***DISCLAIMER: Please note that the following AI-generated transcript may not be 100% accurate and could contain misspellings or errors.***

[00:00:00] Mahan Tavakoli: Welcome to Partnering Leadership. I'm really excited to speak to you welcoming Dr. Richard Moran. Richard is a veteran business leader, radio host, founder of Hat Sack Ventures, and author of the new book, never Say Whatever, how Small Decisions Make a Big Difference In the book and in the conversation he makes the case.

That the constant minor choices we face each day represent pivotal moments to build our careers and brands. Richard has decades of experience as a C E O, college president, venture capitalist, and consultant to major corporations. He explains why tossing off tasks as not my job or skipping optional meetings signals a lack of commitment that gets noticed.

I really enjoyed the conversation with Richard and I'm sure you will too. I also love hearing from you, so keep your comments coming. Mohamad mohan t.com, there's a microphone icon on partnering leadership.com. Really enjoy getting those voice messages. Don't forget to follow the podcast on your favorite platform, and when you get a chance to leave a rating and review, that will help more people find and benefit from the conversations.

 Rich Moran. Welcome to Partnering Leadership. I am thrilled to have you in this conversation with me. 

[00:01:24] Richard Moran: I'm happy to be here. I've been looking forward to 

[00:01:26] Mahan Tavakoli: this I know we're going to have a lot of fun, even some of the titles of your past books, bring a smile to my face but before we get to that, would love to know Richard, whereabouts you grew up and how your upbringing impacted the kind of person you've become.

[00:01:42] Richard Moran: I am the first in my family to go to college. I am part of a big Irish Catholic family from New Jersey, and as my dad says, everything that's loose eventually rolls into California. So I rolled into California a long time ago to work for Atari. I hope all your listeners remember Atari and hold on to those video games.

'cause they're all collectors items now, but it was Silicon Valley when it was just really starting to thrive and I've been here ever since, either as a consultant or a C E O or even a college president. So it's been quite a ride. I'm a lucky guy. Mahan. Those are 

[00:02:22] Mahan Tavakoli: very different experiences, rich, that you briefly highlighted.

You have been a c e O, you have been a consultant, you have been a college president, so you've had a chance and opportunity to see leadership at very different types of organizations. So would love to know. What got you to be able to reinvent yourself, to be able to effectively do those drastically different roles?

[00:02:49] Richard Moran: I think it relates to the book and it relates to leaders in general, and that is, I consider myself to be self-aware and I can tell when my career in certain. Segments has run its course. In my heart of hearts, I say, I don't like this anymore. I'm not being as effective as I want to be.

It's time to do something else. And none of these jobs have been easy, they've all been leadership oriented, but they've all had a different, Color to them,in consulting it's all about knowing how to listen and how to give advice. In venture capital, it's all about knowing how to listen and how to capture a story.

I. And understanding what might happen in the future. As a C E O, it's listening again and learning how to make decisions in a positive way. As a college president, that's probably the hardest job I've had. It's all about understanding all the diverse communities and making the best decision you can, it's all about effective decision making and being self-aware about it.

[00:03:55] Mahan Tavakoli: Your book never say whatever is about those decisions and the fact that all decisions, even small ones, make a difference in our lives. You talk about the fact that we've become the apathetic versions of our corporate selves. Why is that? In some instances rich, when I talk to people, They say every generation has looked at the generations that come after it and they say, oh boy, this would not have worked when I was growing up.

Yeah, so some see it as, The older generations, non-millennials and non Gen Z, not understanding that culture has shifted. So is it that we've become somewhat more apathetic of our corporate selves, or is it that the culture has shifted? 

[00:04:48] Richard Moran: I think as you said, Mahan, every generation looks at the generations behind them and say, what's the matter with these kids?

 Why don't they show up in the office? Why don't they get dressed up? And I think probably since Roman times that has been the case. And I think there probably is some sentiment about the younger people being apathetic. I don't find the younger people being apathetic.

I do find that Covid was not our friend. As far as it comes to attitudes. And I think it made us a little lazy, all of us, about what's important what matters and how to behave. And that's part of what I'm trying to bring out in the book as well, that COVID and afterwards we're all suffering a little bit from I call it decision fatigue.

There's so many decisions to be made now and  what happens is, Rather than make some of them, we put them in a bucket and we'll get to them later. And that bucket is where the fatigue starts because in your mind, ah, man, I have all these decisions I have to make. And my suggestion is make them, I.

When they're in front of you, because the decision that you're going to make probably won't change if you put them in the bucket, but that bucket is where all the decision fatigue comes from, and it's better to just make the decisions you'll feel better about it.

And that is everything from. Should I go out with my friends that I haven't seen in three years? Should I, prepare for my performance review? It's everything. Now, I never suggest that the big decisions should be treated lightly. But I am suggesting that sometimes making those small decisions, when they're right in front of you is way better.

Email's a great example. How many of us go through a hundred emails? We delete 50 of them easily, but the hard ones are the ones we put over to the side. We don't get to those right away. Do it, do those first. That's what creates decision fatigue. And in some ways, you're saying whatever, when you put those hard emails over on the side, 

[00:07:00] Mahan Tavakoli: As you mentioned, your book is about decision making.

So the question I wonder though, rich, is how do we think about what decisions are worthy. Of us taking time on and what decisions should be made quickly. What I get from you, and it makes perfect sense, is we leave a lot of decisions in this big whatever category that ends up costing us emotionally and cognitively taxing us.

We need to decide on some things more quickly and then choose to be deliberate on some other decisions. How do you sort that out? 

[00:07:43] Richard Moran: I always start with the fact that I often talk to people and they say, oh, I have all these big decisions I have to make, or, the big decisions are overwhelming me.

And the truth is, and I've done survey after survey about this, I. There's not a lot of really big decisions in our lives. It's your career. It's your spouse, it's your relationships, it's your family. It's where you go to college. It's whether or not to get a dog. I am hard pressed to find people that can name more than 10 or 12 big decisions in their lives.

So that means they're all in the category that you suggest. Mahan, not big life-changing decisions. So then there's a category of really easy decisions that can be made. I love to tell the story that. Cornell researchers have discovered that in the act of going out to lunch with your colleagues, you make over 200 small decisions, and it's everything from where to go, where to sit, whole wheat, mayonnaise, lettuce, tomato, onions, pickles.

You can imagine. So those are all easy to make, but one thing I want to point out, that every time you say whatever in those small decisions, You're gonna get a sandwich that you didn't want because you've not made that decision. And then in between what to have for lunch and who to marry is this huge matrix of decisions that you still should make.

Generally pretty quickly, if you're deciding about taking a new job in a new location that requires a lot of analysis and thought. But if you're deciding whether or not to prepare for a Zoom meeting or a board meeting, that too is a no-brainer. That's not, whatever that is, yes, make the decision to prepare, and if you say whatever, in fact, you're deciding I'm not gonna prepare. All the mid-range decisions are where we get 

[00:09:41] Mahan Tavakoli: stuck. as I was reading this Rich and your reflections of it, I was also thinking about another person I really enjoyed the conversation with in his books, Patrick McGinnis. Who was a person that had come up initially with the terms FOMO and fobo fear of.

Missing out and Fogo fear of a better option fear of better option. He says it's a real problem with respect to decision making where we are caught in this cycle that's cognitively tasking us. For decisions that don't really matter. So we're spending a lot of cognitive resources as well as postponing decisions, hoping to come up with a better decision on things that don't even matter in 

[00:10:30] video1666392585: our 

[00:10:30] Richard Moran: lives.

It's true. I think the fear of a better offer is a great way to categorize whatever, because that puts you in the whatever zone you're delaying, something that you probably could make. One of the slogans in our family is we'll do that when we win the lottery. And because it's not gonna get better. Things are not gonna change that much. So let's look at this more objectively then emotionally, although sometimes, and I talk about this in the book, sometimes your gut is accurate.

Sometimes what your gut is telling you is your best decision. If you're self-aware, as I've already mentioned, and the effective leaders that I talk to all the time are very self-aware. They're the ones who recognize that a better option is not gonna come. This is as good as we're going to do.

And that especially is true when you have to make a decision and all of the options are bad, which is often the case that a leader has to deal with, when a company's in trouble, almost all the options are bad, but you have to pick one.

[00:11:37] Mahan Tavakoli: The difficulty with decision making in leadership, whether things are good or bad. Usually it's a choice of options with potential benefits and costs to each. There aren't easy options of the perfect one and the not so perfect one. So you mentioned that. The best leaders are ones that are self-aware enough to therefore understand the decisions they need to make and not say whatever.

In your experience, what has enabled. Those leaders to become more self-aware.  

[00:12:14] Richard Moran: Start with being brutally honest and as a c e O I know that I was not going to spend a lot of time on spreadsheets and pivot tables trying to understand, down into the bowels of the organization.

I knew that. So I surrounded myself with excellent people in finance and accounting, and it because I was self-aware to know that I am good at communications, good in sales, good at building relationships, but I'm not gonna spend a lot of time on weekends in, row 55 column 61, wondering whether or not that number is right.

 I was brutally honest with myself. I was not gonna get better at that. I need people to help me with that, and that's part of it, because then I could rely on them to give me the information that I really needed. To help me make decisions. So self-awareness starts with being brutally honest with your strengths and weaknesses what you're good at and what you're not.

And also, when it comes to decision making, can I live with this decision? I've often told the story, Mahan, I've dealt with CEOs and leaders who can readily fire 5,000 people. That he or she has never met around the world somewhere, but when it comes to their assistant, who's right outside the door, who has been underperforming for three years they can't deal with it.

There's too much emotional currency that they'll have to spend on that. So they don't, early in my career, I did a lot of consulting with Apple and John Scully when he was the c e O of Apple at the time.

He said that you can't fight a battle on two fronts. He said, you can't fight a battle at home. And at work at the same time. And I think he was having marital issues and he decided that he couldn't do both at once and that was a self-aware decision.

I. 

[00:14:13] Mahan Tavakoli: It's very hard to make those kinds of self-aware decisions. Rich, you also mentioned even with respect to the c e o, having a tough time holding their assistant accountable. You talk about accountability as a cure, how can accountability help address the whatevers in the organization? Yeah. 

[00:14:36] Richard Moran: I always start out with everyone needs to be accountable you'll appreciate this Mahan, everyone is a leader of something you don't have to be the c e o of.

I, b m or at and t, but you might be the leader of your church group or your family, or your bowling team. But at the most personal level, you're accountable to yourself. You lead your own life and you need to be accountable for that. If you're accountable for it, then you're going to make decisions better.

And it starts with Very simple rule that I use and that is clarifying your intentions. Meaning, another way to put it is actions follow intent. If you are clear about your intentions, then your decisions and your actions follow readily. Some examples are if your intent is to lose weight, you act like you're on a diet.

If your intent is to stay married, you act like you are married. If your intent is to be very customer focused, your decisions are about customers, and if you don't clarify your intent, then you're swimming around and a sea of ambiguity on the actions.

So you really need to work on that. And if you do that, then the accountability just threads right through the actions follow intent model. One of the people I interviewed, For the book, there's a man named John Bullock. He is an attorney and an Episcopal priest and he lives by a personal vision and mission. It drives both his priestly duties and his attorney duties. He's the one that gave me that idea that, organizations have visions and missions, he has a personal one and it drives all of his decisions and it made so much sense to me. 

[00:16:30] Mahan Tavakoli: I absolutely love that rich actions follow intent and that.

Loops back so beautifully with never say whatever. So using your example of the intent to be on a diet or the intent to stay married, then if your intention is to be on a diet, if you are given. Choices for foods to pick. It's no longer whatever because correct, the intent is clear and therefore you follow through with actions that align back with that intention.

Right. 

[00:17:15] Richard Moran: Perfect. You are cured of whatever, mahan. You will never say it and it's so simple, isn't it so simple? Actions follow intent, but the intent is hard to clarify., I used diet 'cause it's so easy. But if your intent is to be a better person, or if your intent is to be a more effective organization, that might not be enough.

You might need to double click on that so that you can still make decisions and you can't have, intents that are paradoxical or fight against each other. I'm working with an organization now. They said their intent is to grow and to cut costs in order to be profitable at the same time.

And as I looked at the organization they can't do that. They've gotta, pick, they're going to grow or they're gonna be profitable because they are not in a spot to do both. And 

[00:18:05] Mahan Tavakoli: this loops back to what you mentioned with respect to our understanding of ourselves and self-awareness in that it takes tremendous self-awareness to understand the depth of our intentions and therefore align our decisions with those intentions.

So the self-awareness. Plays a huge role in making sure that we minimize or eliminate that whatever bucket. 

[00:18:38] Richard Moran: It does. I'm a big believer that a lot of business books are really three bullets that are strung out for 500 pages. And all you need to do is know the three bullets.

So I outline those in the book. , the first thing is, understand your intent. And the second one is be self-aware. And the third bullet is be accountable for the book, I interviewed Michael Huerta, who had been the head of the Federal Aviation Administration. Big organization. He had 160,000 people that worked for him, air traffic controllers and everything. And he said the intent at the f a was very clear because we had one measure and that was do the same number of planes land every day.

That took off on that day. So they made all the decisions about that clarity of their intent. Most organizations don't have. The ability to be so clear about their intent but you have to work at it. It's not easy. 

[00:19:35] Mahan Tavakoli:  Rich,

 You also mentioned whatever culture drives talent away. One of the challenges that organizations are having is. More of the whatever than existed before. Yeah. Where there isn't specific clarity and decisions made on when or how often people need to be in the office or not be in the office.

So what are your thoughts with respect to organizational culture and eliminating the whatever from organizational culture? Yet allowing the talent, some of the flexibility that they're seeking in this environment? Yeah, 

[00:20:16] Richard Moran: well, I have been clear about saying, if your boss doesn't know your name, you're in trouble. Go into the office, get to know your colleagues, get to know your boss. And it might mean driving two days a week or something, but start there. And you need to understand that organizations are struggling with this on the other side of the issue.

Management needs to understand that people don't wanna drive, they don't want to commute, they don't wanna eat burritos in their car for breakfast. They don't want to pay for gas. They don't wanna have all that stress. So be understanding on that side. I think what happens in organizations, whatever can creep up on you, I tell the story of a startup company. People think that, oh, it's only the big organizations that are whatever organizations, but I tell the story of an early stage company.

They have been funded by venture capital and happened to be a woman entrepreneur, and every time somebody came to her with a cost, even a small one. She said, yeah, okay, whatever. And so it was things like, should I go to this conference? Yeah, go ahead. Whatever. Yeah. I need to take this engineer with me too.

Okay. Whatever. Her decisions were whatever. Meaning I don't care. She was basically saying, I don't care. And pretty soon all those costs just crept up and the company ran out of money in a bad way. For your listeners, I hope they understand that, whatever's not bam hit.

One day it can creep up on you and especially on the cost side, on letting bad behavior go on, letting poor performers continue to work and you know it when you're in a whatever organization 'cause you're probably not 

[00:22:01] Mahan Tavakoli: happy.

[00:22:03] Richard Moran: And it's hard, it's difficult. From both a personal level and from the organizational level, I think employees in all organizations only want to know three most basic things. They want to know what's my job? They wanna know how am I doing, and they want to know how does my activity relate to something bigger? 

[00:22:26] Mahan Tavakoli: What you just said might sound simple. Yet, in all of my years of working with organizations around the world, Those three things are major sources of problems.

They are, you're right. A lot of times people assume that they've got it right and they don't. So I'm gonna ask you please to restate those because it's incredible how often. When I work with organizations, when I talk to the CEOs or the leadership teams or survey the team members, that is what's lacking.

It sounds simple. It's not a complex framework, but that is what's lacking in organizations. 

[00:23:15] Richard Moran: Yeah, and it's so simple. As you know by now, Mahan, after our discussions, I try to break everything down. I don't compete with Michael Porter or any Harvard professors. I try to break things down into bite sizes that people can understand.

So the three things that every employee wants to know first, what's my job? When I show up in the morning, is it clear what my responsibilities are how I relate with my colleagues and there's no part of whatever in that. The second part is, How am I doing? Employees wanna know how am I doing?

And that's not in an annual performance review. It's every day. People know at the end of the day, did I contribute? Did I help? And if they know their job and they feel like they contributed, you have happy people. And the third thing, which totally relates to whatever, is how does all my effort, how does my showing up and my working hard relate to something that's bigger relate to saving the environment, relate to being profitable, relate to creating a new artificial intelligence tool.

 And if the answer to any of those questions is whatever, you're gonna have a bunch of people leaving. It's as simple as that.

[00:24:32] Mahan Tavakoli: Rich, it's interesting because one of the exercises that I sometimes do, and I would recommend for the listeners to do is when I'm talking to, executives at different levels and I talk about the clarity that they have and their team members have on their roles, they all say, ah we're perfectly clear.

We've got the job descriptions and we've got the goals set and the annual reviews and everything else. So I go through a very simple exercise. I ask the team members to write what the primary objectives of their jobs are and ask the manager or the executive to write what they believe.

The primary responsibility of those jobs are, and I know you wouldn't be surprised, but in most instances they are shocked at how often they are so different. Yeah. So what you're saying here, that is lacking in a lot of organizations. So many precious gems that you just shared. How am I doing? That's the feedback that is lacking so often, both on the positives and the opportunities for improvement.

People don't have that clarity, and as you said, it is not the once a year, once a quarter review, it is much more specific feedback and then how? Is it that what I do connects to a broader purpose? We all want more of a sense of meaning from what we are doing. So just the three items that you mentioned here can help leaders move away from that whatever culture and have a significant impact on their teams.

If they're willing to say, we can improve in these areas and not assume they already have it right. 

[00:26:21] Richard Moran: Yeah. I learned this lesson from the teamsters because this happened in warehouses.

Teamsters are moving freight on forklifts from one truck bay to the other truck bay. They're really proud of their work, and they want to make decisions about what goes there, what goes here, and. Be proud of it. They know how to do that and they wanted to make decisions and management wouldn't let them make those decisions.

So the teamster said, whatever I'll load these rocks on top of the stereos, whatever, you won't let me make that decision. And at the end of the day, they were all mad. And it was such a simple intervention where we said, listen, these. People wanna make the decisions, let them do it.

Productivity went up, everything changed in a good way, but the leaders wouldn't let the people who are doing the real work make the decisions. So all those people said, whatever, I don't care. It's a bad situation. 

[00:27:19] Mahan Tavakoli: Now one of the challenges that many organizations are running into is they haven't learned the lessons that you shared from cancel meetings, keep the donuts where there are more and more meetings being scheduled and the average professional is now spending more than half.

Of their work time in meetings, many of them not very productive. So would love to know some of your thoughts on how to approach that and how to cancel the meetings, keep the donuts, send around the donuts, 

[00:27:59] Richard Moran: Have them delivered. There's something happened during Covid and it's not over yet, and it's what I call a false sense of activity.

People wanted to be busy during Covid. If I'm home, am I really busy? If I'm walking the dog on a conference call, is that busy? So we got into this trap of having a false sense of activity. And it can happen at a leadership level, it can happen at any level in an organization.

 It's a simple question of, do we really need this meeting? What's the outcome of the meeting? And if you don't, then be happy and cancel it. Don't say whatever we need to have this meeting. Whatever just enters into all these little decisions. Having a 20 minute or half an hour meeting on Zoom is probably not a big decision one way or the other.

But if you would approach it with whatever, we always have this Monday morning meeting, even though nobody ever wants it or says anything, that's a whatever situation, and just cancel it and be more productive so stop that's whatever, that is not effective.

[00:29:01] Mahan Tavakoli: So if we spend time in that, whatever zone, we end up not actually being able to accomplish a lot.

And the other thing I would love to get your thoughts on, rich is that. You actually got your PhD in organizational behavior and you have been at senior levels of different organizations, both as a consultant as A C E O and as a venture capitalist, would love to know what has changed and what is the same with respect to the best practices on organizational leadership.

[00:29:40] Richard Moran: I think we've complicated organizational effectiveness. I think that we're going to go through another sea change of what an organization is all about with artificial intelligence. From my venture capital seat. I'm just seeing that encroaching into every part of our world, and I think that's going to change work life.

It's going to change for, as an author, it's going to change writing. I think it's going to change organization behavior in ways that we can only anticipate. A good example as a consultant. My goal is to keep people busy doing a lot of analysis. If I could keep a hundred people busy doing an analysis on a big project for six months that's golden.

Now that analysis might be able to be done in 20 minutes through ai. What happens to all those a hundred people and what are they supposed to do? So I think it is the French slogan of ever changing at eternally the same. Is going to continue to be the case. It's going to continue to change.

But those things that we've been talking about, mahan are just going to be constant, about what employees want and about making those small decisions. I. 

[00:30:49] Mahan Tavakoli:  That's part of what is going to enable us to tap into that humanity. Rich, I totally agree with you. I've had conversations with leading thinkers on artificial intelligence, and I think it is going to truly transform all aspects of our lives and organizations.

That said, some of those elements that you mentioned with respect to our ongoing decision making and our ability to lead others stay the same. Yes. So we need to stay focused on what's most important. 

 And you can't do big things saying whatever. 

[00:31:30] Richard Moran: Correct. That's a great summary. That's a great summary. 

[00:31:36] Mahan Tavakoli: So Rich in addition to your books are there any other leadership resources that you typically find yourself recommending to leaders of teams and organizations for being able to lead more effectively in this future of work?

[00:31:54] Richard Moran: , I. To be very good listeners. Sometimes this is about being self-aware. You don't just listen to what you want to hear, you listen to what's going on. There are plenty of leadership books out there. The one that I like the best is The Leadership Challenge by Jim Ks and Barry Posner. And it breaks things down with lots of good examples, 

[00:32:20] Mahan Tavakoli: I appreciate both that recommendation as well as what you've done in the conversation and in your book, which is break these ideas down to pretty simple steps, which are simple to read and understand.

Hard to master. Which is why I really appreciate your books and especially never say whatever, because it's those small decisions on an ongoing basis that determine who we become and the kind of influence that we have.

So how can the audience rich find out more about. You connect with you and find out about your book? Never say whatever. 

[00:33:03] Richard Moran: Sure. I pride myself on being pretty accessible. The book is out now. You can get it on Amazon, all the usual places, Barnes and Noble. I have a website, richard moran.com, 

[00:33:14] Mahan Tavakoli: in the book you say the numerous daily decisions we make, both at work and in life are small chances to make a big impact. And then you have a quote, life is a game of inches and you only have to choose to be a little bit.

Better. Thank you so much, rich Moran with this book and the conversation helping us be a 

[00:33:40] Richard Moran: little bit better. Thanks Mahan. It's been a pleasure.