Greg McKeown:
Welcome back, everybody. I’m your host, Greg McKeown, the author of two New York Times bestsellers, Essentialism and also Effortless. And I’m here with you today, coming from Cambridge, England, no less, to see if we can’t make an even higher contribution together.
Have you ever pursued or even achieved something only to feel unsatisfied that you’ve given your energy, your effort to winning a game but, having won it, have questioned the whole experience? Today we will continue with part two of the interview with Bill George. Bill is the former CEO and chairman of Medtronic. He’s the Henry B. Arthur Fellow of Ethics at Harvard Business School. He’s a businessman; he’s an academic; he’s a coach. He’s the author of a new book, True North: Emerging Leader. And by the end of this episode, you will be able to prevent yourself from winning the wrong game. Let’s begin.
Remember, if you want to learn faster, understand more deeply and increase your influence, teach just one idea from this episode to someone else within the next 24 to 48 hours.
Bill George:
One of the practices I have, as I’ve worked a lot with CEOs who come to our program at Harvard, people who have gone through various classes, and if I’m aware that somebody’s having a difficult time, you know, I’ll reach out to them and say, Greg, you know, you resigned from your job. Let’s talk about what comes next. How are you doing? And try to get together with them and go through that. Maybe they just retire from the job they did well, or, you know, maybe they decide to change help. I don’t know. And not everyone wants to do that. So I accept the fact that, that not everyone is open to that kind of discussion, but that I offer myself to just be a listing board, a sounding board, and someone to listen and be there for them and to show some empathy. You know, I remember getting together with a good friend of mine, not close, but a good friend whose wife had just been diagnosed with stage four cancer. And I saw him one night, and he was really angry. And I said, Let’s talk, you know, this has got to be tough for you in addition to your wife. And, you know, and so we had a very upfront, honest conversation. I don’t know how he took that, but I think he appreciated the fact that I reached out to him and was there for him during a very hard time.
Greg McKeown:
So you are saying that when you notice this, it sounds like when you are in person with people, and you notice it, but it sounds maybe that it’s even beyond that. If you are reading about a story in the media and you happen to have a connection, even if it’s a light connection with somebody, you’ll make a point of actually getting their number, calling them, saying, Look, I’m listening. I’m here to listen.
Bill George:
Absolutely. And they may not want that. That’s okay; I just back away. And sometimes I feel like, you know, people lose their jobs. Greg, you’ve seen this happen, and maybe it wasn’t their fault. And so they just need someone to talk it through. Maybe they’re angry. Maybe they feel they’re mistreated. They just need someone they can talk to, you know? I mean, bad things happen to good people. And it took me a while to figure out, you know, it’s not good things happen to good people, and you know, there’s a lot of unfairness in life, so you know, but maybe it was the right thing for the long term. Maybe they’re going to wind up happier somewhere else, or people going through, say, a divorce. Maybe it’ll turn up better after that, but you need someone you can talk to.
Greg McKeown:
This is like a golden thread through our conversation so far, is the need for space to think, but also the role of interpersonal communication in providing a way to think because it’s not just independent work. We’ve talked about the importance of that and the gap in our habits around that. But beyond that, we have to figure out a place to talk with each other so that we can work out what we think below the surface so that we can start to unpack all of that meaning and all that messiness inside of us and actually come to clarity. And that’s what your group seems to have created. Let me ask you another question about that. What changes have you seen in the questions discussed over the 50 years?
Bill George:
We say, we just kind of a joke, Greg, but we say the questions we keep coming back to a lot of the same questions. The questions haven’t changed, but the answers do.
So oftentimes, our perspective on life, what would you like for the latter 30 years of your life? When do you plan to retire? What do you plan to do? And a lot of times, you’re in real-time with those, or what, what do you want to leave behind? What’s the difference you’re trying to make in the world? How do you see that? When do you need to have courage? And I think there are many, many forms.
So the questions are really important, but like I say, the answers will change over time as we gain more life experiences. And it’s in sharing those experiences. So when I do the same thing with all the people I work with you, I gain, you know, I gain richness and intimacy and trust and knowledge of people through that kind of discussion.
I don’t gain a lot by, you know, someone talking about, you know, how the sports team did last week or the, you know, their golf score or anything like that, or superficial things. So one of my weaknesses is I’m not very good at superficial conversations, but I gain a lot from having, Hey, let’s, I love to go on hikes, climbing mountains, Let’s talk, you know, just tell me more about yourself. And so, boy, I find that’s where the richness in life, my life is and has been for a long time because, you know, my purpose, my North Star is to help people reach their full potential. So I’ve always wanted to do it since I was in college. And I still want to do it. So I’m no genius at medical technology at Medtronic or about any company, you know, or even about leadership. I’m just trying to learn. And I think one of the keys to continuing humanity is to figure out every situation you’re in; you can learn.
Greg McKeown:
What you just told me is that the questions have stayed the same, but the answers have changed as you’ve grown all together with this group. What has the shift in answers been?
Bill George:
Well, in a word, it’s wisdom, but my other word might be perspective, having a different perspective. I’ve been with people earlier in life that lost their jobs, and they had pretty good rationale about why they did. And now I would say people are much more thoughtful about what did I do to cause that? What was my impact on that fact? Maybe I was in the wrong place, and I really wanted this promotion. I really wanted this job, and this person took advantage of me. Or, you know, I got cheated by my boss, you know? And it was unfair. And one of the best guys in our group went through that. And yeah, we all empathize with him about the person that did him in. But you know, then he realized he was in the wrong place, and he was causing it. And I think a lot of people don’t realize how much they’re causing the problems they have.
Greg McKeown:
Do you know what is in my mind right now about this? I was going to ask you like, what is the most powerful question that you have come back to again and again in the group? And I do want your answer to that question, but as I was thinking of that question, I thought maybe it’s not really about that. Maybe it’s more like this that all of us and everyone in this team of people that you’ve met with all these years want to talk about what’s most important and essential and honest within themselves. That there is a natural, deep hunger to share that, you know, to be seen, to be heard, to feel that our experience in life matters to someone. So actually, there’s an eagerness to do that. But that there are other restraining functions that push against that desire and make it harder for, for us to share those things or to feel safe to share them. And so it’s almost like the questions matter less than might be obvious because really it’s just an openness. Let’s just talk, let’s just talk about how you’re doing, what’s going on, and how we feel about the world, and that that’s more important than the precise question you’re asked. What are your thoughts about that?
Bill George:
I think that’s extremely perceptive. What I find is, you know, I interviewed twenty-two, two hundred and twenty people over the years for my series of True North books. And I found everyone wants to tell you who they are. They really want to tell you, let me tell you about my life, my experiences. But what they’re fearful of is if I told you the things I did, you might judge me. If I told you this didn’t go my way, you might think less of me. And when they find that you’re really open to that, that’s where we connect. So we don’t connect at the head with how great we are. We don’t connect with the smartest person their own great. We connect at the heart. That’s what Thích Nhat Hanh taught me the longest journey you’ll ever take is the 18 inches from your head to your heart.
People want to open up their hearts, but they also have protection around their hearts, like the ribcage, you know, they have protection for being hurt, and rejection is hurt, and I’ve been rejected. And that hurts. And so you have to get to the point where, you know, I had one woman in the book; it’s just amazing. Beth Ford, who was the first openly gay female CEO. And she said, You know, Bill, I go out and work with Iowa Farmers, Southern Minnesota farmers. They own my company, actually. It’s a co-op. And I show up as the CEO. I don’t show up as the female CEO. I don’t show up as the gay CEO. And if you have a problem with that, that’s your problem, not mine. Because that’s who I am. Now, there’s a woman that knows herself that has the self-confidence. She doesn’t have to hide in some closet or pretend to be something different than she is.
She didn’t have to pretend to be more masculine than the other men. She could be who she is. She doesn’t have to modify because she has a really good acceptance of herself. And that comes out of, you know, a high level of self-awareness. And I think that’s a rich quality, but it takes us a while to get there. It took me a while to get there, to feel like if I’m vulnerable and I share my mistakes with you, will you think less of me? No, you might actually think more. And by the way, then you know, you can see these mistakes I’m making, but if I share with you I’m doing that, then I’ve got the power, not you.
Greg McKeown:
This idea that we want to share, but there’s something in the way. I’ve just been thinking a lot about this recently that it’s almost like there’s a communication wall between all of us. And if you had to name it, it would be something like agree, disagree. As if every interaction we ever have with someone, we have that filter. Do I agree with what they’re saying? Do I disagree with what they’re saying?
And I mean, even people listening to this right now can test what I’m saying by saying, Well, are you listening? Saying, Well, do I agree with that, or do I disagree with that? I mean, it’s like everywhere. And it’s so everywhere I hypothesize that people don’t even know they’re making a choice when they filter what everyone else is saying through that lens. That what listening is, or that’s what conversations are.
I’ve tried to express this, this way. That I believe there is a space between agreeing and disagreeing. I like that language. There’s a space between it. And in that space is our ability to understand each other, you know, the space to understand. And there’s so many forces at play trying to reduce that space that you could be highly emotional because you are angry about something, or somebody else could say something that you so disagree with or are so threatened by. You suddenly freeze up, and whatever space used to exist is suddenly gone. That the wall is back, You know, closed.
It reminds me of that extraordinary speech given by Reagan when he goes to the Berlin wall. And you know, Mr. Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you truly seek freedom, come to this gate, come to this wall, Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall. Like that, the spirit of that, that we need to somehow tear down the walls so that we can maintain a space where we don’t have to agree with the other person. But we don’t have to sit around disagreeing, either. We can just hold the space of understanding and how transformative that seems to be. That’s what I’m thinking about as I’m hearing what you’re sharing, and as I’m thinking about this group that is invested for 50 years, your thoughts.
Bill George:
Think about how many people in your life; everyone on this call should listen. How many people in your life do you have that you can share the deepest secret to your heart, the yearnings, the concerns, the fears where, how they’re not that many people, but having people like that in your life is invaluable. And we started out on Mark Zuckerberg. My fear is he doesn’t have people like that. Now, we all need people, of course, I told you I have my wife, I have my men’s group, and I’ve got a lot of close friends. But the more I can open up, the more they open up with me. And that’s where the bonding becomes. But without that, life can be very lonely, very lonely, and we’re all going to hit difficult times that you don’t go through life without that. And wouldn’t it be a tragedy if we did go through life without doing that?
Greg McKeown:
I keep thinking about the difference between spending and investing. Spending and investing. Of course, in money, we could talk all about that. But also spending and investing time, also spending or investing effort. What’s the return on our effort? But then this final area, whether we spend or invest in our relationships. And it’s a little at the edge of my understanding or precision right now, but I think we can interact with people in a way that we sort of spend relationships. You know, if we’re, if we’re constantly just asking for what we want, if we are treating people as things, just transactionally interacting with them as we go along, thinking of people only when we need something, right? That would be spending the relationships, I suppose. And investing in the relationships is something, something close to the opposite. Reaching out to somebody because you’re thinking about them just, hey, thinking about you today, the text, the email, the phone call. How can I help the doing what Adam Grant explained to me about the five-minute favor. How can you do something that really just is an investment, not for what you’re going to get? Not quid quote pro, but just investing in it. It seems to me that this men’s group, specifically that I keep coming back to, is an exercise in decades of investing in each other. Does that sound right?
Bill George:
Absolutely. But it isn’t just the men’s group. You have to invest in a lot of relationships or they won’t be there. That’s what I’m trying to say. And you invest in them when things are going well. You don’t wait until things are going poorly. You invest in them all the time and building those relationships, and people know that you’ve been there for them when things aren’t going well, they’ll be there for you when things aren’t going well, and they’ll feel a certain bonding a connection, if you will. And that’s what’s critical. Adam Grant, in his book Givers and Takers, says, you know, you’re either a giver or a taker. Well, no one’s comfortable dealing with takers. No one wants to be taken advantage of. I certainly don’t. And so you want to have a source of mutual giving. We give to each other. I mean, that’s what we do in marriage. That’s what we do in relationships with family members. But it should be that way with friends. It should be that way with work colleagues. And honestly, it should be that way with everyone we come in contact with. No one wants to be around people that are just there for themselves.
Greg McKeown:
And yet sometimes, we can create that dynamic without really meaning to. We just get so interested in our own agenda that we’re not thinking proactively about how we can create that value for other people.
What have you learned about how to develop a broader network of people that you are investing in, you know, beyond just keeping it in your head? Okay, here are some of the people I’d like to reach out to. Have you formalized that in any way?
Bill George:
Well, I try to keep in touch with many people that have come through my classes as possible. I ask them to reach out to me when they’d like to talk because I am not chasing them. But I’d like to develop as broadly a relationship. And I think, like to think, there are a lot of people with whom I can have intimate discussions as opposed to superficial conversations. I told you I’m not very good at superficial conversations.
Greg McKeown:
I can relate to it.
Bill George:
A lot of people with whom I can do that. And I keep trying to broaden that network, and I feel guilty when I lose touch with some of my high school friends or college friends and, you know, try to renew. And I’m not as good at that as I’d like to. I keep trying, but you know, it’s there just, it can become overwhelming, and you don’t want it to become more overwhelmed either. Because I think, you know, all relationships have to be a two-way street. So I believe in mentoring other people, but I believe they’re mentoring me too.
I have a co-author in my books Zach Clayton, 37 years old, and I feel like it’s reverse mentoring. I’ve learned a lot more from Zach than he’s learned from me. He taught me about social media. He taught me a lot about how millennials think and where their hearts are, and what’s going on in their lives now. And you know, and if you talk to him on this program, he’d say he’s a work in progress. He’s continuing to grow. But aren’t we all?
Greg McKeown:
A lot of the work you are doing sounds to me like you are coaching senior leaders either in sessions and class sessions that you’re doing or one-on-one conversations. If you take the totality of the years, you’ve done that, both as the CEO of Medtronic or all of the years since then and before, if you take all of that, what would you say is the single biggest mistake you see CEOs or senior leaders make? The single biggest.
Bill George:
Getting caught up in the external gratification that often comes to people in high-level positions. You know, whether it’s making your numbers or whether it’s, you know, it’s getting support from the media or thinking, I always told people, you know, if your self-worth is based on your net worth, you know, you’re in trouble. When you start getting caught up in the external gratification that’s out there, and you see that happening with very successful people. You know, I think people like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk are on the verge of that, but we also all get tempted to do it ourselves. There was a time I thought my goal was to be CEO of Honeywell, and then I realized one day I wasn’t happy doing that, and I didn’t even want the job. And that’s when I went to Medtronic because, you know, I had to look at was I really getting the gratification and satisfaction at a deeper level of a business I loved. And it turned out it wasn’t.
Greg McKeown:
Yeah. Do I want what I really want?
Bill George:
Yeah, exactly. Or am I just looking for it to say, Oh, I’m a CEO of a big company, or I’m, you know, I’m this, or I’m that, you know, I’ve got a big house or whatever it is. All those external measures of success, which I think are very, they’re very fleeting. You know, when you get diagnosed with cancer, you know, like my wife was 25 years ago, and her number one question is not Am I going to live, but does my life really matter? And that’s a question we ask ourselves all the time. Does my life matter? To whom am I making a difference? You know, I’ve only got one life to live. Am I making a difference while I’m here on this earth? And I’d like to think that at the end of the day, maybe I’ve made a difference in a few people’s lives in a positive way, some of whom I’ve never even met.
Greg McKeown:
No, that’s a beautiful way of putting that.
Bill. I have a question for you. This is a tricky one. When we were together at the Kennedy School, there was a leader there, and I’m not going to say who they are, but they were presented, and maybe accurately, as a global leader, a world beater, a famous world executive. Now that may all be true, but there was a point at which somebody asked a question, and they said, How have you navigated the work-life balance? And their answer was so, I mean, it was honest, so you certainly got to give them that. But I thought it was, it was more than just honest. And I wanted your reaction. They said, Oh, I haven’t done balance.
For 20 years, if something came up at the end of the day, if some emergency was happening at work, I would just call, I would just call up my spouse and just say I’m not going to be home for dinner. Hang up the phone and hit the issue at hand. And then they said, And that’s how it is in our company. We all bleed blue. All of us do. That’s how it is for everybody. And then they said, for example, if I email my assistant at two in the morning, she responds by 2:20. If it’s three o’clock by 3:20. And then, and this was perhaps the more, most interesting moment of all for me, pointed to the back of the room and said, Isn’t that right? And all 50 people in the room turned around to see a slightly bemused, not entirely embarrassed, assistant who’s sitting there.
Well, what else is she going to say? I mean, she’s, you know, she’s going to capitulate to that whatever she thinks. But I just wanted to bring that. It’s always been in my mind because we, as a group of leaders in the room, talked about that afterward, that moment. And I really wish we’d talked about it more with the CEO, who had just shared it, or with you afterward. But we never, I don’t think, did that. And so now I’m bringing it to you in this forum. What do you hear when you hear that story? I mean, this is someone that’s being held up as a great leader, a great global executive, and yet you have a story like that, that shows a contrast and contradiction, or the inherent trade tradeoffs maybe and in excellence in one area of life. What are your reactions to it?
Bill George:
Makes me sad. I know the person you’re talking about. They’re quite devoted to their family, but they got caught up in the role of the CEO. And that’s what’s sad is we put people in these roles, and we have these expectations that are totally unrealistic.
Greg McKeown:
Totally.
Bill George:
And I think we have to get over that.
Greg McKeown:
That’s interesting. So do you remember enough that at the time, you had a reaction to it?
Bill George:
I sure noticed the way everyone in the class was reacting. It made me sad because I’d invited this person to come, and it made me quite sad that this was happening. But I think it also, some of the people there didn’t have enough empathy for the pressures on people in leadership roles. To having walked in their shoes too. And I think a lot of people are well-intentioned, and they get caught up in the pressures of the moment, and it doesn’t go well. And that’s what makes me sad. And I think our society has to change to not put these expectations on people. And I think we as people can’t let them put them on us. We just have to be who we are.
And like I told you, I coached soccer for 12 years, you know, while I was executive Vice President of Honeywell and CEO of Medtronic. Well, that took time away from work, but I sure am glad I did. I look back to those days with great joy. My son’s on those teams too. That’s not the only reason I did it, but it was a time of great joy.
Greg McKeown:
Well, you formalized it in your routine. It’s not a question of can I be there or not? The commitment is there. It’s on the schedule. There are people waiting for me. So even if there’s pressures at work, I’m still going to be there.
But I really liked your answer overall because, in a way, what you just did again was create that space for understanding because it was easy as a participant in that moment when they shared this, honestly. Right. Maybe the other, other leaders make the same trade-offs but wouldn’t be as honest about it. You know? So there’s something to be said for just being honest and being open. It was easy, I suppose, not in that role to go, Well, I mean, look at that. And it’s like, yeah, look at that. I have never been in that role. No one else in the room had been in that role. It’s a, it’s a massively demanding, challenging role, and this is what, you know, this is how they navigated it, and they’re willing to share it with us now. The idea of the CEO having empathy looking down, let’s say, is important. But so I think is empathy looking up.
I think about this in, in a political sense, too, sometimes where, whether it’s the prime minister in England or the president of the United States. My general view is to extend far more compassion and empathy than I see certainly anyone in social media doing. But even in just in casual conversation, we allow for the impossible task that we are giving to these people. Whether you’re the Prime Minister or the President today or in any day, your job is impossible. It’s actually impossible. Like how can you? The complexity is so much greater than any single person could possibly comprehend or handle. And yet somehow we think nothing of it to say, Oh, well, they’re just so, so terrible. They’re so this, or they’re so bad, or they’re so, and it’s like, if you put you or me or anyone in that role, the same can be said because it’s so challenging in a world that’s this complex and interrelated. What’s your reaction to that?
Bill George:
Whether I’m teaching a class with a protagonist or people want to judge or have a guest who comes to talk to them, Don’t judge that person. Ask yourself, what can I learn from that? And could this happen to me? Don’t think that, Oh man, I’d never do that. Well, you might find yourself getting so caught up that you would, so you really have to ask yourself those hard questions. So take it inside yourself. Look yourself in the mirror. Could this happen? Maybe there’s another variation. I wouldn’t do A, but I might do B.
Greg McKeown:
Could this happen to me, is such an important question. And sometimes, I think I’m just not realistic about what I believe I would do in some circumstances. Jordan Peterson has made this observation that, that most of us are self congratulatory when we think about what we would’ve done, you know, in a Nazi Germany, you know, how we would’ve behaved. I mean, we just love effortlessly saying, Oh yes, I would’ve been, you know, I’d have been the Schindler. I would’ve been the person to help. You know, my ancestry is Jewish, and it’s easy to believe that that’s how I would behave. But what he observes is that statistically, that’s not what would’ve happened, right? Almost everybody capitulated, and a very, very small number of people actually were willing to take personal risk to help other people who were in a devastating but suddenly socially toxic situation. And so I think that’s a more dramatic example of, of the same idea of, like, could it be me? Could I be that way?
Bill George:
It’s very easy to get caught up in going along with the masses and who’s going to be the person that stands up against that. But it’s pretty easy to get going. I think we need to have some empathy for people that get caught up. And so that, you know, that’s why you build support teams around you. So you can do that.
Greg McKeown:
Bill George, with the new book, True North, The Emerging Leader Edition. He takes the ideas that he’s developed over these many, many years, decades of self-reflection, and working with leaders all over the world and connects it, combines it with Zach Clayton to be able to say, Well, what does leading authentically mean in today’s workplace, in today’s world, in this environment, this challenging scenario? And I suppose it would be fair to say, Bill, wouldn’t it, that no matter what the problem in life is, leadership is the answer. And so, in that spirit, this is so timely, so helpful, so useful.
Thank you for being a coach to the rest of us and helping us to reflect on being a better leader ourselves and self-leadership so that we can lead other people best.
Bill George:
Thank you. I mean, I wrote that chapter called The Leader as Coach because I think leaders need to think more like Bill Campbell and be coaches of people, not judges.
Greg McKeown:
Bill, thank you for being on the podcast for me today.
Bill George:
Thank you for having me. I appreciate it a lot.
Greg McKeown:
Is there anyone in your life you care enough about to make sure that you and they are not winning at the wrong game? I want you to think about who that person is. What is one idea from this podcast that you can share with them so that you can continue the conversation that we’ve started here with Bill into your life, into your relationships?
Remember to subscribe to this podcast, and also, if you have found value in this episode, please write a review on Apple Podcasts. For the first three people who do it, you will get access to the Essentialism Academy. For more details, go to essentialism.com/podcastpromo. And together, let’s avoid this number one era that leaders make. Until next time.
