February 23, 2025 • 54 mins
Recruited right out of college to work at one of the largest data firms, Sean McMann embarked on an eight-year journey from new grad to consulting director. Privileged to see behind the curtain of some of the largest corporations today, he recognized the system was broken and quit at the height of his career, when working the least but making the most money he ever had, betting everything, including his money, reputation, and time, on trying to fix the problem of the corporate jungle. He shares his insights in his new book, Hacking the Corporate Jungle: How to Work Less, Make More and Actually Like Your Life. When he's not writing, researching, and speaking, McMann spends his time riding his bike, visiting art museums, snowboarding, and playing with his two young sons.
Learn more at seanmcmann.com.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Unknown (00:02):
Sean, hello and welcome to the storied human I'm Lynne
Thompson. My guest today is SeanMcMahon. He started out, right
out of college, recruited at oneof the largest data firms. His
future seemed bright, but eightyears later, after seeing behind
the curtain of some of thelargest corporations today, he
recognized that the system wasbroken. He quit at the height of
(00:24):
his career, when working theleast hours but making the most
money he ever had, he beteverything, including his money,
reputation and time, to try tofix the problem of the corporate
jungle. He shares his insightsin his new book, hacking the
corporate jungle, how to workless, make more, and actually,
(00:44):
like your life. Can't wait todig into that. Welcome. Sean,
thanks. Lynne, super excited tobe here.
So how can we hack our I mean,how did you even get to that
point where you could write thatbook?
I guess that's that's a goodquestion. A lot of trial and
error.
(01:05):
But I think the underlying themethrough it all was I was
fearless, even though I wasscared shitless. Most of the
time I I'd ask the questions noone else seemed to have the
courage to I walked up to theleader I wanted to meet and just
introduced myself. I put myselfin the room, I guess, so to
(01:25):
speak. And I guess that thatgoes back to my parents and how
they raised me and and some ofmy unique childhood experiences,
which we can get into, you know,more later, if you'd like,
I just love to hear about that.
Like, how does, how did youbecome that person? Because that
isn't everybody at work. Mostpeople are too afraid to do the
kinds of things you did. Yeah.
(01:49):
So I guess it goes back to my mymom and dad. They're they're
weird. I guess it's a way to sayit in a really great way, like I
great parents. I have no trauma,which I know is big for a lot of
people right now, I have no realchildhood trauma. My parents
were great, but they also hadsome really weird nuances, like,
(02:11):
instead of going on vacation,most years, we would renovate a
part of our house or redo ourfront lawn. Or one year, like,
when I was seven, I got my ownhammer because we were putting
on our own roof. And my littlebrother was five, and he had his
own hammer too. Is like, lookingback was just like, what? That's
an insurance liability. Like,what were you doing? But they
(02:35):
instilled in me from a veryyoung age, you know, like, if
you work hard enough and you payattention to what's going on,
you can really do anything. Andso, for lack of a better term,
it gave me, I would almost say,like, this sort of naivety that,
you know, give it a shot, giveit a swing. Like, the worst that
can happen is, is somebody saysno, or someone tells you to back
(02:57):
off. But more times than not,it's, it's, it's the people who
are gung ho, I guess. And Iguess I learned throughout my
life and throughout mychildhood, like, if you
volunteered to do something,even if you completely stunk at
it, people would at least giveyou a shot. And then at that
point, even if you didn't get tocontinue doing it, you at least
(03:19):
got direct hands on direct oneon one, feedback as to why you
don't get to keep doing it. Soyeah, go ahead. This
is just so interesting to mebecause I just read an article
that said, if kids do chores, ifthey do real work from the time
they're young, they did thestudy on the ones that did
chores had greater success laterin life. And I was saying, I
(03:40):
should have had my kids do morechoice. Not that my kids aren't
successful. They are, but thatjust makes sense to me that you
were given this sort of sense ofmastery and self esteem. I think
that you can do things, and Ilove that, that they were weird
in that great way. So they wereunconventional, conventional.
Yeah, very so here you are.
You're a hot shot. They recruityou straight out of college. You
(04:02):
know, you you got the the goldenticket, right? You're gonna go.
You can see your future right infront of you. How did it change?
I guess, from the I like, Ialways had this imposter
syndrome, um, and from the veryget go, I felt like I shouldn't
have been let in the door, likeI started in this new grad
(04:24):
program and Aleta. And for thoseof you listening who don't know,
like a lot of largecorporations, have a similar
program where they recruit, youknow, class 10 to 20, sometimes
40 kids straight out of collegeto join the company. And in a
lot of those programs, you getshuffled around, and you get to
try little positions in everydepartment to really see where
you fit. And in my program, Istarted with 14, I guess,
(04:49):
students, or, you know, 20somethings. And there were only
two prior that ever went throughthe program. And so we were the,
really, the first, like, realprogram. And. The first day, we
all sit down, and we all, like,talk about what we had done the
last, you know, summer, thislast summer, or what we've been
up to the last year. And I hadgraduated, like, two months
prior, and so, like, I think thebiggest thing I had done was,
(05:12):
you know, I might have cleanedmy house and maybe went on like,
a three a road trip or somethingwith my fiance at the time. Like
I wasn't, you know, and I wentback to the old coffee shop I'd
worked at through college, youknow, make ends meet until the
job started. And so I hadn'tdone really anything of note.
And I remember I must have beenlast or second to last to go.
And everyone had theseincredible stories like, Oh
(05:35):
yeah, you know, I just spent ayear at sea, or, you know, I
just finished up an internshipat Google. Or, you know, my dad.
My dad flew me to Paris, and Ijust spent the last three
months, you know, in Paris, andit was like, you know, a couple
of them had, like, last namesthat were very resonant, I would
say, in the company, you know,like their dads or their uncles
(05:55):
were, we all knew who they were,right? We knew their friends
were. But for me, I was justlike, how like my dad was, he'd
tell you, you know, he was atruck driver his entire life,
and my mom was a teacher. And soI was sitting there, like,
listening to all these intros.
Like, how did I get in? Like,what am I doing here? Yeah, I
don't think I should be here.
And and I think at one point,you know, because of this new
(06:17):
grad program and the nature ofit, we all had mentors, and the
gal who interviewed me and letme in, and ultimately had had
passed me to the people who hadhired me on, I eventually sat
down with her and was like, didyou make a mistake? Like, I
don't know if I put those kindof words, but I was like, why am
I kind of here and, and, youknow, don't get me wrong, I'm
(06:40):
grateful to be here. Like,please, don't, you know, kick me
out. But why am I here? And Ithink that was the most telling
and one of the most informativeconversations I've really had
about how sometimes marketdynamics that you don't get
taught about work. Because sheessentially said, like, you
worked all through college,which you can't say about, about
(07:00):
any of your you know, yourfellow new grads and you have
have had the most workexperience. And at that time,
I'd already, like, ran a coffeeshop as an assistant manager. I
climbed my way up to shiftsupervisor at one of the Panera
breads near me that I worked toadd for three years, I'd been a
delivery driver at a nearby, youknow, Chinese restaurant that my
neighbors owned and so it's likeI worked all these, all these
(07:23):
odd jobs, but I had worked, Ithink, my first job. I'd worked
since I was 15. Wow, in my lasttwo years of college, I took
like, 18 semester credits, and Iworked like almost 3028, to 30
hours a week. And so I was, Iwas always doing something.
Okay, yeah, so she saw the whatthat indicates, like, that
ability to, she already saw therecord, how you work. Yeah,
(07:47):
that's so cool. You know, I, Iwent to one of those, um, when
my kids were looking forcolleges and and you go to
accepted students day or No, itwasn't that, I'm sorry. It was
like, open, open house, andeverybody's, like, interested,
right? I think it wasGettysburg, which is pretty cool
school. The guy got up and said,if you've been babysitting,
(08:10):
like, maybe one of you has beenbabysitting, and you've been
babysitting for like, seven oreight years, does that impress
us? And and people like givingdifferent answers, and he's
like, that super impresses us,because people forget it's not
the, you know, the like, it'snot the elitism of the job or
the level of the job. It's theresponsibility, it's the ability
to stay with something and and Ijust thought that was brilliant.
(08:35):
You know, that that's how theylook at things. It's like you
were able to handle thatresponsibility
of the the coffee shop,and the babysitter was able, you
know, was trusted by the parentsto handle the responsibility for
children. It's a greatindicator. So she shared that
with you. I think that's great.
Yeah, no, I appreciate that.
I've never thought about it inthat, that sort of light. I
(08:56):
guess I didn't have a lot ofresponsibility growing up, um,
your parentstook it for granted. Because I
think you, you know, you hadresponsibility young, you got
that hammer, and you're buildingthings. And I just think it
builds like that confidence andthat trust in your abilities
that not everybody has whenthey're young. I think some
people get there, your parentsalmost gave you like an express
(09:17):
lane to that, that level ofum, express express lane. I'm
going to tell them that nexttime I see him, I think they'll
likesaying, Yeah, you made me work,
yeah, when I was seven, yeah,but I love that. No, it makes
total sense. So did you feelbetter after you talked to her?
Oh, I did. Yeah, good. And thenshe made me feel super better.
(09:40):
And then my first mentor, who Iactually write about in my first
book, here she was, she was verysimilar, and she told me flat
out, she was like, I was the onewho wanted to hire you. And come
to find out, I worked for threedirectors at this point in my
first role, and out of thethree, only one of them actually
wanted to hire me. And she wasthe one who. Wanted to hire me,
(10:00):
and I'll I'll never forget her.
She, she was a true salesperson,which I think a lot of
organizations have lost nowadaysor really struggle to find. For
those of you don't know, liketrue sales people, they're a
different breed, but they bringin as much as they drive most
people in an organizationabsolutely crazy. She had a
skill set that that you reallythat companies pay through the
(10:24):
nose for because she hasdone well. It's so impressive. I
havea friend like that. Yeah, she
could literally sell, you knowhow they say you could sell ice
to the Eskimos, she could and,Oh, absolutely, and they
wouldn't mind. She's, she's verysincere. It's like, very cool
when you have those skills. So,yeah, so she fought for you,
she fought for me, and I thinkit to this day she might have
(10:47):
been one of the only geniuses ihave ever worked for. And she
was this tiny, blonde, smallJewish woman, and she always
told you, like it was and butshe was just a force, like she
was so tiny. It was such adichotomy, right? Because she
was so tiny in physical stature,but she was such a force in the
room. She was so intelligent. Weget out of meetings, and she'd
be like, how do you think thatwent? I'm like, well, they seem
(11:08):
interested. I think we can sellthem a contract. And she was
like, no, they're not going tobe interested for at least
another six months. And she justknew that, I know, yeah, she
changed, and she did itdifferently, and we get out of
what you know most people, ifyou've worked in corporate at
all, Lynne, I don't have youever worked in corporate, okay,
only in corporate. II'm a technical writer, and I'm
a the way I deal with not I'mnot a good employee, so I'm a
(11:31):
consultant. Okay,that's a good way to put it.
That's, that's great advice foreveryone. If you're a bad
employee in corporate, everyonego into consulting.
I just don't enjoy it. I'm notcut out for it. I'm more
entrepreneurial. So this is howI deal with that. But anyway,
what I thought of first when yousaid sales was how many times I
(11:52):
work a lot in it, and I wasthinking, how many times sales
people promised stuff thedevelopers down the line could
not deliver. So there's thatmismatch. Sometimes there's that
contentious relationship withsales, yeah, promise the moon.
You know, promise the moon.
Yeah,she was, and I will say, my
mentor, who I'm talking about,she was so great at things like
(12:12):
that, like, we would almostpromise the moon, and then she'd
always, and I later found outthis was just a tactic that she
it was kind of a double edgedsword. It was a tactic where I
helped solve that exact problemof over promising and under
delivering, that you're talkingabout Lynne, but then it also
allowed us to charge more. Andshe'd say, well, we've never she
was just flat out honest withclients, yeah, whenever that's
(12:33):
great, yeah, yeah. She was justlike, I don't think we can do
that, but, you know, we'd loveto let us get with the team and
let you know. And then we talkto and there be like, Oh yeah,
we could probably figure thatout. It's gonna take longer,
though. And she would go back tothe client and be like, you
know, here's here's thecontract, but it's 2x what we
quoted you. And they would signthe thing, and it was just, how
did that happen? Like,she built that trust. They
(12:54):
trusted her, right? Exactly.
That's so cool. She was yeah forher, yeah.
So as you went along, you'restarting to see I, I did read in
your description like you werethe one that was often given the
extra bonuses you were given,you know, more often than
(13:16):
others, or a larger increase,you began to see that you were
almost it sounded to me like adisrupter compared to people who
were more afraid to say stuff.
I would agree, yeah, and I thinkthere was, there was to that
point, I think disruptorsometimes has this like it's
over glorified, or a negativeconnotation. You know what I
mean, or sounds really sexy, andit's really not, because being a
(13:36):
disrupter is sometimes being inthe meeting where the boss is
talking and stops talking. Andeveryone knows, okay, this is
where we all leave the room andtalk about it later. And I was
the guy who was like, you know,actually, that doesn't I'm
confused, you know, could youjust play that back for me and
so that, yeah, it's, it's sowhen we say disruptor, i You're
totally right. Lynne and and I'mnot disagreeing with you, I
(13:58):
guess. What I'm trying to say isbeing a disruptor oftentimes, is
just saying the thing you'rescared, to going into the fear
like, you know, and being thevoice in the room of reason. And
then, you know what I didn'trealize when I was younger, and
what I started finding as Istarted networking and talking
to all these people, I'mnaturally, you know,
extroverted, and so I havenaturally extroverted
(14:19):
tendencies, and so I wouldnaturally start to talk to
people, and being that person inthe room, you know, there's a
fine line between driving peoplecrazy and like just wanting to
hear yourself talk, but if youcan balance it well, you build
up confidence and respect inother people, because they're
like, Oh my gosh. He said thething I didn't. I was too scared
to. He said the thing I wantedto. And it kind of puts you in
(14:41):
this place of being a naturalleader without the title, and
that's ultimately, I think, whatsets you up for a really great
foundation to eventually get thetitle. I was going
to say as a contractor, somebodywho's not a contractor. Yeah, I
was the person who often saidthe things they wanted to say.
So it was really cool, like Icould just say, Well, what
about. This, and they were,like, afraid to say it, and it's
(15:02):
a wonderful place to be, andthen they really are grateful,
and they know they can count onyou, and it's just a wonderful
kind of trust thing. So you werethat person,
I totally agree, and exactly asit sounds like, your experience
can speak to as well. It's likeonce, once you become that
person, or once you are thatperson everyone else kind of
gets inspired to be too, andthen it just changes the
(15:24):
culture. That's really how youchange the cultures. And
everybody's like, well, Sean'sgonna say it. If I don't, I
might as well say it, you know.
And then everyone starts to geta little stronger and a little
bit bolder, and before you knowit, you're doing stuff on your
team that you're proud about,and you're telling your family
about it. Everyone's doing it,and it's that's, it's fun. And
then work is a whole differentkind of method. Yeah,
(15:45):
and people know that you careenough to speak up. That's cool.
Well, so, so you're that person,right? The years go by, you
start to see stuff you're notreal happy about. All of a
sudden, you realize I'm workingless hours than I worked before.
I'm making more money than I'veever made. Most people would
say, Hey, this is great. Like,what? What made you decide, nah,
(16:07):
I'm not gonna, I'm not gonnastay around for this.
I guess it was a few, it was afew culminating things. I had
two young boys at the time. Mykids were three and one, and,
you know, and I had the houseand the marriage cars in the
driveway, I had the dream, youknow. I mean, the bank owned 80%
(16:28):
of it, but, you know, on paper,it looked like I had the dream.
And I thought it one day, I wassitting in my office or my boy's
nursery, and I was thinking tomyself, like, this is the dream.
Why does it feel like anightmare, you know, and then,
like, if I, if I teach my kidslike, this is okay, and this is
how we're supposed to feel asmen or as people, you know, I
(16:49):
was like, then that I'm reallynot doing them any emotional,
spiritual favors and, and so Iguess, you know, I think COVID
had a lot to do with it, but IGuess it really all came to a
head when one of my old bossesleft, and she was replaced with
a new VP. And in talking with myold boss, kind of, on her exit
interview, she said, Sean, youknow, if you play your cards
(17:11):
right, in 1520, maybe 30 years,you could run this place. And,
you know, the place was abillion dollar company. It was
an eight figure salary. We weretalking about maybe nine figures
like that was, you know, that'swhy I went to business school.
It was like, that was the dream,yeah. And I just started
thinking to myself, I was like,30 years. Like, if it's a long
time, like 30 exactly. I mean,not only is that a long time,
(17:33):
but then what would I be doing?
And, you know, when you'remaking the most and working the
least, I think guilt enters thepicture and and in addition to
that boss telling me, you know,you'll be able to run this
place, one day, I had anotherboss just say, Hey, you earned
it. You've earned it. Just enjoyit. You know, have fun. Lay
back, you know, get somemassages. Like, relax. You know,
you've you've earned this. Youdeserve it. And as I told you
(17:55):
about my parents earlier, likethey worked their asses off and
never made like, I think I was26 when I eclipsed my dad's
annual paycheck, like when Istarted making more than my dad
ever had, and he works for thesame company for 30 plus years.
And so that was tenureship andloyalty and everything. And so
it like that just never jivedwith me. It was like, No, I know
a lot of people who have workedin in areas and industries that
(18:18):
really run a city. And I was, Iwas, you know, as COVID told us,
like, my job is not essential. Iwas not essential. I should not
be making that much money. And,and I realized that's a terrible
feeling, yeah. That is Yeah.
And so I think the guilt set in,and then, as my brain works, you
(18:40):
know, when you start to feeloverwhelmed, I guess you start
to very intellectually and verylogically look for a solution.
And in looking for the solution,I realized I thought the
corporations were a tickingTampa. And I thought that for
two reasons. I thought, youknow, one, the current state of
(19:02):
them is just unsustainable. It'sgonna, you know, kill the planet
if it continues. And then two, Ithought, if I'm managing this
company, you know, puttingmyself in leadership's position,
if I'm managing a company likethis, and I have these leaders
who are working less and makingthe most, eventually, as the
boss, boss, my job wouldprobably be to outsource as much
(19:24):
as possible to robotics or AI.
And so by very definition, like,eventually, if I was running the
place, my job would probablythreaten my current role right
now. And so it just, it kind ofbecomes, then you start to
really see the house of cardsfor what it is. And you're like,
Oh my gosh. Like, yeah, my job,one day, is going to be put my
old self out of a job. Andthat's a Yeah. That gives you an
(19:44):
existential crisis, I guess, butit also didn't
sit right with you. Yeah, yousaw it right with me? Yeah, you
saw, yeah, you saw where it wasgoing exactly. Well, especially,
I mean, one thing I'm alwaysarguing is, like, there you
can't it's not sustainable withhow much. CEOs make and that
structure, and, you know, it'sso much more than the lowest
(20:05):
paid worker, and it's so muchmore than any other
industrialized nation. It kindof bugs the, you know, what, out
of me,but I think that's in the news
right now, right with the USAhealthcare CEO and, oh yeah,
it's, yeah, I'm always talkingabout it. It's hard to go
back, though, you know, once youhit that kind of crazy level,
it's hard to convince people togo back. But my argument is
(20:27):
always like, hey, you know, bewealthy. That's great, but, you
know, this is not sustainable.
How can you keep running acompany where you're laying
people off and giving the personwho laid them off more and more
money? So I can see what youmust have been going through.
It's a weird environment. Wellsaid, well said, Yeah, wow,
there's so much there. I want totalk about it and unpack. I
(20:50):
don't I don't know whatdirection you want to take this,
but no, I totally agree. Itotally agree.
Yeah. Just really, like, youknow, hitting the points for me.
So I really want to know is,what, how were you able to make
that step away like I It allmakes sense that you're you're
thinking ahead, you're realizingwhere it might be going. You're
(21:12):
not pleased with the you knowthat other people are saying to
you, you know, it's fine. Youearned it. Just stick with it.
Relax, get a massage, but whatreally gave you the courage to
step away, that's what we loveto hear on the story of human
is, when did that transformationhappen, and how did you have
that courage? Because that'shard.
(21:37):
I'll have to think I like to sayit was like one moment. You
know, it often is, yeah, I mean,it felt like a build up. But let
me think, I'm sure there was onemoment, the one that comes to
mind, and I would say, up tothis point, I had already spent,
you know, in a position ofpower, in a leadership position
(22:01):
with my own team, I had alreadydone quite a bit of work in not
outsourcing my work, but givingit to others. Giving and
determined management that wesay right is giving
responsibility to others so theycan learn more. And so I already
given a lot of, yeah, so Ialready given a lot of my
responsibility to others, andthey were doing well. And, you
know, throughout COVID, I hadalready seen my entire team
(22:23):
replaced, because everybody had,you know, there were a lot of
people having epiphanies, and alot of people changing their
minds about what they wanted.
And one of my buddies, you know,he came back from a long weekend
and was just like, I'm moving toSpain, I'm going to grad school
and I'm going to work for acruise ship afterwards. And he's
doing that, you know, he went tograd school right after COVID,
and so there was a lot of changein the air. And I think through
all that, I saw everyone wasreplaceable. And so the first,
(22:44):
the herd, first hurdle I hadwas, I can't leave the team. I
can't leave all these greatpeople that I work for or work
with, you know, that thatwouldn't be fair to them. And
then having to replace the teamonce over already I saw, you
know, is as much as it candepress us that everyone's
replaceable, including me. Andso that meant, you know, I
wasn't really insulting anyoneif I left the right way and gave
(23:06):
everyone ample time. And so themoment to answer your question,
the moment that really struck meis I had really put all the
ducks in a row. Everything wasset up, and I was ready to go,
and then I got stuck. You know,it's like that high dive moment.
We're on the edge of the highdive. Your toes are over the
water. Yeah. And I sat there, Ithink for months, I would love
to tell you I had the courage tojust go right away. And I think
(23:27):
I sat there for months, and Iwas dating a gal at the time,
and we were out on a walk. Wewent for like, regular walks
because I wasn't working much,so this was like two hour walk
on a Tuesday in the afternoon,right? And I had a one on one
right before the walk with oneof my team, one of my one of the
folks who worked for me, andthen I had a one on one after
this walk. And so that wasreally all I had from like noon
(23:48):
to five o'clock. I had two halfan hour meetings, and that was
really all I had to do all day.
And so me and her, we went on awalk, and we were walking around
this park I used to live next,next to, and she says, you know
when you do this, because sheknew, she knew my dream, she
knew what I was talking about.
She's like, you know, I'm gonnado this. And she goes, you know
when you're gonna do this, whenyou do this, people are gonna
(24:09):
think you're nuts, yeah. Andthere was, there was something
about that that just like, itwas like, I know that. Like,
that's, that's why, you know,you know it sounds, it sounds, I
guess, cold hearted, but that'swhy I had hired a great lawyer
for my divorce. And like my exwife and I, or my former wife
(24:29):
and I had such an ironcladdivorce, and like, everything
was mutually agreed on, and wehave everything in writing. Is
because, like, I had knownalmost a year and a half, two
years out, that when I did this,the first response from everyone
around me was, Oh, my God, he'shaving a midlife crisis. And
like my brother even joked aboutthat, like you're in the middle
of your midlife crisis. Let'snot take your opinion too far.
(24:49):
And it was like I knew, youknow, I had all these build up
moments where I knew what wasgonna happen. And the minute she
said that, it clicked for me,like, you know, that. You've
prepped for it, you've done yourthing. You know, you have all
these contingencies, like you'reready, you it's time to go. And
then, yeah, from there, I just,I waited for the right moment,
(25:10):
and eventually the right momentcame along where it was like, I
just can't do this anymore. Ihave to go and and I guess the
moment was, I was recently puton a major hotel chain account,
and a couple times throughout mycareer, I flipped something like
a relationship with sour aclient was upset, and I had gone
in and been like, okay, brasstacks. This sucks. Nobody's
(25:31):
happy. I'm assigned to it nowbecause I'm trying to fix it and
I need everyone, you know, yeah,and it was another one of those
accounts where I was broughtinto a major you know, everyone
knows the brand. I won't, Iwon't say its name, but its
name, but everyone knows thebrand. It's a worldwide brand.
And I was brought into thataccount to fix it, or at least
fix our team's portion of it.
(25:51):
And I was on it for about aweek. And then when the managing
VP asked me, like, how are youdoing? How's it working with the
team? You know, just trying to,like, catch speed of, like, when
do you think we can do this? Youknow, trying to get my take I,
you know, we were having a zoomlike this, and I looked her
straight in the eye, and I waslike, Kelly, I can't do this.
(26:11):
Like, I don't care anymore.
Like, I'm like, I want to do agood job for you, but I don't
care anymore. I can't do thisfor you, and it wouldn't be fair
to you for me to stick aroundlike I want you to know come
Friday, you know, I'm I'm givingeverybody my three weeks. I'm
quitting, wow,yeah, but it is hard to fake
caring. I mean, that's when youreach that point. You can't
pretend to care.
(26:35):
Yeah, no. And, well, you'd besurprised how many people in
corporate America do.
Yeah, they try, they try.
But no. A friend of mine, Iguess before that had also said,
you know, there's somethingabout keeping your dignity, and
you have to make sure decisionsyou make in life, even if
they're not always the mostfinancially smart or sound, if
you can respect yourself at theend of the day, you know you're
(26:58):
doing something right. And so Iguess those three moments
together really created that,that leap off moment, and
that's amazing. So did peoplethink you were crazy? Um,
you know, I waited three weeksuntil after, like, three weeks
until my last day. So it waslike, Yeah, my last day was the
end of April, and it was threeweeks into May, and I was
(27:19):
finally at like, a brunch orsomething with my family, and I
was about to get up and leave,and I remember being like, I
should probably tell them I'vebeen out of work now for three
weeks, like, now's probably agood time. And so I was like,
you know, floating the idea,like, hey, just to let you know,
I quit, you know, months ago,and this is what I'm doing. I'm
writing my first book, trying tofix this. And I don't
(27:39):
necessarily know where it'sleading, or you know how I'm
gonna what the long term planis. But this just, you know,
following my intuition, this iswhat needs to happen now. And,
yeah, I think the first my olderbrother, you know, are you
having a midlife crisis? My momwas like, Oh God, Sean, like,
I'm gonna worry about this. Do Ineed to worry? Are you okay?
Like, do you need to talk tosomeone? And then my dad, he
(28:01):
just, he was silent, and I'llnever forget it. He's staring at
me, and he's silent. He's to myright, you know, if you can
imagine, and he, you know, atour family table. So he's at the
head of the table, you know,this big rectangle, and he's
staring at me. And finally,everyone's silent, noticing dad
hasn't said anything. And thendad goes, I think you're stupid.
I think you're really stupid. Ohno, giving up such a great job
(28:25):
at such a great pay, like, youhad worked, you know, all
through school, for everything,for that, like, you know, and he
kind of stopped there, and thenhe just got up, you know,
frustrated. Got up, he went intohis bedroom, I think, like, the
like, are you okay? And, youknow, then I'm not defending
myself. But like, Yeah, I'mfine. Like, this is what I'm
doing. I'm writing a book, youknow, I already have 50,000
(28:45):
words, you know, like, you know,a year and a half and nine
versions later, the thing isfinally coming out on January 1,
right? But then my dad comesback and he goes, You know, he's
more flustered now, and he'sjust like, not that you're
stupid. I think your decisionsare stupid. I think they're
impatient, and you're makingrash decisions, and it's not
(29:06):
what's best for your boys, andthat is immediately where
everyone goes next, right? Islike, how are you gonna pay
boys? How are you gonna takecare of your kids? Like, this is
not, this is not okay, you know?
And, and it's as weird as itsounds, but like my dad was very
much a company man, working forthe same company for 35 years.
And although he liked, like, hisgeneral job, you know, he was
(29:27):
the trucker, and he liked beingon the road. He liked driving.
Got to drive through themountains every day like he
liked it as much as he liked it.
He didn't like the hours. Therewere so many things he didn't
like about his life that, whenhe when he said I was stupid and
I was probably on the wrongpath, I took that as a sign that
I was probably very much on theright path, or at least getting
(29:49):
closer to what the right pathwas. I still couldn't tell you I
found it. But yeah, people didnot. Most people thought I was I
was nuts. And, you know, it'sfunny, like when people would
you behave or you. Act in a waythat, as you said earlier, maybe
I was acting bravely, which Istill don't feel like. I just
feel like, maybe,oh, I think it's courageous to
break out of something. No, it'sjust very hard, right? I think
(30:11):
it's courageous to make a changelike that. But you know what
quotation keeps floating throughmy mind is, if you do what
everyone else does, you'll havewhat everyone else has, and you
didn't want to have whateveryone else had it, and the
system seems like it could betweaked to you. So you you took
a step out, and that, to me, isbrave and makes sense.
(30:32):
No, I appreciate that. I likethat courageous. Oh, I
appreciate that a lot. Yeah,that you
know that most people are notgoing to understand that,
because that's not the majority.
View, and most people are tooafraid to make a big change like
that. Yeah. But I think, I thinkyou know, when you say that, all
I with the book, though, thebook will help people see, like,
(30:54):
what you learned and how you canhelp, you know, and they can
help them, and you can, they canmake it better. So let's, let's
talk about that. The book soundsamazing. I love that you sent it
to me because I've been scanningit and it just, I can really
relate to it, because I havebeen in the corporate world a
long time. Yeah, and why don'tyou talk a little bit about what
(31:15):
you share, because it's so cool.
Like how to how we view work andits connection to our self
worth, the 8020 rule, and how tofulfill your time effectively.
These are things we need toknow,
sure, sure, I'd love to so mybook, it really started in a
meeting. I was joining my ownteam at this point, and I said,
(31:35):
you know, they asked me. Theyknew I didn't have the kids that
weekend. So my team asked me,like, you Sean, what you get up
to this weekend? And I was like,Why start it? You know, just
writing a book. Writing a book,and two of my youngest who I
just recruited right out ofcollege, I got, like, two or
three college new grads everyyear on my team. They they
stopped immediately. And theycould have just been being very
nice to the boss, you know, butthey stopped immediately. And
(31:56):
was like, we would read thatbook. And so initially, I think
my first name of my book,someone asked me about this last
week. I think the first name ofmy book, of my book was like the
new grads guide to corporateAmerica, or to climbing the
ladder or something. It was likethe new grads guide climbing the
ladder. And it started out verymuch as, like, just a how to to
free up your time, make moremoney and navigate corporate
America and and so that's whereyou get the 8020 rule. That's
(32:21):
where you get my rules for howto manage meetings. That's where
I went to a bunch of emailtrainings when I was in
corporate, and it was all abouthow to manage your email.
Because I was working for threedirectors when I first started
my career, where it was likethere was so much work, you
know, when you're when you're anunderling, as anyone knows, or
Grunt, oftentimes there's somuch work being piled on at you,
that if you don't figure out howto prioritize and do things in
(32:44):
the right order, everyone'sgonna say they're upset with
you, and that's the worst thingwhen everyone's upset with you,
who's above you as a grunt to bebecause it means you're probably
not good at your work, even ifit just means you're overwhelmed
and people are giving you theirown work, right? Yeah. So in a
lot of my book, it was stuffthat I learned, you know, I had
(33:04):
problems. And then I'd go to mymentor and say, Hey, like, I
have way much. I have about 60hours of work to do this week. I
have too much, and I probablyhave another 12 hours of emails
I have to get through. And thenshe'd send me to a training, or
she'd give me her tips on how tomanage it. And, you know, you
start to ask enough people, andbefore you know it, you start to
develop a method of how to howto handle that. And that method
(33:25):
was the same one that I usedwhen I was effectively doing two
jobs right when I was trainingmy replacement to take over my
largest accounts, and then alsodoing the rules of a director of
consulting. There was, you know,before I got into that nice
Coast area where I was makingthe most and working least.
There was probably 6065, hoursof work easy every week that I
just can't handle. And so thatsystem came, came the system I
(33:49):
outlined in the book, came handthat transition. People
are drowned in emails. And I'veseen the you know, you I don't
know when this started, butpeople have meetings back to
back. The more important youare, the more meetings you seem
to have. And it's like, oh,yeah, how can anyone work like
that? And then people aremultitasking during the meeting,
(34:09):
because you can't work likethat. You know, it's just
insane. So it's good that youoffer those, those methods. No,
I appreciate that. I think, Ithink when you say that, a key
point I want to, I want to sayto our listeners too, is it's
very important you redefine, youredefine, excuse me, like, what
is productivity and what isoutput? And so I guess, you know
the free exercise. You don'teven have to buy me a book for
(34:31):
this exercise. But the FreeExercise is especially, you
know, with the holidays and theNew Year and any breaks you have
coming up with spring break andeverything, if you work in
corporate, I would recommend,just like, take 10 minutes, you
know, or five minutes and thinkabout what you did the day
before, or the day before that.
Or, you know, if it's Friday,think about what you did on
Monday. And if you're like me,and you use your calendar for
(34:52):
everything, you could probablylook back and go, Oh, on
calendar, I did this, and I didthis, and I did this, and I did
four hours of email, and. I didall of this, but for most of us,
you know, looking back, we'relike, I don't, I don't even know
what I did on Tuesday. I know Iworked nine hours, or I know I
worked seven hours, but I haveno idea what I actually got
done, like, what was actuallyhelpful. And so a big shift in
my career, and I think I go intothis in the book, is, is
(35:16):
defining, like, what isproductivity like, what? What
are the things that you actuallyneed to get done in a day? And
the scenario I give to myreaders is, you know, imagine
emergency happens. You come intothe office, it's nine o'clock,
or you, you know you're workingfrom home, you sit down in front
of the computer, it's 9am andimagine you have 15 or 20
minutes, and then an emergencyerupts. Your kids call you, you
(35:37):
know, their schools on fire orsomething, or, I don't know, you
know, your mom's in thehospital, and you need to dash
out of the office, and you onlyhave time for one thing. What is
that one thing you would do soyou don't have to start tomorrow
in the same place you are today,right? Assuming the emergency is
a one day thing. And so that'sno that's really good. And what
(36:00):
I'm hearing too, is that you'rekind of helping people break
that. I think a lot of us, if wedon't do that, we just react to
whatever comes, whatever getsour attention, the shiny thing.
And that's not productive.
That's really good. I wish, Iwish I had done more of that
myself.
I appreciate that. Well, yeah,and I think, as we've talked
(36:21):
about it at length now, now youhave, you know, like I was, you
have this layer of managementand a lot of corporations that
get paid so much and they havereally nothing to do. And one of
my favorite quotes Lynne, ispeople who are, by definition,
very unproductive, will use themajority of their time appearing
to be productive versus actuallybeing productive. And it's the
(36:43):
idea that, yeah, you have thiswhole layer in corporate America
now that's giving other peoplework that really doesn't need to
get done. And I think, I don'tthink they're necessarily doing
it maliciously. I think maybe,like, I was in the role, you
know, you start to lose yourmind, and you're like, oh my
god, like, I'm making goodmoney. I need to earn this, you
know, I need to contribute. Andso you start giving people more
stuff to do, and you reallydon't have to, maybe sometimes
(37:04):
as to be a great leader, youjust have to cut things out for
people. You know, there's,there's this great experiment. I
don't talk about it in my book.
There's this great experimentwhere they researchers took
like, a Lego bridge. And if youimagine, like, just this bridge
made of Legos. One side istaller than the other, and they
give it to participants with,like, a box of Legos next to it.
And they're saying, okay, youknow, fix it however you want.
(37:27):
And it's like 100 or 99% ofparticipants will start grabbing
Legos out of the box and addingto the size that's too short to
level the bridge when in inactuality, the easiest way to
solve the bridge problem is byremoving, like, three layers of
bricks from the size that'sthat's too big, and that's a lot
(37:50):
of the methodology that's,that's throughout my book, is
like removing things actuallywill allow you to do better
work. It'll allow you to getmore done, and it'll really free
up your cognitive ability tofocus on the stuff that matters.
BecauseI love that image. Yeah, that's
such a great way of explaining Ilove Legos. Oh, yeah, me too. I
always did Legos with my son. Ilove and my daughter, but that's
(38:11):
such a great image because,yeah, that's not something you
think of right away. Also, whatI'm thinking too, is, like a lot
of us, and I've done the samething. We need to put our mark
on something. We feel like wehave to. It's like ego, you
know. And I've, you know,because I'm a writer, I'm always
being edited by someone else.
And, you know, even when itmight not be necessary, they
(38:34):
have to edit it, right? You getused to that. And you see it in
other areas where people justneed to, you know, I touch this,
I approve this, I you know, theyneed to put their mark on it.
And so if you can quiet yourego, it's a much better leader,
right? Because you're not goingto always have to do that. It's
a lot of busy work orunnecessarily drawing attention
(38:55):
to yourself. And I love thewhole idea of take some away so
that you You just must have theymust miss you, because you
really empowered them, you know,like, that's, that's great. I
appreciatethat. I appreciate that. Yeah, I
guess, I guess, towards the end,I really embrace my role is,
like, I'm a fixer, you know,like, I'll give the ball to my
running back. I am not afootball guy, but the analogy
(39:16):
right, is, I'll give my myworks, yeah, thank you. And if
they fumble it, my job is torecover it and try again, you
know, and dust off my runningback and say, Hey, you can do
better. Here's the ball again.
Go. My job is not to preventthem from making mistakes. They
don't learn, and I don't learnhow much they can handle with
that. And so it's, you know, myjob is as a firefighter. It's
(39:37):
not as a fire preventer. Isanother way to put it, I guess.
And I appreciate that. Yeah, Ithink when I embraced that on my
team, we were able to grow quitea bit, very fast, and everyone
took on a lot of responsibility.
And yeah, I guess I put myselfout of a job, which was, which
was nice, which is nice, besidesthe guilt and, you know, all the
anxiety, it was nice, yeah, tobe out of a job. Yeah.
(40:00):
So the book comes out January 1.
It comes out January 1. Yeah,it's on Kindle. It's called
hacking the corporate jungle.
How to work less make bornactually like your life. It's on
Kindle all the major stops. It'sBarnes and Noble Kindle iBooks.
And then it's in a few local I'min from Denver. Still live in
Denver, Denver, Colorado. And soit's in a few local coffee book
and coffee shops around here aswell.
(40:24):
And it sounds like it's, it'smoved from, you know, you were
focusing at first recent grads,but it really applies to, I
mean, I would definitely readthis book. It applies to all of
us.
I appreciate it. Yeah, one of myfirst editors read it, and was
like, I don't like, I don'tthink you're actually writing a
book for new grads. I thinkyou're writing a time management
(40:44):
book for the new age. And I waslike, Well, I like your lingo.
Can I use that?
But that's that's so cool,because you were seeing changes,
and you were really thinkingabout it, right about what the
future looked like, and you'regoing to help people deal with
that, because there's a lot ofstuff coming at us, you know,
the AI stuff and the trying tounderstand, I also the remote,
(41:04):
you know, versus not remote,like, that's such a big thing
now they're trying to forcepeople back to work. But I don't
know that that ship has sailedwhere
I agree. I think, I think it'sand I think it's a power
struggle. I think, you knowthat, like, the those in charge,
or being like, Well, how do wedo our jobs? Well, if we can't
(41:25):
watch you and we can't keep youin your little confined
cubicles, and the short answeris, right, is your job shouldn't
be supervising people likemaybe, maybe our society or our
workforce has started to evolvepast needing immediate
supervisors.
I mean, I'm old enough toremember going in every day,
driving far, you know, the thewasted time, right, that and
(41:46):
just accepting it, but also thatit was more about, like, a
factory mentality, like, youhave to be here so many hours,
and that equals, yeah, work and,like, it didn't matter if you
got stuff done or not.
Eventually they would figure itout, perhaps that you weren't
doing anything. But a lot ofpeople, they just were there,
you know, like putting in theireight hours. That's the truth.
And I remember one time we had asnow day. This is, like, a long,
(42:10):
long time ago, probably likelate 80s, we had a snow day,
right? It was a sizableCorporation, and they said, I
got in, you know, I made my wayin. It was really hard. I wasn't
far away, thank goodness. Andthere were no mountains. So I
got in, and I sat there forlike, an hour, hour and a half,
and my boss came in, and he'slike, well, we'd like you to try
(42:31):
to get here. You can get herethen, you know, we're calling it
early because it's snowing sohard. And I'm like, turn around
and go back driving the activesnowstorm to go home. There was
that kind of mentality, like youhave to get here, you know, no
matter what, and you have to sitthere. So hopefully we're moving
away from that, because I'venever been more productive than
(42:53):
being at home, especially forWell, I for some jobs. I'm sure
it doesn't work as well, but fora writer, it's like blessing,
because you can work extra longand you have that time to think,
and you don't feel like you'reworking extra long because
you're not commuting. And withall the interactive connections
we have, all the applications,where I used to be on a project,
(43:15):
where every morning, I met witha team from India every morning,
and it was evening for them, andit was we moved through our
features of the software releaseand,
wow, it's great. It's like, whattime is it? Locally? It's like,
it's 7am and it's like, it's 8pmhere, what is happening? Like,
(43:35):
yeah, I can relate alittle used to that, right? You
had to say, Good morning, goodevening. Just exactly. It's
just, there's a lot of potentialthere. So I love that this book
is looking at that, you know,like it's going to be harder to
manage your time the old way.
That's what I'm hearing. And Ilove that you're offering
alternatives.
No, I appreciate that. Yeah, I,I, you know, I spent two and a
(43:57):
half years all in, I think,writing the book and researching
for it, because as is as smalland as humble as my initial, I
guess draft was, it really blowsup. I mean, Lynne as writer, you
know, sometimes, if you don'tstay very strict on what the
vision is or what the goal is,your the problem can can
manifest and be huge. And then,you know, your research takes
(44:17):
you down all these rabbit holes,and then before you know it,
you're looking at how to fix theworld. Yeah,
go ahead. I'm sorry. How did youdo that, though? How did you
manage that?
Well, honestly, I would say thisis part one. I went for, okay,
this corporation has problems.
It shouldn't be. It shouldn't.
(44:39):
You know, in a true economicsystem, you probably shouldn't
make the most and work theleast. That doesn't make sense,
right? That's an echo ofcolonialism or an echo of
elitism like that in today'sworld, like, I thought we were
past that. So that shouldn'tmake sense, yeah. So I started
with that problem, and theneventually, as you really dig
in, you start to realize, likecorporations with their
fiduciary duties for leaders,which for those. Of you don't
(45:00):
know, like, even if a leadermorally wants to do a different
thing, like they don't want tolay off 100 people, if the
financiers, and, you know, theiraccounting teams and stuff, say,
Hey, this is the most prudentand the best decision right now,
they are legal, literally,literally, legally obligated to
lay off those people and do whatthey think is best, or depending
(45:22):
on the board and their majorinvestors they are, they're
risking their own career to thenhave to go in front of the board
and explain to them like, Hey,I'm making a four year bet
instead of doing what's mostprudent for our bottom line
right now, and laying thosepeople off. And so I started
with, Okay, I think the problemis just in this one corporation,
(45:43):
and then it kind of blows up to,actually, it's the whole all of
corporations, and then you getto, oh my gosh, it's the
economy. And so it like led medown all these, all these
different research avenues andwhere debt comes from, and the
origins of money and and somefascinating stuff. And so I
would say this is part one,like, we need people to
disconnect their self worth fromtheir work, and we need people
(46:04):
to work less so they can calmthemselves, and, I would say,
center themselves and like, findtheir own spirituality and find
their own peace and find whothey are. Because, to your
point, we have so much coming atus right now. And I think, I
think one of the opinions is allthe world's ending. And my
former wife would tell you allthat I see the world through
money and through economicterms, and working in big data,
(46:26):
I actually had access todatabases that helped me, you
know, evaluate this in a waythat I don't think most people
are privy to, and so I was veryblessed for that. But what I'm
trying to say is we already havean economic crisis on our hands,
and we're struggling emotionallyand psychologically, how to deal
with it, like we don't haveenough jobs for everyone. And
you know, you think about howmany people get paid
(46:48):
astronomical amounts to playprofessional sports. How many
people get paid to just talkabout those players playing
professional sports? How youknow, how many, how many like we
like? When you think about whatessential work is, and running a
city and running a society, wehave the majority, I think it's
like 660, or 70% of people nowin non essential roles, because
(47:09):
we're all struggling to figureout, you know, how to pay our
bills and how to contribute,when, in fact, there's, there's,
you know, we've gotten soefficient, and we've advanced
technologically So much thatthere really isn't enough work
for all of us. And I think thefirst take, and you get this in
the news all the time, is, oh mygosh, this is a crisis. We need
to roll back AI, and we need toroll back Robotics Engineering.
(47:31):
And, you know, we need to stopthis. And I think, I think the
question I want to pose to theworld, and this will be in my
next book, right? Like this,this book, one is for setup, is,
is okay in a world where wedon't all have to work, what
does our daily lives look like?
How do you choose who works, andthen how do you spend the
majority of your time? And thatbrings me back to one of the
first points of research that Iuncovered when I was going down
(47:55):
one of these rabbit holes lane,was there was a a economist back
in the 1930s right aroundironically, a contemporary of
Henry Ford who helped roll outthe 40 hour work week, and his
name was John Maynard Keynes,and he predicted that his great
grandchildren that to us by 2030by 2030 he predicted that his
great grandchildren are us, andour biggest problem would be
(48:18):
Figuring out, due to laborsaving technologies, what to do
with all of their free time. AndI think we're having that right
now, like, you know, and I thinkthere are some, you know, not to
sound like a conspiracytheorist, but I think, you know,
my my research pointed anduncovered a lot of, I would say,
nefarious interests and lobbyinggroups who want to keep people
busy so we're not payingattention to, you know, them
(48:39):
stealing from us, and everythingthat's happening in society that
society that's not Kosher orit's not good, but I think the
majority of us, I like to thinkthat the majority of us, are
struggling to figure out how wefit into a society and what a
society looks like when we don'thave to work all the time,
because we've done it.
You've got that bigger picture.
I love that, that you've donethat research, and you have that
bigger picture, there's atransformation happening, and I
(49:00):
and I, we don't know how to doit. We're moving to a whole
different age. You know,definitely 100% Yeah. And like,
we need different tools. So weneed a different way to be and
how to define what our lifelooks like and productivity
looks like. The 40 hour workweek is not cutting it. I
(49:21):
couldn't agree more. Can youedit my next book? Lynne, this
is great. This is fantastic. I'dlove to you're speaking my
language. I could probably talkto you for two hours. I really
love what you're doing, and I'mreally looking forward to
hearing what my listeners think.
They love the story, but theyalso will love the information,
because who doesn't lovesomething you can use? You know,
(49:42):
it's almost like you wrote aguidebook, which I love. I love
practical information thatpeople can make sense of for
their lives. So thank you forthat. Is there anything that we
didn't talk about that you wouldlike to talk about?
Um, I would say just one thing,when I was, when I first, I
guess, started on this journey.
Ernie and I sat down at my desk,you know. I quit my job, and my
(50:02):
last day was Friday. On Monday,I sat down at my desk in true
workaholic fashion and wrote forfive hours straight at that at
that time, when I sat down, Iwas very naive in the fact that
I thought I'll just come up,I'll solve the issue, you know,
and I will come up with the bestidea, the great idea, and I'll
just roll it out to the world,and I'll get on great shows like
(50:23):
yours, Lynne, and, you know,I'll preach my message, and
everyone will get online. Andthen, you know, I'll lead the
way into this new era, you know,and this new transformation. And
the more and more you research,and the more and more you learn,
the more humble you get, youknow, thank God. And the more I
realized that, like thissolution, would be
(50:43):
decentralized. And what I meanby that is rather than me being
this hierarchical figure, orrather than our, you know,
President, whoever they are, youknow, rather than this
authoritarian figure telling usthis is the way the new world is
going to work, and this is howwe do this, the new paradigm, or
the new the new way we organizeall this is really going to be
based on what we call incomputer sciences, like network
(51:05):
effects. And what I mean by thatis like everyone's little
contribution to this system isgoing to, in turn, make a better
system. And so I would just sayto all you listeners, like you
probably know something to adegree that I don't. You almost
undoubtedly know something andhave an expertise in something
that I don't. I'd love to talkabout it. One and two, we need,
(51:25):
we need your expertise, like tobuild a better world. Everyone
needs to be involved, and we allneed to be communicating and
putting aside our egos, as yousaid earlier, Lynne, and we all
need to really be like in it,for our for each other, you
know, and together. And I thinkthat's like the biggest lie
throughout history is, you know,like, although there have been
(51:47):
geniuses and great mindsthroughout history, like those
weren't the people whonecessarily spread their own
ideas, it was the masses whoadopted it and recognized it for
brilliant that really, arereally insightful, that that
passed it along. And so I'd say,you know, we all need to do this
together. And if you're, youknow, stuck in corporate America
as Lynne and I were for 10 hoursor 12 hours a day, like you
(52:09):
probably don't have the energyor time to to contribute your
part. And I'm, and I'm reallybetting that's why you're here
right now, is because your partis very much needed and, and,
and we need you to stop workingso much like, you know, you're
the medicine, you know, we needyou to join in. Yeah,
I love that, because you see anew way. And that's a wonderful,
(52:32):
hopeful message. Thank you. Howcan people reach you? What's the
best way to reach you? I'll putit all in my book. I like to say
it, yeah, I like to say it onthe episode, because some people
don't readthe show. Yeah, sure. So you can
find me on my website. It's Seanmcmahon.com that's S, E, A n, m,
c, M, a n, n.com, you can signup for my newsletter there. You
(52:56):
can get all the links to all thedifferent books formats. Next
month, I'll be rolling out a oneon one coaching program. So if
you're interested in that,please feel free to reach it.
Reach out. Yeah, thanks. I'vehad quite a bit of interest and
demand in it, and so just tomake sure I can do right by my
my new clients, I'm only goingto be taking on three new
(53:17):
clients at first. And so ifyou're interested in being one
of those first three, please letme know. Excellent. Yeah,
like I said, we're going to havehave to have you back for part
two, because there's a lot to besaid.
I love talking to you. Thank youfor sharing.
Thanks for having me. Lynne,it's been my pleasure. You.
Sean, hello and welcome to the storied human I'm Lynne
Thompson. My guest today is SeanMcMahon. He started out, right
out of college, recruited at oneof the largest data firms. His
future seemed bright, but eightyears later, after seeing behind
the curtain of some of thelargest corporations today, he
recognized that the system wasbroken. He quit at the height of
(00:24):
his career, when working theleast hours but making the most
money he ever had, he beteverything, including his money,
reputation and time, to try tofix the problem of the corporate
jungle. He shares his insightsin his new book, hacking the
corporate jungle, how to workless, make more, and actually,
(00:44):
like your life. Can't wait todig into that. Welcome. Sean,
thanks. Lynne, super excited tobe here.
So how can we hack our I mean,how did you even get to that
point where you could write thatbook?
I guess that's that's a goodquestion. A lot of trial and
error.
(01:05):
But I think the underlying themethrough it all was I was
fearless, even though I wasscared shitless. Most of the
time I I'd ask the questions noone else seemed to have the
courage to I walked up to theleader I wanted to meet and just
introduced myself. I put myselfin the room, I guess, so to
(01:25):
speak. And I guess that thatgoes back to my parents and how
they raised me and and some ofmy unique childhood experiences,
which we can get into, you know,more later, if you'd like,
I just love to hear about that.
Like, how does, how did youbecome that person? Because that
isn't everybody at work. Mostpeople are too afraid to do the
kinds of things you did. Yeah.
(01:49):
So I guess it goes back to my mymom and dad. They're they're
weird. I guess it's a way to sayit in a really great way, like I
great parents. I have no trauma,which I know is big for a lot of
people right now, I have no realchildhood trauma. My parents
were great, but they also hadsome really weird nuances, like,
(02:11):
instead of going on vacation,most years, we would renovate a
part of our house or redo ourfront lawn. Or one year, like,
when I was seven, I got my ownhammer because we were putting
on our own roof. And my littlebrother was five, and he had his
own hammer too. Is like, lookingback was just like, what? That's
an insurance liability. Like,what were you doing? But they
(02:35):
instilled in me from a veryyoung age, you know, like, if
you work hard enough and you payattention to what's going on,
you can really do anything. Andso, for lack of a better term,
it gave me, I would almost say,like, this sort of naivety that,
you know, give it a shot, giveit a swing. Like, the worst that
can happen is, is somebody saysno, or someone tells you to back
(02:57):
off. But more times than not,it's, it's, it's the people who
are gung ho, I guess. And Iguess I learned throughout my
life and throughout mychildhood, like, if you
volunteered to do something,even if you completely stunk at
it, people would at least giveyou a shot. And then at that
point, even if you didn't get tocontinue doing it, you at least
(03:19):
got direct hands on direct oneon one, feedback as to why you
don't get to keep doing it. Soyeah, go ahead. This
is just so interesting to mebecause I just read an article
that said, if kids do chores, ifthey do real work from the time
they're young, they did thestudy on the ones that did
chores had greater success laterin life. And I was saying, I
(03:40):
should have had my kids do morechoice. Not that my kids aren't
successful. They are, but thatjust makes sense to me that you
were given this sort of sense ofmastery and self esteem. I think
that you can do things, and Ilove that, that they were weird
in that great way. So they wereunconventional, conventional.
Yeah, very so here you are.
You're a hot shot. They recruityou straight out of college. You
(04:02):
know, you you got the the goldenticket, right? You're gonna go.
You can see your future right infront of you. How did it change?
I guess, from the I like, Ialways had this imposter
syndrome, um, and from the veryget go, I felt like I shouldn't
have been let in the door, likeI started in this new grad
(04:24):
program and Aleta. And for thoseof you listening who don't know,
like a lot of largecorporations, have a similar
program where they recruit, youknow, class 10 to 20, sometimes
40 kids straight out of collegeto join the company. And in a
lot of those programs, you getshuffled around, and you get to
try little positions in everydepartment to really see where
you fit. And in my program, Istarted with 14, I guess,
(04:49):
students, or, you know, 20somethings. And there were only
two prior that ever went throughthe program. And so we were the,
really, the first, like, realprogram. And. The first day, we
all sit down, and we all, like,talk about what we had done the
last, you know, summer, thislast summer, or what we've been
up to the last year. And I hadgraduated, like, two months
prior, and so, like, I think thebiggest thing I had done was,
(05:12):
you know, I might have cleanedmy house and maybe went on like,
a three a road trip or somethingwith my fiance at the time. Like
I wasn't, you know, and I wentback to the old coffee shop I'd
worked at through college, youknow, make ends meet until the
job started. And so I hadn'tdone really anything of note.
And I remember I must have beenlast or second to last to go.
And everyone had theseincredible stories like, Oh
(05:35):
yeah, you know, I just spent ayear at sea, or, you know, I
just finished up an internshipat Google. Or, you know, my dad.
My dad flew me to Paris, and Ijust spent the last three
months, you know, in Paris, andit was like, you know, a couple
of them had, like, last namesthat were very resonant, I would
say, in the company, you know,like their dads or their uncles
(05:55):
were, we all knew who they were,right? We knew their friends
were. But for me, I was justlike, how like my dad was, he'd
tell you, you know, he was atruck driver his entire life,
and my mom was a teacher. And soI was sitting there, like,
listening to all these intros.
Like, how did I get in? Like,what am I doing here? Yeah, I
don't think I should be here.
And and I think at one point,you know, because of this new
(06:17):
grad program and the nature ofit, we all had mentors, and the
gal who interviewed me and letme in, and ultimately had had
passed me to the people who hadhired me on, I eventually sat
down with her and was like, didyou make a mistake? Like, I
don't know if I put those kindof words, but I was like, why am
I kind of here and, and, youknow, don't get me wrong, I'm
(06:40):
grateful to be here. Like,please, don't, you know, kick me
out. But why am I here? And Ithink that was the most telling
and one of the most informativeconversations I've really had
about how sometimes marketdynamics that you don't get
taught about work. Because sheessentially said, like, you
worked all through college,which you can't say about, about
(07:00):
any of your you know, yourfellow new grads and you have
have had the most workexperience. And at that time,
I'd already, like, ran a coffeeshop as an assistant manager. I
climbed my way up to shiftsupervisor at one of the Panera
breads near me that I worked toadd for three years, I'd been a
delivery driver at a nearby, youknow, Chinese restaurant that my
neighbors owned and so it's likeI worked all these, all these
(07:23):
odd jobs, but I had worked, Ithink, my first job. I'd worked
since I was 15. Wow, in my lasttwo years of college, I took
like, 18 semester credits, and Iworked like almost 3028, to 30
hours a week. And so I was, Iwas always doing something.
Okay, yeah, so she saw the whatthat indicates, like, that
ability to, she already saw therecord, how you work. Yeah,
(07:47):
that's so cool. You know, I, Iwent to one of those, um, when
my kids were looking forcolleges and and you go to
accepted students day or No, itwasn't that, I'm sorry. It was
like, open, open house, andeverybody's, like, interested,
right? I think it wasGettysburg, which is pretty cool
school. The guy got up and said,if you've been babysitting,
(08:10):
like, maybe one of you has beenbabysitting, and you've been
babysitting for like, seven oreight years, does that impress
us? And and people like givingdifferent answers, and he's
like, that super impresses us,because people forget it's not
the, you know, the like, it'snot the elitism of the job or
the level of the job. It's theresponsibility, it's the ability
to stay with something and and Ijust thought that was brilliant.
(08:35):
You know, that that's how theylook at things. It's like you
were able to handle thatresponsibility
of the the coffee shop,and the babysitter was able, you
know, was trusted by the parentsto handle the responsibility for
children. It's a greatindicator. So she shared that
with you. I think that's great.
Yeah, no, I appreciate that.
I've never thought about it inthat, that sort of light. I
(08:56):
guess I didn't have a lot ofresponsibility growing up, um,
your parentstook it for granted. Because I
think you, you know, you hadresponsibility young, you got
that hammer, and you're buildingthings. And I just think it
builds like that confidence andthat trust in your abilities
that not everybody has whenthey're young. I think some
people get there, your parentsalmost gave you like an express
(09:17):
lane to that, that level ofum, express express lane. I'm
going to tell them that nexttime I see him, I think they'll
likesaying, Yeah, you made me work,
yeah, when I was seven, yeah,but I love that. No, it makes
total sense. So did you feelbetter after you talked to her?
Oh, I did. Yeah, good. And thenshe made me feel super better.
(09:40):
And then my first mentor, who Iactually write about in my first
book, here she was, she was verysimilar, and she told me flat
out, she was like, I was the onewho wanted to hire you. And come
to find out, I worked for threedirectors at this point in my
first role, and out of thethree, only one of them actually
wanted to hire me. And she wasthe one who. Wanted to hire me,
(10:00):
and I'll I'll never forget her.
She, she was a true salesperson,which I think a lot of
organizations have lost nowadaysor really struggle to find. For
those of you don't know, liketrue sales people, they're a
different breed, but they bringin as much as they drive most
people in an organizationabsolutely crazy. She had a
skill set that that you reallythat companies pay through the
(10:24):
nose for because she hasdone well. It's so impressive. I
havea friend like that. Yeah, she
could literally sell, you knowhow they say you could sell ice
to the Eskimos, she could and,Oh, absolutely, and they
wouldn't mind. She's, she's verysincere. It's like, very cool
when you have those skills. So,yeah, so she fought for you,
she fought for me, and I thinkit to this day she might have
(10:47):
been one of the only geniuses ihave ever worked for. And she
was this tiny, blonde, smallJewish woman, and she always
told you, like it was and butshe was just a force, like she
was so tiny. It was such adichotomy, right? Because she
was so tiny in physical stature,but she was such a force in the
room. She was so intelligent. Weget out of meetings, and she'd
be like, how do you think thatwent? I'm like, well, they seem
(11:08):
interested. I think we can sellthem a contract. And she was
like, no, they're not going tobe interested for at least
another six months. And she justknew that, I know, yeah, she
changed, and she did itdifferently, and we get out of
what you know most people, ifyou've worked in corporate at
all, Lynne, I don't have youever worked in corporate, okay,
only in corporate. II'm a technical writer, and I'm
a the way I deal with not I'mnot a good employee, so I'm a
(11:31):
consultant. Okay,that's a good way to put it.
That's, that's great advice foreveryone. If you're a bad
employee in corporate, everyonego into consulting.
I just don't enjoy it. I'm notcut out for it. I'm more
entrepreneurial. So this is howI deal with that. But anyway,
what I thought of first when yousaid sales was how many times I
(11:52):
work a lot in it, and I wasthinking, how many times sales
people promised stuff thedevelopers down the line could
not deliver. So there's thatmismatch. Sometimes there's that
contentious relationship withsales, yeah, promise the moon.
You know, promise the moon.
Yeah,she was, and I will say, my
mentor, who I'm talking about,she was so great at things like
(12:12):
that, like, we would almostpromise the moon, and then she'd
always, and I later found outthis was just a tactic that she
it was kind of a double edgedsword. It was a tactic where I
helped solve that exact problemof over promising and under
delivering, that you're talkingabout Lynne, but then it also
allowed us to charge more. Andshe'd say, well, we've never she
was just flat out honest withclients, yeah, whenever that's
(12:33):
great, yeah, yeah. She was justlike, I don't think we can do
that, but, you know, we'd loveto let us get with the team and
let you know. And then we talkto and there be like, Oh yeah,
we could probably figure thatout. It's gonna take longer,
though. And she would go back tothe client and be like, you
know, here's here's thecontract, but it's 2x what we
quoted you. And they would signthe thing, and it was just, how
did that happen? Like,she built that trust. They
(12:54):
trusted her, right? Exactly.
That's so cool. She was yeah forher, yeah.
So as you went along, you'restarting to see I, I did read in
your description like you werethe one that was often given the
extra bonuses you were given,you know, more often than
(13:16):
others, or a larger increase,you began to see that you were
almost it sounded to me like adisrupter compared to people who
were more afraid to say stuff.
I would agree, yeah, and I thinkthere was, there was to that
point, I think disruptorsometimes has this like it's
over glorified, or a negativeconnotation. You know what I
mean, or sounds really sexy, andit's really not, because being a
(13:36):
disrupter is sometimes being inthe meeting where the boss is
talking and stops talking. Andeveryone knows, okay, this is
where we all leave the room andtalk about it later. And I was
the guy who was like, you know,actually, that doesn't I'm
confused, you know, could youjust play that back for me and
so that, yeah, it's, it's sowhen we say disruptor, i You're
totally right. Lynne and and I'mnot disagreeing with you, I
(13:58):
guess. What I'm trying to say isbeing a disruptor oftentimes, is
just saying the thing you'rescared, to going into the fear
like, you know, and being thevoice in the room of reason. And
then, you know what I didn'trealize when I was younger, and
what I started finding as Istarted networking and talking
to all these people, I'mnaturally, you know,
extroverted, and so I havenaturally extroverted
(14:19):
tendencies, and so I wouldnaturally start to talk to
people, and being that person inthe room, you know, there's a
fine line between driving peoplecrazy and like just wanting to
hear yourself talk, but if youcan balance it well, you build
up confidence and respect inother people, because they're
like, Oh my gosh. He said thething I didn't. I was too scared
to. He said the thing I wantedto. And it kind of puts you in
(14:41):
this place of being a naturalleader without the title, and
that's ultimately, I think, whatsets you up for a really great
foundation to eventually get thetitle. I was going
to say as a contractor, somebodywho's not a contractor. Yeah, I
was the person who often saidthe things they wanted to say.
So it was really cool, like Icould just say, Well, what
about. This, and they were,like, afraid to say it, and it's
(15:02):
a wonderful place to be, andthen they really are grateful,
and they know they can count onyou, and it's just a wonderful
kind of trust thing. So you werethat person,
I totally agree, and exactly asit sounds like, your experience
can speak to as well. It's likeonce, once you become that
person, or once you are thatperson everyone else kind of
gets inspired to be too, andthen it just changes the
(15:24):
culture. That's really how youchange the cultures. And
everybody's like, well, Sean'sgonna say it. If I don't, I
might as well say it, you know.
And then everyone starts to geta little stronger and a little
bit bolder, and before you knowit, you're doing stuff on your
team that you're proud about,and you're telling your family
about it. Everyone's doing it,and it's that's, it's fun. And
then work is a whole differentkind of method. Yeah,
(15:45):
and people know that you careenough to speak up. That's cool.
Well, so, so you're that person,right? The years go by, you
start to see stuff you're notreal happy about. All of a
sudden, you realize I'm workingless hours than I worked before.
I'm making more money than I'veever made. Most people would
say, Hey, this is great. Like,what? What made you decide, nah,
(16:07):
I'm not gonna, I'm not gonnastay around for this.
I guess it was a few, it was afew culminating things. I had
two young boys at the time. Mykids were three and one, and,
you know, and I had the houseand the marriage cars in the
driveway, I had the dream, youknow. I mean, the bank owned 80%
(16:28):
of it, but, you know, on paper,it looked like I had the dream.
And I thought it one day, I wassitting in my office or my boy's
nursery, and I was thinking tomyself, like, this is the dream.
Why does it feel like anightmare, you know, and then,
like, if I, if I teach my kidslike, this is okay, and this is
how we're supposed to feel asmen or as people, you know, I
(16:49):
was like, then that I'm reallynot doing them any emotional,
spiritual favors and, and so Iguess, you know, I think COVID
had a lot to do with it, but IGuess it really all came to a
head when one of my old bossesleft, and she was replaced with
a new VP. And in talking with myold boss, kind of, on her exit
interview, she said, Sean, youknow, if you play your cards
(17:11):
right, in 1520, maybe 30 years,you could run this place. And,
you know, the place was abillion dollar company. It was
an eight figure salary. We weretalking about maybe nine figures
like that was, you know, that'swhy I went to business school.
It was like, that was the dream,yeah. And I just started
thinking to myself, I was like,30 years. Like, if it's a long
time, like 30 exactly. I mean,not only is that a long time,
(17:33):
but then what would I be doing?
And, you know, when you'remaking the most and working the
least, I think guilt enters thepicture and and in addition to
that boss telling me, you know,you'll be able to run this
place, one day, I had anotherboss just say, Hey, you earned
it. You've earned it. Just enjoyit. You know, have fun. Lay
back, you know, get somemassages. Like, relax. You know,
you've you've earned this. Youdeserve it. And as I told you
(17:55):
about my parents earlier, likethey worked their asses off and
never made like, I think I was26 when I eclipsed my dad's
annual paycheck, like when Istarted making more than my dad
ever had, and he works for thesame company for 30 plus years.
And so that was tenureship andloyalty and everything. And so
it like that just never jivedwith me. It was like, No, I know
a lot of people who have workedin in areas and industries that
(18:18):
really run a city. And I was, Iwas, you know, as COVID told us,
like, my job is not essential. Iwas not essential. I should not
be making that much money. And,and I realized that's a terrible
feeling, yeah. That is Yeah.
And so I think the guilt set in,and then, as my brain works, you
(18:40):
know, when you start to feeloverwhelmed, I guess you start
to very intellectually and verylogically look for a solution.
And in looking for the solution,I realized I thought the
corporations were a tickingTampa. And I thought that for
two reasons. I thought, youknow, one, the current state of
(19:02):
them is just unsustainable. It'sgonna, you know, kill the planet
if it continues. And then two, Ithought, if I'm managing this
company, you know, puttingmyself in leadership's position,
if I'm managing a company likethis, and I have these leaders
who are working less and makingthe most, eventually, as the
boss, boss, my job wouldprobably be to outsource as much
(19:24):
as possible to robotics or AI.
And so by very definition, like,eventually, if I was running the
place, my job would probablythreaten my current role right
now. And so it just, it kind ofbecomes, then you start to
really see the house of cardsfor what it is. And you're like,
Oh my gosh. Like, yeah, my job,one day, is going to be put my
old self out of a job. Andthat's a Yeah. That gives you an
(19:44):
existential crisis, I guess, butit also didn't
sit right with you. Yeah, yousaw it right with me? Yeah, you
saw, yeah, you saw where it wasgoing exactly. Well, especially,
I mean, one thing I'm alwaysarguing is, like, there you
can't it's not sustainable withhow much. CEOs make and that
structure, and, you know, it'sso much more than the lowest
(20:05):
paid worker, and it's so muchmore than any other
industrialized nation. It kindof bugs the, you know, what, out
of me,but I think that's in the news
right now, right with the USAhealthcare CEO and, oh yeah,
it's, yeah, I'm always talkingabout it. It's hard to go
back, though, you know, once youhit that kind of crazy level,
it's hard to convince people togo back. But my argument is
(20:27):
always like, hey, you know, bewealthy. That's great, but, you
know, this is not sustainable.
How can you keep running acompany where you're laying
people off and giving the personwho laid them off more and more
money? So I can see what youmust have been going through.
It's a weird environment. Wellsaid, well said, Yeah, wow,
there's so much there. I want totalk about it and unpack. I
(20:50):
don't I don't know whatdirection you want to take this,
but no, I totally agree. Itotally agree.
Yeah. Just really, like, youknow, hitting the points for me.
So I really want to know is,what, how were you able to make
that step away like I It allmakes sense that you're you're
thinking ahead, you're realizingwhere it might be going. You're
(21:12):
not pleased with the you knowthat other people are saying to
you, you know, it's fine. Youearned it. Just stick with it.
Relax, get a massage, but whatreally gave you the courage to
step away, that's what we loveto hear on the story of human
is, when did that transformationhappen, and how did you have
that courage? Because that'shard.
(21:37):
I'll have to think I like to sayit was like one moment. You
know, it often is, yeah, I mean,it felt like a build up. But let
me think, I'm sure there was onemoment, the one that comes to
mind, and I would say, up tothis point, I had already spent,
you know, in a position ofpower, in a leadership position
(22:01):
with my own team, I had alreadydone quite a bit of work in not
outsourcing my work, but givingit to others. Giving and
determined management that wesay right is giving
responsibility to others so theycan learn more. And so I already
given a lot of, yeah, so Ialready given a lot of my
responsibility to others, andthey were doing well. And, you
know, throughout COVID, I hadalready seen my entire team
(22:23):
replaced, because everybody had,you know, there were a lot of
people having epiphanies, and alot of people changing their
minds about what they wanted.
And one of my buddies, you know,he came back from a long weekend
and was just like, I'm moving toSpain, I'm going to grad school
and I'm going to work for acruise ship afterwards. And he's
doing that, you know, he went tograd school right after COVID,
and so there was a lot of changein the air. And I think through
all that, I saw everyone wasreplaceable. And so the first,
(22:44):
the herd, first hurdle I hadwas, I can't leave the team. I
can't leave all these greatpeople that I work for or work
with, you know, that thatwouldn't be fair to them. And
then having to replace the teamonce over already I saw, you
know, is as much as it candepress us that everyone's
replaceable, including me. Andso that meant, you know, I
wasn't really insulting anyoneif I left the right way and gave
(23:06):
everyone ample time. And so themoment to answer your question,
the moment that really struck meis I had really put all the
ducks in a row. Everything wasset up, and I was ready to go,
and then I got stuck. You know,it's like that high dive moment.
We're on the edge of the highdive. Your toes are over the
water. Yeah. And I sat there, Ithink for months, I would love
to tell you I had the courage tojust go right away. And I think
(23:27):
I sat there for months, and Iwas dating a gal at the time,
and we were out on a walk. Wewent for like, regular walks
because I wasn't working much,so this was like two hour walk
on a Tuesday in the afternoon,right? And I had a one on one
right before the walk with oneof my team, one of my one of the
folks who worked for me, andthen I had a one on one after
this walk. And so that wasreally all I had from like noon
(23:48):
to five o'clock. I had two halfan hour meetings, and that was
really all I had to do all day.
And so me and her, we went on awalk, and we were walking around
this park I used to live next,next to, and she says, you know
when you do this, because sheknew, she knew my dream, she
knew what I was talking about.
She's like, you know, I'm gonnado this. And she goes, you know
when you're gonna do this, whenyou do this, people are gonna
(24:09):
think you're nuts, yeah. Andthere was, there was something
about that that just like, itwas like, I know that. Like,
that's, that's why, you know,you know it sounds, it sounds, I
guess, cold hearted, but that'swhy I had hired a great lawyer
for my divorce. And like my exwife and I, or my former wife
(24:29):
and I had such an ironcladdivorce, and like, everything
was mutually agreed on, and wehave everything in writing. Is
because, like, I had knownalmost a year and a half, two
years out, that when I did this,the first response from everyone
around me was, Oh, my God, he'shaving a midlife crisis. And
like my brother even joked aboutthat, like you're in the middle
of your midlife crisis. Let'snot take your opinion too far.
(24:49):
And it was like I knew, youknow, I had all these build up
moments where I knew what wasgonna happen. And the minute she
said that, it clicked for me,like, you know, that. You've
prepped for it, you've done yourthing. You know, you have all
these contingencies, like you'reready, you it's time to go. And
then, yeah, from there, I just,I waited for the right moment,
(25:10):
and eventually the right momentcame along where it was like, I
just can't do this anymore. Ihave to go and and I guess the
moment was, I was recently puton a major hotel chain account,
and a couple times throughout mycareer, I flipped something like
a relationship with sour aclient was upset, and I had gone
in and been like, okay, brasstacks. This sucks. Nobody's
(25:31):
happy. I'm assigned to it nowbecause I'm trying to fix it and
I need everyone, you know, yeah,and it was another one of those
accounts where I was broughtinto a major you know, everyone
knows the brand. I won't, Iwon't say its name, but its
name, but everyone knows thebrand. It's a worldwide brand.
And I was brought into thataccount to fix it, or at least
fix our team's portion of it.
(25:51):
And I was on it for about aweek. And then when the managing
VP asked me, like, how are youdoing? How's it working with the
team? You know, just trying to,like, catch speed of, like, when
do you think we can do this? Youknow, trying to get my take I,
you know, we were having a zoomlike this, and I looked her
straight in the eye, and I waslike, Kelly, I can't do this.
(26:11):
Like, I don't care anymore.
Like, I'm like, I want to do agood job for you, but I don't
care anymore. I can't do thisfor you, and it wouldn't be fair
to you for me to stick aroundlike I want you to know come
Friday, you know, I'm I'm givingeverybody my three weeks. I'm
quitting, wow,yeah, but it is hard to fake
caring. I mean, that's when youreach that point. You can't
pretend to care.
(26:35):
Yeah, no. And, well, you'd besurprised how many people in
corporate America do.
Yeah, they try, they try.
But no. A friend of mine, Iguess before that had also said,
you know, there's somethingabout keeping your dignity, and
you have to make sure decisionsyou make in life, even if
they're not always the mostfinancially smart or sound, if
you can respect yourself at theend of the day, you know you're
(26:58):
doing something right. And so Iguess those three moments
together really created that,that leap off moment, and
that's amazing. So did peoplethink you were crazy? Um,
you know, I waited three weeksuntil after, like, three weeks
until my last day. So it waslike, Yeah, my last day was the
end of April, and it was threeweeks into May, and I was
(27:19):
finally at like, a brunch orsomething with my family, and I
was about to get up and leave,and I remember being like, I
should probably tell them I'vebeen out of work now for three
weeks, like, now's probably agood time. And so I was like,
you know, floating the idea,like, hey, just to let you know,
I quit, you know, months ago,and this is what I'm doing. I'm
writing my first book, trying tofix this. And I don't
(27:39):
necessarily know where it'sleading, or you know how I'm
gonna what the long term planis. But this just, you know,
following my intuition, this iswhat needs to happen now. And,
yeah, I think the first my olderbrother, you know, are you
having a midlife crisis? My momwas like, Oh God, Sean, like,
I'm gonna worry about this. Do Ineed to worry? Are you okay?
Like, do you need to talk tosomeone? And then my dad, he
(28:01):
just, he was silent, and I'llnever forget it. He's staring at
me, and he's silent. He's to myright, you know, if you can
imagine, and he, you know, atour family table. So he's at the
head of the table, you know,this big rectangle, and he's
staring at me. And finally,everyone's silent, noticing dad
hasn't said anything. And thendad goes, I think you're stupid.
I think you're really stupid. Ohno, giving up such a great job
(28:25):
at such a great pay, like, youhad worked, you know, all
through school, for everything,for that, like, you know, and he
kind of stopped there, and thenhe just got up, you know,
frustrated. Got up, he went intohis bedroom, I think, like, the
like, are you okay? And, youknow, then I'm not defending
myself. But like, Yeah, I'mfine. Like, this is what I'm
doing. I'm writing a book, youknow, I already have 50,000
(28:45):
words, you know, like, you know,a year and a half and nine
versions later, the thing isfinally coming out on January 1,
right? But then my dad comesback and he goes, You know, he's
more flustered now, and he'sjust like, not that you're
stupid. I think your decisionsare stupid. I think they're
impatient, and you're makingrash decisions, and it's not
(29:06):
what's best for your boys, andthat is immediately where
everyone goes next, right? Islike, how are you gonna pay
boys? How are you gonna takecare of your kids? Like, this is
not, this is not okay, you know?
And, and it's as weird as itsounds, but like my dad was very
much a company man, working forthe same company for 35 years.
And although he liked, like, hisgeneral job, you know, he was
(29:27):
the trucker, and he liked beingon the road. He liked driving.
Got to drive through themountains every day like he
liked it as much as he liked it.
He didn't like the hours. Therewere so many things he didn't
like about his life that, whenhe when he said I was stupid and
I was probably on the wrongpath, I took that as a sign that
I was probably very much on theright path, or at least getting
(29:49):
closer to what the right pathwas. I still couldn't tell you I
found it. But yeah, people didnot. Most people thought I was I
was nuts. And, you know, it'sfunny, like when people would
you behave or you. Act in a waythat, as you said earlier, maybe
I was acting bravely, which Istill don't feel like. I just
feel like, maybe,oh, I think it's courageous to
break out of something. No, it'sjust very hard, right? I think
(30:11):
it's courageous to make a changelike that. But you know what
quotation keeps floating throughmy mind is, if you do what
everyone else does, you'll havewhat everyone else has, and you
didn't want to have whateveryone else had it, and the
system seems like it could betweaked to you. So you you took
a step out, and that, to me, isbrave and makes sense.
(30:32):
No, I appreciate that. I likethat courageous. Oh, I
appreciate that a lot. Yeah,that you
know that most people are notgoing to understand that,
because that's not the majority.
View, and most people are tooafraid to make a big change like
that. Yeah. But I think, I thinkyou know, when you say that, all
I with the book, though, thebook will help people see, like,
(30:54):
what you learned and how you canhelp, you know, and they can
help them, and you can, they canmake it better. So let's, let's
talk about that. The book soundsamazing. I love that you sent it
to me because I've been scanningit and it just, I can really
relate to it, because I havebeen in the corporate world a
long time. Yeah, and why don'tyou talk a little bit about what
(31:15):
you share, because it's so cool.
Like how to how we view work andits connection to our self
worth, the 8020 rule, and how tofulfill your time effectively.
These are things we need toknow,
sure, sure, I'd love to so mybook, it really started in a
meeting. I was joining my ownteam at this point, and I said,
(31:35):
you know, they asked me. Theyknew I didn't have the kids that
weekend. So my team asked me,like, you Sean, what you get up
to this weekend? And I was like,Why start it? You know, just
writing a book. Writing a book,and two of my youngest who I
just recruited right out ofcollege, I got, like, two or
three college new grads everyyear on my team. They they
stopped immediately. And theycould have just been being very
nice to the boss, you know, butthey stopped immediately. And
(31:56):
was like, we would read thatbook. And so initially, I think
my first name of my book,someone asked me about this last
week. I think the first name ofmy book, of my book was like the
new grads guide to corporateAmerica, or to climbing the
ladder or something. It was likethe new grads guide climbing the
ladder. And it started out verymuch as, like, just a how to to
free up your time, make moremoney and navigate corporate
America and and so that's whereyou get the 8020 rule. That's
(32:21):
where you get my rules for howto manage meetings. That's where
I went to a bunch of emailtrainings when I was in
corporate, and it was all abouthow to manage your email.
Because I was working for threedirectors when I first started
my career, where it was likethere was so much work, you
know, when you're when you're anunderling, as anyone knows, or
Grunt, oftentimes there's somuch work being piled on at you,
that if you don't figure out howto prioritize and do things in
(32:44):
the right order, everyone'sgonna say they're upset with
you, and that's the worst thingwhen everyone's upset with you,
who's above you as a grunt to bebecause it means you're probably
not good at your work, even ifit just means you're overwhelmed
and people are giving you theirown work, right? Yeah. So in a
lot of my book, it was stuffthat I learned, you know, I had
(33:04):
problems. And then I'd go to mymentor and say, Hey, like, I
have way much. I have about 60hours of work to do this week. I
have too much, and I probablyhave another 12 hours of emails
I have to get through. And thenshe'd send me to a training, or
she'd give me her tips on how tomanage it. And, you know, you
start to ask enough people, andbefore you know it, you start to
develop a method of how to howto handle that. And that method
(33:25):
was the same one that I usedwhen I was effectively doing two
jobs right when I was trainingmy replacement to take over my
largest accounts, and then alsodoing the rules of a director of
consulting. There was, you know,before I got into that nice
Coast area where I was makingthe most and working least.
There was probably 6065, hoursof work easy every week that I
just can't handle. And so thatsystem came, came the system I
(33:49):
outlined in the book, came handthat transition. People
are drowned in emails. And I'veseen the you know, you I don't
know when this started, butpeople have meetings back to
back. The more important youare, the more meetings you seem
to have. And it's like, oh,yeah, how can anyone work like
that? And then people aremultitasking during the meeting,
(34:09):
because you can't work likethat. You know, it's just
insane. So it's good that youoffer those, those methods. No,
I appreciate that. I think, Ithink when you say that, a key
point I want to, I want to sayto our listeners too, is it's
very important you redefine, youredefine, excuse me, like, what
is productivity and what isoutput? And so I guess, you know
the free exercise. You don'teven have to buy me a book for
(34:31):
this exercise. But the FreeExercise is especially, you
know, with the holidays and theNew Year and any breaks you have
coming up with spring break andeverything, if you work in
corporate, I would recommend,just like, take 10 minutes, you
know, or five minutes and thinkabout what you did the day
before, or the day before that.
Or, you know, if it's Friday,think about what you did on
Monday. And if you're like me,and you use your calendar for
(34:52):
everything, you could probablylook back and go, Oh, on
calendar, I did this, and I didthis, and I did this, and I did
four hours of email, and. I didall of this, but for most of us,
you know, looking back, we'relike, I don't, I don't even know
what I did on Tuesday. I know Iworked nine hours, or I know I
worked seven hours, but I haveno idea what I actually got
done, like, what was actuallyhelpful. And so a big shift in
my career, and I think I go intothis in the book, is, is
(35:16):
defining, like, what isproductivity like, what? What
are the things that you actuallyneed to get done in a day? And
the scenario I give to myreaders is, you know, imagine
emergency happens. You come intothe office, it's nine o'clock,
or you, you know you're workingfrom home, you sit down in front
of the computer, it's 9am andimagine you have 15 or 20
minutes, and then an emergencyerupts. Your kids call you, you
(35:37):
know, their schools on fire orsomething, or, I don't know, you
know, your mom's in thehospital, and you need to dash
out of the office, and you onlyhave time for one thing. What is
that one thing you would do soyou don't have to start tomorrow
in the same place you are today,right? Assuming the emergency is
a one day thing. And so that'sno that's really good. And what
(36:00):
I'm hearing too, is that you'rekind of helping people break
that. I think a lot of us, if wedon't do that, we just react to
whatever comes, whatever getsour attention, the shiny thing.
And that's not productive.
That's really good. I wish, Iwish I had done more of that
myself.
I appreciate that. Well, yeah,and I think, as we've talked
(36:21):
about it at length now, now youhave, you know, like I was, you
have this layer of managementand a lot of corporations that
get paid so much and they havereally nothing to do. And one of
my favorite quotes Lynne, ispeople who are, by definition,
very unproductive, will use themajority of their time appearing
to be productive versus actuallybeing productive. And it's the
(36:43):
idea that, yeah, you have thiswhole layer in corporate America
now that's giving other peoplework that really doesn't need to
get done. And I think, I don'tthink they're necessarily doing
it maliciously. I think maybe,like, I was in the role, you
know, you start to lose yourmind, and you're like, oh my
god, like, I'm making goodmoney. I need to earn this, you
know, I need to contribute. Andso you start giving people more
stuff to do, and you reallydon't have to, maybe sometimes
(37:04):
as to be a great leader, youjust have to cut things out for
people. You know, there's,there's this great experiment. I
don't talk about it in my book.
There's this great experimentwhere they researchers took
like, a Lego bridge. And if youimagine, like, just this bridge
made of Legos. One side istaller than the other, and they
give it to participants with,like, a box of Legos next to it.
And they're saying, okay, youknow, fix it however you want.
(37:27):
And it's like 100 or 99% ofparticipants will start grabbing
Legos out of the box and addingto the size that's too short to
level the bridge when in inactuality, the easiest way to
solve the bridge problem is byremoving, like, three layers of
bricks from the size that'sthat's too big, and that's a lot
(37:50):
of the methodology that's,that's throughout my book, is
like removing things actuallywill allow you to do better
work. It'll allow you to getmore done, and it'll really free
up your cognitive ability tofocus on the stuff that matters.
BecauseI love that image. Yeah, that's
such a great way of explaining Ilove Legos. Oh, yeah, me too. I
always did Legos with my son. Ilove and my daughter, but that's
(38:11):
such a great image because,yeah, that's not something you
think of right away. Also, whatI'm thinking too, is, like a lot
of us, and I've done the samething. We need to put our mark
on something. We feel like wehave to. It's like ego, you
know. And I've, you know,because I'm a writer, I'm always
being edited by someone else.
And, you know, even when itmight not be necessary, they
(38:34):
have to edit it, right? You getused to that. And you see it in
other areas where people justneed to, you know, I touch this,
I approve this, I you know, theyneed to put their mark on it.
And so if you can quiet yourego, it's a much better leader,
right? Because you're not goingto always have to do that. It's
a lot of busy work orunnecessarily drawing attention
(38:55):
to yourself. And I love thewhole idea of take some away so
that you You just must have theymust miss you, because you
really empowered them, you know,like, that's, that's great. I
appreciatethat. I appreciate that. Yeah, I
guess, I guess, towards the end,I really embrace my role is,
like, I'm a fixer, you know,like, I'll give the ball to my
running back. I am not afootball guy, but the analogy
(39:16):
right, is, I'll give my myworks, yeah, thank you. And if
they fumble it, my job is torecover it and try again, you
know, and dust off my runningback and say, Hey, you can do
better. Here's the ball again.
Go. My job is not to preventthem from making mistakes. They
don't learn, and I don't learnhow much they can handle with
that. And so it's, you know, myjob is as a firefighter. It's
(39:37):
not as a fire preventer. Isanother way to put it, I guess.
And I appreciate that. Yeah, Ithink when I embraced that on my
team, we were able to grow quitea bit, very fast, and everyone
took on a lot of responsibility.
And yeah, I guess I put myselfout of a job, which was, which
was nice, which is nice, besidesthe guilt and, you know, all the
anxiety, it was nice, yeah, tobe out of a job. Yeah.
(40:00):
So the book comes out January 1.
It comes out January 1. Yeah,it's on Kindle. It's called
hacking the corporate jungle.
How to work less make bornactually like your life. It's on
Kindle all the major stops. It'sBarnes and Noble Kindle iBooks.
And then it's in a few local I'min from Denver. Still live in
Denver, Denver, Colorado. And soit's in a few local coffee book
and coffee shops around here aswell.
(40:24):
And it sounds like it's, it'smoved from, you know, you were
focusing at first recent grads,but it really applies to, I
mean, I would definitely readthis book. It applies to all of
us.
I appreciate it. Yeah, one of myfirst editors read it, and was
like, I don't like, I don'tthink you're actually writing a
book for new grads. I thinkyou're writing a time management
(40:44):
book for the new age. And I waslike, Well, I like your lingo.
Can I use that?
But that's that's so cool,because you were seeing changes,
and you were really thinkingabout it, right about what the
future looked like, and you'regoing to help people deal with
that, because there's a lot ofstuff coming at us, you know,
the AI stuff and the trying tounderstand, I also the remote,
(41:04):
you know, versus not remote,like, that's such a big thing
now they're trying to forcepeople back to work. But I don't
know that that ship has sailedwhere
I agree. I think, I think it'sand I think it's a power
struggle. I think, you knowthat, like, the those in charge,
or being like, Well, how do wedo our jobs? Well, if we can't
(41:25):
watch you and we can't keep youin your little confined
cubicles, and the short answeris, right, is your job shouldn't
be supervising people likemaybe, maybe our society or our
workforce has started to evolvepast needing immediate
supervisors.
I mean, I'm old enough toremember going in every day,
driving far, you know, the thewasted time, right, that and
(41:46):
just accepting it, but also thatit was more about, like, a
factory mentality, like, youhave to be here so many hours,
and that equals, yeah, work and,like, it didn't matter if you
got stuff done or not.
Eventually they would figure itout, perhaps that you weren't
doing anything. But a lot ofpeople, they just were there,
you know, like putting in theireight hours. That's the truth.
And I remember one time we had asnow day. This is, like, a long,
(42:10):
long time ago, probably likelate 80s, we had a snow day,
right? It was a sizableCorporation, and they said, I
got in, you know, I made my wayin. It was really hard. I wasn't
far away, thank goodness. Andthere were no mountains. So I
got in, and I sat there forlike, an hour, hour and a half,
and my boss came in, and he'slike, well, we'd like you to try
(42:31):
to get here. You can get herethen, you know, we're calling it
early because it's snowing sohard. And I'm like, turn around
and go back driving the activesnowstorm to go home. There was
that kind of mentality, like youhave to get here, you know, no
matter what, and you have to sitthere. So hopefully we're moving
away from that, because I'venever been more productive than
(42:53):
being at home, especially forWell, I for some jobs. I'm sure
it doesn't work as well, but fora writer, it's like blessing,
because you can work extra longand you have that time to think,
and you don't feel like you'reworking extra long because
you're not commuting. And withall the interactive connections
we have, all the applications,where I used to be on a project,
(43:15):
where every morning, I met witha team from India every morning,
and it was evening for them, andit was we moved through our
features of the software releaseand,
wow, it's great. It's like, whattime is it? Locally? It's like,
it's 7am and it's like, it's 8pmhere, what is happening? Like,
(43:35):
yeah, I can relate alittle used to that, right? You
had to say, Good morning, goodevening. Just exactly. It's
just, there's a lot of potentialthere. So I love that this book
is looking at that, you know,like it's going to be harder to
manage your time the old way.
That's what I'm hearing. And Ilove that you're offering
alternatives.
No, I appreciate that. Yeah, I,I, you know, I spent two and a
(43:57):
half years all in, I think,writing the book and researching
for it, because as is as smalland as humble as my initial, I
guess draft was, it really blowsup. I mean, Lynne as writer, you
know, sometimes, if you don'tstay very strict on what the
vision is or what the goal is,your the problem can can
manifest and be huge. And then,you know, your research takes
(44:17):
you down all these rabbit holes,and then before you know it,
you're looking at how to fix theworld. Yeah,
go ahead. I'm sorry. How did youdo that, though? How did you
manage that?
Well, honestly, I would say thisis part one. I went for, okay,
this corporation has problems.
It shouldn't be. It shouldn't.
(44:39):
You know, in a true economicsystem, you probably shouldn't
make the most and work theleast. That doesn't make sense,
right? That's an echo ofcolonialism or an echo of
elitism like that in today'sworld, like, I thought we were
past that. So that shouldn'tmake sense, yeah. So I started
with that problem, and theneventually, as you really dig
in, you start to realize, likecorporations with their
fiduciary duties for leaders,which for those. Of you don't
(45:00):
know, like, even if a leadermorally wants to do a different
thing, like they don't want tolay off 100 people, if the
financiers, and, you know, theiraccounting teams and stuff, say,
Hey, this is the most prudentand the best decision right now,
they are legal, literally,literally, legally obligated to
lay off those people and do whatthey think is best, or depending
(45:22):
on the board and their majorinvestors they are, they're
risking their own career to thenhave to go in front of the board
and explain to them like, Hey,I'm making a four year bet
instead of doing what's mostprudent for our bottom line
right now, and laying thosepeople off. And so I started
with, Okay, I think the problemis just in this one corporation,
(45:43):
and then it kind of blows up to,actually, it's the whole all of
corporations, and then you getto, oh my gosh, it's the
economy. And so it like led medown all these, all these
different research avenues andwhere debt comes from, and the
origins of money and and somefascinating stuff. And so I
would say this is part one,like, we need people to
disconnect their self worth fromtheir work, and we need people
(46:04):
to work less so they can calmthemselves, and, I would say,
center themselves and like, findtheir own spirituality and find
their own peace and find whothey are. Because, to your
point, we have so much coming atus right now. And I think, I
think one of the opinions is allthe world's ending. And my
former wife would tell you allthat I see the world through
money and through economicterms, and working in big data,
(46:26):
I actually had access todatabases that helped me, you
know, evaluate this in a waythat I don't think most people
are privy to, and so I was veryblessed for that. But what I'm
trying to say is we already havean economic crisis on our hands,
and we're struggling emotionallyand psychologically, how to deal
with it, like we don't haveenough jobs for everyone. And
you know, you think about howmany people get paid
(46:48):
astronomical amounts to playprofessional sports. How many
people get paid to just talkabout those players playing
professional sports? How youknow, how many, how many like we
like? When you think about whatessential work is, and running a
city and running a society, wehave the majority, I think it's
like 660, or 70% of people nowin non essential roles, because
(47:09):
we're all struggling to figureout, you know, how to pay our
bills and how to contribute,when, in fact, there's, there's,
you know, we've gotten soefficient, and we've advanced
technologically So much thatthere really isn't enough work
for all of us. And I think thefirst take, and you get this in
the news all the time, is, oh mygosh, this is a crisis. We need
to roll back AI, and we need toroll back Robotics Engineering.
(47:31):
And, you know, we need to stopthis. And I think, I think the
question I want to pose to theworld, and this will be in my
next book, right? Like this,this book, one is for setup, is,
is okay in a world where wedon't all have to work, what
does our daily lives look like?
How do you choose who works, andthen how do you spend the
majority of your time? And thatbrings me back to one of the
first points of research that Iuncovered when I was going down
(47:55):
one of these rabbit holes lane,was there was a a economist back
in the 1930s right aroundironically, a contemporary of
Henry Ford who helped roll outthe 40 hour work week, and his
name was John Maynard Keynes,and he predicted that his great
grandchildren that to us by 2030by 2030 he predicted that his
great grandchildren are us, andour biggest problem would be
(48:18):
Figuring out, due to laborsaving technologies, what to do
with all of their free time. AndI think we're having that right
now, like, you know, and I thinkthere are some, you know, not to
sound like a conspiracytheorist, but I think, you know,
my my research pointed anduncovered a lot of, I would say,
nefarious interests and lobbyinggroups who want to keep people
busy so we're not payingattention to, you know, them
(48:39):
stealing from us, and everythingthat's happening in society that
society that's not Kosher orit's not good, but I think the
majority of us, I like to thinkthat the majority of us, are
struggling to figure out how wefit into a society and what a
society looks like when we don'thave to work all the time,
because we've done it.
You've got that bigger picture.
I love that, that you've donethat research, and you have that
bigger picture, there's atransformation happening, and I
(49:00):
and I, we don't know how to doit. We're moving to a whole
different age. You know,definitely 100% Yeah. And like,
we need different tools. So weneed a different way to be and
how to define what our lifelooks like and productivity
looks like. The 40 hour workweek is not cutting it. I
(49:21):
couldn't agree more. Can youedit my next book? Lynne, this
is great. This is fantastic. I'dlove to you're speaking my
language. I could probably talkto you for two hours. I really
love what you're doing, and I'mreally looking forward to
hearing what my listeners think.
They love the story, but theyalso will love the information,
because who doesn't lovesomething you can use? You know,
(49:42):
it's almost like you wrote aguidebook, which I love. I love
practical information thatpeople can make sense of for
their lives. So thank you forthat. Is there anything that we
didn't talk about that you wouldlike to talk about?
Um, I would say just one thing,when I was, when I first, I
guess, started on this journey.
Ernie and I sat down at my desk,you know. I quit my job, and my
(50:02):
last day was Friday. On Monday,I sat down at my desk in true
workaholic fashion and wrote forfive hours straight at that at
that time, when I sat down, Iwas very naive in the fact that
I thought I'll just come up,I'll solve the issue, you know,
and I will come up with the bestidea, the great idea, and I'll
just roll it out to the world,and I'll get on great shows like
(50:23):
yours, Lynne, and, you know,I'll preach my message, and
everyone will get online. Andthen, you know, I'll lead the
way into this new era, you know,and this new transformation. And
the more and more you research,and the more and more you learn,
the more humble you get, youknow, thank God. And the more I
realized that, like thissolution, would be
(50:43):
decentralized. And what I meanby that is rather than me being
this hierarchical figure, orrather than our, you know,
President, whoever they are, youknow, rather than this
authoritarian figure telling usthis is the way the new world is
going to work, and this is howwe do this, the new paradigm, or
the new the new way we organizeall this is really going to be
based on what we call incomputer sciences, like network
(51:05):
effects. And what I mean by thatis like everyone's little
contribution to this system isgoing to, in turn, make a better
system. And so I would just sayto all you listeners, like you
probably know something to adegree that I don't. You almost
undoubtedly know something andhave an expertise in something
that I don't. I'd love to talkabout it. One and two, we need,
(51:25):
we need your expertise, like tobuild a better world. Everyone
needs to be involved, and we allneed to be communicating and
putting aside our egos, as yousaid earlier, Lynne, and we all
need to really be like in it,for our for each other, you
know, and together. And I thinkthat's like the biggest lie
throughout history is, you know,like, although there have been
(51:47):
geniuses and great mindsthroughout history, like those
weren't the people whonecessarily spread their own
ideas, it was the masses whoadopted it and recognized it for
brilliant that really, arereally insightful, that that
passed it along. And so I'd say,you know, we all need to do this
together. And if you're, youknow, stuck in corporate America
as Lynne and I were for 10 hoursor 12 hours a day, like you
(52:09):
probably don't have the energyor time to to contribute your
part. And I'm, and I'm reallybetting that's why you're here
right now, is because your partis very much needed and, and,
and we need you to stop workingso much like, you know, you're
the medicine, you know, we needyou to join in. Yeah,
I love that, because you see anew way. And that's a wonderful,
(52:32):
hopeful message. Thank you. Howcan people reach you? What's the
best way to reach you? I'll putit all in my book. I like to say
it, yeah, I like to say it onthe episode, because some people
don't readthe show. Yeah, sure. So you can
find me on my website. It's Seanmcmahon.com that's S, E, A n, m,
c, M, a n, n.com, you can signup for my newsletter there. You
(52:56):
can get all the links to all thedifferent books formats. Next
month, I'll be rolling out a oneon one coaching program. So if
you're interested in that,please feel free to reach it.
Reach out. Yeah, thanks. I'vehad quite a bit of interest and
demand in it, and so just tomake sure I can do right by my
my new clients, I'm only goingto be taking on three new
(53:17):
clients at first. And so ifyou're interested in being one
of those first three, please letme know. Excellent. Yeah,
like I said, we're going to havehave to have you back for part
two, because there's a lot to besaid.
I love talking to you. Thank youfor sharing.
Thanks for having me. Lynne,it's been my pleasure. You.
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