Simon Sinek

Phil & David feel inspired and downright happy to welcome to "Lunch" the inspiring and insightful Simon Sinek, the New York Times bestselling author of "Start With Why" and "The Infinite Game," Optimist influencer and host of his own "A Bit of Optimism" podcast. For more about Simon and his Optimism Company, go to https://simonsinek.com. To learn more about building community through food and "Somebody Feed the People," visit the Philanthropy page at philrosenthalworld.com

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
David. Hey, Phil, I know you know who Simon Sinek is,
but I'm not sure everybody knows well.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
I have discovered that Simon is unbelievably big star. Yeah,
but he's sort of like, if you know him, you
love him.

Speaker 1 (00:18):
Millions of followers, many millions.

Speaker 2 (00:21):
I think his book sold, you know, three or four
million copies? Is He's got the second I think most
viewed YouTube.

Speaker 1 (00:28):
Sorry, Tedpaw, Yes right on YouTube on YouTube, yes and.

Speaker 2 (00:32):
See wherever you see your finer Ted Pops.

Speaker 1 (00:35):
And he has a podcast called a Bit of Optimism
with Simon Sinek, and I did that podcast, and I
have to tell you he's one of the most brilliant
minds I've ever met. He's a sweetie pie, and he's
just an all around great guy that we can learn
things from. How often do you get all those in
one package?

Speaker 3 (00:53):
I've never had the.

Speaker 1 (00:54):
Ladies and gentlemen, my friend Simon Sinek.

Speaker 4 (01:04):
Let's build the beans, chew the fat, food for thought
and jokes on tap, talking with our mouths full, having fun,
bes the cake and humble pies, serving up slice live,
leave the dressing on the side. It's naked. Lush clothing optional.

Speaker 1 (01:55):
Call a cafe. Just want to plug them because they're awesome.
They started as a pop up sandwich thing and then
now boom.

Speaker 3 (02:03):
So this is what just occurred to me, which is
worth sharing that for people who are excessively healthy who
criticize the way we eat, we are on the side
of healthy, not them, hear me out premise. So I
went to I went to this longevity summit my not my,

(02:24):
not my tribe, but a friend of mine was speaking,
and I was being a good friend, and they're all
very obsessive about all of it. And I took this test.
I don't remember what it was, and I stood on
the platform. It spun me around. I don't know what
it was. And I'm you know, I exercise ish. Yes,
I eat shapes, you know, But.

Speaker 2 (02:46):
I walk with Maria shreiver ish.

Speaker 3 (02:48):
I do I and like I do like to like
have dessert, and I do like to eat badly sometimes
because I love food, and I because I love food,
I sometimes eat excessively and it's not constant, but I
have spens. And I had the fifth best score in
the room. I should have had the worst score in
the room. So then I did this other test. It's

(03:08):
called it's a thing called glycan age where basically what
they do is they measure they measure the uh inflammation
of your cells. And inflammation, as we know, leads to
all kinds of horrible things, including shortening your life. Right,
and if you get an inflammation glac and age that's
eight years younger than your chronological age. They say, that's amazing.

(03:29):
I was twenty two years younger than my chronological age.
What yeah. And they go through my lifestyle to go
through everything, and basically what it was is I prioritize
joy and friends over all the other stuff. Now I
do all the other stuff. I'm just not obsessive about it, right,
And what they were telling me is it's basically about
stress and the people who have all the measurements it causes.

Speaker 1 (03:53):
Them stress because they have to hit them every day.

Speaker 3 (03:55):
They have to hit them every day and it's caused
a stress. And for example, when you stress about eating
chocolate cake, the cortisol that's released from the stress about
eating the chocolate cake is worse for you than the
chocolate cake.

Speaker 1 (04:07):
Preach this is my new guru, Simon Sinek. Everybody, this
is fantastic.

Speaker 3 (04:15):
So and you know they do their their their their
heavy exercise and their intimate and fasting and the cold plunges,
and each one of those things is healthy, but not
when you stack the stress, because you can't do all
of those things every day. It's too much stress on
the body. So what we're doing right now. Oh, and

(04:35):
elite athletes don't live long what they don't live along?
This is what they were telling me. Elite athletes do
not live longer than everybody else. They do not.

Speaker 2 (04:44):
There is the more you, I think, the longer you live,
the more you realize there's no rhyme or reason that
I can For instance, we had on a recent episode,
Don was and trying to figure out why Keith Richards
is still alive.

Speaker 3 (04:56):
You can't, I know the answer to that. Yes, to
make the rest of the band look healthy, well said,
to make the rest of humanity.

Speaker 2 (05:06):
By the way, you tell me if this has been
done for you. I listened to your podcast with with
Phil and then I've now gone through the deep dive.
But one thing, and by the way you fed Phil.
Nobody ever fed Phil more than Simon.

Speaker 1 (05:19):
You can't. I couldn't even begin to compete with the
food that you gave me.

Speaker 2 (05:23):
But I have prepared for this episode a why uh
playlist of all my favorite songs with the word why
and the title, and I realized, uh, like starting, we're
gonna this episode I think will already have begun with
why by Annie Lennox. When I hope you like, Yes,
you don't, he said, I'm just like Keith Richards.

Speaker 1 (05:49):
I'm sorry, why You're sorry.

Speaker 2 (05:52):
Uh, let's talk about more important things. But oh, I
will say that after you were on Phil's podcast. I've
never gotten exactly after that, within those right now, Yes, exactly.
Within minutes, I got a text from my cousin Debbie,
my greatest relative, I think because she was adopted so

(06:13):
she is free of all the issues of my family.
But she wrote to say that you're her favorite person
on earth, and she sent a question I will ask
much later, but I will say it taught me that
there is a you are, much like the band Fish
in my musical terms, the people who know you are.

Speaker 3 (06:33):
It's like the Grateful Dead. It is a life.

Speaker 2 (06:35):
It is the obsession, and it's I feel like I've
been welcomed into this community I was unaware of, and
it's a massive community that's very nice.

Speaker 1 (06:45):
And I don't know any of this stuff. I just
you're one of my favorite people to talk to.

Speaker 3 (06:49):
The fans mutual.

Speaker 1 (06:50):
No, I love you and I'm just so happy we've
become friends. We have to thank our friend Alex Edelman.

Speaker 3 (06:57):
For introducer just right.

Speaker 1 (06:58):
We had a perfect, lovely Chinese meal.

Speaker 3 (07:01):
And the way I met Alex was funny.

Speaker 1 (07:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (07:03):
I was told to go see his show. He was
in LA. I went to see the show, an amazing shown, amazing,
amazing show. I went on Instagram the next day. I
slid into his DMS, said love your show, see you're
in LA. I want to come on my podcast and
he wrote back, Oh my god, I'd love to, and
he came into the podcast and then he invited me

(07:23):
out for done it with you with Phil. I mean,
that's it's one of these just funny, isn't that. It's
one of these funny things. Yeah, that's how life. I
didn't know him.

Speaker 1 (07:30):
That's how life should work. Isn't that great? So what
are you up to now? You said you're traveling, You're
tell me what's new in the world of Signon.

Speaker 3 (07:40):
My obsession these days is friendship. I talk about it
is whenever I can. I'm obsessed with this concept of friendship.
And if you think about it, there's an entire industry
on how to be a good leader. I'm a part
of that. There's an entire industry and how to have
a successful marriage or how to find love, but there's
precious little on how to be a friend or have

(08:01):
a friend's and yet, and yet, friendship is I think
the single most important thing in our lives. The way
that you have successful relationships or successful jobs is you
have friends who are there for you in the difficult times.
But if we're not nursing and looking after the friends,
then who's there for us?

Speaker 1 (08:16):
I feel this instinctually. I feel it, especially because I
travel around the world making friends. Yeah, and it's great.
You do have to keep up though, but and it's
not hard work. But it's not hard work.

Speaker 3 (08:29):
It's not hard work, but it is effort. It's effort.

Speaker 1 (08:31):
Sometimes it's as easy as liking their thing on Instagram.
That's just saying I'm here and I see how you
exist exactly, And that's and that tiny little bridge to
the person. That door then remains open for the phone

(08:51):
call for the dinner. Right. So I just feel like,
never lose that connection. Never never, always keep a toe
in that water.

Speaker 3 (09:01):
It's true. The mistake that I've made, the mistake that
I've made in my friendships and still struggle, but way
better than I was, is I want to talk to
a friend I haven't talked in a while. It's a
good friend, and just you know, just haven't talked in
a while, and I keep not having the time. I'm like, oh,
I've got twenty minutes. I'll wait, I've got half an hour. Wait,

(09:21):
I've got a gap here. Who I forgot? This day
I forgot? And before I know it, a month passes. Yeah,
and I haven't called his friend.

Speaker 1 (09:27):
And it gets worse and worse. Then cross that bridge again.

Speaker 3 (09:31):
Correct. So what I've learned is just to either text, hey,
I'm thinking about you, or to like, if I'm in
the car and I'm like just rushing from here to there,
I'll call and be like, I'm in the car for
five minutes, I haven't talked in a while. I just
want you to know I'm thinking about you, and I
love you. Only have five minutes. We talked for five
minutes and I'm like, I'm here, i gotta go, and
it's great. Yes, just to how you doing as to

(09:51):
how you're doing. Letting me know that they exist and
that you're on their mind, yes, or that they're on
your mind is a and because think about how it
feels to us that some one is thinking about us
such a nice, so nice.

Speaker 1 (10:04):
Have you ever lost anyone in suicide not to go
dark right away?

Speaker 3 (10:08):
I haven't. I have my I have people who are
close to me who've lost people who are close to them,
But I have yet.

Speaker 1 (10:18):
To I have in my life. And I feel like
if I had sent that text how you doing, I
don't know if it would have made a bit of difference.
But that's the regret that I live with.

Speaker 3 (10:33):
Yeah, you know. I mean suicide is an act of loneliness, ye,
you know, And and the feeling of being unseen, unheard, misunderstood.
And I think the pursuit of friendship is the universal
pursuit in every culture to just feel like we matter.

(10:56):
That's it. We just want to know that we matter
in one person life right in the world. Very good
And it's as you said, it's not really complicated stuff.
But for some reason, you know, cats don't have to
work very hard to be cats.

Speaker 1 (11:10):
Really, you know why anybody they don't care.

Speaker 2 (11:15):
That's what we're dog people.

Speaker 3 (11:17):
I'm a cat person. You know my theory about cat
people and dog people. I've told you, haven't I tell again?
So I have a theory the difference between cat people
and dog people. Dog people wish their dogs were people, true,
and cat people wish they were cats.

Speaker 1 (11:30):
Ah, that's interesting.

Speaker 3 (11:33):
I'm a cat prison.

Speaker 1 (11:34):
I get it.

Speaker 3 (11:34):
I have a cat.

Speaker 1 (11:35):
We've covered suicide cats, Okay, important topics was their cative
and suicide. That's but they would never do. They would jump,
but they would survive. The the cat though, here's the
difference between cats and dogs. The dog is always texting
how you doing. The cat will never send that too much?

(11:59):
I love you, but too much?

Speaker 3 (12:01):
Correct. Having a dog like having a child. Having a
cat like having a roommate, A great roommate. I mean,
my my cat is an amazingly good roommate. Cleans up
after itself. Yeah, I get it, you know, just does
its own thing.

Speaker 1 (12:14):
Do you have the automatic litter thing that cleans of course.
See when I had a cat years and years ago,
we didn't. That wasn't invented yet. Yeah, it sounds like
a game changer.

Speaker 3 (12:22):
It is a game changer because the only thing I
have to do, yeah, is feed the cat. And even
then because cats won't eat themselves to death like a dog. Right,
if you give a dog three days worth of food, yeah,
it'll be fat, it'll overeat one day.

Speaker 1 (12:36):
Are you saying dog stupid?

Speaker 3 (12:38):
I'm saying cats smart. I mean, I'm just it's a
controversial episode. I'm just saying cats have the ability to
stop eating and say, I think I'll save something for later.
I think. You know, I'm watching my figure. You know
he's away for three days. I think i'll I think
i'll He's given me a lot of extra food. Yeah,
I won't eat it all.

Speaker 1 (12:58):
That we're expeating of food. What do you think?

Speaker 3 (13:01):
I like it? Rich Good's a good shop.

Speaker 2 (13:02):
Selling your point about texting people, I find there are
two things in my life right now, getting older and
doing a podcast have helped. One. Doing a podcast, you
have to text your friends to say, come and do
my podcast. And that actually is a way. Like there
are people like while love it would be an example
like old friends who I've texted and it's like I've

(13:24):
lost touch for a couple of years, like during the pandemic,
and it's it's actually re ingratiated some of them into
my life. Also, in my case, getting old, I now
am making more mistakes when I text. For instance, I
had my nephew Justin. I was texting at the airport
and I accidentally texted Boney ver justin Vernon, and I'm like, okay,

(13:45):
this is a way to stay in touch by accidentally
texting a lot of people. No, it was an accident.
It literally was an.

Speaker 3 (13:51):
Accis does do you type with your thumbs or do
you type with one finger? I think I do with thumbs.

Speaker 1 (13:59):
I do with thumbs.

Speaker 3 (14:00):
Okay, it's if you watch, you can generally tell somebody's
uh generation, Like older people tend to type with a finger. Oh,
by the way, so I'm young, you're young, young, that's
but they also I'm realizing I can't imagine typing with
my fingers so slow. Yes, but we all have issues
with our hands.

Speaker 1 (14:20):
Sure you know.

Speaker 3 (14:22):
I had to go see the doctor because I was
having pain. And if I'm texting so much, it's called
they have a nighbor it like it's texting hand or
whatever it's called it. But I'm faster like tennis elbow.

Speaker 1 (14:36):
Then I am typing on a keyboard.

Speaker 3 (14:38):
We aren't made to do this jammy thing? And like
if you look look at your finger. Yeah, do you
have a little indentation on your pinky finger from resting
your No? No, like because when I hold my phone?
Oh yeah, yeah like this. Yeah, and so I got
a little I've got a little indentation.

Speaker 1 (14:54):
Wow.

Speaker 3 (14:54):
Are you an addict? No? No, no, But I use
my phone just as excessively as everybody else.

Speaker 1 (15:00):
I think I'm an addict?

Speaker 3 (15:01):
Are you?

Speaker 1 (15:02):
I think there's something wrong with me.

Speaker 3 (15:03):
Do you carry the phone with you everywhere? Everywhere? Do
you take it to the bathroom with you every time?
Every time? Do you check your phone and do you
check your phone in the morning before you say good
morning to your wife.

Speaker 1 (15:19):
If she's asleep.

Speaker 3 (15:21):
If she's awake, I say hi, lean over and pick
up the phone more than yeah, yeah, you're probably it's
next to my bed.

Speaker 1 (15:30):
Yeah, but I also listened to music from it to
go to sleep.

Speaker 3 (15:33):
That's okay, but it is next to my bed. Do
you tech? Are you on your phone while you're watching TV?

Speaker 1 (15:41):
If TV is boring?

Speaker 3 (15:45):
How often? Is TV boring? Almost all the time? Now
not since they canceled everyone yeah where? Ever, since they
canceled I should.

Speaker 1 (15:56):
Say they didn't cancel it. We quit on our own master.

Speaker 3 (16:00):
That's right, because I should before it was off the air.

Speaker 1 (16:05):
I don't like being kids.

Speaker 3 (16:07):
Can I ask you that was one of the things
we talked about. That's cancel yourself?

Speaker 1 (16:10):
Yeah? Can I see you?

Speaker 2 (16:22):
A question about your podcast? A bit of optimism?

Speaker 3 (16:27):
It may be?

Speaker 2 (16:28):
Yeah, it's a great podcast, very successful. What's to be
optimistic about right now?

Speaker 1 (16:33):
Oh?

Speaker 3 (16:34):
Good question.

Speaker 2 (16:36):
I mean, it's sincerely. It's like if someone asked me,
I guess I might go I have a bit of optimism,
like the Fiddler on the Roof interpretation of the title.
But if you're you say it as it feels a
lot more positive when you say it.

Speaker 3 (16:53):
I think there's a lot to be positive and optimistic about.
I mean, the world is always balanced, right if you
take boom years and good years where and remember it's
also relative, right, It's it may seem not optimistic given

(17:15):
your worldview and your politics, et cetera. But for some
people this.

Speaker 2 (17:18):
Is like the Golden Age.

Speaker 3 (17:20):
Is the best time ever, right, and so number one
is relative, but number two that it doesn't matter because
whenever their times are good. We're blind to all the
things that aren't going well. Books. We don't want to
look because who cares. It's the eighties. We're all making money.
Life is good, the music's amazing. Who cares? What's wrong
in the world? Right, it's there's a there's a will

(17:42):
for blindness when things are good in our lives. So
I and and and and light cannot exist without dark,
and dark cannot exists without light. And I think the
time to be very optimistic is the time where most people,
maybe in your friend group, who are woe is me
and sad. This is the time to be optimistic, and
it is time to celebrate the human spirit and ingenuity

(18:04):
and the good things that are happening in the world.
And also, you know, I also see the benefits of upheaval,
believe it or not, you know, which is because when
there's upheaval, you get to rebuild. And there's a rebuilding
that will happen in this country that can be a
very good thing.

Speaker 1 (18:24):
You're sure of this.

Speaker 3 (18:25):
It's the way of the world. Yes, it's the way
of the world. Now, how much pain will be caused
before the building, I can't say, but but there's always
a rebuilding, and I would like to be a part
of planning what the future of America can look like,
rather than you know, I want to be a part

(18:46):
of solutions. I believe that's optimistic, yes, and I agree
with you.

Speaker 1 (18:52):
And my optimism comes from traveling and meeting people from
everywhere and realizing that most people in the world are
nice and sweet and great and want to live in peace.

Speaker 3 (19:02):
And are like minded, including in our country. Exactly righting
in our country. And it's it's the thing that both
sides of the political spectrum get wrong, which is we
can actually we disagree with how to get things done.
We all want to wake up in the morning. We
want to be able to provide for ourselves and our families.
We want us and our kids to feel safe. Going
to say this all the time coming home, and most

(19:23):
people are trying their best to make it work and
make ends meet, and and that's where we're all the same.

Speaker 1 (19:31):
But the news can't report on that.

Speaker 3 (19:32):
But the news can't report on that, and they try
to tell us that the other side isn't like that, right,
and they are. Yeah, And you know this, I'm from
traveling absolutely, which is people tend to be good and
they're all trying agree.

Speaker 1 (19:48):
Not like David who hates everybody.

Speaker 2 (19:50):
No, in fact, to prove I don't hate everyone. We
have a mutual friend who I love and I know
you love Trevor Noah love who you know. I've worked
with now on the Grammys for many years after sort
of a chance encounter on a plane where we flew
next to each other, ended up developed you know, ended
up with him presenting the Grammys and has now you know,

(20:11):
he's hosted it so brilliantly.

Speaker 1 (20:13):
I what I like.

Speaker 2 (20:14):
I will just say, like someone, I've heard all of
your podcast on with him and all those conversations, and
I will say that a lot of what you're talking
about I see in him because he is one of
the most positive people I've ever worked with. But also
he is a leader because he like I have never
like working with someone. I've never heard someone give me
more direct feedback, like I love this, let's go with this.

(20:38):
And but if you ask him, most comedians, you know,
pure comedians are in such turmoil doubt neurosis. Sure, Ray Romano,
sometimes you might be.

Speaker 1 (20:48):
But he's the He's the best kind of neurotic because
he only hurts himself.

Speaker 2 (20:51):
Oh, actolutely no no, but it so what what what
if you've observed about Trevor's mind that you love well.

Speaker 3 (20:57):
One of the things that I love about him, which is,
and you know this, it's rare in Hollywood Land. It's
where is rare in show business. Which is who he
is on camera and who he is off camera, or
exactly the same, exactly, exactly the same. Hanging out with
him is, to watch him on stage, it's the same.
He's serious, he's funny, he's insightful, he's direct, he's very

(21:21):
very curious. He's very very open minded. He doesn't take
anything personally, which allows for very very difficult conversations, which
are difficult to have with other people because everybody takes
everything personally or politicizes something or attacks or wants to debate.
He wants none of that. He wants he loves the
idea of standing shouldered or shoulder with someone to face

(21:41):
a problem, rather than to be, you know, against each other,
across the table from each other.

Speaker 1 (21:46):
Where is he. I haven't seen him lately.

Speaker 3 (21:48):
He's always traveling. He's never around you, literally, like he's
left the Daily Show. He is anywhere in the world.

Speaker 2 (21:54):
And one time he was in Paris. When I was
I noticed he was in Paris, and I was going
to go either, and I said me, who I can
contact in case I can go see you? He goes, yeah,
I think I know someone me and you know it
couldn't be, but he literally that was a part of
his life after the Daily Show, where he was just
wherever he wanted to go and whatever he wanted to do,
he would go. And I think he's the freedom. It's

(22:15):
like he may have been a visionary in leaving late
night before well.

Speaker 1 (22:20):
There still was before getting kicked out. Yeah, yes, well
that's he's great.

Speaker 3 (22:26):
I'm interested in your thoughts, which is is late night
television dead? And if so, what's the real.

Speaker 1 (22:32):
Reason Network TV is dying? Okay, so that's the real reason,
And was Colbert's firing? Little political maybe, but there's a
hard truth in there also, which is business isn't good?
It's not his fault, No, it's do you know that

(22:54):
they get more hits all the late night shows from
their YouTube excerpts than they do on the air. I
believe many people can believe it because they.

Speaker 3 (23:03):
Grow up with TV.

Speaker 1 (23:03):
I mean, you think of it as the primary source,
but I cannot the.

Speaker 3 (23:07):
Last time I watched an episode of Saturday Night Live.
But I've seen all the clips that people sent to
me that are the the the next day that make
it the zeitgeist. You know? Do you know that I
got to work the word zeitgeist into the.

Speaker 1 (23:18):
Excellent Everybody's Everybody's opening monologue is put online right after
they film it at four in the afternoon. Wow, so
that it can live on YouTube first now wow. So
the reason so they got a short term gain there,

(23:40):
which is they've gotten lots of hits on YouTube, doesn't
help the show any because you've already seen the monologue
if you're a fan of the show, and so you're
not watching it when it's own or the ads surrounding
exactly right.

Speaker 3 (23:53):
And YouTube is the number one platform for podcasts.

Speaker 1 (23:58):
I heard that too. That's why we filming like like.

Speaker 3 (24:01):
Podcasters used to like. The reason we liked it is
because you could show up unshaved and unshowered and didn't
matter and you just recorded and but no, but you
have to be it's become a visual medium.

Speaker 2 (24:14):
As someone who I guess, I don't want to insult
you if I got the number wrong, but I believe
you're you are. When I last checked, the third most
viewed ted talk of all time is that I I.

Speaker 3 (24:24):
Haven't checked in a while. If I'm honest, at its best,
it was the second. It might be the fifth or sixth,
let's go with second, but it's up. It was the second.
It's definitely not that that's incredible and was.

Speaker 2 (24:34):
That Excuse my ignorance on a million things, but it
was that mainly people through YouTube like the as they
discovery you or how does that?

Speaker 3 (24:43):
No, No, that was it's I'm I'm I'm old enough
that on this podcast I got so I my the
Ted talk that went viral was actually a ted x
talk so poorly produced, bad vision quality, broken microphone, literally
my microphone breaks in the middle of my talk, and uh.

(25:06):
And it was they put it on YouTube because that's
all that Ted would do. If you were on the
main Ted stage, you got the honor being on ted
dot com. If you were a ted X, you were
relegated to this lesser life form known as YouTube. At
the time, I think I did that, and so they
put me on YouTube because that's the only place it
could exist, and it became the number one watched TEDx

(25:27):
talk on YouTube wow, which the numbers were relatively low
because they could be back then, they weren't that many.
Because of that, they decided to put it on ted
dot com. So it was one of the very few
TEDx talks that ever made of tech cook and then
continued to go viral on ted dot com and that's
when it made it to number two. So it wasn't
it was at the time. It was actually ted dot

(25:48):
com that did it, but that is no longer the case.

Speaker 2 (25:51):
And how life is changing? Was that moment for you
that with a broken mic on a you know, on
the second stage of.

Speaker 3 (25:58):
A well, in the moment, not life changing at all
is an honor, but in the moment, not at all.
I would say that what people don't know is that
they think the book and the ted talk came out
actually coincidentally the same month. So I had already developed

(26:18):
the theory, people already expressed interest. I was ready on
the speaking circuit amongst businesses. That's what gave me the
opportunity to write a book, and that's also got me
the invitation to do the TEDx And weirdly, it didn't
drive book sales like THEX. You could see that everybody

(26:39):
who bought the book had seen the TEDx talk, but
not everybody who had seen the Ted Talk even knew
I had a book, and so you could see that
they weren't growing at the same pace, but at some
point it did. At some point it clicked. So it
definitely was a huge catalyst.

Speaker 1 (26:56):
I mean it.

Speaker 3 (26:58):
Made Yeah, people were stopping me on the street more
than they used to because of this Ted Talk, and yeah,
it was definitely had an impact for sure.

Speaker 2 (27:06):
And when you get stopped on the street, because I
literally have just in the last few months realized how
many people you've impacted, and they're thinking, what is the
first thing that they say to you?

Speaker 3 (27:17):
Do? They just say why? No, no, no, no no.
I The good news is I've written many other things
and said many other things since that original Ted Talk
in that original book. And that's I mean, we just
came up with a fifteenth anniversary.

Speaker 2 (27:28):
Edition and that's your I want to hold my hand,
that's your yeah, first grade and I and I remember
when I wrote the second book, the publisher made it
look exactly like the first book.

Speaker 3 (27:36):
The cover design was like leaders eat Less, you know,
look like start with why yeah, And I was like,
why are you doing this? They're like, well, that's how
marketing works. Iimon we serialize it. They're telling you, yeah,
And I was like, it's an entirely different idea set.
It's an entirely different thought. Yes, it builds on the
previous set, of course, because it's from me. But if
you read the second book without reading the first book,
you'd be fine. You know, they're unrelated. You can watch

(27:58):
James Bond movies out of order, you know. And and
so I was very sort of like, we will change
the design. And so no, people don't stop me and
ask me why. What they The first thing they say
is thank you. The people are so nice to me
when they stop me. And every single time it happens,

(28:20):
I'm surprised. Every single time it happens. I'm immensely grateful.
I'm fully aware that my idea has spread because of
these magical human beings who not only embrace the ideas
but share them with their friends and colleagues. I'm fully
aware of that, and I view them. I view us
as compatriots in a in a movement like we are.
We stand shoulder to shoulder, and so you know, I

(28:40):
do my job, I play my role and they play
there is in the army. Yeah, people are so nice.

Speaker 2 (28:46):
So it's oddly you feel, do you feel that's oddly
similar to what goes on with you and your your
fan base, and.

Speaker 1 (28:52):
Most people kick me when they see me. It's one
of the great beautiful perks of being out there if
you have a message of optimism is you find people
who want to be optimistic too, and they are generally sweet,

(29:14):
kind thice people, as most of the world is.

Speaker 3 (29:16):
I have to believe that the way people treat you now,
those who may have been big fans of Raymond and
knew about you because you were largely behind the scenes
back sure, exclusively, exclusively, Yeah, he looked much better though,
did you do the voice of George Steinber? If they
knew you, I assume that it was like, oh, I

(29:37):
love the show. Sure, right, of course, it makes sense.
I think that's the same for a lot of celebrities,
which is I love your show, I love your movie,
I love your song. Right whereas now with somebody feed Phil,
I have to believe that now it's something more than that,
that it's not just I love the show, but rather
there's a thank you that comes from because you do

(29:59):
have a message. It's not just a travel show and
a food show. It's not what it is. It's just
there's a beautiful message that underlies I'm so glad you
get that.

Speaker 1 (30:10):
You want to say it without saying it, And I'm
just using, as I always say, food in my stupid
sense of human to get you that real message.

Speaker 3 (30:17):
So how do people stop you now?

Speaker 1 (30:21):
Hug really? Yeah? Wow, It's the sweetest thing in the world.
And I go out now. I'm doing a North American
tour right now, speaking engagements, and I love it just
as much as doing somebody feed field because I meet
the people. I meet the people and they're just fantastic,

(30:43):
and that gives me optimism when you meet people who
are sweet and nice and great everywhere. I was just
in the middle of the country. We've been raised now
by the news to think the middle of the country
is quote unquote the flyover states. They're all red and rednecks,
and they're not no.

Speaker 3 (31:05):
And and and when somebody comes up to you and
thanks you for your work, nobody cares what anybody's politics are,
what their beliefs are, you know, And it really drives
me nuts. And by the way, I don't think the
problem is our politicians. I think our politicians are a
reflection of us. I think we're the problem.

Speaker 1 (31:20):
Well like, well, then again there can be a hostile takeover,
but there.

Speaker 3 (31:24):
You know, the the you know, and and I mean
this on the left and the right. Yeah, you know
friends who when you say you know. I was with
a friend recently who was pretty clear about her politics,
and I said, you know, you you you do realize
that you I know that you think that they're the sheeple.

(31:46):
You do realize they think you're the sheep. Right, it's
the same, right, she goes, perhaps, but the difference is
is I'm smarter. And it's like that attitude is so flawed.

Speaker 1 (31:56):
Anyone who thinks they're the smart one.

Speaker 3 (31:58):
Right, and that an entire population is yea is the
dumb is the dumb one?

Speaker 1 (32:01):
I never make that mistake.

Speaker 3 (32:02):
And both sides the smart one, right and and and
so I say, like it starts with us thinking you're like,
we may disagree, but it isn't and and and I
want to understand. I want to be curious how somebody
came to their beliefs. I'm curious about their story, how
they got to where they are, how they you know,
why they reacted the way they reacted, And we've lost

(32:23):
curiosity about each other, and that to me is something
to lament.

Speaker 1 (32:27):
I am very curious about how people come to their
beliefs in today's day and age.

Speaker 3 (32:32):
Why and.

Speaker 1 (32:35):
Is the simple answer, it's because they're feed a steady
diet of false information.

Speaker 3 (32:40):
I mean, it's echo chamber is a huge part of it,
because it's like it's like you have you started to
see these studies that are coming at now about AI
where it's like it's I can't remember the exact name
of it, it's something psychosis. I mean, it's like it's
like this because AI is basically an affirmation machine, right right,
you're right about that. It's an acquation machine. Yeah, David Well,

(33:04):
I love this podcast. Uh. And so if somebody has
an inkling or an openness to sort of sort of
odd beliefs like we're all you know, possessed by aliens
or something, you know, and they go down that path,
you can find it. Not only will you find it,
will affirment affirment affirmament yes from it and give you

(33:25):
evidence of it to tell you that you're right yes.
And so it's creating these it's literally it's a tool
that is disconnecting people from reality.

Speaker 1 (33:32):
If you ask chat, GPT or Gemini the Google version
it is such and such good, they will hit you
with the positive things about it, right right, because they
know by the tone of your question that's what your bias.

Speaker 3 (33:47):
Right.

Speaker 1 (33:47):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (33:47):
I've used it twice at work, like when you're backstage
at an award shone you want to check effect. And
I have discovered if you ask the question the wrong way,
you're going to get you get the if you if
you ask that you want the wrong answer to be right,
it will find something absolutely so that you have to
be very careful with that.

Speaker 3 (34:04):
This is an Internet problem. AI exaggerated everything before it.
You know, it's not like it's a new idea, no,
so like, But this was a Google problem too. Still
is a Google problem, which is Google doesn't tell you
the answer. Google tells you the answer you think you want.
It thinks you want.

Speaker 1 (34:21):
So.

Speaker 3 (34:22):
So if two people with diametrically opposed political points of view, yes,
ask the same question, they will get different search results.

Speaker 1 (34:30):
Is this guy the best president who ever lived? The
way you're asking that you're going to get.

Speaker 3 (34:35):
Or or even simpler than that. And there was a
study done a bunch of years ago to demonstrate this. Yeah,
we're well intended, good meaning Americans who just want to
ignore the media, understand that it's being thrown at them,
that it's biased, and they want to just do their
own research, okay, right in an unbiased way. Will go

(34:56):
onto Google to do their own research. And what it
was at the time of Benghazi, and what they found
out was that when uh, left leaning people asked about
Benghazi gave them left leaning answers. Right leaning people asked
about BENGI.

Speaker 1 (35:09):
Is by the tone of the question, they already know
your history.

Speaker 3 (35:12):
It knows your leanings because it knows your Google history,
your search history. So we're never gonna So so two
people time to the same question, which is I would
like to know more about Benghazi. Yes, Benghazi got different
search results, and people who had no political leanings they
got travel advice.

Speaker 1 (35:27):
Oh my god. So this is essential for people to
know and.

Speaker 3 (35:31):
So and so the machine isn't telling you the answer, Yes,
it's telling you the answer.

Speaker 1 (35:36):
It thinks you based on your history traces. So there's
no such thing as a neutral no question, because it tracks.
Is there a search engine out there if you go to.

Speaker 3 (35:47):
A if you go to a college, professor you know
who studied history, and you say, tell me about blank
incident in history. They're like, let me tell you. They're
not saying, well, tell me everything about you. Tell all
your political leanings, tell me everything you've ever searched for, all.

Speaker 1 (36:02):
Your you know, you you're you're You're getting You're getting
his Michigas too, aren't you for sure? There's yeah, there's
no is that a scientific he knows what I'm talking about,
of course, So the come to a meeting, David, We've
got nine, You're welcome.

Speaker 2 (36:18):
I'll translate that. I'll translate that he knows a country
that meants bias. I believe we need one more so
the the uh, there's always bias. There's no getting bias out.
But it's one thing when I can understand and filter
someone else's bias that I'm aware of as it's coming
to me, versus my biases being exaggerated and amplified.

Speaker 1 (36:42):
Because I never thought for a second, Google is giving
me the answer I want simply because they know what
I like from before that new information of me work.

Speaker 3 (36:54):
And I've done it. I've done it with friends, even
with very similar beliefs, and is every sort of like
if we did it right now, you down at our Google, Yes,
on our separate computers. Yes, typed in the same thing.
We will get mostly but not exactly the same lists
of things or things will be in different orders. It
should be exactly the same.

Speaker 1 (37:11):
Should it's not and it won't be sons of bitches.

Speaker 3 (37:15):
See now you know we want to pull out O.

Speaker 1 (37:17):
Yes, I don't.

Speaker 3 (37:19):
I don't know.

Speaker 2 (37:20):
If you like the movie I think you do the
movie Her, I don't know.

Speaker 1 (37:23):
YEA fascinating I found it and prophetic, prophetic movie.

Speaker 2 (37:27):
And what's interesting is until now I thought that's maybe
that's the big problem, that people will lose their contact
with real life. And but this is more worrying to
me than that, because maybe maybe there's comfort for people.
I think there might be lonely people can find some
comfort in it.

Speaker 3 (37:42):
But we have to be careful not to villainize these things.
You know, there it's not a it's not an entirely
bad thing.

Speaker 1 (37:50):
It's a tool. It's how you use it.

Speaker 3 (37:52):
You know, it's a it's a recreational drug. You know,
which is it's okay? You know? The question is you
know in the the movie Her A spoiler alert, I
don't nobody's seen it. I'm going to ruin the movie,
so turn off now. Paul's come back in a few minutes.
At the end, he is devastated, emotionally devastated to learn

(38:17):
he's not the only one right. It's like discovering that
your wife has a million partners.

Speaker 2 (38:28):
I got a call friend.

Speaker 3 (38:32):
So and and it's you know, because what we want
is to feel special. And the tool did such a
good job of making him feel special until he realized
he wasn't special, Like fact and and and the tool
is like, what's the problem? I say everything I say
to you. You know, everything I say to you is true.
And by the way, we have examples like that in

(38:53):
our own lives. We're all kind of guilty this, especially
as young men. You know, well, you you pay a
particular compliment to someone, It's framed in a way that
is unique. You know, you are the most marvelous, wonderful,
fun loving person I've ever met. Oh, then to the
next girl, you're the most marvelous, wonderful, fun loving person
I've ever met. Then she discovers you said that to

(39:14):
the other girl too. I can't believe you said that,
but I meant it to you, and I meant it
to her. Doesn't matter, it wasn't for me. I don't
think he's married.

Speaker 2 (39:24):
Ah, I will say you talked about recreational drugs, which
reminded me that we both grew up in the same
exact place. Well, at least, I'm wearing my Wimbledon hat

(39:46):
because when I first realized you were were you were
born in Wimbledon Hospital. I went there recently for the
first time for the tournament hat.

Speaker 3 (39:53):
Well, thank you, it's just for you.

Speaker 2 (39:55):
But I grew up in Tenafly, New Jersey, And no kidding,
did you spend a signal nificing part of your childhood
around the corner in a town?

Speaker 3 (40:02):
I loved them? Closer I was raised in Closer and
now I spent my whole childhood from the age of
ten until I went to college, so eight years I
spent my whole childhood and Closer and I went to
Demris High School.

Speaker 1 (40:14):
Why did your folks move from England to We didn't
here in England.

Speaker 3 (40:17):
We moved from Hong Kong. WHOA, Yeah, I grew up
all over the world. I was born in England. In Rngland,
we moved to South Africa, moved back to England, moved
to Hong Kong, and then moved to exotic New Jersey.
And how did that shape who you are? I mean,
of course the shape who I was. You know. The
funny thing is people ask me, you know, what's it
like not to have any sort of childhood roots anywhere?
I'm like, I don't know, I have nothing to compare

(40:38):
it to. It's an amazing way to grow up.

Speaker 1 (40:40):
Did you remember enjoying the moves or was it it was.

Speaker 3 (40:44):
Part of our life when you're that young, it was
our lifestyle. You know, we moved. My sister and I
are extremely close, in part because the only constant in
each other's lives was each other, right, you know, we
kept losing friends, right, and so that had to be hard.
I mean, it's pre Internet, it's pre you know, easy
phone calls, pre FaceTime. So you once you moved, that's it.

(41:06):
They were gone. You know, I don't honestly remember it
being traumatic or difficult.

Speaker 1 (41:12):
Was there something fun about it?

Speaker 3 (41:14):
I have to believe our parents did a great job
of making us, making it an adventure for us.

Speaker 1 (41:18):
And they were moving for work, moving for work.

Speaker 3 (41:20):
Yeah, what was going on? My dad was an ex
My dad work for what was then Standard Brands that
became to Bisco. He was a marketing guy ex pat
and you became a marketing and I became marketing guys.
So the company moved us around. Uh, and then he
left that company enjoyed an American company which took us
to took us to New Jersey.

Speaker 1 (41:38):
So you're ten years old in New Jersey. I arrived
in American run And what do you think now when
you went at ten years old America?

Speaker 2 (41:45):
Compared to my it was like the Paris of Bergen County.
It was there was to me, that was a lot
going on.

Speaker 3 (41:51):
T neck and closed. Well. Tenafly was the Tenafly was
the bougie. We had a movie theater. You had a
movie theater, but we had better pizza. We had. It's
still there. Rudy's pizza is still there. It's not seventy
five cents of slice anymore. Oh my god, I just
said that. Oh my god. It's like grandfather. Like when
I was your hottag was a neck. I think it
was probably fifty cents for me. I think it was

(42:12):
eighty five cents when we used to go get it
from school. But yeah, Rudy'sizza is still there? Great pizza.

Speaker 1 (42:20):
It was.

Speaker 3 (42:22):
It's the same.

Speaker 1 (42:22):
But did you love America when you.

Speaker 3 (42:24):
America is an easy place to love, right? You know?
As a kid, I got to you know, I grew
up wearing school uniforms my whole life, and then I
show up in America and I can wear jeans and
T shirts and sneakers and like the thing that I
saw on TV and the movies of like Americans who
dress however they want. Like, that's me. Now I get
to wear whatever I want. And one of the things

(42:46):
it did was it forced me to consider what identity
I wanted, right because I'm in a very formative age. Yeah,
at ten and I had an English accent, right, So
do I want to bury it or do I want
to keep it? And I remember sort of being very proud.
That's when I started sort of getting comfortable being different,
because I was.

Speaker 2 (43:04):
Is there any word you say, because you have a
rather elegant speaking voice, which doesn't hurt in your field,
but a little I hear a little bit of the British.
I hear it's a little South Africa. Is there any
word you say that sounds New Jersey? My kids they
know a few words I say that are like tells, sandwich.

Speaker 1 (43:24):
Sanguige, yes and drawer draw those.

Speaker 3 (43:30):
Other than that, my kids can't hear the jersey. I like,
I cannot say the word. I cannot say South Africa
like I have to read it's South Africa. Like South Africa.
I grew up in South Africa, right, Like that's how
you say it. So that's still left over. There's there's
sentence constructions and word choices that are very English. So

(43:51):
for example, I only learned this years after I was
doing it. I would say to friends do you want
to go have a catch? And let's say, well, I'm like,
do you want to have a catch? And then like
what are you talking about? Like you know, go outside
and throw a ball. You're like, oh, play catch? Ah
right yeah, but in the UK it's like you have
a catch, right, I didn't know that.

Speaker 1 (44:11):
Well, your addiction is also gives you a way a
little bit because you're a very.

Speaker 3 (44:14):
Good thank you. So yeah, there's some tells if somebody's listening.
And I'm bilingual as well, I speak English and American
when I talk to my parents or when I'm in England,
I actually have a much stronger English accent. It's not
an affectation. It's like you know kids who speak to
their parents in French, they just start speaking French. Well,
I just start speaking English. It's the same thing. How
do you say s C h U d oh? I

(44:36):
don't say schedule? No, okay's schedule. Schedule is weird? Schedule.

Speaker 1 (44:42):
It sounds cool though when I hear a lady say it, Uh,
tell us in your schedule, yes, tell us. What's up
with you lately? What are you doing well?

Speaker 3 (44:55):
Like I said, writing this book about friendship.

Speaker 1 (44:57):
That's oh, yes, that's right. That's how we started.

Speaker 3 (44:59):
That's how we started.

Speaker 1 (45:01):
You're writing it currently.

Speaker 3 (45:03):
Yeah, it should be supposed to be instead of this,
Instead of that, you have your title.

Speaker 2 (45:07):
I will not ask you to share it, but you
have a title that you start with a title.

Speaker 3 (45:10):
I do start with a title, and I'm always aware
because you have to write to something. Yeah, but it
almost always changes. I'm fairly confident the word friend or
friendship will be in the title. But uh, yeah, I've
got a few.

Speaker 1 (45:25):
I know.

Speaker 3 (45:26):
I know what I'm writing to, which is sort of
intentional friendship. And we'll see what happens.

Speaker 2 (45:33):
What if because you deal so much with corporate I
have dealt with a lot from a slightly different angle professionally,
but you work with a lot of titans of industry,
a lot of you know, very powerful leaders in business world.
How does friendship exist in the corporate world and how
are there different rules for friendship?

Speaker 3 (45:54):
Oh, it's such a good question. So a lot of
people who are in the corporate world in a quiet
space will concede that they have a lot of deal friends,
but not a lot of real friends, and that making
friends as they've become more successful becomes more difficult. For

(46:17):
some reasons are cynical, you know, like when you have
some level of accomplishment, people want things from you, and
so your guard goes up. You know, I don't know
if they actually want to be my friend or they
just want something from me. So that happens, So it
makes you super cynical. Sometimes they lose old friends because

(46:37):
their careers went into very different paths and they live
very different lives and they struggle to relate anymore. So
that happens. And there's the loneliness of leadership that just
is inherent in leadership in general. But yeah, I mean,
I think a lot of folks have conceded or at
least admitted that they have great deal friends, but they
can count on one hand the number of real friends.

(46:59):
They even fewers. Sadly, that is sad.

Speaker 1 (47:04):
Uh. I try to think I was going to write
a book called Everyone's Nice in the Meeting. Yeah, you
think we're going to be friends from that meeting, but
everyone's on their best behavior.

Speaker 3 (47:16):
A meeting is a first date exactly, It's an interview,
it's it's it's it's a charm offensive.

Speaker 1 (47:21):
Yeah. And then because we want something well yeah, generally, yeah,
something from each other. We want it and we we
actually with good intentions, we want it to work out.

Speaker 3 (47:32):
Sure, Sure, and we're not saying this is machiavellian or cynical,
but the reason most people take a meeting is is
because they want to get something out of this meeting.
Occasionally we take meetings purely altruistically to help somebody, but
a lot of our meetings we hope that there's at
least mutual.

Speaker 1 (47:49):
Benefit, right, right, But when you get in bed with
someone figuratively, then you realize that monster sometimes and in business.

Speaker 3 (48:00):
Can be Monica was saying a similar thing.

Speaker 1 (48:01):
Yes, literally, she wasn't yeah, yeah, she wasn't figurative. He's
gonna say, I have a comedian friend. He got a
big deal at a at a popular streamer, and he
was telling us, uh, you know, I'm buddies with the
head guy. Um set, this is fantastic. We play golf,

(48:23):
we go out to dinner. He's my buddy. He's my buddy.
He was canceled after four episodes. And he goes, I
don't understand it. We were we were buddies. Another friend
of mine goes, you idiot, there's no buddies in show business.

Speaker 3 (48:38):
It's true. But and this is this is you're you're
just making a case for why friends who love you
for you, Yeah, when you're an idiot and you're an
asshole and all of these things. Yeah, you know this
is this really matters. And if you have good friends
and those things happen and careers sometimes go sideways, yes,
you have someone to fall back to, right, and it's

(48:58):
not going to be your buddy.

Speaker 1 (49:00):
That's right, that's right.

Speaker 3 (49:02):
I think people also confuse their identities with their with
with this as well. You know, he thinks he's made
it because he knows this person until this person has
no use until he has no utility anymore. I saw this.
There's a somebody very senior in and that we all
know in one of the big Hollywood companies. Uh and uh.

(49:24):
And he left his job and he wasn't invited to
one of the big parties. And he says to a friend,
you know, you got your invitation, right, And his friend goes, yeah,
of course, of course I got my invitation. So I
didn't I get my invitation? Like maybe it got lost.
It never occurred to him that they were never inviting
him to the party. They were inviting the fact that

(49:45):
he was president of executives at a big company to
the party, of course.

Speaker 1 (49:49):
And if you're anymore, we're inviting the next exactly.

Speaker 3 (49:54):
And by the way, he was the big Mrketing Buck.
He was the he was the one who people were saying,
I had gol he's my buddy, and all of a sudden,
to the to the system, he has no utility. It's
it's a it's it's so.

Speaker 1 (50:07):
Cold, it's so cold, But it's really this is why
friends matter. Do you feel when you're dealing with heads
of companies like this that they the head guy feels
like it's his job to be that buddy to be. Like,
I know someone depends on that high up and in

(50:28):
a certain field who thinks it's his job to be
the buddy to all the people he's trying to recruit
for the company. But then he lets subordinates run it
and stays above the fray where I'm just the nice
guy at the that's clever. Look.

Speaker 3 (50:49):
To some degree, every person who makes it to that
level is charming, right, whether you hate them or disagree
with them. Yeah, they're all charming when they need to be,
because you have to. If you just an ass the
entire time, you could become president. But he's I guarantee
you there's charm. I guarantee there's charm. There's always charm.

(51:10):
All the dictators you know were charming, you know when
they need it to be. Uh, and charismatic and all
of these things. Yes, so uh, I think that I
think to some degree, like it goes back to what

(51:31):
we're saying before, which is what is what does a
friend do? A friend makes you feel seen and heard
and understood and lets you know that you matter in
the worst and in this in your life. Right, Well,
a good leader genuinely not not not not as not
as a not as a manipulation, but genuinely wants their
people to feel seen and heard and that they matter
to this company, you know, because people who are happier

(51:54):
at work are happier people, and happier people. If we
want to be really sort of transactional about it, yes
we're hard.

Speaker 1 (52:02):
Absolutely, But when you realize that this leader, let's say
that that was an act for those reasons, well.

Speaker 3 (52:09):
Then it'll collapse.

Speaker 1 (52:11):
Not only does it collapse, but it erodes your optimism
in human beings. And the next guy who treats you nicely,
you're not You're gonna have one eye.

Speaker 3 (52:21):
Open, one hundred percent. And a friend of mine, Bob Chapman,
who's the CEO of a company called Barry wey Miller
that I've written about quite extensively, who I've written about
and the company, is remarkable, a remarkable leader who does
just that. I mean, he makes people feel seen and heard,
that they matter to him, and he's just wonderful. And
he tells stories of how people come to his company.

(52:43):
They get hired, and they've been burned, and they've heard
it all before and they've had the charm offensive and
then they got fired. You know, when the when when
the company missed its financial projections, you know, and so
to your point, very cynical and just waiting, and Bob
Boys has them. You know, it's good. You don't have
to you don't have to believe me, but I'm still
gonna love you. And he tells this wonderful story. He

(53:04):
relates it to he's a he's a he's a religious man.
He's deeply faithful, and he talks to he tells the
story of when he was a young man, he had
a crisis of faith and he said, he goes to
his pastor and he says, Pastor, I need to talk
to you. I don't think I believe in God. And
the pastor says, well, the good thing is God still

(53:25):
believes in you. And so that's like, that's how Bob
treats his people, which is, you don't have to believe me,
but I'll still believe in you. Yes, and in time,
maybe you'll believe me. And they then the first time
that they miss their projections and no one gets fired,
and you start to realize, hold on, he's not full
of it. That's right. And so I think time, time reveals,
time reveals everything. I think in the short term. It's

(53:48):
very hard for us to judge, but time always reveals
the truth.

Speaker 2 (53:52):
The I wonder your opinion because you're so conscious with
these corporate decisions on a big lover dealing with the
people inside these companies. I have been very pushy with
my sons, like wanting them to be in offices to
a certain degree.

Speaker 3 (54:08):
Like the era of people versus working virtually.

Speaker 2 (54:10):
I mean, yes, completely, and I just in my own life,
I find there's deep value in the when you can
have a meeting, but when you need to knock on
a door and go, let me just make a couple points.
That's often where I find the most important communication goes on.
And I don't know if that happens is easily on
zooms and all that. Are you a believer that there

(54:31):
is a lot of upside to people actually being in
a space, at least some of the time one percent?

Speaker 1 (54:38):
Yes?

Speaker 3 (54:39):
You know. The thing that differentiates the great leaders from
the leaders is that they have the human skills necessary
to be a leader. A leader is all human skills.
That's not how good you are at math. You can
hire those people, right, And we know this from young
kids who went through school of age during lockdown, which

(55:03):
is there are some things that they are regressed on
that their social skills that they are trying to catch
up on. There was damage done, right, we know this
through no fault of their own, and so there's nothing
wrong with working from home occasionally. You know, I'm all
in favor of flexibility, like I think that's great, but
you're one hundred percent right, which is going to work
for some people is uncomfortable and that's why they want

(55:23):
to avoid it. That is the very reason you have
to go because human interaction is uncomfortable. Human interaction is
messy and imperfect, and everybody brings their baggage, their egos,
their bad nights, sleep, their ambitions. Sometimes we are good
at suppressing and sometimes we're acted out, and sometimes it's personal,

(55:43):
sometimes it's not, and we all do it at the
same time. And the ability to navigate and learn those
skills to navigate the messiness of human beings equip somebody
not only to be a better leader in their corporate lives,
I believe equips them to be a better partner in
their romantic lives, a better friend, because you're the skills
are the skills learning to listen, learning to hold space,

(56:03):
learning to be patient, learning to be curious. The skills
are the skills, regardless of where you apply them. And
you know, especially for somebody who's junior in their career,
especially for somebody who's junior in their career, this is
a continuation of college. Like they taught you the stuff,
and you took a bunch of tests, and now you
start at the bottom again, like you were a senior.
You're now a freshman again. When you start your first job, right,

(56:26):
you're nothing to anybody and there's nothing you can do
that's going to break the company. They're not going to
give you that kind of responsibility. But you're going to
school to learn about because because school is easy, because
you're from the day we start school to the day
we graduate high school or college. You're with people about
the same age, with about the same stresses, about the

(56:48):
same life experiences, going through about the same challenges. You know,
puberty hits about the same time for all the kids,
and so there's a lot to relate to. And you
go to school together every day, and so you're all
going through it together. And then once you get into
the real world. You know your first job a little bit,

(57:10):
but now as soon as you start, you're going to
start hanging out with people going through different stresses, different
stages of their lives, lots of different ages. Right, there's
no social promotion anymore in businesses like there were in school. Right,
just because you've passed a few tests and you're the
right age. If you go, you know, that's not the
way it works anymore, right, they'll hold you back. Right,

(57:31):
And so now it's much harder to relate to people.
And that's a skill you got to learn. It's a
skill you got to learn, and you can't learn it
from a book. And AI is not going to teach
it to you. And the problem is is now AI
is relying on people are relying on AI to help
them solve the problems. For example, you have a fight
with your spouse, your girlfriend, your boyfriend. You want to

(57:52):
say the right thing. You're really well intentioned as you
go to AI and you say, tell you what I
should say to repair and you sit down and say honey,
and you say the right thing, says oh my goodness,
thank you. And then she she happens to catch your
phone and she says, did your AI what to say
to me? And you're like, well, I wanted to say
the right thing, and you're like, I wish you would
have come to me and said the wrong thing. I

(58:14):
wish you would have come to me and said, I
don't know what to say, but let me try.

Speaker 2 (58:17):
And it's so interesting to say that. I never heard
of anyone doing something like that until last night over dinner,
and I think that's happening. I would never happens all
the time.

Speaker 3 (58:27):
Because the machine is an affirmation machine. It will say
the right thing. But the problem is is you have
not learned the skill of how to navigate the conflict
in your relationship. Yes, you have not learned the skill.
So the next time you're on vacation on an island
and there's no Wi Fi and you say the wrong thing,
you're three years regressed or row through the head. And

(58:51):
every relationship, whether it's professional or personal, should be should
be an opportunity for personal growth that I want to
be a better version of myself today than I was yesterday,
and I look to the person who I am with
in this relationship to help me grow. My definition of
a great friend is the same definition as a great
marriage or a romantic relationship. Is the same definition of

(59:12):
a community. It's the same definition of a highly successful
corporate culture, which is two people or in the case
of a group of people who agree to grow together.
And if I can't support you and you can't support
me in my growth, and you're just going to rely
on the machine, you won't grow at all. You'll get
all the right answers and grow zero. And this is
what I think people get wrong about AI, and it's utility,

(59:36):
and it's a reflection of our society, which is we
are a society obsessed with the results. We're obsessed with
the outcome. We're obsessed with the metric. We have completely
and we've completely forgotten the value of process. Right. And
even in what I grew up in marketing and advertising,

(59:56):
right where we knew that fifty percent of advertising work,
we just didn't know which fifty percent we knew that,
and so there was craft and there was process. Now,
because of the Internet, we can actually measure what works
and what doesn't work. So and so you can just
see how we don't care about the value of the
creative anymore. And by the way, there is a strong
argument to say maybe for advertising you don't need to right.

(01:00:19):
I could make another argument which is the reason we
hate advertising is because the craft is lost. Think about it.
Advertising is the only thing, and it's the only sort
of creative thing that exists on the planet where there's
a progress bar on when it will end? Right, downloading
software and advertising literally at the top of the screen

(01:00:41):
is a progress bar. How bad is your product that
you have to tell people it's over soon? On YouTube ads,
there's countdowns, right, and you don't watch the ad.

Speaker 1 (01:00:53):
You watch the countdowns to when.

Speaker 3 (01:00:54):
You can get to skip. Can you imagine an episode
of any of the shows you've ever made with a
progress bar? How torturous does it have to be that
you're forcing people and letting that's the point? And and
and you and I want everybody sitting at this table
we know this right. Which is I am smarter, I'm

(01:01:15):
a better problem solver, I'm better pattern recognition, I'm better
information organizer. Not because there are books with my ideas
in them, but because I wrote them. The excruciating pain
that required immense amounts of help from people around me
to get that thing made is what made me smarter,

(01:01:36):
not the existence of the book. AI can write a
fairly decent version of a book as if it were
my voice. It won't be original, it'll be it'll be derivative,
but it'll be it'll be, it'll be decent. I've done experiment.
It's written some pretty amazing articles.

Speaker 2 (01:01:49):
Oh no, I've had record reviews written in my style.
And I go, it's it's getting better, and it's getting better.

Speaker 3 (01:01:56):
And by the way, it's a tool. But I'm not
learning right. And that's the point, which is I'm all
in favor of the tool, and I'm all in favor
of making better product and quicker product, and a fairly
decent product. But if you're a human being that wants
to go through life and be a better version of
yourself by the end than you were at the beginning,

(01:02:16):
I have some bad news. At some point in the middle,
you're going to have to do some of the work yourself. Yeah,
And when it comes to relationships, I personally would rather
be in a relationship with somebody who wants to do
the work. I would personally want to be in a
relationship with someone who values that I want to do
with the work, and I want to hire people who

(01:02:37):
want to do the work. And I hope that the
people who work for me see that I'm trying to
be a better leader than I was, not just feeding
them the thing that makes them feel good.

Speaker 2 (01:02:45):
Because you were speaking about working with different kinds of people.
Can I read you my question from my cousin Debbie,
who yes, loves you this a way, Hey, this is
a question from Debbie Lombard, who has worked with children, teens,
and adults with developmental disabilities for thirty four years Baby
Boomer leading a team of Gen X, millennials and Gen Z.
She's found your talks bridging generations very helpful. At sixty eight,

(01:03:08):
she was diagnosed with ADHD. With growing awareness of autism,
ADHD and other forms of diversity, would you consider doing
a podcast on creating workplaces where neurodiverse employees and leaders
who support them can thrive while helping others to see
the strengths that they bring.

Speaker 3 (01:03:28):
The neurodiversity. It's like, it's amazing that this has to
be a discovery, right, which is everybody has something wrong
with their body, right, Like I carry all of my
stress and my shoulders. I'm always stiff on my shoulders.
Someone's got a bum knee, someone's got a you know,
a bad back, someone's got freaking you know, acid reflux.

(01:03:53):
They didn't do anything. It's just it's their body. And
nobody has a perfect body. Everybody's got something wrong. Well,
so why would we think that everybody's mind is perfect, right, right?
Like we all have a thing. Somebody's got adhd. You know,
it's a spectrum, it's a little bit, they'll a lot.

Speaker 1 (01:04:14):
What makes life interesting.

Speaker 3 (01:04:15):
Some of us are this, Some of us are that.
You know, we're all scarred by our upbringings to some degree,
and it makes us these beautiful, magical, messy human beings
that we are. So I think it's funny that it's
like we have to call it neurodiversity. We don't have
like body diversity, like every we know that, right, Like
it's just because we can't see it because it's in
the skull post that visual. But I think that the way,

(01:04:39):
And I appreciate her question, and I appreciate what she's
doing so much, and I think she's doing the right thing,
which is whether it's generational or neurodiversity, or someone's upbringing,
or whether they grow up in America or not, or
they grow up rich or they grow up poor, they
grow up you know, it doesn't matter whatever somebody brings
the way we have to approach everybody's with curiosity.

Speaker 2 (01:04:59):
That's it, what you said about generations, it's something fill
you with your the way you've always reached out to
these legends from the generation before. I think about it
with my kids at this stage of life. One of
the things I think is makes some such incredible kids
is they were around there my wife's parents, like, oh,
they were around multiple generations a lot. Yeah, And I

(01:05:19):
think that is again, like the office thing, to be around,
you around people, be around people. That teaches you so much.

Speaker 3 (01:05:25):
Phil has proved it. There are many ways to be
around people, which is why travel is a magical, magical thing,
the most mind expanding thing we can do in life.
I agree. And and the thing the thing that I
actually love about the Europeans which I don't think the
Americans have quite cracked, which is the Americans think you
have to be wealthy to travel. That's absolutely not and
that's not true. And the Europeans know, you don't and

(01:05:50):
you know, and there's entire economies in Europe that like
easy Jet and of course that you can travel anywhere
in Europe. And when you're your ten pounds twenty twenty
euros that's right.

Speaker 1 (01:06:02):
When you're young, you can put up with a little
discomfort in the overseas. We all did, We all did.
When you're my age, you have earned the right to
lie down. Yeah, But when you're twenty something.

Speaker 3 (01:06:14):
Right, and your hotel can be on the outskirts of town,
you know, and it can be a hostel. You don't
have to be in the middle. And we've all done this.

Speaker 2 (01:06:21):
Yes. I remember going to the first time and they called,
they said, do you want the lover's room?

Speaker 3 (01:06:25):
And what that?

Speaker 2 (01:06:26):
It was for young couples. It was in a bed
and breakfast in Paris. It was a room where you
had to walk up a lot of stairs. And that's like,
everyone should stay there.

Speaker 3 (01:06:34):
I remember staying by myself in an attic in Paris,
and it was hot and cramped and peaky. Yes, And
I looked out the window and I said it was Paris.

Speaker 1 (01:06:43):
I always say, you'd get up you. I could only
afford a baguette and a piece of cheese, and I
sat out in the park and I was King Louis
exactly in Paris, exactly right. No one had it any
better than I did.

Speaker 3 (01:06:53):
And I'm and look, you can travel internationally on a budget,
it's entirely possible. But I want Americans to travel America too.
You know, I wish we had high speed trains here.
I wish we had high speed training.

Speaker 1 (01:07:03):
I think it's coming.

Speaker 3 (01:07:05):
I mean, who knows they've been talking about. I mean,
the Aesla is not a high speed train. No, it's
fifteen minutes faster than the regular train, the new one
that they're talking about. Yeah, I mean they said, if
we had European style high speed Japan oh my, like Japan,
the Shinkansen. Like, if we had European or Japanese style, yeah,
high speed trains, you could make Washington, d C. I

(01:07:26):
think in an hour, an hour and a half, something
like that. I mean you could go for dinner, you
go for a meeting from here, No no, no, no,
no no, from New York. I should say that. I
was gonna say, but I bet well for San Francisco,
from LA to San Francisco, you could probably do it
in wasn't an hour?

Speaker 1 (01:07:40):
Wasn't the Musk Company. There was a must company called
hyper Looper right.

Speaker 3 (01:07:44):
Right right right that was doing that. Yeah, I don't
know what happened to that.

Speaker 1 (01:07:47):
It was like it was like get to San Francisco
in a half hour.

Speaker 3 (01:07:49):
From Yeah, from LA that'd be awesome, that'd be awesome.

Speaker 2 (01:07:53):
But for anyone who feels like this is not true,
that you can't travel, or if you have some other
reasons you can't travel, right, I will also say we
had a singer songwriter named Regina spect On recently.

Speaker 3 (01:08:03):
I love Regina.

Speaker 2 (01:08:05):
She said something that was so to me, so upset
I wasn't here.

Speaker 3 (01:08:09):
Well, we'll have to do another one with I've been
a fan of hers before anybody knew who she was.

Speaker 2 (01:08:13):
If you listened to that episode, which you don't have to.
Anything we can do to get more listeners, any any help?

Speaker 1 (01:08:19):
That's the why?

Speaker 3 (01:08:19):
Where one?

Speaker 2 (01:08:20):
Why are we not as popular as you? Okay, Regina,
we will connect you. But here's the thing she said,
is even if you can't afford to travel, she said,
that's the argument for arts education or any kind of
cultural She goes, if you can learn to love paintings,
you can go to a museum and you can travel
the world and can pick up it. If you we
teach our kids instruments in school, they can sit in

(01:08:40):
a room and be taken around.

Speaker 1 (01:08:42):
Order something tonight from a restaurant, you haven't been to
an ethnic restaurant, anything about order something in and you've.

Speaker 3 (01:08:51):
Traveled like this is how the conversation started before we
take the microphones on. Yes, we were comparing Indian food
and Ethiopians exactly right. And I don't like spicy, great,
don't eat something that's spicy.

Speaker 1 (01:09:02):
But you can find something on almost any menu that
you may like.

Speaker 3 (01:09:06):
And expose the kids to different things too. Yes, and
it becomes fun because it makes I'm curious, it makes
them adventurous.

Speaker 1 (01:09:12):
You can always if it's terrible, have a bowl of cereal.
You won't go a bit hungry, but try it.

Speaker 3 (01:09:18):
There's always rice somewhere.

Speaker 1 (01:09:20):
Yes, there's a peanut butter and jelly.

Speaker 3 (01:09:22):
Wait that Ethiopian food, what is it? The pancake that
gira and gira is the bread with the flower called tef.

Speaker 1 (01:09:30):
Right, And if you don't like a spongey spongy.

Speaker 3 (01:09:32):
And yeah, it's it's new. It's waterproof bread. Right, it's great,
it's great, it's so great.

Speaker 1 (01:09:38):
That's our next meal. And we love you and thank
you for this. You're terrific that the to say, is
there anything you'd like to plug before we go? It's
it's your podcast.

Speaker 3 (01:09:53):
A bit of optimism is the podcast? Right, yeah, we're
you know, I'm committed to teaching people the human skills
they need to lead. We're doing that at simonson dot com.
There's lots of great stuff in there.

Speaker 2 (01:10:04):
By the books which I'm going to make sign one
for cousin Debbi.

Speaker 3 (01:10:07):
I will, I will. I guess my publisher would be
angry at me if I didn't say, please check out
the fifteenth anniversary of start with why I updated it,
put some new stuff in there, and and I'm very
I'm very proud of that book. It's the o G
that's great original gangster book.

Speaker 1 (01:10:25):
When you get older, start with who, start with who?
That'll be You're very old.

Speaker 3 (01:10:31):
It's because I'm hard of hearing that.

Speaker 1 (01:10:32):
Right, did you meet so and so? Who?

Speaker 3 (01:10:35):
Yeah, that's grandpa. He always starts with who exactly?

Speaker 2 (01:10:39):
You just made the Golden Circle seem so much older
when you write, you're golden circles so hip and yet
he just yeah who?

Speaker 3 (01:10:49):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (01:10:49):
Then the last one, start with what so good? Simon Sinek, everybody,
Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Speaker 5 (01:11:01):
Naked Lunch is a podcast by Phil Rosenthal and David Wilde.
Theme song and music by Brad Paisley, produced by Will
Sterling and Ryan Tillotson, with video editing by Daniel Ferrara
and motion graphics by Ali Ahmed. Executive produced by Phil Rosenthal,
David Wilde, and our consulting journalist is Pamela Chellan. If
you enjoyed the show, share it with a friend, But
if you can't take my word for it, take Phil's.

Speaker 1 (01:11:23):
And don't forget to leave a good rating and review.
We like five stars.

Speaker 5 (01:11:26):
You know, thanks for listening to Naked Lunch, a Lucky
Bastard's production.