October 6, 2025 • 41 mins
Two managers trade stories and tactics for managing up—how to spot when it works, when it backfires, and how to propose solutions that win you visibility without fueling Friday fire drills. Along the way, we get honest about ego, boundaries, and using small wins to open bigger doors.
• secret pod hidden on Discord and community update
• abacus mental math and why process beats memorization
• the case for managing up as a core career skill
• when not to manage up in toxic or micromanaged teams
• diagnosing ego, credit-sharing, and trust signals
• bring solutions not problems, with practical scripts
• design intake, dashboards, and friction-free status
• asking for visibility, running meetings, presenting wins
• promotions, psychology, and the role of relationships
• boundaries for late “urgent” requests and Friday chaos
• building team culture with rituals and recognition
Share this podcast with your friends, family, neighbors, co-workers, manage up, say, hey, I listened to this episode and I thought you might need a little bit of these skills for yourself
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_03 (00:11):
I don't know what that is.
I think that's a duck.
I'm not a hundred percent sure,but that's a duck.
SPEAKER_00 (00:26):
No, it's not.
Interrupting duck.
SPEAKER_01 (00:32):
Interrupting duck.
You missed your chance.
Failure.
SPEAKER_00 (00:40):
Oh, got him.
Live on the air.
Welcome back to CorporateStrategy, the podcast that could
have been an email.
I'm Bruce.
And I'm Clark.
Hey Clark, guess what?
What's that?
Secret Pod.
Ooh, Secret Pod.
Secret Pod.
Tell me more.
Tell me more.
(01:00):
Some of the people arewondering.
Some people, some, some of thepeople were messaging me on
Twitter asking me, BruceBangers, saying, Hey, where was
last week's pod?
And I like, you didn't hear itbecause it wasn't on the feed.
It was a secret pod.
A secret pod.
It was too personal.
Too secret.
So where is the only place youcould see, listen, listen to the
(01:24):
secret pod, Clark E boy?
Clark Kitty.
SPEAKER_01 (01:30):
Thank you for correcting that.
If you didn't say Clark Kitty, Iwas gonna be so disappointed in
you.
Yeah, you got it.
Well, Bruce Baby, listen tothis.
It's on our Discord.
It's on our Discord.
unknown (01:45):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (01:45):
That is where you can find it.
The Secret Pod.
I also had people reaching outto me saying, where's the
episode?
Are you guys just skipping thisweek?
And I said, no.
You gotta find it.
And it's hidden on our Discord.
And it's so easy to join.
You just scroll down.
Scroll down.
No, do it.
Do it.
Scroll down.
Okay.
No, you.
I'm looking at you.
Do you do it with your finger?
(02:06):
I'm okay.
There you go.
There it is.
I see it.
SPEAKER_00 (02:09):
I see it.
SPEAKER_01 (02:10):
There's a there's a link tree.
L N K T R E E.
Click on that, and then there'sa link to join our Discord.
You just hit the join Discord.
It's literally one click.
That's it.
I'm clicking, but nothing'shappening.
Oh, wait, it's my internet.
I think it's your internet,sorry.
Yeah, it'll work if you haveinternet.
You know, what you just did, Ithink is indicative of what our
society will be once we movephones to our faces with
(02:34):
glassware, and everybody's justscrolling like this with their
fingers in mid-air, and they'redoing these wrist gestures, and
you're like, what are you doing?
And the reality is they'recontrolling what's on their
eyes.
SPEAKER_00 (02:44):
Have you ever seen um the videos of the kids who
can do the math?
Like math, like like a mathathlete, but like to the next
level.
I don't know how to say thiswithout using words that I feel
like might offend people.
Um there are children who areincredibly smart and they are
(03:05):
able to do math, but if you everwatch them do it, they're like
shaking their hand in the air,right?
Like they're literally justpoking an invisible screen in
the air.
Have you ever seen that before?
I have.
I know what you're talkingabout.
I've seen that.
Do you know what they're doing?
SPEAKER_01 (03:17):
No, I mean I imagine they're writing down the
equations.
SPEAKER_00 (03:21):
No, it's so much more interesting than that.
Really?
So, uh, yeah, what they'redoing, you're familiar with an
abacus, I'm sure.
I'm sliding.
What child doesn't know what anabacus is, right?
So these kids basically have avirtual abacus.
So they're able to docomputations in the air.
(03:42):
The the shaking of the hand isthem moving the beads on the
abacus.
No.
So they'll they'll watch ascreen and the screen will flash
all these numbers at them, likeand you know, maths plus 472,
minus 369, plus 27, like andthey're they're abacusing.
That's that's exactly whatthey're doing.
And part of the the way itworks, the way they're able to
(04:03):
do math so quickly, is becausethey've they've mastered the
abacus.
The hand movement is connectinglike the brain capability of
doing that math.
It's so cool.
These kids are like wizards.
SPEAKER_01 (04:17):
That's insane.
Yeah, it is.
That feels like the mostineffective way to do it.
I think it's actually the mosteffective way to do it.
Maybe.
Maybe, but you think like timestable.
Well, you know, we do mathwrong.
Maybe that's what the issue is.
Maybe we're just we learned mathwrong.
SPEAKER_00 (04:38):
And if you if you look at kids' math today, I
think it's what's common commoncore or whatever it is.
Um, they're they're actuallylearning math more in an abacus
style of way versus how welearned, which is like you learn
your multiplication tables,right?
You memorize all these six timeseight is 48.
(04:58):
Oh, I know that.
But like you don't know how thatis.
You just know what it is.
And the way they're teachingmath today, it's more about the
how and like getting the brainto do math appropriately versus
just memorizing outcomes, whichkids like us did.
SPEAKER_01 (05:16):
That's so interesting.
Yeah, but it's so true becauseit's like the second you go over
the 12 times tables, you'relike, 13 times 14 is what like
it's impossible to do becauseyou you don't, yeah, you didn't
memorize it.
Right.
But if you actually knew likerealistically what you're doing
and how to break that down intosmaller pieces that you can
actually do in your head, likethat's a much more effective
(05:37):
way.
Because what I do in thosesituations is you take the
closest thing yet you know, andthen you just add the additional
stuff on top of it.
And the abacus maybe is theright way.
SPEAKER_00 (05:46):
The abacus has always been the right way.
We were wrong, they were right,uh, we were bad.
And now the new kids arelearning good, so good for them.
I'm happy.
I'm happy to know the nextgeneration of adults in the
corporate workplace will atleast know how to do math good.
Because I can't.
I'm terrible at it.
SPEAKER_01 (06:04):
We can only say this just because we do have a lot of
European listeners.
We can only say this forAmericans.
You may have done it right.
In your learning, you may havedone it right.
But in America, in ourdemographic, we learned it
wrong.
SPEAKER_00 (06:17):
Right.
I mean wrong.
SPEAKER_01 (06:19):
I mean right.
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (06:20):
Correct.
SPEAKER_01 (06:20):
Yeah.
Double negative, you know?
SPEAKER_00 (06:22):
Affirmative.
SPEAKER_01 (06:23):
Yeah.
You know, this actually goesright into our topic.
No way.
Because how are you gonna makethat happen?
You're not gonna do it.
If we only pushed back on thepeople that told us that
multiplication tables and memorymemorizing those were the way to
do math, then maybe we wouldhave flipped the whole thing on
(06:44):
its head and been able to learnthe right way to make us more
effective and productive in thereal world.
SPEAKER_00 (06:50):
I like your optimism.
I really do.
I really do.
That's great.
Let's let's let's run with that.
We could have changed the worldif we only pushed back.
SPEAKER_01 (07:00):
Sometimes you've got to manage up, and that is the
day's topic.
Manage that up.
Nice.
I love it.
Yeah.
Yeah, we we had a little bit ofa break, we did a secret pod,
and we did not get back tomanaging up.
But what led us into this?
What was the topic that led intomanaging up?
I totally how am I forgettingtwo episodes before this?
SPEAKER_00 (07:22):
Uh, we were talking about you know getting promoted,
getting you know, plans, and youknow, how how you how you ask
for a promotion or how you caneven grow at a remote office,
right?
All of these kind of things,yeah.
Yeah, with Sarah, right?
SPEAKER_01 (07:38):
Sarah brought up that topic.
She was like, I saw somethingaround um, can you actually grow
meaningfully in your career ifyou're remote?
And that well, that's what kindof led us down the path.
It was a really fun episode oflike, is it possible to grow?
And I think uh to to spoil it,you should go back and listen to
the episode, but to spoil it, weboth said, yes, we do think in
this day and age you canmeaningfully move up in your
(08:00):
career, but it does depend onyour overarching company and if
they have a physical presence orif they are you know completely
hybrid.
That's a very important factor.
But then at the end, webasically got into it's not all
about what you do, it is aboutthe manager and them create
opportunities for you oropportunity or you know, areas
where you can grow too, becauseif they are constantly capping
(08:23):
you to be able to grow, thenthere's no way you're going to
be achieved be able to achievewhatever career goals that you
have.
SPEAKER_00 (08:29):
Yep.
It's that's such a necessaryskill.
And I think it's one that is notuh it's not a magical salve,
right?
Like there's there's no promiseor yeah, you bite into that meat
chomp.
There's no promise or guarantee.
I was talking to our audience,not Clark, by the way.
Okay, uh, there's no guaranteethat anything we tell you today
is actually going to work, butit's still a necessary skill,
(08:52):
and knowing how to approach itand do it is very important.
SPEAKER_03 (08:57):
Yeah, it's one of those things that it can go very
wrong.
And it's really scary.
It can be scary.
SPEAKER_01 (09:08):
Like doing this is not easy to do, and especially
when you're early on in yourcareer, like you don't
understand that that's evennecessary.
Because you just assume yourmanager is gonna do all these
things for you.
And the reality of it is they'renot gonna do anything unless you
get a really good manager foryou at all.
Yeah.
And I think that's like thecrappy part that like I'm
(09:28):
thinking about now.
It's we have to set the contextof before we go into this, what
are the signs where you need todo this, maybe?
And uh what are the signs thatyou shouldn't do this, even
though you probably need to dothis?
What comes to mind for you?
What is the sign you shouldn'tyou shouldn't manage up?
(09:51):
What kind of scenario would youput yourself in?
SPEAKER_00 (09:54):
I think toxic or hostile management, where if
you're in a micromanagementenvironment or if your manager
is constantly critical,criticizing, uh belittling you,
it it if you're stuck in one ofthose scenarios, managing up is
only gonna hurt you more thanit's going to help you.
Um, I think that's theclear-cut, easy answer.
(10:15):
It gets harder when you have amanager that cares about you, or
maybe like is very invested inyou and they have a plan for
you.
Then managing up can also hurtyou because you might be
conflicting with their visionfor your growth, and they could
see it as not having trust inthem.
(10:37):
I think the easiest place wheremanaging up actually works is
when you have sort of a let'ssay more autonomy-oriented
manager that really has notoverly invested in you, but also
micromanaging and is more justlike, hey, if you want to take
this off my plate, by all meansgo ahead and do it, right?
(10:58):
Like that's your golden windowto get in there and really make
a name for yourself by doingsome some upward management
tasks.
Do you think it's all about ego?
SPEAKER_01 (11:08):
Like, is it about assessing the ego of your
manager?
SPEAKER_00 (11:12):
I think everything is about ego in corporate.
SPEAKER_01 (11:16):
If you really step back and think about it,
everything.
SPEAKER_00 (11:19):
Everything, like truly every single operation of
existing in corporate to someextent, is either dealing with
an overly active or lack of ego.
SPEAKER_01 (11:31):
Yep.
Yeah, it's those are the thingsthat I think you gotta look for
in the managing up scenario.
It's like if your boss alwaystakes the credit, no matter
what, like never credits a team,is always like, oh yeah, you
know, I did such a good job onthis, look at what I'm doing and
my team is accomplishing, butnever like, never puts the
spotlight on you to be like,well, Bruce Baby did all the
(11:54):
work here.
Like, I don't don't give me theapplause.
Give it to Bruce Baby, he's theone who did all the work, and
giving you the opportunities toshine.
If it's never there for you,like the ego of your manager, if
you try to go to them and belike, hey, I want or I think you
know, it'd be really great ifyou give me the opportunity to
speak at this, it's just goingto get bad real quick.
(12:14):
They're not gonna see whatyou're trying to do by creating
opportunity for growth foryourself or to expand your skill
set or whatever it is.
Your egotistic manager is notgoing to help you in this path.
And there's no managing upthere, unfortunately.
You gotta just do whatever theysay.
I also think to your point, likecommand and control,
micromanaging, telling youexactly what needs to be done,
(12:36):
always solving problems insteadof asking you to solve them.
Like that type of scenario is aperfect example where it's like,
don't do this.
That's a bad idea.
SPEAKER_00 (12:45):
Oh, I think that's that's actually a really good
sort of entryway into themanaging up functionality set.
What what you just said.
We love to bring problems to ourmanagers, right?
Like, oh, dude, you would notbelieve what Janice did.
Like, Janice is just the worstat her job, fumble the TPS
(13:06):
reports.
Again, can you believe it?
Janice sucks so bad.
Versus, hey, I've noticed thatJanice is having a really
difficult time when it comes toTPS reports.
And I root I root caused it, andit turns out the way that we're
actually doing TPS reports isit's non-intuitive.
(13:27):
Do you mind if I go and build uhjust some training and
enablement around how to receiveand you know submit a TPS report
for all of our employees and runthem through it?
I think it would help both folksunderstand the task as well as
it would help you uh get whatyour desired outcome is from
sending out the reports in thefirst place.
SPEAKER_01 (13:49):
I love so many aspects of that.
And if you abstracted it awayfrom like down to the basics of
what you just did, youidentified a problem that needs
to be solved that your team isresponsible for, and someone's
responsible for adjacent to yourteam.
Yep, or someone manager in thiscase, right?
(14:10):
And it's it got a meaningfulimpact.
So you identified this is theproblem, I understand why it's
important, and if we fix it,here's the result that I could
see us having.
Like those three things are sokey to being able to manage up,
and then ancillary to that,you're creating a pathway for
you to receive visibility and tohave a bigger impact at your
(14:32):
organization by taking on workoutside of just your day-to-day.
And that's where you're lookingfor the your manager in a good
scenario to be like, actually,yeah, that's a great idea.
Like then we can get you, youknow, in with this team, you can
be able to demo this.
And as a good manager, they'regonna find opportunities to be
like, absolutely.
In our next town hall, if itgoes well, let's bring up the
(14:52):
success story of how we did thisand how it made a difference and
really highlight you.
Like a good manager will dothat, and you're kind of just
bringing the opportunities tothe table for them to do that.
And so the good manager will,you know, expand upon your idea
or give you guidance to say,actually, there's something
bigger than that.
Like, what if you did thisinstead?
And so a good manager is goingto look for the bigger
opportunities that you don'thave purview to to expand the
(15:14):
purview that you have.
I love that.
SPEAKER_00 (15:16):
Yeah.
And I think that's that is theperfect opportunity for managing
up, is when you identify achallenge, you come up with a
solution, you present saidsolution, and then see if you
can get an opportunity to go andand and take care of it
yourself, right?
Because you're taking work offyour manager's plate by doing
(15:37):
this, you're potentiallyimproving their well-being and
their sort of mental stabilityat their job, but you're also
likely going to help othersaround you.
And that's the whole reason whywe do it, right?
Managers like Clark and I arenot perfect and we make
mistakes.
And I love when my team comes tome with solutions to problems
(15:59):
and it's like, hey, can I likeyeah, go?
Do do whatever you want to do.
I it was a terrible idea.
I want you to do it anyway.
I don't care.
Like, it means so much becauseyou know, we did our
appreciation series, acts ofservice.
Managing up is absolutely an actof service with your manager.
SPEAKER_01 (16:17):
Yeah, 100%.
Another great example is like ifyou have one-on-ones with your
manager, say, hey, I know inevery single one-on-one, you're
always asking about like thestatus of projects.
If you want the most real-timestatuses, I actually built you a
Jira dashboard.
You can check it at any time tosee how we're progressing
towards our goal.
Like then I knew, like, Iobserved something that they're
obviously interested in.
(16:38):
I already created a solutionthat's pretty easy for me to do,
and I'm providing value to them.
And like all those things aregreat opportunities to you know,
show that to your manager thatyou're willing to go the extra
mile so that hopefully they willbe able to open more opportunity
for you.
Or then every singleconversation, you don't have to
give your status report.
You can talk about moremeaningful things so you open up
(16:59):
more room to talk about managingup or getting more opportunity
or whatever it is.
Agree.
Completely agree.
I love that.
I'm thinking about anotherscenario too.
So as the manager, and maybe weput ourselves, let's put our
manager's shoes on.
You got your shoes on?
I'm looking for your manager'sshoes.
Are they there?
(17:20):
Oh, yeah, he's got he's got noshoes on, and that's the way
managers roll.
I never have shoes on.
I walk around barefoot in theoffice every day.
Put your get your nasty feet offthe camera.
They actually weren't nasty.
SPEAKER_00 (17:32):
Can you imagine if we live streamed this show and
everyone just got an unabashedview at the bottom of my foot
for 15 seconds?
People pay for that, by the way.
SPEAKER_01 (17:41):
They do, which is I'm giving it to you for free.
What a world we live in.
SPEAKER_00 (17:45):
Those little piggies.
They went to the market and wentwee wee wee all the way home.
SPEAKER_01 (17:50):
They really did.
At least they were clean.
I mean, that's debatable, butyeah, I'll take it.
We're going back to managing up,I'm thinking about other
opportunities too, where it'slike you're feeling stunted in
your growth and you're doingeverything.
Like you're going to yourmanager, you're saying, hey, all
the you know, all the things youwant me to achieve, I was able
to accomplish.
(18:10):
Like, I feel like I'm ready forthis next step, this next
promotion.
And then they're like, Well, youknow, I don't know if you have
enough visibility.
Like, I don't think we're goingto be able to swing it this
year.
That's the perfect opportunityto start that managing up
conversation, being like, okay,yes, you know, is there anything
you can do to help me get morevisibility?
Like putting it back on yourmanager.
And like when I have my managerson shoes on, it's like, I
(18:31):
sometimes don't think aboutthose things that I may be doing
that is getting in the way of myteam because it's just so, you
know, rhythmic and you know, souh cycle of the project or
whatever that I'm just so usedto running something when in
reality I actually need to stepback and let this person run the
meeting.
And so an employee coming to meto your point earlier about
(18:51):
taking work off your plate andsaying, Hey, you know, this
meeting, I know you run it everytime, but I think I'm ready.
Like, how about you let me tryrunning it this next time?
And like that to me is like thebest feeling in the world.
It's like, oh my goodness,that'd be incredible that I
don't have to prep, I don't haveto get the slide deck, I don't
have to coordinate the material,I don't have to be on for this
meeting.
I can just let you drive and bea supporting actor rather than a
driver.
(19:12):
Like, that is like the perfectopportunity for you to step in
to take something off yourmanager's plate and to get more
visibility that will hopefullyget you, you know, to whatever
your your career goal is.
SPEAKER_00 (19:23):
Couldn't agree more.
It's also, I think it's arelationship builder, right?
Like there might be a reasonyour manager isn't, and this is
I hate to say this.
Like, I just hate to say thisout loud, but like getting
promoted does not mean that yougot you did a good job, and it
also doesn't mean that you gotpromoted, or if you didn't get
promoted because you didn't do agood job.
(19:45):
So much of again, I go back tothe earlier statement, ego,
right?
Like, so much of work isego-focused, ego-based.
What do they always say whenyou're looking for a job?
It's not what you know, it's whoyou know.
And your manager is part of yournetwork.
Your manager needs to be someonethat likes you.
They you want them to like you,you want them to the you want
(20:08):
your manager.
Well, not only that, you wantthem to think, hey, I'm a good
manager, right?
Like, you need to make them feelthat way.
And the only way you can do thatvia managing up is to make sure
you set goals for them to makethem feel like they're a good
(20:28):
manager, right?
Like, I feel like a crappymanager all the time because I
fail my team all the time.
And they hate my guts, andthat's fine, right?
Like, you know, I live with thatevery day of my life in the back
of my mind, thinking thesepeople might one day assault me
on the street.
I have to carry that with me.
But, you know, if I did care, ifI did care about my team, I
(20:49):
would think, hmm, what should Ido to make Janice believe that
I'm a good manager?
And what Janice could do is say,hey, Bruce, you know, I I've
really been going hard this yearon all of my projects.
I feel like I've executed well.
Uh, is it possible that we cantalk about next steps for me,
(21:11):
career growth?
And because I have arelationship with Janice and I
care about what Janice thinksabout me, because I'm an
egomaniac, I'm gonna say, okay,well, Janice, I need to figure
out a way to promote her.
So maybe I need to spend sometime thinking up a career plan,
building out something for her.
Because if I don't do this,she's gonna think less of me.
So, like, you can you can usepsychology and ego as a weapon
(21:32):
if you have that kind ofrelationship.
Yeah, because the alternativeis, oh, I really like Janice.
She's a great worker, and I feellike I really let her down, and
she's not gonna, she's she'sdemoralized, she's not gonna
work as hard for me anymore.
And she probably thinks I'm aterrible manager.
Like, I won't be able to workwith her again.
Yeah, like those are your twopaths, right?
So you you do have to play alittle psychology.
And I would always advise you dowhat's best for you.
(21:57):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (21:57):
Man, that's so interesting.
Like in the broader, the broaderscheme of the conversation, the
relationship.
I also think it's even in thoselike micro interactions, like
even in your one-on-one, likejust saying small things here or
there, of like, you know, I Ilove how how much work we take
on.
Like, you must be so proud ofthe team you've built and how
(22:19):
much we've grown over the lastcouple of years.
Like those types of words ofaffirmation go a really long way
with building that relationshipwith your manager who doesn't
always feel appreciated.
I think that's something toremember too, is like they might
not feel appreciated in theirrole because no one's reaching
out to them and telling themthey're doing a good job.
(22:40):
So you doing that, even if youdon't think they're doing the
best job, helps build thatrelationship and you know, you
guys having a better rapport.
SPEAKER_00 (22:49):
One thing I love to do with my manager, and I I I
can say this openly and andproudly because it's true, is
you know, as a manager who has amanager, I feel like I'm saying
the word manager too much, andnow it's become weird for me to
think the word manager out loud.
I'm gonna try and move past it.
Don't do it.
Hmm.
(23:10):
Manager.
Manager.
Manager count 12.
I'm 12 in the last 30 seconds.
I'm really stuck right now.
Uh I think the uh the hmm.
The thing that the thing that Ido that works, I'm really stuck
on this word.
It's driving me nuts.
Don't you hate when thathappens?
Isn't it the worst?
SPEAKER_01 (23:30):
You can't get around it and you find like a thing you
say or like a mannerism you haveand you can't shake it.
Yeah.
I can't shake it.
I literally can't shake it.
I have to plow through.
SPEAKER_00 (23:38):
I have to plow through.
Just do it.
I like to focus on and highlightgrowth whenever I get the
chance, right?
Because I don't know if they seeit.
And that's not their job to seethe growth of my team.
So I make it my point to show mymanager, say, hey, you know,
Janice, Melanie, Marqueen,Manager, they're all doing
(24:03):
really good jobs.
And look at look at how they'vegrown quarter over quarter to
remind my manager, you know,like, hey, you know, me as a
manager, I'm doing my job.
One, but two, my team is doingtheir job.
And three, like, just you know,just to, you know, hey, this
makes you look good too, right?
Like from top down, it makeseveryone look good.
(24:23):
And I think it's important forthe middle managers like us to
manage in both directions well.
And that's that's the hardestthing, in in my opinion, as God.
We have to find a differentword.
As a leader who has people ontheir team.
There you go.
As a people leader.
(24:43):
As a people leader, you have togo both ways and you have to be
very good at it.
And I would actually argue, asan IC, it's great to manage up,
and it's a good, it's a goodskill to have.
But as a people leader, it isalmost a requirement if you want
to be good at your job, to beable to manage down and up
simultaneously.
(25:04):
And if you can't do that, youshouldn't be a manager.
Yeah, that's true.
Well, you won't last long as amanager if you can't do that.
I I don't know about that.
I think you'll you'll lastforever and everyone will hate
you.
And they'll write your name inthe bathroom wall next to an
obscene image.
SPEAKER_01 (25:20):
I wish we could say that this was like made up and
you just thought of that on thespot, but no, that's real life.
That happens.
SPEAKER_00 (25:28):
That's the craziest thing about the words you've
just said.
I can see it because I lived it.
I was there.
I wrote it on the wall.
What?
Uh anyway.
Did you just admit guilt?
Never admit guilt.
Never.
Never.
I can okay.
You want to hear you want tohear uh Bruce's crime history?
Yes, please.
I used to vandalize the hell outof bathrooms.
(25:50):
Like I would keep a sharpie inmy pocket just at all times, and
I would just write on walls.
Yeah, yeah.
What did you write?
Younger, younger me.
This is like, you know,20-year-old Bruce, 20-year-old
Bruce Banger.
I was a I was a bathroom wallartist.
Oh, yeah.
What did you what did you draw?
What did you write?
What didn't I write?
(26:10):
Uh, lyrics to songs, fun pages.
I would always draw these goofylittle cute pictures.
And I just, you know, what whatcould you do?
I'm in there, you know,committing a crime with my
bowels, and I'm bored.
This was I didn't have like asmartphone until I mean I had I
had smartphones, but they werethey were really crappy.
(26:30):
Yeah, yeah.
I didn't get a smartphone untillike my junior year of college
that was actually like aniPhone.
So, you know, what was I gonnado in the in the bathroom other
than writing?
Newspaper.
Newspaper.
See in my age, I was too youngfor the newspaper, but too old
(26:51):
and too poor for the iPhone.
So we had to make our own funwith Sharpies.
SPEAKER_01 (26:59):
When you said 20, I mean I almost just spit out my
water in my mouth when you said20.
Because like I can totally seeit, you being like a teenager,
you're in high school, like Ithink everyone's kind of been
there at one point.
20?
Well, I was a good kid.
SPEAKER_00 (27:14):
So you had your bad, your your bad streak.
Yeah, my bad years was once youstarted to take sharpies and tag
the bathrooms.
I actually uh I once had a goalto use every single toilet at my
college, and I got pretty close.
There were a few I couldn't getto, just access reasons, but uh
I always did the deed at home.
SPEAKER_01 (27:35):
I never took it to work, to school.
That was too much.
Why?
It just wasn't as comfortable.
SPEAKER_00 (27:41):
You know, there's nothing like being at home.
To to bring it all back home,boss makes a dollar, I make a
dime.
That's why I poop on companytime.
What about school where you'repaying to go there?
Even more reason.
I'm not gonna waste my owntoilet paper.
I'm paying for this toiletpaper.
Clog my parents' pipes at home.
(28:02):
No, I'm saving that.
I'm making a deposit at the oldeducational institution of
higher learning.
You left your mark, didn't you?
You left your mark.
In in more ways than one.
SPEAKER_01 (28:17):
Well, going back, all let's go back to the topic.
Manager Okay, let's go.
I got two more scenarios.
Let's get back on track here.
Okay.
I got two more scenarios in you.
In you.
In you.
Scenario coming out soon.
No, no, I said in you becauseit's future manager Bruce, and
they're just sitting and waitingto be activated.
So they'll come out soon forsure.
(28:38):
Your poor team.
Teach me some.
It's getting really, reallyinteresting at the latter half
of that the podcast here.
Um, okay.
Bad scenarios that you have tomanage up.
Your boss always loves to causea fire drill at 4 p.m.
on Fridays.
(28:58):
They have a routine, they end upgoing through their emails, last
thing of the day on Friday forthe whole week, and then they
just start firing notes ateverybody.
Hey, Bruce, I need you to jumpon this like right away.
I didn't know this was happeningthis week.
It's an urgent issue.
How do you manage up in ascenario where they're just
causing swirl?
SPEAKER_03 (29:17):
I don't even know.
SPEAKER_00 (29:19):
So I have two answers here to this one.
The first is the right one, andthe second is what I'd actually
do.
Um the the managing up way isactually to say to your manager
on your one-on-one or wheneveryou meet with them, say, hey,
Frank.
(29:39):
Uh I noticed that like you'rejust getting a lot of email uh
that you know just comes intoyour box.
Would would you mind if weactually created like a shared
alias for requests so that way Icould take this prioritization
off your plate when it comes tothese specific requests and and
delegate them to the team?
Or you know, is there Way that Ican like basically whatever
(30:02):
whatever is causing them to gocheck all their email at 4 p.m.
on a Friday, root cause wherethe email is coming from and see
if you can short cycle it uh andpresent that option to them.
So if it's coming from aspecific person or a specific
team, talk to them and say, Hey,you know, would you mind adding
me to the CC on this?
So that way you're not waitingfor prioritization.
(30:23):
Instead, if it comes through andI can get to it earlier, I'll
take it on or whatever.
I think that's that's the rightanswer.
I agree.
I think I think you know that'sit.
SPEAKER_01 (30:32):
It's like so my answer is the problem.
Understand that you saidsomething important.
It's like understand theproblem, understand how to drive
the value, and then bring it upwith them to say, hey, exactly
like you did.
It's like, hey, I noticed, youknow, I I you have a ton of
email.
You have so much going on, andevery single time you send these
notes, we have to kind ofscramble and figure out the
(30:53):
answer.
I actually got ahead of that.
I created an intake process.
Now the requests are coming tous.
We will send you a report at theend of the week so you know it's
all taken care of.
And like that is incrediblebecause the manager is gonna be
like, oh wow, that's gonna saveme a lot of time.
I'm not gonna feel stressedgoing into the weekend.
Like, that's awesome.
They're gonna love that.
SPEAKER_00 (31:11):
And that's not what I would do, by the way.
What would you say to us?
What I would do is I would closethe lid and I would uh disable
notifications on all my devices,and then on Monday when you're
like, Hey, where were you?
I couldn't get hold of you.
It's like, yeah, man.
On Fridays, I disappear.
I'm actually a big believer incomplete disconnecting.
I go out into the forest and Inature bathe.
(31:32):
Uh, you know, I've got a littletent out there, and you can't
get me after five o'clockbecause my obligations are
filled.
So, you know, in the future, ifyou want to do that kind of
thing, why don't you do yourfreaking job and uh give it to
me earlier in the week?
SPEAKER_03 (31:47):
Nature bathed, huh?
unknown (31:49):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (31:49):
Never heard that one.
Yeah, no.
I go out there full exposed.
No, you don't.
No, of course it's a total lie,Clark.
I just don't feel like helpingthis incompetent Rube who waits
till 4 p.m.
on a Friday.
Like, why do I want to help thisperson succeed?
They suck, they deserve to befired.
(32:10):
I'm not gonna enable this,they're not gonna help me grow.
Why am I gonna waste my time tomake their life better?
They suck, not me.
I'm gonna go live my life andenjoy my weekend.
SPEAKER_01 (32:19):
I'm I'm crying over here because I'm envisioning
like if this happened to you andyou said this, and then they
decided to call you over Slackor Teams or whatever, like video
call, and then you hop on thecall and you're just fully
exposed, as you said, like in atent and being like, Yeah, I
told you this was gonna be thesituation.
You shouldn't have called meafter five on a Friday.
(32:40):
And then guess what?
This is the ultimate hack.
They'll never do it again.
They'll be like, Hold out.
SPEAKER_00 (32:45):
Here's the thing even if even if you just
completely go A-WOL in thiscase, they still won't do it
again because you werecompletely unreliable and they
can't fire you for it.
What are they Oh HR, um, so whenI drop the ball on my emails, I
can't get in touch with my teamon Friday nights and weekends.
Uh, I think I think we shouldconsider removing this person.
(33:06):
Like, no, they will not promoteyou and you will be stunted in
your career growth.
But sometimes that's better thandealing with the asshattery that
comes from management like this.
Just, you know, my personalopinion.
SPEAKER_01 (33:18):
I agree.
I like that answer.
I like that answer.
For the people that are actuallyexperiencing this, do the first
thing, not the second thing.
It'll it'll turn out much betterfor you.
Second scenario, you ready?
And this one has happened to me.
This one has happened to me.
When you're on a team with acertain type of manager, nobody
has the courage to speak up, butsomebody has to.
(33:41):
So the team ends up talking toeach other and they're like,
okay, yeah, we see this behaviora lot.
For me, it was I'm I sometimesforget how important team
building is because we're justso busy all the time that I
don't like set aside the time tocelebrate wins.
And so the team got together andthey all went through one
person.
They said, Hey, they came to meand they're like, Hey, we're
(34:03):
doing so much great work.
You know, talking to the team,they think it'd be awesome if we
could like celebrate that oncein a while.
Like maybe even just like goout, get a drink together, just
spend some of that timetogether.
And for me, I was like, ohshoot, you're right.
When was the last time we didthat?
And they're like, Yeah, likeeight months ago.
And we've had like 26 releasessince then.
We should make this like aregular thing.
(34:24):
You know, why don't we make thisquarterly?
And we can go out, celebrate ourwins, get together as a team, do
something fun.
And you know, if you're okaywith it, let's use some of the
budget and like plan a funevent.
I'm like, yeah, you're right,that's a great idea.
So that's like the managing upwhere, again, going back to what
we were talking about earlier, Iwas oblivious to it just because
like those things, you know,quality time is not the highest
(34:46):
on my list for working with myteam.
And so I am kind of blindsidedby that, and I'm happy when my
team brings up those things thatare for the greater good of the
team, because then I knowthey're looking out for them,
then I know they're looking tobuild a more collaborative
culture, like the all thepositive things you want your
team doing.
So those are the muchappreciated times when I love it
when my team is managing up.
SPEAKER_00 (35:07):
Yeah, that is great.
I I love that.
And and I truly believe it is atool that really only is used
for good.
When when you know how to manageup well, that I don't think
there's a way you can abuse thatsystem or or use it for evil.
It benefits everybody.
And if you can do it, and I Isay can because you're not
(35:28):
always guaranteed to have amanager that's gonna be
receptive to this, but if youare in a situation where you
can, it will benefit you sotremendously, which is why it's
important you learn how to doit.
And you do it often, wheneveryou see the chance to do 100%.
SPEAKER_01 (35:42):
I think we crushed it.
We can know I'm gonna when to doit, when not to do it, what the
strategies are when you bringthose things up and how to kind
of you know go about pattingthem on the back a little bit,
positive, negative, sandwichingit in for that review cycle,
bringing them solutions toproblems and not problems
themselves, and showing that youunderstand the value,
(36:03):
identifying opportunities whereyou can expand your visibility,
your career growth, what it is,whatever it is, and asking them
to give you permission to dothose things, and then just
being proactive, like noticingthings that need to be done or a
pattern and how you canpotentially get ahead of that to
better help your manager.
All those things are gonna go,you know, really, really
positively towards your careergrowth.
SPEAKER_00 (36:25):
Yep.
Couldn't agree more.
It's such a great skill to have,and I think it is.
I think you crushed it, Clark.
SPEAKER_01 (36:32):
Oh, I think you did.
And it's scary.
It's scary.
So don't feel bad if this isscary for you, but you gotta
start somewhere.
Pick something small and do it.
It will make a big difference.
SPEAKER_00 (36:40):
And and that's the that's the growth capability
too.
Is it you do it one with alittle small thing, you'll sort
of be like, oh, that wasn't sobad.
Yeah, I can't.
I'll do more again.
I can do more, and youabsolutely can.
I believe in you, listener.
Nice job.
We nailed it.
You did a nice job.
SPEAKER_03 (36:57):
I'm proud of you.
Proud of you, Clark Kidding.
Yeah, you too originally.
Thanks, Clark Kitty.
SPEAKER_00 (37:04):
You know, I'd I do what I can.
SPEAKER_03 (37:08):
Yeah, so uh you feel good, I feel good.
SPEAKER_00 (37:11):
Alright, I'll see you next week.
Alright, well, sounds soundslike a plan.
I mean, uh okay.
SPEAKER_03 (37:16):
Alright, maybe we can Okay.
No, don't worry, I'm just gonnago.
I'm a little sad it's over now.
I kinda wanted to you know hangout.
SPEAKER_00 (37:29):
Yeah, talk about it.
SPEAKER_01 (37:33):
Managing up.
Yeah, you love sports ball, so Iknow we can get real deep on
that topic.
SPEAKER_00 (37:38):
Talk about the points that were earned on the
last game.
All the the units that werescored.
You watching the game tonight?
You watch the game tonight andoh, am I Oh those those
buckenskins, they're reallybringing the the heat with their
offense.
SPEAKER_01 (38:00):
They're gonna slapshot that volley right into
a touchdown.
SPEAKER_00 (38:04):
I know they I knew I knew you were gonna say that
because I agree.
Oh, it is just heartfelt whenthey when the team takes the
field and the baskets are made.
SPEAKER_01 (38:22):
People don't know you, but in the office you would
do this because there would belike fan people who would
actually care about sports, theywould bring things up to you
like catch the game last night,and he would legitimately do
this, like in the elevator, andthen they would very clearly
know that he had no idea what hewas talking about, and they
thought it was hilarious.
They were like, Oh, so not asports guy, got it.
SPEAKER_00 (38:45):
You know, I think back on how much of just a
curmudgeon and jerk that I am tomany people that I come in
contact with.
And, you know, one day I willprobably be visited by ghosts of
various decades that I grew upin in my sleep.
(39:05):
And maybe I'll recant, but inthe moment right now, I just
feel like they deserved it.
And, you know, I feel good.
I feel good for all thedecisions I've made in my life.
I think I did the right thing,you know.
I mean, you could say you leftyour mark.
I you could say that.
And I hope somewhere out thereon a college campus that I may
(39:27):
or may not have attended, thosemarks still remain.
SPEAKER_03 (39:32):
Who can know only time?
Only time will tell.
SPEAKER_00 (39:39):
Well, Clark, it's been a real good time talking
with you today.
Clark Kitty.
I think uh I think we didanother great episode.
We already told them how to getin the Discord.
If you want to buy shirts,onesies, stickers, hat pins, uh
flak jacket for the upcomingwars, um, you can go on our
spreadshop and get them there.
It's a great place to buy thingsbecause it's nonprofit.
(40:00):
We don't make a single dime onit.
But if you want our logo on atactical vest, go get it.
Be ready.
Things are coming.
Uh, if you are interested inchecking out our website, we got
one of those.
But more importantly than that,we would love it if you would
share this podcast with yourfriends, family, neighbors,
co-workers, manage up, say, hey,I listened to this episode and I
(40:23):
thought you might need a littlebit of these skills for
yourself.
Be sure to share the parts withthem where I talk specifically
about my bathroom experiences.
I think there's a lot to beyielded from that specifically.
So clip that if you need it.
But that really would mean a lotto us.
Uh, we are a non-marketedpodcast, we're a nonprofit
podcast.
In fact, we're a profit-negativepodcast, and sharing is the
(40:45):
least you can do to keep usgoing.
As long as we see line go up, wefeel good.
Well, one of us feels good.
One of us probably hasundiagnosed depression.
Anything else, Clark?
SPEAKER_01 (40:56):
No, I think you know that.
I think that just summed it upto exactly what we are in a
nutshell.
So I appreciate you closing usout there.
Couldn't agree more.
Uh stay medicated, stay classy.
SPEAKER_00 (41:07):
I'm Bruce.
SPEAKER_03 (41:09):
And I'm kidding.
And you're on Mute City.
We'll see you next week.
I don't know what that is.
I think that's a duck.
I'm not a hundred percent sure,but that's a duck.
SPEAKER_00 (00:26):
No, it's not.
Interrupting duck.
SPEAKER_01 (00:32):
Interrupting duck.
You missed your chance.
Failure.
SPEAKER_00 (00:40):
Oh, got him.
Live on the air.
Welcome back to CorporateStrategy, the podcast that could
have been an email.
I'm Bruce.
And I'm Clark.
Hey Clark, guess what?
What's that?
Secret Pod.
Ooh, Secret Pod.
Secret Pod.
Tell me more.
Tell me more.
(01:00):
Some of the people arewondering.
Some people, some, some of thepeople were messaging me on
Twitter asking me, BruceBangers, saying, Hey, where was
last week's pod?
And I like, you didn't hear itbecause it wasn't on the feed.
It was a secret pod.
A secret pod.
It was too personal.
Too secret.
So where is the only place youcould see, listen, listen to the
(01:24):
secret pod, Clark E boy?
Clark Kitty.
SPEAKER_01 (01:30):
Thank you for correcting that.
If you didn't say Clark Kitty, Iwas gonna be so disappointed in
you.
Yeah, you got it.
Well, Bruce Baby, listen tothis.
It's on our Discord.
It's on our Discord.
unknown (01:45):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (01:45):
That is where you can find it.
The Secret Pod.
I also had people reaching outto me saying, where's the
episode?
Are you guys just skipping thisweek?
And I said, no.
You gotta find it.
And it's hidden on our Discord.
And it's so easy to join.
You just scroll down.
Scroll down.
No, do it.
Do it.
Scroll down.
Okay.
No, you.
I'm looking at you.
Do you do it with your finger?
(02:06):
I'm okay.
There you go.
There it is.
I see it.
SPEAKER_00 (02:09):
I see it.
SPEAKER_01 (02:10):
There's a there's a link tree.
L N K T R E E.
Click on that, and then there'sa link to join our Discord.
You just hit the join Discord.
It's literally one click.
That's it.
I'm clicking, but nothing'shappening.
Oh, wait, it's my internet.
I think it's your internet,sorry.
Yeah, it'll work if you haveinternet.
You know, what you just did, Ithink is indicative of what our
society will be once we movephones to our faces with
(02:34):
glassware, and everybody's justscrolling like this with their
fingers in mid-air, and they'redoing these wrist gestures, and
you're like, what are you doing?
And the reality is they'recontrolling what's on their
eyes.
SPEAKER_00 (02:44):
Have you ever seen um the videos of the kids who
can do the math?
Like math, like like a mathathlete, but like to the next
level.
I don't know how to say thiswithout using words that I feel
like might offend people.
Um there are children who areincredibly smart and they are
(03:05):
able to do math, but if you everwatch them do it, they're like
shaking their hand in the air,right?
Like they're literally justpoking an invisible screen in
the air.
Have you ever seen that before?
I have.
I know what you're talkingabout.
I've seen that.
Do you know what they're doing?
SPEAKER_01 (03:17):
No, I mean I imagine they're writing down the
equations.
SPEAKER_00 (03:21):
No, it's so much more interesting than that.
Really?
So, uh, yeah, what they'redoing, you're familiar with an
abacus, I'm sure.
I'm sliding.
What child doesn't know what anabacus is, right?
So these kids basically have avirtual abacus.
So they're able to docomputations in the air.
(03:42):
The the shaking of the hand isthem moving the beads on the
abacus.
No.
So they'll they'll watch ascreen and the screen will flash
all these numbers at them, likeand you know, maths plus 472,
minus 369, plus 27, like andthey're they're abacusing.
That's that's exactly whatthey're doing.
And part of the the way itworks, the way they're able to
(04:03):
do math so quickly, is becausethey've they've mastered the
abacus.
The hand movement is connectinglike the brain capability of
doing that math.
It's so cool.
These kids are like wizards.
SPEAKER_01 (04:17):
That's insane.
Yeah, it is.
That feels like the mostineffective way to do it.
I think it's actually the mosteffective way to do it.
Maybe.
Maybe, but you think like timestable.
Well, you know, we do mathwrong.
Maybe that's what the issue is.
Maybe we're just we learned mathwrong.
SPEAKER_00 (04:38):
And if you if you look at kids' math today, I
think it's what's common commoncore or whatever it is.
Um, they're they're actuallylearning math more in an abacus
style of way versus how welearned, which is like you learn
your multiplication tables,right?
You memorize all these six timeseight is 48.
(04:58):
Oh, I know that.
But like you don't know how thatis.
You just know what it is.
And the way they're teachingmath today, it's more about the
how and like getting the brainto do math appropriately versus
just memorizing outcomes, whichkids like us did.
SPEAKER_01 (05:16):
That's so interesting.
Yeah, but it's so true becauseit's like the second you go over
the 12 times tables, you'relike, 13 times 14 is what like
it's impossible to do becauseyou you don't, yeah, you didn't
memorize it.
Right.
But if you actually knew likerealistically what you're doing
and how to break that down intosmaller pieces that you can
actually do in your head, likethat's a much more effective
(05:37):
way.
Because what I do in thosesituations is you take the
closest thing yet you know, andthen you just add the additional
stuff on top of it.
And the abacus maybe is theright way.
SPEAKER_00 (05:46):
The abacus has always been the right way.
We were wrong, they were right,uh, we were bad.
And now the new kids arelearning good, so good for them.
I'm happy.
I'm happy to know the nextgeneration of adults in the
corporate workplace will atleast know how to do math good.
Because I can't.
I'm terrible at it.
SPEAKER_01 (06:04):
We can only say this just because we do have a lot of
European listeners.
We can only say this forAmericans.
You may have done it right.
In your learning, you may havedone it right.
But in America, in ourdemographic, we learned it
wrong.
SPEAKER_00 (06:17):
Right.
I mean wrong.
SPEAKER_01 (06:19):
I mean right.
Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (06:20):
Correct.
SPEAKER_01 (06:20):
Yeah.
Double negative, you know?
SPEAKER_00 (06:22):
Affirmative.
SPEAKER_01 (06:23):
Yeah.
You know, this actually goesright into our topic.
No way.
Because how are you gonna makethat happen?
You're not gonna do it.
If we only pushed back on thepeople that told us that
multiplication tables and memorymemorizing those were the way to
do math, then maybe we wouldhave flipped the whole thing on
(06:44):
its head and been able to learnthe right way to make us more
effective and productive in thereal world.
SPEAKER_00 (06:50):
I like your optimism.
I really do.
I really do.
That's great.
Let's let's let's run with that.
We could have changed the worldif we only pushed back.
SPEAKER_01 (07:00):
Sometimes you've got to manage up, and that is the
day's topic.
Manage that up.
Nice.
I love it.
Yeah.
Yeah, we we had a little bit ofa break, we did a secret pod,
and we did not get back tomanaging up.
But what led us into this?
What was the topic that led intomanaging up?
I totally how am I forgettingtwo episodes before this?
SPEAKER_00 (07:22):
Uh, we were talking about you know getting promoted,
getting you know, plans, and youknow, how how you how you ask
for a promotion or how you caneven grow at a remote office,
right?
All of these kind of things,yeah.
Yeah, with Sarah, right?
SPEAKER_01 (07:38):
Sarah brought up that topic.
She was like, I saw somethingaround um, can you actually grow
meaningfully in your career ifyou're remote?
And that well, that's what kindof led us down the path.
It was a really fun episode oflike, is it possible to grow?
And I think uh to to spoil it,you should go back and listen to
the episode, but to spoil it, weboth said, yes, we do think in
this day and age you canmeaningfully move up in your
(08:00):
career, but it does depend onyour overarching company and if
they have a physical presence orif they are you know completely
hybrid.
That's a very important factor.
But then at the end, webasically got into it's not all
about what you do, it is aboutthe manager and them create
opportunities for you oropportunity or you know, areas
where you can grow too, becauseif they are constantly capping
(08:23):
you to be able to grow, thenthere's no way you're going to
be achieved be able to achievewhatever career goals that you
have.
SPEAKER_00 (08:29):
Yep.
It's that's such a necessaryskill.
And I think it's one that is notuh it's not a magical salve,
right?
Like there's there's no promiseor yeah, you bite into that meat
chomp.
There's no promise or guarantee.
I was talking to our audience,not Clark, by the way.
Okay, uh, there's no guaranteethat anything we tell you today
is actually going to work, butit's still a necessary skill,
(08:52):
and knowing how to approach itand do it is very important.
SPEAKER_03 (08:57):
Yeah, it's one of those things that it can go very
wrong.
And it's really scary.
It can be scary.
SPEAKER_01 (09:08):
Like doing this is not easy to do, and especially
when you're early on in yourcareer, like you don't
understand that that's evennecessary.
Because you just assume yourmanager is gonna do all these
things for you.
And the reality of it is they'renot gonna do anything unless you
get a really good manager foryou at all.
Yeah.
And I think that's like thecrappy part that like I'm
(09:28):
thinking about now.
It's we have to set the contextof before we go into this, what
are the signs where you need todo this, maybe?
And uh what are the signs thatyou shouldn't do this, even
though you probably need to dothis?
What comes to mind for you?
What is the sign you shouldn'tyou shouldn't manage up?
(09:51):
What kind of scenario would youput yourself in?
SPEAKER_00 (09:54):
I think toxic or hostile management, where if
you're in a micromanagementenvironment or if your manager
is constantly critical,criticizing, uh belittling you,
it it if you're stuck in one ofthose scenarios, managing up is
only gonna hurt you more thanit's going to help you.
Um, I think that's theclear-cut, easy answer.
(10:15):
It gets harder when you have amanager that cares about you, or
maybe like is very invested inyou and they have a plan for
you.
Then managing up can also hurtyou because you might be
conflicting with their visionfor your growth, and they could
see it as not having trust inthem.
(10:37):
I think the easiest place wheremanaging up actually works is
when you have sort of a let'ssay more autonomy-oriented
manager that really has notoverly invested in you, but also
micromanaging and is more justlike, hey, if you want to take
this off my plate, by all meansgo ahead and do it, right?
(10:58):
Like that's your golden windowto get in there and really make
a name for yourself by doingsome some upward management
tasks.
Do you think it's all about ego?
SPEAKER_01 (11:08):
Like, is it about assessing the ego of your
manager?
SPEAKER_00 (11:12):
I think everything is about ego in corporate.
SPEAKER_01 (11:16):
If you really step back and think about it,
everything.
SPEAKER_00 (11:19):
Everything, like truly every single operation of
existing in corporate to someextent, is either dealing with
an overly active or lack of ego.
SPEAKER_01 (11:31):
Yep.
Yeah, it's those are the thingsthat I think you gotta look for
in the managing up scenario.
It's like if your boss alwaystakes the credit, no matter
what, like never credits a team,is always like, oh yeah, you
know, I did such a good job onthis, look at what I'm doing and
my team is accomplishing, butnever like, never puts the
spotlight on you to be like,well, Bruce Baby did all the
(11:54):
work here.
Like, I don't don't give me theapplause.
Give it to Bruce Baby, he's theone who did all the work, and
giving you the opportunities toshine.
If it's never there for you,like the ego of your manager, if
you try to go to them and belike, hey, I want or I think you
know, it'd be really great ifyou give me the opportunity to
speak at this, it's just goingto get bad real quick.
(12:14):
They're not gonna see whatyou're trying to do by creating
opportunity for growth foryourself or to expand your skill
set or whatever it is.
Your egotistic manager is notgoing to help you in this path.
And there's no managing upthere, unfortunately.
You gotta just do whatever theysay.
I also think to your point, likecommand and control,
micromanaging, telling youexactly what needs to be done,
(12:36):
always solving problems insteadof asking you to solve them.
Like that type of scenario is aperfect example where it's like,
don't do this.
That's a bad idea.
SPEAKER_00 (12:45):
Oh, I think that's that's actually a really good
sort of entryway into themanaging up functionality set.
What what you just said.
We love to bring problems to ourmanagers, right?
Like, oh, dude, you would notbelieve what Janice did.
Like, Janice is just the worstat her job, fumble the TPS
(13:06):
reports.
Again, can you believe it?
Janice sucks so bad.
Versus, hey, I've noticed thatJanice is having a really
difficult time when it comes toTPS reports.
And I root I root caused it, andit turns out the way that we're
actually doing TPS reports isit's non-intuitive.
(13:27):
Do you mind if I go and build uhjust some training and
enablement around how to receiveand you know submit a TPS report
for all of our employees and runthem through it?
I think it would help both folksunderstand the task as well as
it would help you uh get whatyour desired outcome is from
sending out the reports in thefirst place.
SPEAKER_01 (13:49):
I love so many aspects of that.
And if you abstracted it awayfrom like down to the basics of
what you just did, youidentified a problem that needs
to be solved that your team isresponsible for, and someone's
responsible for adjacent to yourteam.
Yep, or someone manager in thiscase, right?
(14:10):
And it's it got a meaningfulimpact.
So you identified this is theproblem, I understand why it's
important, and if we fix it,here's the result that I could
see us having.
Like those three things are sokey to being able to manage up,
and then ancillary to that,you're creating a pathway for
you to receive visibility and tohave a bigger impact at your
(14:32):
organization by taking on workoutside of just your day-to-day.
And that's where you're lookingfor the your manager in a good
scenario to be like, actually,yeah, that's a great idea.
Like then we can get you, youknow, in with this team, you can
be able to demo this.
And as a good manager, they'regonna find opportunities to be
like, absolutely.
In our next town hall, if itgoes well, let's bring up the
(14:52):
success story of how we did thisand how it made a difference and
really highlight you.
Like a good manager will dothat, and you're kind of just
bringing the opportunities tothe table for them to do that.
And so the good manager will,you know, expand upon your idea
or give you guidance to say,actually, there's something
bigger than that.
Like, what if you did thisinstead?
And so a good manager is goingto look for the bigger
opportunities that you don'thave purview to to expand the
(15:14):
purview that you have.
I love that.
SPEAKER_00 (15:16):
Yeah.
And I think that's that is theperfect opportunity for managing
up, is when you identify achallenge, you come up with a
solution, you present saidsolution, and then see if you
can get an opportunity to go andand and take care of it
yourself, right?
Because you're taking work offyour manager's plate by doing
(15:37):
this, you're potentiallyimproving their well-being and
their sort of mental stabilityat their job, but you're also
likely going to help othersaround you.
And that's the whole reason whywe do it, right?
Managers like Clark and I arenot perfect and we make
mistakes.
And I love when my team comes tome with solutions to problems
(15:59):
and it's like, hey, can I likeyeah, go?
Do do whatever you want to do.
I it was a terrible idea.
I want you to do it anyway.
I don't care.
Like, it means so much becauseyou know, we did our
appreciation series, acts ofservice.
Managing up is absolutely an actof service with your manager.
SPEAKER_01 (16:17):
Yeah, 100%.
Another great example is like ifyou have one-on-ones with your
manager, say, hey, I know inevery single one-on-one, you're
always asking about like thestatus of projects.
If you want the most real-timestatuses, I actually built you a
Jira dashboard.
You can check it at any time tosee how we're progressing
towards our goal.
Like then I knew, like, Iobserved something that they're
obviously interested in.
(16:38):
I already created a solutionthat's pretty easy for me to do,
and I'm providing value to them.
And like all those things aregreat opportunities to you know,
show that to your manager thatyou're willing to go the extra
mile so that hopefully they willbe able to open more opportunity
for you.
Or then every singleconversation, you don't have to
give your status report.
You can talk about moremeaningful things so you open up
(16:59):
more room to talk about managingup or getting more opportunity
or whatever it is.
Agree.
Completely agree.
I love that.
I'm thinking about anotherscenario too.
So as the manager, and maybe weput ourselves, let's put our
manager's shoes on.
You got your shoes on?
I'm looking for your manager'sshoes.
Are they there?
(17:20):
Oh, yeah, he's got he's got noshoes on, and that's the way
managers roll.
I never have shoes on.
I walk around barefoot in theoffice every day.
Put your get your nasty feet offthe camera.
They actually weren't nasty.
SPEAKER_00 (17:32):
Can you imagine if we live streamed this show and
everyone just got an unabashedview at the bottom of my foot
for 15 seconds?
People pay for that, by the way.
SPEAKER_01 (17:41):
They do, which is I'm giving it to you for free.
What a world we live in.
SPEAKER_00 (17:45):
Those little piggies.
They went to the market and wentwee wee wee all the way home.
SPEAKER_01 (17:50):
They really did.
At least they were clean.
I mean, that's debatable, butyeah, I'll take it.
We're going back to managing up,I'm thinking about other
opportunities too, where it'slike you're feeling stunted in
your growth and you're doingeverything.
Like you're going to yourmanager, you're saying, hey, all
the you know, all the things youwant me to achieve, I was able
to accomplish.
(18:10):
Like, I feel like I'm ready forthis next step, this next
promotion.
And then they're like, Well, youknow, I don't know if you have
enough visibility.
Like, I don't think we're goingto be able to swing it this
year.
That's the perfect opportunityto start that managing up
conversation, being like, okay,yes, you know, is there anything
you can do to help me get morevisibility?
Like putting it back on yourmanager.
And like when I have my managerson shoes on, it's like, I
(18:31):
sometimes don't think aboutthose things that I may be doing
that is getting in the way of myteam because it's just so, you
know, rhythmic and you know, souh cycle of the project or
whatever that I'm just so usedto running something when in
reality I actually need to stepback and let this person run the
meeting.
And so an employee coming to meto your point earlier about
(18:51):
taking work off your plate andsaying, Hey, you know, this
meeting, I know you run it everytime, but I think I'm ready.
Like, how about you let me tryrunning it this next time?
And like that to me is like thebest feeling in the world.
It's like, oh my goodness,that'd be incredible that I
don't have to prep, I don't haveto get the slide deck, I don't
have to coordinate the material,I don't have to be on for this
meeting.
I can just let you drive and bea supporting actor rather than a
driver.
(19:12):
Like, that is like the perfectopportunity for you to step in
to take something off yourmanager's plate and to get more
visibility that will hopefullyget you, you know, to whatever
your your career goal is.
SPEAKER_00 (19:23):
Couldn't agree more.
It's also, I think it's arelationship builder, right?
Like there might be a reasonyour manager isn't, and this is
I hate to say this.
Like, I just hate to say thisout loud, but like getting
promoted does not mean that yougot you did a good job, and it
also doesn't mean that you gotpromoted, or if you didn't get
promoted because you didn't do agood job.
(19:45):
So much of again, I go back tothe earlier statement, ego,
right?
Like, so much of work isego-focused, ego-based.
What do they always say whenyou're looking for a job?
It's not what you know, it's whoyou know.
And your manager is part of yournetwork.
Your manager needs to be someonethat likes you.
They you want them to like you,you want them to the you want
(20:08):
your manager.
Well, not only that, you wantthem to think, hey, I'm a good
manager, right?
Like, you need to make them feelthat way.
And the only way you can do thatvia managing up is to make sure
you set goals for them to makethem feel like they're a good
(20:28):
manager, right?
Like, I feel like a crappymanager all the time because I
fail my team all the time.
And they hate my guts, andthat's fine, right?
Like, you know, I live with thatevery day of my life in the back
of my mind, thinking thesepeople might one day assault me
on the street.
I have to carry that with me.
But, you know, if I did care, ifI did care about my team, I
(20:49):
would think, hmm, what should Ido to make Janice believe that
I'm a good manager?
And what Janice could do is say,hey, Bruce, you know, I I've
really been going hard this yearon all of my projects.
I feel like I've executed well.
Uh, is it possible that we cantalk about next steps for me,
(21:11):
career growth?
And because I have arelationship with Janice and I
care about what Janice thinksabout me, because I'm an
egomaniac, I'm gonna say, okay,well, Janice, I need to figure
out a way to promote her.
So maybe I need to spend sometime thinking up a career plan,
building out something for her.
Because if I don't do this,she's gonna think less of me.
So, like, you can you can usepsychology and ego as a weapon
(21:32):
if you have that kind ofrelationship.
Yeah, because the alternativeis, oh, I really like Janice.
She's a great worker, and I feellike I really let her down, and
she's not gonna, she's she'sdemoralized, she's not gonna
work as hard for me anymore.
And she probably thinks I'm aterrible manager.
Like, I won't be able to workwith her again.
Yeah, like those are your twopaths, right?
So you you do have to play alittle psychology.
And I would always advise you dowhat's best for you.
(21:57):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (21:57):
Man, that's so interesting.
Like in the broader, the broaderscheme of the conversation, the
relationship.
I also think it's even in thoselike micro interactions, like
even in your one-on-one, likejust saying small things here or
there, of like, you know, I Ilove how how much work we take
on.
Like, you must be so proud ofthe team you've built and how
(22:19):
much we've grown over the lastcouple of years.
Like those types of words ofaffirmation go a really long way
with building that relationshipwith your manager who doesn't
always feel appreciated.
I think that's something toremember too, is like they might
not feel appreciated in theirrole because no one's reaching
out to them and telling themthey're doing a good job.
(22:40):
So you doing that, even if youdon't think they're doing the
best job, helps build thatrelationship and you know, you
guys having a better rapport.
SPEAKER_00 (22:49):
One thing I love to do with my manager, and I I I
can say this openly and andproudly because it's true, is
you know, as a manager who has amanager, I feel like I'm saying
the word manager too much, andnow it's become weird for me to
think the word manager out loud.
I'm gonna try and move past it.
Don't do it.
Hmm.
(23:10):
Manager.
Manager.
Manager count 12.
I'm 12 in the last 30 seconds.
I'm really stuck right now.
Uh I think the uh the hmm.
The thing that the thing that Ido that works, I'm really stuck
on this word.
It's driving me nuts.
Don't you hate when thathappens?
Isn't it the worst?
SPEAKER_01 (23:30):
You can't get around it and you find like a thing you
say or like a mannerism you haveand you can't shake it.
Yeah.
I can't shake it.
I literally can't shake it.
I have to plow through.
SPEAKER_00 (23:38):
I have to plow through.
Just do it.
I like to focus on and highlightgrowth whenever I get the
chance, right?
Because I don't know if they seeit.
And that's not their job to seethe growth of my team.
So I make it my point to show mymanager, say, hey, you know,
Janice, Melanie, Marqueen,Manager, they're all doing
(24:03):
really good jobs.
And look at look at how they'vegrown quarter over quarter to
remind my manager, you know,like, hey, you know, me as a
manager, I'm doing my job.
One, but two, my team is doingtheir job.
And three, like, just you know,just to, you know, hey, this
makes you look good too, right?
Like from top down, it makeseveryone look good.
(24:23):
And I think it's important forthe middle managers like us to
manage in both directions well.
And that's that's the hardestthing, in in my opinion, as God.
We have to find a differentword.
As a leader who has people ontheir team.
There you go.
As a people leader.
(24:43):
As a people leader, you have togo both ways and you have to be
very good at it.
And I would actually argue, asan IC, it's great to manage up,
and it's a good, it's a goodskill to have.
But as a people leader, it isalmost a requirement if you want
to be good at your job, to beable to manage down and up
simultaneously.
(25:04):
And if you can't do that, youshouldn't be a manager.
Yeah, that's true.
Well, you won't last long as amanager if you can't do that.
I I don't know about that.
I think you'll you'll lastforever and everyone will hate
you.
And they'll write your name inthe bathroom wall next to an
obscene image.
SPEAKER_01 (25:20):
I wish we could say that this was like made up and
you just thought of that on thespot, but no, that's real life.
That happens.
SPEAKER_00 (25:28):
That's the craziest thing about the words you've
just said.
I can see it because I lived it.
I was there.
I wrote it on the wall.
What?
Uh anyway.
Did you just admit guilt?
Never admit guilt.
Never.
Never.
I can okay.
You want to hear you want tohear uh Bruce's crime history?
Yes, please.
I used to vandalize the hell outof bathrooms.
(25:50):
Like I would keep a sharpie inmy pocket just at all times, and
I would just write on walls.
Yeah, yeah.
What did you write?
Younger, younger me.
This is like, you know,20-year-old Bruce, 20-year-old
Bruce Banger.
I was a I was a bathroom wallartist.
Oh, yeah.
What did you what did you draw?
What did you write?
What didn't I write?
(26:10):
Uh, lyrics to songs, fun pages.
I would always draw these goofylittle cute pictures.
And I just, you know, what whatcould you do?
I'm in there, you know,committing a crime with my
bowels, and I'm bored.
This was I didn't have like asmartphone until I mean I had I
had smartphones, but they werethey were really crappy.
(26:30):
Yeah, yeah.
I didn't get a smartphone untillike my junior year of college
that was actually like aniPhone.
So, you know, what was I gonnado in the in the bathroom other
than writing?
Newspaper.
Newspaper.
See in my age, I was too youngfor the newspaper, but too old
(26:51):
and too poor for the iPhone.
So we had to make our own funwith Sharpies.
SPEAKER_01 (26:59):
When you said 20, I mean I almost just spit out my
water in my mouth when you said20.
Because like I can totally seeit, you being like a teenager,
you're in high school, like Ithink everyone's kind of been
there at one point.
20?
Well, I was a good kid.
SPEAKER_00 (27:14):
So you had your bad, your your bad streak.
Yeah, my bad years was once youstarted to take sharpies and tag
the bathrooms.
I actually uh I once had a goalto use every single toilet at my
college, and I got pretty close.
There were a few I couldn't getto, just access reasons, but uh
I always did the deed at home.
SPEAKER_01 (27:35):
I never took it to work, to school.
That was too much.
Why?
It just wasn't as comfortable.
SPEAKER_00 (27:41):
You know, there's nothing like being at home.
To to bring it all back home,boss makes a dollar, I make a
dime.
That's why I poop on companytime.
What about school where you'repaying to go there?
Even more reason.
I'm not gonna waste my owntoilet paper.
I'm paying for this toiletpaper.
Clog my parents' pipes at home.
(28:02):
No, I'm saving that.
I'm making a deposit at the oldeducational institution of
higher learning.
You left your mark, didn't you?
You left your mark.
In in more ways than one.
SPEAKER_01 (28:17):
Well, going back, all let's go back to the topic.
Manager Okay, let's go.
I got two more scenarios.
Let's get back on track here.
Okay.
I got two more scenarios in you.
In you.
In you.
Scenario coming out soon.
No, no, I said in you becauseit's future manager Bruce, and
they're just sitting and waitingto be activated.
So they'll come out soon forsure.
(28:38):
Your poor team.
Teach me some.
It's getting really, reallyinteresting at the latter half
of that the podcast here.
Um, okay.
Bad scenarios that you have tomanage up.
Your boss always loves to causea fire drill at 4 p.m.
on Fridays.
(28:58):
They have a routine, they end upgoing through their emails, last
thing of the day on Friday forthe whole week, and then they
just start firing notes ateverybody.
Hey, Bruce, I need you to jumpon this like right away.
I didn't know this was happeningthis week.
It's an urgent issue.
How do you manage up in ascenario where they're just
causing swirl?
SPEAKER_03 (29:17):
I don't even know.
SPEAKER_00 (29:19):
So I have two answers here to this one.
The first is the right one, andthe second is what I'd actually
do.
Um the the managing up way isactually to say to your manager
on your one-on-one or wheneveryou meet with them, say, hey,
Frank.
(29:39):
Uh I noticed that like you'rejust getting a lot of email uh
that you know just comes intoyour box.
Would would you mind if weactually created like a shared
alias for requests so that way Icould take this prioritization
off your plate when it comes tothese specific requests and and
delegate them to the team?
Or you know, is there Way that Ican like basically whatever
(30:02):
whatever is causing them to gocheck all their email at 4 p.m.
on a Friday, root cause wherethe email is coming from and see
if you can short cycle it uh andpresent that option to them.
So if it's coming from aspecific person or a specific
team, talk to them and say, Hey,you know, would you mind adding
me to the CC on this?
So that way you're not waitingfor prioritization.
(30:23):
Instead, if it comes through andI can get to it earlier, I'll
take it on or whatever.
I think that's that's the rightanswer.
I agree.
I think I think you know that'sit.
SPEAKER_01 (30:32):
It's like so my answer is the problem.
Understand that you saidsomething important.
It's like understand theproblem, understand how to drive
the value, and then bring it upwith them to say, hey, exactly
like you did.
It's like, hey, I noticed, youknow, I I you have a ton of
email.
You have so much going on, andevery single time you send these
notes, we have to kind ofscramble and figure out the
(30:53):
answer.
I actually got ahead of that.
I created an intake process.
Now the requests are coming tous.
We will send you a report at theend of the week so you know it's
all taken care of.
And like that is incrediblebecause the manager is gonna be
like, oh wow, that's gonna saveme a lot of time.
I'm not gonna feel stressedgoing into the weekend.
Like, that's awesome.
They're gonna love that.
SPEAKER_00 (31:11):
And that's not what I would do, by the way.
What would you say to us?
What I would do is I would closethe lid and I would uh disable
notifications on all my devices,and then on Monday when you're
like, Hey, where were you?
I couldn't get hold of you.
It's like, yeah, man.
On Fridays, I disappear.
I'm actually a big believer incomplete disconnecting.
I go out into the forest and Inature bathe.
(31:32):
Uh, you know, I've got a littletent out there, and you can't
get me after five o'clockbecause my obligations are
filled.
So, you know, in the future, ifyou want to do that kind of
thing, why don't you do yourfreaking job and uh give it to
me earlier in the week?
SPEAKER_03 (31:47):
Nature bathed, huh?
unknown (31:49):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (31:49):
Never heard that one.
Yeah, no.
I go out there full exposed.
No, you don't.
No, of course it's a total lie,Clark.
I just don't feel like helpingthis incompetent Rube who waits
till 4 p.m.
on a Friday.
Like, why do I want to help thisperson succeed?
They suck, they deserve to befired.
(32:10):
I'm not gonna enable this,they're not gonna help me grow.
Why am I gonna waste my time tomake their life better?
They suck, not me.
I'm gonna go live my life andenjoy my weekend.
SPEAKER_01 (32:19):
I'm I'm crying over here because I'm envisioning
like if this happened to you andyou said this, and then they
decided to call you over Slackor Teams or whatever, like video
call, and then you hop on thecall and you're just fully
exposed, as you said, like in atent and being like, Yeah, I
told you this was gonna be thesituation.
You shouldn't have called meafter five on a Friday.
(32:40):
And then guess what?
This is the ultimate hack.
They'll never do it again.
They'll be like, Hold out.
SPEAKER_00 (32:45):
Here's the thing even if even if you just
completely go A-WOL in thiscase, they still won't do it
again because you werecompletely unreliable and they
can't fire you for it.
What are they Oh HR, um, so whenI drop the ball on my emails, I
can't get in touch with my teamon Friday nights and weekends.
Uh, I think I think we shouldconsider removing this person.
(33:06):
Like, no, they will not promoteyou and you will be stunted in
your career growth.
But sometimes that's better thandealing with the asshattery that
comes from management like this.
Just, you know, my personalopinion.
SPEAKER_01 (33:18):
I agree.
I like that answer.
I like that answer.
For the people that are actuallyexperiencing this, do the first
thing, not the second thing.
It'll it'll turn out much betterfor you.
Second scenario, you ready?
And this one has happened to me.
This one has happened to me.
When you're on a team with acertain type of manager, nobody
has the courage to speak up, butsomebody has to.
(33:41):
So the team ends up talking toeach other and they're like,
okay, yeah, we see this behaviora lot.
For me, it was I'm I sometimesforget how important team
building is because we're justso busy all the time that I
don't like set aside the time tocelebrate wins.
And so the team got together andthey all went through one
person.
They said, Hey, they came to meand they're like, Hey, we're
(34:03):
doing so much great work.
You know, talking to the team,they think it'd be awesome if we
could like celebrate that oncein a while.
Like maybe even just like goout, get a drink together, just
spend some of that timetogether.
And for me, I was like, ohshoot, you're right.
When was the last time we didthat?
And they're like, Yeah, likeeight months ago.
And we've had like 26 releasessince then.
We should make this like aregular thing.
(34:24):
You know, why don't we make thisquarterly?
And we can go out, celebrate ourwins, get together as a team, do
something fun.
And you know, if you're okaywith it, let's use some of the
budget and like plan a funevent.
I'm like, yeah, you're right,that's a great idea.
So that's like the managing upwhere, again, going back to what
we were talking about earlier, Iwas oblivious to it just because
like those things, you know,quality time is not the highest
(34:46):
on my list for working with myteam.
And so I am kind of blindsidedby that, and I'm happy when my
team brings up those things thatare for the greater good of the
team, because then I knowthey're looking out for them,
then I know they're looking tobuild a more collaborative
culture, like the all thepositive things you want your
team doing.
So those are the muchappreciated times when I love it
when my team is managing up.
SPEAKER_00 (35:07):
Yeah, that is great.
I I love that.
And and I truly believe it is atool that really only is used
for good.
When when you know how to manageup well, that I don't think
there's a way you can abuse thatsystem or or use it for evil.
It benefits everybody.
And if you can do it, and I Isay can because you're not
(35:28):
always guaranteed to have amanager that's gonna be
receptive to this, but if youare in a situation where you
can, it will benefit you sotremendously, which is why it's
important you learn how to doit.
And you do it often, wheneveryou see the chance to do 100%.
SPEAKER_01 (35:42):
I think we crushed it.
We can know I'm gonna when to doit, when not to do it, what the
strategies are when you bringthose things up and how to kind
of you know go about pattingthem on the back a little bit,
positive, negative, sandwichingit in for that review cycle,
bringing them solutions toproblems and not problems
themselves, and showing that youunderstand the value,
(36:03):
identifying opportunities whereyou can expand your visibility,
your career growth, what it is,whatever it is, and asking them
to give you permission to dothose things, and then just
being proactive, like noticingthings that need to be done or a
pattern and how you canpotentially get ahead of that to
better help your manager.
All those things are gonna go,you know, really, really
positively towards your careergrowth.
SPEAKER_00 (36:25):
Yep.
Couldn't agree more.
It's such a great skill to have,and I think it is.
I think you crushed it, Clark.
SPEAKER_01 (36:32):
Oh, I think you did.
And it's scary.
It's scary.
So don't feel bad if this isscary for you, but you gotta
start somewhere.
Pick something small and do it.
It will make a big difference.
SPEAKER_00 (36:40):
And and that's the that's the growth capability
too.
Is it you do it one with alittle small thing, you'll sort
of be like, oh, that wasn't sobad.
Yeah, I can't.
I'll do more again.
I can do more, and youabsolutely can.
I believe in you, listener.
Nice job.
We nailed it.
You did a nice job.
SPEAKER_03 (36:57):
I'm proud of you.
Proud of you, Clark Kidding.
Yeah, you too originally.
Thanks, Clark Kitty.
SPEAKER_00 (37:04):
You know, I'd I do what I can.
SPEAKER_03 (37:08):
Yeah, so uh you feel good, I feel good.
SPEAKER_00 (37:11):
Alright, I'll see you next week.
Alright, well, sounds soundslike a plan.
I mean, uh okay.
SPEAKER_03 (37:16):
Alright, maybe we can Okay.
No, don't worry, I'm just gonnago.
I'm a little sad it's over now.
I kinda wanted to you know hangout.
SPEAKER_00 (37:29):
Yeah, talk about it.
SPEAKER_01 (37:33):
Managing up.
Yeah, you love sports ball, so Iknow we can get real deep on
that topic.
SPEAKER_00 (37:38):
Talk about the points that were earned on the
last game.
All the the units that werescored.
You watching the game tonight?
You watch the game tonight andoh, am I Oh those those
buckenskins, they're reallybringing the the heat with their
offense.
SPEAKER_01 (38:00):
They're gonna slapshot that volley right into
a touchdown.
SPEAKER_00 (38:04):
I know they I knew I knew you were gonna say that
because I agree.
Oh, it is just heartfelt whenthey when the team takes the
field and the baskets are made.
SPEAKER_01 (38:22):
People don't know you, but in the office you would
do this because there would belike fan people who would
actually care about sports, theywould bring things up to you
like catch the game last night,and he would legitimately do
this, like in the elevator, andthen they would very clearly
know that he had no idea what hewas talking about, and they
thought it was hilarious.
They were like, Oh, so not asports guy, got it.
SPEAKER_00 (38:45):
You know, I think back on how much of just a
curmudgeon and jerk that I am tomany people that I come in
contact with.
And, you know, one day I willprobably be visited by ghosts of
various decades that I grew upin in my sleep.
(39:05):
And maybe I'll recant, but inthe moment right now, I just
feel like they deserved it.
And, you know, I feel good.
I feel good for all thedecisions I've made in my life.
I think I did the right thing,you know.
I mean, you could say you leftyour mark.
I you could say that.
And I hope somewhere out thereon a college campus that I may
(39:27):
or may not have attended, thosemarks still remain.
SPEAKER_03 (39:32):
Who can know only time?
Only time will tell.
SPEAKER_00 (39:39):
Well, Clark, it's been a real good time talking
with you today.
Clark Kitty.
I think uh I think we didanother great episode.
We already told them how to getin the Discord.
If you want to buy shirts,onesies, stickers, hat pins, uh
flak jacket for the upcomingwars, um, you can go on our
spreadshop and get them there.
It's a great place to buy thingsbecause it's nonprofit.
(40:00):
We don't make a single dime onit.
But if you want our logo on atactical vest, go get it.
Be ready.
Things are coming.
Uh, if you are interested inchecking out our website, we got
one of those.
But more importantly than that,we would love it if you would
share this podcast with yourfriends, family, neighbors,
co-workers, manage up, say, hey,I listened to this episode and I
(40:23):
thought you might need a littlebit of these skills for
yourself.
Be sure to share the parts withthem where I talk specifically
about my bathroom experiences.
I think there's a lot to beyielded from that specifically.
So clip that if you need it.
But that really would mean a lotto us.
Uh, we are a non-marketedpodcast, we're a nonprofit
podcast.
In fact, we're a profit-negativepodcast, and sharing is the
(40:45):
least you can do to keep usgoing.
As long as we see line go up, wefeel good.
Well, one of us feels good.
One of us probably hasundiagnosed depression.
Anything else, Clark?
SPEAKER_01 (40:56):
No, I think you know that.
I think that just summed it upto exactly what we are in a
nutshell.
So I appreciate you closing usout there.
Couldn't agree more.
Uh stay medicated, stay classy.
SPEAKER_00 (41:07):
I'm Bruce.
SPEAKER_03 (41:09):
And I'm kidding.
And you're on Mute City.
We'll see you next week.
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