The Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway - Office Hours: How to Get on a Board, Leaving a Company with Grace, and Fostering Civil Discourse

Episode Date: September 7, 2022

Scott takes a question about the experience necessary to be on a board of directors. He then offers advice for leaving a job at a company respectfully, and shares his thoughts on the importance of listening to people who disagree with you. Music: https://www.davidcuttermusic.com / @dcuttermusic Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I just don't get it. Just wish someone could do the research on it. Can we figure this out? Hey y'all, I'm John Blenhill, and I'm hosting a new podcast at Vox called Explain It To Me. Here's how it works. You call our hotline with questions you can't quite answer on your own. We'll investigate and call you back to tell you what we found.

We'll bring you the answers you need every Wednesday starting September 18th. So follow Explain It to Me, presented by Klaviyo. Support for PropG comes from NerdWallet. Starting your credit card search with NerdWallet? Smart. Using their tools to finally find the card that works for you? Even smarter. You can filter for the features you care about, access the latest deals, and add your top cards to a comparison table to make smarter decisions. And it's all powered by the Nerds expert reviews of over 400

credit cards. Head over to nerdwallet.com forward slash learn more to find smarter credit cards, savings accounts, mortgage rates, and more. NerdWallet. Finance smarter. NerdWallet Compare Incorporated. NMLS 1617539. Welcome to PropGPOD's Office Hours. This is the part of the show where we answer questions about business, big tech, entrepreneurship, and whatever else is on your mind. So we try to answer questions. If you'd like to submit a question, please visit officehours.propgmedia.com.

Again, that's officehours.propgmedia.com. I have not seen or heard these questions. First question. I listened to your show about a year ago, and I've learned so much from you, and I appreciate you as a young professional. I have not seen or heard these questions. First question. experience. My end goal as a professional is to be a board member of a publicly traded company. I know that you've sat on a number of boards, so what advice can you give to a young professional who seeks to have that same position in the future? Thanks, Scott. I appreciate you and the work that you and your team do for the show. The fact that you're even thinking that way at the age of 25 means that you probably will be on a board at some point. So boards are really, it's one of those kind of, I think they

used to say it about the Gurkhas, which is like the elite fighting force of the Indian army. And that is many are called, but few are chosen. And that is the hardest thing about getting on a board is getting on your first one, especially publicly traded one. You usually get there after a long, prestigious career as a CEO somewhere because you have some domain expertise. And also lately, there's been a huge demand for female or people of color to join boards because basically boards to this point have been the land of stale, pale, and male. And that is just old fucking white dudes sitting around a table getting paid $150,000 a year to pontificate on what they think the company should do. So there's a lot of opportunity for groups that have been traditionally excluded from boards.

Anyway, it's not your question. I would say that at the end of the day, the way you get on a public company board is you just sort of kill it professionally and develop deep domain expertise or are seen as somebody who can add value to a board. I get calls, what feels like every week, it's probably every other week, from very accomplished professionals who say, hey, you know what, I would like to be on a board. And it's okay, but unless you're called, it's the kind of thing you don't ask for. You're either called or you're not.

So there's no real algorithm other than being the CEO of a publicly traded company, you'll get opportunities to be on boards. Also financial professionals is the hardest board members to recruit or for the audit committee because those people actually have to do real work on the board, which typically board members don't like to do. So other than being a CPA and the CEO of a publicly traded company, I would say that at the end of the day, you just have to work hard and develop domain expertise and be successful yourself. But there is no algorithm or secret sauce

for immediately becoming a publicly traded board member. The way I got on public boards, I started a public company. So I was automatically on the board. The other way I got on public company boards, I raised a shit ton of money, bought huge percentages of publicly traded companies and then demanded to be on the board. So I was not invited on a board. My first public company

board was at the age of 34 when I was on my own company's board, but I was not asked or invited to be on a public company board until I was well into my 40s. And now I get asked a decent amount, but that's only because I've been on board. So again, I apologize for the wishy-washy answer, but my brother, like anything else, the key to success in that domain is killing it. Thanks for the question. Next question. Hey, Scott, Aaron here.

I'm about to leave my comfortable job at a mid-sized tech company to lead a team at a small 20-person startup working on NFT infrastructure. Now, I was originally going to ask if I should take the job or not, but given I'm a young, motivated 30-year-old in New York City, I imagined you'd say yes. So I took it. Now I'm trying to figure out how to elegantly and professionally leave my current job such that I

could potentially come back should my startup dreams crash and burn. P.S. Could not agree with you more on how powerful writing is as a tool. I actually got introduced to this startup because of a blog post I wrote last year. Love the show and appreciate the advice. Thanks. Aaron, first off, congratulations on your new gig. You bring up something that's really important, and that is how you leave, how you end a relationship is as important as the relationship to that point. And that is you can spend 10 years at a firm, work your ass off, be a good manager, be a good citizen. And if you succumb to the temptation to stick up the middle finger on the way out or to shitpost people or to talk about what you don't like about the firm or

to not be gracious when you leave, it kind of stains the entire thing. You want to leave with grace. You want to walk into your boss's office and you want to say, look, I'm leaving. I'm taking a job in an NFT infrastructure company. I want to do something like this. It's a great opportunity for me. How can I make my exit as painless for you? You want to give them, one, as much notice as possible. You want to be as gracious as possible. You want to try and ensure that your responsibilities are covered. In sum, how you leave, how you leave the 30, the 60, the 90 days before you exit are as important as the previous several years or even decades. I know a lot of fantastic employees who were just kind of jerks on their way out the door. And that's all anybody remembers. People remember how you behave at the end. So what do you do? Simply put, you have a

ton of grace. You make additional effort. Maybe you want to leave in two weeks because your head is already at the new firm. Don't do that. Stay around as long as they need you. I mean, within reason such that you can make your exit as seamless for them. And the truth has a nice ring to it. You're going to an NFT infrastructure firm. You want to bet on something more risky, more future forward. I think they will understand that. Congratulations. This is a good problem, Aaron, from NYC going into NFT infrastructure. We have one quick break before our final question. Stay with us. This podcast now features a series hosted by Capital Group CEO, Mike Gitlin. Through the words and experiences of investment professionals, you'll discover what differentiates

their investment approach, what learnings have shifted their career trajectories, and how do they find their next great idea. Invest 30 minutes in an episode today. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Published by Capital Client Group, Inc. marketing is the last thing on your mind. But if customers don't know about you, the rest of it doesn't really matter. Luckily, there's Constant Contact. Constant Contact's award-winning marketing platform can help your businesses stand out, stay top of mind, and see big results. Sell more, raise more, and build more genuine relationships with your audience through a suite of digital marketing tools made to fast track your growth. With Constant Contact, you can get email marketing

that helps you create and send the perfect email to every customer and create, promote and manage your events with ease all in one place. Get all the automation, integration, and reporting tools that get your marketing running seamlessly. All backed by Constant Contact's expert live customer support. Ready, set, grow. Go to ConstantContact.ca and start your free trial today. Go to ConstantContact.ca for your free trial. ConstantContact.ca for your free trial. ConstantContact.ca. Welcome back. Question number three.

Hi, Scott. I started reading No Mercy, No Malice years ago, and although I find myself disagreeing with many of your opinions, I still look forward to Friday mornings when I know that email is on its way. And now I'm really enjoying the podcast as well. Winning over those who think like you isn't that impressive in my opinion. But in my case, and I suspect for many others that listen to your content, you're appealing because of the way you think, not just what you think. I might even admit to being persuaded

to your side of an argument a few times. But my question is, do you create your content with those that disagree with you in mind? And how can we replicate more of this phenomenon of disagreement but respect in our world? Chase, I absolutely love this question, and I'm flattered by it. My mission around this stuff is not to be right. It's to catalyze a conversation. I think through civil, thoughtful, rigorous debate, we craft better solutions. And Salman Rushdie, who I've been reading a lot about because of the recent attack on him, a lot of his work is being highlighted. He said that when you conflate a discussion around ideas with personal attacks, or if you start attacking

someone personally because you disagree with their ideas, it's the end of modern civilization. And I think there's some real merit to that. And that is we can disagree with each other politically, but we don't have to be enemies. We can disagree with each other around the value of a company, but that doesn't mean we should shitpost each other on Twitter. And by the way, you disagree with me a lot. I disagree with me a lot. Occasionally I find I say something and then I think about it and then I come back to it and then people inform me of information that's out there that I didn't absorb. And I realized, you know what? I got that wrong. I was wrong. And the key isn't to be right. The key is to evolve as a person to get to a better solution. It's dangerous to say right or wrong because as evidence moves on,

as the world moves on, science moves on, as control groups and experimentation and peer review research move on, we find a lot of us were right or wrong looking back. So I think it's really important and I purposely try to like comments that disagree with me on Twitter,

they're civil because I recognize I get it wrong a lot. And what I think you should do, or I think how we foment a better world that crafts better solutions is to recognize if you're in the other party, it doesn't automatically make you my enemy. If you disagree with what I say, it doesn't mean that my job is to undermine your credibility and shitpost you. Peer-reviewed research in academia, which is the basis for a lot of great breakthroughs scientifically, is dependent upon people disagreeing with you. When academic theories are dispelled by a younger academic, we celebrate that younger academic for saying, no,

this individual got it wrong. And the initial academic is usually the first to honor and highlight that person or to award them or to honor them. So civil discourse that respects the other side, that bulletproofs our theories and our notions is so important. I can't tell you how many times people say, I don't always agree with you, but I like your content. Well, that's the whole point. If you're reading media, if you're watching media, if you're listening to people who you only agree with, then you have fucked up. You have gone into a bubble that just cements your current biases. We are never too old to evolve. Nobody ever figures it out. No one is ever 100% right. And if you just want to cement the shit you already have a bias towards, you are not going to grow.

So I appreciate that you don't agree with me, but together, if we are thoughtful, if our heart's in the right place, if we push back on each other politely, we're going to craft better solutions. Civil discourse. Thanks for the question, Chase. That's all for this episode.

Again, if you'd like to submit a question, Chase. That's all for this episode. Again, if you'd like to submit a question, please submit a voice recording by visiting officehours.profgmedia.com. Our producers are Caroline Chagrin and Drew Burrows. Claire Miller is our associate producer. She reminded me that she's Gen Z, not a millennial. If you'd like what you heard, please follow, download, and subscribe. Thank you for listening to The Prof G Pod from the Vox Media Podcast Network.

We will catch you on Thursday. Hello, I'm Esther Perel, psychotherapist and host of the podcast, Where Should We Begin, which delves into the multiple layers of relationships, mostly romantic. But in this special series, I focus on our relationships with our colleagues, business partners and managers. Listen in as I talk to co-workers facing their own challenges with one another and get the real work done. Tune into Housework, a special series from

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