The Work Expert: Why Your Obsession With Speed Is Destroying Your Team | Bree Groff

0:00The leaders that I know that are best at getting the right work done brilliantly are the ones who know how to say project C, D, D, and E. we are not starting until we have finished projects A and B.

0:19What 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 Cattie 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.

0:57Hi, everyone. Welcome to another episode of TruthWorks. I'm your host, Jessica Neal. And today I have a very special guest. I'm very excited. So this woman, her name is Bree Groff. She is one of the clearest voices calling out a lie most of us have quietly accepted at work. That it's not hard. It's not meaningful. If it's not hard, it's not meaningful. I mean, we all think that. It should be hard or I'm not earning it. So I'm so excited to have Brie. Brie is, she has been a CEO, she has taught math, she is an advisor and an executive, and she is an author of a book that she's going to talk to us about.

1:41So Brie, welcome to the show. Thank you for having me, Jessica. You're welcome. So tell us a little bit about your story, because you kind of go from teaching math in high school to CEO to SY, and writing a book. Which, by the way, I love the title of the book. It's just so, it's fun. It's good. It's fun. Today was fun, you know? Because not every day is fun at work. No. Not, all I'm shooting for is most days. If most days are fun, like, you're batting above. You're winning. You're winning. That's great. Right? Yes. And so I, yeah, the title I felt encapsulated for me, like, the one metric that we should be asking of ourselves, which is most days, can you say today was fun?

2:33Yes. But yeah, to back up, I've had a few different careers, lots of different variations on what work was to me. I started my career in education. I taught seventh grade math, high school math and physics. Amazingly, it would happen that on a Friday afternoon of teaching, I would say to myself, I have to wait two more days till I get to see those kids again. I think I started off my career with this sense of I'm looking forward to going back to work on Monday. My parents were both educators. My mom was a kindergarten teacher. My dad was an elementary school principal. I remember my mom coming home and saying, I have the best days.

3:13And so it was very easy to grow up with this concept of work being a place to have fun. Yeah, you had parents who liked what they did. Yeah. Yeah. And you just grow up and you're like, oh, that's normal, right? I'm going to grow up and like what I do too. Yeah. I mean, I guess if you have a parent that comes home every day is like, oh, the worst day ever. Work is terrible. Then you probably grow up thinking work is pretty terrible. Yeah. Right. That's just the culture, the water we're swimming in. Yeah. So it was really only when I moved into consulting after some time in education, I moved into innovation and coaching within education.

3:49And then from there, got interested in other industries. I moved into consulting and doing more innovation and service design work. It was only then when I was in meetings back to back, say eight hours a day, when I was peeking into all of these different company cultures through our work. And I'm like, oh, people are not having fun. No, not in the least, right? Like it would be a week after week of the same refrain where it's like, oh my God, it's Monday. Is it only Wednesday? It's Thursday. TGIF, right? And then you get the Sunday scaries and then you have to do it all again. You do. You get the Sunday scaries.

4:29Right? And I get that. Yeah. I didn't have them so much with work because I've kind of always liked what I did. But there were certain days where it wasn't as fun as some of the days, for sure. But when I was little, I remember my parents used to always watch 60 Minutes on Sunday nights and that like the 60 minutes, like if anybody, I'm sure most people have seen 60 minutes, like that ticking and I'd hear the ticking. I'm like, oh God, I have school tomorrow. I know. It's just like, oh, so now I still watch 60 minutes, but every time I hear the ticking, I'm like, oh, school. It's like you've been pavloved into like, I hear the ticking and I We know the alarm clock is coming.

5:13Yes. Yes. And it's like, I get it. You know, like at work, we are, work is athletic, right? It's, we are exerting ourselves. We are doing, hopefully, high enough stakes things that there's some degree of nervousness. Is it going to work out? And are our plans going to succeed? So there is a degree of exertion that then does beg for some rest. I think what I'm trying to change the narrative around is, does the exertion or even, dare I say, pain that comes with work, does that feel like a hard workout, which is the good kind of pain, right? Like I'm training, I'm proving myself. I'm in pain. Yes.

6:03Right. If you're running or lifting something, but I know it's going to be good for me. And I'm like checking myself out in the mirror. I'm looking my muscles are popping versus the bad kind of pain, which is I'm getting beat up. Like I did not choose this. This is not good for me. And I think far too often we accept that bad kind of pain when really what we want is a hard workout, something that actually feels like I'm growing stronger through this experience. Yeah, no, that's a good reframing, I think. So continuing into your story, because we get a little off track. So you're in consulting, everybody's miserable, they're going to all these meetings.

6:43And then what aha do you have? Well, at the time, I was doing more innovation kind of consulting. What new products or services are you offering? And I I thought to myself, this is the least interesting part of what's going on here. Like the products and services, sure, interesting. We can talk about what those things are. But I thought the most interesting part was, wait, how are you all feeling? Do you all like each other? Did anyone laugh in the last hour? Like when you go home, what are you going to tell your significant other or your friends about your day? That's what I felt just so immensely curious about.

7:19And so that's really when I started to focus more on culture, employee experience. I did a master's degree in learning and organizational change to really get nerdy about how people, the human experience of navigating change. And then from there, moved to SY Partners, where I was a partner and where I'm now a senior advisor. And doing all sorts of work, leadership and strategy, but still my favorite work was always that employee experience, culture work. You know, because you can talk about, yes, we're investing in this market or this product. But the interesting thing is, oh, but that person was a jerk in the meeting.

7:57Like, oh, now that can ruin your day, even if your product's going well. You sure can. So that's where I have found the most joy professionally is understanding what's the human experience of work. And then, of course, putting that into a book, everything that I've learned about leading teams myself and all throughout my consulting experience was this really joyful, a big like exhale of everything I'd learned. Yeah. So, well, let's talk about culture and work. And, you know, you do have companies and experiences where even if you're working really hard and you're in back-to-back meetings, but you're doing it with people that you generally like and respect, it's pretty fun.

8:44When you're doing it with people that you don't really like, you don't respect, maybe you don't think they're that smart, it tends to be pretty terrible. Yes. So is it just surrounding yourself with the best people or what's the trick? Yeah, I hold a strong belief and I think would resonate with many that people make the difference, which is not like groundbreaking in and of itself, right? There's the longitudinal studies of happiness that say, surprise, surprise, there's one factor that matters more than anything else in terms of long-term human happiness. It is the relationships. It's just the people that make our life what it is.

9:29And, you know, I think of a show like The Office where there is no purpose or meaning for Miles, right? They are selling paper. Yeah. Like we are, we're not touting the benefits of meaningful work here. The whole point of the show is that even when work isn't meaningful. Yeah. Still, you can have fun. Yeah. If you are around people that make it so. If you make it so yourself. If you like those people. And they all kind of hated each other a little bit, which like make it funny. But the show was about relationships. Yeah. And the joy that you can create even despite the circumstances. Yes. Well, let's talk about this.

10:15I mean, I think that there are things that companies can do to ensure that the environment is just as you're describing. Right. And we worked very, very, very hard at that at Netflix. Like, you know, one of our big things was not hiring brilliant jerks. Like, we didn't care how smart you were. But if you were a jerk, it wasn't going to work out. And because at the end of the day, even though they're brilliant, it's not going to scale. Right? Because, yeah, like nobody wants to work with a jerk who thinks they know it all. Right. And oh, by the way, they don't want to work with you either. Because they think they know it all.

10:57Yes. So it's just a toxic environment. So we worked very hard at that. But a lot of companies may not work as hard at that. Or maybe they're trying to work hard at that. They just haven't figured it out yet. Me as an employee, as an individual, and I'm sort of in this environment where it's not that great. I don't really like the people I'm working with. What do I do? How do I have fun? Well, first of all, a big plus one on the goal, and then we can talk about how. Frankly, I'm very clear in the book and also in my life that I am optimizing for good laughs with good people. I am optimizing for spending my days with creative, inspiring, funny people.

11:45And then while we're hanging out, a fun thing to do is to create value for others and money for ourselves. I'm not optimizing for my impact in the world. I know what drives human happiness and my happiness, and that's my day spent with people I like. So to get to the question, what do you do? Well, the first thing is it's just so much easier to like people if you know them. And so much about professionalism keeps us from knowing people, right? There's this like, oh, you're not supposed to ask about anything personal. Don't say, how was your weekend? Because you never know, maybe they had a traumatic weekend.

12:18But I honestly think there is so much headroom. It's like you're not asking like, hey, when did you lose your virginity? There's so much between that question. No, you probably shouldn't. It's a little too far. That's too far, right? Like, yeah. And everyone listening who's in HR was like, oh my God. But there's so much distance between that and knowing if someone has pets, right? There's so much that's safe to know. And I'd argue is very human and caring and fundamental to know often you can spend years working with someone and then all of a sudden they're like oh my brother's in town and you're like you have a brother and sometimes it's just nice to know about the people very basic things like who are the people or animals who are important to them i don't know where in the world roughly did they grow up um i don't do you know their middle name do you know like there's so much that's still in the realm of like not intrusive yeah and i think when we start with just get to know the people and this can start through to get practical about it very small um you could even call them like micro confessions so in an email i'll often say um hey how was your weekend hope it was good You know, we were dog sitting some dogs.

13:40And so my apartment is covered in hair. Wish me luck. Anyway, if you could send the report by next week, right? It's like a very small window of like I've shared something not sensitive, but personal. Personal, yeah. Right? That in turn, I think when people slightly open the door to us, it invites us then to share back with them. All to say, if you can sort of crack that candy coating that we put up as a wall of professionalism, then it's like, I know this person that's easier to like them, to have ultimately work friends. Yeah. And I think ultimately it's true that most individuals are not jerks, right?

14:25There's the rare brilliant jerk that you're never going to change that person's colors. They're a jerk. But most people aren't and they're behaving in a way that they think that they should behave because they've been told to behave that way or they saw somebody else behave that way. And so that's how they've learned to work or, you know, whatever. But I do think that once you get to know who they are and what their motivations are, then you can see them more as a human. And when you see them more as a human, that they're just normal. It's much easier to have fun with them. Yes. Totally. This is a perfect example of this is road rage, right?

15:13Like someone. What is I hate road rage? But people have it. I know people have it. My girlfriend, I get in the car with her. I'm like, who are you? This is not the person I know. Like what's happening? The volcano. She just turns into a different person. I'm like, good God. Well, it's just, it's really true. But there's something so othering and you're in your little bubble of a car, right? And so you are assuming that the other person is not going to come talk to you. You're assuming you're going to have no contact, right? They're very othered and it's very easy to assign malice when there's ambiguity.

15:53you know what I do this is tell me um every time I like I don't even say I don't like really cuss about road people be like oh man idiot or like whatever I always say god I'm sorry I said I don't know like you know I'm sure people have thought I'm an idiot at some point but I always like try to like ask for forgiveness that's so sweet well you're just like writing your karma. I really like that. I'm trying. I'm trying. I'm like, oh God, here I am. But I'm not like my girlfriend, fortunately. Well, the funniest thing I've heard about road rage, an alternative to flicking someone off, to giving them the middle finger, much more powerful is just giving them a thumbs down, which I love because it's just so human, right?

16:40Yeah. Like that, no, no good. I like that. No good. No, somebody told me one time, because you just remind me with a thumbs down. Like when somebody says something like rude to you or, you know, it's kind of maybe being a bit of a bully to instead of not responding or kind of responding in a bully way back, just to say, are you okay? Yeah. Something wrong? Yeah. I have a 10-year-old daughter and so we're always talking with her about like emotional regulation as she grows up. And we talk about anger is always a cover-up emotion. Like, anger is not usually what you're really feeling or trying to express.

17:22It's like, I'm disappointed. I'm embarrassed. I'm frustrated. There's something that then gets expressed as anger. And what I love about the, are you okay? It's like, it takes the anger away. I guess as long as you don't say it, like, condescendingly. But it takes the anger away just to like, hey, you're a human. Right? Or like you could respond with someone's meme to you with like, I didn't like that. Yeah. You know, just like, what's the actual like, oh, that made me feel bad. Yeah. Like just the if we take our walls down and I think so much of what I see as a fix for not enjoying our work or to not getting along with people is like, how can we humanize the situation?

18:06Like, how can we just be like, hey, I'm here to try and make my way in the world to try and have a good day. You probably are, too. Yeah. You know? Yeah, exactly. I think, you know, is that so obviously humanizing, but like this comes down to communication. Mm hmm. Is that really what you're asking people to do? I think to communicate. I get the thing I'm overusing the word human, but to communicate as a human rather than communicating as a professional. professional. Professionalism at its best is respect for other people's time, respect for the work, doing high quality work. This is all really valuable professionalism, but there's a kind of performative professionalism that is not helpful.

18:51So when we use all sorts of jargon because we're like, I don't know what I'm doing here, but I think it's going to sound smart if I say it this way, right? Or the way that we might be very curt or passive aggressive in our communication when And we're trying not to say something that upset us. And we're just trying to keep it professional. But I just don't, I think it does us more disservice than not. And so I'm always a fan of de-jargoning. Instead of saying leverage strategic capabilities, can we just say use what we're good at? Yeah. I hate those terms. You know, it's, I get it. You know the one I hate the most?

19:30Oh, tell me. When people say, let's double click on that. I'm like, can we not say that anymore? I don't want to double click on anything. Oh my God. Let's double click. I know. And you know, we don't, I guess we do double click. I'm sorry for the people that say double click. I'm sorry. If you love it, keep saying it. You know, I was in a taxi with my husband the other day and we thought we forgot something and he's like, oh, well, we should just circle back. And I'm like, so jargony. He's like, no, I mean, like, literally we should go around the block. And I was like, I forgot that's actually like just a real thing you do.

20:06Yeah. Yeah. You actually can circle back your path. Yes. Yeah. And make sure you did. So I think you've said that like misery at work is mostly like by design. Yeah. It's not necessary. Right. Hot take. So, right. So tell us more. I think there's a misconception that we get paid at work because work is painful and you have to incentivize people to do it. Yeah. This is not true. You get paid at work because you create value. The pain is entirely optional. There are plenty of people who are creating value of all kinds, like impact, dollars, growth, who are having a grand time. So it's just not strictly true that we get paid because work is painful.

21:03And so therefore, if we can start to even open our minds to the possibility that not every day, but most days could be great days at work. if we're showing up and creating value, we don't need to struggle in order to achieve it. And I think a lot of times what we end up doing is this, again, a performative thing, this performative exhaustion. Oh, I'm so tired. Or, you know, even on the days when maybe you don't have that many meetings and you feel kind of refreshed. I know I in the past have felt like, did I not work hard enough? Like, it's so weird not to be exhausted. I should be exhausted because it's almost like to sit at the cool kids table at work, you have to say, oh my God, I was in so many meetings today.

21:53Oh, I have to work late tonight. Right? Like, I'm sleep when I'm dead. And I'm trying to rewrite that narrative. Yeah. But if you think about it, everybody says that. And sometimes it's true, but sometimes it's not. And we say it because we think it should be true. Right. Right. Because if we're not burning ourselves out, we're doing something wrong. People don't think you are. Yes. Then, yeah, they're going to think you're not working hard enough or, yeah. Yeah. When, in fact, there are a few people I've worked with who are so brilliant. And then they just stopped working at 5 o 'clock. My friend was like, yeah, I'm just going to go get my kid now and have an evening.

22:35Yeah. And I remember at the time I was like, oh, I'm going back on to work after my kid goes to bed. And I was like, wait, does she know something? I don't. So this is not to shame anybody, right? That really just has a math problem at work. Like I have more work than I have hours, which is true for many people. But also I think we should start to glamorize the idea that I'm so good. I can do all of my work within business hours. Yeah. And then go hang out. Yeah. That should be celebrated. Because if you are that good, great. Great for you. Yeah, I know. I mean, we never, we never, and Netflix, I thought about it this way.

23:19Like, I didn't care how many hours you worked. I cared about the work you did and if it was good or not. Yeah. And if it was great work, like, I didn't care if you took a long vacation. Like, what do I care? You only care when, and this is why we got rid of, like, vacation policy and all that. all the things. You only cared when people were not working that hard or weren't doing great work when they were like, I'm going to go out on vacation. You're like, you're going on vacation? Yeah. Why are you going? You should be working on it. But you didn't care if the person on the team who was doing exceptional work was like, I'm going to take a week or two vacation.

23:55You're like, great. Yeah. Go take a vacation. Well earned, well deserved, right? Yeah. But I do think, and we've talked about this on the podcast before, like this idea of like rest as a reward. Like, you know, I have to earn that rest. Yeah. But I like what you're saying because what you're saying is like, just be good at what you do and be okay with finishing it at an exceptional, you know, rate of time. Yes. Further, I would say too, like rest, you know, rest is good for productivity. We've heard that argument so many times. totally true, right? Everyone, you know, the marathoner needs to rest and taper before the big race.

24:37But also rest is just part of being human and enjoying your life. Yeah, I remember like Netflix being one of the OGs of vacation policy. There's even a new acronym I've been toying with. Okay. Let me see. Instead of PTO. Oh yeah, I hate PTO. Which is paid time off where It has this assumption like the company still owns your time, is generously gifting your life back to you. And a lot of times you request PTO. Right? Yeah. And then it can be denied. Like, oh, can I have some of my life back? And then the company is like, no. Yeah, no. Take it another week. Instead, because we all have employment contracts and in there somewhere it talks about how this PTO is negotiated.

25:25But I like the term TINS. T-I-N-S. which stands for time I never sold. I never sold you this time, right? Like, because there's this assumption that you, if you're a full-time salaried employee, you have signed your life to the company. Right. And the company acknowledges, oh, you're a human being. I guess you get some rest in order to - Go take a vacation. Right. And like, you better come back recharged or else, right? Like, as if your time off is to like, refuel your corporate battery. Yeah. But no, time I never sold is like, no. And I signed this agreement. I did not sell you my whole life.

26:01In fact, this time I'm going to go take now was never yours in the first place. This was all mine. Right. I like it. I don't know if it'll stick, but I'm working on it. I like it. Or it could even be like time I deserve. Tid. Tid. Nice too. Saves a letter. Right. Because you do. You deserve it. I mean, we feel like we don't, but we do. You know, and I think I, I don't know about you, but I think I got a little bit better at thinking about this when I did have a kid. Yeah. You know, it did change. Like, I didn't, I wanted to, like, take a break and be with my kid. Like, you know, like, I was ready to, like, hang out with them.

26:42I was like, okay, got it all done. And I would sort of, you know, say, okay, like at this time I'm going to spend with my kid and I'm just, I'm going to try to be as present and okay with that. And then when I'm at work, I'm going to try to be as present and okay with that. You know, now when I first had him, I had a really, really big job at Netflix and that was a little harder to do and we had people all over the world. But I tried not to feel bad about it. And, and, but you do, you start to like, when I was with him, I'd feel guilty that I wasn't working. And then when I was working, I'd feel guilty I wasn't with him.

27:17But I just tried to not get that out of my head and like be, be present where I am and be okay with, you know, letting go. You know, you had to let go a little bit. You have to. Yeah. I mean, I, one of the reframes I make for myself is if I think, oh, Brie works a lot, kind of fine with that. Yes, I work a lot. If I think Arden, who's my daughter, Arden's mom works a lot, I think, oh, no. Like, is that what I want for her? Like, do I want her to have a mom that works a lot? And obviously a lot is relative, but. Right. Right. Or like Arden never sees her mom because she works a lot. Right. That's the more salient.

28:02Like Arden never sees her mom because she works a lot. That makes me go, hold everything, right? We need to reframe. And there was one time when she was, I think, four years old. I was reading her a bedtime story, which any parent would know, sometimes it goes on for ages. And I knew I had work left to do that night. I could feel slack, like burning a hole in my pocket. God. And so I'm like, ugh, she's four. I started turning two pages of her bedtime story at once being like, oh, we'll just get through it faster. She's not following the plot. Yeah. And then she caught me and was like, you're not doing your best.