3 Takeaways - NBCUniversal Vice Chair Bonnie Hammer: Life Lessons for Getting Ahead (#236)

Episode Date: February 11, 2025

NBCUniversal Vice-Chair Bonnie Hammer didn’t climb to the top by following the rules—she rewrote them. In this conversation, she dismantles the biggest career myths, reveals what really drives success, and shares why sweating the small stuff can make or break you. Packed with no-nonsense advice, game-changing insights, and hard-earned wisdom, this episode is a masterclass in ambition, leadership, and career strategy—without the clichés.

I'm going to start this episode by asking my guest today to read an excerpt from her book. At every rung of the professional ladder, whether you are new to the work world, on the cusp of a first promotion, or on the path to a job, there are too many rules rooted in pithy dictums, mantras, and maxims that too many people continue to believe. They sound nice. They roll off the tongue. They seem like an easy enough script to follow, and they feel like a time-tested playbook. That's why I wrote 15 lives to call BS or bullshit on these cliches. So what are these rules that too many people believe

that actually aren't true? Hi everyone, I'm Lynn Toman and this is Three Takeaways. On Three Takeaways, I talk with some of the world's best thinkers, business leaders, writers, politicians, newsmakers, and scientists. Each episode ends with three key takeaways to help us understand the world, and maybe even ourselves a little better. Today, I'm excited to be joined by Bonnie Hammer.

She rose to become vice chairman of NBC Universal by rejecting common myths about how to act in the workplace. She believes that the traditional wisdom about work hold people back. Having risen from an entry-level production assistant job where her chief charge was a dog, to become vice chairman at NBC Universal, Bonnie Hammer challenges conventional workplace wisdom and shares the uncommon sense needed to succeed. She is the author of the new book, 15 Lies. I'm excited to find out what the rules and lies are that too many people believe that actually

are not true. Welcome Bonnie and thanks so much for joining Three Takeaways today. I'm delighted to be here Lynne. It's always fun. It is my pleasure. Let's talk about your lessons learned. What do you think about Don't Sweat the Small Stuff? It is a conceit that came around when people were talking about stressing too much on little things that you lost the big picture. But I'm a believer that the details are in the small stuff and success is in the small stuff.

If you ignore the little things around you, you're never going to get to think about the big stuff. You're judged on the tiny things in life that you clearly can put to the side because you don't think it's important enough to deal with on a daily basis, whether it's literally in a deck, little typos, or saying thank you, or being kind at a specific moment. So I'm big on sweating all stuff. And I believe that one of the paths to success is being aware that everything matters, not just

the big picture. And for you, your first job as a production assistant was to essentially follow around and take care of a dog. And if you hadn't done that job well, your career would not have taken off the way it did. Can you talk about that? That's absolutely true. But then it wasn't so much the small stuff.

But that was really about attitude. It was about humility. It was about knowing my worth at that point in time. And there's a huge difference between personal worth, which we are all born with, and professional worth, which you have to earn. It was my first job, all the other production assistants, which in the media world is the lowest job

you could possibly have, it's an entry level. It's even lower than the lowest of assistants. And everybody else had a kid, it was a television children's show about math, because I was the newest and the youngest. I got the dog. Now mind you, we were a union house, so none of the stagehands were going to fall around a dog and pick up its poop.

I had to do it. But I did it with a smile because I realized that it's all about attitude. If I had a good attitude, if people wanted me around, if people knew I would deal with stuff that wasn't exactly pretty or pleasant, they would be there to help me grow and they were. What do you think about the advice of follow your dreams? That's another cliche we've all been brought up with. And it's interesting because when you think about where we got those dreams and when we got those dreams, we were kids.

It was either our parents whispering them in our ear or a teacher or a kid's book that we read when we were young. But they weren't things we actually got exposed to and learned by example. In my mind, you can't be what you can't see. You can't dream what you don't know. It's not that I think people should throw away passions or dreams that they think they may want, but people have to concentrate on opportunities.

I lie to myself and to others, you don't have to throw your passion away. It just doesn't have to be your boss in life. If you follow your dreams, in my mind, you're going to sleepwalk through life. If you follow opportunities dreams, in my mind, you're going to sleepwalk through life. If you follow opportunities, it can get you to very, very interesting places. But those dreams can always stay in the background, and you can play with them as a sideline. What do you think about the fake it till you make it strategy of trying to appear knowledgeable and confident? First of all, I think all of us at some point in life have felt like an imposter.

I think it's just a given in terms of who we are, what we get exposed to, especially when we start navigating the corporate world. But I'm a big believer that the minute you fake it and the minute you get caught in a lie, it's kind of over because it's impossible to build back that trust from people once they've lost it in you. It's really about being open and honest and letting people know what you know and what you don't. And when you ask for help in a corporate world or in life in general, you're empowering other people to help you.

So then they want to take you under their wing and help you grow. The minute you lie about something and you get caught in it, they're not going to want to give you the opportunity anymore. So take advantage of the people around you. Be honest about what you know, what you don't know. You're going to learn a lot more.

You're going to gain a lot more friends and mentors, if you will, because you can admit what you know so they're going to trust you the next time you say you do know something, because they already knew that you were honest when you didn't. I love your story about what happened when you were asked to edit four shows, including, I forget what the acronym stands for, WWE, and you'd never done an editing job in your life before, and how you were able to do that, but also how being an outsider and knowing

nothing about it actually helped you. Can you talk about that? The WWE story was interesting. My boss at the time decided that he thought that I could help Vince McMahon and his team develop stories for the wrestling world. Now mind you, I had never watched one of his shows in my life. I didn't even know really what it was. And it was just mind blowing to me,

but I felt, okay, if it didn't work, I didn't like it. I could always quit, but I might as well try it. And I remember going up to the Stanford, Connecticut offices and walking in this room with these big oversized guys. I was the only chick in the room and I'm only just under five, four. And I remember walking in and trying to figure out what am I gonna say to these guys?

I was put into their world by my boss. They didn't ask for me. And I remember when Vince came in, he literally looked at me and all he said was, so? And I took a deep breath and I said, Vince, up until two weeks ago, I never watched one of your shows. I surely was never in a stadium to watch one of your live events. So I don't know anything about what your world is.

The only thing I know is how to develop stories, how to create great characters, and that's how I can help you. And he just said to me, thanks for being honest, let's go. And we worked together for over 20 years and had an amazing relationship in a world that was completely foreign to me. How important is being the smartest or the most knowledgeable person in the room? I have a saying that I've often said to myself, you don't have to and shouldn't be the smartest one in the room. You should surround yourself with great people, with smarter people, and always have the smartest one you know on speed dial.

To pretend to be the smartest in the room or to act like that basically shuts down everybody else. And that's such an unhealthy world to be in. If you sit back, ask questions, let others have conversations around you, you get a much better project property show because you are inclusive. So you usually come out with the best idea.

I don't think most people appreciate enough the fact that as you become more senior, it becomes more about the other people and having the other people become stars and flourish to me. You are only as good as the people who surround you. I don't think I would be anywhere near where I am now without the people who have surrounded me, who I've hired or who have been given to me by others in terms of the professional world. Anybody who believes they can do it themselves, I personally think are lying.

But the truth is, even if they are smarter and better, the journey is a lot less fun. Many children are raised today being told that they can do anything. What happens when they start their first job? Well, it's a really complicated question right now for a variety of reasons. I think kids need encouragement, and you

need to have them believe that if they work hard enough at something, they can do pretty much anything they want to do. But it takes work, and they have to prove their worth by their hard work. But what's happening in the work world right now, and I think in life in general, that the pendulum has swung so far out there that being able to critique, give criticism, tell somebody they need to grow or learn in certain ways, doesn't exist anymore because of the fear of saying something that might hurt somebody else's feeling, and therefore, is

a bad thing to do or say. So I think a lot of the younger folks coming into our corporate world right now don't understand the advantage of criticism. Don't understand that in order to grow, you may hear things that might not always feel good, but are really useful in terms of learning if you're open enough to it. I grew up with some really tough mentors. One of the first people that I interviewed for three takeaways

was Joel Peterson who was then chairman of JetBlue and one of his takeaways which I thought was so interesting goes exactly to your point. It was about feedback. He called feedback the breakfast of champions. I completely agree with him. 150%. I may frame it differently than he does, but for me, if you really want to succeed in life, you need challenging mentors, you need truth tellers, you need sparring partners. Just having people who are cheering you on

or who are cheerleaders in life, it's really not going to get you. It may make you feel good, but it's not going to help you get anywhere. I kind of divided into three different ways. You have supportive mentors. Those are the people who are your cheerleaders. They're going to tell you how great you are.

Then you have what I call more active supported mentors who are your coaches. They'll help you get into the game because they're going to help build your confidence and help you get there. But then there are the challenging mentors, which are the drill sergeants. They're not only going to prepare you for the game, but they're going to help you win the war. So they're the ones who, for me, are the guys and gals. But for most part, for me, they've been men in the world who've been my challenging mentors. They've been the ones who've said things to me that might not have felt good at the moment, but because I was open enough to listen and to hear their critiques, criticisms were the things that got me to move forward. They help you realize what

you're capable of, even when you don't realize it yourself. And Barry Diller fell into one of those categories. Oh, yes. Barry was and to this day still is, believe it or not, my challenging mentor. He taught me how to think. He taught me how to take criticism. And he was without doubt my sparring partner and I don't believe I would have been where I am today without Barry a part of my life and not because he helped pull strings or get me anywhere, trust me he did not, but it was because he taught me how to think, he taught me how to turn things upside down and inside out. And Barry, to this day as a person, he doesn't care if a great idea comes from a new assistant or a chair person, you know, didn't care what shape, color, size, anything you were. A good idea was a good idea and a bad idea was a bad idea.

And he let me know it. And to this day, I have tremendous respect for him, even though it was really painful living through that error. And what was Barry's position or title? At that time, it was a company called IAC that owned USA Sci-Fi and Universal Films. And Barry was the CEO of IAC. And at that time, I was running sci fi channel working for Barry. And how did he challenge you to be better?

How did he give feedback to you that was really helpful? It's a funny example, but it's a very specific example that describes it. So I was running sci fi channel. And I was about to put a show that had a sidekick onto the Sci-Fi Channel. So it was in December, and it was a snowy day, and I was working from home, and I was on a computer.

And keep in mind, those days, we didn't have our iPhones. Everything had to be sitting in front of a computer if you're emailing back and forth to someone. So Barry emails me and says, it was about a four o'clock on a Friday saying, why would you have a psychic on the sci-fi channel? And I go back and forth saying, well, because it's an interesting topic. People are into psychics and there is a huge interest.

And he sends me back an email. I get that. I accept that. But if psychics are real, why would they be on science fiction? And if psychics aren't real, why the hell are you in business with this guy anyway? So this goes back and forth and back and forth, probably every few hours till Sunday,

probably late in the day, maybe even the evening. And I finally came up with the answer. And I was able to write back and I said, Barrett, you cannot prove a psychic is real or not real. It's all in the eye of the beholder. So it doesn't matter whether you believe them or I believe them. It's out there in the ether

and it's somewhere between fact and fiction. Let's call it friction, which is why it should be on sci-fi. He wrote back, okay, your idea wins, go. So it was always having some kind of argument that made sense, that had a form of logic. And if it was logical and smart, he would let you do anything. If I didn't come up with that last piece,

I'm not sure I would've gotten it on the air. Great story. Bonnie, what is the most common piece of advice that you dole out? I don't know if there's one piece. There are just so many pieces of advice that I give people based on who they are. For me, advice is individualized. It's people coming to me with what they need at that stage of their life or their career that I then help them navigate through their situation. For example, I get constantly the question

from so many people, particularly women, but everybody, it's how can I have it all? And my answer to them, there's no such thing as having it all. What we have in life is choices, and it's having the agency of those choices. So don't let somebody else's all define who you are, because my all and then your all are going to be totally different. So you have to figure out what you need in one end of life. And then even once you isolate that, you have to choose. It can change over different decades or different times of your life.

But you do have to figure out what your all is for you at that moment in time and then move forward. And know that everybody feels at a balance at some point, and so will you, and that's okay. Bonnie, before I ask for the three takeaways you'd like to leave the audience with, is there anything else you'd like to mention? I think that the only way to be happy and get through life is to maintain a sense of

humility, not arrogance, no matter who you are, what you do, what you've achieved. And that humility and that kindness goes a long way and actually contributes to your own happiness, but also to success because people want to work with you. That is lovely. What are the three takeaways you'd like to leave the audience with? The first one is there's no such word as can't. If you can't do something, you're simply not trying hard enough. That is something my father said to me when I was very, very young, when I couldn't do mathematics and math problems. And it's something that has stayed with me for life.

And the reason I think I've succeeded at life because I don't believe there's any obstacle that you can't get around if you try hard enough. The second is the only thing in life that's constant is change. Change comes at you at any stage, at any wage, and at any age, and you've got to embrace it in order to move forward in life. If you embrace it, you learn more, you do more, and it's a much more interesting journey.

more, you do more, and it's a much more interesting journey. And the other is everyone in life should find a challenging mentor. It's the sparring partners, the truth tellers in life that are going to help you grow. It might not always feel good what you hear, but if you're open to it, you're going to be a much better person. Bonnie, this has been wonderful. I would add an interesting one word to your first takeaway, which is yet. For people who can't do something, not to say I can't do it, but to say I can't do

it yet. I think I might have to use that in the next edition of the book. I agree with you. And in my mind, there is no obstacle. You can't get around. You just have to do a little bit more homework, figure out whether you have to go backwards, forwards, right or left. But if you have the right attitude, if you are thinking positively, you

will figure out a way to get around it at some point. So yet is 100% right. Bonnie, thank you so much. I really enjoyed your book, 15 Lies. Thank you. It's always fun. If you're enjoying the podcast, and I really hope you are, please review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. It really helps get the word out.

If you're interested, you can also sign up for the Three Takeaways newsletter at ThreeTakeaways.com, where you can also listen to previous episodes. You can also follow us on LinkedIn, X, Instagram, and Facebook. I'm Lynn Toman and this is 3 Takeaways. Thanks for listening.