
00:27:41 of putting a lot of pressure on people to,
00:27:44 jobs was not an easy man to work for.
00:27:48 He pushed people, but everyone who worked there
00:27:50 was given the space to create and do things
00:27:52 that they would not have been able to do anywhere else
00:27:54 and work at a level that they didn’t work anywhere else.
00:27:56 And jobs didn’t have all the answers.
00:27:58 I mean, he pushed his people to come up with answers.
00:28:02 He wasn’t just looking for people to execute his ideas.
00:28:07 And people did, people accomplished more
00:28:09 than they thought they were capable of, which is wonderful.
00:28:12 How do you, you’re talking about the infinite game
00:28:16 and not thinking about too short term.
00:28:19 And yet you see some of the most brilliant people
00:28:22 in the world being pushed by Elam us
00:28:24 to accomplish some of the most incredible things.
00:28:27 When we’re talking about autopilot,
00:28:28 when we’re talking about some of the hardware engineering,
00:28:32 and they do some of the best work of their life
00:28:35 and then leave.
00:28:37 How do you balance that in terms of what it takes
00:28:40 to be a good leader,
00:28:41 what it takes to accomplish great things in your life?
00:28:44 So I think there’s a difference between someone
00:28:49 who can get a lot out of people in the short term
00:28:52 and building an organization
00:28:53 that can sustain beyond any individual.
00:28:57 There’s a difference.
00:28:58 When you say beyond any individual,
00:28:59 you mean beyond like if the leader dies.
00:29:03 Correct.
00:29:03 Like could Tesla continue to do what it’s doing
00:29:05 without Elon Musk?
00:29:08 And you’re perhaps implying,
00:29:10 which is a very interesting question that it cannot.
00:29:13 I don’t know.
00:29:15 You know, the argument you’re making
00:29:16 of this person who pushes everyone
00:29:20 arguably is not a repeatable model, right?
00:29:23 You know, is Apple the same without Steve Jobs
00:29:25 or is it slowly moving in a different direction?
00:29:29 Or has he established something
00:29:31 that could be resurrected with the right leader?
00:29:34 That was his dream, I think,
00:29:35 is to build an organization that lives on beyond them.
00:29:39 At least I remember reading that somewhere.
00:29:40 I think that’s what a lot of leaders desire,
00:29:44 which is to create something that was bigger than them.
00:29:47 You know, most businesses, most entrepreneurial ventures
00:29:51 could not pass the school bus test,
00:29:54 which is if the founder was hit by a school bus,
00:29:57 would everyone continue the business without them
00:29:58 or would they all just go find jobs?
00:30:01 And the vast majority of companies would fail that test,
00:30:04 you know, especially in the entrepreneurial world
00:30:08 that if you take the inspired visionary leader away,
00:30:11 the whole thing collapses.
00:30:12 So is that a business
00:30:13 or is that just a force of personality?
00:30:15 And a lot of entrepreneurs, you know, face that reality,
00:30:19 which is they have to be in every meeting,
00:30:20 make every decision, you know, come up with every idea,
00:30:24 because if they don’t, who will?
00:30:25 And the question is, is, well,
00:30:27 what have you done to build your bench?
00:30:31 Is it, it’s not, sometimes it’s ego,
00:30:33 the belief that only I can.
00:30:35 Sometimes it’s just things got,
00:30:39 did so well for so long that just forgot.
00:30:43 And sometimes it’s a failure
00:30:48 to build the training programs or hire the right people
00:30:51 that could replace you,
00:30:53 who are maybe smarter and better.
00:30:58 And browbeating people is only one strategy.
00:31:01 I don’t think it’s necessarily the only strategy,
00:31:03 nor is it always the best strategy.
00:31:05 I think people get to choose the cultures
00:31:07 they wanna work in.
00:31:07 This is why I think companies should be honest
00:31:12 about the kind of culture that they’ve created.
00:31:16 You know, I heard a story about Apple
00:31:18 where somebody came in from a big company,
00:31:21 you know, he had accomplished a lot
00:31:23 and his ego was very large
00:31:26 and he was going on about how he did this and he did that
00:31:28 and he did this and he did that.
00:31:30 And somebody from Apple said,
00:31:32 we don’t care what you’ve done.
00:31:34 The question is, what are you gonna do?
00:31:36 And that’s, you know, for somebody who wants to be pushed,
00:31:41 that’s the place you go because you choose to be pushed.
00:31:45 Now, we all wanna be pushed to some degree,
00:31:47 you know, anybody who wants to, you know,
00:31:49 accomplish anything in this world
00:31:50 wants to be pushed to some degree,
00:31:51 whether it’s through self pressure or external pressure
00:31:55 or, you know, public pressure, whatever it is.
00:31:59 But I think this whole idea of one size fits all
00:32:02 is a false narrative of how leadership works,
00:32:05 but what all leadership requires is creating an environment
00:32:08 in which people can work at their natural best.
00:32:10 But you have a sense that it’s possible
00:32:12 to create a business where it lives on beyond you.
00:32:17 So if we look at now,
00:32:19 if we just look at this current moment,
00:32:21 I just recently talked to Jack Dorsey, CEO of Twitter,
00:32:25 and he’s under a lot of pressure now.
00:32:26 I don’t know if you’re aware of the news
00:32:28 that he’s being pushed out as a potential CEO of Twitter
00:32:31 because he’s the CEO already
00:32:33 of an incredibly successful company
00:32:35 plus he wants to go to Africa to live a few months in Africa
00:32:39 to connect with the world that’s outside of the Silicon Valley
00:32:43 and sort of, there’s this idea,
00:32:45 well, can Twitter live without Jack?
00:32:48 We’ll find out.
00:32:50 But you have a general, as a student of great leadership,
00:32:55 you have a general sense that it’s possible.
00:32:57 Yeah, of course it’s possible.
00:32:58 I mean, what Bill Gates built with Microsoft
00:33:01 may not have survived Steve Ballmer
00:33:04 if the company weren’t so rich,
00:33:06 but Sachin Ardala is putting it back on track again.
00:33:11 It’s become a visionary company again.
00:33:12 It’s attracting great talent again.
00:33:14 It went through a period
00:33:14 where they couldn’t get the best talent
00:33:16 and the best talent was leaving.
00:33:17 Now people wanna work for Microsoft again.
00:33:19 Well, that’s not because of pressure.
00:33:21 Ballmer put more pressure on people
00:33:24 mainly to hit numbers than anything else.
00:33:26 That didn’t work.
00:33:28 Yes. Right?
00:33:30 And so the question is,
00:33:31 what kind of pressure are we putting on people?
00:33:33 We’re putting on pressure people to hit numbers
00:33:35 or hit arbitrary deadlines,
00:33:38 or we’re putting on pressure on people
00:33:39 because we believe that they can do better work.
00:33:41 And the work that we’re trying to do
00:33:44 is to advance a vision that’s bigger than all of us.
00:33:46 And if you’re gonna put pressure on people,
00:33:47 it better be for the right reason.
00:33:49 Like if you’re gonna put pressure on me,
00:33:50 it better be for a worthwhile reason.
00:33:52 If it’s just to hit a goal,
00:33:54 if it’s just to hit some arbitrary date
00:33:55 or some arbitrary number or make a stock price
00:33:58 hit some target, you can keep it, I’m outta here.
00:34:01 But if you wanna put pressure on me
00:34:02 because we are brothers and sisters in arms
00:34:06 working to advance a cause bigger than ourselves,
00:34:09 that we believe whatever we’re gonna build
00:34:10 will significantly contribute
00:34:12 to the greater good of society,
00:34:14 then go ahead, I’ll take the pressure.
00:34:16 And if you look at the Apples
00:34:17 and if you look at the Elon Musk’s,
00:34:23 the Jobs and the Elon Musk,
00:34:24 they fundamentally believed that what they were doing
00:34:26 would improve society.
00:34:27 And it was for the good of humankind.
00:34:31 And so the pressure, in other words,
00:34:33 what they were doing was more important,
00:34:36 more valuable than any individual on the team.
00:34:39 And so the pressure they put on people
00:34:41 served a greater good.
00:34:42 And so we looked to the left
00:34:45 and we looked to the right to each other and said,
00:34:47 we’re in this together.
00:34:49 We accept this, we want this.
00:34:51 But if it’s just pressure to hit a number
00:34:54 or make the widget move a little faster,
00:35:01 that’s soul sucking.
00:35:03 That’s not passion, that’s stress.
00:35:06 And I think a lot of leaders confuse
00:35:11 that making people work hard
00:35:12 is not what makes them passionate.
00:35:15 Giving to them something to believe in
00:35:17 and work on is what drives passion.
00:35:20 And when you have that, then turning up the pressure
00:35:23 only brings people together,
00:35:26 drives them further.
00:35:27 If done the right way.
00:35:28 If done the right way.
00:35:30 Speaking of pressure,
00:35:32 I’m gonna give you 90 seconds to answer the last question,
00:35:36 which is if I told you that tomorrow
00:35:39 was your last day to live,
00:35:41 we talked about mortality,
00:35:42 sunrise to sunset, can you tell me,
00:35:45 can you take me through the day?
00:35:46 What do you think that day would involve?
00:35:48 You can’t spend it with your family,
00:35:50 I told you as well.
00:35:52 I would probably want to fill all of my senses
00:35:54 with things that excite my senses.
00:35:59 I’d want to look at beautiful art.
00:36:00 I’d want to listen to beautiful music.
00:36:02 I’d want to taste incredible food.
00:36:04 I’d want to smell amazing tastes.
00:36:06 I’d want to touch something that’s beautiful to touch.
00:36:14 I’d want all of my senses to just be consumed
00:36:19 with things that I find beautiful.
00:36:21 And you talked about this idea of
00:36:23 we don’t do it often these days,
00:36:24 of just listening to music, turning off all the devices
00:36:27 and actually taking in and listening to music.
00:36:29 So as an addendum,
00:36:33 if we were to talk about music,
00:36:34 what song would you be blasting
00:36:36 on this last day you’re alive?
00:36:38 Is it Led Zeppelin?
00:36:39 What are we talking about?
00:36:39 That I love.
00:36:40 No, no.
00:36:41 There’s probably gonna be a Beatles song in there.
00:36:42 There’ll definitely be some Beethoven in there.
00:36:46 The classics.
00:36:47 The classics.
00:36:48 Yeah, exactly.
00:36:49 Well, thank you so much for talking today.
00:36:51 Thank you for making time for it.
00:36:53 Under pressure, we made it happen.
00:36:55 It was great.
00:36:56 Thanks for listening to this conversation
00:36:58 with Simon Sinek.
00:36:59 And thank you to our sponsors, Cash App and Masterclass.
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00:37:14 If you enjoy this podcast, subscribe on YouTube,
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00:37:21 or simply connect with me on Twitter at Lex Friedman.
00:37:25 And now let me leave you with some words from Simon Sinek.
00:37:29 There are only two ways to influence human behavior.
00:37:32 You can manipulate it or you can inspire it.
00:37:35 Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.