Episode 8: The Last Car in the Parking Lot

California is ordering state workers back to the office four days a week, and Theresa and Anthony use the news as a jumping-off point for a bigger question: what were those years of mandatory presence actually measuring? Anthony makes the case that the technology finally caught up to distributed work, and that the real shift ahead is output over optics, skills-based hiring, fewer traditional W2 roles, and more fractional and project-based talent. Theresa brings the other side of the ledger, recalling her own resistance to a remote CHRO opportunity back in 2017 and the presence culture she came up in, where being the last car in the parking lot was treated as a career strategy.

Where they land is more interesting than a simple verdict on RTO. Both hosts dig into what early-career professionals stand to lose without in-person exposure, from a handshake that reshaped a 15-year career trajectory to the unwritten habits nobody teaches on Zoom. Anthony pushes on whether proximity should ever drive promotions, Theresa argues for the human connection that makes work stick, and together they sketch a future where work is curated around how people actually communicate and contribute rather than one-size-fits-all mandates. The episode also marks a 250 milestone for The Breaking Views.

Discussion topics

• California's four-day return-to-office mandate for state workers, and why blanket presence rules keep coming back
• Anthony's case for outcome-based work: skills-based hiring, fractional talent, and the end of celebrating a calendar full of meetings
• Theresa's evolution from RTO skeptic-in-reverse to hybrid realist, including the CFO battles of the COVID era
• How the next generation learns workplace norms, mentorship, and visibility when the hallway moments disappear

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:11

Hello, it's the day before, or we the day two days before 4th of July. We're halfway through the year. Uh, welcome to another episode of The Breaking Views with Anthony Ernesto, my good friend and advisory council member on everything. Uh, that's everything. And myself, Teresa Festenstein, uh founder of People Power AI and just general curious human being. So excited to be kind of halfway through this year, Anthony. I don't know. Like, I I think a good like recap of what we've seen so far and also digging into some new news. We're back, it sounds like in California. Um, there's a news article about the state of California is requiring back to back to work four days a week. What we think about that? Have we learned nothing? What are you what are your thoughts and feelings on it, my friend?

SPEAKER_00 1:01

Well, so you know, like it's it's to be clear, and I think you said this, but the state workers, so California state workers are gonna be required to return to the office four days a week, and that's up from two. It's uh Newsom, um, who interesting enough, I thought he was, you know, I think he's making a play for the next presidential race and bringing people back into an office may not be the best move, but I'm sure he's consulted folks smarter than I am. Um, but also I want to go back to when you started the episode. I wasn't sure what the clap was. Maybe that was like an act. Um, so anyway, just wanted to call that out. That was uh just interesting, uh interesting.

SPEAKER_01 1:39

That's my like clap board. That way I that way I know nobody, nobody in watching the episode will see that, although now I've just talked about it. But it's my way of sort of like yeah, I actually I actually saw a really good tip. I was uh watching this thing on audio producers. This is just like a for anybody who does podcasts to get like a dog clicker to help you understand where you need to edit and and stop editing. So I'm gonna maybe I'll start using that in the future, but um yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:07

I might I might look for my food or something.

SPEAKER_02 2:11

Treats.

SPEAKER_00 2:12

Yeah, like where is the where's the chocolate?

SPEAKER_02 2:14

Um what did I do?

SPEAKER_00 2:16

So yeah, I mean I think it's interesting. Like there obviously the unions are protesting this, and you know, there's our you know, there's so much this pendulum has swung so many different ways. I mean, obviously, when we were in COVID, everyone I and I remember the story. So I was um I was sitting at Susie where I was the chief people officer, uh, and I love to tell this story all the time. And and uh, you know, COVID comes in, uh, it's a couple of weeks into COVID, uh, people are freaking out. And so I go into the CEO's office and I'm like, listen, if you know, if the world goes into a pandemic and we all have to, you know, work from home or something like that, we should be ready for that. Um, and so let's test, let's test it out. Let's um, you know what, let's have our sales, and he was, by the way, very much a focused sales CEO, which most CEOs are, of course, but very focused on sales. Um, and he was one of the drivers of that. Like he was probably one of our best salesmen, as most CEO founders are. And uh, and so he like literally like I don't we had a good relationship, so I don't want to overstate this, but he like basically cursed me out and kicked me out of his office as if I was saying something so radical and so different. I'm like, we should just test, like send the sales team home, they can get on calls. And and there was also like we were in an office, we were in an office in Soho, and so it's always noisy, and there was like everyone complained about the salespeople being on calls and other, you know, anything. So um, so then two weeks later, we're all working from home, and I was like, see, uh, we should have tested this. Um, but anyway, I mean, this this is just interesting. And and then, of course, when COVID ended, you know, everyone was like returned to office, everyone and you know, I and same story, like Zoom CEO brought people back in. And when I saw that news article, I waited. Uh, I was like, okay, when is the slack coming from my CEO with the link to this article to say, why aren't we all back in the office um at our company? And and I I think it was like literally under an hour, maybe a little bit over an hour. I get the slack, and now it's like, is it you know, should we come back to the office? So I it's just interesting that we're still like like there's there's been plenty of signs, and Nick Bloom, I believe he's out of Stanford, does a lot of this sort of work from home research, and and they have proven like actually work from home is more productive um than work from an office. Um so he's actually, you know, there's no pro productivity loss, there's actually productivity gains. And like, you know, you can talk about all the qualitative, like how many times do you know, like you're since you're at home, you know, maybe you jump into the kitchen a little bit early or whatever it is, or do some errands or whatever it is. But there's definitely research that shows this. So it's interesting to see like a state taking a position on this that, like, hey, we want people to come back into an office. I don't know. What do you what are your thoughts on this, this whole thing and and the fact that we're still talking about it?

SPEAKER_01 5:20

Yeah, it's funny. I have uh a woman that uh I very much admire and and worked, she worked on my team for a long time. It's like the mentors become the mentee and um absolutely love her. Name's Joy uh Sabisma. And sure. Yes, she runs a company called Scale Joy. And I remember um in like 20, might have been 2017, I had just started a new job. I was a little uncertain about it. She called me, she's like, hey, there's a company out in um Syracuse that's looking to hire a head of H. Like, do you would you be curious? And I was like, sure, I'd be curious as a head of HR role. But I was like, at the end of the day, I'm not moving to Syracuse. You know, like my family's here, my husband's here. Um and she's like, no, no, no, you'd be remote. And like I struggled so much with the idea that um, like as the head of HR, I would be remote. Like I couldn't, I really struggled with like, how do you actually do that? Like, how do you support an organization when you're not there? And boy, did I have a change of heart after COVID. You know, I really found the tools. There's a big difference. I think a lot of people that have come up working in an office all the time came up, and I'm talking about Gen X, you know, even millennial to some extent. Um, we grew up and we didn't have the tools that exist today. You know, we didn't have, you know, we had um WebEx or Skype or whatever it was, and they were crap tools at the time. And, you know, it was like that's what you had other than the telephone. And video conferencing was shit. Like not nobody would have considered doing it at their desk. It was like you have to go to the conference room and there's this big, like, whirly camera that tries to grab everybody and grab nobody. And um, and so I think at that, that's what I go back to and thinking about like why did I feel like that? Why would I feel like that was such an impossible thing? It's because I'd never lived it and the technology hadn't caught up to what would be needed. And I the story is different today, but the leadership is in some cases still living in that era. Um, my last in-house role as a CHRO, I worked for a commercial real estate company and the battle royales I would get in with our CFO around um why we needed to be in the office during COVID were just ridiculous in terms of the first argument is well, you know, it's it's hypocritical if we want people that purchase our office space to not be in the office if we're not in the office. And I'm like, first of all, nobody even sees those people that are in our back office. So there's no perception of hypocrisy. Nobody knows whether we're there or not. And then it was, well, we can't, and I think this is one uh very valid for conversation, which is his next argument was well, I can't build culture, I can't build connection and really mentor my team if we're not in person. And I felt like my little team of three people became closer, sharper, more connected during that period of time. Again, because the technology caught up with what we were doing. It was, you know, huddles in real time on Zoom or whatever we were, Slack, whatever we were using. It was video meetings, it was the phone, it was text messaging. It was just like every possible technology was there to help us connect. So I don't know. I I struggle with the requirement. And then at the same time, I also you know came up in that world of five days a week. There wasn't a an option to not have it be in office. So I mean I'm at a crossroads around it. I feel like as I've gotten older, I've sort of adopted this like some time at home for focused work is really good. And if you're not gonna set up the system so that it actually accomplishes what you're looking for to accomplish. So for example, my husband's supposed to be in the office two days a week for like to help with collaboration, but his entire team is away. It's like what's he's going into just sitting in an empty row by himself.

SPEAKER_00 9:40

He could collaborate with himself, yeah, yeah. Um, yeah, I mean, I think you know, it's it's interesting because you're right. I mean, the technology absolutely, you know, I remembered the Citrix, and every time, you know, you had to download something to your computer, even though you had it on your computer, it was just a nightmare. And then Polycom, if you remember that one, like that was the best, you know, office-to-office kind of connection, but it was so my god, yes. Yeah, it was like tens of thousands of dollars just to do video. I remember when I was at Zeta, we were building, you know, we were a company that was um private equity smooshed together six or seven, it's now Zeta Global Billion Dollar Company, but we were I was very early stage, and and my mandate was to take seven companies and and put them together. And we had bought a company out of Hyderabad, India, and so we built a con uh polycomp system uh with them. Um, and so it was just like, and that was the best that we can do. But even that, you know, there were so many different operational and culture challenges with working, you know, globally with an Indian office, like it's just like in an American office, and then having, you know, it was just like it's it's very complicated. The tech now, yeah, Zoom, you know, coming on board. I think it was Blue Jeans at one point, that one too, like all these different technologies that kind of just brought this to a simple way of just connecting and and having folks connect one-on-one in groups. So I I think you're right. I think the technology has made it a lot easier. I think it's also just like I and I remember years ago I was working next to someone, um, and you know, it it's kind of like the pedigree of of a university. Like this person was a Harvard grad, got his MBA at Harvard, and frankly, he was useless. Um, he he wasn't productive at all. He was he was actually counterproductive, but yet he had this pedigree. So I think, you know, like we're we're going to always default to our norms. Like if we believe that someone from Harvard is smarter than someone from another university, we're gonna, we're gonna believe in that. If we believe in office is more productive, if I can see you working, you're actually working. That's the other thing. He used to like work till like 10 o'clock at night. And then I was brought in into his termination process, and um, and they were like, I just don't know what he's doing. Um, yeah, you know, he's just so unproductive. So it's just a perfect example of our norms. Like just again, the university piece, the fact that he was visibly there till 10 o'clock at night. But yet, you know, and and this is this is actually leading to a really interesting conversation, I believe, that we can have around this. So, you know, work from home or in office or whatever it is, but this idea of outcomes and skill-based employment and the idea, like I I have um I have a uh uh a webinar coming up in partnership with High Bob around skills and some of the the data they uh uh Dr. Matos um works for them. He's he's uh just just a brilliant individual. And he looked at a bunch of data around skills and how you know what are the skills that are going to be needed in this new, you know, of course, we have to say AI, in this new AI workplace. Um, but again, going back to like I I think it's always been looked at in the wrong way. If you're in the office, you're productive. If you're from a certain university, you're smarter, you know, like it's it and and now I think we're shifting to like, are you actually getting outcomes? Are you actually producing things? And it's yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:15

I think it's also I think it also is a generational shift, right? Like coming up when I came up, and I don't know if I've mentioned it here before, but I was, you know, my first five years of work, I was such a student of Jack Welch, right? And his whole how do we build stronger business leaders? And, you know, uh just a little background. Like I always struggled in school. I always I I I was never I probably due to ADHD that was undiagnosed because we just didn't believe in that shit when I was five years old, right? Um but I I always struggled with my grades, not necessarily with the understanding, but it was like my attention. Then when I got into professional work, I really glommed on to like the idea of hard work, like being a hard worker. That was something that I I was creative, I was curious, and read this book that said the this leader of this global company said, be the first to arrive at work so that the CEO sees your car in the parking lot, be the last to leave so they see it when they leave, and they start asking the question, whose car is that? Like I remember that viscerally. Believe you me, I was the earliest to arrive, the last to leave. Um, and then even as I got into throughout my 28-year career in corporate world, I even think about the expectation when I before we before COVID hit and we all worked from home, it was like celebrated that a few people on the executive team, myself included, would stay as a part of this, like were the last ones in the office and this pride of visibility that on reflection was all just most of us just bullshitting at the end of the day for two hours. And it's like, wait a minute, I I actually got married fairly recently. I was kind of a newlywed. I'm like, I want to go hang out with my husband, but I felt this pressure. And as the only woman, I did not want to be the one who was leaving, right? Even if other executives could leave because it didn't in my perception, it felt different. And you know, I think what happened after that is during COVID, is I certainly realized this like the time that I'm taking, the extra two hours, three hours leaving at seven o'clock, leaving at eight o'clock, eight thirty at night was just it wasn't about like uh sometimes it was about hey, I'm working on a really hard project or this is a busy time, but a lot of times it was just like bullshitting about the business that like we could have been doing during the day or regurgitating different things. And so, you know, I say that because I think this, you know, the conversation of like what is the future of work gonna look like, skills-based hiring and and uh priority and objective-based, um, you know, having we've talked about this before in my perception, I think it's skill-based hiring, it's a much greater reduction of W-2s, much higher percentage of technology combined with uh fractional workers or part, you know, periodic workers, project-based. But this idea that like whether it's the state of California or it's a law firm or it's a whoever, that you can't get away from this idea that if you really did a time um outcome analysis, that the amount of time spent in meetings and the celebration of, hey, my day is back to that, like the way that we celebrate that, like I'm just busy all day, I have no time. It's just it's really, it's really a sad state. And I think as an educator now for undergraduate students, I don't see that the future generations being that hyped up to work until 9 p.m. You know?

SPEAKER_02 17:21

Right.

SPEAKER_01 17:22

Yeah, you have a daughter, you have a daughter that's you know, uh uh several children, but your daughter, 23, she's moving into her own place in the city, and and yeah, she's got a big job. Like, what is what are her hours look like? What does she expect?

SPEAKER_00 17:37

Yeah, I mean, I think she's different. Like, I of course I did a lot of research on Gen Z, wrote a book on them, what their expectations are. She's she's an anomaly. I think she's almost like uh maybe the you know early stage millennial uh or even Gen Xer to a degree. Like she, and I think a lot of it has to do with some of my influence.

SPEAKER_01 18:00

I was gonna say her Gen X influence on her.

SPEAKER_00 18:03

Yeah, like like it's you know, go in early, stay late. You know, you know, there was one thing it's so funny. So she's graduating from the University of Miami, and we're in the stands, and she's on the floor. And I'm noticing that um a lot of just generally the kids, but it was it was um, and this is why like I I'm kind of my whole life is a curbier enthusiasm because I I I just observe people to details that no one else is doing. I'm just like, and it's it sits in my brain, but I'm observing people accepting their diplomas and not shaking the president's hand. They're just and they're you know, like he's he's extending it out, and he and they're and and so I text her and I said, if you don't wait for his hand, you reach out to him and you shake his hand. And it's like these little things that it's probably those norms that again, she's coming into a workforce where there are majority baby boomers, Gen Xers, and millennials, right? So you do have to, to a degree, you know, push some of your ideals and your norms into those generations, but you also have to know what those generations find is valuable. So it to me, it's a balance. Like, I don't want you to lose the things that are important to you as a generation. If the if life work-life balance is important to you, like that's something you have to balance, but you can't go into a workforce and just be like, hey, um, and I've seen Gen Zers in general do this and call out companies and do certain things, and I'm okay with that too. But I was very like, and she's like, Dad, you know, like I got the dah, okay. And she did it. Like, I have a picture on my fridge in my in my kitchen with her shaking, and I was like, look him in the eyes, you shake his hand, like you are equal, whatever your gender, wherever your background is. I don't care if he's the president, if he's like a PhD, you are equals at that moment, and you shake his hand.

SPEAKER_01 20:10

So it's like I I want to break in here really quick, Anthony, because I have to tell you my own personal story with my dad. So when I was graduating eighth grade, I literally had a con my dad had a conversation with me about like when you go up, you're gonna shake his hand. And they and he taught me how to like hold the hand out and grip and have a strong, firm handshake and up and down. My entire life, I think that has impacted the way that I go about introducing myself to people and feel like there's something you just brought up. My dad's in a rough, is that a rough medical year? And so you brought up a really good memory for me, and I want to thank you for that.

SPEAKER_00 20:53

I know last time I did too, dancing. So you you mentioned your father was a good dancer, which I love.

SPEAKER_01 20:59

Oh, he's a great dancer, but I I think that idea of like to your point, like is do you think the question was I don't feel equal to shake hand? I don't want to like I I was coming up during COVID and touching was a weird thing. Is that was that it? Like, no, I don't think it was an objection.

SPEAKER_00 21:18

I don't think it was an objection. Like she, I think for her, it was like, yeah, duh. Like she knew. So it was probably more of me understanding the dynamics of what I had been through as a head of HR or as a young kid in in the workplace. Like there to your point, like the Jack Welches, like you probably and I'm not you, but but uh if I met Jack Welch or Jack Welch was in a room, I probably would not go up to him and introduce myself. Because it was just like there was a hierarchy thing, it was just whatever it was. I just wasn't, you know, and maybe that was a me thing, maybe it was generational. With her, I don't want her to do that. In fact, so she's at an off so the before she got her research. Jobs. She she was working for a company. They had a um uh a summer retreat in DC. And so she's at an event and she will go up to anyone and introduce herself. And I love that about her. Like one, that I'm a little bit of a whatever that new extrovert, introvert. Like, I could sit on stage, but I I don't sit in small groups like like you know, 50 or more. Yeah, she'll go up to people. She doesn't care who you are if you're Jack Well, especially if you're Jack Well, she's gonna come up to you. So she sees this guy standing in the corner of the room. No one, no one is, you know, he's a little bit older, maybe a little bit older than well, actually, probably a lot older than me, but at least she's like, so she goes up to him and she introduced Hi, I'm Nicolette, I'm blah, blah, blah, blah. This was this. It was the founder of the 401k. And she talked to him for an hour. That's and like he was so, and she said to me, like, no one was going up to this guy. I'm like, Do you understand? Like, this guy has created generational wealth for millions of Americans for because of the product he had created. And she's like, Yeah, I that's why I talked to him for an hour. But there, so anyway, the point is like, I don't know if it's like over time, the little notes or the texts or whatever it is, but like building that sort of thing into her, you know, and and and so for me that text, you know, but Anthony Ibrahim of the president.

SPEAKER_01 23:27

But this is this is so this takes us right back to the conversation that I think a lot of people would have. If you I I'm tying the strings together of you've got young talent graduating school that may or may not have been provided the guidance, they don't have a dad sitting in the audience saying, Hey, you better, you know, please shake this guy's hand, be proactive, whatever. You've got them now maybe not having as much opportunity to gather those key learnings on how to just interface with the world of work. Short story, I had a young man. Um, I've told the story a lot because it just makes me really happy and it makes me laugh. But I had a young man join my team, very charismatic, um, very smart young man. Um his very first day, I invited, you know, he we had a you know day one meeting, and he comes into my office with nothing in hand, like just brought his happy body, and that was it. And we were talking, and and I can tell as I'm saying things, I said, you know, you might want to get a notebook and a pen and you know, write some of this stuff down. He's like, okay. So he goes out and he comes back with a post-it notepad and he starts just like writing, writing everything down on different post-it notes. And then like the next day he comes in again, he's got his little post-it notepad, and I go out and I hadn't really noticed it because maybe I hadn't walked past his desk or whatever, but I noticed the next day he's his whole desktop, which was quite large, was like covered in post-it notes. And then the next time he came in with that same freaking notepad, I was like, let's get you a notebook, like the notebook that you can keep. Like, and I I say that he was an incredibly smart kid, high GPA, had never been in a work world, like used his laptop when he was in classes and just didn't have he could have brought his notebook, but like or his laptop. But I I think like there were things that I learned as a young adult, and I I how in this world of remote are people learning those things? And maybe those things aren't as important as they used to be, because now everything's gonna be transcribed and so nobody has to take notes, but but there's this like you talking about like how do you interface with the people how do you if you're not in this space with them, how do you ever get a chance to see the CEO? My first day at News Corp, uh this was now in 2020, I was 26 years old-ish. And 25 or 26, and was walking around my first day, and there was there were two older gentlemen sitting on the side, and like my dad said, you know, put that hand out, shake hands. I walk up and I say, Hi, I'm Teresa, Teresa Inc., my maiden name, and I'm the new um, the new training coordinator or training specialist, whatever my title was. And the one guy said, Hi, I'm Gene Klein, I'm the chief operations officer, and the other guy said, Hi, I'm Paul Carlucci, I'm the CEO. And I thought, holy shit, I probably should have known who these people were. Like I should have known their names and I did it. But if I had, I may have been more hesitant to do what I did.

SPEAKER_02 26:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:40

And that moment changed, I believe, the way that Paul interacted with me the entirety of my career, 15 years at that company. He saw me as outgoing, he saw me as personable, he saw me as not, you know, shying away from this moment and invited me into a lot of things that he wouldn't have before. And so that's like when we talk about return to office and how does that piece get hand covered at work?

SPEAKER_00 27:10

I don't know. I think so. I'm I'm of two minds here because I am the one saying shake the hand because I think it's important. But if you are the Harvard graduate and you're staying late and you shake the hand and you're not producing and you're not contributing uh value into the organization, that means nothing. So at the end of the day, all of this, if you are an individual that isn't shaking the hand, if you're, you know, there are folks in the world, and I I'm a father of a few, you know, one of them, like is an introvert, doesn't really will go. Like, I have my older daughter, I have my son, my younger daughter, like they're three different people, same environment, same parents, three different people completely. He's not gonna go up to the CEO. He's not gonna do that. And I'm still I'm saying it, like, hey, you gotta go up, but but if he's delivering value into that organization, that's what I love about this new world. Like that that bullshit of like, oh, playing golf with people and being friends with people, like, is that important? Yeah, maybe it was at some point because it's relationship, and maybe that's still an element. And I I don't want to lose that piece, but also that was bullshit. Like there were, you know, like you saw it. How many organizations where you're like, oh, that's you know, whatever that, you know, like they're always next to the CEO. And like you, they would I I would see it all the time in HR, you know, we we do this. We like we scan the room and it's like, oh yeah, that group is sitting next to the CEO, they're always you know, up their ass, that kind of stuff. Like, we listen, we notice this stuff that we're in HR, like this is what we do. Um, and I feel like that was always BS. Like, if I'm producing output and creating value for this organization that makes the organization more valuable, then I should be recognized. And I think that's why I love where we're going to this, where if we could go into a scorecard that accounts for my contribution as an employee into this organization versus just my relationships, I'm all for it. Sign me up. Like I'm I'm and by the way, if I'm not providing value, I'm I'm in the wrong role. Yeah, like that, that I just because I know the CEO or I play golf with them, or you know, I I go to their house, whatever it is, like that shouldn't protect me either.

SPEAKER_01 29:30

I don't disagree, but I think there's a difference between are you are you leveraging only social currency as a a friendship, uh alumni connection, uh whatever it might be as a as a decision maker relevant to promotions or opportunities. That's very different than like as humans, building personal connection helps us feel more embedded, helps us feel there's obviously many studies that you know a friend at work will increase your longevity and your loyalty to that company exponentially. And I'm not saying that those things can't be built without like I I I I hear what you're saying, and I don't disagree that it needs to be based on what is your output, what is your value that you're bringing? Are you meeting your objectives? Are you exceeding the objectives? Are you working to support the continuity and growth of the business? But this balance where I what I actually really like is the idea that maybe in the future of work, we're better at understanding. I mean, number one, we're better at understanding neurodiversity, we're better at acknowledging the differences in the way people communicate, learn and and contribute. And so maybe there's a maybe the future of work is a better kind of alignment of it. Doesn't have to be fucking one for all and all for one. Everybody's got the same experience. You are more of an active introvert, you have a dynamic that looks like X. You have a more outgoing relationship with tethered personality and or behavior style, that gets a different type of thing. Like this, I the I love the idea that maybe we're moving into a space where things are more curated, not just because of people's preferences, but also because of their true behavior approach, skill set, mentality, whatever it might be.

SPEAKER_00 31:41

Yeah. I mean, if you think of like that, it's it's it's a level of both, right? I think traditionally we have looked at pedigree and where, you know, listen, I have a chip on my shoulder. Like I don't, I think I'm as smart as anyone out there in any un, you know, in any Ivy League university, but I never had access to it. And nor like, you know, like you talked about before, like, there's no way I was getting into those schools. I just I just didn't have that capacity. But there's, you know, so I might have a chip on my shoulder, but also like you look at my beloved New York Knicks, who are the NBA champions, right? Like, you know, like no Jalen Brunson, you know, unestimated from day one, takes a pay cut, went to Villanova, won a championship there. But, you know, like it wasn't the traditional sort of um, you know, Blue State uh uh university, Duke University coming out of those. Like they they didn't have a number one star on the team. It was just a combination of output that this team, and I do believe in in the you know, the coach bringing a certain energy and a connection to all these guys, they they absolutely love each other, right? They are so I I think that you know it's a perfect example of a team that was so listen, they were, you know, top two in the Eastern Conference. They were, you know, top team in the NBA because of the chemistry, but no, no, you know, other than Jalen Brunson, who I believe, again, underestimated MVP, you know, should have been MVP of the league. Um, and and hopefully will be, you know, he'll be known as a Hall of Famer in New York or even in the NBA, you know, winning this championship. All of it underestimated because none of them had the pedigree, none of them came number one draft, like like all of these things. Um, so for me, I think yes.

SPEAKER_01 33:29

But the thing is there'll be so many of them played together at like right, several of them played together at Villano together. So maybe there's maybe there's this like combined argument of talent and like when you know that the guy in front of you is gonna break left because you've played with him for so long. Maybe it's this, yeah, maybe it's this what is well, I I'm gonna take us in a in a queer, uh kind of a weird um uh diversion. What is the longest period of time you've ever worked at a company? Your longest stretch?

SPEAKER_00 34:06

Um it's actually a toss-up between Fresh Direct and Susie, about seven years, six and a half, seven years.

SPEAKER_01 34:13

And I and mine is 15 and then five. And I there is something maybe in this correlation with the NYX of like having this time to build an a deeper understanding of how people are, that maybe there's maybe with this evolution there's something to be learned around time in position.

SPEAKER_00 34:35

And it could be team connectivity. But my point here is like it didn't matter where they came from, their pedigree, it was outcome-based. And that's what you love about sports. You can have teams of rock stars, the Brooklyn Nets tried to do this, pulling in some of the best NBA players, they couldn't get to a championship. Here's a team of of people that you know are good players, but they're not premier players in the league. And even the MVP, Jalen Brunson, was underestimated. And here it's outcome-based. You won a championship. And as a Knicks fan, I have even more gray hair watching them. It was like you lose for half of the game and then you'd win the second half of the game, right? So it again, it's to me, and I don't love sports analogies, but in this case, it's the best example of outcome-based performance. Like we won a championship, and so that is the future that I'm excited about. It's outcome-based. How do you, hey, you're, you know, you're this incredible uh pedigreed marketer. You came from all these other places. You come into an organization and you can't drive MQL's marketing qualified leads, you're like not okay. You're not doing your job. Yeah, like it's outcome-based. Like it's all this kind of stuff. And and I'm I'm excited that there's a world where the folks that don't necessarily high-five the CEO in the hallway are also the ones that are, you know, getting the promotions and getting, you know, um uh increases and and are highlighted for performance because they're just getting like Jalen Brunson, just getting the job done when he needs to get the job done, and then getting the recognition after that, if that makes sense. So I'm I'm excited, hopefully, about this new world that that we're coming into.

SPEAKER_01 36:21

I like it that you're very bullish about it. Like I get excited when people are like fired up. Um, I feel like I deviate a little, maybe because my entire career, I feel like I was I leveraged the relationship. Not that I wasn't a producer, I would arguably say I was one of the best producers, but I also learned and there's a lot of psychology that goes behind the way that you're feeling about this and some of the hangups that we have and our histories, right? Like this isn't just yeah, this isn't just about, you know, uh outcomes. This is about the things that led to us feeling in a particular way about how things have come up for generations of workers, right?

SPEAKER_00 37:06

Um also the HR profession has been underestimated forever. Oh my gosh, yes. It's been the most underestimated, and we're finally seeing, and I actually um I published a blog post today from one of my favorite companies, Irrational Capital, who has effectively connected human capital to business results. They have said, here are seven dimensions of human capital practice that if you do well, we've proven they've done research with JP Morgan Chase. I think I've mentioned them in the on the show before. I just can't mention them enough because it's a wake-up call. Like, hey, HR folks, you should go check this out. Because this is a direct connection. They have an ETF that outperforms the SP. Like, I'm an investor in it, full disclosure. Like, and it's the best performing ETF in my portfolio. Uh, again, not investment in vice at all. But it's, you know, so for me, it's I I think it's that chip on my shoulder. One chip on my shoulder from from an early age just being underestimated. Then getting into a profession that was underestimated. Maybe I'm a glutton for punishment. Maybe that maybe I'm a masochist. Uh anyway.

SPEAKER_01 38:15

Well, I like it. I I I don't think you're a masochist, but I I love the I love this idea, whether it's because you had your own children or because I teach people that age that there's a real investment in what does the future look like and how can we in our own way, maybe through the podcast or the other outside work that we do, have uh a finger on the pulse and or influence over what does that next, what is the next 10 years, decades over decades of work look like.

SPEAKER_02 38:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:50

Great conversation, my friend. As always. I love uh love our chats. Um, I look forward to next time after the July 4th holiday when we have a chance to maybe re-reinvigorate our unconference HR conference that we've been started talking about and uh back into some some big topics. Any big plans for 4th of July?

SPEAKER_00 39:11

Uh moving my daughter into her apartment in in the city, excited about that. Beach on the fourth and celebrating 250 years of this. By the way, I have to recommend there is a Netflix series. I think it was produced by Tom Hanks. Um, I think it was called the uh oh, I'm I'm killing. Uh, US the experiment or the US experiment or something like that. It just goes through the history of the democracy that was created. I think it was in celebration of the 250th anniversary, and it's just fascinating how we're still experiment. Like this thing is so this this US was a startup, and we're still in that startup phase. So uh just real fascinating. But good.

SPEAKER_01 39:54

It's called the American Experiment.

SPEAKER_00 39:56

The American Experiment. There you go.

SPEAKER_01 39:58

Yes, yeah, it is good. Highly recommend um because it is, we're all still kind of experiments, I think.

SPEAKER_02 40:04

Yeah. Well, I am going fascinating.

SPEAKER_01 40:06

I'm gonna be trying to figure out how to avoid this. Uh what has a real feel yesterday of 108. I don't know what it's gonna get up to today because it was it was 87 this morning. Um, so I'm just trying to stay inside, keep cool. Good luck at the beach. Lots of lots of uh suntan lotion and SPS.

SPEAKER_00 40:24

Second to do a shout out to the inventor of the air conditioning. I mean, like if you think about game-changing technologies.

SPEAKER_01 40:32

And my house is 120 years old, so we don't even have central air. We have awful window units, but it's the only thing that keeps me sane, honestly.

SPEAKER_00 40:43

Let's give a shout out. I wish I knew who that was at this moment. I could Google it, but shout out to the inventor of AC. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 40:50

And shout out to our 250 downloads and listeners of the Green.

SPEAKER_00 40:57

There you go.

SPEAKER_01 40:58

Our 250 mark, uh, continuing to support and have the conversation about what is breaking in the world of work and uh appreciate always being able to have that conversation with you, Anthony.

SPEAKER_00 41:10

Have a great one. You too.