Lens of Leadership: A Ted Lasso Rewatch Podcast

Difficult Conversations | S2 Ep6

• Marnie Stockman and Nick Coniglio

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🎙️ Lens of Leadership - Episode 6: The Signal, Difficult Conversations, and Bold Risks with Dan Ayer 🎙️

In this episode of Lens of Leadership, Marnie and Nick dive into Season 2, Episode 6 of Ted Lasso—“The Signal”—and explore its leadership lessons with Dan Ayer, award-winning copywriter and co-founder of Oyster Creative.

We unpack key moments from Ted Lasso, including:
⚽ Ted’s struggle with vulnerability and panic attacks—and how leaders can show strength through openness.
⚽ Higgins’ tough conversation with Coach Beard—what it teaches us about addressing personal issues at work.
⚽ Jamie Tartt’s ego check and growth mindset—lessons in embracing feedback and trying new approaches.

Special Guest Insight:
Dan shares his journey as a creative leader, opening up about his own battles with anxiety and depression and how vulnerability became his superpower. He reflects on:
âś… Building a culture of psychological safety and creativity at work.
✅ Supporting employees through challenges—without losing sight of goals.
✅ Taking bold risks and trusting the process—even when it feels uncomfortable.

💡 Key Takeaway: Whether you’re navigating difficult conversations, pushing past creative blocks, or rethinking your leadership style, this episode will inspire you to lead with heart, humor, and courage—just like Ted.

👉 Subscribe for more Ted Lasso insights and leadership lessons, and follow us for updates!

đź“š Read it like Lasso: Get our book Lead It Like Lasso to learn more about leadership principles for life.

đź“Ł Connect with Dan Ayer:

#LeadershipPodcast #TedLasso #TheSignal #MentalHealthAwareness #CreativeLeadership #LeadershipLessons #LeadItLikeLasso

Marnie:

Welcome to Lens of Leadership, our Ted Lasso rewatch podcast. Before we dive into this episode's leadership lessons, let's watch a quick recap.

Narrator:

Season 2. Episode 6. The signal starts with Jamie Tartt passing to Danny Rojas for a goal. Rebecca's mom walks into a naked man in Rebecca's kitchen. Ted wanders into AFC Richmond calling everyone by name the Diamond Dogs minus Beard. Gets a question from Higgins about Beard and Jane. While Nate yells at the team, roy coaches All but Jamie, that is. Ted loves people's moms because they are like instruction manuals. Keeley says it is best just to agree with Roy. Rebecca Keeley, ted and Rebecca's mom do lunch. Roy has Jamie repeat that he is an ugly, ugly boy with bad hair and then agrees to coach him. He tells him that his power is in being a jerk. Sometimes there would be a signal In the next game. The coaches all flip. Jamie the bird. Ted has a panic attack. Nate has the team park the bus and becomes the wonder kid. Rebecca aims to help Ted and needs a Ted pep talk. We learn Sam is the banter boy. Ted is found in Dr Sharon's office. He needs to make an appointment.

Marnie:

Hi everyone. I'm Nick Negleo and I'm Marnie Stockman, and this is Lens of Leadership, a Ted Lasso rewatch podcast. We're the authors of Lead it Like Lasso, a leadership book for life, your life.

Nick:

And this podcast is an extension of many of the elements we outlined in our book. We invite you to join us as we take a deep dive into each episode and explore the leadership principles as they play out in the series. And for today's episode, we're diving into season two. Episode six the Signal.

Marnie:

I'm not going to be giving the Signal on the podcast, for sure.

Marnie:

But we're super excited and today we are welcoming Dan Ayer to the podcast. So let me tell you a little bit about Dan. He's an award-winning copywriter and a public relations powerhouse with nearly two decades of experience turning creative ideas into campaigns that deliver results. He's one of the co-founders of Oyster Creative, specializing in really uncovering a unique brand story something we talk a lot about and bringing them to life through engaging content, strategy and design Also phrases that we love to incorporate. Under Dan's leadership, oyster Creative has grown into a thriving agency. It's been recognized for innovative campaigns and dedication to client success Over 90 awards and accolades, like the PRSA, pittsburgh's Entrepreneur of the Year and Renaissance Rising Star. So Dan's work is proof that storytelling done well doesn't just resonate, it transforms, which I think really leads us right into Ted Lasso right, and so I think not just the storytelling but also the power of Ted Lasso resonates with what we have learned about Dan. So, dan, welcome.

Janet:

Welcome, thank you. Thank you for having me. Super excited to talk a little, ted.

Marnie:

And how did we do in the intro? Did I miss any big pieces?

Janet:

You nailed it because one of my teammates cleaned up everything and sent over my bio and said more than 20 years, and I really appreciated her editing that back to nearly 20 years. She's about 22 years old. I really wanted to remind her that I have not been working her whole life. That does make me feel just a hair about it, but that's the story. That's Oyster. We're a creative services firm located right in Pittsburgh, pennsylvania. We work with a wide variety of clients and, like you said, marnie, helping them tell their story. Sometimes, if you're not in the most the sexiest or most exciting business in the world, it can be hard to get people excited about what you do and why you're doing it. And we do a good job of helping people do just that, of finding their why and then communicating that to the world.

Nick:

So Love that, love finding your. Why. Now are you guys just focused in the Pittsburgh area, or are you guys national?

Janet:

No, we have clients all around the country, but we're based in Pittsburgh. We also have, you know, some remote workforce too, so we have a couple of people working in New York. We had a person out in Denver and in DC, so we're we're spread out all, all around.

Marnie:

Like Roy Kent, here, there and every effing way right. So just as a quick icebreaker question in this episode, keely decides she's going to have to go tip one back at lunch to get her creative juices buzz going, do you have a drink of choice to get creativity going? It might be hot tea or coffee. I'm not saying you're tipping one back at anything.

Janet:

No, some of the advertising stereotypes of Mad Men have faded into the past and some of them are still around. So, uh, I'm a, I'm an old fashioned guy, so a good whiskey. But I also, um, you know, my. My joke used to be is I'm very, uh, I'm the Martin Luther King of drinking. I'm very agnostic. I like all different creeds and colors and all those things. So, uh, just about anything in my glass will make me happy.

Nick:

We're going to take note that he didn't mention how many times a week they need to embrace that creativity. I will say that, you know, I my background is, our audience knows his technology and and I have found that sometimes creativity is needed when you're programming. And you know, I think I've written an entire rules engine with those creative juices flowing at some time.

Janet:

So sometimes you need it. You know, and I'll tell you what it's one of the hardest things to do is to get them the juices flowing Like it's hard to come up with that first idea. You know we were talking a little bit before. You know previously about the battling the blank page and getting something down and how hard that is. And you know we talk to our people about if you can just get something down, you can edit it. You know the Ernest Hemingway and he probably never really said this because it's on the Internet but you know, write drunk, edit sober, and there's something to be said about that If you can get all the ideas out and then fix them and fix them in post or fix them, you know on the page, you're in a lot better shape than a blank page.

Marnie:

I sure hope he said that and we have definitely found, and I've read a study on that your editing brain is different than your creating brain and then, once you have something down, both brains are actually engaged. So you're actually way more effective if you're in both modes instead of just trying to be a defeat the blank page brain.

Janet:

Absolutely.

Nick:

All right. So you know, as we do with this podcast, we try to pull some themes out of it. You know what, what? What really resonated with us with the signal and the first thing that came to mind as we were watching this and there were a couple of different things that came to mind, but there's's there's a couple of different examples in the show of having difficult conversations. I think it's it's represented with the beer Jane storyline and clearly everybody knows, or everybody is of the mindset, that it's really not a great relationship, at least at this point in time in the show.

Nick:

But Higgins is the one that really is kind of feeling it. It feels like he needs to have that conversation with Beard and it happens throughout the show. It progresses and then we have a same but different situation with Rebecca and her mom. You know the, you know the issues with her mom and dad and it happens time after time and time again and she ends the show basically saying, ok, I got to, I got to have this difficult conversation with her mom, with my mom, and her mom is not around anymore. But it led us to think of a couple of questions related to this and the first one that I have and I'm curious. You know, as a leader, you know, is it appropriate or should you approach somebody with a conversation that involves somebody's personal life? Where do you find that appropriate, or do you find that appropriate at all to have a difficult conversation about somebody's personal life and business?

Janet:

You know, I think it's changed a lot over the nearly 20 years I've been in the business of. Nearly 20 years ago it was a very awkward thing if personal things came up beyond you know, hey, what'd you do this weekend? Or my daughter's getting married, or you know, my son's going off to school somewhere. It's changed a lot, and a lot of that, I think, has to do with with a new generation of employees coming in. You know, I see our teammates who are Gen Z folks who are much more open and sharing and able to communicate about their feelings and about things that are going on in life, and I think ultimately that's a really good thing in a professional setting. I understand that it definitely does open up problematic issues and I don't think you should ever run into those issues, but if somebody is bringing something to you as their co-worker, as their mentor, leader, boss, I think you have a responsibility to acknowledge that and make them feel seen that you are valuing, that they're opening up to you.

Janet:

I remember a couple of years ago a teammate of mine came to me and said that they were having a certain medical procedure done and I turned to my wife later that night. This was deep in the heart of COVID lockdowns and I said to myself I'm like I can't believe that they shared that with me and she goes. I'm like that just feels a little overly personal. And she said that should be. The highest compliment that you receive is that somebody on your team feels comfortable enough with you to share that. And so, to your point, is not everybody's going to feel that way, but if they are, try to be there for them and and and relate to them in in whatever way you possibly can. Won't always be easy that one that wasn't an easy conversation for me either, but, um, you know, I think that's important to be open to those conversations.

Marnie:

I think so much of that is about willingness to listen, um and and people give you what they're comfortable giving, right? I remember when my kids were little and there was both the Santa Claus and the sex ed conversations and somebody said, like my four-year-old's asking my five-year-old's asking my seven-year-old, my 10-year-old, right. Those are different conversations and the guidance that I read in a child development book was just ask the next question and they will stop. When they get to a, they will stop responding and they will. They will check out when they're done, right. But but don't over, don't assume like, oh, they opened that door so I'm going to bust it open and maybe add on an addition to the house.

Marnie:

I, you know, just ask a question. Let people be comfortable with what they want to share and know that you're willing to help, and, just like five-year-olds, they'll stop asking or they'll stop, you know, pushing the envelope if they get to a point that they're not ready to hear. I know that sounds weird and I've never I've certainly never said that on air before. So I'm sure Nick was like, well, that's a new one, but I thought it was an interesting strategy.

Nick:

Yeah, absolutely. Now just, and I'm curious, and there may not be something that comes to mind right off the top of your head, but you know we talk a lot about the power of a counter example. You know how not to do something. Does anything come to mind, you know, in terms of maybe, when you mishandle a difficult situation, Can you, can you think about something like that, and did you learn anything from that experience?

Janet:

Absolutely I can. I can think of two people, and I think, if I were to look back at the recent parts of my career, as some of the biggest regrets that I have there's two examples that jump out at me is we had a very talented young person working for us who was really having a difficult time figuring out the path that they wanted to go towards. Incredibly likable Every moment you spent with this person. You adored spending time with them, like it was just almost like with them. It was just almost like a gift. There was a lot of creative energy, there was a lot of things.

Janet:

There was no focus, though, and I let myself get lost as a leader. I let myself get lost in enjoying the back and forth and, yeah, things are moving forward, but they're not moving forward well enough, and you know, I let some of my enjoyment and friendship with this person you know this, this, this co-worker, this person that reported to me, you know betray my leadership stake in developing this person and helping them towards the right path, and you know I look back at that and that, ultimately, was a situation that didn't work out for us or for that person, and you know that is that. That solely lies on me. I could have done a better us or for that person and you know that is that that solely lies on me. I could have done a better job of guiding that person and I wish that I had been more direct, and earlier on I wish I had been more direct and saying, hey, you know what Loving the stuff that you're doing, but it's got to have some direction.

Janet:

It can't just be we're coming up with ideas and we're doing this and then it falls flat. We have to have some, you know, follow through. We have to decide that we want to go this way instead of figuring out if I like everything, which is great when you're first starting out, you know we'll let you test the waters, but we ultimately have to, you know, help you find a direction and go towards it. And that was that was really, really disappointing for me, because you know that's a person has a tremendous amount of potential and will ultimately be very successful, but I think, you know, ultimately I failed them.

Marnie:

Nick, I don't know if you're thinking the same thing I am, but that reminds me of the first person we hired at Lifecycle Insights and I felt like I clearly wasn't communicating expectations, because I think there was work being done, but not sure it was the right work.

Marnie:

Um and uh, and it took a while to get to the point where I couldn't, I, the communication wasn't right to get what we needed, uh, and had to let them go. And it actually, uh is the impetus behind us developing the personal operating system and the communication guide that we talk about in our book to help. Okay, when we hire someone, we're going to be very clear on how we like to work, how we're going to communicate expectations and how, and they're going to share the same types of things so that we don't lose that communication gap and we can set the expectations. And, of course, we do check-ins. We were a quarterly business review company, so we knew how to have business reviews and strategic plans and checking in on kpis. But at a personal level, needed to do that too, yeah, I think what?

Nick:

what both of you guys are talking about right Is, you know, recognizing the mistakes, learning from failure right, it's, it's, it's, not that it's. You know, everybody makes mistakes, right, and everybody has regrets. You talked about regretting that, dan, right, it's, it's. What are you going to do to make sure that that doesn't happen again? And I think I appreciate you sharing both of you guys sharing your story about that, because I I'm sure other people have had similar situations. Right and it's. It's not a matter of just saying, ok, yeah, that happens. It's like Marnie said, you know, we developed personal operating system. You know the communication guide.

Janet:

It's OK, conversations is something that nobody really likes to do ever, right, but it's so critical, you know, for for building and growing and developing teams and developing ourselves. Quite honestly, well, I mean, I love the humor humor that is added by Higgins. His little tick and gag of every time he thinks about having to have this conversation basically makes him sick, and that's true. Like you don't want to have those conversations, um, and yeah, they don't want to have them either.

Nick:

Um, so yeah, and I love how the show portrays that it it actually worked out for him, right. And you know, at the very end, right, I think, uh, I think Higgins said something the effect of you're a great man, right, does Jane make you better. And Beard says you know, I hear you, I get it, you know I love you, or something to that effect. But let's never speak about this again.

Marnie:

Let me ask you one question. You're a great man. Does Jane make you greater? Okay, I apologize, you're a great man, does jane, make you greater.

Nick:

All right, okay, I apologize. Okay, I hear you, I get it. We will never speak of this again.

Janet:

No, no he swats his hand away, gives him the big hug and lets him speak of this.

Nick:

So it's not all sunshines and rainbows, but they prove the point that, OK, this was a mission and a quest that Higgins didn't take on for nothing. I think that's pretty cool.

Janet:

Well, one of the cool things I think about this is you know, especially, you think we think of Ted and we think you know as this, you know almost golden rule of leadership Ted's thing stay out of his business. And you know, it's this weird thing of like that's how hard these conversations are. Ted was like you know what, nope, not going to cross that. Yeah, yeah, I feel like there's something that brought that up.

Marnie:

So I want to switch gears and chat about the episode where Jamie is having to think again, rethink his strategy on how to get Roy to be his coach Now. First, if anyone on this call has a younger sibling, nick, you are a younger sibling, so I'm curious if you ever did this to your older siblings. When Roy realized that Jamie was taking Keely's advice and was just going to agree with whatever he had to say, roy then said aha, okay, you are an ugly, ugly boy with bad hair. And Jamie had to choke down all his ego and repeat it and you're ugly.

Janet:

You're an ugly, ugly boy with bad hair.

Narrator:

Say it.

Nick:

I am.

Narrator:

I am an ugly, ugly boy With hair that maybe could be slightly with bad hair. Fine Cheers, I enjoyed that.

Marnie:

So I'm curious about strategies really in how to get folks to think again and try different approaches, especially in a creative environment.

Janet:

Yeah, it's an awesome question and, honestly, it's one that we probably wrestle with on a day to day basis, because you constantly have to rethink things on how to get your client to stand out, and you know easy ways to get things people to stand out. Yeah, you can. You know somebody running around screaming in the middle of the street stands out. That doesn't. That's not strategic, that's just, you know, being loud and boisterous, you know that's not what you ultimately want. So you have to find you know wonderful, smart, strategic ways that are colored with creativity to make your clients stand out or to make the people that you work with stand out. You know, one of the things that I think we do a good job at Oyster is we're a place for people in a lot of different periods of their career. I think we do a really nice job developing younger people who come in with a ton of energy and they're looking to crack a door open and they're willing to do just about anything to do that. We also do a really nice job of working with some people who work part-time for us, who need the flexibility in their lives to be raising a family, to be there for pickup times, to do those things and we've tried to create an environment where we have spots on the team for everybody. You know very much, like you know, roy's in the season one. Roy's towards the end of his career. He's not the same player that Jamie was. You cannot coach them the exact same way which Ted sort of realizes at the end of the first season of you know. He can't just blindly continue to believe that Roy is going to come through because he's always been there. It's you have to change that and for me it's a little bit about finding to get people excited and continuing to come up with new ideas. It's finding ways to push them a little bit out of their comfort zone. But support the hell out of that, because you are outside of your comfort zone. We are asking you to do something a little different.

Janet:

I think of you know one of the one of the women on my team who, um, you know, started with us as a consultant, just coming in for some occasional writing stuff. She's now leading social media for two of our brands where she's creating content and social things that, like you know, she'd be the first person to tell you that. You know I've never went on TikTok before I worked here, I never would have thought of that stuff. And now she's developing content for two of our biggest brands and doing a killer job for that because, one, she was brave enough to take our little push and, two, we were willing to be there with her when the first things don't come out right how you expect, because anybody who hits the ground running full speed wasn't being challenged enough anyway. So you know, that means you did something wrong in the first place to put them where they were before.

Janet:

So you know, I think it's a little bit about that is having empathy and understanding that there's going to be trips and blocks and things that everybody has to overcome as they're trying something new. But being there and also continuing to put people in positions where they have to try something new and I want to also state, sometimes that does mean moving them away from a challenge for a little while. You know, I think that you have to also be open to saying, okay, this isn't the right time for whatever's going on in my personal life or whatever's going on in my, on my, my other clients, or you know, with this thing, or I'm pushing in one other area and you know what. Let's move you over here to support in this role and be that role player, as opposed to be the person that's driving things forward, because no one can continue to drive everything at all times, everything everywhere, all at once is a good movie, but it's not a good strategy for coming up with anything creative. It just doesn't work. So understanding that and having people that are open to playing different roles, I think, is really important.

Marnie:

And, like Jamie, that takes you looking at your own ego and getting out of your own way to be able to have that conversation. One of the most impressive things I've seen someone do in a company I work for is they took on a risk for a role that was well, they were kicking outside their coverage before and they knew it and the company really worked to support them. And then it didn't work out and, with the most grace I have ever seen, she backed out of that role and went and did an amazing job as an individual contributor and really helped the next person that took the role that she was in. I was very impressed with the character of that human to be able to do that and the company to have the grace of not like okay, we're going to try you in this and then we're going to fire you. Right, it wasn't the. The transition was really handled, um, really well.

Janet:

It takes just as much guts to to do something like that as it does to lead something, because the reality of it is that may change people's perceptions of of what they think you are capable of, and that's not always fair. But you have to be open to to taking on different roles and I think that's one of the things I I super struggled with and I'll make this real quick was a couple of years ago I was still doing the vast majority of the writing for the firm and I was beginning to become the biggest roadblock in our agency and it was the hardest change for me to make to step out of the way.

Janet:

And was the stuff that was being written by us always up to what I wanted? For a few months, oh God no. There were a lot of whiskeys after work that were getting me through some of the copy that I was reviewing and looking at, and it wasn't that these weren't wonderful writers, it was just I was losing control of it and I wasn't ready to deal with that, and it took some time.

Nick:

So yeah, that is an we can do a whole podcast episode on that topic right there, but you mentioned something earlier and it's something we definitely want to get to.

Nick:

You mentioned guts, and one of the things that we appreciate about the entire series and it was evident in this episode is the notion of the writers raising awareness about anxiety and panic attacks, and this is the second time that we've seen Ted have a panic attack, and it's something that's near and dear to both Marnie and myself, because we have openly admitted, we've talked about our experiences with anxiety and panic attacks and the impact that it's had in our life. And what our listeners might not know is, dan, that you've had similar experiences. We know that you've posted an article on this on Medium, maybe other places, which you openly shared your struggles with depression and anxiety, and I'd love for you, if you're okay with it, to talk about it. Talk a little bit about you know what inspired you to go public with your story and did that decision impact you personally and professionally? I'm sure it did, but anything that you can share, you know, I think, is really important.

Janet:

So yeah, I'll give the real quick background to it. You know, I mean, anybody's anxiety and personal mental health journey is always going to be a little bit different. Mine actually sort of kicked off with something related to work and you know I was on a really long business trip about 15 years ago. That was a couple of weeks long, really run down, very, very, you know, not a great place. Heading home, get on the plane.

Janet:

I had a panic attack on an airplane which is pretty much, you know, the worst place you can have. Luckily we hadn't, luckily we were still, you know, taxiing back from the, from the walkway, and they just pulled the plane. I was taken off the airplane. Terrifying, horrible experience, trust me, took a few years to get back on one. It was not a wasn't a wasn't a real positive airline experience and zero stars. But you know that panic attack, I had a coworker who was with me who got off the plane and you know I will forever be thankful to that young woman of like you know I actually just ran into her just a couple of weeks ago and you know we didn't talk about that, but it was, like, you know, one of those things that's always going to be something I'm really thankful for that she was there for me in such a bad period of you know, such a first panic attack moment. But I had a whole series of them about nine years ago where I went through a bad period of depression and anxiety and it really rocked me to my core and I didn't talk about it with anybody at work. You know, certainly my parents knew my now wife, who was just a friend of mine at that point in time, knew I had some other friends who knew something was going on, but I don't think had any idea the extent that I really couldn't do anything for about six months. I was either on the couch or dragging myself through work and I needed to do something to get better. I worked at it. I did therapy, medication, meditation, all the things to get myself into a better place. But the thing that really hurt me was I wasn't able to be my authentic and true self in that work environment that I was in and in hindsight I felt I wasn't able to do the work and if people found out that I was going through this, I was in a hyper-competitive ad agency. This was before I started Oyster, or with Jeff started Oyster, my business partner, even Jeff, worked with me. He had no idea this was going on. I'm sure he knew I wasn't at my best, but he had no idea the extent.

Janet:

Fast forward to middle of the pandemic, we were starting to build our team and I had a person who was working for me, who was who I could see a lot of the similar things going on with them that were going on with me. You know that they were going through a really hard time and they had expressed some of that to me and it got me really to thinking about. You know, I'm in this really fortunate situation. You know we were, our agency was starting to grow, we were starting to get some attention, we were starting to get some notoriety, we were beginning to have people know and you know I was thinking, oh, depression and anxiety, and still ultimately be a success.

Janet:

And what I wanted that person on my team to know and other people to know is you can too. You know it's. It's not a matter of you being able to do it right now or this not being a real thing, or got through it and it'll be fine, because none of those things are true. It's a matter of it's not this absolute dark position or this absolute terrifying position that you're in forever. You can find ways to deal with and manage it and get through it, and that's why I wrote that article.

Janet:

You know, it was a matter of wanting to share with that person that I'm willing to talk about this publicly. You don't have to be willing to talk about it publicly, that's fine, but you should know that other people that are in similar situations go through this stuff and are successful, and you can be too. You don't have to be successful, you don't have to do all those things, but this isn't going to be what stops you. This can be something that's awful to deal with. And listen, if I could wave a magic wand and have never had a panic attack or depression or anxiety, I'd be searching for that wand everywhere, but that's not a real thing. So how do you deal with it and tell others that you can be there for them and that you can get through it too.

Nick:

Yeah, and that there, there potentially is a light at the end of the tunnel, right, and again, you never fully get it. But that, to me, that was always my issue. You know, this was going back 20 years ago where I felt like I would never get better, right, I just I, I, you know, and that it just it. It snowballs, right, and you're just like, oh, it's never good.

Nick:

But the importance of sharing it because you think you're unique, you think you're a unicorn, right? This only impacts me when kind of you know intellectually that other people go through the same thing, and it's been talked about more and more. Like when I was going through it. I don't ever remember anybody talking about self-care, but I'm so appreciative of shows like Ted Lasso and stories that you're sharing, dan, because people start to realize, okay, other people, they have found ways to adapt and get through it, and it's something that you may not necessarily have a cure for, right, but you can get through it, you can work through it and that's really important.

Nick:

But one other thing I wanted to ask because, um, it was a great article that you posted a medium and you kind of use the parallel and you reference Anthony Bourdain. Um, and the question are you happy? You know that that Anthony Bourdain, you know um had you, you you kind of correlated that. That. I'm curious how do you personally measure success now, right, and has that perspective evolved, you know, since, kind of over the years? Do you measure success? Is that something you consciously think about?

Janet:

I think less than I used to. I think I, you know, I almost cringe, like when you, when you and I know it's my personal bio but I almost cringe, marty, when you read like 90 awards, like, yes, I'm super proud of that, I, I am, I don't want to, but like, also, at the same time, they're little plastic pieces of lucite, like trophies, like cool, awesome. Like you know they're not going to keep me warm. You know, on an 18 degree day like today, you know they're not, they're nice. Um, you know they're not going to keep me warm. You know, on an 18 degree day like today, you know they're not, they're nice. And you know I used to think like, oh, we want to be this big, huge agency, or we want to do this and this and this, and the ambition is still there. But the ambition is how many, how many really cool stories can we tell for our brands, how many you brands? How many people can we get to realize and think a little bit more like us? That it's. You know those awards are great but they're not, you know they're not some metric, like on my deathbed no, if on my deathbed somebody mentions that I won 90, you know, pr, I'm going to be really disappointed, like that's. You know they're nice things and you know I think so.

Janet:

Nick started sort of beat around the bush to your question, but, like I think measuring success has changed a lot more. For me, it's the ability to say no for us or for my team when we're not being treated the way that we want to be treated by a client or partner, the opportunity to say no to a project that doesn't get our creative juices flowing. To me, that is probably the biggest metric of success. For me is the ability to be more choosy.

Janet:

Like I think right now the interesting thing and we can talk about season four at some point, but, like to me, that's the ultimate version of success for Jason Sudeikis is he has the option, he can say no to it and he's created this little wonderful thing. Now he might want 25, 30, $40 million whatever they're going to throw at him to do a season four and he might want the challenge of telling a new story for that, but he doesn't have to. And to me and I'm speaking for somebody else and they're happy, but that's the kind of happiness that I would chase is the opportunity to have people want or be interested in what I'm doing or what the way that I think and or the way that my team thinks, and have the option to choose what we want to do. Be selective of how we want to use our energy and time.

Nick:

That is fantastic yeah.

Marnie:

Could not agree more. So you mentioned right on your deathbed we won't have the 90 awards. We'll keep that in mind. No, no, no, tell the. You know the, the headstone folks, please don't put that.

Janet:

Yes, yes, please don't chisel that in. Yeah.

Marnie:

But if there is a life hack, we like always like to end with this. If there's a life hack or a trick play called the Dan Air, what would it be?

Janet:

So I will admit and I will admit for your listeners you sent this over to me to do something and I spent way too much time thinking about this because, you know, I originally wanted to be well, I played college baseball and I wanted to coach. I coached for a semester. After I graduated, realized that that wasn't really what I wanted to do. I wasn't the life fit for me, that I originally thought it was, but because of my love of sport and all those things, I spent way too much time thinking. So I actually just finished and I'm going to I'm going to share a book just off my shelf. I just finished Soccernomics not long ago and there's this whole section about like math and you know how it all fits into the data of different, different decisions, and it was about shootouts and how much time is spent on what.

Janet:

Should I dive right? Should I dive left as a goalie? Should I do all of the you know and they have? They now have like cheat sheets in the goalies, like soccer sock, like they pull them out. So I was thinking about this and if I had any trick play, I'm creating my own scenario. Since I'm a creator, I'm gonna go ahead and do that if I come down to the biggest possible scenario like world cup, I I send my guy out there for the final kick. He makes it, we win, he the save happens, we lose'm going to tell my guy or my girl to drill the ball directly at the goalie Because all the data, everything says 70% of the time right, 30% of the time, but almost never are they going to have the guts to drill it right at you.

Janet:

The only part that's blocked, and you know what, that's a less than 1% chance of that happening. And you know what, like, that's a less than 1% chance of that happening. And you know what, if they do it and they block it, you know I can live with that. If I took that little crazy risk to kick straight at it at the goalie and they were smart enough and out there enough to make the save All right, I can deal with that, you know. You know maybe my country and you know all those things wouldn't be able to deal with it, but you know, I think there's. It's a crazy enough thing, in the biggest possible situation, to say I'm going to take the risk of hitting it right at you and I think you're going to dive one way or another, and you know, if you don't you beat me.

Nick:

So what I would love to do is to be watching soccer, soccer saturday, soccer sunday, and then say, oh, and you know, ronaldo just pulled off a Danair, right, right at the middle, right there you go.

Marnie:

You heard it here first.

Janet:

I would spit my old-fashioned right out.

Marnie:

Take a challenge head-on is what I heard from that. I love it.

Nick:

So tell us, tell our audience, before we wrap up. I mean, how do people find Oyster Creative? How do they find Dan Ayer? Any?

Janet:

Yeah, we're online Oystercreatescom or any social platforms. Oystercreates not creative, Couldn't get that URL, you know.

Narrator:

Always, really really sorry, but Oystercreatescom.

Janet:

I'm also on LinkedIn, dan Ayer. You know search for me. I always tell I've been in leadership positions with professional development organizations before and I always tell young people that you have this incredible resource to ask people questions, to reach out. To do that. I respond to all the messages I receive. That aren't you know, asking me for generation services on LinkedIn.

Janet:

Those ones don't get responses. But you know, if a young person or a professional reaches out to me and has a question and it's an interesting question I'd love nothing more than to have a conversation with them, because I believe that's how you build your network, that's how you find new ideas, that's how you find new people and new perspectives, so I get really excited about that.

Nick:

That's awesome, dan. I mean we can't thank you enough for sharing your story, especially such a personal one. This has been awesome. We appreciate the fact that you told us in the green room that you're an open book and you absolutely were, which is what we love. Thanks for joining us.

Janet:

Yeah, and I want to thank you both. I mean I, I shared, I gave the book to a couple of people on my team who've who've read it now and have come back with with rave reviews of I finished it in one night and I said to them I said this isn't really the book that you're supposed to read in one night, but okay it's. It's such a wonderful way of using a story to communicate something. That's difficult.

Janet:

You know, leadership is not easy. I mean, half the things I talked about today are failures or things I wish I could have done differently, and I think that being open to that is the most important thing. And I think the openness that Ted Lasso's characters explore to improving themselves all the way from Roy being anything but an open book to joining the Diamond Dogs at the very end, you know, to Jamie throwing his ego away, to all the different character development that happens with each one of them that's the kind of openness that it takes for leadership and you guys really struck on that to create this book and this story in this little universe inside of another universe. So thank you for the book and thank you for what you guys are doing.

Marnie:

Oh, thank you so much, that means a lot, very kind, thank you.

People on this episode

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Marnie Stockman

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Nick Coniglio

Host