The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – The Soft Girl Revolution: Embracing Femininity in the Workplace

Episode Date: December 8, 2023

The Soft Girl Revolution: Embracing Femininity in the Workplace Thenorfusfirm.com Show Notes About The Guest(s): ​ Natalie E. Norfus is the founder and managing owner of Norfus Firm. With nearly 20 years of experience as a labor and employment attorney and HR DEI practitioner, Natalie partners with organizations to solve people problems, develop policies and programs, and create customized HR and DEI strategies. She is also the host of the podcast "What's the Diel?" which focuses on diversity, equity, inclusion, and leadership. ​ Summary: ​ Natalie E. Norfus joins Chris Voss on The Chris Voss Show to discuss the "soft girl revolution" and the changing dynamics in the workplace. The soft girl revolution is a trend where individuals, regardless of gender, are opting out of the traditional corporate ladder and prioritizing their own happiness and well-being. Natalie explains that this trend is a response to the exhaustion and lack of fulfillment that many people experience in their careers. She emphasizes the importance of recognizing that there is no one-size-fits-all approach to success and that individuals should have the freedom to define their own paths. Natalie also highlights the need for authentic human connections and effective communication in the workplace. ​ Key Takeaways: ​ - The soft girl revolution is a response to the exhaustion and lack of fulfillment that many people experience in their careers. - People are prioritizing their own happiness and well-being over traditional notions of success and climbing the corporate ladder. - There is no one-size-fits-all approach to success, and individuals should have the freedom to define their own paths. - Authentic human connections and effective communication are crucial in the workplace. ​ Quotes: ​ - "There isn't one way to be a woman, a mother, or a wife. People are tired of feeling like they're putting in all these hours into work and not feeling satisfied." - Natalie E. Norfus - "The soft girl revolution is about opting out of the traditional corporate ladder and focusing on what makes you happy." - Natalie E. Norfus - "We need to break out of the box and recognize that there are multiple ways to be successful." - Natalie E. Norfus

You wanted the best. You've got the best podcast. The hottest podcast in the world. The Chris Voss Show. The preeminent podcast with guests so smart you may experience serious brain bleed. The CEOs, authors, thought leaders, visionaries, and motivators. Get ready. Get ready. Strap yourself in. Keep your hands, arms, and legs inside the vehicle at all times, because you're about to go on a monster education roller coaster with your brain. Now, here's your host, Chris Voss. Hi, folks. This is Voss here from the chrisvossshow.com. There you go. Welcome to the show, ladies and gentlemen. As always, the Chris Voss Show. The family loves you but doesn't judge you, at least not as harshly as your mother-in-law,

because she never liked you anyway. And that's just a fact, folks. She told me to say that. Whoever's in the audience that has their mother-in-law riding me, you know who you are. In fact, I think it's all of you. Anyway, guys, we have an amazing guest, as always, on the show. We have the most smartest people that come on the show. They share a lifetime of journeys and stories and cathartic moments.

The CEOs, the billionaires, the White House presidential advisors, the governors, the Congress members, the astronauts, the Pulitzer Prize winners, authors of all walks of life with the hottest new books coming out. They bring you the stories that will change your life. As we always say on the Chris Voss Show, stories are the owner's manual to life. Because I don't know if you got yours in the mail, but I didn't get mine. And I've been waiting 55 years for U.S. Postal Service, so that's on them. Anyway, guys, we have an amazing young lady on the show today, and we're going to be talking to her about an interesting time she went viral and her work and some of the things that she does as well. We have Natalie E. Norfuss on the show with us today. She'll be talking to us about her work and everything that goes into it. She is the founder and managing owner of the Norfuss Firm. Natalie is a creative and proven problem solver with nearly 20 years of experience as a labor and employment attorney and HR DEI

practitioner. She partners with employers on DEI and HR strategies, conducts complex internal investigations, and provides coaching and training to boards of directors and other senior leaders. She believes there's no one-size-fits-all approach to HR or DEI initiatives. She uses a metrics-based model to help organizations develop policies, programs, and goals that are customized to their needs. And here she is now. Welcome to the show, Natalie. How are you? Doing great. I loved all of your introduction. I feel like I'm ready to provide a roller coaster here. One of my favorite things to do is ride a roller coaster. So I love that intro. There you go.

We've got a soundbite coming soon that's going to say, I'm just here from the brain bleed, which kind of upsets some people. They're like, what is brain bleeding? What's going on in the show? So welcome to the show. Give us your dot coms. Tell us. Yeah, absolutely.

First of all, I appreciate the kind introduction. We are at thenorphisfirm.com. And like Nancy, O-R-F, like Frank, U-S, like Sam, my dad did that my whole life. So I feel really special to be able to do it myself with the last name. So we're at thenorphusfirm.com and we're at the Norfus Firm on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and on LinkedIn. And we also have a podcast too. It's called What's the Deal? D-E-I-L. So diversity, equity, inclusion, and leadership. Because we're clever like that.

That is clever. What's the deal? What's the deal? So what's the deal with the crazy stuff leaders do at work? There you go. So give us a 30,000 overview of what you do and how you do it. We'll get into some of the TikTok scrum you got into there. Yeah. So in short, we solve people problems. So we work with organizations all around the world on solving conflicts, creating people strategies. We really are in workplaces in all different industries, for-profit, non-profit, huge, huge companies, companies as small as 30. So we really get a unique view of what's happening every day at work. There you go. So you have a viral moment that comes about that

kind of goes, I guess, mainstream or viral on TikTok. Tell us about how that came about and what... I don't know if I went viral, but I know that there's a viral trend around the soft girl thing. I would love to go viral. Maybe that's whatever we wish for. But I know that one of the trends that seems to have been relevant to your viewers is this soft girl trend, which is fascinating. And I'll tell you why. I love the dictionary. I love words and I love what we do with words. So this idea that we're in this sort of soft girl era, it's fascinating

to me because it's something that many of us have heard for decades that is not specific to a gender, but folks saying, hey, look, I'm opting out of grinding. I don't need to climb this corporate ladder. But what's really different about it this time around post-pandemic is folks are really leaning in heavy to this idea that I don't really care if I get promoted. And I think that, you know, we first heard that in terms of quiet quitting, which is right after the pandemic. And I just think, again, it's funny because as an employment lawyer, I've always seen employees say they're only going to do what the job description says. And that's functionally what quiet quitting is. And soft girl era is a good offshoot of that. I don't, I'm not going to break my neck anymore for these companies that don't break their neck for me.

So I think it presents an interesting challenge for people managers who often were able to motivate folks by saying, but if you do this, you can get a promotion. If you do this, you can get a raise. And people are like, yeah, I mean, that's not as important to me these days. Yeah. I remember, you know, the first time I got promoted from off, you know, the basic line, I guess, to management. And I was like, wait, I'm working more hours and technically getting paid less, but you're paying me a salary so it's hard for me to figure that out.

Exactly. I didn't get promoted. But you have more hours. You're a manager. But you are getting paid a lump sum. And you're like, but if I break down the hours I'm working and say, what? i think i got tricked here exactly yeah the reward for good work is what more work yeah but but you have a really nice title

oh well geez wow okay i should get my day job so tell us about what the soft girl revolution is i guess this has become really popular on i guess what i was these tiktok videos the one that i guess they sent us the thing i i'd assume this was yours was mia a ran away i had posted one in 12 of 21 appears or 412 21 however that works on tiktok and and so how does this become a thing i guess so you, we have a really unique vantage point during the heart of the pandemic of doing somewhere around like 400 or 500 listening sessions with employees from companies around the world. And listening to what folks were going through during the pandemic and what they've come out is there's been a lot of self-reflection, right? What's important here? Do I want to grind up this corporate ladder and put all these hours into work or do I want to do something different with my life? And we kept seeing stories of folks who were,

you know, doctors who became food truck owners or, you know, people who, police officers who became nail techs, things where it's like people just did something completely different. They decided whatever they were doing wasn't satisfying. And so, again, because people love to use words in different ways, soft girl era makes it sound a lot more, you know, I don't know, fancy, very cozy. But that's kind of the idea where I'm going to focus on me and what makes me happy. Maybe that's a job. Maybe it's, I'm going to focus on me and what makes me happy. Maybe that's a job. Maybe it's not. If it's, if it is a job, I'm not going to go too hard because I'm going to make sure I have time for, you know, working out and time for eating out with my friends and, you know, all of those frolicking, uh, for lack of a better word. And I, again, I don't think that's a new

phase, but I think that the way that people are a lot more comfortable with openly saying that. Right. If I think about me growing up in my career, I wouldn't think to say that because I'd be afraid I wouldn't have a job. And so I applaud the courageousness of this, of the way we're discussing it now. But I think folks are just tired. They're tired of feeling like they're putting all this hours into work and grocery shopping and all these things, and they're not feeling the sort of satisfaction from it all. There you go. And we saw that a lot in COVID. I mean, a lot of people wrote books in COVID. They changed careers in COVID. They really just took an assessment. We took an assessment on the show and changed the format of the show in 2020 because we wanted to do something that had a bigger impact in the world you know

we're talking about yeah up until covid we were talking about you know a lot of silicon valley stuff and you know which is you know tech stuff and you know which is better google and apple you know that sort of thing iphone or android phones and you know everything ceo is about just mostly business and stuff and we and after that was, what, 10, 12 years in at that point? And at COVID, we just realized that, hey, man, like none of this stuff really matters anymore. Like, at least in this moment. Like, why don't we talk about shit that's going on in the world

that actually, you know, makes a difference? Who cares about the iPhone if your family's gone? And still, who cares about the iPhonehone if your family's gone and and and still who cares about the iphone really i'm an android person start a fight here we just met so that wouldn't go so well we'll side we'll sidestep that one we'll we'll send that one i don't want your green text in my phone anyway it's fine i see how you roll it's about dei it's about equality no i'm just kidding. So what's interesting to me about the software revolutions, I've seen women go through this whole thing with the girl boss thing, being in masculine business, doing leadership,

chasing the sort of ball. I see that in, I've dated for 35 years. And so it used to be that I would see women, it used to be that my first encounter with dating with some divorced women was in my late twenties. And so they had, you know, back in my day, there were people who got married in their, in their 18 to 22. And so they were blowing out of their marriages in their first, it was about my 28, 30. And then like by 32, it was pretty much, you know, divorce women. Now what's interesting to me when I see in my dating pools is women who have done this girl boss thing and, you know,

I'm going to chase the corporate ladder. And they finally got married and had kids in their first marriage at 40, 45. And now they're like 50 or late 40s blowing out of their first marriages. And it's kind of an interesting time to be blowing out of your first marriage at that age because it's a very different dating market than it is at the lower end. You know, usually, you know, in your 30s, it's really easy to flip to finding people. But, you know, men start, we start dying off at 50, really. We do.

That took a really wild turn. I wasn't expecting that. Yeah, the amount of men that are on the planet starts really diving. I think about 55 or 60, it doubles or triples. I mean, we go through a harsh slide. Women live forever because genetically and biologically, they're designed to propagate the species. And so it's really interesting to see people getting divorced and having three, four kids. And now they're looking for a new mate at

that age. So I've been kind of curious as to, you know, seeing different things on TikTok with the software revolution, which to me kind of seems to be like a return to femininity or an embracement of femininity. Is that accurate? So that's a good question. And I think if you're looking at what sort of you were talking about in terms of like the changes in the dating pool and when people are getting married or choosing to have kids, I think what it all comes back to is that, and again, I wouldn't say that this is just women, but certainly this particular topic is people are trying to break out of the box, right? We're not one thing. And so I think that's where, like, for example, in our work, we keep elevating discussions around, you know, in the beginning of the DEI era, it was like, how do we get more women in? How do we get more black people in like very single dimensions and creating greater representation in workplaces? And now I think what you're hearing, and for sure, what we're hearing is I'm not that one

thing so I'm not there isn't one way to be a woman there isn't one way to be a mother there isn't one way to be a wife and so folks are saying we're going to figure out the the path the approach that makes sense for us and I can speak for growing up and not just growing up as a human and growing up in my career, I think a lot about how it was like you had to pick something, right? Go pick something, go to college, be something, have a job, be that thing. And even when you see, because I, you know, I was a lawyer for most of my career. I still am a lawyer. I just don't practice as much anymore, but it's like people box you into that. Oh, she's a lawyer. You're a lawyer. She's a lawyer. You're a lawyer. Sure, but I'm other things, right? And it's really hard to

change roles because people are like, oh, but you're a lawyer. And you're like, okay, but I can do other things, right? Like that's not the only thing my brain is meant for. So I think what I would call sort of the onslaught of a revolution is people saying, stop trying to box me in. So the soft girl era is putting, I'm going to do what I want to do to make myself happy. And that may or may not be climbing a corporate ladder, probably isn't. It may be getting married. Maybe it's not. Maybe it's having kids. Maybe it's freezing my eggs, right? Like just the idea of there isn't one way to do this life thing. There it goes. and i guess the soft girl revolution is women are

ditching girl boss hustle culture and corporate ladders and dealing with burnout and so most of the videos i watch they're they're talking about feminine stuff you know and i think it depends on what you define that as right and the reason why i'm saying that maybe feminine with things that are things that are historically defined as feminine. But that's why I don't think it's it's left to one generation, one generation, because we always blame the young people. And I think one of the articles says it's Gen Z, but it's really all ages and men, too. Right. So there are men. I'm sure that there's times you're like, do I want to keep working this hard? What's important to me? I mean, you mentioned it.

Yeah, but I'm not laying in. I'm not doing the things I'm seeing in there's times you're like, do I want to keep working this hard? What's important to me? I mean, you mentioned it. Yeah, but I'm not laying in. I'm not doing the things I'm seeing in the soft curl. Yeah. I'm not laying in a bed of roses. I don't know if it's me that's actually laying in the meadows. Sitting in a bath. I mean, the things you guys are talking about in the soft curls. Not you guys.

I'm not talking about meadows. It's very funny. But yeah, I'm not doing it. I'm not doing it. But I think that that's the point, right? If you want to lay in dewy grass great go for it i mean it may not it's not if you're if you're if you're a guy doing that well i'll just look for your grinder profile let's put it that way but yeah i don't i don't know many men that are doing that

at least not that are i don't know hipsters uh actually hipsters are pretty masculine men but yeah i i think it's interesting you know know, I've been seeing this thing on TikTok too, where women have been kind of re-embracing their feminine. And women that, some of them have done videos where they've talked about how I enjoy being married. I enjoy staying home. I enjoy having kids. I enjoy basically being in my feminine.

And the amount of hate and viciousness and shaming and anger and just, just sheer. I mean, it's, I don't know if you've seen it online, but it's quite ugly. And has the soft life gotten into that sort of blowback to, you know, where, where, you know, I don't know. It's, it's, it's a lot of blowback that's gone to, you know, how, how dare you let a man dominate you and all this sort of thing. And I don't know if you've seen any of that go on, but it, it, it seems to coincide with the soft life in parallels. I don't know how close they are together, but I think it's interesting that people are reaching a breaking point with, with trying to be in the masculine and, and trying to get, and trying to really kind of recognize the beauty of femininity and what a

great, what a great thing it is. I mean, it's, it wasn't for the beauty of femininity. This world would be an ugly ass place. Cause we just be men. It would just all be men.

Well, I think that when you're looking at it from the perspective of, I just look at, I'll, I'll take myself as an example, right? I've always been incredibly driven uh like the straight a girl without anyone telling me to get straight a's and finishing college early and all those things and one of the things that always took stuck out of my head was when i was in college and my dad was like why are you in such

a rush right you have your whole life to work and i I'm like, no, but I got to get to law school and I got to finish and I finished it. Right. And you don't know what you're racing to. And you get there and you're like, oh, my God, he's so right. Right. I did have my whole life to work. I mean, when you think about how we're like from babies to like finishing college or however much schooling you go to, we have built in breaks, summer off, winter off, spring break. And when you start working, life feels really, really long because you're like, you don't have those three months, the three months summer break and all these other things built in. And so if I'm speaking for my own personal experience, I personally felt like I was rushing through life to get to, I'm not exactly

sure where, because being an adult is really tough, right? Having to pay bills and, you know, you're like, oh, oh, I'm like here. Like I'm on, like I'm on stage now, like being this adult thing. And so I think that it may correlate with becoming more in touch with your feminine side. But in the discussions and the types of things we see is people are generally exhausted, right? Like they're exhausted of a lot of what it takes to just live in the US. Gas is expensive. Groceries are expensive. So people are constantly trying, it's like a pressure cooker. They're trying to relieve some of that pressure to live a life that feels, you know, okay, at least I'm, as you mentioned, like I'm making an impact on a

community or an organization or others. I have time to enjoy with my friends and I don't feel rushed. I can sit and have a conversation with my son. Like for me, for example, I'm really trying to be thoughtful of when I'm taking him to school. Like I'm not on the phone, like I'm talking to him on the way to school. I'm being present in the moments that matter for me. There you go. So tell us about what motivates you want to be a lawyer and get into this field of helping each HR and diversity, equity, inclusion. So really good question. I was going through like my mom was a teacher, so she laminated a lot of stuff in the 80s. You know, the teachers in the 80s, like really, they have a lot of lamination.

There's a laminated school newspaper for when I was in the first grade that I said I wanted to be a lawyer. And so initially, when I thought about what being a lawyer was, it was like constitutional law, civil rights, we're going to say we're going to help people, you know, have their rights. And as I grew, and especially as I went to law school, I realized it wasn't as straightforward as we thought it was, right? It's not what you see on TV. But from day one, in large part, because I come from parents that are different races, they're different religions, I had a very interesting upbringing. I've always been interested in people's identities and where they're from and their culture and their government. And so it's carried its way through from undergrad to law school and to then, you know,

choosing labor and employment as my practice area. So I've had to dissect complex people problems for a really long time. And I'm always motivated by trying to help folks create authentic human connection. There you go. It's quite a journey that people go through. And this kind of took me by surprise. One of the challenges I see in our dating field is the women that have waited, have done their corporate lives, and they've waited all this time to create a family and all that stuff. The challenge is they're really stuck in their masculine still. They, they like everything they post or a spouse on when you're dating is, is masculine traits. And,

you know, I have a house, I have a career, I have a car, I have a, you know, I have this, you know,

I built this corporate thing and men just don't care. We're just like, I don't, I don't really care. Biologically. We're not, we're not driven to seek another masculine figure.'re not, we're not driven to seek another masculine figure. We're, we're not looking to date another leader. We're looking to date someone

who's feminine, who could nurture and, and do that. And it's, it's really interesting to me how stuck they are in it because it's, it's not attractive. And, and here they are and they're blowing out of their first marriages at 50 sometimes. And I'm 55 years old. I'm ready to retire and enjoy the rest of my life. I'm not looking to go in and pick up a whole new family. And most guys my age, they've been through one or two divorces. They're not looking to start over. So I think it's, I think it's great that women are looking at, you know, whether they're operating in their masculine or feminine and appreciating their feminine more at going in and doing the things that women do that, that are the greatest part of them is, is being in their feminine, enjoying it, you know, being soft is okay, I, is what you call in the soccer revolution. To me, all I saw in the soccer revolution was a celebration of being feminine

and all the traits and behaviors that make it work. And people seem to be really happy. So I think I would challenge what you're saying because I think it creates this idea that you're one or the other, right? Because there's actually pieces of time where even the sort of what we would say, the manliest of men have softness to them. And I think that if what you're describing as masculine is sort of the sort of more outward view of success, which is coming as CEO or how much material items you amass.

I mean, I guess I think that what I see is that there was a very singular or boxed in way of being successful in corporate America pre-pandemic, right? So maybe because men dominated those fields, we associate some of these things with men. But the reality is, is that, again, bringing it back, there's multiple ways to be successful. And when I look at, for example, you know, older, more seasoned CEOs that are confused by it, but don't they want to get promoted? And I'm like, no, they don't care. You know, you're like, it's because it's there's more. Again, when we think about success, a lot of times we look at what we did to become successful and say, if you didn't do that, then like what are you talking about?

And I think that's where you're seeing, like when you mentioned earlier about folks who are trashing ladies who have decided they want to stay at home or do something that people think is more traditionally a woman's role or what at least it was in the past. It's sort of this idea of when you're feeling a resistance inside, it's because it's like something you're feeling you're not accomplishing that you want to usually, or you're challenged. Do I want to keep showing up and sludging myself to work? And like I said, I talk to men, women, and non-binary people every day. And every person I talk to starts off a conversation with how tired they are and how they work too much. It's like a very consistent conversation. And so I think, again, I wouldn't put that in a binary box of you're being more feminine or masculine. I think a lot of it is we're like, like I said, what is important to us? I don't want to be exhausted every day. Most people probably don't.

You want to feel like you have that pep so again i think some of us felt okay we had to really be laser focused on our careers so that we could you know amass the most amount of money possible so we could do everything we wanted to do and then we realize wow is that really what i want to do because i'm i'm awfully tired doing this and i'm not getting the fulfillment that you know i was hoping for i think fulfillment's the key word there. And just to make a point, I don't believe it's a monolith. I mean, women and men can move in and out of their feminine and their masculine. They can depend upon whatever they're doing, you know.

But women are largely based in femininity, their emotions and stuff. Most men that are going to be living in the basis of their emotions are going to have a very different experience than when they're masculine. But leadership, pursuit, hunting, all this sort of thing, it all comes back to cavemen. It's all biology. This isn't some sort of traditional thing. This isn't some sort of generational thing. This isn't some sort of thing.

This is biology at its core. And I think what people have been doing is fighting biology. And that doesn't mean that everyone should go home and raise kids or everyone should not do whatever. It's fine. But we need to identify that we're fighting our biology and that which makes us fulfilled and that which makes us happy. And I think that's what people are identifying now. That, hey, there's a certain nature to human nature that's been with us for eons of time. And the shortness of a generation or whatever and whatever sort of delusions it wants to feed itself is not going to change. And biology will always go back to biology and

a result to it. And I think that's what people are seeing. Well, I think if you look at the soft girl revolution or quiet quitting, these are all sort of like variations of a theme that has probably always existed. And so I was saying to someone recently that I finally understand what it means to go with the flow right we say that you know we use a lot of these cliches and make it seem like I'm just going to go with the flow but it's the reality is sometimes you're just fighting upstream so like we talk about and again all of it can come from a lot of different areas right I think for me part of it has come is the older I've gotten the the more I'm like, your circle gets smaller in terms of who you think are your close friends, even some of your family members. And so it's either you come or you don't come. I'm not going to fight you to come with me.

I'm not going to, you know, have arguments over every single thing. And people are like, oh, but you're a lawyer. I'm like, yeah, I'm not. I mean, but I don't, I don't litigate anymore for a reason, right? Like, you know, our, our court systems are, they don't actually solve real problems. Like you're just, you're like caught up in paper exchanging, especially as a civil litigator. And so you're like, this is not fun, right? What are we doing here? And like most of the time, which is why I love what I do now, you can solve conflict much differently, right? And so like when you're in that adversarial proceeding, it's just, it stays that way the whole time. And it's hard and it's against the flow a lot of times. And so I think when you look at, again, these trends that we're using the words differently now,

history continues to repeat itself. Another funny one is that people love to say, well, no one wants to work anymore. I mean, the reality is, I don't know anybody who really wanted to work ever, but the funny thing is that our project manager found a video that from the late 1800s, that they were always headlines about people not wanting to work anymore, right? So there was like, they were flashing headlines over decades and they love to also blame it again on young people.

And we recruit nice help people all the time. I have folks that for our interviewing for six-figure jobs that just ghost us that don't even show up that don't even say they're not going to show up and so it's just there's this general thing that happened in the u.s where after the pandemic folks were like i'm not doing it like that anymore and and so i think the more we can find that inward, like where does our peace come from? Where's your flow? What's the flow you're going with? I think the better off, because the other piece of all of this is that we've also lost our way with how to talk to each other. So if you

noticed, or maybe you see this a lot, but I do because I still investigate HR complaints. People are very hair triggered, these days and i'm surprised sometimes by the complaints i see because i'm like wow i haven't seen complaints like that i knew there was a big shift when in the last two or three years i've had more internal complaints that i've investigated by lawyers and hr people than i did in my entire like 17 years before that because we're really not to complain even though like it kind of seems counterintuitive and as people are fed up they're just like i don't want to deal with these things anymore so you know bosses that are are throwing things on their plate the last minute who are

yelling at them who are overlooking them when they've performed the way they're supposed to right people are ready to snap and if we're not thoughtful of each other and mindful of that you know it's hard for us to make progress in this thing we call life you put a finger on a pulse to something i think it's interesting that for the first 17 years you weren't seeing it and now you're really seeing it maybe you know i mean everyone's kind of brought to the brink mentally you know i i think i think we joked and i think some people covered it that we all, after COVID, we all kind of need like a psychiatrist for about 15 years. We just don't want to go in as a country and just be like, yeah, our mom didn't hug us enough as a child or some shit. But yeah, I think we all got a little broken.

But, you know, so in what you're seeing and you described there, are we reaching a breaking point? You think we're still on a train that's, you know, people are sick of a lot of things in life, you know, high prices for different things. You know, I hear a lot of people say, you know, when are we going to return back to normal? And I'm like, I think this is the new normal. I don't think there's any pre-COVID normal coming back. Do you see it coming to a breaking point in business? I think we're reaching it where it can boil over and I'll tell you why. I think that leaders who've led for a long time

are still stuck on how to deal with this new workplace that we have. I mean, when you look at some of the changes that have happened in the workplace, some are permanent and some are permanent in people's minds. So even when you have, for example, executives who are like, no, we got to get people back in the office. Permanent in people's minds is that some of the best years that some of these companies had were with people working from home, which is what a lot of us have been saying long before the pandemic is give people some flexibility, you know, in terms of where they work. Certainly, I think about my early career if i didn't have any touch points with partners as a as a young lawyer i don't know if i would have evolved

but it's not the point is that it's not a one-size-fits-all and where people work so you have a lot of eye rolling when ceos are like well we need to collaborate we need to this and i also think it's important i am constantly encouraging encouraging CEOs be real. If part of it is you have all this real estate that just is sitting empty and you don't want your money to be spent that way because you can't get out, just tell people like we want to utilize our investment because that's also a huge thing. That was the number one term we heard from employees was transparency. They don't want to be bullshitted, right? Like they don't want you to come up with these things that sound good when they've seen how it actually works. You mean They don't want to be bullshitted, right? Like they don't want you to come up with these things that sound good when they've seen how it actually works.

You mean they don't want pizza parties? They don't want pizza parties. I love pizza, but they, you know, it's just, cause it's like, it's like this, it's a placation that people are like, no, let's just be real with it. And again, I push leaders like that all the time. Just tell them what you mean. That's what they want to know. They don't want that fluffed up, some expert communicator fixed all the words for you and they're typed perfectly and the message is so pretty.

They want the real. And sometimes they can handle that and sometimes they can't, but they can't handle feeling like they're being lied to, which is what you've seen in a lot of these workforces, which is why you get the quiet quitting and all of this or the running jokes like, oh, let me guess, I'm going to get pizza. Let me guess, you're going to come and, you know, give me employee of the month and put me in a placard up there and give me more work as a recognition. So that's kind of the things that we're seeing is that people just are like, want to kind of blow up some of these systems

because they've seen a different side of them. Let me ask you this, because I'm really curious about this. You made me think about something. So, you know, I've worked at home since 2004 when I got rid of my partners and just took over our businesses. And so I've loved living a home life. In fact, when COVID came, I'm like, why are you guys in my space? I was doing this in 2004. And, you know, I could work anywhere in the world as long as there was Wi-Fi. And even then, I don't need Wi-Fi 24-7, which is, why am I here?

Anyway, I'm just kidding. In the state that I'm in. But so one of the issues with, and we've talked about this with lots of authors and scientists and psychologists that have been on the show one of the one of the detriments are what am i trying to fucking say here what i'm trying to say is i think it's really cool that people stay home and they can enjoy their family life you know spending you know i've lived in la spending two to four hours a day in a car to go to work for eight hours a day and you know, that equates to about 10 or 12 hours that you're basically engaged in working, technically. And now they're spending more time with their family and they can be more present maybe

and they can have more intimacy with their family because they're there as opposed to in the car or at work. I think there's a healthy factor to that so i'm not i'm not dishing that but but also there's there's a real detriment to isolating us and not having us be around other people i'm going to fall back to biology here and and people that we've had on the show that are psychologists and metaphysics and one of the things we need is being able to see other people in 3D. And so we live and we developed as a species over millions of years and being able to see people in three-dimensional, to see your facial reactions when I talk to you,

and your eyes and your body language, which is 3D. So like in Zoom right now, we're not seeing what's going on with the rest of our body and how that's communicating and flowing. and this actually stimulates and enhances our brain and and keeps us you know from going into different states like alzheimer and dementia and stuff by keeping our brain stimulated because you know we're of course doing the fight fight thing you know is this person at danger who am i talking to but the interaction and there, and there's even a thing of how our dopamine reacts chemically with pheromones or just hormonally.

When we touch, when we shake hands, that actually sends signals to our brain that set off different things. And we don't do that anymore. And in fact, one of the problems we have too is biologically over all these millions of years, we're used to seeing 3D. One of the problems with phones, it's very 2D. And our brains have not adapted to this.

And are not meant for the amount of inputs that come from those phones, right? Our brains are not built to consume as much information that's being thrown at us on a daily basis we're still cavemen when it comes down to it like people just lie to themselves nowadays everything really comes down to our caveman stuff we're still cavemen in a rudimentary design how we were built and so do you think that do you think that this breaking point that you're seeing in the last year or two is you know people being so isolated now they don't interact with each other. And when they interact with each other, they're really having problems socially. Is that possible?

So, one, back to sort of what I was talking about earlier, I don't think the fix is one or the other. Because I do think that in-person communication is so critical. I mean, we do executive coaching, and there was a time where we were coaching someone, and I was saying to my colleague, I just can't get a feel on Zoom, right? There's just, we're not connecting to this point. And so I was like, well, I live in Miami, so I'm like, maybe we can go meet an outdoor cafe so that there's, there's some enough that was still kind of in the mix of COVID, but I'm like, I don't think we're going to have any level of success if we keep trying to do this on Zoom. And it was interesting because what it really highlighted for me is the nuance that comes

from being in 3D. So we both, it just so happened that he and I, there was three of us and the client, he drank tea and I drank tea. And the waitstaff brought us the tiniest amount of hot water. So it was like, became this inside joke that you get a little bit of this hot water and I'll get a little bit of this hot water. But that wouldn't have happened on Zoom, right? That thing where you create those small points of connection. So I do always say, as much as I can challenge a CEO to say, don't bullshit people and say it's just about collaboration and say also, that's why I think hybrid is great as well. But also it's really helpful to see people in person. My personal opinion, though, to the other part of

your question is that we had so many distractions prior to COVID, meaning we did not realize how distracted we were by sports games, by concerts, by traveling, which we're largely back to, but I think our brains have not forgotten the space that we had with none of it. And I think you don't realize all the stuff you didn't, you weren't dealing with, with yourself. Right. So then it's, you're like, wow, gosh, I really, if you think about some of the relationships that ended, like maybe we were having problems for years and I just didn't have time to think about it because I'm always at work or I'm driving two hours, you know, to and from, and we're just functioning in

life. And so I think that same thing is what's happening with people's relationship with work. Gosh, I didn't really think about how tough this is on me to five days a week, commute like 20 hours of my week. Like, I don't want to do that anymore. Right. So that I think it's just like there was that period of undistraction, so to speak. I don't even think that's a word, but let's just pretend it is. And then now you're like, oh, yeah, I'm not going back to that. I'm not going to go back to that piece now that I have that awareness. Yeah. And I believe you're right.

It should be a monolith. I mean, the world isn't black and white. It's color. And it's gradient. And so I think maybe the right thing is it seems like maybe there's a search for more balance and maybe the reason you're seeing in theory this this you know this growing thing of it you know we're we're kind of seeing that same sort of agitation that you're seeing in the in the workforce you know go into our politics oh yeah going to so much to stuff divisiveness at

the school level which is kind of a play into politics if you understand what the things are there um but we're just seeing people agitate every level you know i mean you can you can go on tiktok and find a karen every other day upset about like when you're just like um it's it's some of the times where i'm like wow so i look at it in one way. Like my son, when he was younger, he'd always ask me my favorite something. And I'm like, am I supposed to have a favorite like sock? I mean, like it would be the most obscure things.

And then you see now that, so that's the cute, oh my gosh, side of it. But now people are so angry about so many different things. And I think that that's where this, I liked your, I like your 2D versus 3D thing is that where we do need to get out there and touch some grass and talk to people sometimes because it gets too easy to be behind that screen and be like, as I always say, a keyboard gangster. And, you know, we're going to like type, type, type fast and push it off. And we're not thinking about each other as humans. If you think about how this country and many countries started, we were a lot more communal where we needed. You do need each other to survive. Right. You can't really we can't really live a strong quality of life or do everything ourselves.

It's just it's not really it's not like you said, it's more sort of a biological thing. You're not born alone. You can't even when you're born do anything for you you know what i mean it's this idea of like where did we lose that piece of yes our individualism is important but to move things forward we need you know we need we need a group we need folks that we connect with and you know i'm hoping we get back to that because the biggest biggest challenge we see in the workplace is people not know how to talk to each other. And so it seems so basic. And I say it all the time. I'm like, we got to get back to talking to each other. Well, but it's just bizarre where I'm constantly pushing CEOs to make

decisions, which sounds weird, give people feedback. And they're like, oh, but I don't want to argue. I'm like, this is not an argument. You pay people to do a job. And if they're not doing the job, then they should know that they're not doing the job, right? It's this piece where there's just this people will be direct when you don't see them, right? They'll be direct in an anonymous setting, but they're not as direct. We're not direct with each other the way we used to be. And it means that there's all this skirting around the real issues and that creates these mini fights about things that don't seem like they're like, why are you upset about that? But I think if you look at, if you were to track down some of these commenters and all these

mean folks in the comments of posts, you would see that there was something else that was bigger that never got addressed. And now it just shows up in these other ways. So you've given me another epiphany. This is what I love about the show. I learn more than my audience does. I need to start making it like, this is an epiphany, ding, for our audience. But I think they get it. They've been doing this for a while.

But you give me another epiphany. One of the problems, you know, we've run the chris faust show and it's a podcast but for years it's been a tech review company so we've reviewed technology and like i said in the early days apple iphone and you know all the different tech stuff and speakers and you know we we have a whole side of the company that does that and one of the things we've always been in is gaming so i i used to never be really into gaming much but i i got into it because we had to review the xboxes and the playstations and you know the games and there's a whole arm and podcast for that crap and i i do gaming now gaming is is largely a tribal thing where where men are doing the cave

and stuff once again biology they're they're getting together and they're going and finding stuff to kill i mean that's basically what it together and they're going and finding stuff to kill. I mean, that's basically what it is. And it's the camaraderie and masculinity that comes from that. And so they like that. But one of the problems I saw in gaming, and I still see this day, it's really upsetting, is the same sort of concept that you see

with people in cars. Like when people get in cars and go into traffic, they become like maniacal assholes and and there's the psychology that basically you you kind of enter your own private idaho and you get your car and you're an asshole because you know you have four walls around you and you you feel like you're not really connected to other people and you you can just go be a jerk if you really want to and and all that stuff and the same thing is applicable to the gaming you know the extraordinary racism the hate uh you know like discord like the the side chat just the the pieces

of yeah you know and you wonder i mean i do wonder regularly of like, what, what's going through your head when you say these really hateful things, what's going through your head when you're side swiping someone. And I mean, at least for us in Florida, I won't even have, I won't even argue with anyone now after you know that there can be permitless carry, like, just go ahead in front of me. Right. Like, even if it was, even if it was rude, even if it's the thing, like, because you're just like, people are like, like you said, like you're saying, they think their four walls sort of protect them from, you know, being a decent human being. And, you know, that ideas of just asking people how they're doing in the morning and, you know, the basics. Yeah.

And, you know, I ran a lot of groups. We ran discords of like thousands of people for different gaming communities. And of course we would use it to promote the show and the products we reviewed, but the amount of hate and racism that we had to deal with, I mean, there were times we had to have PlayStation or Sony come in and clean up a chat. Cause for some reason they don't make it so that you can moderate it. The people we would have to ban that would just sheer racism.

The N-word, just ugliness, beglore. And I've thought for so many years, you would never say that to another person if they were sitting next to you or standing next to you. You would not say what you're saying and i wonder if that mentality that car traffic mentality that gaming mentality that seems to be of the same psychology is not have transposed it has transposed over to the zoom thing where since we're looking at each other behind these screens you know we're thinking you know the same sort of car mentality like there's jane and james and bob and bob's doing or even off camera so to your point like you're even like you know there's there's because we you know i think it is exhausting to look at yourself all day it's different that's the thing

that zoom added that's different from you're like oh it's you again oh right you know that type of thing although i did learn a lot about myself because i was like i make a lot of interesting facial expressions but but no to to your i think to your point this is why we have to look at the things in a flexible way of we got to be in person with each other at times um some people work better at home for many different reasons some people are very distracted at home like we're like you're saying i like that word that mono like we're not a monolith and and again and and maybe it's maybe it's my age in the workforce i feel like we used to put a lot more effort into the learning opportunities that allowed us to connect and it felt like a lot of

that like leadership development training and all the things just kind of went out the window and we're throwing folks, which is true, we're throwing folks who've never managed people into these management situations and expecting them to do really well. And we're not giving folks the tools to even connect in the ways that you and I are talking about that are more, again, decent than some of the stuff that happens behind these screens or in our cars. There you go. I think my theory is one of the reasons you might be seeing this new agitation last year or two is people are reaching that breaking point. And there's a lot of that going on behind the screens because they're, like you said, they're not having that interactivity. I mean, there's a lot of that going on behind the screens because they're like you said they're not having that interactivity i mean there's there's real activity and brain building that

it does when we meet in person when we touch when we hug there's all sorts of dopamine and serotonin and stuff that goes off and when the 2d screens happen we don't have that there's a you can get like a dopamine but some people are getting you know attacked that but i think that maybe one of the things that's going on you know know, I've talked to some friends, well, I've seen friends that have gone through the Zoom thing and the Zoom exhaustion and they'll post on Facebook. They're like, I did 12 freaking Zoom meetings today. And that was my whole work day. I just want to kill myself. And fortunately, I don't have to do that. But know I just I just saw that so I just say one thing though I actually just read something recently which I think goes to what you're

talking about is that our hugs are not long enough so apparently you have to hug for about 20 seconds to get that's true and and it's funny because I'm like wow 20 seconds is actually a long hug if you if you're not getting if someone's not giving you consent to that long hug it could be pretty creepy to have a 20-second hug but i think that when you again so if you bring this all the way back right we all start with ourself and i think we don't do enough of that introspection to think about our part in situations how we're showing up in situations what we're're showing up in situations, what we're not getting, what we are getting. And we are always encouraging folks to look inward. I just was telling an executive the other day, forget about the job for a second, stop and think about you as a person and what is it that you need in your own life so that that will help you show

up here differently. And I think that it's, again, we've become in a place that because we're behind these screens, we can always blame somebody else for something. And again, that personal accountability is just not relished as much as it used to be. And we're trying to bring it back. There you go. One of the things that was pointed out to me by one of the authors that talked to us, and you alluded to it, is there's an experiment they did with babies and mothers and so they took a baby just you know fairly new baby and really can't talk and so the only communication that has of this mother is watching its face or her face and and and mother looking at its face the baby and so they they did this thing where they filmed the mothers interacting with babies as mothers do, and all that stuff, and the baby's joyous and the baby's happy and stuff.

And then they did a thing where they took the mother and they had to ignore the baby but still be in front of it. And so not looking at it, not showing any facial expression or emotion so just kind of dead facing the baby just starts freaking out and you can see the brain just go crazy it starts crying it starts thrashing about and and really freaking out because it's not getting that 3d input from the mother that's that's giving it the communication and i don't think we realize again going back to our biology and caveman times how much that sort of stuff is the minutiae is the juice for our interpersonal relationships maybe that's why we're just a bunch of more miserable assholes these days

with one or two friends i'd be interested to hear back from you in a few years if you study, you know, if this continues this trend of the last year, year and a half, if maybe some of that isn't there. And maybe someone should do a study that if hybrid workforce stuff seems to be better because clearly, you know, there's

an opposing side to this. We've gone from working in the office where we at least put up with each other. Now we're working at home and now we can't deal with each other at all. Maybe hybrid does a balance. So anyway, as we go out, your final thoughts and pitch to people that would be interested in doing business with your company, how they can onboard and reach out to you guys. Yeah. So at the end of the day, a lot of what we've talked about today, if you're looking at it from the bigger picture is you need to know what's going on in your

workforce. So we really specialize in the data-driven workplace assessments so that you're developing strategies that are thoughtful to what's actually happening. Again, I could say this as a parent, and I'm sure a lot of leaders and other parents can say, you think you know, but then there's a lot of stuff out there that you don't. And so let us help you figure out what your employees need and let us help you work through things that make sense for your company and not just what you're hearing other companies do, because it may not work for you. There you go. And check out the podcast as well. Yes, we'd love for you to listen, because you know what we do is we take the mystery out of how to be inclusive. We run into a lot of leaders who say they want to do it, but they don't know

how to do it. We keep our episodes short and practical and we're funny and fun. Not just me saying that, but definitely, and I appreciate the plug and the invite. It was great to have a nice challenging conversation with you. Yeah, you give me some really interesting ideas on the theories of why we're having those struggles. And I think I was interesting what you said that in the last year, year and a half where there's kind of a thing and I'm always curious

if there's going to be a breaking point or I don't know, maybe we just have to all find each other's stuff. You know, there you go. Thank you very much for coming on the show, Natalie. I really appreciate it. Thanks to our audience for tuning in. Go to goodreads.com,

FortressCrisfoss, LinkedIn.com, FortressCrisfoss. Subscribe to the big LinkedIn newsletter, the 130,000 LinkedIn group over there. YouTube.com, FortressCrisfoss, one of the TikTok, and Facebook, crisfoss.com. Thanks for tuning in. Be good to each other. Stay safe. We'll see you guys next time.