Career Confessions: Interviewing Elsewhere, Giving 100% and When To Call It Quits

0:00And trust me, if you're just showing up to be stale and boring, they really don't love you. Yes, probably not.

0:12What would happen if we just told the truth? Welcome to TruthWorks, where we dig into the nitty gritty of leadership and work. And what needs to change? I'm Jessica Neal. And I'm Patti McCord. Our journey together started in HR, but trust us, it's evolved into something wild, honest, and well, a bit rebellious. So throw out the handbook. We're here to redefine rules to work for us, not against us. Let's dive into another episode.

0:47Hello, and welcome to another episode of TruthWorks. I'm Jessica Neal, and I'm here with... Patti McCord. And I'm pretty excited about today. This is sort of an impromptu freeform day of podcasting. I know. Oh, I always love when we do this together and just chat about stuff. Yeah. And we have fans now and they write such great questions to us. So we're going to dedicate this podcast to what we call career confessions, which is when the folks out there that listen to our podcast write in questions for us to answer. And they're really great. So we love this part. They're really great. Before we dive in, though, how are you?

1:28What's up? I'm in the middle of a bomb cyclone atmospheric river. Well, I know that's like a bomb cyclone. They're calling it an atmospheric reservoir. I'm like, what is it? Is it a bomb or is it a river? It's a bomb river. And you know what? Like we used to just have storms. I love that. I love that every year, like it gets more dramatic. You know, it's going to be the end of the world is coming because it's a bomb cyclone. And however, it is probably going to rain like a mofo and wind blowing and all that kind of stuff. But that's okay. It's wintertime in California and that's what we do. That is.

2:07If you're lucky. If you're lucky, it'll rain in the winter. I'm moving houses. Uh-huh. And it's crazy. Isn't it funny? It's like no matter how far you go, it's the same process. Oh, it's so crazy. Yeah. I mean, you know, I moved down the street. and it doesn't matter how far yeah i thought oh how hard could this be right i'm gonna just schlep stuff down there no no no it's still just as hard and i'm trying to get rid of all the junk all the crap and we just have so much of it you know i've got two men who you know one is five and i don't blame him but the other one may be a bit of a hoarder yeah we could you know go deeply into what all of this means.

2:53We could. But we have to do career conversions. As you clear out the detritus of these two men. I know. My five-year-old and my husband. It's funny that you're calling Hudson a man, right? I know. Well, he's going to be. I don't want him to... I don't want him... I'm really trying hard for him not to be, you know, a messy man for whomever he loves in his life later on. It's a long time, babe. I know. Right now he's just gross. You know, you got a while. And being the mother of complete grownups, you know, they change their ways when it's their mess. Oh, I'm sure. That they have to live in. Like, you know, he's, I'm like, are you going to help me pick up?

3:35He's like, no. I'm like, well, then I'm not going to play with you later. He's like, okay, I'll help you. But his helping is, you know, not really help. It just makes it harder. I know. I know. I know. And I love him. He's so cute.

4:00So shall we dive in? Let's dive in to our questions. Shall I read the first one? Sure. Okay, here's the question. Is it bad to interview at other companies if you have no intention of taking the job? I love my current role, but was curious to see if my CV had strength in the current job market. So I popped a few random applications into different similar roles, including more senior ones. And I got an interview. Made me realize just how much I actually love my current job. And it would take a lot for me to ever leave. I still did the interview pretending I was interested and came in second to getting the role.

4:37But I was so relieved when I got the rejection email. Oh, I like this one. I know what you're going to say. Yeah, I mean, you know, I think you should interview your whole career. I think it's really good practice because eventually you're going to have to do it anyway. And I think there's some... So I don't like the premise, right, that he's faking it and saying, you know, I'm just faking it to see what I'm worth out there. That's okay. But, you know, you should go into every conversation with an open mind thinking, like, if they make me an offer I can't refuse, then I won't refuse, right? Or yeah, or you might really like what they're up to.

5:13Yeah. And I think that telling a stranger what you want is a really good exercise because you can't help but tell your boss kind of what they want to hear. And, you know, it's so intimate. And the act of telling a stranger makes you realize, like, this happened to this person. Oh, wait a minute. Like, the things I want, I kind of already have. Yeah. When I would go off an interview, one, it would either validate that I was like had a very good situation or not. Right. And then the thing that I loved about the experience is that I got really good at talking about what I do. Because when you're at work, you don't really have to talk.

5:59Everybody knows what you do. So you're not like going off saying, hey, here's what I did today and blah, blah, blah, the impact that I had. And so when you would go and interview and people would ask you, you know, what do you do? And you're like, huh? And then you start telling and you're like, God, I do a lot. You know, like, you know, the impact that I've had is tremendous. Oh, God. I mean, if I go back in my career, I remember one time thinking, you know, my boss is such an asshole. I hate my boss. You know, I could just leave. And in my mind, you know, I wrote my resume, my CV. And I thought, you know, and I'm reading it in my mind going, oh, I'm a professional.

6:37Like, I actually have skills. And it just never occurred to me being in my job that I had accumulated skills. Then it was like, well, this company just isn't worth it. I'm not going to do that anymore. Well, I'm a professional. And then after time in your career, you're like, you know, my organization got rearranged and there's a new structure and I got a new boss and she and I are not good. It's not going to work out. Right. So that's OK. I am a professional. The CV, I can make a choice. And I think that interviewing gives you what you just said. It gives you confidence that you can take back if you decide to stay.

7:20Well, yeah, but also knowing how to define your impact. It's very helpful if you do stay because you can talk to your boss about that as well. Because when your boss comes back and says, well, you know, I don't know how this is going or that is going. Then you can say, well, let me tell you about these things. Right. Right. That I'm doing very well. So it's just helpful all around. You learn a lot about yourself. You learn a lot about your company and what you love and you don't love. And then you get to learn about another organization. Right. And sometimes you might fall in love there, too. Right.

7:56And there's two other sort of bonuses you get. One of them is if you're a hiring manager, somebody like us, you get to practice seeing what it feels like on the other side of the table. Right. It's like, oh, gosh, you know, I am I'm nervous and I do this for a living. Right. Can you imagine what the person on the other side of me feels like who's an introvert who's never been away from home before? Right. So that's that's one thing that you get. You learn that the other thing is, if you do a great job, which you should, you should never do anything half ass and they love you. And you're number two.

8:32Look at the connection you have now. Right. So now you've expanded your network. So I just talked to somebody the other day about like my saying about it's not what you know or who you know, but it's who knows what you know. Right. So it's so networking. People think it's just about like collecting other people in your network and I'm connected to you and we're Facebook friends or we're on LinkedIn and I've whatever Insta. We share Insta photos. But the truth is, if you don't know what I know, then you're not going to think of me. And in this case, you know, for this person, they're going to remember number two.

9:11Yeah, absolutely. And they're going to call you up for something else. Or to see if you know anybody. And you can call them up and say, hey, by the way, I really liked your company. I had a great time interviewing there. I know somebody who's interested in a job or I'd be interested in exploring further down the line. And so, yeah, great question. Good. Yeah, it is a good question. And the answer is yes. Do it. Do it. Do it. Don't be scared. And the other part, I mean, the other part I want to make sure that I say is like, it's not cheating on your spouse when you interview at another company.

9:45You're not married to your company. You work there. Right. And so the first time I told somebody to do that, Reed caught me. He's like, he came in, he's, did you tell, you know, our head of product to go interview? And I'm like, yeah, she's really unhappy and she doesn't really like what she's doing and she wants to do something else. And I said, so go find out if the grass is greener. He's like, you told her to go interview. I'm like, yeah, because she'll be back in a hot minute. Yeah. Right. But she doesn't know. Yeah. You've got to see the other side. And a lot of times the grass is not greener.

10:24Yeah. My turn. Here's the question. I want to hear more about your approaches to team management. How do you deal with conflicts within a team? Can you make a team more compatible through any bonding exercises or accept that the team's chemistry isn't working and make some changes? Well, I bet we have a lot to say about this. You know, I remember somebody I hired from some other big company coming in and going, you know, my team is just really dysfunctional. And there's a lot of people that I I'm starting to believe don't really belong. I'm like, right. I told you that in the interview. Right.

11:05Remember, we said I said, like, the reason we're hiring you is we think that it's probably not the right team. And we want you to figure it out, get the right team in place, get going. And he's like, he goes, yeah, I know. I'm like, so what do you what do you want? What is it you want from me? He's like, well, I was thinking we could do some bonding exercises. I'm like, you mean like truss falls or a rope course? And he goes, yeah. I'm like, yeah, no. Here's what we hired you to do. Build a team. Not go to HR for an outdoor activity. Right. And we don't do that, right? We're going to help you figure it out.

11:43We're going to, but yeah, you have some people on your team that are the wrong people. you can't make the right team out of this group of people. So how are we going to figure that out? Which is the question this person's asking. Yes, I think so. I will also say literally an hour ago was having this conversation with the CEO. I pushed on the right people. And you know this, Patty, there's always, you know, sort of times there's some new people on the team. There's some people that have been there for a while. It takes some time for those things to sort themselves out. Forming, storming, norming, performing.

12:15Exactly. Exactly. But, you know, outside of pushing on, are they the right people? You know, the only thing I know to do, and I learned this from working with you and Reid, is to address it head on. I was just going to say. Because, you know, you are going to have times when teams, you know, cross-functional teams, leaders, whomever, don't agree. And we would always say, like, if I came to you and said, oh, Patty, you know, so and so on this team is like, and you'd say, well, what did that person say when you told them that? And I'm like, oh, well, I didn't tell them that. And then, you know. I like when they say, oh, I can't tell them that.

12:58And I would say, you just told me. Right. Yeah. The words are there. May not be the right, you know, order. Right. But if you can tell me, you can tell them. Exactly. And then, you know, I loved what Reed would do if we were in a meeting with him. He's like, okay, let's call them or let's get them to come over here right now. And then we'd literally get, we'd have the conversation right there. And I think, you know, you just have to nip these things in the bud real quick and actually have a tough conversation. And the thing that encouraged this CEO that I was talking about an hour ago is that the team has a good foundation.

13:40They seem to like like each other and respect each other. And like then you should be able to talk about the tension and walk away with a different solution than what you're doing now, because what you're doing now, it's not working. Yeah. And sometimes as a leader, it's in this situation, it's really, really, really important to model disagreement. Right. Which is, it's perfectly reasonable that a new team member or change in organization or a change in what you're doing or a team member leaving or all that. That's always going to create tension. And tension isn't a bad thing. Yeah, I agree. And debate's not a bad thing either.

14:20And if people are disagreeing and arguing about it, particularly about something that's about work, then that's an issue for the whole team. Yeah, I agree. And so when you do that, you two don't come out until you're friends again, may not be the right solution, you know, when it's a team dynamic about something that's bigger than those two particular people. Agreed. But generally, in my experience, these tensions stem from like one or two people, you know, and so you do kind of have to address it with them, but also address it with the team after you've done that. Yeah. And just the other thing that people, when it's this snarky one-on-one thing, well, you know how Jessica is.

15:04Yeah. Right. It's not that I don't like her. It's just that she's kind of stupid or she has the wrong opinion about something or she's just wrong. Right. And you're right. Our favorite saying in the world is what did you say when you told her that? But also that that's just it's usually about something that's important to one person or the other. Right. And so it's important to everybody. And so the more you let isolate those two people and let them keep having their fight, the more destructive it is. Because, I mean, I've said this a million times on our podcast, like whenever there's conflict between individual team members, that's the show everybody wants to watch.

15:44It's just people do. It's human nature. Right. And so what's going to happen in the da-da-da meeting? And they just sit back and go, oh, here it comes. This is going to be good. Right. Or, wow, that was a career limiting move. Yeah. That was when I worked at Sun Microsystems. That was our favorite saying, like, oh, she stood up and like said something to the boss. That's a career limiting move. Yeah. And if you can demonstrate that it's not, like, what's the conflict here? And, you know, it's probably happened to you. But half the time when you really bring whatever it is out in the open, people are like, well, maybe it wasn't that big a deal.

16:21It's like, OK, can we move on? Yeah, exactly. And we would often do that. So, you know, at Netflix, we would talk to the two individuals. OK, let's go debate this in front of everybody. And then we'd have the debate in front of everybody. And then, you know, I think when you can talk about the hard things openly, you can solve them. But, you know, you have to do it in a respectful way. And if somebody's not doing it in a respectful way, then that's a different thing. But if you can talk about the things, it doesn't mean you can't be passionate about them. Yeah. And one more thing I wanted to say that's particularly important for managers, which is a really easy trap to get into, which is if you get in the middle of solving this problem between the two people, it will never solve.

17:06Right. I talk to you and you tell me, you know, how crappy somebody else is. The other person says, oh, well, you think I'm crappy. You should hear what Jessica did. Right. You're like, oh, yeah, well, you know, I did. I mean, it's like. Yeah. No, you can't do that. You can't do it. And it's so easy. It's very easy. Because you're in a one on one with somebody and you're having a conversation. You're like, what went wrong? And the person you say, oh, you know how she is. Right. Like, did it again. I told you. I told you. And we want to be the answer. Yeah. Right. We want to solve the problem because we think that's our job.

17:45And so the question was, what are your approaches to team management? And one of them is to not be the solution all the time if you're the leader. I think that's great advice. And talk openly about the hard things and the tension. You're always, I mean, and to your point, Patty, tension, tension's good. You know, it doesn't, it's not necessarily a bad thing because it gets, you get to the heart of the hard things when you debate and you talk about these things, but you have to do it in a respectful way. Yeah. And if everything's easy and happy all the time, you're not probably pushing it very hard, right?

18:25Right. And and that's the, you know, back to the team metaphor, the things that are amazing that you accomplish together with other people at work are often things that are hard. Yeah. And so learning how to push through that together is a skill that will last you the rest of your life. Right. Not just at work, but but certainly at work will help you be successful. But I think your point about not being the solution, like, and I was just thinking, like, be the leader. Lead them through that. Don't don't try to solve it, but show them show them how to do it by you doing it. Yeah. Which means you got to get better at it, too, which means a little self-reflection for you to say, is there anybody that of one of my peers that I might be, you know, I might be modeling the wrong behavior.

19:19Right. Again, you know, I know it sounds so simple and so cliched, but it's not what you say. It's what you do. I know. Perception's reality, my friend. My friend. You want to do the next one? How do I juggle personal and professional responsibilities? My spouse has developed a disability that's altered my priorities in life. They weren't in a high paid role before, so I've always been the higher earner. But now I feel guilty about not being able to give 100 percent to my work. How can I best navigate this? Oh, well, I'm sorry to hear about that. That's a tough situation to be in. And while we may not all be in that situation, we are all always or at least sometimes in a situation that's very similar to this.

20:09I know. A new baby at home, a sick parent, losing a pet. I mean, there's the juggling my personal and professional relationship is probably a question we all ask ourselves. All the time. All the time. Right. Yeah. And I learned when I was when I was a young ripper snapper and I worked at Sun, I worked with a woman named Carol Bartz. She went on to become the CEO of Yahoo. She was the she was the head of sales at Sun, like the only woman on the other side of the cement ceiling there. Right. And I had her come speak to a women's group one time and they said, oh, how do you find balance? Right. How do you do it?

20:51How do you balance, you know, your career and your family? And she said, there's not a scale. Right. It just doesn't work that way. And so she said, here's what I do. And it may not work for you, but here's what I do. I negotiate pretty frequently with my family the things that are absolutely critical and must be important. You know, whatever those and say nothing will come between me and your ballet recital, doctor's appointment, whatever those things are. And I will go to work and I will say those are non-negotiables. And there will be times when work's going to take that all away. Right. And so her advice was it's not balance.

21:34It's constant negotiation. In this person's particular case, it's hard to negotiate away when somebody has a disability. Does somebody need you? And here's the deal. You got to rethink what 100 % is and really evaluate what that means to you. So I remember that early in my career, one of the things I would do when I didn't have children was I would hang out outside. It was a company that had half our company was in Singapore. So all the executives met in the executive conference room at seven o 'clock at night and had their early morning call with Singapore. Right. And I would hang out on a bench outside the door, you know, looking at resumes or whatever and wait for them to come out.

22:20And 100 % of the time, one of them would go, Patty, what are you doing here? I've been meaning to talk to you about an opening I have, right? And just because I was there, I got that interaction, right? Then I had my son. And I realized, wait a minute, I don't know if I can work 12-hour days anymore. Maybe I should skip those two-hour lunches. Yeah. Maybe I should not shoot the shit with, right? I mean, and so what I started to think about was the difference between time in the job and time at the job. Right. And so that's a real self-reflection thing you need to do, which is what does 100 % mean?

23:06If it means really long hours, you can't do that anymore. So how do you rearrange that? The other thing is to not make it, to make it just part of the rhythm of the conversations you have with your boss. Here's my situation. Here's what I can and can't do. I still want to be amazing. Yeah. But it's going to be different. Exactly. And I was going to say that. And to the point that you were making earlier, we all have lives outside of work and we all have these things, whether it's someone that has a disability or a sick parent or a kid or, you know, many, many other things. And I have found that when you are transparent about those things to your boss, they find ways to support you because they've likely been there at some point, too.

23:57Right. Or know someone that has. Right. And so when you can go and have that conversation to say, this is going on. Uh-huh. However, I still want to be amazing. Yeah. But it's going to look different. And it also might be a, hey, listen, here's what the next six months are going to look like for me. Yeah. And we got to figure out how to make that work. I mean, for me and my example, I started realizing I could just book time on an executive's calendar like anybody else. Yeah. Right. I didn't have to wait for them to notice me. I could. And they would say, what are you doing here at 10 o 'clock in the morning?

24:33I want to talk to you about this opening you have. Oh, good. I'm glad you're here. Right. Yeah. And it was like, I just had to change the way I approached it. The other thing about some of those situations is that they take a lot of emotion. And so that's where having a great relationship with your boss and your team members is really helpful because they want to support you. Yeah, absolutely. I was just thinking about the guilt because they brought up the guilt. Yeah. And, you know, I struggle with the guilt because being a mom is the only thing that I can sort of relate to the situation. Because when I'm spending time with Hudson, I feel guilty about not spending time with work.

25:21And when I'm at work, I feel guilty about not spending time with Hudson. Been there, done that. And it's a really hard thing. And the only thing that I've learned to do that helps me with it is what you said earlier. I don't know if I thought about it as negotiating, right? Like the woman at Sun did. But it's just creating boundaries to say, you know, here are the things that I absolutely have to be for, right? And here are the things that it's okay if I miss at work and at home, you know? Like, you know, there's a holiday party in New York. I'm like, I don't need to go. Yeah, right. They're not going to miss me, you know, and it's a bunch of young people from work.

26:05And, you know, I don't need to go to that. It's okay that I miss that, you know, and it's one less person that they have to pay travel for and all this stuff. But I try to think about that. And that's the only thing that kind of helps me be a little bit more calm and not as anxious or guilty. Yeah. You know, here's the thing that surprised me that we learned. And I love this part of the pandemic when we all went virtual. Like, remember the viral one of the newscaster who's broadcasting the news? Oh, yeah, with the kids coming in. His kids walk to the back room. Still love that video. I still love that.