 So first off, welcome to the show, Alex Abav. It's great to have you. Thank you so much. Great to be here. Amazing to be here. Now, writing a book is a huge undertaking for one person, let alone a married couple, trying to put their words down to paper. And I know your past history with some relationship bumps in the road, you would think would not make you want to jump into writing a book with your spouse. So how did this project come about? I don't know what you're talking about. We actually consciously kept out of each other's businesses for several years because of past relationship problems. It took us a while to decide, all right, we're doing this together. Yeah, I mean, I think Alex had a special, I mean, I don't know, I had had my own issues, but I think you especially had had some issues with creative projects together. I had had plenty of relationship problems in my life. So I was very happy to keep things simple and really happy to prioritize our relationship over our work or our, you know, like I supported your work, you supported my work, but we just didn't get involved in each other's work. And I think it worked really, really well for the first four or five years of our relationship. Yeah. And how did the aim method help with this exact project? It's fun, you should ask. Well, we've been using the method for a long time, you know, in everything from sort of stressful family visits of which, you know, my family is particularly a source of for me and also, you know, raising a child together and moving into, you know, picking into apartment and trying to move in New York City, which is always an adventure. And we just had a great, and even actually deciding to get married, we used it when we decided to get married, we used it to plan our wedding. It was just one of these things that we just always went back to. And then when we finally realized after a while of people, we'd had so many people asking us about the method again and again, and we explained it over and over again. And so we were a little bit slow on the uptake when it came to, hey, maybe we have a product here, maybe we should do something with this thing. And so we were like, okay, I think, I think one of us needs to write this book. And for a while it was just going to be me and I was totally blocked about it. And then finally, I think we were on a beach in Rhode Island or something. And I was like, I think we have to do this together. And I think there's there's no way around this. And so I probably, you immediately were like, okay, now let's, let's use the method. Let's do this. Let's talk about this. Let's really talk about it. Yeah. And it actually, it really helped us quiet our nervous system upset about getting involved in a multi year creative and business project together. Now, well, when it's something like a book, there is a, there's a lot of intimate thought processes that go along and putting together that content. And now you were laying that out in the open. So I can only see that while mostly as a positive for a relationship to really gain some understandings of how you see certain things so that the other one may have a better understanding of your approach to situations, worldviews. So I do a lot of work with teams in my, in my day job or my other job, you know, like that's my, I work by the leadership teams, a lot of product teams. And I've always had a strong belief that it's actually, you know, the differences on the teams that really make the difference. The differences make the difference, right? That, and it's not because somebody might have a better idea. It's more because ideas kind of bump into each other and then create that third better idea, the cognitive friction will sort of create forces creativity. And so we really wanted to embrace that, I think, for this project. And we've both done, as I said, collaborative projects. I'd written a book previously with a bunch of colleagues at a company I was at where I'd been the editor. So I'd been kind of the final source of all the words for that. And I've been very heavy-handed and I actually heard some personal relationships through that. So I was a little bit, I didn't, I certainly didn't want to do that with, with Alex. And so one of the things that emerged from running through the method together, one of the boundaries we had was when it came to editing that we could be ruthless with each other in a sense. So because we wanted a voice, we wanted our voice to emerge from it, not it to be like, I do one chapter, you do one chapter, and then somehow you get this sort of Frankenstein monster of a book. We wanted it to be a unified project. Yeah. And actually my concerns going in were without going into too much gruesome detail. My ex and I made the movie Super Size Me. And it wasn't the creative process itself that was the source of friction, but it was the legal stuff that sat around the film, like intellectual property rights and, you know, all that stuff. IMDB credits. Yeah. All that stuff that goes around a creative project when there's any kind of money or platform involved, like to get really clear with each other, what your agreements are, what the, you know, what the boundaries are, and what's really important. I think I wish I had learned that so much earlier in my life that those things should be discussed, really. Yeah. I think everyone goes into a collaborative creative space thinking that it's going to just magically end up where we all want it to be. And unfortunately, once it's created and out in the world and credit is due and the project is at fruition, of course, people are going to feel differently than they did at the very start of that project. And we've experienced it ourselves. And that's why it's so remarkable a book about alignment. We got two co-authors getting in alignment to actually write that book, and that backstory is fascinating. Now, for our audience, what is the aim method? Let's break it down for them first so they can really understand what we're talking about. Sure. So it's just a simple method that it's a structured conversation. The idea is not to problem solve or negotiate or anything like that. So it's different from maybe sort of a planning methodology or a negotiating methodology that you might find in other books, which we are happy to recommend. But it's really a good, an opportunity before you get into that to really develop a nuanced understanding and empathy for each other. I was actually just listening to your podcast with Keith Verazzi and he just emphasized empathy over and vulnerability over and over and over again. And so often I find, and I use some of his methodology, I love his perspective. And it's very easy to kind of always keep, you know, force that in either completely outside of the business context or kind of within some other thing, you know, some, like some planning methodology or some meeting methodology. But we really felt like what was needed is just an opportunity to listen to each other in a new way, to simply develop, we think of as you have a big informational landscape, right? So if I'm, before we get into planning, before we get into boundaries, before we get into setting up the team, let's really just kind of figure out where we are and really listen to each other in sort of a deep and vulnerable and authentic way. And we find that that speeds up everything else, it actually makes everything else work better. So the method itself is the sort of, what we think of as the traditional sort of missing conversations or the conversations that often don't happen or they happen only after you've sort of stumbled across some in landmine. So one is intentions, which is like, why, why are you doing this? And why am I doing this? And it may be for different reasons, that's completely fine, right? I may be going on vacation to, I don't know. Have adventure. Have adventure. And you may want to go on vacation to drink my ties on the beach, which is absolutely not your style, but you know, but that's the, you know, like that, that kind of disagreement might, might be there. And we can probably reconcile that, but let's, let's first like just surface all of that. So intentions, the next are concerns and concerns are super easy. Yeah, our brains are incredibly good at coming up with all the fears and the worries. So this is the place, this is the safe place to express all the crazy, like really go for it. We recommend being very brave. Like I'm worried if we write this book together, we will fight and divorce and I will die alone under a bridge. Like that is where my brain goes. And we've learned through some conversations with our friend, Dr. Sreny Pillay. Like when you actually say your fears out loud, your brain hears it, your nervous system can actually calm down. So it does help you eventually make better decisions. And then you can just be aware like, oh, you have a fear or a concern about that. Not taking it personally, just putting these things out, because that's what our brains do. Yeah, the concern doesn't even need to make sense or be defensible in any way. And often, again, a lot of the planning methodologies that I've used is sort of like, we will explore like where, where might this go wrong? But then it forces a kind of structure to it. It's sort of like, well, if I'm going to say this, I better have a defense. I better have a reason why rather than just my brain does this crazy stuff, you know, like, I'm just thinking this stuff, which is really the information we want to have, like knowing that Alex is afraid of dying alone under a bridge, which is of course, also my fear, you know, like, for some reason, I don't know why it's always a bridge. But, you know, like, it's sort of like, that's where the sort of concern chain goes to. And, you know, let's have fun with our concerns rather than be all serious about them too. Yeah, I think for a lot of us, when we think about concerns, we don't feel comfortable airing them in a conversation, especially at work, where we feel like we are going to have to defend anything that comes out of our mouths and hey, to admit some of those fears. Well, that opens you up to scrutiny that maybe you don't really want to have in a meeting with all of your peers. So I totally understand in relationships that matter and our families, that's difficult, but business seems to open up a whole other can of worms when it comes to vulnerability. And it's something that we also talked about with Keith. So how do you encourage those teams to speak openly about their concerns where it's not with their spouse, it is with someone who's judging their performance, who ultimately is going to be in charge of their promotions? A couple of things. One is that you set it up as a sense of, as a kind of look, we're just going to gather information about each other and even a sense of play. Like you're like, again, your concerns don't have to make sense. Like even encouraging people throw out like the craziest concern you have. Like, and really, again, so we're not, we don't encourage or we don't usually even allow when we run the method with groups, crosstalk. So it's not like anybody else is going to interrupt you, anybody else is going to comment on what you say. We're just here to get to know you and get to know your brain and the way you think about the world, the way you see the world. And some of that for all of us is some degree of unreasonable concerns. Our brains are, and this sometimes will bring in data. Data is always fun, right? You bring in a study about how our cognitive bias, you know, like negativity bias and what that is and how that, and how that developed evolutionarily and all of these things can be super helpful in giving people the permission to play with this a little bit. The other thing I do is I also will coach leaders and say, look, probably I'm not not 100%, but probably you're not going to get vulnerability out of people that's further than where you are willing to go. You're the person who's kind of got to set the bar. And so, and it really depends on the leaders. Sometimes I'll push the leader to go first and sometimes I'll push the leader to go last and it really depends on the dynamics in the room. And it's often a judgment call. But really, you know, letting the leaders set the tone and understanding that the leader can also set the tone can dampen the tone as well, right? They can, you know, everybody's going to be kind of playing to them in some way. It's just what we do as social primates. I think the other big piece to that, as many of us, to your earlier point, will hold onto these concerns internally and it actually blocks us from being able to hear all the other important information in that meeting. If all we're thinking about is the worst case or the most negative outcome, we don't share it. Well, we're not going to hear all the other relevant details that we need to discuss. It is a creativity killer for sure. So once you share your intention, and by the way, we really encourage people and even in our relationship in our family, like we will time it. Everybody gets two minutes or everybody gets four minutes and that really does create that team psychological safety for those of us who, like me, may need 15 seconds to put my thoughts together. I'm not worried that people are going to jump in or I'm wasting time and like, no, I have my space here. So each share your intentions, concerns, and then you get to boundaries. Now this is tough for a lot of people because most of us have never been taught to have boundaries. Think of it as starter boundaries. All right, you don't have to get this perfect, but you can also consider like, what are the things I need to show up as my best? You know, I need to get eight hours of sleep a night or I need to, like, I need to not answer emails after the sun goes down. There are those kinds of boundaries that you can consider. Or in your marriage, like let's say we're having a stressful family vacation, my own boundary, maybe I am not drinking any alcohol when I am with these family members because my patience wears thin too quickly and I become not my best self. So I might avoid booze completely. Those are some examples. Yeah, I mean, boundaries at work as well. I mean, I think so often we're just not encouraged to have them, right? You know, like, I've been in business a long time and it was always like work comes first, job comes first. And I, you know, when I was design director at a US kind of a big US newspaper for several years, and I worked like 16 hour days, six days a week for a very long period of time. And I remember at one point, you know, almost had a nervous breakdown. I had ulcers and all these things. And it wasn't that it was a bad job. And it wasn't even that people, other people expected that of me, but it was just sort of, I expected that of me. And I expected that work comes first and this idea that and, you know, like, you know, you manage stress through alcohol and cigarettes, which somehow made sense. And, you know, but, but I think the framing again of the question of boundaries is really important. In a work context, I'll often frame it as what is it, what are some rules that we could make in order to kind of keep us safe, you know, kind of as a team, what are the things that we are, or in terms of the project, what are the things that we are sure must happen. And what are the things that I'm really sure must not happen, right? So in terms of writing the book together, you know, one of the must haves was like, we should both be really happy with the copy as it comes out, like, we're not going to send something to an editor that one of us is unhappy with, or must not happen was like, well, what's our great, our boundary was like, we have like a project safe word. Yeah, we gotta, we gotta be able to like tap out or stop, stop the action so that we can like, okay, wait, what's happening here? What's the dynamic going on? Either of us could hit pause on the project at any time, because we were both, we both wanted to prioritize the relationship over the project. And that was kind of another sort of boundary. But another way we can phrase it too, is you just, Alex just said it beautifully, which is like, what helps you be your best, you know, and it's weird, like I work in a lot of business contexts, and often people are like, wait, wait, I've never really, I've never really thought about that. I mean, people that are into personal development, and probably folks who listen to a show like this, they might be used to asking that question, but a lot of people in the business context really have not spent a lot of time asking that question, almost because the answer feels too frightening, like some or two out of reach. I take an hour for lunch every day. That is like revolutionary for a lot of people. In our work at Art of Charm, one of the things that we do spend a lot of time on is showing people how to set boundaries and why the issues and challenges that they're facing are usually self-imposed, because they haven't learned to set these boundaries. And most people think the only people that would push my boundaries around are evil people or bad people or people who have nefarious intentions, but we also need to impose the boundaries on ourselves. And it's not that we're evil to ourselves, it's just that they need to be set up. And this is one of the new subjects or at least one of the new things that children are going to need to be taught in school, because if that's not set up at home, if your parents have issues in setting those boundaries, how are you supposed to learn? And especially as a child, you have all the time for your friends in the world. But as you get older, your priorities change, you have goals and things that you want to reach. That's not going to happen if those boundaries are not set. You just hit on something that I am so passionate and excited about. Our dear friend who wrote the forward to the book is a children's book author. And her third book is going to have the all-in method as the heart lesson of her next book. Because she's like, she has five kids, she's like, this has changed how I talked to my kids and how they interact. So they're learning how to have tough conversations where they bring their full heart to it and are able to listen to others too. Well, I think that's the important thing. I mean, both concerns and boundaries often just live in our head. And we often think other people have those same boundaries. So of course, it's obvious, but it's not. And your concerns aren't always obvious either, especially if you're a little introverted or shy. So creating that space to actually verbalize, vocalize this, diffuse yourself from the emotion psychologically, and then on top of it, allow everyone to know each other's boundaries. It's not just a one-way street. It creates a space in that team environment for everyone to learn. Okay, well, this is how Bob works really well. And this is Johnny's area of expertise that he really shines in. So I'll respect his boundaries knowing that I could be a better teammate to him. Before we get to the last step, which is the most important, I really want to honor what you just said because I realized recently why this all-in method is so helpful to me, which is as an introverted person and as a little, you know, we grew up in, let's call them codependent families. I grew up thinking I had to know all the answers and have all the solutions and be able to defend them before I could have an important conversation. And this all-in method, like it creates the space and the safety to discover together what the truth, what everybody's individual truths are and like, oh, I don't have to know the answer. Like, we're going to find it together. It's such a relief. Yeah, I think many of us go into difficult conversations, playing it out in our head, trying to think about what the other person's going to respond and you get so many levels deep. And then the conversation actually happens and it doesn't go the way you planned. And then you don't have the skills to get it back to a place where we can actually be productive in that conversation. And when we talk about being defensive and we talk about not understanding each other's boundaries, of course, that's a recipe for disaster. Yeah, and I think we also, you know, Joni, I really appreciate what you said about, you know, like setting, well, somebody said to me a while ago that like, if you don't hold your own boundaries, no one else is going to hold them for you. And then I had to realize, you know, again, you know, my, you know, Alex alluded to our family history. So I have a kind of a long history or several years ago, a program called Alanon, which is a 12-step program for people who kind of grew up in families that have addictive behaviors, let's say, as well in them. It really sort of saved my life and learning how to set boundaries and learning even just sort of to examine what those boundaries were. And also learning that I didn't even have to defend what the boundary was, right? You know, like one of the phrases that comes up in that program a lot is that no is a complete sentence, you know, like this is what works for me and learning how to hold that, learning how to honor that. And then that tied in in this very, very interesting way, I think also into performance at work, which is I've also often valued stuff that's hard, like stuff that, like I, stuff that I find personally hard, like I'm just, I'm an MBA and like, but I'm not a quant guy. And so I always thought like quant was where it was at, like, like being able to do, you know, strategic quantitative analysis, like that was the thing that I wanted to do. And then I know all these people who are really great at it. I'm blessed with a business partner who is incredible at it. And then she just values all this other stuff, all this like kind of soft stuff in me or all the facilitation thing and I'm like, why do you value that? That's just so easy. And I realized that when we examine our boundaries, we also are examining our value in some ways, right? We're saying like, oh, this is the part like this is the part of the project I enjoy. I'm willing to jump into the other part, the part that I don't enjoy, but the part that I enjoy is the part where my kind of core capability is and where my natural, I think our genius is often invisible to ourselves for this reason. And so sometimes examining our boundaries can really help that I never really connected those two thoughts until this conversation by the way. So thank you so much for that. Certainly having that open space to be able to express those boundaries is important and getting comfortable expressing them. I even know for myself that if I'm, if I find myself in a position where I may have to move beyond my boundaries or where I may feel comfortable moving into unknown chartered territory, I will even say, hey, my line is here. I'm willing to go beyond that because I understand what is to be gained from this, but let everyone in the room know that I'm moving into uncharted territory and it's going to look clumsy. I might be frustrated. I might be moody about it, but I am making this attempt to understand you on your side over here as well, which allows everyone to know that what I'm doing is for them and stepping over to say, hey, I'm willing to compromise. I'm willing to work and I'm willing to be opening about this just as long as you know I'm making this move first, which from leading will allow others to maybe loosen up on those. If we're looking for a compromise, we're looking for some understanding, which if it's going to be a relationship, if it's going to be a collaboration, some boundaries aren't going to need to be moved a bit and you might learn some things. I love that. That's so good. Yeah, boundaries have to be flexible, right? If you're a parent, you know this very, you learn this very, very, very quickly, right? That you, you know, that you can't, that hard and fast rules just don't, don't, don't get you where you're trying to get to necessarily. I'm just going to add the other key there is oftentimes especially if we're introverted, if we're not verbalizing it, people only have our body language to read in those situations. And just by that example of Johnny saying, you know, I'm going into unchartered territory, it allows other people in the room, if he has a scrunchie brow or he looks like he's discontent, to not read that in such a negative way and go, oh, this is just Johnny working through this creates a better open environment for us to work through those issues. And I think the problem with boundaries is when you set them really firm and you just completely stop there, it can be very off putting in these team dynamics where we're trying to work through this to get a result that works for everybody. I just wanted to say on AJ's point there for the reason that that has become apparent to me or acknowledge that and we've talked about it in our classrooms is for a lot of our clients who come through our programs, they're very analytical, analytically minded problem solvers. And so their processing face as they're working through new things looks like they're upset, looks like they're frustrated. And if you don't understand that that is them working through a problem, you can interpret that as they're pissed off. They don't like me. There's something going on that I'm not clear on. So by being open about that, everyone could be a little bit more relaxed about the situation. So good. I love that. Yeah. I mean, and it really speaks, I mean, this process and there are other processes out there by the way that I love like user manual to me. I don't know if you've ever tried that Brad Feld sort of talks about this, but this idea like just like what works for me and what doesn't work for me. And so it gives you just this much more rich informational landscape from which to interpret behavior from. And I find like a little bit of empathy goes so far and empathy not necessarily in the sense of, you know, like the woo woo of California, I know you guys are in California, but but like not so much in the in the sort of like empathy and like, oh, kind of empathy, but empathy in the sense of I get where you're coming from. Like I, you know what, Chris boss in his book, I don't know, you know, never split the difference. He talks about tactical empathy, this idea that you don't necessarily need to need to need to approve of somebody else's position, even. But it does mean that you understand where they're coming from and you understand who they are. And I find this kind of process every time I skip this kind of thing, I regret it later. Just I really, you know, starting off slow, starting off with some degree of sort of empathic understanding is so valuable. You're, you're dying to get to the last one. I can see it. I can see on your face. Yeah. So you've gone through the hard stuff. You've gone through intentions, concerns, and boundaries. We love to end on a high note. And really, we, we have reconstructed this process. And it is intentions, concerns, boundaries, and dreams, you end on the the expansive, if this were to go amazingly, what would be true for me? How would I feel? What would I be proud of? And what I think would be true for you if this goes really well and us and the project, like, and then you take it out and out and out, it's kind of like that meta meditation. But it really does, like you start to get expansive with it energetically. And I find it very hard to not be excited about your dreams, right? Like, I, I now am enrolled in what you want. And I'm back in, even if there was a little discomfort in the first part of the conversation, like, okay, I feel your heart here. I'm excited for what you're excited for. You start, you know, the oxytocin starts blooming in the room. It's beautiful. But, but it's where things really come together. It's a great place to wrap it up. And I mean, to know what everyone's dreams are, right, to have that level of clarity in a team environment, in a family environment, in your relationships, personal, I mean, that's such a beautiful thing. And we don't spend enough time not only sharing the tough stuff, but then that stuff that's so enlightening and so inspiring in others. Yeah, you know, we have a 13 year old son. And this is like the biggest parenting one of my life a couple weeks ago, sitting at dinner, and out of nowhere, like Bob and I are talking about the book and like, what are we going to talk about? And out of nowhere, this kid just says, really glad I'm growing up learning to care about other people's feelings. Like, yeah, dude, me too. Like, thank you. So glad you are too. Well, many of us not only don't share our own, but we certainly don't pay attention to other people's feelings when we're trying to get something done, when we have objectives, and we're coming into a meeting with a strict agenda off of that gets shoved to the side. And there's not enough space for it. You know, what do you think are the common pitfalls that teams have when it comes to reaching alignment? I feel so many teams are misaligned and frustrated. And I know there are people listening to this right now who might be on a team going through that. Yeah, so I mean, when I think of teams, when I think of I always think of, you know, like conversations and missing conversations, like, what are the conversations that need to happen? And also, like, are you having the conversation with the right people at the right time, you know, in the right way or in the right, in the right context? And so part of the idea are is that often I find teams get, especially in big organizations, I think this, you know, sort of problems sort of amplify the bigger the organization gets because teams get in some ways less distinct, right? Like there's not like, are we a team or are we not a team? Or are we just like, do I just need you for this thing that it's in the way of me doing my thing? But also sometimes we have kind of authority gaps, right? We'll get a team together. And I found this a lot. I've worked in a field of agile software development, which is sort of the inherited a lot of things that came out of lean manufacturing and the Toyota production system. This idea that you empower people at the local level to make decisions. And you sort of give them, and it's, you know, this is how most large technology organizations operate right now. You'll give a team a business problem and you'll say, go move the needle on this business problem together. And you are empowered to do that. You have decision making authority and decision making rights beyond that, or that's commensurate with your the task at hand, right, that allow you to kind of do what you're trying to do. And often where I think teams kind of get wrapped around the axle is either they're a team and they don't know they're a team, or they have the kind of the wrong set of decision rights or the wrong set of, you know, sort of people on the team. And so they're always stuck with bottlenecks. They're always having to elevate things. I know you guys run a small business. We run a small business. I really worked very hard to make myself not the bottleneck for decision, for all decision making, right? Because if everything has to roll up to me, one, my inbox gets really full. And two, you know, people just are slow, like everything I just become, you know, my inbox becomes the gating factor for anything meaningful happening inside the organization. So I would say, you know, one, making sure, and so I do a lot of work with leadership teams, we will do strategic work first, we'll say, okay, what's your, you know, I work with a lot of mission driven organizations, what's your purpose in the world? What are the strategic priorities that that would then, you know, sort of, would sort of fall out of that purpose, right? Like, what are your current strategic priorities? And then let's organize your team around those strategic priorities. So it's not like you have this weird sort of hierarchy, and I have to go talk to somebody who's in the whole other department. Let's kind of put those people on the same team. They can report to different people. That's fine. But let's put them on the same team. And then let's begin to run them through a process where they are able to take that strategic priority themselves and decompose it into the actual work they're going to do. Sort of there, they're sort of like, rather than taking orders from the boss, they're actually saying, this is where we intend to go. This is what we're going to do. Do you approve of this or not? So really, really empowering the teams. I don't know if I answered your question exactly, but those are sort of the things that came in my mind. Yeah, I also feel a lot of us feel busy. And we often think of this stuff as not as important. And it doesn't fall on our radar. So we allow the busy to hurt the team over the long haul. It's like, Oh, I don't want to go to my boss and explain my boundaries on this. I'm just going to let it slide or, Oh, you know, I'm not going to express my concerns because I'm probably the only one that has them. And guess what? That's often not the case. If that's happening in that environment, there are other people on the team who are struggling with that boundary and certainly probably have those same concerns. But in the process of being busy, we don't create the space to air these concerns. We don't create the space to talk about those boundaries to make everyone more efficient and ultimately more aligned. One of the main super simple problems that I can look back over my life and like, Oh, why didn't I just do that one thing, which is just define like, why are we talking? Like, like, right. And this is really part of the setting the scene for the all in method is we are going to talk about this topic at this time and it will be these people who will be present. And that also calms down my amygdala because I'm like, Oh, we're going to talk about this one thing. So I don't have to worry about like re litigating our entire past relationship together. It's just this topic. It's very soothing. Yeah, right. We're having a meeting. Oh, well, my head goes all over the place that I do something wrong, things not getting done properly. So you're so right talking and defining that space before the meeting starts is key. Now we ask all of our guests what their x factor is and we believe x factors when a mindset unlocks a skill set for you makes you unique. What would you say each of your x factors are? Oh, that's fun. What do you get? I want to do you. Can we do that? Yeah, even more fun. There we go. Because I think I mean, I don't think I don't necessarily always think I'm a great observer of myself. So also, I'd love to hear her say nice things about me. So this is just fishing here. So I think for Alex, what she brings to the table is this skill in both listening and being present and being non judgmental. I've never seen, I actually, I remember watching, so I watched the movie Super Size Me 10 years before I ever went on a date with her. And I was, I remember being like, it's a very weird experience. I've been on a date with somebody who you were like totally into when you watch them on screen like 10 years before. And what I loved about her was when, because she was a vegan chef at the time, and there her partner is eating McDonald's every day. And she's just going like, oh, whatever, you know, like, just there, there, you're okay. But it was, but you weren't, and I just wasn't used to, I'm just going to out myself, but I wasn't used to vegans being non judgmental or vegetarians being non judgmental. I was a judgemental vegetarian. And there's this lack of judgmentalness. And there's, but there's this extreme sort of presence. And then there's this little sort of, like you're so widely read in so many different play in so many different modalities and everything from like druid and magic to, to certain, you know, to positive psychology, right? And you kind of bring all of this little thing in, and you have this knack for sort of bringing out like, Oh, here's the nugget. And here's the thing that needs to move this thing forward in some in some specific way. Oh, yeah. Thanks for asking that, shall we really? All right, now your turn. So I don't know if you knew this, but Bob is a philosopher. He actually actually went to school for this. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. One degree. Right. Right. You, you think so deeply and with such nuance about things that I am in awe of how your brain works. I, I think of myself as a dabbler. I know that's not always true, but I think you go so deep and he's like, I just listened to 10 podcasts and read three books about this top, like, Oh my goodness. So great. I don't have to tell me everything you just learned. You're, you're an incredibly deep thinker and it's, I feel smarter being with you. Love it. Now let's open up the mailbox here. If you want your question or questions answered on this show, you can send them to go into the articharm.com slash questions or also email us questions at the articharm as well as on social media. First question is from Jason. Long time listener here. My conversation skills have increased in leaps and bounds since I discovered your show in 2017. I'm the father of a teenager whose inability to have a conversation is only surpassed by his unwillingness to do so. How can I teach him to be more open to and in conversations? I could only imagine the disadvantages his current attitude will have when he's leaving for school. Jason, the proud father of an introvert. Jason, I am so glad you asked this and it's never too late to change your conversation habits with people in your life. And it is sometimes hardest to change it with the people we're closest to, right? They expect us to be a certain way. But I, I really do recommend to try this four-step process and let him know in advance that you want to use this. Like maybe, you know, put it on a little post-it note, hey, we're going to talk about these four things about this topic. Give him some advanced warning and give him the space, right? Like wait for him to reply. Don't rush in. Really give him time to answer. I think that's, I know with with our son, like he just thinks differently and he sometimes needs even longer, like 30 seconds to reply with an answer. So maybe don't rush it and keep trying. Like really keep showing up for it. Keep listening. Be as non-judgmental as you can. This is, um, it's not normal to have intimate, fair conversations. So you may be the only person in his life who wants to have this dynamic with him right now, but it's so worth it. I'm really thinking about, um, and I'm going to bring this back to teams and I hope this, spare with me. I think we'll, I think we'll get someplace interesting. Um, but we've talked about psychological safety a couple of times here and I'm sure you're familiar with Amy Edmondson's work on that. But just in, in short, like if somebody feels psychologically safe, it means that they're, that they're making an assessment that this is a place where I can take a risk or I can throw out an idea and I'm not going to be shamed. I'm not going to be ridiculed. I'm, no one's going to get angry at me. So I can take a conversational risk. And I find myself often when I'm, you know, I get very quiet actually in new environments until I can assess whether or not it's safe. Um, and so I think one thing is we just want to make sure that we're listening in a way that we're not, you know, um, rolling our eyes, that we're not shutting somebody down, that we're not arguing with them to sort of all the things that we are not doing that allow the space potentially for, for, for information to come forward or communication to come forward. But the other thing I was thinking was about Amy Cuddy's work on trust, where she talks about trust being a dual assessment. We're making an assessment, one that somebody cares and two that somebody can deliver on their promises. And that our brains actually ask the care question first. And often I think the mistake that I've made, um, as a parent that I've made as a leader is I try to pretend that I know all the answers, right? Which is actually trying to demonstrate that I have a capability or that I have strength, which is actually the second question that our brain is asking rather than that I care, that I'm present, that I'm here, and that I'm, I'm ready for, that I'm also ready for anything, you know, and I think I'm, you know, we've had some, I've had some conversations with our son recently too, where I'm like, you can say any, you know, like, I'm not going to, I'm going to do, you know, I have literally said, you can say things to me, you can say whatever you want to, to me. And I, hopefully he believes that I, you know, like I'm also trying to communicate that with, with everything in me that I'm not going to shut you down for anything that you say. I would love to add to something that Alex mentioned about taking time and not only taking time in the conversation, but making sure that when you're dealing with a teenager, and I'm certainly going to speak for myself because I was certainly one that didn't want to have any conversations with my dad because he certainly wasn't going to understand, and he doesn't understand the way I think and feel, but my dad always made opportunity to be alone with me with, obviously, during that time, I didn't have an iPhone that I was going to pull out to ignore my dad, but he made, he made efforts that we would be alone, that we would have nothing but time that will you be in the room together. And what my dad would do is he would just start talking to fill that space and is begrudging or frustrated with him or the situation I was in that I was, and I were even would remember saying, he's trying to get me to talk. I'm not saying anything, but he just kept talking. And eventually I would have to retort or start talking back with him. And this opened the doors for me to fully come clean and open about everything that I was feeling. And I remembered always being upset that I didn't hold my ground with him and that I didn't, I wasn't able to shun him again. But it was the effort that he put in to make sure that we were spending time together and there was a lot of it. He wasn't forcing me to talk. He wasn't hurrying me. He wasn't expecting an answer. He knew that that space in that time was going to be valuable if this was going to happen. And if there was important conversations that needed to come up, well, he was going to make sure that there was going to be plenty of time to have those conversations because as all teenagers, I are stubborn. And I want to add, you know, we model our parents and if you want to change your child's behavior, you're going to have to start changing your own behavior. And many of us don't realize at times the way that we're asking questions without an explanation of why, without our reasoning and a deeper level of understanding of just, you know, asking, how was your day? Well, many of us will feel like I don't really care. You don't care, right? How was your day? Because it seems to me like you're in a rotten mood would at least draw me into explaining why I'm in a rotten mood and being a little more forthright. And I think many of us, when we're trying to change other people, we only look at their actions and their behaviors and go, okay, you know, there's got to be some trick here or some tactic that I can use. And we don't realize that oftentimes, especially our children are following our lead. And what Johnny said, I think is so key here, it's creating the space for him to feel comfortable to express himself further and emotionally. That's really important. And I didn't learn this growing up. It was a struggle that I had and I brought into relationships in college and beyond where I never really expressed my feelings. And I was never given time in my family to express my feelings. It was my dad's way or the highway was often the way it went. So there was no point in arguing or expressing it. But of course, as I got older and realized, well, no, there are a lot of people in my life that need to know my feelings because they want to have a good relationship with me. I just never really felt I had that space. So I think, you know, what what we're all saying here and obviously what the aim method is about is creating that space. And many of us aren't taking the time. And many of us aren't explaining our intentions clear enough. So the other person feels safe in that environment in that space. And, you know, that's why I love your method. And that's why I think it's so powerful, not just for teams or companies, but families like Jason to really create that space for his son to grow and blossom. Next question we have here, someone is struggling with a boss who doesn't take their feedback well. My boss is often asking for open feedback, but never takes it well. Defensiveness or plainly ignoring it are kind of the best outcomes. Even worse, it can also turn into passive aggressiveness. The entire team is picked up on this by now and there's no way any of us are going to say anything anymore. In fact, it's become a sad running gag for us by now to say, well, we'll just have to make sure we tell the boss any idea how to solve this. By the way, I said boss, he is the top honcho. So there's no chance of taking this further up the hierarchy. Thank you, a concerned coder. Oh, man. I just want to tell him to read like Keith's latest book, Keith Francis latest book. I wasn't leading without influence. Because I mean, and I'm actually maybe, maybe the right or maybe the wrong person to ask this question, because I think one of the things that I've learned, I'm just going to go in kind of a weird direction with this because it's just very personal for me because I've been in this position many, many, many times. And one of the things that I've had to learn, as a matter of fact, I was just talking about this with some colleagues today, is that early in my career, I was trying to make myself more round to fit in the round hole that I found, being the square person. And then I started looking for square holes and then making myself more square to fit in that hole. And then I realized that there's really, you know, one of the reasons I'm a, you know, out on my own now is because there's really like the sort of Bob shaped hole, right? And that and I need to really kind of craft my own career. So I think what I would ask this person, and I don't know anything about their history, but I would start with, where are you now in your career? And what's your intent? Because often what happens in my experience is we be, we can start to outgrow the place that we're in. And it's no fault of the boss, you know, like this is this sounds like very typical boss behavior, but it also sounds like something which is coming, which is showing up as highly frustrating for you. And it may be that you're beginning to kind of outgrow this team. And it may be time for you rather than learning how to like, because we're not in control of what other people do, right? We're just, we're just not, you could go to, you know, I think Keith's book is great. I think Chris Boss's book on negotiation never split the difference is wonderful as well. There's really some really wonderful negotiation techniques that we can do. But I think they're mostly suitable for, I need to do this specific thing, and I need to kind of get this person on board or, you know, build this team or build some, you know, build a better sort of situation in order to get this specific thing done. But they're talking about sort of this habitual behavior, which has become this running joke among the team. And to me, that's actually sounds like a relatively high mountain to be done. I wish I could give sort of an easy like you just need to listen to the person. And it may be, it may be that you can sort of be like very specific, like, Oh, this is the thing that I need to get done, let me get really, really laser focused on that thing. You're not going to be able to change this boss's behavior long term. And that's not your, it's not your job, you know, it's just, it's just not your job to kind of perform loss. I think it's such an important point to be made that if you've put in a lot of effort and energy and you've tried some of these other tactics and techniques, and you've talked to other people on the team, but you are hitting a brick wall, then you do have to ask yourself, is this the right culture for me? And we talked about this with Patrick Lancioni earlier this year, that there are great cultures that will unlock your potential. And there are other cultures that will literally wreak havoc on your potential and your mental health and wellbeing. And if you're not asking yourself that question culturally, and you're only focusing on, well, how can I get through to this boss? Or how can I stop him from being passive aggressive? And guess what? He's doing it with everyone on the team as your question states, and everyone now has turned it into a joke, then that leads me to believe that culturally it may not be the best fit for you. And instead of spending more effort and energy trying to change someone who clearly is not interested in the change, let's put some effort and energy in growing our network and making a change in our own environment and finding a culture that we could thrive in. That point is great. And I just want to add to that. If this person is listening to this show, and obviously is, he's throwing in a question, he has a growth mindset and you're talking about cultures. But the thing for anyone to understand is if you develop cultivated a growth mindset, you are going to start to realize that most people don't think in those terms are not interested in growth or are content with where they're at. And if you continue to think in that way and are looking for those places and opportunities to grow, you're going to see things like somebody doesn't take feedback well, or that your friends are not who you thought they were, or maybe that they're just done on their path of growth, or just not interested at this point, that becomes more and more apparent as you grow older and as you continue to cultivate your life and go after your dreams, you will start to see some people giving up or just saying, I'm good right here. But it becomes more apparent and you have to get comfortable with that because you're only going to run into that even more. 100%. Yeah, I mean, you have to think about who you're becoming in the environment. How is this shaping me? And that's because that's what happens. It's not like you come into a team and you shape it. I mean, you can have some influence, but more likely than not, and there's actually reams of research about this that we take on the traits of the people we hang out with. And so now you're hanging out with people that are showing contempt for their boss and rolling their eyes, which is kind of a relationship killer. And it may be appropriate, it may be unavoidable, but it's just sort of like, you're probably not going to be able to be the lone person who can kind of push that tie the other direction. Right. If the team is happy to engage in that and it's become a joke or a gag, it's a pretty unhealthy environment. Here's a question from Rob about being curious. Hey guys, this is a two part question. One is about expressing curiosity in the other person. Sometimes it comes naturally and then everything just flows effortlessly. But if I'm not interested in the other person, I'm unable to go past the typical boring small talk questions. Now here's part two. When I'm not interested in the other person, I'm also a really bad listener. It's like my mind can't stay on task for more than a second before I start to fade out. You could probably tell that it's not very useful at social events, any tips that you have on becoming a better listener, especially when not interested. I have to say I hate small talk. Like I want to go, I just want to go to the most important thing about you that you're passionate about right away. So I may not be the best person to ask this. Well, no, that's good because how do you go to that in conversation? What's your tool to get to that point? You know, I actually loved and it did take me, I'm going to say 35 plus years to learn this, but I tend to now like actually approach people at parties. Like it's a job, like it's a little bit of a job, but in a fun way, like oh, it's my job to like meet somebody, but who feels like there's like there's some kind of an energy there that I'm attracted to. So I just look for an energy that I'm resonating with and walk. And it's not always the easiest thing to do, but I'll compliment them or say, I just saw you from across the room and I just, I just had to come say hi. And if it's the right energy and it often is, they're so excited that I came over to them because we have energy that vibe together. Yeah, I also say like for me, sometimes it's asking frankly better questions. You know, I was once stuck in a car with a guy who had spent his entire career, like his life working on the floor in soda factories in California. It's a long story about how that we were driving up to Lake Tahoe with the whole group. And it was just me and him. This guy was like frontline worker and it was like, at the first blush, we wouldn't have anything in common, but I learned so much about how soda is made, because he was so passionate about it. And he he had so much to say about it. But also I think, who is it? Ted Raul. He's a comic book artist. I don't know if you know him. It's back in the 90s, but he had this book called the worst thing you've ever done. And it was for him, it was solving this specific problem. He would just walk up to people at parties and tell me and say, what's the worst thing you've ever done? And then he created a whole comic book series about people telling like, like their deep dark secrets. And sometimes I find, I don't do that question, but I will do a question that makes me uncomfortable. You know, like a question that forces like a little bit of authenticity, a little bit of vulnerability, and maybe even, you know, be willing to go first in some way, because I find that people really do. I mean, we all say we don't like small talk. I don't know anybody that really, really, I know some people that are good at it, but I don't know people that really love it. Our brunches. Yeah. We hold these brunches where the only rule is you're not allowed to talk about what you do for work. And people love it. Yorkers are terrible at it, but it forces them to come up with it. It just forces their mind into, I am going to find something else to talk about. And pretty quickly, the room is buzzing with excitement. So we love those rules based kinds of gatherings that Priya Parker talks about in her book, The Art of Gathering. We should publish that. We actually have a list of questions that's called, I don't care what you do. That's the name, that's the title. And we had a friend who's a musician who wrote this beautiful song about it after one of our, anyway, it's, it's, we should publish that as that list of questions. It's a great list of questions. And that's just it. I mean, hit the nail on the head. It's, you're taking the conversation in boring directions. So be the conductor of the conversation that you want to have. Choose fun, exciting topics to ask questions around. And when we're going in saying, well, this is going to be boring, or I'm just going to get stuck in small talk, well, it's a self fulfilling prophecy. And you make such a great point. We're all craving better conversations than boring small talk. We all know that no one's interested in what we do unless there's some synergy. So throwing that out first and expecting different results or some magical conversation with little effort to happen, it's just not a likely outcome. So looking at what are the questions that you're asking, number one, and then number two, using that empathy muscle and really thinking about the emotional context that this person is sharing. Are they hesitant to share this? Are they excited to share this? Often if I train myself to focus more on the emotional content than the data or the topical content, I unlock a deeper level of listening that creates the path or the road to the more exciting fun conversation. I love that so much. I love the focusing on the emotion. I also find like sometimes I'm just not present in my body, you know, like I studied acting for a while and my teacher would always say, become aware of the bottoms of your feet. And I often find it parties because I'm an introvert. I'm like, I just have to kind of get back into my own body and ask the question and then be present and then actually kind of sense where they're coming from. Like, what is this person thinking? What is this person feeling? And many of us have the safety behavior of immediately grabbing our phone or thinking about our phone. So leaving your phone in your car, leaving it on airplane mode, removing that stimulus that's going to distract us that's going to keep us from being focused on what the other person is sharing. Because ultimately what the other person is sharing is most important to them. And if we're not listening to what they're sharing, they're going to pick up on that and the conversation is going to die. Here's a short one. I just want to add to that really quickly. You guys in your book had mentioned the Gottman Institute and of course us here at the Art of Charm have put a lot of time in with their research and Laura Heck who works for them. And when you learn things such as emotional bids and you get to play with these and you understand how they work, this is now something that changes your view in small talk. All of a sudden you have the ability to see small talk turn into something else. As AJ was talking about focusing on those emotions of emotional bids or just that and how to exploit them and how to validate them, recognize and validate them. They're a very powerful tool. When you have that in your repertoire, well now conversation becomes fun because not only are you enhancing your own skills, you are now opening people up to share and opening the doors to better conversation. All right. This is a quick question. Do you recommend writing down questions or topics before a date or a meeting or something that you're feeling a little anxious about ahead of time? This is actually one of the main ways that we use the all-in method. I use it to get my own thoughts clear about something in advance especially if it's a really big or high stakes topic. I'm the kind of person that just needs to sit right or go for a walk and bank to really get clear and comfortable and grounded into what I believe. I think some of us need right extra time or reprocess things differently. Taking time to write it out before, absolutely. I don't necessarily, although sometimes you do need to have your notes there present to help you along. People have used this to go into important doctor's meetings. I'm the kind of person where sometimes I get in front of a doctor and my mind just goes blank. I know I had important questions to ask. It's okay to bring a note with you about what you need to cover. On a date, I probably don't want somebody... No cards on a date. I want to take it a step further. I think it's also really important to think about your answers to the questions that you plan on asking in that meeting or that date or that event because many of us don't realize you might have the greatest question in the world, but if you surprise someone or they're not ready for it and they're unexpected that question, it's going to lead to a bit of an awkward silence. It's really important in those moments that we at least fill that silence with our own answer and our own response to that question. It'll often help the other person realize what the context is, what we were trying to share, how vulnerable we're going to get. Many of us, when we just focus on, well, what can I get out of this other person? We often leave that conversation realizing, well, man, I didn't represent myself or I didn't get a chance to share what I was really excited about or my own answers to those questions. I would definitely recommend at least taking some time. I wouldn't say reading it as you said in the date, certainly not, reading it word for word in the meeting, but being more prepared conversationally, if you feel that you're lacking in some experience in those areas or you know in the past that you've gone blank and just hearing you say that, it was so relatable to me. I'm like, oh, I've been there before where you just go blank. It wasn't in the doctor's office, but I've been on that job interview where I just drew a blank and that makes you so much more connectable to be vulnerable in that way and open and honest about it. We'd love to hear a challenge for our listeners this week. How can we get them in radical alignment? I'm so glad you asked because I feel like I knew you were going to ask and I took on the challenge myself in the last week. It's so funny to be like talking about a book all about how to have tough conversations with like empathy and safety and behind the scenes. I'm actually involved in some of the most difficult conversations of my life right now, both professionally and personally, but I'll tell you what, they're still kind of ongoing and I am so glad that I have opened the door for these conversations that honestly one of them is with my members of my family that I have wanted to have these conversations for decades and I don't know where they're going to go, but I'm so like I'm so relieved that I've asked them to have this conversation with me, even if it goes nowhere or even if the questions come back with unhappy answers. I'm like it's such a okay I've asked them to join me in this. So my challenge, our challenge for all the listeners is to have or at least invite in that important person or those really important people that you know you need to have that missing conversation with. Open the door for this. Use the method, like get clear on what you want to say and then share it with them so you have like a shared vocabulary. Whatever you do, don't say we need to talk. Don't start it like that. Think about a more gentle inviting way to broach it, but time is wasting. Life is short. In the next 48 hours, invite somebody into your important conversation. I love that. Thank you both for joining us. We're so excited for the book to come out next month. Where can our audience learn more about you? So if they get a radical alignment book.com, they can find where to pre-order the book and of course like all good authors, we've got a whole lot of extras including an eight-week intensive that we're running mainly designed for team leaders or people who are you know leading organizations, but if they buy 10 books they get eight weeks of workshop with us, which is we just decided like look we could we could spend all of our time marketing this thing, but right now we just want to give and so we really wanted to lean into this workshop. So go to radicalalignmentbook.com, find out more. Thank you guys. It's amazing. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks so much.