Rethink Retirement: Why the Next Chapter Needs a New Identity

In this episode of Behind the Story, Jelani Gonzalez sits down with Dr. Andrea “Andi” Simon, a corporate anthropologist, culture change expert, author, and speaker who helps people and organizations learn to see, feel, and think differently.

Andi explains why change is so difficult, why leaders often misunderstand culture, and how people protect identity, status, and certainty when they feel disruption coming. She also shares why true transformation begins with curiosity, listening, small wins, and a willingness to see what customers, employees, and communities are really experiencing.

The conversation then turns to one of Andi’s most powerful ideas: retirement may be the biggest culture change many people will ever face. Instead of treating retirement as an ending, Andi invites us to rethink it as a new beginning that requires identity, structure, purpose, community, and adaptability.

This episode is for leaders, business owners, high achievers, and anyone preparing for a personal or professional transition.

Transcript

Jelani Gonzalez: ⁓ when say corporate anthropologist, what do you do ⁓ that typical consultant doesn't?

Andi Simon: You know, the methodology theory and tools of anthropology were designed to help us step outside of ⁓ a business relationship or something that we want to better understand and observe. Not really to what we're going to do, but to see it through a fresh lens. And the methodology was done through ethnographic research, participant observation, storytelling. Because most of the time if you ask somebody, what are you doing? Why are you doing it? They'll answer based upon what they think you want to hear. And then you actually watch what they're doing and you realize it has nothing to do with what they said. And after a while, you begin to understand that the application of this approach is really very relevant to businesses and particularly when they're going through change. Because often the mind exactly what it thinks is real. There is no reality. And it creates this illusion of what we will do because that's the way customers are acting or the market is moving. And so if we can help you understand what is happening through an outside in perspective, we can help you understand those customers are actually changing or moving or your staff aren't really responding. some of my early work, before I launched my business 24 years ago, I was inside corporations. I was helping them change. They didn't know what an anthropologist did. They just needed to help. Help me change. And what I learned was that people hate change. And they could say, need to change, but I don't really know why or how to do it. And you begin to appreciate the value you can bring through a different perspective. And so when I take on a new client, I take them exploring with me. I said, let's go see your clients. Let's see them using the tools that you have provided for them and not really judge it. And what I want you to do is write down everything you think you heard or saw, and I'll do the same. At Jelani, you'll be amazed at how we were in the same place, watching the same things, and saw completely different operations. And the client will say, you saw that? I say, yes. And he said, well, I saw this. I said, you're filling it into your box. And I'm looking outside. We're looking to create a new box, or at least go outside of the box. Whatever is going on isn't what you expect, but you're going to try and figure out excuses why, explain why. So when I launched my business, I had a wonderful PR guy and John Rosigast said to me, a corporate anthropologist that helps companies change. And I said, yes. And was my elevator speech. They didn't know what I did, ⁓ but did know one thing and you'd appreciate this. It wasn't what I did, it's what they needed. And each of my clients from the beginning have needed something to adapt to changing times and didn't know what to do. And their boards often wanted them to do whatever they did before better. And there may have been no opportunity to build on that model. And so, you my first book on the brink was about how anthropology could help eight of our clients who were stuck or stalled actually rethink what they were doing. And it wasn't hard. Once you open their eyes, they went, that's what you mean. I said, no, that's what your customers mean. I'm just the narrator. So that's how I've been applying it. And I enjoy the journey because I'm an explorer and a philosopher at heart. And I know how difficult it is for people to see, you know, there's nothing better than AI to help me with my business because everyone's afraid or they're trying a little bit or they can't quite imagine a new world. Somebody once said so wisely, anything you do today is already obsolete. And ⁓ the joy of being an anthropologist to help you realize that what you've always done, you did well, ⁓ it may not be what you need for tomorrow. So that's my story.

Jelani Gonzalez: Got it. of the questions I'm often asked by, I'm in talent acquisition, and one of the questions I'm always asked by candidates is about the culture ⁓ of companies that I work for. And what's the most, in your experience, working with leaders and companies, what's the most common ⁓ misunderstanding have about culture?

Andi Simon: Let me answer this gently. They say the word, but don't really understand that humans have created culture as a way to thrive, survive. That really was in my mind how we ⁓ beat Neanderthals. We create story about the way things are done here. It's as relevant now as it was 45,000 years ago. What we were able to do is think about ourselves in a tribal kind of fashion about this was a way that we did this. And therefore it gave us an advantage. It gave us continuity, new hires, new how to get things done in a culturally appropriate fashion. And when I work, I use something called the Organizational Culture Assessment Instrument developed at the University of Michigan. And the OCI is a wonderful way to assess a culture. And there are four dominant types. Are you a rules driven? a bank so regulated that the rules rule or the opposite of that are you entrepreneurial where your creativity is wonderful. And I find entrepreneurs have an idea a minute. And one told me so wisely, if I don't have my type AA, who's my controller person who organizes the rules, I'll never get anything out of the idea box to get market. The third type is a team, ⁓ clan and collaborative. They just can't get anything done unless they all agree. sometimes to the benefit and sometimes nothing ever gets done. And then there's a market-driven one that's wonderfully competitive. Now you can imagine the kinds of cultures that a leader is looking at. I worked with one company and he had made five acquisitions. And he was sure that his very rule-driven, market-oriented, competitive approach would turn all of these five, basically family firms into performers. Now they had been performers. But the model they had used before was collaboration, creativity, and were never market driven. And the rules were rules, but they weren't the drivers. They weren't the processes he wanted. And he had a hard time understanding. He had made five acquisitions of companies that didn't match what he thought. He'd taken out their leaders, and they were sitting there waiting to be led in a different fashion from what he was doing. Now, going back to your question about how leaders, leaders believe that a culture can be their competitive advantage. The question is what kind of culture? And during fast changing times, which one is going to be the right one to prepare you for tomorrow? And how do you make sure you have the right people to be there? I had one client and he put an engineer in charge of creativity. didn't work. The engineer was so rules driven and he saw boxes and he wanted creative ideas outside of those boxes. And they said, oh, is that why he's so talented? And he said, yes, in his zone. But if you're going to build a creative culture, you're going to have to build people who can see differently, think broadly, and be willing to risk things. I'm working with a client now for eight years, and they had been rules-driven. And the CEO was very controlling. If he didn't tell you, you didn't do it. I've had a couple of clients like that. The new CEO wanted them to be more entrepreneurial, risk-taking. and willing to come up with new ideas to solve problems. It's a healthcare client. my goodness, people said, she wants us to do what? And I said, yes, ⁓ behaviors associated with being entrepreneurial, risk-taking, are an anathema to people who were obedient and rules-driven. And so you can begin to appreciate in these fast-changing times that what you had may be ill-designed for what you're going to need, and that may change again to what you had. So there's a... whole lot of possibilities going on now. And people want to be safe. They want to have continuity and certainty. And they want to protect their jobs and their status. And change is not their friend. Their brain goes, really, please, fear it, flee it, go away. Don't bother me with the changes. I know what I know. I don't need the new stuff. So that's my wisdom to your leaders is open your mind to possibilities and be wise about the kind of organization that you have built. and what they need to do for a new world that is emerging right now.

Jelani Gonzalez: Speaking about what you just mentioned about change, how does change most often fail? Is it because people are trying to protect something? What's like one of the things you've come across in your work with organizations that causes change to fail?

Andi Simon: Well, things. ⁓ we say if you can't see it, you can't be it. And so if you have something new that's emerging and you don't really visualize it a very granular way, you're not quite sure what it is you're being expected to change to. So we do a lot of visualization. Draw us big pictures of what you're doing now. Draw us a big picture of what you think it's going to become. And let's talk about a story, and I'll tell you about stories in a moment. But unless you can see it, you're not going to move toward it. And the brain is going to hijack it. The oldest rectilinear part of the brain protects you from unfamiliar, unknown things. This change. So first thing you need to do is what is it you really mean? Not the story, not the words, show me a picture. And that's the same if I'm going to go through a weight loss program, or I'm going to change the way my marriage is, or I'm going to change my company. See it. The second thing is I need some rehearsal time. I often use theater as a metaphor. Actors can play different roles on stage, so can you. But unless you have a little rehearsal time, you learn the script, you write the script, you have somebody who can direct you on stage, you're gonna be making it up. Now you can add libid and that's fine, but it won't necessarily match what whoever is telling you to change thinks it should be. And you have a... a dialect divergence here where he said this and I'm doing that, but he doesn't think that's right or she doesn't agree. And so you have those issues. And then the last part is the human brain is designed to protect you from the unfamiliar. I mentioned that. We have a story in our mind and it protects us from unfamiliar things and change. It's very efficient. The habits take over and you don't even think about, you know, we think we have free will, not much. Your habits go through a process. And your habits are really making you do the kinds of things that you did every day. You drive in the same way. You take care of yourself in the same fashion. answer the questions in a familiar way. And now somebody wants you to be more entrepreneurial. And unless you can see what that means and practice doing it, your habits are going to hijack it. And when it hijacks it, creates cortisol in your brain, and that creates literally pain. It hurts. And if you think about coming to your office in a new way, the roads were blocked. We've had 18 inches of snow, we had a lot of blocked roads, and you had to drive in a new direction. You had to think very hard about your GPS and what it was telling you. But if you just had the old habit and drove in the same old way, what was that you see? And so it's a very interesting process for protecting us at a time when we must change to something new. I love the pandemic. I didn't love the pandemic, but I love the pandemic because everyone changed. And people who were never monitors rose to the occasion. People who never were hybrid workers loved it or at least adapted to it. And next thing you know, we all were working differently. And then we had to come back to what people thought we had done before, but it really wasn't the same as what we had done before. Right. And that's a perfect illustration of how adaptive we can be when you don't have a choice. Often, and my last thought on the topic is that I used to tell people if you want to change, have a crisis or create one, unless you're really, you you're going to say yes, but not do it. And the last thing is if you sit like this, you don't have much to work with because you're pulling away, no change allowed. So I wish them well as they're starting the process, but if you can visualize it, you can make it happen.

Jelani Gonzalez: Mm-hmm ⁓ In regards to stories, is there a story where, in working with a company obviously, where you realize the data was fine, the strategy was fine, but the people were not?

Andi Simon: Let's see, which one shall I share with you? ⁓ one my ⁓ earliest was in battery design business. And he waited for companies to come with batteries that they needed. And I show this as a design. And their job was to build that battery. And it was really a wonderful business until

Jelani Gonzalez: Yeah.

Andi Simon: the disposable battery industry began to shift to rechargeable batteries. And he lost one of his biggest clients. And I met with the client and I said, why did you leave? You love this company. Well, I need rechargeable batteries and they say, we don't do that. Now those are famous words because every place that you go says, ⁓ we don't do that. So I went back to my client and I said, he says you don't do what he needs. And I went to all of their folks and no, no, no, that's not how it's done. That's not the way it's done here. We are really good at disposable batteries. He has to go someplace else. And I said, but you're going to lose your best clients because the market is moving. And he said, well, I guess we could change. I said, well, unless the leader changes, nobody else is going to at all. And so he had a hard time realizing that he had to lead the transformation while everyone else was pulling back. And I appreciated them pulling back a prior conversation. That's not what we do. That's not how we do it. And they were very good at what they did, but the market was going to lose them or leave them. And it wasn't hard because they didn't make anything if people didn't come with a need. And slowly but surely he sold his company to another company who needed his kind of skills and the folks there. But they were ⁓ the not the opportunity, because there was no reason that they couldn't find a new way to build. batteries and partner up with someone who did it with them. I there were lots of solutions, but not with a mindset that said, no, we don't do that. And that was one of my favorite, because it was one of my ⁓ clients and I liked them very much. And I was glad when he sold it, because he could then live happily ever after and not get angry that he wasn't doing what his clients wanted.

Jelani Gonzalez: Right. When you are dealing with a situation like that and the leaders are telling you, for example, people are resisting, is there a commonality around what they're resisting or is it all over the place? What are usually people resisting when it comes to making those sort of changes?

Andi Simon: Mm-hmm. You know, resistance is an interesting word. People protect their status. And their brains want continuity and certainty. And so the resistance comes from ⁓ being clear. In this particular case, the leader, the CEO of the company was the resistor. And when he showed them they didn't have to change, they didn't either. It wasn't hard to simply say, if he's not online. And became an interesting ⁓ discussion it. resistance is an interesting phenomenon. had a wonderful college, ⁓ and was going out of business because it kept thinking it was selling outside humanities, and people buying it. And we went through faculty, and I was a faculty member once upon a time, were like these employees, resisting the that the market they thought they served didn't want them anymore. And they said, well, our recruiters have to go out and do a better job. Well, the recruiters weren't doing a good job, but nobody was buying what they were selling. And so the resistance is to protect oneself. And I understand it. of the things that I do, the more you can take people out of their ⁓ and make them into the change agents, the easier it is for them to lead others in it. It doesn't do well to be the consultant. ⁓ easy to delete me. Deleting the consultant is so easy that it becomes silly. And I take them. I say, no, you're going to build a new company or college or product, and I'm going to enable it. I'm going to help you see it. I'm going to help your customers help you drive it. But unless you have an aha moment and your brain goes, oh, that's what they're saying. I said, and it's not what I'm saying. It's what they're saying. The last thing I need is a PowerPoint to show them. I need to take them and let them listen. If they form a team, it's really fun to watch because the team begins to gel itself into something new. We're going to change the way we're doing things here because the customers aren't coming to what we're doing. And everyone here is going to have a role in that transformation. You'll be amazed how creative they are. But the one thing they don't want to look like is that they're different than the ones who are resisting. And you get into battlegrounds where the resistors pull them back and the change agents move it forward. And so you need to be careful that your dynamic frees them from the anchors that want to hold them back. ⁓ lot of this just human nature. every time I start with a new client and they start to say, no, we don't do that. said, no, that's where we start. Because now we have to figure out how. And you can.

Jelani Gonzalez: How do you that? Yeah. there any early warning signs in to working with a company on their change initiative where ⁓ you see that it's heading in the wrong direction towards like, I don't know, quiet sabotage?

Andi Simon: Yes, question. One of the things we try to do ⁓ is up small wins and feedback. let's build a vision of where we're going. In a year, we're going to be moving in this direction, rechargeable batteries. And we can all the pieces. And we know what we have to do. OK, let's go backwards and reverse plan it. if that's a year, what have we done in nine months, six months, three months, and where do we start? What are the small wins? And if every month we have small wins that are deliverables and we haven't moved on them, we have an early warning sign that is going to not be done in a year because you haven't started. you've started and it's not going the way you thought, ⁓ the group has to rethink the of those small wins. And I like small wins because you begin to develop comfort and confidence and competence. And my three C's, I'm comfortable with this, I'm confident with it, and I'm competent. And once you get over that hurdle, then the next wind comes along faster. Every month we begin to have a meeting, strategy session, and we begin to talk about what's working, what's not working. is essential because if we, and the word is important, can begin to see progress, it's contagious. And so you begin to build in all of things. I love data. And so the small winds have to have some data. You know, what will you see if that is beginning to change? This gentleman who had acquired five companies, let's pick one. And let's talk about how we're going to change the culture there. What would be a key indicator that people are beginning to follow your If you can't define it, then you'll never know if they're making progress. And once we defined it in some way and they could see the opportunities developing, they began to realize that they could be ⁓ comfortable, confident. competent and move forward. But it is interesting. You you started at the beginning asking how an anthropologist can apply this to business. And I must say we do it gently because humans are really, they're clever creative and they could easily sabotage something for no particular reason other than power and their own self-worth. And so it becomes a team effort, becomes much more effective than a solo. The gentleman who was the engineer who became head of creative.

Jelani Gonzalez: Mm-hmm.

Andi Simon: wasn't very good all by himself. didn't even know he wasn't good all by himself. ⁓

Jelani Gonzalez: I got a follow up that is there any language or actions that you know a leader can do unintentionally that triggers or resistance to that change?

Andi Simon: The word I. ⁓ intelligence that Judith Glaser wrote about is about the power of the brain to respond to words. The words we use create the worlds we live in. The story that the leader tells has to be visual and he has to tell it often. But the one word that if he says, I want you to, the of the person hearing it immediately goes into ⁓ reject, run, fight it. And the cortisol that's going on in the brain is in a reaction like to push you away. But if he says, we, then all of a the oxytocin and serotonin begins to create bonding feelings. Remember we decide with feelings. And so the heart and the eyes play a real important role. It's not the data. It's how does it feel with that data? And so if he builds a we culture, where we are going to, you know, really climb that mountain together. If he's an enabler and a facilitator, not a commander, things move really fast. Once you let them go, they just need you to steer. And every time I work with a company that says, ⁓ they're doing it all by themselves, I said, of course, they know what has to get done. You can now steer them into the next direction, but you don't have to drive them. And so I do think if we change the conversation, things happen in a better way. Don't try and control it. Don't put rules in. a lot of fun and change can be fun if you make it your friend.

Jelani Gonzalez: there one ⁓ habit that a leader could immediately implement that would accelerate the culture change the fastest?

Andi Simon: Great question also. think the more that leader gets out of the corner office and gets to know the people who he's employed to do this, understands their own anxiety or concerns, sees them real people, ⁓ not as or staff, the more they'll trust. I was on a conference yesterday and everything was talking about trust. Gen Zs don't trust anything. Well, you need to build trust. And a leader who is distant and isolated not trustworthy. But that comes and gets to know you, you know, the old stories about Toyota and the CEO coming to have lunch with people, is not humans humans. And they want to know that you care about them and that they care about you and the trust factor builds. And so if you had one thing you had to work on is get out of your office and get to know your folks and go as far as you can to be present and then try not to be prescriptive, try to listen. And listening is in short supply. Hear what they're saying. Listen to their stories. Ask them, you know, tell me the things that are working well and things that you need to do better and how can I help? And that becomes a leader people trust and rise to the occasion to support. and it is very much a collaboration.

Jelani Gonzalez: What do you look for in the beginning, in the first, say, 48 hours a client to understand ⁓ things really work in the organization?

Andi Simon: If I can, I will spend time in there, whatever, manufacturing. one part, Markel Paper was a client of ours, and I ⁓ spent a night in the night shift. I wanted to see what was going on. I spent the day wandering around, sitting with people and listening. I'm looking in that first 48 hours for the obstacles that are high priority and things that are working really well. For Markel, I was fascinated. The night shift worked without any managers. But the day shift needed a lot of management control. And when I asked that to the president who had hired me, I said, how come you need all these managers during the day? They're very expensive. And at night, they don't need any. And that's the way we do it. I said, OK. if you want to begin to be more efficient, maybe we should borrow from the night folks the things that seem to work well. They seem to do really well all alone. And do begin to now move forward in a more

Jelani Gonzalez: Mmm.

Andi Simon: a more respectful way of what your folks can do without the command and control of the manager. And this is just old habits. It's not they've demonstrated that it works better. Because that night crew did real, I was just, aw, I said, the whole day should just be a night crew. In fact, we should move you guys to the day ⁓ and swap. Because are quite if entitled, ⁓ if to be and

Jelani Gonzalez: I wrote down a couple phrases from your website that I want you to talk about. The first is, what's the blue ocean strategy?

Andi Simon: You know, I've done 500 workshops on Blue Ocean Strategy. So I'll tell you my Blue Ocean story. I was in business, I don't know, six years, and I met the woman who wrote the book, Blue Ocean Strategy, Mabon, in the elevator at the Harvard club where she was going up to do a book launch talk. I had read it and I had a client at the time who said, let's do this. And I said, I don't know what this is, so let's go listen. And I read it and I said to Renee, I said, your book is very anthropological.

Jelani Gonzalez: .

Andi Simon: I'll tell you what the blue ocean is in a moment. She said, you should be a blue ocean strategist. And I said, well, that's cool. What's that? She said, I have no idea. Let's make it up. Now, my style. I'm perfectly happy exploring. But it did become a practitioner. And what I loved about the approach is that at the time, and even today, the typical strategic approach was a Michael Portis' approach. You're going to compete. You're going to carve out your share of the market. You're going to be better on pricing or better on service or have a better product, but you're going to be competitive. And I don't care if you're a commercial real estate company or you're a telephone company, you're going to be competing out there. And most companies at the time were doing just that. Renee Mabon and Chan Kim, the co-authors of the book, wanted to understand how come so many Fortune 500 companies stopped being Fortune 500 companies? know, 85 % of them stopped. with that in mind, they went to research the ones that thrived. And what they found was that it wasn't an industry and it wasn't a type of company, but it was a strategy. And the strategy they adopted was to create new solutions, add value innovatively, find non-users and ⁓ with unmet needs and think about it differently than simply competing against others that look just like you. know, in healthcare, the hospitals all compare each other. In banks, I was a banker for 14 years. We all compared each other. You know, they brought in this many deposits and sold that. I mean, you had all the data to look at each other competitively, but not creatively. We weren't doing bank simple, or we weren't doing, you know, PayPal. We were thinking bank. And so once I began to understand this, I began to then speak about it and pick up clients. And the key difference was that many of them were stuck because they were competing against others just like them and couldn't differentiate themselves. But when you started to think about it in a creative fashion, opening a new market space, that college that I mentioned earlier had only so many dorms. And there are only so many people who could come and stay there, and they didn't have a market to pull from. So we said, why don't you go out at the, this was early on. they had become known for giving every student a laptop. So it was very early on. So when we got to the businesses, and let's create a new market where you're providing business courses for businesses on site using laptops as part of your toolkit. And they went from 475 students to 2,500 students by offering a completely different distribution channel and creating a new market that gave them access in ways that they hadn't before. And I share that with you because That was one that was so stuck installed, and we weren't sure how you were going to grow with a traditional student body. But at that time, you didn't need to be a traditional student body. You needed to think about it in a completely different way. And so each of the experiences that we have are folks who began to see themselves, I had an accounting firm for eight years as a great client, and they began to do things for their clients, which was to take over their financial back office.

Jelani Gonzalez: Mm-hmm.

Andi Simon: They would become their bookkeeper, their controller, take care of all the QuickBooks, upload everything and be an outsource of whole different revenue stream. Worked. then, you know, my healthcare client in Michigan had no focus on men. I said, here's the challenge. You own a women's market and you think women make all the decisions. But less than 50 % of the men have primary care doctors. Why don't we go out to them? And Cleveland Clinic had got a whole program to go after men. Same idea. so all of sudden we went after with Men's Health as a whole new market space that was a blue ocean approach to bringing healthcare to a market that needed them. ⁓ part of the problem was that the doctor's offices closed at five o'clock. I said, so here's your problem. They use the emergency room because you're not open when they need you. So why don't we open when they need you as opposed to pushing them into the emergency, which is much more expensive way of taking care. And the men said, I'm working all day. I can't get to the doctor. I said, well, if we were open till eight o'clock at night, even if you're open from three to eight and changing your hours, you could have a whole market space. And so the idea is to see things through a fresh lens. I've done, I said 500 workshops. I've got a dozen set up this year. And I love working with both key groups, key leaders in the organization and CEOs. And sometimes the younger ones, are emerging leaders who can really see possibilities ⁓ and know that more of the same cheaper is not a good strategy anymore. So I became Blue Ocean I hardly ever do a plain old red ocean strategy where we're gonna compete better, because you can't. ⁓ so much pricing you can squeeze out today.

Jelani Gonzalez: Mm-hmm. Right. I love it. The other phrase I wrote down that I want you to talk about is because when I read it, obviously my brain was going with my assumptions and I'm thinking it's probably not what it means at all. So what does the phrase rethinking women means according into the context of consultancy?

Andi Simon: You know, there's a book behind me is called Rethink, Smashing the ⁓ of Women in Business. And I wrote it, ⁓ had a program at Washington University called Simon Initiative for Entrepreneurship. And we were very interested in helping women entrepreneurs. And the women said, need role models. And so I went out and started interviewing people, women, to see how they were doing what they did. in a world which was often difficult for women to compete. And I found lots and lots and lots of stories of women who simply made it, I'm gonna do this. You know, I can't do this. One woman said, I wanna be a geologist. And the man said, women aren't. And she said, of course I am. One woman was in aerospace and she said, hmm, there only like 6 % of us women in, but I can do it. Another woman was told, don't be a lady lawyer. Nobody likes a lady lawyer. She became a partner in a big firm and became a very successful lady lawyer. And I have a CEO in there and I have folks who became entrepreneurs. And as we were developing it, it became part of my mission to begin to help people understand how to rethink women in the workplace. Women aren't the same as men. They bring a whole different repertoire of skills there.

Jelani Gonzalez: Mmm. Obviously.

Andi Simon: The woman who was an attorney said, and she has a great chapter in the book, I sat on the compensation committee for this law firm and the men all came in with ⁓ reviews and they said they had climbed the Empire State Building to save the client damsel from distress. And the women all came in and said, we work together as a team to make sure that the client never had a problem. And she said, and that's when I learned that women and men see the world in different ways and operate differently.

Jelani Gonzalez: Yeah.

Andi Simon: And worse, they're different. And so my whole purpose is to help you understand the mythology that limits you. Women can't. Women don't. aren't. And break through that mythology. Women can. ⁓ enable See it as a different way. 65 % of the college today are women. 60 % of accountants are women. Over half the doctors are women. Half the dentists are women. rethinking what women can do. And I don't think you need to worry those women. They're going to do it differently. And they're going to add value innovatively in very much a blue ocean way. And they're going to help your business do extremely well. And all the data suggests that's what happens. So ⁓ my job to help you rethink it.

Jelani Gonzalez: That resonates with me from this perspective. I wonder if you, and I want you to advise me, is this a negative thing? Because in thinking about it, it sort of feels negative from my perspective. What you describe about the men at the firm where they were saving, the company was the damsel in distress and they're saving. And my immediate thought was hero complex. And I recognized that, like I always want to help. I always want to save. I always want to be that. But the way you phrase it,

Andi Simon: Yes, sir.

Jelani Gonzalez: I could see some people responding to that in a negative way like you're saying, it's not good to be like that. But that's not what you're saying. You're just saying that's men are and women see it differently, right? Am I interpreting that correctly?

Andi Simon: ⁓ absolutely correct. And I don't think there's a better or worse here. I think it's different. And I like the difference. You put them together and you have a very vibrant culture you have competitors collaborators. And take a and see which ones work best ⁓ in the you're in for the customers you want to attract. Because you know, like I do, that some of those customers are going to love the collaboration. and others going to really like the hard driving, mark driven competitor. That's just, I think that's just healthy. And I do think that it's pretty cool stuff. And you're right. You can be a hero. I like heroes.

Jelani Gonzalez: very true. Like I grew up with my mom and dad having very spirited debates. And one of the things they always said was, if two people are identically the same, one's unnecessary. So you have to have the differences. So sometimes when I'm something, I'll ask my wife her opinion, even though she has no idea about the topic, I still want ⁓ perspective, that female view, because women do see things differently. ⁓ she does from time to time point out things that I was not even considering because I simply did not look at it through her lens. So I'm conscious of what you said and how women bring different attributes to the table. And I always remember if she was exactly like me, then one of us would not be necessary for what my mom and dad used to say. So what you're saying really does resonate from that perspective.

Andi Simon: Yes. Well, but you're wise and go pick her brain. The more ideas you have, the more likely you will have big ones and they come at the intersections. And unless you articulate your ideas, they don't exist. And so the more you talk about it, the more you'll watch your brain working through the story in your mind. She'll add more to it and your story will change hers. And that's where growth comes from. That's what's so exciting.

Jelani Gonzalez: Yeah, that collaborative thing, which is what women do, and they're really great at collaborating. Going into your consultancy brain with companies that you've worked with, have you come across a time where the company thought it had a market problem, but it was probably actually an identity problem? And how did you reconcile that for them to move them forward?

Andi Simon: you know, I'll use ⁓ a water filler company that came to us because they had developed, and I'm sure you've seen them, filler stations that sit on top of water fountains. And they had won an award. And it was designed to help people when they go through the airport, fill their water bottle. And I met their chief financial officer at a meeting and he said, come help us because it's not selling. And they were positioning it as something that people who were

Jelani Gonzalez: Mm-hmm.

Andi Simon: building buildings and by code how to put the water fountain in would buy and put on top of it. They weren't. They didn't see any reason to. And they weren't interested in helping you fill your bottle, except for universities. And so I said, who is buying it? Well, Allegheny University is. NYU bought 150 of them. So let me talk to them. And they said, oh, we don't care about filling the bottle. We want to fill the bottle. We don't want to fill the bottle. We want to kill the bottle. So this is important to us so we can eliminate the sale of the plastic bottle and put it into landfills no more. So I went back and I said, they don't want to fill the bottle, they want to kill it. And they went, And the marketing person said, that's why I got college students asking how they can get filler stations on that college campus. I said, yes, there's a lot of movement across the country for college students to eliminate the sale of plastic water bottles. And. They hired a bunch of college student graduates to go out to colleges to sell it. And I went back and did some more work with them another project. And they said, it's now about 25 % of our billion dollar business because we repositioned it not to fill the bottle, but to eliminate the bottle, to kill it. And next thing you know, we had a market. And next thing you know, it became contagious. And next thing you know, we're doing really well. ⁓ that was just a perception problem. ⁓ filled it through the same way we would sell waterfowls. But that's not who was buying it. Interesting.

Jelani Gonzalez: brilliant way of like listening to the market and listening to your customers and then speaking about customers what's the difference between a company being customer focused or and being customer curious?

Andi Simon: ⁓ those great words. Curiosity is one of the most important things that ⁓ can have at any time, but today in particular. You be customer focused. My hope is that you're not focused on what you think your customers need or want. The challenges you impose on your customers, your own of how they're using the product, the problem they're trying to solve, what they're telling you in a focus group meeting. and you impose on it your reality. If you're curious, go out and spend a day in the life of a customer. Undercover Boss is some of my favorite videos about what anthropology can do. Go, actually do it. But if you're curious, then you open your mind to what is really going on, not what you think is going on. And so those are terrific contrasting approaches to understanding. can be customer focused, but be curious. One of the things I often do is have my customers sit on the customer service telephone, listen to what people are asking for. A story, one of them, my favorite stories is a gentleman, Jim Riley, who has a leclean chain, who had leclean chain, his son now runs it, and they made chain for snow tigers. And after a work session, I told him to go back and listen to the phone. All the people who were calling, his customer service person said, oh, I'm sorry, we don't do that. No, no, that's not what we do. After two hours, and it may have been an hour or three hours, but Jim laughs when I tell the story, he realized that, he said to her, I can do all of that. Why do you tell them we can't? She said, you told me we don't do that. He said, I know, but that's not our core product, but we could do that. She said, but they don't call us for what we do, they call us for what they need. At which point he had his epiphany and his curiosity changed the whole business model. think now what do people need and how do I do it as opposed to this is what I sell please buy different models.

Jelani Gonzalez: Different model completely, yeah. Let's switch gears for a moment and talk about retirement as a culture change, as I alluded to in the introduction. You've said that retirement is the biggest culture change that most people will ever face. Why is it so destabilizing for high achievers?

Andi Simon: De-sabalizing for a whole lot of folks. the new book came out last Monday ⁓ on 23rd it's called Rethink Retirement. It's not the end, it's the beginning of what's next. Context. ⁓ husband his business and joined mine. And I laughed, he said, I'm not retiring. I said, okay, I'm not retiring. He picked up right away and he learned a whole, he rewired himself. He learned a whole lot of new skills in different ways. While we were talking, I said, you know, there's a book here. What do people do when they retire? Let's go find out. So I started to interview, you know, 60, 70, 100 people to find out how are they dealing with this thing called retirement. Being who I am, I was looking for patterns or interesting insights or, you know, what could I share? And what I discovered was that many folks, whether they owned a company that they sold, they had high-performing jobs that they were retiring out of. Women who were eliminated from their job, or had decided to leave what they had always done. both of whom sometimes at the same time or at different times, one an attorney and one in their own business, decide to close up. And what I found were five important things. When you leave what you've done, ⁓ also often leave your identity. That business card was who you are. You're not prepared for the next phase. You're happy you made it. And I think of the first year as a honeymoon. So you're going to do all these things. You know, I'm going to go on trips and I'm going to play more golf and I'm going to visit my grandkids and all the things I couldn't do when I worked. That can handle it for about a year. But then you go to a cocktail party and people say, what do you do? You say, I'm retired. It's a huge tribe called retired. They don't do anything. They just retired. And slowly they begin to realize who am I? So the first one is Who are you? And I did my first workshop on this and I'm fascinated by women and men both trying to figure out an identity. It's essential. And I call it an anthropological liminal phase between what you were before you know who you are, other than retirement. The second thing is you don't know what to do when you get up in the morning. One of the gentlemen in the book said, I had it all planned. And then I realized I get up in the morning, I go to the gym, I come home, I have my coffee, and I have nothing to do. One of the women said, really want to spend time with my grandson, up to a point. And then I realized, ⁓ don't have any friends. I don't have anything to do. So we had this whole big gap between the structure that you had, the identity you had, and now you don't have. The third thing is, my purpose? You know, when I worked, I had a real clarity of purpose. ⁓ Sometimes wasn't happy with the work, but very often it defined me in some way. Now I need meaning. One of the questions we ask is who must know you? Who do you care that knows you? Who do you matter for? And then the fourth part is what's your community? Who are you gonna have lunch with? Who are you gonna play golf with? One of the gentlemen was very clear. I asked for his story. He said, right away, I retired at 58. I was gonna play golf, lower my handicap. My golf buddies all drank, all through the 18 holes. And then to the 19th hole. And then I came home and had a glass of wine and then I fell asleep. Next thing you know, I was becoming an alcoholic. This wasn't what I failed retirement. I had a fine purpose. The last thing is how adaptive are we? The adaptability quotient has become quite fascinating to me because it isn't simply a matter of moving from what you were to something new because it's unplanned, but how flexible for all of these other things can you be? and I'm beginning to develop a quiz, a sort of a self-assessment on your adaptability quotient. Because I think if you see yourself as being you're going to immediately try and understand what you have to create. How are you going to build a day that's going to work for you? ⁓ can do it. But hope, who's going to be your community, and how do you define it? And so ⁓ the that we're creating are going to help people rethink retirement. I don't say don't retire. You don't have to be me or my husband. And if you're going to play golf or you're going to play mahjong and pickleball and have lunch and you're enjoying it, go for it. not my job isn't to judge. It is to really help. Because retirement may take it. Remember there's 75 million boomers. That's a whole lot of folks. In one of the groups I was talking to, they all want to know why is it so hard to find a nonprofit who can use our services? I think because the nonprofits have been doing just fine without your services. And what is it you're bringing to them that adds something of value? And one nonprofit said, I have to hire a whole person to manage all the people who want to work for me for free and manage them. It's not so simple. hop on. And then one gentleman said to me, I hate being on this board. They don't do anything. So there's disconnect. But I think that our society has no rituals. Remember, as we grew up, people will say to you, what are you going to be when you finish college? Or then you get married and you get a... family, maybe get divorced, but you have sort of plans. And now, what am I going to do? I have no plan. I don't even know I should plan. And I'm not even sure how to make the plan work. And so it's a big, and some people, you know, my father went to a hundred. That gives us a lot of years to figure it out. So that's my journey.

Jelani Gonzalez: Yeah, yeah, it sounds like you're if I'm understanding you're saying that when people get into retirement, it's possible that they can lose their structure, their identity, their purpose, and even their community because they're transition to something else. What are some of the myths about retirement?

Andi Simon: guess. ⁓ great stories. First of all, you have enough money so you can do whatever you like. Well, true and false. I'm going to be strong and healthy and I'm going to be able to do it. ⁓ Five the 30 stories in there all got cancer or some bad disease the day after or four months after they retired. I don't know what retirement does, but don't think that the health you have is necessarily the one that you're going to have. I have lots of friends. I'm going to have lots of time. One woman discovered, ⁓ All her friends were in the office. None of them had any time for her. Very scary. One of them, you know, the myth is when you hit 62 or 65, that's the day I made it. Well, you know, that's sort of a myth that was created for a purpose for social security. It was 65 because people died at 62. And that's right. Time is a wonderful piece. I'm going to have all this time.

Jelani Gonzalez: Yeah, even younger. Yeah.

Andi Simon: Well, the myth is that you're going to have wonderful empty space only to discover, it's lonely and empty space. And humans need structure. So you need to think through. And the book has 10 of these myths because each of the stories began to bundle together. As people told stories, there was a recurring theme that seemed to be appropriate for it. And ⁓ I'm just a maker, myth Humans are meaning makers. And so on the one hand, we make myths to make it easy for us to live our lives. So we're expecting to retire and we're going to do this and that. then we discovered the reality that doesn't match the mythology. Now, ⁓ guy, some the fellows had wonderful stories about selling their business. And the was that they had lots of money and then they were gonna stay on to help the transition. And they discovered something symbolic. slowly but surely after the first year they had a smaller office and then an even smaller office. And as I hit their two-year mark, they had no office. And they said, thought I had two years for transitioning, but I didn't prepare for the fact they didn't need me anymore. So it's lot of mythology helps us make reality feel good. And then we find the reality isn't quite what we thought.

Jelani Gonzalez: Right, right. somebody is six to 12 months out from retiring, what should they start practicing before the exit?

Andi Simon: ⁓ that's a marvelous question. Think of this theater. You're going to get on stage and be retired. What are you going to do? What are you going to say to whom? Think about all the ⁓ five You're already So ⁓ is there not-for-profit you want to learn about? Do it now. If you want little time to travel, ⁓ take a little now and go do it. My husband and I have been to 40 countries. We didn't wait to retire. Every 90 days we found a place to go and we love to do what we live. wasn't, know, my mother didn't make it past 60, so who knew what was going to happen. Then be serious who am I without my job. You know, begin to craft a story about yourself. You are multiple. You have lots of ⁓ layers to You're a wife you're a mother, or if you're not, then you're involved in something, but begin to have a you. that you're going to carry past that retirement moment. wait. Nobody's this, but you are. And if have a partner or a spouse, talk about it. The most challenging ⁓ stories I'm hearing when one is retiring and the other is not. And the gentleman retired and the wife did not. And the pressure for someone trying to now restructure his life, her life doesn't fit it. That's really awkward, right? And the opposite is the case too. So, you know, talk about it, but anticipate the fact that there's going to be a transformation on nobody practices retirement. not like you stop working. One I love, my physician had to have surgery on his feet. And so he was in a chair for almost a month and he couldn't do anything. And when he came back, he said, I'm never retiring.

Jelani Gonzalez: Yes.

Andi Simon: I learned what it's like. practiced it. He said, and his wife has died. He was alone. He said, it was lonely. I had no one to talk to. I had nothing to do. He said, and TV is awful. And so that was my practice. I'm not ever retiring. said, we've been hanging out together for a long time. So it is an exciting time for American society to absorb a very different culture.

Jelani Gonzalez: What does the first 90 days after leaving full-time work look like in real life?

Andi Simon: ⁓ excitement, ⁓ the things that you couldn't do when you had a nine to five or a nine to nine job. People testing life after work. And they, assuming they stay healthy, they ⁓ travel or they visit friends, spend with their grandkids, with their families. They fill in a whole lot, take an art class, start to play games in ways. You know, women and men who moved to independent living often find themselves at odds because the men have nothing to do and the women are playing Mahjong or canaster or something all day long, things that they never could do before. I ⁓ had an study to do for a senior living community on the West Coast. So I spent two weeks living in two communities. I just hung out, lived in one of the rooms and spent my time eating there and talking to people and watching what was happening. In one of them, the men were fascinating because they were successful prior to retiring. They didn't have a spouse or a partner, and they moved in here for the gourmet food, and they had nothing to do. So they formed committees. And their frustration was that they formed committees, they ⁓ up with decisions about safety and food and entertainment, and they present them to the executive team, and they were promptly deleted. The executive team said to me, that's not their job.

Jelani Gonzalez: Mmm.

Andi Simon: They're here for the last stage of their life. I said, you guys are talking different English languages. ⁓ here for the next stage of their life that they want to design. They want to have value and respect. ⁓ they're not waiting to die. They want to live. Listen to what they're telling you. They'll be good collaborators. It was so fascinating. In the other one, many of the folks who I interviewed had been put there by their children.

Jelani Gonzalez: Mmm.

Andi Simon: Their children were not able in their minds to care for them in their homes and they wanted them to be more safe and secure. For the folks who were there, however, they felt like they had been put into a prison they weren't going to get out of. And so there are all kinds of dynamics going on. folks who hired me wanted to know what quality and happiness meant. I said, it's not about your facility. It's about the dynamics of what it means to move into your facility. And this is... The nature, you know, you asked me about the first 90 days. Be happy. You know, you made it. But then be wise. What's the next fart going to be? Let's assume you're going to live 20 more years. That's rich. You know, meaningful, right? Don't waste it.

Jelani Gonzalez: Andy, as we wrap up, what do you want listeners to remember when it comes to change and when it feels personal or uncomfortable?

Andi Simon: I often talk about making change your friend. If you think of a good friend, you love sitting down and talking to them. My roommate from college and I talk all the time. Why isn't change also your friend? It's going to help you adapt to the next things that are coming at us. And the fact of life is changes all around you. Somebody said the future's already here, it's just not widely distributed. And I think that you need to make this word change, not something you flee. You're the only one who can manage your mind. So as you're thinking about the conclusion of our talk today, you know, this has been a wonderful opportunity to share from my heart to yours that change is not negative, it's positive. And open your mind to what you can become in the next day phase, 90 days, whatever it is. And I don't care whether you're a woman who's growing in your career. setting up your own business, or dealing with all kinds of challenges as homemakers, things are changing. And if you're a man and you're looking at that end exit point, go for it. And then make sure you plan what comes next. It's in your hands. And there's nobody who's going to help you really manage the transformation. Me, maybe. But by and large, go find someone who you can talk with. more you talk, the more talk to your wife. The more you're going to hear yourself answering your own questions, next? Make change something that's fun. It's ⁓ go pickleball ⁓ or up golf or tennis or master something like art. Those are all good things, but be positive. Life is just short trip. It's a journey. I'm enjoying it. I hope you are too.

Jelani Gonzalez: Perfect. And where can people connect with you and follow your work?

Andi Simon: thank you. ⁓ LinkedIn is always everyone's favorite ⁓ It may be under Andrea Simon there or Andy Simon. But ⁓ there, can find my website, it's andysimon.com and simonassociates.net. And don't know if you would like me to put info at Simon Associates in which is an email that you can reach us at. But we love people. We love talk to people. And at the end of the day, if we can help, we love being helpful. It's our purpose of sharing.

Jelani Gonzalez: Perfect, thank you, Andy. Well, that's a wrap on this episode of Behind the Story. If you got value from today's conversation, hit like and subscribe so you don't miss what's next. Thanks for watching. See you next time.