The Value of Love is Blind [Grace McCarrick]

Grace McCarrick is one of those rare interviews where the subject is funny, interesting, and compelling - all at the same time. Grace is a self-titled Culture Coach, as she works with established businesses to improve and develop their existing company culture into something greater than the sum of its parts. She's also a keen social media content creator, having recently unlocked a strong strategy to go from 3-10K followers on TikTok in less than 3 months, with no signs of slowing down.

Grace and I chatted about a number of topics, including discussions of her TikTok strategy, her ability to disconnect from comments on the internet, and how the Netflix show Love is Blind applies to work (yes, really).

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
- Hello, everybody.
Welcome to today's episode.
For those of you watching on YouTube,
you'll notice a different background.
I am traveling with my family,
but that hasn't preventedme from continuing
to interview phenomenal people
and to bring their stories to you.
So for today, let's talk aboutmy guest, Grace McCarrick.
One of my favorite parts aboutthe podcast is that I get
to interview both interesting people

(00:22):
and knowledgeable people.
And Grace is both of those things.
She's also hysterically funny.
Grace is a self-described culture coach.
She works with business teams
to take their existinginteroperability and culture
and supercharge it, sort
of like adding lighter fluid to a fire.
She's also been working onher presences on both LinkedIn
and TikTok, where she just crossed the

(00:43):
10,000 follower threshold.
Our conversation included bitsabout her TikTok strategy,
her ability to disconnectfrom shady comments on the
internet, and how the show love is Blind
applies to the workplace.
Yeah, no, really it does.
It was pretty, pretty compelling stuff.
This is Grace McCarrick.Welcome to Building Value.
I'm Jason Nellis,

(01:04):
and I am obsessed withthe creator economy.
I've spent my career at theintersection of creativity
and technology buildingproducts at companies like Hulu
and Facebook, all trying to make it easier
and more valuable forartists to do what they love,
whether they're contentcreators themselves,
or the people buildingproducts that creators use.
Every one of the folks I interviewoffer compelling ideas on

(01:25):
how to create something of lasting value.
If you like what you hearand you want to get more,
please subscribe on YouTube
or wherever you consumefine podcast products.
And if you really love whatyou hear, leave a review.
That always helps. Andwith that on with the show.
And here we are today with Grace McCarrick
Grace, thanks so much forjoining. How are you today,

(01:45):
- Jason?
I'm so good, and I'm so excited to be here
because I've been listening to your show
and watching the clips onTikTok, so I just feel very ready
to be a part of the Jason experience.
- So what you're tellingme is you are the one,
the one person who'sbeen watching the TikTok.
That's very kind. Thank
- You.
If it's four times it's me.What's that sound? Yeah,
- That generosity.

(02:06):
That's a great starting place. Yeah. Yeah.
Um, so let me set thescene for our listeners.
You are a culture coach.Mm-Hmm. .
You work with businesses aswell as, uh, solo entrepreneurs.
Mm-Hmm. onthinking about not only how
to lay the groundwork for culture,
but broadly how to scale it.
Um, talk to me a little bitfirst about just how, uh,
you think about that, that work.
You know, is there a a particular

(02:26):
framework you come to it with?
Or is it just, you know, you go in
and assess each in eachsituation individually?
- So I actually have onmy website, um, something
to the effect of like, big
consultancy firms will assess you.
I'm not doing that. That's not my thing.
Um, and, and someone in marketing, um,
who is helping me out, it was like,
you really position yourself in

(02:47):
opposition to a lot of things.
So, you know, culture work ishard to describe right. Now.
Here's how I approach it.
One is, I think culture isan operational exercise.
So it is not this likehappy hour, you know,
mushy feelings oriented,like very soft thing.

(03:07):
It is truly the operationsof how the business runs.
And then if you do itwell, you get more revenue,
you get more clients, you get more money.
Great. The other way Iapproach this, my, I might,
these would be my two pillars.
I guess the other way I approachthis is people are really,
really live here.
And if you're just on sound,I'm pointing to my forehead,
this like prefrontal cortexwhere they do so much sort

(03:30):
of logic and, and likerationality and this,
and people get reallycaught up in the nonsense,
in the hamster wheel.
And so I go in
and I'm always, always goingto pull them out of that.
So I do that with a coupledifferent tools, some behavioral
research, some esoteric, some just trying

(03:50):
to be really disarming, uh,
you know, as I'm presenting to them.
But my goal coming in isalways, let's get you out
of this work mindset where you're
so limited and you're in a box.
Let's talk about what's possible.
And then from there, let'soperationalize the good stuff so
that you can keep doing this long
after you forgot I was even here.

(04:12):
- I dig it, cut out the fat, focus on
what works, scale it up.
Great equation. Um, I love that you,
in our interactions together, have proven
to be very TikTok forward, which is really
- Interesting.
- , given that, you know,
traditionally folks in yourspace tend to be longer form,
um, I, you know, I know
that you post on LinkedIn very frequently.

(04:34):
You also have, you have your own podcast.
You've, you've experimentedin a lot of spaces,
but in our conversations, you'vebeen very forward on TikTok
as being the place where you want
to build your top of funnel.
Can you take me through that process?
Why, why you settled on TikTok
and how you just think sort of broadly
that platform can help, uh,
benefit your business while you're trying

(04:54):
to help other people's businesses?
- Totally. TikTok has, I'mnot gonna be the first person
to say this, probablyeven today, you know,
TikTok has this viralitycomponent that makes it really,
really attractive for businesses,
which is you have the abilityto take a piece of information
and get it to thousands,hundreds of thousands, millions
of eyeballs in just, you know, 24 hours.

(05:16):
It's really, really attractive.
So for me, the way that coincided was,
I was already working.
So I had already established my business.
I was already in companies,
and I found that one of thebiggest issues was this like,
generational, how arewe talking about work?
What, you know, my younger team members,

(05:36):
what do they even care about?
So I thought, okay, well,let me be a little sneaky.
I'm on TikTok, like lookingat videos like everyone else.
Let me post a couple things on here and,
and start to get, you know,get at the heart of Gen Z,
get at the heart of this conversation.
That was a very simplistic approach,
and it has expanded into so much more.

(05:57):
But for me, what it providesis social credibility.
When I go back to my clients
and I say, you know, I'm talkingabout this topic on TikTok,
150,000 people are involvedin this conversation.
Here's, here's wherethe lay of the land is.
You know, here's, here's thegeneral consensus when we're
talking about hybrid work

(06:18):
or when we're talking about performance
reviews or whatever it is.
So that's really powerful
and those kind of numbers, I,
I don't think we're immune to them yet.
So it's still really coolfor me to be able to go,
I went viral on TikTok last night,
300,000 people touched on this topic.
I got hundreds of comments that, you know,
gives me that credibility.

(06:40):
And then I think the other piece is,
it is a really cool placeto build your brand.
You have to be so egoless about it
because you have to havethe ability to hit it
a hundred different timesin a hundred different ways
and not let every single one trip you up.
And sometimes you flub 12 times in a row.

(07:00):
Um, but what you really startto do is develop a voice
and you see what part of
that voice is interesting to other people.
And it's, it can be kind of real time.
So as opposed to, you know,what would I be doing?
You know, maybe like a a a
twice a month like YouTubevideo on a longer form, or,
or if I'm doing speechesor whatever it is,

(07:20):
that feedback loop doesn't come close to
what you can do when you post a video
and then the next day, you know,
you've got 2000 people going.
I love the way you said this.
Can you, we talk about this more
- Interesting perspective though,
because you're talking abouthow immediate that feedback is,
and yet

(07:42):
that knee-jerk feedback canalso be detrimental, right?
Because, you know, you'regonna get negative comments
and certainly, you know,as, as nice as it is to hear
that feedback immediately,
that doesn't necessarily translate
into something longer term.
It's, uh, either engagingfans who subscribe
or business opportunities.
Mm-Hmm. . Sohow do you balance as you're
thinking strategicallyabout it, um, you know,
taking advantage of those bigpeak moments versus thinking

(08:05):
more broadly about how thatcan benefit your business? Hmm.
- So I've had, I have acouple people in my life
who have had long sustainedvirality on TikTok.
I'm talking, you know, 800,000,
a million followers, things like that.
It's very much a mindset fromwhat I understand from them,
that that's what they'll coach me in it.
You know, if I have something go viral,
it's an overwhelming amount of attention.

(08:29):
And, you know, I had, my first thing
that went viral this year was
the highest viral I had gotten.
I think it got to like ahundred thousand views.
And at that point I had, you know,
3000 followers, something like that.
And it was largely negative.
And so what I did is I reallyput myself in the mindset of,
I'm gonna divorce myself fromthe tone of this content.

(08:51):
What I wanna understand iswhat can I get out of it?
And so I went through the, you know,
500 brutal comments andI, I made, uh, buckets.
I said, okay, this one's talkingabout this type of thing,
and this is this kind of response.
And as I did, I was able to go, oh, okay.
So there's a huge chunk of people on here
who really care about this.

(09:12):
I can speak to that differently.
There's a huge chunk of peoplewho really care about this.
I'll speak to that. Anda lot of, I, I mean,
my next eight videos
or so, were me kind of takingsome of those responses
and going, um, let meframe it to you like this.
But I think you can't be apologetic.
You can't be trying to backtrack.
Um, but it's, you know,

(09:35):
to, it's still hard, Jason.
It's still, it's still,
there are some days where I get comments.
I'm, I'm looking like, I'm trying
to see which one rightnow I have a couple videos
that nothing's doing well.
Like the engagement is nothigh on any of them. Yeah.
And so I'm really,
you can really see when thecomments come in one by one,
and I get, you know,comments that are critical

(09:58):
and I'm like, you know,
it's just like someonegoing, Hey, you suck.
Like, just into your phone, .
- Yeah. I mean, as a, asa former theater kid, I,
I've had people yell atme from the audience,
so I certainly appreciate that.
Sure. Yeah. I, I find in my experience,
and tell me if this isreflective of yours, that
it's really easy to fall, particularly
as you're building a presence.

(10:20):
Um, it's easy to fall into the rabbit hole
that everything matters
because every negative piece
of feedback I get must be a misstep.
Mm-Hmm. , uh, or,or you launch, as you said,
you know, you launch a video,you launch a short form piece
of content, and it flubs, you know,
hearing you talk about thisand talk about, you know,
the moments where thingsdon't land as well.
Mm-Hmm. bringsto mind my own experience

(10:42):
where I've had, uh, newpresences like this podcast
where you launch an episode or a video
or a short form piece of content
and you think it's gonna do really well,
and you're really excited about it,
or you've gotten some positive feedback.
And so you're going down that same line
and then it falls flat.
It's really very easy tofall into the black hole
of depression, of sadness, of frustration
that you thought you knew

(11:03):
what you were doing now,and of course now you don't.
And what the hell and allthat that comes to mind.
Um, I don't wanna askthe, the obvious question
of like, how do you deal with that?
But I do wanna know,like, you know, I see you
and you keep going and you keep pushing
and you are producing two to three pieces
of content every day.
What tricks and techniqueshave you found to sort
of get past that andkeep the content going?

(11:26):
Because the results do show after time.
It's just a matter ofgetting through the slog
before you start to find gold.
- Totally. Thank you for saying that.
That's nice to have thateffort be seen, validated.
Uh, I just have a bigger
- Go ahead.
If I can jump in just to say, like,
even in the last few weeks,
I know on TikTok thesenumbers are small comparative
to other platforms, but you'vegone up a couple thousand

(11:48):
followers, uh, uh, by the time we launch,
you may be at the 10,000 follower mark,
or more like the consistency works, right?
Yeah. The consistency is,is absolutely helping.
I see the work. I see you growing.
I know you, you're, you'regonna hit 10,000 soon. Soon.
Yeah. Um, do you feel like,

(12:08):
as you talk about the techniques,
and I do want you to touch on those, um,
do you feel like eventhough, you know, it's hard
to get past those moments,
like does the numbergoing up help you feel
like you're accomplishing your goal
of growth and figuring it out? Oh, shit.
- Yes. Can I curse on this?Awesome. Yeah. Absolutely. Yes.
- Fuck yeah.- Yeah. Fuck yes, it does. Yeah, it is.

(12:29):
Um, you know what? It's so funny.
Um, this creative, this,this content creator
lifestyle, the things you have
to have a mindset about isactually really similar,
more similar than anythingelse I found to my, like,
bootstrapped founder lifestyle.
You have to just have thisbig picture perspective

(12:52):
all the time because the winds
range, you know?
And if you're going to beatyourself up over everything,
which I have, and I, youknow, I can do, it's not fun.
It stops being fun. So there'ssome days where I'm like,
you know, if I'm gonnaoverthink all of this,

(13:13):
it's not gonna be fun this week.
Um, so I, I try to just make it easy
and I have enough, um,excuse me for a second.
I have enough followers right now where
my content can be all reactiveon most days if I want it
to be so I can take comments, which is
so much easier than sittingthere with O 1,400 followers

(13:34):
and going, what do 200 peoplewanna hear about today?
?
- Yeah. As somebody who's gotnot quite 250 followers on
TikTok, I hear you. Um, but
- Then I will say the, okay,here's my other trick for this.
Just Yeah, tell me as people are talking.
So I have, I have, I triedTikTok a couple different times,

(13:54):
a couple different waysfor probably eight months
before I landed on what is now
a consistent upward growth.
I had to do it my own way.
I'm gonna show you, I don'tknow if this is gonna show.
So basically here, thisis, um, this is Jan to Feb.

(14:15):
This is Feb to March.
And basically everyone said,make a content calendar,
plot stuff out, do stuffoutta your programs,
do customer test, customer testimonials.
Like everyone has ideas for you.
I, when I tell you the amountof content calendars in notion
that I have started andabandoned, it's, it's

(14:35):
more than single digits.
So for me, what worked wasto go, okay, let me think
of it from this big picture perspective.
I'm not gonna plan anything.
I'm going to write downwhen I have finished filming
and posting for the day,
what's the videos I filmed and post.
And then every two weeks or soish, I go look at the numbers
and then I go, oh, that kindof thing is doing really well.

(14:57):
Great. I'll keep that in mind.
So that's my really lightlift content philosophy.
And, and I think itspeaks to, like, you have
to do it your own way,
other people's way did not work for me.
- Uh, I love that. Let me,let me pull back for a second.
So your suggestion is,instead of planning,
which you find doesn'twork for you Mm-Hmm.
, shoot from thehip, figure out what you want
to do day in and day out,and then do a retrospective

(15:19):
and see what worked consistently,
and then apply that to thenext round of iteration.
Um, totally love that. Love that idea.
I, I think lots ofcreators get stuck in the,
what am I gonna talk about today?
Death loop. And instead oftrying to plan it in advance,
just saying, well, whatevercomes to mind, go with it.
And then start to findthe nuggets of gold.

(15:40):
That's key. That's great.
- Also, your wife is avery talented astrologer
and spiritualist as we that she is.
She told me that I would know what
to say when I was sitting down to say it.
- That's funny. 'cause she tells me
to stop talking ,and that's fine. I'm glad,
- I'm- Glad she doesn't actually,
let's not turn this into anepisode of the Honeymooners.

(16:00):
No, my wife is actuallyincredibly supportive. Yeah.
But I, I get one thingthat that does speak to,
and I I'd love to hear yourthought on this, is, um,
everybody needs to findtheir own unique path.
And I know that that'salmost a trite thing
to say at this point, but it'sworth reminding yourself, uh,
in any experience, it's easy to try
to copy somebody else's techniques you,
but it's really mostimportant to find your own.

(16:23):
If you were to take a step back
and sort of give yourself, youknow, advice at the beginning
of the TikTok journey, would it be
to focus more on just getting content up
and running every day andthen do the retrospective?
Or would it be more to sortof pick a real point of view
that you can build that content from
before you start layingout the three every day?
- Oh my gosh, a hundred percent the first.
So I'm in the position now ofa as, um, as you mentioned,

(16:46):
I'm, I'll probably hit 10,000 followers
by the time this episode airs.
And I was in January, the middle
of January at 3000 followers.
So I'm the person right now
that friends are sendingtheir friends to me.
Oh, this person wants to do something.
Like, I'm not big enoughwhere people are like, oh,
we'll get someone, like,I'm like, they're like,
she's growing really fast
right now, figure out what she's doing.

(17:07):
And so I will say it toanyone who wants to do it,
go film 20 videos, don'teven think about 'em.
Go film 20 videos, post 'em on there.
I would go three times a day.
I think that algorithm seemsto very much like that.
And then just, Dr don'tcare. Don't overthink them.
Because the thing is, Ialways, even still now I do it,
I'm like, here's the threetopics I wanna talk about today.

(17:31):
You know, not that many people look at,
most people are notlooking at every video.
First of all, most peopleonly seeing one video.
So you don't, it doesn't needto be as coherent right now.
Now when I have a hundred thousand
followers, if I ever get there.
Yeah. There, I think you look at people's
feeds and they look way nicer.
But what I did
before I started my January push, I went

(17:53):
to a couple creators I likedwho were at 150, 200 kind
of thing, and I scrolled allthe way down to the bottom
of their feeds until it got
messy. Have you done that, Jason?
- Uh, more times than I'mwilling to admit on air.
- Okay, sure. Yeah. So if,if the listener has not done
that, if you're, ifyou're looking at someone
with a big audience, a nice branding,

(18:14):
their feed looks really clean on TikTok,
everything looks the same.
Um, you, you know, everyvideo has 50,000 views,
200,000 views, like that kind of thing.
What you wanna do to learn howthose people grew is scroll
until their feed starts lookingreally messy and chaotic.
And it, it's, unless they clean up,

(18:35):
unless they're super highly branded
and they've cleaned it up,you'll catch almost every,
you'll, you'll get thatpoint to almost everyone,
and then start looking at that space
and look at those videosand watch the evolution.
And you start to see patternsand how people sort of pick up
and become more consistent.
But what I, what that taughtme was, there's a starting.

(18:56):
You can't avoid thestarting, because I was like,
I would just like to beperfect out of the gate.
- Having heard all of thatabout TikTok, I'd love
to hear your thoughts abouthow that compares to LinkedIn.
We have heard now for yearsthat LinkedIn is the home
for professional development.
This is the new home forcreators who are looking
to build their communities, et cetera.
I do see that you post on LinkedIn,
and I see that it's intentional,

(19:16):
but it's a very different kind of content.
And from the outside,
it feels like you'reputting a lot more work
and a lot more focus onTikTok than on LinkedIn.
That might just be becauseposting on LinkedIn isn't
as frequent, but I'd love tohear your thoughts on sort of
how you're differentiatingthat, um, strategy
and where you're findingsuccess on LinkedIn as well.

(19:38):
- So the advantage onLinkedIn for me was that prior
to any meaningful engagementon any of my posts, you know,
I got seven likes, whatever,
sometimes I still get seven likes.
I was getting inboundbusiness . Yeah.
So any content strategy
for me was just gonnabe icing on the cake.
I am finding, I actuallyam finding LinkedIn really,

(20:00):
really challenging right now.
Like I said, I really like
to learn from people who've grown.
And so there's a couplepeople on LinkedIn who are,
who are at, you know,250, 300,000 followers.
It's also confusing becauseconnections versus followers,
that's not a real clear metric.
Okay. So they're, they're atfollowers and it's this many,
and every, every post they have,
every post they have isbasically like a regurgitated

(20:25):
platitude in a carousel
or in some like, reallysimply branded thing.
And it has hundreds of comments
and thousands of likesand all these shares.
And it's really, reallyhard on LinkedIn to go, wow,
how the fuck did you do that?
And, and I've gone back downthrough people's profiles,

(20:45):
and the thing aboutLinkedIn is that there,
you don't understand it.
So I've gone throughthose people's profiles
and it's like one day they'reposting like a normal person
from some retreat that gets 12 likes,
and the next day they havea carousel with 4,000 likes.
And, you know, impressionsare probably somewhere in,
in the neighborhood of amillion for, for metrics.

(21:07):
Like, I have my most viral
video on my most viralpost on LinkedIn got
300,000 impressions.
So, or 30,000 whatever,something in that, you know,
so much less than a million.
Yeah. So, um, you actuallydon't really understand.

(21:28):
And, and there's a little bit
of this conspiracy theorybubbling under like smaller
creators on LinkedIn right now going, um,
that there's some undergroundway I've heard the word pods
thrown around engagement pods.
There's some underground way
that these people are gettingall of that engagement,
and it's not, you know, above board.

(21:48):
- Okay. A LinkedIn conspiracy. Mm-Hmm.
broken herefirst. Mm-Hmm. .
Yeah. I'm fascinated. Yeah. Okay.
- So it's a tough one.
And it's like, you know,
and TikTok people are, are,someone described TikTok, um,
on a podcast I was listening to is like,
when you sit down on your couchwith a bag of chips or snack
or you know, whatever, a glassof wine to watch something.

(22:11):
Now in 2024 people are watching TikTok.
You know, that's the entertainment.
It's not, um, full house or one Tree Hill
or like, those kind of things.
It's, it's the internet. Are
- You happy?
I see we're dating ourselveswith our cultural records too.
- - One Tree Hill is a specific kind of cut.
- I was on a TRL school weekepisode of One Tree Hill,

(22:31):
the cast of One Tree Hill picked
me up and took me to school.
- Huh. - And then to aconcert. Mm-Hmm. .
- Okay. Yeah. So, uh, whenI was nine years old, uh,
Mark Summers, uh, slime meat Universal Studios Florida.
So there we go. I think yours is better.
- Wow. So slime is pretty good, though.
- You know, it doesn't reallyhave the same, uh, cache,
mostly because if I tellsomebody I got slime

(22:53):
by Mark Summers, they ask if Ineed to file a police report.
So I, I, you know, sure. I get it.
But the Onery Hill cast very
attractive. I understand.That must have been
- A lot of fun.
Very nice. Very nice.I was in high school.
It, it brought me a ton ofso, so cliche. Yeah, I'll bet.
Um, so you, you know, if that'swhat people are, there is a,
there is an element to like,if you can be entertaining,
if you can be educational, whatever.

(23:14):
And sometimes on LinkedIn,I feel like I try
so hard to be thoughtful.
I try so hard to be helpful.
I try so hard to be funny,irreverent something,
and it's just like crickets.
Part of the reason is because
of the way the LinkedIn algorithm works.
If I comment on one of yourvideos, Jason, it'll send that
to my whole feed.

(23:35):
So it'll go, it'll showyour post in their feed
and they'll go, Grace McCarrick comment.
They say comment. So peopleare really hesitant to engage
because it's, it's feels very invasive.
Like there's a lot of tracking of
what you're doing, doing on there.
And yeah.
So I, I'm finding LinkedInfrustrating at the moment.
- I get how frustrating that is.
And I certainly can resonate.

(23:57):
I mean, as a creatormyself, it's difficult
to post something on thereand see it, you know,
flat just doing nothingversus other things
that I just repost.
And suddenly they explode mostly
because the person who I'mposting about liked it,
and now suddenly theirwhole feed is liking it.
Um, that happened recently,
and I was like, why the hell couldn't
that happen on a podcast clip?
Um, so I get it. I understand.

(24:18):
I, I think one thing thoughthat, that is interesting
to me is, uh, your idea around, um,
you know, continuing to innovate, right?
Like, and, and I do see youapplying that on LinkedIn,
and I do think it's probably a good
piece of advice for everybody, right?
You still want to try to buildsomething in other places,
but knowing where you'refinding your most traction
and putting 90% of youreffort there is probably the,

(24:40):
the best advice.
Um, as you find yourself morefrustrated with LinkedIn,
do you see yourselfpulling away from wanting
to invest in that platform?
Or is it just encouragingyou to experiment more?
- It's a good question. Somy engagement on LinkedIn
does not, does not have anycorrelation with the type
of outreach I get from it.
So I'm booked to do this big speech

(25:04):
for this big retreat with a bunch
of companies in Montana in September.
That happened because peoplewere watching my LinkedIn
videos successively.
Like, I don't know thatany of them really engaged
with it in any meaningful way.
Um, so there's a lot of mebuilding that brand on LinkedIn.
And regardless of engagement,
that still brings me waymore business in TikTok.

(25:26):
TikTok has been bringing mebusiness, which is crazy.
Sometimes you get a DM fromsome random name on TikTok,
you get them to emailand they're like, head
of marketing at this big bank,
or head of brand atthis big retail company.
But I find, I don't know if it's our age,
like I find the peoplewho have reached out

(25:48):
to me on TikTok are like at the,
a little bit flakier than the people
who've reached out to me on LinkedIn.
And I don't know if they thinkbecause we met on TikTok,
you know, they don't have tohave so much follow through,
um, or they're just not interested.
One, like they, they have someperception of me from TikTok,
and then we get to like,this is my program,
and then, then that's not, youknow, I don't, I don't know.

(26:09):
I haven't had enoughexperiences of that yet.
Um, but no, I will never stop LinkedIn
because it brings me so much business
and it's built so much brand
and a professional community for me.
But I do, it's like Ireally have a love hate
with a really relationshipwith it right now.
- I understand it. It mayalso be, it may well listen,

(26:29):
it may also be that the peoplewho are motivated to respond,
it's, it know much like the nature
of the For You page on TikTok.
Once you hit that moment of,you know, serotonin bliss,
you're gonna move on to the next thing
to try to keep it going.
So I can certainly appreciatethe, um, lack of follow
through that may come from that.
So let's turn it then to your customers,
because as you talked about, you know,

(26:50):
you are finding reallygood leads from LinkedIn
and I, I wanna say someleads maybe not very good
- Leads. Some leads, TikTok for
- Sure.
TikTok. Mm-Hmm. .Um, what attracts you
to helping businessesimprove their culture?
And what specifically doyou define as being culture
in the context of their business?
I know we talked a littlebit earlier about it,
but like, if, if I'ma prospective customer

(27:12):
and I'm like, uh, my, my company's fine.
Why do, why do I need you?
How do you respond to something like that?
- Oh, I just had this email yesterday.
So I work with excellent teams.
I'm not a, I'm not like, um, what's,
what was that, that TV show?
The Fixer where people comein Mm-Hmm. .
I don't go into Cultures in Crisis.
I go into really good teams
and I help them just geta little bit tighter.

(27:33):
And the reason I, the way I do that is
by focusing on how they work.
So I would say themodern version of culture
for me is how people work.
That simple, that complicated.
And then, um, the reason I lovethat, like, you know, those,
you know, those, I'm such a,you know, I'm a nineties kid,
the sports movie montages,the friends movie montages,

(27:57):
you know, those moments when everyone just
starts clicking together.
Especially when everyone'scomfort all it's like the nerd
and the, the popular girland the smart kid in this,
and everyone sort of comes together.
I'm also a huge Lord of the Rings fan.
So those, those moments whenpeople, you know, come in like
that and, and put all theirvaried interests in towards a

(28:19):
common goal, that made
me feel excited aboutlife every time I saw it.
And that remains a reaction for me.
So every time I'm working with a team
and I get to see everyonesort of put their,
their own special spin into the pot,
I feel excited about life.

(28:40):
- As I mentioned on a previous podcast,
I think I was interviewingmy friend Bettina from Hulu.
Mm-Hmm. culture generally gloms
around the idea of abusiness as a family, right?
Yeah. This is something alot of leaders talk about,
the idea that we're all in ittogether and we're all family
and we all care for each other.
And I love my family,
but as most families aren't,
there's always dysfunction within family.

(29:01):
'cause you're not, you'renot built for specialization.
You're just, you live together,you act together, you work,
you know, you, you exist together.
Versus a sports team or,
or as you pointed out, Lord of the Rings,
where everybody has a role,everybody has a specific silo in
which they sit to then come together
to execute on the larger goal.
So I guess my first question
before I, I go further, do youagree with that comparison?

(29:23):
That like, family's kindof the wrong image there,
comparative to a team or a,a common goal in that way?
- A completely agree. Isay this to all my clients.
I do think there's a littlebit of a generational thing
that people can't let go of
and really like, it's, it's lives partway
through millennials, but thenanything up, like, it's it

(29:43):
to them that was saying
that we're like a familywas their modern, fresh,
empathetic take on culture.
So it still feels likethe best way to do it.
I completely agree with you.
I think a team is much more
where you wanna be oriented around.
For me, I have a uniqueperspective on this, in that

(30:05):
the way that I was raised inmy family, we were a team.
We were a, our nuclear unit was a team,
and then we have this bigfamily and everyone was a team.
Everyone just showed up foreach other. Everyone had roles.
Everyone knows how to pitch in.
Everyone knows how to help out.
And so I was acclimatedwithout being a sports kid

(30:26):
to a team environmentfrom, you know, the get go.
That to me is, is there's no more
motivating force forward than going like,
oh, you got this.
Okay, let's go. Yeah.
- In my family, we allwanted to be the lead actor.
So it was prettydysfunctional from the get go.

(30:46):
It was pretty, yeah. It's,it's still rough .
Um, when my brothers
and I get together, uh, mysister too, we all just,
it's like, it's like listeningto six conversations trying
to happen over each other simultaneously.
It's painful. Um,
- It's the, yeah, I, I think there's,
there's always some of that.
Um, certainly I wouldn't say it's,
let me not paint the pictureof like, I, I'm the oldest
of four as teenagers.

(31:07):
We were not this likehighly functional team,
but our parents were, you know.
Yeah. And they, theytaught us that. Yeah. So
- I love that.
Yeah. Um, well then it'sworking under that framework.
Mm-Hmm. , howdo you get particularly older
leaders of companies toreframe into the team mindset?
Is it as simple as justpresenting them with the example?

(31:28):
Or do they need to reallybe brought into the idea of
family doesn't really describe
what is in realitywithin your organization?
- So my mo in everypiece of every work I do
is instead of focusingon what isn't working,
we're gonna point our light
or direction onto whatis working and expand it.

(31:49):
So I don't usually go in
and say, don't think of it like this.
Don't do this. What I'll, whatI'll go is put a lot of focus
where I think they shouldfocus and let that grow.
And then you don't have to, you don't have
to worry about that so much.
So here's my example. So I have this
session I call Dream Team.
The way my programs work, Icall myself the culture coach.

(32:14):
I could live in sort of a,
I think my LinkedIn might say consultancy.
I'm not really either ofthose. I only work with teams.
I, you know, I can do a little bit of work
with individuals, butit's not really what I do.
Um, and I don't assess anything.I just run this program.
It, it's, it's sort oflike a mix and match.
So I can customize it for different,
different group's needs.
But at the end of the day,

(32:34):
there's a specific cadence I'm running.
No matter who you are, nomatter how much time we have,
I want, I wanna hit this cadence with you.
The cadence starts with, uh,this session I call Dream Team.
And it's surfacing for peoplewhat they like about teams
that they have either been a part of
and enjoyed that theyexperience in their daily life.
Like a big one, I, I talkabout on this one is I

(32:55):
live right by a train station.
And so there's a Starbucks right there
at seven 30 prime time am This
Starbucks team is like, they are moving.
They're quick. That's always,
so I always find thatso fascinating to watch.
'cause that's a really hard job.
And everyone's standing there like,

(33:16):
my train in four minutes.
You know, you can likeget so much, um, anxiety
and they just do a beautiful job.
So letting people think about, you know,
superheroes come up, thosekind of things come up and,
and I really continue topush that focus towards team.
The next layer is what doyou like about these teams?
What's interesting to you?What makes them fun for you?

(33:38):
What makes it, what makes you admire them?
So then you're not only going,not only going, okay, we have
to think about this as a team,but we're going, okay, well
what kind of team do we wanna be?
And part of that exercise,
I actually have themassign a type of team.
So I had this law firm, um, or,
or they were part of a bigger company.

(33:59):
It's the, the legal team.
And they basically, they were like,
we are a Formula One pit crew.
You don't really noticeus. The car zooms in.
We have very specialized things.
We have, like, when thewheels falling off, we fix it.
We get all that done,we step out of the way
and the car goes on its way.
Like, we're not, we'renot up on the stand.
We're not part of that.No one's interviewing us,

(34:21):
but we're crucial to keepthe, the wheel on the car.
And when you can defineyour team in those ways,
it gives your people a expectations
and then it gives themsomething else to rally around.
So, uh, my long-windedanswer to, to the team piece,
- Not long-winded at all.
Uh, I, I think the one thing though that,
that you didn't talk about

(34:41):
that I do think is reallyinteresting is, um,
when we think about teams broadly, right?
That's one way to sortof establish a framework
for how to interact with them.
And I love the positivity thatyou're talking about, right?
We don't focus on the negative,we only focus on the goals,
and then those negativethings just tend to fall away.
But there can be a realdifference if there's a lot
of different generationalthinking between each

(35:04):
of the subsets of that culture.
And particularly in larger organizations
where there's a contingentof, uh, baby boomers,
of millennials, of Gen Z.
Now, you know, gen A is startingto turn into a, you know,
it's becoming the, the way wethink about, um, gen X too.
I, I think I'd get yelled atif I don't include everybody.
Sure, sure, sure. But if, if a, if

(35:25):
that being the case is sort of a constant,
do the ways in which you findthat you're able to engage
with those cultures, uh,collectively always work
or be, do you have to find away to have to engage with some
of those generational, uh, uh, per uh,
perspectives individually?
And how do you balance all of that?
- No, Jason, everyonewants the same thing.

(35:45):
They all want the same thing.People want to feel valued.
They wanna feel connected to each other.
They wanna feel like the workthey're doing means something.
So when you come from thatlanguage, there is no,
there is no room for misinterpretation.
- But you don't just havesomebody who sometimes shows up

(36:05):
and goes, the only thing
that's gonna make me happieris if you pay me more money.
Like, you don't have somebody who tries
to throw a little dynamitein the experience. Only
- In my TikTok comments,never, never in my,
in my actual sessions, never.
And I've done big speeches, never.
No, because it's reallyinterestings. It's not.

(36:26):
And I've, I do videos on this, like,
money isn't a motivator.
Money is something thatdecreases dissatisfaction.
Motivators are things like feeling valued,
feeling recognized, doinginteresting, challenging work,
having responsibility.
Those are the things thatget people up in the morning.
You know, when you thinkabout the way, like, our money
works, you get a raise for10 k, do you know how quick

(36:48):
that's normalized in a year?
Like a 10 K raise?
What is it a after taxes acouple hundred? You know,
- That's a fair point.
I do think, um, I I
I love the call out for TikTok.
I love that it's, youonly hear that on TikTok
where everybody can be sort of snarky

(37:10):
and quick about it and then move on.
That's really interesting.
Um, that does raise the question
of whether it's a genuine concern
or an easy way to score internet points.
- There's so many comments in,especially in my viral videos
where I'm like, first of all, take a hike.
Second of all, if you sat in front of me
and I talked to you theway I talked to my clients,

(37:32):
you would be backtrackinglike an Olympic runner.
Did you see Love isblind this season, Jason.
- I'm loathed to admit we started it
and then immediately fell off.
Sure. Because fair.
And, and to be fair, uh, I, Ihave been catching up enough
to know the various memesthat have come out of it.
Mm-Hmm. because, um,

(37:54):
I, I have trouble watching.
Love is Blind for one specific reason.
I can't help but yell at my television.
I, and I get that that'skind of the intent.
You want people who are gonnabe really emotionally engaged.
But it's like watching episodes
of embarrassing peopledoing embarrassing things
to the point where I hurtat what they're doing.

(38:15):
Um, so when I watched this particular
season, I was already on edge.
'cause we've done the lastseveral and I have strong
feelings about the wholepredicament of the show.
But then watching people,particularly this season,
we're starting off with lies.
We're starting off withmischaracterizations.
We're starting off withmisrepresentations of how we look
and how we experience the world.

(38:35):
And even, even the ideaof two weeks in the pod
and basically beingfed snacks and alcohol.
And at the end of it,we're gonna find love.
Like, I just really feel, um, overwhelmed
whenever I watch it now, it
did. This season was the hardest.
- I have to watch it withsomeone. I can't watch it alone.
Okay. Otherwise, I want to jumpout a window similar to you.

(38:57):
I'm like, I don't believe in the,
first of all, I don'tbelieve in the premise.
Love's not blind. Yep. Um, but
- No.
And we've seen that in sewe're totally off topic.
I love this. We've seenthat in several episodes
of several seasonswhere they do the reveal
and somebody's perception meets reality.
And now they're not interested anymore,
which I think is fine. Which I
- Think is normal.
Yeah. That happens on datingapps all the time. Yeah.

(39:19):
Well, so there was, there'sthis one famous line from the
season where this, this, um,guy was interested with these,
these two girls, one hadmisrepresented herself, um,
aesthetically and still beautiful,
but misre misrepresentation.
But you know, we sometimeswe do the oversell
and, and that's just what happens.
This other girl a lot more liketypically hot, I would say.

(39:42):
Um, and she does this thingwhen he's breaking up with her.
Sorry, spoiler. Um,
and she's like, when you see me,
you are gonna choke .
So that's sometimeshow I feel to be honest
with the people in my TikTok comments.
I'm like, if I were infront of you doing my,

(40:03):
doing my session, doing myspiel, you would fucking choke.
You would love this. Soget off your high horse.
- I think that's probablynot only good, uh,
social media advice.
Probably good dating advice too. Yeah.
Just like, you know, beconfident. Own yourself. Yeah.
I like that. Yeah. There we go.

(40:24):
Now we've turned this into a dating
show. We'll see. I'm totally
- Down.
Yeah. I'm very qualified. So,
- .
I I appreciate that .
Um, first of all, I, I have seen
how much you've talkedabout this particular season
of Love Is Blind and comparingthe current contestants
to a lot of the archetypesyou see in the office.
Mm-Hmm. , I, ifyou were dropped into the Love
Is Blind production studio
and you had an opportunityto change anything Oh.

(40:45):
Whether to make the show more interesting
or just to make everybody,you know, less insane.
Is there anything that comesto mind that you would want
to change about the showto make it healthier or,
or perhaps more actuallyembracing the premise
of discovering if, if, youknow, love can be blind?
- What a great question.Do you have an answer
to this one already in your head?
- Do I have an answer thatwhat I would do? Yeah.

(41:07):
Um, you know, the top ofmind for me is I would,
I would introduce a therapist.
Like, I think an interestingidea would be a therapist
character who works oncamera with the cast
after the reveal about
how do you feel about the
experience now thatyou've gotten together.
And I think the producers kind of do this.

(41:28):
I think that's how youget the testimonials.
But I think it would beactually much more interesting
and a much better representation of
how deep relationships form ina very short period of time.
To have a, to have a professionalcome in who says, okay,
now that you've spent thesetwo weeks having this imaginary
camp love affair the way
that we all do when we goaway from our real lives,

(41:48):
and then we come back toreality and reality hits.
What are you feeling now? Mm-Hmm.
I think it would make for better content.
I also think it would make for
healthier outcomes personally.
Mm. It may not be as, I likethat it may not be as, um,
social media sexy as what you get now.
- Yes. No,- But you know, I think we're all tired
of seeing Nick cliche donothing for several seasons.
So at least then it'd givehim something to do. Oh

(42:10):
- My God.
And the reunions. I can'tstand the way those two do.
The reunions. Okay, here'swhat I would change.
I would make it sober. I'dmake it dry. Mm. No drinking.
- No drinking. Well,
that's a lot less excitingon several levels.
Yeah. But I'm intrigued. Go on. Yeah.
- Um, I just think you probablydon't realize as a viewer,
'cause we don't know thesepeople, so we don't know

(42:31):
how far their inhibitions are down,
or like how much, we don'tknow how alcohol affects them.
We don't know how much they're drinking.
So you're kind of watching this thinking,
everyone's coming from a place.
I mean, you do this in dating too.
Like, you go out, go out ona date, someone has a couple
of drinks, they're like,oh, I really like you.
And then you're, the nextday you don't hear anything.

(42:51):
You're like, was it booze?
Was it this, you know, you kind of do.
So I don't drink anymore.
I mean, I, I have like four drinks a year.
Um, so I, I basically don't drink anymore.
Um, and my like mostmeaningful relationship
and my last relationship was we met sober.
I mean, she also didn'tDr. Drink very much.
So like, all our dates are sober,

(43:12):
all our phone conversations are sober.
Um, and it was, we didfall in love very quickly.
So I will, I, you know,lesbians are not immune to the,
like, the two week sortof falling in love.
I, I, I do watch that. I'mlike, eh, makes sense. But I,
- I don't think anybody, Idon't think, you know Yeah.
Sexual orientation, notwithstanding, I think you have
to have a heart of lead to notfall in love with, you know,
somebody you're attracted to in two weeks.

(43:32):
I've certainly beendown that road. Yes. You
- Know?
Yes. Fair point. Yeah, fair point.
Um, I, I guess I'm trying tomake a, a, a stereotype when,
when there might not be one, but,
- Sorry, you know what?
I, you know what? I'llallow it. Let's ride. Okay.
- Yeah. Anyway, so I think
that might be a little more interesting.
It's like, okay, be beyourself without the, you know,
the social lubrication.

(43:53):
See what happens. I alwaysalso think I could tell
behind the wall who was hot, actually.
Like, I think that I couldprobably, and I think you
and Jen would be able to, like,
you're the same kind of people.
Like, you know, you knowenough about people to know
how people who are perceivedas hot interact in the world.

(44:15):
So I would know by the way,they came into the conversation,
the way they spoke, thequestions they asked,
the way they answered questions,
I would know if they were hot.
- Uh, you're probably right.
Although we've often joked that neither
of us would do very well
because we would just end uplaughing at everybody's like,
you know, baloney, trauma dump.
That that, that some ofthem are, you know, some

(44:38):
of the trauma that they revealin the we're so off topic.
I love this. No, some of the trauma
that they reveal inthe pods are, um, real.
And I don't wanna minimize that.
I'm not talking aboutthe kinds of, you know,
a parent passing away when you're young
or, you know, abuse, you've suffered.
Those are very real. Butwhen, when, you know,
people are like, I was really lonely
and now I'm just looking for somebody
to make me feel less lonely.

(44:59):
I'm like, nah, that smells likebolon. Pure grade a bologna.
- It, it is funny, thereunion this season, they kind
of went after this one girl
who got on social media, all this drama.
I also didn't like that thecontestants were on TikTok
as the episodes were releasing,kind of talking about stuff.
I thought that took away fromthe fourth wall of it all. And

(45:21):
- I didn't.
And the production companywants them to, to ju it up.
They want the, they want the support.
- I didn't care to hear from them.
I, I was like, let me finish the show in
peace and then I'll look for you.
Um, I think the way they dothe reunions is so crazy.
But basically they went afterthis one girl for saying,
aren't you enter, are you not entertained?
Something like that. Andthey were like, how dare you.

(45:44):
How dare you think that thisis a show where people are,
this is their real lives.
Okay. They're finding theirtrue loves on your And you
- It's summer camp.
It's summer camp. It's
- A game show. It's a game show. It's a
- Game show.
Yeah. And it's allright. But in any event,
- To this point, so this is not
so off topic, and lemme tell you why.
Yeah. Common language.

(46:05):
Everyone talks about commonlanguage up the wazoo.
Everyone, any consultantcoming in common language
in our culture right now,
a really good common language is tv.
A really good common languageis movies a really good,
easy common language is likethe pop culture, the internet
of it, all the memes.

(46:26):
And I find when you havethose, you, it enables you
to have conversations about what needs
to happen in theworkplace without being so
rigid about it.
So I could say to a team, you know,
we're talking about love is blind.
And I'm saying, what do you, oh yeah.
What do you guys think ofthis season? How did that go?
And someone's like, you know, I hate how,

(46:48):
it just seems like there's this facade
where they're pretendingit's a real thing.
And behind the scenesit's really just a game.
And I go, I know that kindof lack of transparency is
so frustrating.
Is that something youget frustrated by here?
- Yeah. You turn water coolerconversation into a lesson.
The the one downside of that,I just want to point out,

(47:09):
because I think it'sworth mentioning with TV
and content being sofractionalized now, right?
With there is no, we don'tall sit down at Thursday night
to watch Seinfeld.
Right? We don't all know who,you know, RA where Rachel
and Ross are at any given moment.
Mm-Hmm. . Um,that can be more difficult I
imagine for your work.
On the other hand, as withthe love is blind example,

(47:31):
if you're using that example, you know,
you're targeting a specificaudience who will have
that touch base and it mightbe actually more meaningful.
So you, you've perhaps, uh,touched on a great concept here.
We've lost the generality of that kind,
those kinds of cultural examples.
Mm-Hmm. . Butknowing the specific ones
for your audience can probablymake a much bigger mark on
what it is you're tryingto deliver to them.

(47:51):
- That's valid.
I think, I think there'stwo ways that could show up.
One is people will say, like, you,
I haven't watched thisseason, but I get it.
I get, I know this, I've
seen the memes, I've seen the headlines.
I get the concepts. And so that's enough.
Or, um, I will focus it in as I go in.
I'll like focus it in. I'mactually running a cold outreach,

(48:14):
uh, series of pitches right now
with, um, .
This is embarrassing. I know I i's good.
Anyway, A cold outreach series of pitches
to financial institutionslike investment firms
and stuff in, in my areaoutside New York City.
And I am saying, didyou ever watch Billions
and Want a Wendy like coach for your team?

(48:36):
Could you be getting more outta your team?
We'll see, we'll see how it goes.
This is my first run at it.
I'm really waiting forsomeone to come back
and be like, what the fuck?
.
- I think that's a great comparison.
And, and to be fair, the numberof Wall Street bros that,
that, you know, the same way
that people in Silicon Valleylooked up to, um, well,
the show Silicon Valley.
Yeah. Um, as well as, uh,folks in the advertising world

(48:58):
who look at, you know, madMen as if it's the heyday.
That's a great comparison.I, I'd be willing to bet.
And I'm, I'm gonna putit on tape now. Mm-Hmm.
, I'd be willingto bet that ends up being a
good, solid foundation forhowever that pitch develops. Mm,
- Thank you.
We'll see, we'll see it.
I'm hoping it appealsto, as it as I mean it
to the ego a little bit.
Yeah. To go like, you wanna be,

(49:19):
wait, what's that guy's name?
Ace the Ack. What the
- Fuck is that?
- Ax? Ax. You wanna be Ax? You want be Ax? Yeah.
- . So a lot of whatyou do is very hands-on Mm-Hmm.
. But itwouldn't be responsible for me
to have this conversationwithout mentioning, of course,
the proliferation of AI tools
and AI support that we'reall seeing left and right.
Mm-Hmm. . Mm-Hmm., you know, do

(49:39):
you utilize AI in your workor in your content generation?
And if so, how are you applying it?
- So right now I'm using,
so I have two wonderfulsales team members, um, head
of biz one head of sales,
and, um, they, one of themintroduced me to Lavender ai.

(50:00):
And it's this email toolspecifically for cold email,
specifically when I'm playing
with different types of pitching.
I love it. It's so fun. I
just started playing with it this week.
So I use that. I do use chat.
GPTI actually, I don't knowif I talked to Jen about this.
I've been using chat GPTA lot to
give me some alternativeperspectives on my tarot spreads.

(50:20):
Hmm. Um, which sometimes I'm doing for,
for someone in some sort
of company setting, sometimes I'm not.
Uh, I am so pro ai.
I think that it, it so fits with my,
my vision of the future, which is
as we continue down thispath of like you think of us,

(50:42):
we're, we're reallynarrowing into what it means
to be a really modern,civilized civilization.
So I read this book calledWork by James Susman,
and it is a history ofthe way humans have,
the way homo sapiens haveexpended their energy from
basically the beginningof, of what we understand
to be their existence.

(51:02):
So being able to take thatbig picture, look at it,
what I see is all the focusgoes into the brain, right?
All the focus goes into the brain,
the gut, the intuition, of course.
All those things. All the focus is,
is thinking and not physical.
And what that helps usdo is really zero in on
what is unique about each of us.

(51:23):
Because if, if Jason, you
and I were, you know, a couplehundred years ago working on
a farm, it didn't reallymatter what was unique about us
unless like the animalsliked to be more in the case,
I got better eggs from them or something.
But more or less, we justhad to do the same kind
of work to get by.
Right? It's so differentnow in which every person's

(51:44):
approach brings somethingunique and special.
And what I think AI willdo is continue to take out
that mundane, those piecesand allow everyone who is able
and willing to really own
what it is that makes them special.
Because the input isstill the input, right?
We, there's, we're notsprouting things out of nowhere.

(52:04):
When you want to get something,sorry, I'm not close.
When you want to get somethinggreat out of an AI tool,
you have to put a good input in.
And the more unique your input is,
the more unique your output will be.
So I actually have an AI cultureworkshop, um, that I built
with my brother who's an AI developer.
And it's really around howto think about this, how
to think about AI froma cultural perspective.

(52:26):
How do you think about it from,
from this big picture view of your org?
What do you want it to do?
Instead of being scared of it
or instead of feeling like,I don't even know where
to start, build a little vision, you know,
build some vision around it.
It's pretty fun.
- That's a unique perspective.
'cause I think a lot of folkslook at ai, uh, either as a

(52:48):
help me scale kind of tool
or as a function as we were talking about
before, about help me create something.
I can't think of myself.Let me generate new content.
You gimme new ideas, kind of a thing.
I I'm almost hearing youtalk about it as sort
of a another person inyour business, right?
Another, you know, the various tools.
Like, it's very much almostas if you, you are using
AI collectively as sort ofyour personal, you know, the,

(53:11):
the Swiss Army knife of yourorganization to just ensure
that that person isresponsible for all of that.
Um, do you think eventuallythat that, you know,
as we develop these systems
and as we eventually have, Iassume Siri just gonna come
alive at some point, um,do you think of yourself
as being sort of, you know,continually AI dependent
or is this something thatit just lets you experiment?

(53:32):
- I have felt dependent upon technology
until the first time myGPS didn't work in my car.
- Hmm. - And I thought, Hmm,that's gonna suck .
- Yeah.- So I don't worry about that
as much.
I think I trust in myselfas this world evolves

(53:52):
to figure out, you know,what needs to happen.
AI dependent. I don't useit for content creation.
Maybe there, maybe people smarter,
more interesting than me are using it
for like, interesting content creation.
That's not where I'mfinding any value in it.
Um, but I do think, uh, so my brother
who built this workshop with me,
he works in the insurance industry.

(54:13):
That's where a lot of my clients are.
So he built this toolfor us to talk about,
and it's basically, uh, DNO uh, directors
and officers is a type ofinsurance in like financial lines.
I won't go further into, it's quite, it's,
I actually think it's really interesting,
but it's quite boring tothe like, layman's ear
and there's this DNO like, you know,

(54:33):
educational market newsletter
that comes out everyweek and has for years.
So basically he put coded some shit up
and put it all together sothat my sister who runs a d
and o team of 60 people cansay, okay, prior to the meeting,
everyone needs to be up

(54:54):
to date on these top threemarket risk and these things.
And, you know, whatever those things are,
they can then go into that tool
and everyone has a consistentunderstanding cited referenced
of what they need to know andwhat they need to talk about.
And so she's just then been able
to uplevel her team on theway into a meeting in a matter
of minutes prior to that kind of tool.

(55:14):
It would be dependenton who's Googling what,
what do they find, who'sspending time on it,
who's even interestedin spending time on it.
So I think it levels theplaying field a little bit in a,
in a way that's not, I don'tthink it's detrimental.
- Totally. Get it. On thatnote, I have one last question
for you, and then I'm going to allow you
to get back to your life.

(55:36):
Um, but I have to saythis has been a pleasure
and I hope you'll come back sometime soon.
Oh, this has been so fun.
Um, I'm glad, um, I've startedasking this consistently
of my guests around the idea
of sort of, what doyou wanna leave behind?
Mm-Hmm. , um, you know, uh,
I don't know if you're a fanof Hank and John Green, uh,
but you know, they, they runthe Vlog Brothers account
and the writers, you know, they, they,

(55:57):
they are just prolific business builders.
Um, and one of the thingsthey've talked about on,
on some recent episodes was the idea
that the various channelsthat they have are thought of
by them as conversations.
And eventually thoseconversations have to end, right?
Mm-Hmm. . Andso when you get to the end
of the line, you know, thenthe question is sort of
what are you leaving behindwhen the conversation is over?
Mm-Hmm. So I would justlike to hear your thoughts

(56:17):
and sort of, when you lookback at your creative work,
when you look back atyour professional work,
what do you hope people will take away?
What do you you hope yourcontributions will be
that you'll be remembered for?
- Hmm. I love that question.
I think for a second, I thinkwhat I'm circling around is
I came of age in the latenineties, early two thousands,

(56:38):
and we were very much onthe East coast to privilege.
We were very much taught there's a way
to exist in this world.
There's rules and there's a path.
You go and there's statusand there's prestige.
And the way you sort of buildall that up is gonna depend
how your life turns out for you.

(56:58):
And you'll be happy if you sortof check all of these boxes.
My life has taught me the opposite.
And part of what I, I liketo do in my whole life,
but in teams in mywork, is I like to go in
and say, you don't have to do it this way.

(57:19):
And I'm not, we're, we're not, you know,
we're not smashing the desk.
Like when I say, you don'thave to do it this way.
We're talking about doing a
meeting a different kindof way or something.
But you don't have the status quo.
Doesn't have to be how it goes.
You don't have to Also, it'snot like exile or status quo.
There's ways to be within the system
and still, still do it in a way that,

(57:41):
that best works for you.
So I think I would like that to be the,
the conversation I leavebehind, which is, um, you,
you have the ability tocreate this path for yourself.
You have the abilityto do this differently.

(58:01):
Um, and there's no right
way to do it.
It's just what's right for you.
- What a perfect note to end on. Mm-Hmm.
Grace, thank you so much for joining.
This has been a tremendouspleasure. I really do.
I hope you'll come back soon 'cause I want
to hear more about, you know, on your trip
to a hundred thousand followers.
And more and more importantly, I think

(58:22):
what you're doing inthis space is innovative
and interesting, and I hopeyou'll keep us up to date on
how your path of growthcontinues to accelerate.
- Thank you so much, Jason. This is, I,
I really enjoy being on here.
It was better than I dreamed up watching
all those episodes on TikTok.
- You know, see, you don'tneed to butter me up.
You're already on the show,but thank you .
Alright, have a goodday. Thanks again. Bye.