Greg McKeown:
Welcome back, everybody. This is part two of a conversation with Noah Kagan and also with Taylor Wallace. We have in part one unpacked, at least to some degree, this new marvelous book, Million Dollar Weekend, which is all about the first step, the first way of working on launching a successful business, let’s say, a million-dollar business. What would you do in that first weekend, either literally in a first weekend or metaphorically in a first weekend? Where do you begin?
It’s a great book, but it raises a question. And that’s what we’re going to wrestle with now, which is, should you do it? So many people are working in jobs and they say they want to start their own business and don’t. And then there’s so many people that have started businesses and find themselves going, well, maybe that was worth it and maybe it wasn’t. And some that say, well, I’d never go back.
But it’s so easy, wherever you are on this side of the fence, to be able to only see the upsides of your own position. I’m reminded now of Seinfeld, who said, “When I was single, I looked at my married friends with children and thought, you’re crazy. I mean, look at what you’ve given up. Look at all of the independence and the ability to do what you want to do in the world. And then when I was married, I looked at my single friends, and I thought, ‘oh, but your life is so pointless and it’s just lost meaning’. And you look at all of this substance in my life.” He said, “I think I was right both times.”
That’s sort of his conclusion to his own contradiction. And that’s a little bit like this. So we’re going to do something different. Noah, who has just written this book advocating to you, who is listening or watching this right now, advocating to you that you should take a weekend and design your million dollar business, that you should take the leap outside of the corporate experience, create your own financial destiny, all of that.
But I’m going to switch it completely. So now we have Taylor Wallace, who is an employee at Appsumo. Welcome, Taylor.
Taylor Wallace:
Thank you. Glad to be here.
Greg McKeown:
Welcome, Noah. They’re not going to know. They won’t listen to the other one, so just say hi. Welcome, Noah.
Noah Kagan:
Hello.
Greg McKeown:
That was marvelously enthusiastic. And now the restate debate begins. So here’s how it’s going to work. I want, instead of the normal approach with debates, where you try to say your own side first, I want you to instead try to make the case for the other side of this conundrum, right? So that you can’t just put up a strawman argument and then knock it down. That is a false argument. That isn’t even what the other person is saying. And then attack it rather than the real argument that they have.
Most of the debates that we see, certainly all presidential debates these days, are just not debates, even, even close to them. And I think restate debates could be something extremely helpful in this. So, who wants to go first? We should flip a coin. But who wants to go first? Shall we actually flip a coin?
Noah Kagan:
Greg, for the audience? Taylor works at my company, Appsumo. I’m the founder and CEO, and I do have a book saying, go start your own companies. And I think it’s a, I love that you’re hosting the platform to have a conversation about, is it better to be a CEO, is it better to be employee, but switched. And I’ve never done this ever, so I love that you’re initiating this.
Greg McKeown:
Thank you. I like how succinctly you explained what it is that we’re trying to do here. Now, there’s one rule, which is you only get to make your point when your own opinion of the situation once you have explained to the other person’s satisfaction what they are trying to say so that you have to listen. And this might not be so contentious of an issue, but people listening could even, at a meta-level, say, well, what if I could only say my side of an issue if I could understand the others to their satisfaction, think of how quickly we might move through some of these stalemate conversations we have in our lives or in society at large. Okay, so with that in mind, so your job now, Taylor, is to explain to Noah why he’s right. You’re going to try and get into his head. Why should people, everyone, so to speak, start their own business and be entrepreneurs?
Taylor Wallace:
Well, first of all, I would start by saying I think the way that I interpret Noah’s book and Noah’s message is not that everyone should start their own business; it’s that everybody can start their own business. Right? And so there’s a big difference in, like, should you or can you, everyone is able to take that step and to lean into themselves and take that leap of faith and say, you know what? I have this idea. I have this passion. I don’t want to work this job anymore, and I’m going to do it.
I think the argument is, if you feel that way, then you need to do it, and you need to take a swing and like the both of you discussed before, that is going to be a long, difficult road in most cases. It’s very rare that somebody hits it out of the park the first time. You know, failure is the most important ingredient of success. You know? But the important thing, if you want to start your own business, is that you need to start.
You know, you can’t just sit and think about it forever. And that is, you know, one of the things that Noah touches on a lot is you can’t not take a swing. You can’t just sit there forever. So, if you’re thinking about it and you have this idea, then you need to get a plan together. And you need to trust that it’s doable. Because there are so many successful entrepreneurs, business owners, and CEOs out there who are less qualified than you right now.
I can. I guarantee you that everybody knows it. Like, it’s. The hardest part about starting a business is doing the work and starting.
Greg McKeown:
Okay? That whole time, Noah, you were nodding your head. So you have no disagreement with this. Why don’t you just respond to that? And then you’re going to have a chance to say, you know, to speak to Taylor’s view on this, his own view of, like, well, he’s working. He’s working for you. He isn’t launching his business as a primary thing. So you can speak to why someone would do that and why that might be better. But did he get it right?
Noah Kagan:
First of all, you should go on these book tours. Taylor, we’ll switch. That was perfect, what you said. It was very well put. And I think that is my message. It’s that. Not that you should, but yeah, you can. Everyone can start a business. And there are, as you said, Taylor, ordinary people doing it every day who are way less qualified than most of the people who are capable of doing it. And I love that. The hardest part of starting a business is starting.
And if people can start and get comfortable with failing, there is a technique and process, and a plan that they can execute on that will eventually get them to do it. But for some people, it’s just that they don’t want it, or they don’t start. And maybe there’s a belief that they can’t do it even. And when the reality is that they can.
Greg McKeown:
Okay, so if we were scoring, which I’ve never done before, but we would say Taylor got a point just then because he’s explained successfully to your satisfaction, Noah, what it is you’re trying to say. So now, in the spirit of a restate debate, it’s your turn to try and express. Well, what’s the other side of this? Why might Taylor not do that? Why might it be the right thing for somebody, even if they could, to not do it?
Noah Kagan:
When I think about Taylor, I wonder how he feels about me and how he feels that my job is to come on a show. Or there’s a job where the CEO can travel the world, or the CEO makes, you know, ten times more money than him, and he knows the amount. And is that fair for how myself as an employee, feels? And as an employee, I guess I realize that I can do it if I wanted to. There’s no one stopping me in the mornings and lunches and evenings and weekends from changing my life, if that’s something I wanted.
And as an employee, there are a lot of advantages that a CEO doesn’t about. I turn off my computer at six. They don’t own me in the free time. They only owe me mentally till 05:00 p.m. I have less stress about whether the business survives. If it doesn’t survive, I’m gonna get another job. And no one knows I failed. I like the structure of being an employee, possibly that, you know, there’s performance reviews, there’s set raises, they’re structured. No, there is a structure.
Greg McKeown:
I’m laughing, though. I’m laughing because I don’t see. Not that you’re doing some terrible job there, Noah, but Taylor’s not nodding in the same way as you were nodding. So he’s not going, man, you get it. You’re naming it and explaining why it is I want the job. So that’s your job? Like express why someone listening to this wants to have the job and not start the business. What’s the legitimate argument for that?
Noah Kagan:
Okay, my name is Taylor Wallace. I get to fricking live in Mexico, in Cozumel, working and scuba diving most of the day, even though they think I’m working when I’m not working. Okay, I’m working a lot, but I’m scuba diving. I get a great salary, so I don’t have to worry about where my paychecks are going to come from. I don’t have to spend my free time working. I could spend my free time doing whatever I want.
I get a lot of creativity in my job. I’m paid really well to do a thing I would do, I get to do every single day. I like the people I get to work with, and I don’t have to worry about firing or hiring or any of the real things that come with running a business.
Greg McKeown:
Okay, well, we got more nodding, but I couldn’t tell if it was, like, socially enforced nodding after I just said it, and all pressure’s on. Okay, so, Taylor, how did that sound? Did that name it for you? Did you say, yeah, that’s what it’s about for me? Or did you find yourself going, well, I don’t know, that was a little bit something else? Go. What’s your view on it?
Taylor Wallace:
No, Noah definitely, like, nailed it. You know, a unique thing about Appsumo is that a lot of the people who work there are entrepreneurial. You know, I’ve started businesses. I know how hard it is. You know, I’ve taken swings and struck out a few times, and it’s exhausting. And there is a comfort to being an employee. You know, if you offered me Noah’s salary, I would say yes. But if you offered me Noah’s job, I would say no, thank you. You know, because that’s a lot of responsibility and a lot of work, and that’s not what I’m looking for at this season of my life. I’m looking for stability. I’m looking for growth. I’m looking for consistency. And I consider myself. There will probably come a time when I step out again and do start another company. I don’t know what that is right now or would have started, but I’m in a place right now where I work at a company where I’m surrounded by some of the smartest people I’ve ever met, and I’m learning from them every day. And so I’m in the gym training, essentially, and at some point, I might want to get in the ring.
So having a job and being an employee, to me, that, like, it’s not a bad thing. Like. Like I was saying, not everybody needs to own their own company. One, you literally couldn’t because then there would be nobody to work for any of the companies if everybody was the CEO.
Greg McKeown:
Right?
Taylor Wallace:
Noah needs people like me, just like I need people like Noah. And, yeah, Appsumo has afforded me a really nice life. We get to work remote. I have lived abroad and, you know, been scuba diving in the morning and then jumped on Zoom calls all day in the afternoon. You know, that is a huge thing that is really valuable and important to me.
Greg McKeown:
Okay. I heard something interesting in what you’re saying, but I’m not the one that’s on the hook right now, so. Noah, what did you hear? You’re going to have you have a second shot at restating here. Like, what is he. Don’t repeat the words. But what’s the essence of what he just said?
Noah Kagan:
It’s a great life for Taylor, and what Taylor wants, how I think is not how Taylor thinks. And how Taylor wants to live is not how I want to live. And that’s okay. And I love that Taylor, for me. And what I heard is, he’s getting the life he wants to live out of his work as an employee. We call him teammates at Appsumo.
Greg McKeown:
Okay, how did he do that, Taylor? Was that. Give me, like, a. You can give him a full point, half a point, or no points. How did he do just then?
Taylor Wallace:
I think he gets a full point there. I mean, that. That is the essence of it. Like, I. I choose to be an employer right now. I’m not in. You know, I think we talked. You know, the book talks about and we. It’s very common, like, get out of your rat race, your nine to five job. Go start your own business. It’s not always a prison to escape from. You know, sometimes having a job is exactly where you want to be, and it’s what you want to be doing, you know? Doesn’t mean I want to do it forever.
Greg McKeown:
So, I wanted to add that aspect. There was something I heard under the surface, which was like. And you correct me if I’m wrong, it’s like I’m in a phase of recovery, and that can be a whole range. That could be someone who recovers. You start a business, you get some scars from it, some wounds from it. So it could be that depth of recovery, or even if you’ve just had a hard workout today, and you go, okay, well, I need to recover here for a day or two. You need seasons of stretch and also seasons of recovery in anything. That’s what I heard you saying. It wasn’t.
I’m in favor of one or the other. It’s right now. Need a phase recovery reorientation, get clear again, and then I’m sure there’ll come a point where I do launch something else, but it’s not right now. Is that. Did I hear you right?
Taylor Wallace:
That’s 100% correct, yeah.
Greg McKeown:
Okay. It’s back to you, then, Taylor. Give us more. What is the. You know, go beyond. Go beyond what you’ve explained before about the case for launching your own business, trying to create the million-dollar business, and the whole theme of the weekend. Of the million-dollar weekend.
Taylor Wallace:
I mean, I think one of the things that I get jealous of that Noah has that I don’t is that when you are a CEO and a founder of a company, you get to really, you have an opportunity to cultivate a really cool culture, and you get to hire and bring people along for the ride. That is, to me, invaluable. You know, we do retreats once a year. And when I see, you know, Noah give a speech at the retreat, and we’re all there, and it’s like he made that happen, you know. In that weekend that he decided to start this business. You know, years later, there are hundreds of people whose lives that he’s touched, whose lives are better because he decided to start that business. And if you at home are thinking about starting a business, like that is a great motivator to start a business. Not just because, like, yeah, I’m going to be important and I’m going to be rich, but, like, if you start a business, you have the ability to affect multiple people’s lives. Not only the customers of that business but especially the employees of that business, and the teammates of that business. That’s incredibly powerful. You take something that didn’t exist, that now makes a lot of money and puts a roof over people’s heads and helps their children have healthcare, I think a lot of people take that for granted. We don’t really realize how special that is. The creation of jobs and stability for others.
Greg McKeown:
So, did he get it right? Did Taylor express correctly sort of the argument for doing this?
Noah Kagan:
What I heard him say was that it’s nice that you get to make the decisions and you’re in control of the decisions.
Greg McKeown:
That’s not what I heard.
Noah Kagan:
That’s what I heard. Where it’s like, hey, I can control my schedule. I can control, potentially, my salary. I can control who I hire and who I work around.
Greg McKeown:
Here’s what I heard, Taylor. I’m going to give you two options, and you’re going to tell us what’s what, where we’re at. And I don’t care at all if I’m wrong. I want you to speak up. What I heard you say was, there’s something. There’s something paralleled to this experience of, like, mental creation. You sparked something. You imagined it. You brought it into existence. You pulled it from behind the curtain.
It wasn’t there. It wasn’t manifested. It didn’t exist. Now it does. And there’s just something about that. You go, that’s amazing. You know, you feel, to use a phrase, holy envy for that. It’s like, that’s something that, yes, you can do it in a smaller way as an employee, but it’s not the same as being able to. First it was a thought, and now it’s an organization, and now it comes into existence.
How close did I get?
Taylor Wallace:
I think you got closer than Noah did. Yeah. It’s the beauty and the magic of creating that thing that didn’t exist. And the. The fact that that idea now affects so many other people. It’s not really the idea of, like, being in control of your surroundings. It’s creating something that so positively affects other people that then are pulled into your orbit that you never would have met. You know, it’s. It’s. It’s a really beautiful thing. It’s. That is, like, if I want to start a company, that is one of the things that motivates me the most is, like, how cool is it that I could start a company people rely on and that they can all come together and their skills are being utilized, and they’re being paid well, and they’re being treated well, and, you know, it’s. We’re doing good stuff in the world.
That, to me, is, like, more of a motivator to start a company than I want to. I want to do, make millions.
Greg McKeown:
Control my schedule, make more money. It’s the creation that is the thing that’s really pulling on you.
Taylor Wallace:
For the record, I think Noah’s done that. Like, he’s done a really good job, or I wouldn’t work at Appsumo.
Greg McKeown:
Yeah. There’s praise in what you’re saying. Noah, a response from you before you make. Before you then try and make more of the case for Taylor’s actual position, just respond to what it is. Did you think he said there?
Noah Kagan:
Yeah. I appreciate you restating it again, Greg. What I heard Taylor say was that there’s magic in the making of something, and that’s the special part of entrepreneurship that literally doesn’t exist. And then, poof, it exists, and there’s something special about that. And the second thing that I was hearing you say, Taylor, is by doing the creation part, it’s bringing in amazing people around you, whether it’s your customers, whether it’s partners, whether it’s being on a podcast with Greg McKeown, it’s pulling in people because of something you initiated, even if it was initiated in a very brief period of time.
Taylor Wallace:
Yeah, 100%. I mean, Greg, one of our mottos at Appsumo is that work doesn’t have to suck. That’s one of our team models.
Greg McKeown:
It’s a great one liner. I love it. I love that.
Taylor Wallace:
Noah’s never told me where this came from, but I guarantee you, while he was working at one of the companies that he worked for before he started Appsumo, he had the idea of, this doesn’t have to suck like this. Like, if I started a company, it would be better. We would treat employees better, we would have more open communication, et cetera. And he’s done that, you know, so, like, that’s where the idea comes from of, like, and I think a lot of people start businesses because they’re, like, “Working at a place, and they’re like, I don’t like the way they do things here. I think I could do this better,” you know, and that is the impetus, the spark of, like, okay, if you think you can do it better, get out there and do it.
Greg McKeown:
Yeah.
Taylor Wallace:
You know, because you might be able to affect the change and create that company that, in your mind, is the ideal place to work that you wish that you could work at. Like, don’t wait for the company that you want to work at to arrive. Go make it.
Greg McKeown:
You know, there’s a wake-up moment where you realize, oh, the business I’m in was just created by people just like me, and I’m living inside of the matrix they created. And I can go off and create, you know, I don’t want to say my own matrix exactly, but, you know, like, you can create a new reality, something different, something better than the one that you’ve been in. Okay. No. Why, despite that, that beautiful description of creation, go further as to why Taylor, or of course Taylor, just speaking on behalf of many people listening, why might they still, despite that, prefer to stay where they are, doing what they’re doing within another organization?
Noah Kagan:
I think sometimes people are afraid and it’s a little safer to just stay within the confines of the work that we have and that there’s also, with a lot of our jobs, maybe they’re not as bad as we think. Maybe they’re actually awesome, and there’s just other things that are not as great. And being an entrepreneur won’t actually fix that. There’s probably a lot of really nice growth within a company that you don’t need to have total control over to really enjoy being an employee.
I was thinking about my brother as well, who’s an employee, and he complains about it, but he’s not willing, and I think he’s accepted that. He’s like, hey, that’s okay, that this is going to be my work, and maybe I’m not going to love it, and maybe I don’t have to love my work, Taylor.
Greg McKeown:
How does that land with you? Do you find yourself going, yep? That kind of speaks to me. Or do you find yourself, “Well, that’s not really the. That’s not the sensation for me. That’s not what it is for me.”
Taylor Wallace:
I think it. Yeah, I think it definitely resonates. Like, starting a business is scary, and there are risks involved. Right. You know, and you have to be. You have to have the stomach for those risks, and some people don’t have the stomach for that, you know, or the means. You know? If I were married and had three children, you know, it’d be a lot more difficult for me to say, you know what? I’m gonna quit my job, and I’m gonna start my own company because the risks are higher.
You know, the. The, you know, right now, I don’t have any children. If I decided to quit my job and start a company, and I failed in two years, I had to go sleep on my friend’s couch. Okay, I slept on my friend’s couch. I’ll go find another job. I’ll start over. I’ll dust. Dust off.
Greg McKeown:
It’s more asymmetric for you right now, right? There’s less downside, or at least it feels like that to you. Do you go, “Well, you know, it’s just me, and so if I want to do it, I can do it.”
Here’s what I heard that I thought was interesting there. When Noah when you were talking, you gave a few different reasons. You started with people are afraid. And I’m not suggesting that there aren’t people who want to start businesses, and the fear keeps them from doing it.
But as I was hearing it sort of from Taylor’s point of view and Taylor’s representing others, I thought, I think there’s a lot of people listening to this that aren’t starting a business because they’re afraid of starting a business, but because they genuinely like the set of trade-offs they have right now. They go, “This really works. I like the company, and I like the culture, and I like that it’s consistent, and I like that there’s relatively low stress. You know, this is working for me. This works. The combination of ups and downs. I’m happy with this,” at least as we’ve said for now. And that was the thing that was more resonant for me. Taylor, was it for you, or am I hearing that wrong?
Taylor Wallace:
Yeah, I think that that is very accurate, and I think a lot of people feel that way and need that, like we talked about before, need the stability of, you know, I love right now, I love being in a place where it’s like, I know what my job is because someone has laid that out for me. These are the things that you need to nail. And I’m like, I’m going to come in, and I’m going to nail them, you know, like, and then I’m going to go home for, log off for the day in this case, you know, and I’m not going to think about it most of the time until tomorrow when I have to come in and knock it out.
And, you know, entrepreneurship and leading a company, you don’t really turn that off ever. You know, it’s constantly going; you’re constantly thinking of new ways to change and expand and, you know, things like that. And for some people, that’s really uncomfortable. There is a lot to gain from knowing I know what my job is and I know what’s expected of me, and I’m gonna do it really well, and then I’m gonna be done for the day.
Greg McKeown:
You know what I just heard you say, Taylor is really insightful to me, and it’s if, as an employee, you are protected to a degree from the marketplace, you’re in the marketplace still, but you’re protected from the extremes of those fluctuations. You know, you can launch a new product in a company and maybe the product doesn’t go very well. That’s the marketplace saying, well, we didn’t want it. We didn’t want that version of it. We didn’t like that service, the way you packaged it, and immediately, the business is directly hit with that, and a founder is directly hit with the consequence of that. But as an employee, unless it’s a complete make-or-break moment in the business, it’s like, “Oh, yeah, that’s kind of unfortunate. Carry on.”
You know, it’s a. So to some extent, you are at least in some of those immediate consequences; you’re just protected from them. It still impacts you. But there’s a sort of, I don’t know, something like a pillow in between the impact. There’s a buffer there, and that’s what being an employee being a team member of an organization does. Did that sound right?
Taylor Wallace:
Absolutely.
Greg McKeown:
Okay. I don’t even know where we are with this debate, but, oh, yeah, we have Noah’s ready. Go.
Noah Kagan:
First off, I want to say thank you both. Thank you, Greg, for hosting and Taylor, for sharing openly. I think I just had misconceptions and this is such a cool way in general to understand even deeper another person versus I, you know, I have my own preconceptions from intel and being an employee and all that. I wouldn’t say trauma, but the frustrations I felt there where I don’t think.
Greg McKeown:
You know, somebody uses the phrase, “I wouldn’t say trauma.” They revealed quite a bit.
Noah Kagan:
I think sometimes trauma. Trauma is overused or dramatic. But, yeah, it’s definitely.
Greg McKeown:
But carry on with the main point. I didn’t mean to interrupt you.
Noah Kagan:
Yeah, it’s okay. I just have a lot of frustrations. And so for me to be an employee is just like, what? I’ll never want to do this again. And I really appreciate hearing your perspectives of it, and what I heard there and what it got me thinking of is like holy crap, man. Maybe being an employee is awesome and not maybe it is awesome, right? Maybe it is an awesome experience. And there’s the other thing you said, which I really like as an employee, is that there’s very clear success, a lot of times as an employee. It’s like, hey, here’s the job. Do you do great or not? And as a leader, it’s kind of, it’s alone a lot of the time.
Taylor Wallace:
Right.
Noah Kagan:
There’s not necessarily a structure that I can follow even. And the glory cause some extent, yes, I have it, but it is in a private setting of sorts. And you have a very kind of, like, nice thing, like, hey, here’s your game. Go play. You succeed in it, and then you can close out and move on. Where I will say the founder stuff is twenty four seven, and it’s stressful on my family. And I did hear you say earlier, which really I wrote down as a note, which is like, “Yeah, I would trade the money, but not the responsibility.”
I think that was interesting. And there’s a lot of optimism and positivity of having a nice environment to come play, do your thing, and then enjoy it optimistically positively, and then move on to the other areas of your life where mine bleeds into my entire life.
Greg McKeown:
What I heard you just say there, which I thought was so interesting, is the difference between playing a game like I’m thinking about if you’re playing on a team in the NBA versus you own the NBA, if you play within it, you know what the rules are, you know what the goal is, you know, whether you’ve done well or not, every single game, every minute you’re out there.
If you own the NBA, you’re like, well, where do I take this now? Where where are we going for the next 50 years? What. What could. What rules could be changed in the game? And how does anybody know if we’re doing a good job or not? Like, okay, yes, money maybe is going up. That’s a good sign. But we could be so many different things. There’s so much ambiguity to the game. What game are we even in? What’s our international play? And so on. There’s the huge ambiguity of the ownership versus. This is the game. Go and play it and enjoy winning or not winning. But you know how the. You know, you know what game you’re in.
That was the metaphor that came to my mind as I heard you talking nowhere. I see both of you nodding your heads. Taylor, do you have anything else you’d like to add as we wrap this?
Taylor Wallace:
Well, first of all, I think that was really great. I love a good sports analogy, and that’s really good. I do feel that way. I feel like, “Hey, this is your role on the team. Get out there. We expect you to play 15 minutes a game and, you know, handle your position and handle it well. Otherwise, you know, in sports, you get cut,” you know? And I think, yeah, this has been a really wonderful conversation for me to have.
I have the privilege of working at Noah’s company, and it’s not very often that, you know, an employee, teammate, in our case, has a relationship with their CEO, with their founder. And I’m lucky to say that I do. Me and Noah have had, like, a handful of really great philosophical conversations in Mexico and Austin. And so, yeah, I jumped at the chance to do this podcast, and I love getting his take on what it’s like to be an employee and also just what it’s like to be a CEO. I mean, I’ve listened to him on some podcasts, and as he’s promoting Million Dollar Weekend, and I’ve learned a lot of really great things about him and a lot of really great things that, you know, I’ve written down that are, like, if I’m not focusing on, you know, building a business right now, but there’s a lot of things that he’s talking about in that book that just apply to life in general, like being not being afraid to hear no. You know, being willing to ask. You know, these are important things in our daily lives that, like, if we can master some of these things, the world opens up and feels a little bit easier for us, whether we’re trying to start a business or not.
Greg McKeown:
Noah, did you have more?
Noah Kagan:
I was anxious about doing this and thinking in my head, how I’m the CEO, and I make the money and I get this stuff, and there’s a lot of awesome stuff on the other side, too. And it made me reflect, Greg, where what other parts of our lives are we making assumptions that it’s better or worse, and we can just have an open conversation and really listen. Like, and I took notes, but I’m trying to listen, and I did. But even no notes, no phone, nothing. And just really listen to another person’s perspective, whether it’s, you know, Israel Palestine employee, founder, husband, wife, kid, parent.
And I think there’ll be more empathy and deeper connections and enjoyment as we do this. So I appreciated that Taylor was willing to come and chat about it.
Greg McKeown:
This was an unusual way to approach this conversation, and it’s a non-dramatic way to illustrate what I’ve come to describe as restate debates. This is like a little microcosm of something I think is absolutely enormous. It’s a subtle thing, but I think it is an absolute game-changer. Not the phrase restate debate, but the process is taken directly from Carl Rogers, the psychotherapist who had been taught a specific way to try to help people in therapy sessions.
And it was more like you have to kind of almost force the other person to admit the stuff that’s going on underneath them because it was so Freudian in its structure when he was first a therapist. And then it’s actually like an interesting meta moment back to part one of our conversation because, at first, he’s following the rules of the therapy process that he’s been taught. And then eventually, he’s just, well, I’ve got to fit in. Like, this is what people are doing, and so I need to kind of do it the way that they’re doing it. And slowly, he just started to trust his own experience with people, and he started to listen, and not just listen intently, but would record the interviews, of course, with permission, and with his students, would relisten to therapy sessions again and again and again and again to try to understand the dance that’s going on.
And out of that grew this, what we would say, very simple challenge or rules of interaction. He says, you know, and we’ve already expressed it, but it simply says you stop the conversation as soon as you get the sense. This friction, as soon as you get the sense we’re not quite understanding each other, you stop the conversation, you say, okay, let me make sure I can. I’m understanding you. And you try to put into words not the words they’re saying but the meaning behind it. And you wait until they say, yes, that’s it. The perfect word. This is not his phraseology, but it’s the word I’ve learned to look for is exactly. You’re waiting for somebody to say exactly. And if they say exactly, you’ve nailed it. Now you have permission to make your point. And if the rules have been established and the norms established, they then get a chance to do the same. And this goes back and forth and back and forth until you really understand.
There was no enormous misunderstanding to resolve here. It’s not like we started with conflict, and now we’re at understanding. But even on this relatively gentle subject, you can see how easy it is to assume, you know, what the other person thinks and experiences and what a difference it makes to actually understand it. And also how scary it is, how vulnerable it is to be open to somebody saying something that isn’t the way you see it. And we don’t necessarily want, we really want to hear what they’re going to say. Maybe they’re going to say something that just I don’t want to know. I’d rather not know because I’d rather not have to change and how it takes courage and vulnerability to have even on this, what I would say, relatively gentle subject.
I really thank you for being game to try this. You are doing a great service to everybody listening right now, but also to all future restate debates. Thank you, both of you. Everybody listening. What is one thing that stood out to you today? What is one thing you can do immediately different as a result of today’s conversation? And who can you share this with so that the conversation can continue now that this conversation has come to a close? Thank you, really, thank you for listening.
