The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 474: Jeffrey Pfeffer - How To Gain Power, Break The Rules, & Advance Your Career

Episode Date: May 29, 2022

Text Hawk to 66866 to become part of "Mindful Monday." Receive a carefully curated email each Monday morning to help you start your week off right... Full show notes at www.LearningLeader.com Twitter/IG: @RyanHawk12    https://twitter.com/RyanHawk12 Jeffrey Pfeffer is the Thomas D. Dee II Professor of Organizational Behavior at the Graduate School of Business, Stanford University where he has taught since 1979. He is the author or co-author of 15 books including Leadership B.S.: Fixing Workplaces and Careers One Truth at a Time; Power: Why Some People Have It—and Others Don't; The Human Equation: Building Profits by Putting People First; Hard Facts, Dangerous Half-Truths, and Total Nonsense: Profiting from Evidence-Based Management.  Notes: "The two fundamental dimensions that distinguish people who rise to great heights and accomplish amazing things are will, the drive to take on big challenges, and skill, the capabilities required to turn ambition into accomplishment. The three personal qualities embodied are ambition, energy, and focus. The four skills useful in acquiring power are self-knowledge and a reflective mindset, confidence and the ability to project self-assurance, the ability to read others and empathize with their point of view, and a capacity to tolerate conflict." "Being memorable equals getting picked." "Measuring the wrong thing is often worse than measuring nothing because you do get what you measure." "People are seduced by and attracted to narcissists and despots and wind up voting for or working for them, frequently with bad outcomes." Break the rules — in one test, the rule breaker dropped cigarette ashes on the floor and spoke rudely to the waiter. That person was perceived to be 29% more powerful than the person who was more polite. "I completely reject the idea that working adults need to be treated like infants or worse and not told the realities, harsh or not, about the world of work." Build a powerful brand — in late 2020, Laura Chau was promoted to partner at Canaan Partners, an early-stage venture capital firm. She started a podcast. It gave her the opportunity to ask women who were very senior in their careers to talk for an hour… she expanded her network. Her own status was enhanced through her association with high-status people. Then she started writing and publishing her work. This attracted people to her. A brand needs coherence. Have a narrative and tell it repeatedly. Love: "Kathleen, whom I met at a party in the Green Room of the War Memorial Opera House in San Francisco on January 19, 1985, and married on July 23, 1986. As she would say, no algorithm would have matched us." "To the amazing Kathleen, the love of my life, whose death left a hole in my heart and soul." The 7 rules of Power are: 1)     Get out of your own way. 2)     Break the rules. 3)     Show up in a powerful fashion. 4)     Create a powerful brand. 5)     Network relentlessly. 6)     Use your power. 7)     Understand that once you have acquired power, what you did to get it will be forgiven, forgotten, or both.

Welcome to the Learning Leader Show presented by Insight Global. I am your host, Ryan Hawk. Thank you so much for being here. Text, Hawk to 66866 to become part of Mindful Monday. You, along with tens of thousands of other learning leaders from all over the world, will receive a carefully curated email from me each Monday, day morning to help you start your week off right. You'll also receive details about how my book, The Pursuit of Excellence, will help you become a more effective leader. Text, Hawk, to 66866.

Now, on to tonight's featured leader. This one was all over the map. Dr. Jeffrey Pfeffer, professor of organizational behavior at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, where he has taught since 1979. He's also the author of 15 books, many of them bestsellers, including Leadership BS, The Human Equation, and most recently, seven rules of power, surprising but true advice on how to get things done and advance your work. career during this conversation we discuss why modesty and humility might not be useful qualities to possess if you want to get promoted then the curse of authenticity and how it can hurt you

and then why people are attracted to liars and narcissists as you could probably gather This conversation was wild and that my anecdotal stories seem to be the opposite of what Jeffrey teaches and what he's learned through decades of research. So what you're about to hear is different from pretty much any episode we've ever done. Enjoy. Ladies and gentlemen, it's Dr. Jeffrey Pfeffer. Jeff, great to have you here on the Learning Leaders Show. Welcome. Brian, it's a pleasure to be with you.

To start, I want to go back in time, specifically to January 19, 1985, you're standing in the green room of the War Memorial Opera House and San Francisco. What happened next? Who did you meet? What did you do that day? Well, I was not in a very good mood because I had gotten through the Christmas holidays, which as many people know are a time, oftentimes of family and I don't have family really. So I was reasonably depressed, and I was standing there not in the best mood. And a friend of mine watched a woman walk in at around 10 o'clock and Kathleen Fowler, as it turned out. And she went up to her since I wasn't going to be very proactive and introduced herself. and then brought Kathleen over to me.

And we wound up dating and getting married on July 23rd, 1986, and living together until Kathleen died on September 11th of 2021. You dedicated the book to her, and you said, The Love of My Life, whose death left a whole in my heart and soul, a really vulnerable, authentic statement. I love starting with love. I think that's what living's all about.

Can you share more about that when someone leaves a hole in you? That's as deep as it gets, man. Can you share more about her and your relationship? Sure. So we, if she would say, no algorithm would have matched us, which I think is right. Why? Why is that? Because we were very different.

I mean, I think in many instances, the social science suggests that similarity is a fundamental basis of interpersonal attraction. I have very committed to my work. She had had a very successful career first as the first female bank examiner for the 12th District of the Federal Reserve. And then as a working on her own, setting up accounting systems for small businesses, mostly doctors and lawyers offices and a few famous. people such as the painter Joan Brown and the industrial designer Primo Angelie, but she did not really, she was not that committed to her career. I was very committed to mine. I think we had different preferences in movies. We had different preferences in the kind of art we liked. We had many differences, but somehow we were like, you know, connected. I mean,

she would say that we've been together in prior lives and would be in subsequent lives. And we had, I think, a very, very deep connection and cared very much about and for each other. And so when on August 27th, 2020, she had a stroke, a very small stroke in a very bad place that compromised her right arm and leg, but left her ability to speak and to think and to talk and to chew and all these other things unaffected. I then, you know, organized her 24-7 care and her physical therapy, which costs, by the way, $35,000 a month. And she, you know, and we spent even more time together as she, you know, was in this house along with her caregiver, basically all the time. She got better. But she also was determined not to live, she was going to live life on our own terms. She was definitely going to live life on her own terms.

She did not want to be particularly an old woman, and she certainly did not want to be an old woman in a wheelchair. So on September 10th, after about a year of trying to get better, and she was making progress, not sufficient for her, she went to the Pietater, the house that we owned in San Francisco with her caregiver and engineered, as I say, her departure from this world. She killed herself. And I decided on that day, by the way, to do two things. Number one, to not use euphemisms or anything. And as I have talked to people about what she did and why she did it, people have come forward with their own stories of brothers and cousins and sisters who have killed themselves. And, you know, I have a very dear friend whose wife killed herself in 2003.

And it has become a way, it's kind of weird to say it's become a way of connection. but it actually has become a way of finding a bond with people who have gone through a similar experience. And the second decision I made is that I was going to take help and ask for help from all of any friend who is willing to offer it. And so that, you know, to use your earlier phrase, I mean, this, of course, leaves me not only vulnerable, but it also leaves me much more closely connected to people. I mean, I, you know, I knew a lot of people, and we are now much closer than we once were. And so that has been, you know, an interesting, an interesting experience. Thank you for sure.

It's a hard experience. I mean, I still remember, I mean, contrary to, you know, if your listeners are interested in advanced directives and the living will and all this other stuff, basically this is up to the doctor. And the doctor at California Pacific Medical Center at Davies Campus on the night she was admitted, even though she was brain dead, kept her alive overnight. And so she actually died on September the 11th of 2021. And when I had finished talking to the doctor and giving him the instructions to withdraw life support, and she took no breath after that, I helped the phone and let out a scream. It is as if my heart was being ripped out of my chest.

That's the only way to describe it. But, you know, I have friends who are much more religious than me who say that the Lord does not give you anything that you cannot handle. And so, you know, I survive. Do you believe that? I don't know. I've certainly handled it. I certainly, you know, I'm continuing to do work and research.

And, you know, I've actually even met somebody. And, you know, so I guess I believe that, you know, in the words of a dear friend of mine, I'm a survivor. And so I think, you know, certainly I, this was not something I was looking forward to, but it is something that I've managed to survive. Thank you for sharing, man. I wasn't sure how that would go, but I appreciate it. And there's no real way to transition from this,

but you study and write about power and leadership and work. And what you just did was display, I think, a really courageous amount of authenticity and vulnerability. And you could have definitely glossed over parts of that story and you chose not to. And what you are already experiencing is the fact that that can develop, can deepen connection with other people. My friend Jason Gainard told me relationships move at the speed of vulnerability. And so through the course of this terribly tragic event that you've gone through that's left a hole in your heart, Does it make you rethink some things when it comes to vulnerability and leadership and authenticity?

Not really for the following reason. There is, you know, so I would say two things. Number one, and I'll get to the main point in a second. I think one of the characteristics that I displayed in the story that I just told is a characteristic that is, I'm not sure, is always serving well. but it is a characteristic that I think I can engage in as an academic with tenure. You know, as I tell people, I'm old, which makes me dangerous, I'm tenure, which makes me dangerous.

The combination of big old and times tenure makes me very dangerous. I can tell the truth. And so, you know, and so I can choose to tell the truth and not have to, you know, kiss up to my boss, not that this is particularly relevant for that story, I don't have to put on a display. I have something, and I've said this in some of the posts I've written on LinkedIn, for instance, about aging and aging at work. I have advantages that many people do not have because of the career that I have, because of the position that I have, and so on and so forth.

Now, to go to your question, there is research that asks the following question. And I cite this end in the new book, Seven Rules of Power. there's research to ask the following question. There's all this stuff about authenticity and vulnerability, and there is this desire to show this other part of yourself, and how does this work? And what they find is that there are two different kinds of relationships. There are work-relevant relationships,

and particularly work relationships where you are in a position of authority, where people are looking to you for leadership. We're demonstrating authenticity and vulnerability is not very helpful. But the authenticity and vulnerability that I displayed with my friends is in a different context. It's not a work-related context. So you have friends and you have work. And we have a very popular class at Stanford called Interpersonal Dynamics, otherwise known as Touchy-Healy, where people, you know, get very,

close to each other or whatever. And many of the, and that is fabulous because in Stanford, you're in a community. There's relatively low levels of work-related interdependence. These are people who are friends of yours. They are not competing for promotions. They're not competing for jobs. And many people, therefore you can develop these close relationships that hopefully will last with you long after you graduate from Stanford. But people who take those same behaviors and then apply them in a work context, often get into a lot of trouble because work is different than non-work. There is a different level of competition at work, whereas we know most work organizations are hierarchies. There's a different level of connection in your work people than in

your friend people. You're running different agendas. You're doing all kinds of things that are that are different. The relationships at work may be more transitory, bosses come and go, work colleagues come and go, particularly in this age of the great resignation. Your friends are going to be much more stable, probably than your work people. So I think you should not much, the research suggests that what you do at work and what you do outside of work ought to be different. And that isn't surprising. I mean, you know, you see people who behave towards their subordinates or their colleagues in ways that if they behave that way towards their spouse and their children, they would have no family. You know, maybe Elon Musk would be an example. I want to talk to you

about him in a second, by the way. I'll tease that for later. So I think the general point is, is that we occupy many roles. We're members of religious communities, we're members of families, we're members of work organizations. And we, and I think it is natural for us to think about behaving differently in these different contexts. Well, so I know you basically everything you write and say is backed by research. So I understand that completely. So everything I share is anecdotal evidence from my own life and some friends. But I have been at a number of workplaces, whether I've actually worked there or

worked with them as a client, where those lines are really blurred, meaning the bulk of their friendships. A lot of times this happens if people move and you start somewhere and the only place you meet friends are at the office. I know people aren't working in office as much, but it's still happening. So what about in that case where the business, the culture is set up where it feels, they say family. I know it's not a family, but it feels like your core friend group. You go to happy hours. You may meet your spouse there. I did by the way. You may, like all those things happen. And so they get so blurry where there isn't just this cutoff between, okay, outside of work and inside of work, a lot of places I've found and people I've worked with, especially in, I grew up in an inside sales organization, you know, a bunch of young, hard charging people who want the happy hour every Friday, that type of thing. What about, what about in those cases where I feel like that's still happening, maybe not as much as it used to?

It definitely happens. The question is whether or not I would recommend that that happened. You know, because because work relationships tend to be more transitory in a world in which there are things like layoffs, you know, and there certainly are things where people move for jobs and whatever. You know, there is research, and as you know, and there's been a lot of discussion about this, about how the number of friendships that most people have has gone down, many people have almost no close friends, and the relationship between the number of close social ties. you have and a variety of both behavioral and physical health outcomes has been demonstrated repeatedly. So I would say, you know, you know, yes, many people find friends at work. My advice is not. My advice would be to find friends outside of work where you are able to separate, if you will, the instrumental aspects of your interactions from the, if you will, the more social

social supportive aspects of your relationship. Why can't you do both? I have friends at Stanford, but I have a lot of friends outsiders. Yeah. Why can't you do both? Or why do you suggest not to do both? I mean, I know there's, you're talking about research here. So there has been research done by a woman at the University of Toronto, Tiziana Casiaro.

I think that's her last name. who's written actually a book on power. And she says that at work, you oftentimes need to interact with your workmates and even your friends in order to get stuff done. You know, so we work in an interdependent situation. I need your help. I need your advice.

And when I mix friendship with these, if you will, more instrumental agendas that I have, have. I need help. I need advice. I need, you know, I need you to do something, you know, so that we can move our projects forward. She says, and there's research that she has done that supports this, that people feel dirty. So they, they, people are often uncomfortable in mixing. Okay, I got Ryan. Ryan, I need you to do stuff for me so that, you know, we can get work done and I can advance in my career. Ryan, you're also my friend. And Mitch, The mixing the two causes people to be uncomfortable.

Maybe not, obviously not everybody. I'm not talking about physics here. This is like, you know, we're talking about probabilities. So that, I think that would be number one reason. Number two, it depends, you know, everybody says to me, and I think you're going to agree with this, that work careers, not careers over the course of life, But the average tenure, particularly for men, in jobs, has gone down.

So if I now, if my friendships are based upon a relatively less stable environment where people are coming and going much more, you know, I would like, I think you would like, I think we would all like, a set of friends who will be with us for a longer period than the typical people are now. We're coming and going, particularly in the Silicon Valley, where, you know, people stay. So the average tenure, I believe this is true, wouldn't want to be quoted too much on this. I think the average tenure of her first job for an MBA out of Stanford Business School is 18 months. Hold on a second. As much as I'd love to say this, Jeff, that is not an average human, though. MBA at Stanford, I know that's normal for you, but that's not normal for most humans. So maybe, I don't know what the average.

I got you. I love to. But with that, with a high level of mobility, both geographic and across organizations, I would argue that you want a foundation of social support that is more stable than what you're going to get from the people coming and going. I got you. I think, I think I'm, my vision is colored by my own experience, like all of ours are. And my first job is where I met friends that I, still have to this day and none of us work at that company anymore yet we're still friends.

So I do think it can happen. And to your first point, I feel like it might be uncomfortable, I guess, if that's what the research says. But I feel like if I have a real relationship with somebody and maybe even we're friends, that the chance for us to collaborate and get things done would increase, not decrease. So I think I'm ready to, I'm okay to shift gears because I think, again, my opinion of this is viewed based on my experience is not the wide range of research that you and many others have done. So I'm with you because there's so much to get to with your work in leadership BBS as well as

that's the title of one of your books as well as the books you've written about power. So you wrote about and leadership B S you wrote about another person who's been on this podcast a few times named Jim Collins. Jim wrote good to great and he wrote about being a level five leader. and you focus on this for part of that book. And I want to talk specifically about being humble and being modest. So humble and modest. So I think most people would say, of course, I want a leader who's got humility. And I would say this and they have some modesty.

Can you share what you found about being humble and modest as a leader? So I would say two things. Number one, Jim is a very good friend of mine. and endorsed my power book, and I think maybe even have endorsed leadership, yes. The second thing I would say about Jim Collins, and you use the term level five leader, and I agree with his conclusions about level five readers. I would say two things about level five readers. Number one, Jim and I discussed this.

He said, I am talking about people who had already achieved the CEO role. I did not talk about what it took for them to get them. there. That's number one. And number two, I would ask you, Ryan, and I'm sure you remember, how many of the 1,400 plus companies that he studied, how many level 5 leaders did he find? 14. 14. 14. 14. It may be 11 or maybe 14. Whatever. The point is, is that he is studying unicorns. And I would not give advice to people on the basis of what a tiny, tiny, tiny minority of people do. I mean, you know, this is like saying, you know, I have pancreatic cancer. I know somebody who took peach pits and they had some spontaneous recovery. I'm sure

we could find such a person. But that is not, that is not how I would base my advice to most people. And the research on, so the opposite of modesty, I'm not sure if it is really the opposite of honesty, but it's kind of, to me, it's the opposite of modesty is narcissism. And the research on the effect of narcissism on getting jobs, advancing in your jobs, and whatever is overwhelming. And my friend, Charles, you know, Charles O'Reilly and I have now done some even more recent research on why that is. It turns out narcissists are more political and more politically skilled and more likely to play politics successfully. But the, but the, but the, but the, but the, but the, but the, but the, But the research which far goes beyond what we have done personally looks at the relationship

between narcissism, which is quite nicely measured, a variety of different ways and a variety of career outcome measures, and it finds the opposite. And so, you know, yes, Jim has level five leaders. They're 14 of them, or 11, you know, relatively rare. And by the way, they have already achieved the CEO position. and, you know, many, you know, many leaders. I mean, once you, once you become a very famous leader, one of the things that is very successful as the famous leaders tend to do

is they surround themselves with people, sometimes biographers, sometimes PR people, sometimes both, who tell stories about their behavior. But then if you actually, of course, talk, and I'm sure you've had this experience, you talk to the people who actually work for them, It's not quite the same story that they tell. So one of the running themes through your work, and this is why I wanted to talk to you, man,

because there are many moments where I'm bummed out. Honestly, man, I'm bummed out by your work. And I know I'm not the first person to tell you that because you're like, so here's the path. Narcissism, then you get to the top, then you can be humble all you want because you're already the CEO. That's essentially what you're writing. And to me, like, does it really, does it really,

have to be that way? I mean, we all have examples where it's not. I like to think that's not true. And I feel like you kind of look at this just in a cold-blooded way. The science says this. So that's what I'm going to report. That's what I'm going to write about. And to me, it's just tough. It's tough to take at times to realize because I was brought up and hopefully embody the qualities of trying to be caring and kind and loving and humble and giving and useful to other people. And then if you do that enough over and over, good things will happen. And I feel like that is true. But the science says a lot of things, and we'll get to some other ones.

This is just scratching the surface when it comes to narcissism versus humility and modesty. It's tough to take. And I would have to, I would wonder what your conversations are like on a daily basis with people like me who are saying, come on, Jeff. Like, I don't want, let's not spread this around. That doesn't seem like it's the right thing, you know? Well, so I would say two things. of all you use the word give. If you read Adam Grant's book,

give and take. Yeah, one of my favorites. If you know, he talks about you don't want to be a taker completely, but you don't want to be a giver. He's explicit about that, that if you are overly generous, overly generous and overly giving, and you do not take care of yourself,

you become a past. So, so yes, of course. So I understand, you know, this and all of this. And my job, I think so, you know, so I did, and this way basically is the fundamental theme of leadership, yes, and why the book is titled as it is. We tell people's stories.

Much of the leadership literature has been a literature of lay preaching in which we tell people what they want to hear, in which we, you know, play to applause, in which we, you know, know, make people smile. But at the end of the day, if you went to a doctor, you would want the doctor to give you the best medical advice. You wouldn't, you know, if your PSA, God forbid, is eight. You don't want a doctor to tell you, Ryan, your PSA is pointing just because it's going to make you feel better.

You want the doctor to say, you are facing a serious illness. This is the likely course of this illness. This is how we are going to intervene in ways to give you the. the highest chance of overcoming this illness, you want to hear nice stories. You want to hear what the science says that will give you the best chance of succeeding in with respect to the medical conditions you face. It's exactly the same. My job is not to tell people nice stories, which by the way, many of my friends have made a fortune on doing telling people, telling people's stories. What stories? Read Moby Dick. It's better literature.

and they actually told better than half of the stuff that is in the leadership literature. My job is to give people, and of course the science obviously evolves because it does in medicine, but to give people the best science that I know at this moment in the truth, and to prepare them for the world, not the world that they want, but the world that they're going to likely encounter so that they will be able to cope with that world. My explicit objective on my course outline is to never so that you, my job is to prepare you with the knowledge and skills so that you never have to leave a job involuntarily. And so in order to do that, I can't tell you, you know, everybody's going to be nice. Nobody's going to compete with you.

Everybody's going to be this, that, and the other thing. I have to tell you the world that you're going to face so that you can cope with that world as effectively as possible, which is why just fine. prior, you know, 20 minutes prior to this, I got an email from one of my online students because we teach this course online. Also in the lead program, it's the most, my father, the most popular elective, you know, telling me of his success based upon using this stuff and thanking me, it's why I have, from my 8 o'clock section last winter, I had 191 people on the waiting list for the class. As one student said to me, you're the only person who teaches leadership who's actually willing to tell us the truth. You know, you look at the world,

rule. We have we had a president he may be president again and Donald Trump who doesn't do anything that hey, the leadership of literature suggests you ought to do. You know, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, we could go down Steve Jobs along with the people. Okay. And this is not to press you. My, I'm pretty explicit about this in the new book, The Seven Rules of Power. If I give you knowledge, Now, if you use that knowledge, and many students do quite successfully, to make yourself more influential, give yourself a leg up in your career, that is not depressing. At the end of the day, you are happier and you are wealthier and you are able to get things done because you follow these principles. So it is not depressing. it actually makes you, you know, happy.

So I agree. I'm still bummed a little bit, but I agree with you. So speaking of Adam Grant, I talked to him about this one topic that I want to talk with you about that is when you write about power in your most recent book and other books and you're actually modeling this behavior

right now as we go. So I'm glad we can get meta for a second. I remember saying, man, I really struggle promoting all of my stuff online. It's hard. I feel like such sleazy and like a self-promoter and it's weird. And he said to me, don't think of it as promoting yourself.

You're promoting the work that will help other people. And when he said that to me, it changed. It made it so much easier. And now I promote stuff all the time. You've already promoted. You said there's 191 people on the waiting list. This class is the most popular.

Right. you're promoting yourself, you're promoting work. And when you read your books, you promote yourself and your stuff all the time. Right. And this is a part of, I guess, power and gaining power. Can you share more about this idea of being a self-promoter and promoting your work? So I think Adam Grant is completely right. So if Ryan has a set of ideas, if Ryan has a skill as a podcaster, you know,

It's like, you know, if a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, there's no, there's no sound. If you have a podcast with no audience, you know, this is, you haven't done anybody any good. Not only haven't you done yourself any good. You haven't done your guests any good and you haven't done your listeners who you, I mean, you're presumably doing this podcast so the people will learn things. So they will think about things. So at the end of your podcasts, you know, and you've done a bunch of them, you know, they will be better informed, they will be more thoughtful, they will be more successful, they will know about things that they didn't know about before, they'll have more knowledge, skill, all of those good things. you have to, in order for them to have the advantage of what you have produced on your podcast, they have to know about it.

So Adam Grant's statement to you, I believe, is 100% correct. You have, if you, you know, if I'm a doctor and I've discovered, you know, something about the coronavirus, or if I've discovered something about a cure for cancer or a cure or some treatment, for whatever disease it is, I have a responsibility to diffuse that knowledge. Through scientific publications, through presentations at professional societies, you know, every, every field has its own way of diffusing information. But if the information is valid and scientifically proven and useful, you have responsibility to diffuse it. Okay.

Makes sense. Getting back to what you said before, getting back to what you just said before, that question and I appreciate that. I think I may regret asking this, but I'm going to ask it anyway. Somebody's 27. They just got promoted from an individual contributor to their first management role. And they've been a manager for a year. And all of a sudden they say, you know what?

I want to be the CEO of this place. There's 3,000 people working here. I'm a mid-level manager. I'm really low. But I want to be the CEO. someday, what advice would you give that person to one day fulfill that dream of being the CEO of the company? I do know the answer to that.

I would tell them to learn as much as they can about power dynamics. And so I would tell them, I think, so I would analogize your question. I'm a tennis player and I want to be the next Serena Williams. I need to learn how to play tennis. I need to practice playing tennis and I need to get good coaching. You're talking to somebody, first of all, Marshall Goldsmith was kind enough to endorse the new book. But I, holding aside Marshall Goldsmith, in my MBA class on campus and in my online class that Stanford offers to the lead program, we use executive coaches. We use fabulous executive coaches.

And I thank them all the time. I say to them, you are what makes this class successful, not me. And I am a big fan of executive coaching. So I would say to your 27-year-old, learn, you know, the first rule of power is get out of your own way. So, you know, basically get out of your own way. Lose the inhibitions that will hold you back in the competition with the 2,900 and 99 other people I'm going to compete with you for this job. Learn the rules of power.

Learn the social science. Be intellectually curious. Apply what you're learning and get coaching. So that would be my... The one difference with the Serena Williams analogy, though, is that doesn't really work because you have to have some semblance of skill or talent to eventually become Serena Williams. You know what I mean? And I think it's a little bit different at the workplace than...

Yeah. You and I will have a little debate about this. I mean, there is, you know, there's a social scientist's name escapes me at the moment, but he's done a lot of work on genius. And, you know, genius is, of course, there are differences in individual abilities. But the biggest difference. So yes, you know, I mean, there's some people are smarter than others. There's no question about that. But as you compete your way to the top, after a while, the The differences in ability falls away because the people who don't have the ability basically, you know, don't, they never get to that next level of competition. The difference between the Williams sisters and their competitors is reflected in one of the reasons why almost all basketball and baseball teams now hire sports psychologists. Beyond a certain level of ability, this is all about the mind. it is all it is all about the mind and and general managers now increasingly you know and good coaches not only hire sports psychologists or various behavioral scientists but they also themselves have intuitively learned how to bring out the best in their people so so the difference the difference you know and you see this you know managers come in you see this managers come in and And they take essentially the same personnel and the team performs better or some managers come in and the team performs worse. And the skills haven't changed.

What has changed is how those skills have been led, managed, and motivated. So, yes, there are individual differences, but there are, but you can't control the fact, you know, of your height and some natural ability, but you can control, number one, finding a place. where your abilities are best suited. And secondly, doing the most you can with your abilities and wherever you are. Let's talk about self-confidence. And you write, people want to feel proud of what they're involved with and to believe that they and their colleagues will be successful.

So one of the leader's most important task is to project confidence. When someone projects confidence, others are more likely to follow them. Sounds right. What about for those people that deal with imposter syndrome, which you write about when it comes to power, those ones who don't feel worthy of being confident. So whether it's okay, how to manage this, because I know if I want to lead, if I want to be in a position where people are going to follow, I have to, I got to be confident. Can you talk more about the science behind self-confidence? One, why it's so important, and then how to gain some of it if you don't have it right now. So you see Berkeley professor Cameron Anderson has done a lot of research on this, and he finds that confidence is confused with competence.

So if you act confident, people will perceive you as more competent than you are, even if, by the way, in some of his studies, they get objective data that says you're not more competent. So confidence becomes conflated with competence. think is over the long term though people figure that out like if you're not very bright that doesn't I could see in the short term let me oh god we could have a long discussion about this we're going to have a short discussion about this oh you are so you have you have a belief that many of my students have which is that organizational processes are homeostatic that at the end truth triumphs that at the end we know the stuff I will tell you, and we could have a long discussion about this, I'll try to keep it short.

Most organizational processes are variance amplifying. So if I believe Ryan Hawk is, because you display confidence, I believe you're competent. What happens? People are more likely to invest in you. People are more likely to want to work for you. More talented people are going to want to work for you. more people are going to want to support you in a variety of ways. And therefore, you will, in fact, become more competent over time.

Because if you display confidence and the best people want to work with you, over time, you become better because the best people are working with you. But the smart people, the smart people figure that out, though. No, they don't. They do not. Are you sure? You know the reset. We won't even talk about confidence.

People are very bad at uncovering deception. Really? If you pet found out, think about Apple. Who's a good example? Like, yeah, who's a good, like Steve Jobs is really smart, a brilliant sales, professional, marketer, like, what do you mean? Steve Jobs, which, you conflated a bunch of things together. Steve Jobs, with the help of Regis McKenna, a public relations guy, became,

I mean, I know Regis is still. live. He will tell you that he created Steve Jobs, that Steve, when he came to him, could hardly give a talk. At the end, he was a spell binding speaker. And Apple is a perfect example of the operation of the self-fulfilling prophecy. If everybody thinks this is the coolest product, everybody lines up to buy it. And you see, look, a friend of mine said, you don't believe what you see. You see what you believe. I mean, iPhones are pretty sweet, right? No? I'm going to feel like I'm frustrated you. Look, the evidence for the power of the self-fulfilling prophecy goes back to the 1940s. If you display competence, things happen that cause you to in fact become more

competent. It goes, so let me give you another example. Yeah, how about an example, a person that we know that is not. I'm going to give you a study. So there was a study on expectation effects changing students' IQs. And you say, so teachers are randomly assigned, this is by a study co-author by a guy named Robert Rosenthal. And teachers are randomly assigned to get fake, which you probably couldn't do today for ethical reasons, fake IQ scores.

So some students get high IQs assigned higher than the real IQ, some people get assigned IQs lower than their real IQ. Some people get the same. At the end of the year, they measure IQ, which is, by the way, supposed to be a stable mental ability. At the end of the year, it turns out that people assign higher IQs, their IQs have actually gone up, the lower IQs, the IQs have actually gone down. Why? Why? So they go in and they film the teachers. Turns out that if I think Ryan's smart, I spend more time with Ryan. I give him better feedback. And therefore, Ryan becomes smarter that the original thing, the original assumption,

which was not true, becomes true because of the interaction and the interpersonal processes. So if I assume your company is going to be successful, I'm going to invest in you. I'm going to give you more coaching. I will give you more mentoring. better people will work for you and your company will become more successful. If I think your company is going to fail, the opposite will happen. So the power of the self-fulfilling prophecy, so the definition of a self-fulfilling prophecy,

and there are many mechanisms that are associated with this called confirmation bias. If I think Ryan is a genius, I take the same behavior, I interpret it as a genius behavior. If I assume you're not a genius, I assume that you like to sound kind of weird eccentric, et cetera, et cetera. Self-fulfilling prophecy means that something that we assume that may originally not be true, becomes true because we believe it. Okay. Actually, as an aside, I really like you.

You use my first name a lot. Every time you do it, it makes me like you more. Is that intentional? Do you do this on purpose? No, I'm trying to, you know, I'm trying to use your name. I'm not trying to use your name because this is your damn podcast. You understand power, though. Is that a thing?

Like, what is that a thing or do you, that you teach people to do from a, from a likeability and power perspective? People like, of course, people like everything associated with themselves. Sure, of course. Your favorite number is probably a number associated with your birthday, you know. Football number. I mean, there is, there is research on what's called implicit. But that is why I'm doing it.

I'm doing it because, you know, I want to, you know, I want to make this more of a personal conversation than a conversation with somebody who I've just seen on my Zoom screen. How, how, how conscious are you of all the stuff you've learned from a power perspective to then implement and use it within your own life to gain more power? I am I should follow my own advice much more than I do. I'm sure I've been much more successful, richer and everything else. I have colleagues who have followed my advice much more than I have. I have, you know, I don't follow my advice as much as I should, but when I do, the advice mostly works. So, I mean, I mean, the stuff, the stuff is not only scientifically based. I mean, it's anecdotally based. I give you like a zillion, you know, stories about people who have done it. So there's an example I want to pull because one of the tests of the interview process,

I think people are still doing this. COVID probably put a pause for a second is, okay, this is a big time leadership role. Let's take them out to dinner, right? Sometimes we're going to have a few drinks. We're going to loosen them up. And one of the things they look for is how they treat the waiter or the waitress. And in one of these tests, when you write about breaking the rules, And one of the tests, the rule breaker in this case, dropped cigarette ashes on the floor and spoke rudely to the waiter.

And that person was perceived to be 29% more powerful than the person who was more polite. Jeff, this one killed me, man. I can't stand people being rude to the waiter. I absolutely would judge a candidate based on this, let alone putting cigarette ashes on the ground. So I wonder if this study was recent. It probably wasn't. But can you share about that in the... the case like this blows my mind that that I guess they view it as like look look you know the

intuition behind this study which is by the way been replicated um is that it's the same and by the way it's the same principle as anger powerful people get to be angry and so therefore we have display anger you're assumed to be more powerful powerful people get to break the rules so therefore when you break the rules, the assumption is you're more powerful. I was on a podcast, not a podcast, I was on a Zoom thing with the Washington Post people who wrote the book about how many times Donald Trump lies. And I asked them the following question based upon the research that you and I are now discussing. Is Donald Trump's line a bug or a feature? Is he in fact more powerful because he, by the way, many of his supporters, not so much about the election thing,

where I think actually they have come to believe him. And there's some psychological research behind that also. But in many instances, they know he's like, no care. And in fact, they give him more credit for being powerful because he can break with the social convention of having to tell the truth. So, you know, I mean, isn't that weird, though? Like, Because powerful people get to break the rules, the reverse assumption also holds that we see rule breakers as being more powerful. Particularly, if you think about the study you just described, this situation is ambiguous. You see somebody dropping cigarette ashes. You don't see Ryan Hawk or Donald Trump or Joe Biden or Pope Francis dropping cigarette ashes.

you see a human being that you know nothing about a stranger dropping cigarette ashes. So therefore, your only basis of attribution of how powerful this person is is their behavior. You know nothing else about them. You don't know what degrees they have. You don't know what formal position they have. You don't know how much money they have. All you know is their behavior. So if you're going to infer, you know, attributes, you know,

attributes from behavior, which we all do a little bit, you're going to look at the behavior and then make the attributions. So obviously it's not advice to treat a waiter or waitress rudely or to drop cigarette ashes on the ground. You were saying from a scientific research perspective, when somebody views that, they say, well, they must have some power if they're going to treat people poorly and they're going to drop cigarette ashes on the ground. That is correct. And however, it's not advice that I would give because actually I would. think people ought to treat other people nicely. But if you look at high-level executives, they will often, in fact, treat lower-level people.

Come on, you've heard the phrase. I mean, you're too experienced who not have heard this phrase, you know, which is kiss up and kicked down. I will not be the first human being who's ever used that phrase. I hate that, though. I hate that. Of course. And will you hate many things?

So the next thing, so I'm going to give you like, are your listeners, one more piece of advice, which is, you know, if you want to hate things, hate many things. I hate the idea of aging. Aging just sucks. You know, I'm a big believer in chair, you know, if I could turn back time. You know, you should hate the idea that we get old and die. You should hate many things much more than you hate these behavioral science principles. I, one of the things that I, one of the things that I, I, one of the things that I, I, one of the things that I, I try to teach in my class is to become less judgmental, to not like or dislike or hate or whatever, to say, you know, isn't it interesting? Walt Whitman, the American poet, has this phrase be curious, not judgmental. And I think that's a very good, I think that's very good advice. So when you see people, you know, doing things that you don't like, instead of saying, I don't like this, move, you know, say, why does this work? how do they get away with it? What lessons can I learn?

Not do I want to imitate them, but you know what? In observing their behavior and in their interactions, what can I learn from them that can be useful for me? Thank you. You're right. You're right. That is great advice. And also I think one of the things that happens, Jeff,

by doing 500 of these over the last seven and a half years is these little moments where for a second I have to pause. and say, ah, yeah, that's better. That's a better way to view the world as opposed to saying, I hate kissing up and kicking down, to say, hmm, I wonder why they are that way. I wonder why that works. I wonder why lying can be attractive to a subset of people, which that one, by the way, I still don't get because that is one of the least, I'm going to try not to be judgmental. So I am wondering why it works. I don't get why lying all the time.

works. I don't get it. It's not attractive to me, but it seems like it is attractive to a lot of people. Many people want to be told what they want to hear. And we know this also because what happens to whistleblowers. Whistleblowers, even when the whistleblowers turn out to be right, few whistleblowers, you know, get promoted. Most of them get fired even even when they pointed out, you know, the wrongdoing. People want to hear what they want to hear. Yep. So I wish you could see, I may send it to you afterwards, my outline and how that I've touched like 1% of it. So let me hit one more that's actually on the outline. This has just been fun. So I appreciate it because I'm learning. So rule number four in the book, most recent book, Laura Chow, who I believe was she one of your students, which I also, is right? She was one of your students? Yes, Laura Chow was one of my students. She comes to my, she comes to my, she comes to my, she comes to my, she comes

to my class. She's on a panel. No, she's not on a panel anymore. She actually comes with Tristan Walker and they talk about Branding. Yeah. So the reason another part about your book when it comes to self-promotion is a lot of the stories are people that you've taught who then have gone on to become amazing people. So it's like, look, Jeff is the man. He goes and teaches them and then they go off into the world and they crush it, which I love. So nothing wrong with that. But this branding thing is important and I identify with it a bit because she started a podcast and the podcast built these amazing relationships with her for her, which to me, I kind of stumbled into this over the past seven years of these close relationships

with heroes of mine. People I've read their work and I really admire them and they've helped me so much. And then we've talked and I've seen them. I've had dinner. I've had breakfast. I go to conferences with him. So can you share about Laura Chow and her story of building a brand and why that is important, again, for that 27-year-old-old-ish who wants to do whatever, maybe be a CEO or maybe start their own business, why this is so important from a power perspective? So Laura Chow came from Canaan Partners, where she went back to. Canaan Partners is not Andreessen Horowitz. It's not, you know, it's not one of the high-level, fanciest venture capital firms. Laura Chow was just made general partner in a very short period of time.

And so Lachau said, look, if you are on a venture capital firm, you are obviously competing for deals. So why should anybody take my call? Why should anybody pay attention to me in a world in which, as we know at least at the moment, or at least until the stock market collapsed, there was way too much money chasing way too few deals? And she said, one of the reasons why people will take my call, or the only way I'm going to get them to take my call, is I have to build an identity. So I'm not Laura Chow, some random woman, you know, who happens to, by the way, of Asian, Vietnamese heritage. You know, I'm not just some, you know, random woman. you know, I am I am somebody that they know of and have heard of and have respect for.

And in order to do that, I need to do podcasts, I need to do writing, I need to build a distinct look. One of the things that she did is take advantage of the fact that, you know, many people will say that she's the tallest Asian woman that they've ever mad at. She wears heels to accentuate this and she dresses in a very stylish fashion. and she, you know, has intentionally, you know, learned a lot and built a lot and has built a lot of relationships. And so, therefore, she has become known. And being known, therefore gets her more access to the deals that she needs to have exposure to if she is, in fact, going to be a successful venture capital. There are jobs.

Venture capital is one. investment banking is another. Sales is another. Where it's very hard to sell if you're not, you know, able to connect or be in contact with your customers. So in those instances, you need to have a reputation, a brand that causes people to be willing to interact with you and to take your phone calls. Yep. You have time for one more question? Sure.

So you studied leaders for decades. You've seen ones who get results, who have built amazing businesses, right? You've done an extensive amount of research. When you think about those leaders who have sustained excellence, the word sustained is important here, sustained excellence over an extended period of time, what are some of the common features, the common behaviors of those leaders? So you're not going to particularly like the answer, but the answer. Hey, hold on.

I'm not going to judge it. I'm going to wonder, I'm going to wonder why it's that way. Because so many organizational processes are, in fact, self-reinforcing and self-sustaining, the number one thing you have to do to be a leader with sustained success is understand the advice of Machiavelli, who said the first job of a leader. is to keep his or her job. You cannot have sustained success if you get your ass fired. You cannot have sustained success if you're not able to leverage your skills and talents,

continue growing and learning and continue to bring resources and talent into your organization. And so therefore, things like branding, things like networking and continuing to build relationships with important, intelligent people who can help you become more intelligent than you are and more insightful than you are. You know, those, so branding, networking, acting and speaking with power, basically the rules of the, you need to build influence. Influence comes from, you know, sustained success comes from having sustained influence over a long period of time.

It feels like one of the criticisms of kind of career or long-term politicians is once they get in power, they will literally do or say, and I shouldn't speak for all of them, but there's a lot of them where they will do and say anything to remain in power, whatever it takes. I gather that you've witnessed that too. Of course. By the way, that's not that different from, you know, CEOs also, who will do and say, whatever it takes. They will, you know, Sandy Weil fired John Reed out of Citibank. You see people at Google

and at other organizations come and go, you know, from the senior management ranks as there is jockeying for power. Yes, you know, I mean, you know, when Jim Collins left Stanford Business School, he was a good friend of mine. He gave me a book. He gave me a book. He gave me a book. The book he gave me is called Chimpanzee politics. And it is literally the politics of, you know, chimpanzees. And, you know, Jim and I discussed the fact that the politics of chimpanzees and the politics of human beings are not. We are hardwired in this way. We think we're better. We think we're this. We think we're that. We are talking about fundamental behavioral forces, which are constant over time. You know, one of the things I am particularly proud of, and I did it intentionally, in both my class and in seven rules of power, was to have examples.

Lar Chow, Asian woman, Rukaya Adams, African American woman. Tadilla Smith, African American woman. One of the things that I hear is that what I teach is for the rich white guys. That's bullshit. The rich white guys don't need rules of power. They've already got it. The people who actually need to learn and follow the rules of power are the people who have been disadvantaged by society, who have not been given the extra advantages and the extra opportunities.

And so I have examples in this book of Latino women and Latino men for that matter. and people, you know, I have lunch, dinner actually the other night with somebody who came from the favelas of Brazil. I had a student in my class who was homeless on the streets of Hong Kong at one point in his life. These are the people who need the rules of power because these are the people whose success

is going to be determined primarily by their ability to navigate the system. Jeff, the book is called Seven Rules, the most recent one. I would read more than just seven rules of power. I appreciate you sending me a copy. Surprising but true advice on how to get things done and advance your career. I appreciate that you challenged me, make me think, even if I was bummed out during some of the prep process, I think it's the wrong way to view it.

And also to not hate things like kiss up and kick down, but to wonder why it is that way or to wonder why someone may be attracted to a quality that I'm not. I think it's good to be more reasonable, less judgmental, be more curious, and that's probably a better way to approach life. So thank you for teaching me that today. Thank you for being a great sport. And thank you for sharing your story about the love of your life. I think that I really appreciate that, and it means a lot to me. So I really appreciate your time, ma'am. That's okay.

I'm happy. This was a very, very engaging conversation. I appreciate your, you know, pushing me and having the kind of debate and interchange we had. I think it makes it way more entertaining. Way more. Way more fun for me. Well, good. Me too.

Me too. Just to kind of let it loose and let it go. I think it's much more enjoyable. So I would certainly love to continue our dialogue as we both progress, ma'am. I would love to do it also. And if you're ever, I don't know, where do you live? I'm in Ohio. Okay.

Well, if you ever. One of my good friends of the assistant. You guys are going to have an interesting, pay attention to the Senate election in the context of the book. What about it? What about it? What about it? What about it?

What about it? I don't pay much attention to it. I don't pay much attention to it. I think, you know, I think it illustrates many of the points that you've made that, you know, people will do anything. People will do anything to win. But not just in politics. I mean, watch carefully.

I mean, I have had students. I mean, you know, as I said to you earlier, my objective in my class is to never have people who've taken this class leave a job involuntarily. Trust me, we are not at 100% quality. People get thrown out of jobs. Founders get thrown out of their jobs. You know, people lose their positions all the time. And so I'm still working on that. And I try to get them, you know, to learn from that experience and to pay attention, to be vigilant, to, you know, to be curious and to keep them.

eyes open and to, you know, and to try to understand the phenomenon that's going on in any way that permits them to not only understand it, but then to act on that understanding. So you have, so it's not just, if you notice, you can read the seven rules of power. If you don't do any, if you don't act on it, you know, you're not going to get anywhere. And that's why I talk, that's why I think it's so important to practice. And one of the things that I do in the class is I have people do a lot of writing and a lot of personal planning and a lot of practice. You know, that's the way to do it. The thing that made Tiger Woods a great golfer is not only his ability.

He started playing golf when he was very young and he got a lot of good courage. We learn who we are in practice, not in theory. You got to do it. You got to be an experimental's mindset. I think you got to do it. Jeff, when I'm out West, one of my good friends is an assistant basketball coach at Stanford, Rob Eason. When I'm out there meeting with Rob, I would love to go to dinner with you.

It would be great, man. Let's do it. Absolutely. Thanks, man. Wow. So that conversation certainly had a lot of range. When you look at Ed's online persona, he shares highs and lows, but you also see private planes, fancy cars. He just bought an island, he told me prior to recording.

So when you see that sometimes, I wonder what you're going to get. But prior to recording, And after we recorded, we talked for about 30 minutes, and I found him to be so kind and caring, super curious, and generous. And that obviously made him very likable. So when you think about what Vanessa Van Edwards told me episodes ago about warmth and competence, Ed has that in spades. Oh, I really enjoyed a few takeaways from my notes. that emotional moment when he talked about missing his dad and how he isn't able to call him after a big speech anymore. To me is a great reminder for being grateful for what you currently have, especially loved ones.

And then self-confidence is about keeping promises to yourself and surrounding yourself with people who live at a higher temperature. You become what they are. You think differently. You act differently and will achieve different results based on your inner circle. Who is your who? And then excellence equals high standards. People who sustain excellence expect more from themselves. They're prepared for big moments.

Their habits, routines, and rituals enable them to perform at a high level each day. And then they keep raising their standards. Isn't that the type of person we want to be? This one was so good. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. I think it's one of those episodes where it would certainly behoove others to hear it. So I hope you'd want to tell a friend or two. Hey, you should listen to this episode of The Learning Leader Show with Ed Milette.

I think he'll help you become a more effective leader. And because you continue to do that and you continue to write reviews on Apple Podcast and rate the show, hopefully five stars, you are giving me the opportunity to do what I love on a daily basis. And for that, I will forever be grateful. Thank you so, so much. Talk to you soon. Can't wait.