Brené Brown on What It Takes to Lead with Courage

0:00:06 I think what I would tell someone going into college right now is we’re unwittingly, some
0:00:12 people wittingly, building a world where there are going to be thinkers and consumers, creators
0:00:13 and consumers.
0:00:16 We want to be on the thinking creating side.
0:00:22 Your attention, your thinking, and your focus are commodities that algorithms are desperate
0:00:23 to get a hold of.
0:00:25 Protect them at all costs.
0:00:26 Read.
0:00:28 Don’t let anyone talk you out of liberal arts classes.
0:00:29 Take them.
0:00:35 Be mindful of how much time you spend consuming versus creating.
0:00:43 So listen, my podcast is called The Remarkable People Podcast.
0:00:45 That’s why you’re on it.
0:00:46 All right.
0:00:46 So.
0:00:46 Wow.
0:00:47 Right off the bat.
0:00:50 Oh, Brene, don’t be so modest.
0:00:58 Brene, on my podcast, I’ve had Bob Cialdini, David Acker, Angela Duckworth, Carol Dweck, Richard
0:00:59 Thaler.
0:01:02 And now, Brene Brown, I have arrived.
0:01:03 That’s the lineup right there.
0:01:04 I have arrived.
0:01:06 This is a big moment.
0:01:09 I could die tomorrow and I’d die happy now.
0:01:10 I’m excited to be here.
0:01:12 I have followed your work for so long.
0:01:12 No.
0:01:14 Oh, no, I have for sure.
0:01:15 You say that to everybody.
0:01:16 I actually don’t.
0:01:22 Despite my Texas upbringing, I’m not a flatterer.
0:01:33 But I have followed your work and probably been shaped by the role of beauty and excellence,
0:01:36 passion, engagement.
0:01:38 That’s probably shaped how I think about my work.
0:01:39 Maybe you invented it.
0:01:44 I was introduced to the idea of evangelism, brand evangelism.
0:01:46 But it was Jesus before me.
0:01:49 I mean, he was the OG evangelist, I guess, right?
0:01:50 It was 2,000 year gap.
0:01:59 Yeah, but I was introduced to the idea that if you don’t love what you’re doing and you’re
0:02:03 not excited about it, don’t expect other people to.
0:02:05 All right.
0:02:08 So, oh, yeah, we have an audience.
0:02:09 Shit, I forgot that.
0:02:10 Hey, y’all.
0:02:14 So, this is an audience quiz, okay?
0:02:14 Okay, let’s do it.
0:02:19 This is Brene’s latest book.
0:02:20 Strong ground.
0:02:23 Yeah, put it on all the cameras.
0:02:23 All right.
0:02:26 So, now, this is a quiz for the audience.
0:02:31 So, which story do you think this book would open up with?
0:02:32 And I’ll give you some choices.
0:02:32 Okay.
0:02:33 I’m not asking you.
0:02:34 Right, the audience, of course.
0:02:35 I know you.
0:02:35 Yeah.
0:02:39 So, a story of Steve Jobs and the iPhone.
0:02:42 A story of the reinvention of Microsoft.
0:02:47 A story of the impact of Elon Musk going Nazi on Tesla.
0:02:53 A story about helping her kids use artificial intelligence.
0:02:57 Or a story of playing pickleball.
0:03:03 Now, which story do you think would open up a tome like this?
0:03:05 It’s a serious academic work.
0:03:06 It’s pickleball.
0:03:07 It’s pickleball.
0:03:08 All day, baby.
0:03:10 And why is that, Brene?
0:03:15 Because this metaphor just unfolded in front of me.
0:03:16 So, I got hurt playing pickleball.
0:03:18 I go to a great trainer.
0:03:24 And he uses the term compensatory injury.
0:03:31 He tells me I’m hurt because I don’t have a core and I’m using insufficient muscle groups
0:03:34 to do the work of big muscles that I should be using.
0:03:35 And he keeps talking.
0:03:37 He says, we’re going to go slow.
0:03:39 We’re going to be intentional.
0:03:42 We’re going to not build on dysfunction.
0:03:52 And the whole time I’m working with him, I’m thinking, he’s working with me on what I’m working on with CEOs and leaders.
0:03:53 Not building on dysfunction.
0:03:54 Yeah.
0:03:56 Building core muscles and skills.
0:03:57 Yeah.
0:03:57 It just made sense.
0:03:58 So, I loved it.
0:04:01 And I am a very serious pickleball player.
0:04:01 Yeah.
0:04:02 I noticed.
0:04:04 I’m very competitive.
0:04:07 I noticed I’m not playing pickleball with you.
0:04:14 So, you, in this pickleball story, you talk about the word writhing, right?
0:04:15 Because you were in pain.
0:04:18 Would you say that America is writhing right now?
0:04:21 No, but I hope we get there soon.
0:04:23 You want to writhe?
0:04:23 Yes.
0:04:24 Why?
0:04:29 Because we’re clearly not at our pain threshold yet.
0:04:32 So, we’re tolerating a lot of stuff.
0:04:33 We are being injured.
0:04:37 But the pain doesn’t match the level of injury yet.
0:04:42 And so, I think at the time where the pain matches the injury, that’s usually when people
0:04:44 say, enough, I’ve got to do something different.
0:04:45 Are we close?
0:04:50 I hope so, because I don’t know how much more injury we can sustain, to be honest with you.
0:04:51 Yeah, ma’am.
0:04:51 All right.
0:04:54 I’m going to just go dark for a little bit.
0:04:55 I mean, we’re not there already.
0:04:57 It feels pretty dark already.
0:04:58 Just like saying.
0:04:59 All right.
0:05:01 I’m gearing up.
0:05:01 Yeah.
0:05:02 So, seriously.
0:05:04 So, you know, you’ve read my writing.
0:05:05 I’ve read your writing.
0:05:11 And, you know, we’re all about empowerment and empathy and vulnerability and all that kind
0:05:12 of good stuff.
0:05:17 But I got to tell you, there are days right now that I look at this and I say, well, it
0:05:20 seems like the path is you focus on crypto.
0:05:23 So, you focus on long-term capital gains.
0:05:28 You work at Fox to become a high-ranking government official.
0:05:33 Do you ever, like, just get disgusted and give up and say, you know, the world is topsy-turvy.
0:05:35 We’re living in a simulation.
0:05:36 God has a sense of humor.
0:05:39 Yes, like, three or four times a day.
0:05:40 Yeah.
0:05:46 I think if you are not questioning that, you need to probably go outside and take a look
0:05:47 at what’s happening.
0:05:50 But I think that two things can be true.
0:05:53 I think the call to courage has never been more important.
0:05:58 And I think that these are really very difficult times.
0:06:04 And I think right now, we’re not good in uncertainty.
0:06:08 And I think a lot of people feel disconnected and distrusting and are in pain.
0:06:14 And if you can deliver certainty, whether it’s real or not, and you can give people someone
0:06:20 to blame for their pain, hopefully someone that doesn’t look like them, I think in the
0:06:22 short term, you can gain a lot of advantage.
0:06:28 I just don’t think that’s a long-term play because I do believe the moral arc bends towards
0:06:29 justice.
0:06:32 And I do think people are inherently good.
0:06:36 I think people in fear are inherently dangerous.
0:06:39 And I’m not giving up on all the things that we write about.
0:06:41 I’m just, I’m not going to.
0:06:42 Yeah.
0:06:47 I don’t even know if I dare ask this question, but, you know, I was reading your book and I
0:06:53 said, oh my God, what does Brene think of the quantical Ritz-Carlton off-site?
0:06:56 I mean, I didn’t see a lot of vulnerability.
0:06:59 I didn’t see a lot of leading from the ground.
0:07:00 I didn’t see anything like that.
0:07:02 What do you think to yourself about the leadership?
0:07:08 I don’t look toward those folks as models of leaders.
0:07:12 And so I don’t think much about it at all, actually.
0:07:17 I look toward the leaders that I work with every day who are waking up.
0:07:19 They’re committed to understanding themselves.
0:07:23 They’re committed to accountability and discipline and courage.
0:07:30 They’re committed to understanding that the role of a leader is to serve the people they
0:07:31 lead, not be served by them.
0:07:37 And so I’m looking in a vastly different direction for models of courageous leadership.
0:07:39 And I’m not going to be distracted.
0:07:41 I’m just not going to be distracted.
0:07:48 I don’t know what day he’s here, but have you ever interacted with Stanley McChrystal?
0:07:55 No, I know his work on character and I know about his military career, but I’ve never worked
0:07:56 with him now.
0:07:58 I hope you can meet him here.
0:08:00 He’s a remarkable person.
0:08:06 His book about leadership, I think, is the best book I’ve ever read about leadership.
0:08:13 And I would rank Peter Drucker’s work number one, and I would rank Stanley McChrystal’s work
0:08:15 on leadership number two.
0:08:21 There are some tremendous leaders coming out of organizations, military, non-military.
0:08:26 I’ve done a lot of work with the military and been able to work with a lot of the most kind
0:08:33 of outstanding, humility-driven leaders that I’ve met in my career who are all really struggling
0:08:34 right now.
0:08:34 Yeah, yeah.
0:08:41 I truly enjoyed your book, but could you just, for the listeners, talk about what does finding
0:08:42 your ground mean?
0:08:52 Yeah, I think it comes out of that injury metaphor where part of strength and stability is finding
0:08:53 our ground.
0:08:56 And the ground is such an interesting metaphor.
0:08:59 And it’s actually a metaphor, but it’s also real, that the ground is the only thing in
0:09:03 our lives that can both stabilize us and give us a springboard for action.
0:09:06 And I think that’s what we’re looking for right now.
0:09:08 I don’t think very many people feel tethered right now.
0:09:12 And they’re looking for external things to tether them.
0:09:14 And you’re not going to find that.
0:09:21 What you’re going to find is your own ground, your own values, your own clarity about who you
0:09:25 are, how you’re going to show up, emotional awareness and self-awareness.
0:09:30 And that stability is also the springboard for change.
0:09:34 And so, I think it’s time to find our athletic stance.
0:09:44 You know, and I have to say that I have never heard of the tush push until your book.
0:09:48 So, you have got to explain the tush push.
0:09:50 Yeah, the tush push is.
0:09:52 So, there’s a lot of sports metaphors in the book.
0:09:53 Yeah, there are.
0:09:53 Yeah.
0:09:57 And I think it’s because I really believe that sports is leadership theater.
0:10:04 Like, I can be with a supply chain group of, you know, senior managers for a year and slowly
0:10:05 roll out some of the learnings.
0:10:14 Or you can watch center court at Wimbledon and see how discipline and strategy and work
0:10:16 and training play out.
0:10:20 And so, the tush push is an American football play.
0:10:26 It’s a short yardage play where the team, the offense needs to move the ball like a yard
0:10:27 or less.
0:10:31 And the way they do it is they literally ground into the ground.
0:10:39 They push their feet into the turf and they shove the quarterback forward for that one exclusive
0:10:40 yard that they need.
0:10:42 And I like it because it’s all physics.
0:10:45 It’s all physics, but it’s actually the physics.
0:10:48 I think it’s the physics of great leadership and great teamwork.
0:10:50 Imagine a team.
0:10:52 Let’s just take it into an organization.
0:10:55 Imagine a marketing team of eight people.
0:10:58 Each of them firmly grounded in their own values.
0:11:04 Each of them firmly grounded in the mission of the brand that they’re working for.
0:11:10 All pushing together, being very mindful that they have a split-second advantage in the market.
0:11:11 Moving together.
0:11:12 They can do anything.
0:11:30 When I read about the tush push, the first question that entered my brain was, how the hell does Brené Brown come up with a metaphor from professional football about pushing the quarterback’s ass forward?
0:11:33 I don’t understand that.
0:11:36 I’m a huge sports fan.
0:11:45 Because what’s interesting to me about the tush push is Newtonian physics, again, like force is mass times acceleration, right?
0:12:02 And so why no one else does it well besides the Eagles, go birds, go birds, I see Aaron, your producer, saying yes, go birds, is they think that there’s going to be an advantage when they send a player over the top of the scrum.
0:12:15 But the minute that you lose your footing in the ground, you get pushed back because then your force is only your weight, not your weight times the ground.
0:12:23 And that’s why if we can stay tethered, I mean, like, let’s just take you to an organizational example of AI strategy.
0:12:40 If you are going to put a team, a corporate team on a field and watch them with AI strategy, you’ve got five of the people airborne, not tethered at all into business strategy, not tethered at all into what it takes for the humans who are going to be using AI to be trained and on board.
0:12:42 And that’s why it’s not working.
0:12:45 That’s why when the NFL is like, we’re going to ban it.
0:12:46 Why?
0:12:47 Yeah, yeah.
0:12:49 Why?
0:12:50 You’re going to ban physics?
0:12:51 You’re going to ban stars?
0:13:00 I must admit, I have never seen Brene Brown, Tush Push, and Neil deGrasse Tyson in one context together.
0:13:07 One of my favorite questions I’ve been asked on the book tour was, it actually started with a call from my editor who said,
0:13:15 I cannot put a chapter on John Keats, the poet, next to a chapter called the Tush Push about the Philadelphia Eagles.
0:13:16 And it was so crazy to me.
0:13:17 It was like, why?
0:13:18 Who doesn’t love poetry?
0:13:19 And who doesn’t love football?
0:13:21 We can do it.
0:13:22 Humans are very…
0:13:23 So you put David White instead.
0:13:26 I put them all, like poetry and sports.
0:13:27 I love it.
0:13:29 We need both right now.
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0:14:15 The cost of not upskilling, way higher than the investment.
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0:14:20 Find the answers at PMI.org.
0:14:24 I can offer you an idea of…
0:14:24 Please.
0:14:26 If you ever go to Japan…
0:14:26 Yes.
0:14:28 That’s, like, number one on my wish list.
0:14:28 Yeah.
0:14:30 So if you go to Japan…
0:14:31 When I go to Japan…
0:14:33 You can go to the sumo schools.
0:14:37 You can watch how sumo wrestlers train.
0:14:42 And if there is a sport where you need to be grounded, it’s sumo.
0:14:42 Right?
0:14:45 If you’re a sumo wrestler and you’re in the air, you’re going to just push out.
0:14:47 It’s all about grounding.
0:14:48 Okay.
0:14:50 So I have to ask you this question.
0:14:58 I watch sumo videos when I was riding it, but I was really scared to take it on as a sports example because there’s so much culture behind it.
0:15:04 But they take big, hard steps into the ground to get ready.
0:15:08 Like, they have such an intimate relationship with the ground.
0:15:10 The wrestlers do.
0:15:16 The only problem with using sumo as a metaphor for what you want to do is that it’s not a team sport.
0:15:17 Right.
0:15:19 They’re not pushing the quarterback’s ass.
0:15:19 No.
0:15:20 They’re pushing their own ass.
0:15:21 They’re pushing…
0:15:21 And yet…
0:15:24 But their relationship with the ground…
0:15:24 Yeah.
0:15:26 Like, you can tell in the middle…
0:15:27 Is it a match?
0:15:28 Is it called a match?
0:15:28 What is it called?
0:15:29 I don’t know.
0:15:30 A match.
0:15:31 A match.
0:15:39 In the middle of a match, if you’re watching the video, you can actually see them repositioning their body so they can get back to the ground.
0:15:42 Don’t think I didn’t look up sumo wrestling.
0:15:43 I did.
0:15:44 Yeah.
0:15:45 And I’m going to Japan.
0:15:46 I cannot wait.
0:15:48 Oh, that’s better than a tush-push.
0:15:50 It’s probably better.
0:15:53 But I think we need the team capability.
0:15:53 Yeah.
0:15:53 Well…
0:15:54 Yeah, yeah.
0:15:54 Yeah, yeah.
0:15:54 Okay.
0:15:55 And I’m into it.
0:15:56 I’m going to go to sumo school when I go.
0:15:58 Well, that’s why you’re Brene Brown and I’m not.
0:16:01 I do love a good metaphor.
0:16:01 Okay.
0:16:08 So, you know, I encounter people who read my book and they come up to me and they ask me questions.
0:16:13 And I want to say to them, you know, you’re thinking way too much.
0:16:19 So, I’m going to ask you a question that you can just say, Guy, you’re thinking way too much.
0:16:19 Okay?
0:16:19 Okay.
0:16:20 I’m so excited.
0:16:22 I don’t know.
0:16:23 All right.
0:16:32 So, you have this concept where you made it into math with this S and then parentheses R, right?
0:16:35 So, stimulus, response, and there’s the parentheses.
0:16:43 And you say you got to put space so that there’s space between the stimulus and the response.
0:16:45 And, you know, so you think and you ground yourself.
0:16:47 See, I really read the book.
0:16:47 You really did.
0:16:49 I’m loving this so far.
0:16:51 I really read the book.
0:16:51 This is not NPR.
0:16:53 I really read the book.
0:16:57 It’s not like some producer just gave me a Wikipedia entry.
0:16:58 I read the freaking book.
0:16:59 I mean, I love it.
0:17:01 That’s clear so far.
0:17:01 Okay.
0:17:05 So, here comes the part where you tell me, Guy, you’re thinking way too much.
0:17:06 Okay.
0:17:12 So, I read that S, parentheses, R, and then I read your acknowledgements.
0:17:18 And your acknowledgements is probably the most complete acknowledgements I’ve ever read in my life.
0:17:20 You list your colleagues.
0:17:21 You list your peers.
0:17:23 You list your team.
0:17:25 You list everybody.
0:17:29 And then, at the end, you list your dog, Lucy.
0:17:31 And I looked at that.
0:17:41 I said, that is an example of she put space between the stimulus of writing the acknowledgement and the R of actually writing it.
0:17:49 And she filled all that space because she’s so grounded and she’s so intellectual and she’s so empathetic.
0:17:51 She got everybody in that space.
0:17:52 How’s that?
0:17:54 I’m full of shit.
0:17:57 You know, I’ll tell you what I’m doing right now.
0:18:01 I forgot two people that were really important in that acknowledgement.
0:18:04 And I’m going to tell you why I forgot them.
0:18:07 There was not enough space between stimulus and response.
0:18:12 So, I don’t think you’re reading too much into it at all.
0:18:13 I’ll tell you what happened.
0:18:16 Random House crashed this book.
0:18:17 Say that, huh?
0:18:20 Random House, my publisher, crashed this book.
0:18:21 You mean the file got corrupt?
0:18:21 No.
0:18:27 A publication crash is a book that they speed through the process of publishing.
0:18:33 So, I turned that book in like eight weeks or ten weeks before it was published.
0:18:34 Really?
0:18:37 It was one of the fastest crashes in publishing history.
0:18:44 So, I was so rushed to do the acknowledgement that I did not stick my foot in to that closing elevator door.
0:18:48 And I didn’t do right by a couple of people who were really important to me.
0:18:49 And call them all, no.
0:18:50 Yeah, no.
0:18:52 And now I’m so afraid that I’ve missed more than two.
0:18:58 But I want to say to Tina James, for sure, she had already left our team.
0:18:59 But she was instrumental in this work.
0:19:03 And so, I definitely want to say to Tina James, she should have been in there.
0:19:06 And she’ll be in the next run, the next publishing run.
0:19:06 We’ve already added it.
0:19:09 But I do think that, you know what?
0:19:11 I don’t think you’re overthinking.
0:19:17 And I think it’s such a Guy Kawasaki question to all of your work.
0:19:20 I’m thinking about the books I’ve read by you.
0:19:24 All of your work happens in the space between stimulus and response.
0:19:30 Oh, I thought it happened between, you know, getting on the plane and getting off the plane.
0:19:36 No, you know, because you put a lot of our thinking into slow motion.
0:19:37 I do?
0:19:38 Yeah, you do.
0:19:39 Okay.
0:19:41 Yeah, I don’t think you’re thinking too much.
0:19:42 I just think you’re thinking like you.
0:19:45 Which is a different way of thinking.
0:19:47 Whoa, wow.
0:19:50 Let’s just end the interview now.
0:19:57 But it’s true because it’s like, I think beauty and excellence is one of our organizational values.
0:20:00 I don’t think it would have been had I not read your work.
0:20:08 Because I think I would have assumed that, I don’t know, I think about my work and our brand
0:20:13 very differently because you introduced the idea of love.
0:20:21 You know, I’m going to have a very hard time getting out of the door because my head is going to explode because it’s so big now.
0:20:24 Well, I don’t know because I think a lot of us think that way now.
0:20:28 But I think it was really weird when you started writing about it.
0:20:29 Do you not think that’s true?
0:20:30 This is…
0:20:31 We were surprised.
0:20:34 This interview is not going how I planned, Brene.
0:20:35 Excellent.
0:20:37 Okay, so…
0:20:40 I hear you hear he’s going back in the driver’s seat.
0:20:42 I see you shifting gears.
0:20:46 This is what happens when you get two podcast hosts together.
0:20:46 Yeah, no, right.
0:20:47 Whose interview is it?
0:20:48 Right?
0:20:49 But I do think…
0:20:56 Do you not think it’s true that the way we think about brands and business today has been changed?
0:20:56 Oh, yeah.
0:21:05 By the idea that we have to create space between stimulus and response and make sure love exists in that space and excitement and enthusiasm?
0:21:06 Wow.
0:21:09 Do you not think you introduce those ideas?
0:21:11 This is a beautiful…
0:21:14 I mean, I’m not as cerebral as you, Brene.
0:21:15 Bullshit.
0:21:16 I mean, that’s like nice.
0:21:17 That’s like, yeah, yeah.
0:21:19 You’re uncomfortable right now, but you are cerebral.
0:21:20 So, okay.
0:21:20 Well…
0:21:22 But, I mean, I think it’s true.
0:21:27 In the last interview I did in these chairs, the guest forced me to sing with her.
0:21:28 So, you know…
0:21:30 That you don’t ever have to worry about happening.
0:21:37 Unless we’re going to sing like some kind of University of Texas fight song or the Liverpool You’ll Never Walk Alone.
0:21:38 Hook’em Horns.
0:21:40 Oh, sorry.
0:21:41 This is a shocker.
0:21:42 Oh, yeah, yeah.
0:21:43 Let’s go here.
0:21:44 It’s Hawaiian Hook’em Horns.
0:21:44 Right.
0:21:45 Let’s go here.
0:21:50 And let’s look directly at the camera and say, Hook’em Horns, oh, you sucks.
0:21:53 Okay.
0:22:02 So, now, the next part of the book that I read, I said, oh, my God, that is Steve Jobs, which is someone who combines plumbing and poetry.
0:22:04 Oh, James March’s quote.
0:22:07 Steve Jobs truly combined plumbing and poetry.
0:22:12 He was in the nitty-gritty and he was in the big vision and the romance, too.
0:22:13 He was really…
0:22:14 I love that.
0:22:16 Well, first of all, I love alliteration.
0:22:18 So, poetry and plumbing is already a winner.
0:22:19 It’s good, isn’t it?
0:22:19 Already?
0:22:20 Yeah.
0:22:21 That’s James March from Stanford.
0:22:24 I have to say, I would love…
0:22:27 We don’t even have to do a podcast, but we could take a walk one day.
0:22:30 I would love for you to read March’s book on leadership.
0:22:34 It’s a very difficult read, and I don’t have the balls to say I’ve read it.
0:22:38 I just have interacted with it for long periods of time because it’s complicated.
0:22:43 But he’s the one who said leadership is plumbing and poetry.
0:22:53 We have to be poetic enough to cast a vision that people want to follow and then care enough about operational excellence to build the systems that deliver upon that vision.
0:22:54 This is plumbing.
0:22:55 That’s Steve Jobs, right?
0:22:56 Yeah.
0:22:57 Yeah, it really was.
0:22:58 It really was.
0:23:02 You think that those qualities are learned or you’re just born with them?
0:23:04 Because there’s not been too many Steve Jobs.
0:23:18 No, I think what’s interesting is, and I was actually talking to Reed about this just an hour ago, I’m better at poetry than I am at plumbing.
0:23:24 Maybe you find both in founders more than anything else.
0:23:25 By necessity.
0:23:26 By necessity.
0:23:32 Because I think I can’t decide whether I’m good at plumbing or I’m an anxious micromanager.
0:23:39 I do know I’m good at the poetry part because I love language and I can cast a vision and I’m creative and problem solving.
0:23:43 But operationally, I just want that shit to work.
0:23:52 No pun intended on the plumbing, but I just want that to work and I don’t want to talk about time fences and critical paths.
0:23:56 But I do, I’m going to insert myself in conversations about font choices.
0:23:56 All right.
0:23:59 Now, next topic is vulnerability.
0:24:01 Tell me about vulnerability.
0:24:04 You know all about vulnerability, but I’ll tell you about it.
0:24:05 I’m the host.
0:24:06 You’re the guest.
0:24:07 Okay.
0:24:15 Well, definition that emerged from the data probably 15 years ago that has held up through the test of much more data.
0:24:22 That vulnerability is the emotion that we experience when we feel uncertain, at risk, or emotionally exposed.
0:24:25 So vulnerability is the emotion.
0:24:29 My kids would call it the cringe feeling or the awkward feeling.
0:24:36 And so we know that the mythology around vulnerability is that vulnerability is weakness.
0:24:41 But the truth of vulnerability is there’s no courage without vulnerability.
0:24:51 Because if you think you’re being brave, but there’s no uncertainty and no risk and no exposure, if you already know how it’s going to end, it doesn’t require very much bravery.
0:24:55 And so every act of courage is at its heart an act of vulnerability.
0:25:05 So when you see that Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg are channeling each other to wrestling or, you know, MMA fight, that’s not exactly vulnerability.
0:25:07 You think that’s just pseudo macho bullshit?
0:25:10 I mean, those would be the first terms that came to mind, but yes.
0:25:16 Like, who do you see in the Brene Brown Hall of Fame of vulnerability?
0:25:20 I work with leaders every day, possibly whose names you wouldn’t know.
0:25:32 Let me define it in a way that who can face uncertainty and fear and risk and not be an asshole.
0:25:35 That’s a short list.
0:25:35 Right.
0:25:45 But who can, in the midst of those really hard emotions, stay self-aware, dignity, accountability.
0:25:47 I think we’ve got a lot of leaders.
0:25:58 I just don’t think they’re really famous because I think when you get to politicians, I don’t know that we’re talking, at least today, about leadership.
0:25:59 On either part.
0:26:00 No.
0:26:02 I think we’re talking about power and control.
0:26:04 And that’s different than leadership.
0:26:10 I mean, like, one of the things that I think you’ll find really interesting is for people who want to do our work.
0:26:15 So we’ve taken 150,000 leaders through our work, 45 countries the last six years.
0:26:24 About 30% of the people who are interested in doing the work with us make it through the assessment in the beginning because we ask really hard questions in the beginning.
0:26:25 And they drop off.
0:26:26 They do.
0:26:27 Or we say it’s not a good fit.
0:26:37 Because one of the things we’ll say right off the bat is we’re going to want to have really honest conversations about power and how it’s used in your organization.
0:26:41 We need people who are not armored up every day.
0:26:46 So we’re going to ask a lot of people here, why is armor required to come to work here every day?
0:26:47 Or why is it rewarded?
0:26:52 And there’s a whole group of leaders that say, you’re not going to ask that around my company, right?
0:26:55 But then there’s a whole bunch of leaders that say, ask away.
0:26:56 I want to know.
0:26:59 I care more about doing good work than I do protecting my reputation.
0:27:03 And if there’s things I need to learn or unlearn, I’m all in.
0:27:06 And that eliminates 30%.
0:27:08 That eliminates 70%.
0:27:08 Oh, 70%.
0:27:09 30%, yeah.
0:27:15 And not just those questions, but you know this, the readiness for transformation.
0:27:17 Transformation’s hard.
0:27:20 You’re going to break some shit, right?
0:27:20 Yeah.
0:27:21 By definition.
0:27:22 By definition.
0:27:29 And you’re going to break some of the things that are even off limits to talk about, much less interrogate and break.
0:27:30 Yeah.
0:27:32 So you got to be ready for transformation.
0:27:33 It’s a hard walk.
0:27:41 And if you quit transformation early because it gets too hard, you don’t have healthy incremental change.
0:27:43 You just have broken transformation.
0:27:45 Which arguably is regression.
0:27:46 Which is regression.
0:27:47 Yeah.
0:28:08 I have to ask you.
0:28:16 So if magically God, she put you in charge and said, okay, Brene, you can redesign the electoral system.
0:28:18 You can design Congress.
0:28:20 You can design separation of powers.
0:28:24 What does Brene Brown do with her magical powers?
0:28:26 Damn.
0:28:30 I take God up on the offer for sure.
0:28:32 Say that again.
0:28:34 I would definitely take God up on the offer for sure.
0:28:35 So you’re in the 30%.
0:28:35 Yeah.
0:28:37 I would take God up on the offer.
0:28:43 And then I would surround myself with people who are much smarter than me, whose integrity and character I trust.
0:28:49 And then I would go back because I actually am a big believer of democracy.
0:28:54 And I’m not sure actually that extremists on either side actually want democracy.
0:28:57 Democracy is very difficult and very messy.
0:28:59 And you can’t control what it’s going to deliver.
0:29:02 But I’m a real big believer in multicultural democracy.
0:29:04 I think it’s beautiful.
0:29:11 So I’d probably go back to the founding fathers and mothers because there were as many founding mothers as fathers for sure.
0:29:12 We just didn’t hear about them.
0:29:13 You didn’t get the credit.
0:29:20 And I’d go back to the original kind of, I got to interview Ken Burns about the American Revolution.
0:29:26 And one of the things that struck me when watching that is that the hallmarks of democracy are virtue and education.
0:29:33 And whatever I built would examine virtue and education, income equality.
0:29:41 And I would build a country where our ability to take care of the most vulnerable people was an exact reflection of our character.
0:29:47 Well, you are exactly 180 degrees from what’s happening right now, right?
0:29:55 I might be 180 degrees different than what’s happening in some places.
0:30:00 But am I 180 degrees different from the American public?
0:30:01 I doubt it.
0:30:02 Yeah, that’s true.
0:30:02 I doubt it.
0:30:05 Am I different from the people who hold a lot of power right now?
0:30:07 Mercifully, yes.
0:30:08 Wow.
0:30:11 Okay, so now I’m really going to go off the track here.
0:30:12 Oh my God.
0:30:20 As you know, because you heard me discuss your acknowledgments as a space between the S and the R,
0:30:23 I read in your acknowledgments,
0:30:26 I read in your acknowledgments a name, Nellie Novak.
0:30:29 Nellie Novak is the person who did the head.
0:30:30 What do you call her?
0:30:30 Noli.
0:30:31 No,
0:30:32 Noli.
0:30:32 Noli.
0:30:33 Noli Novak.
0:30:33 Yeah.
0:30:34 Noli Novak.
0:30:34 Yeah.
0:30:35 She does the head.
0:30:36 What do you call her?
0:30:39 The head cuts, like the Wall Street Journal, like pen and ink.
0:30:40 Okay.
0:30:40 Yeah, yeah.
0:30:41 So I read that.
0:30:44 I was like, so this is how it’s done.
0:30:51 So today I went to her site and I sent an inquiry in, but I really want to know, how does it work?
0:30:54 Do you just send them a picture and then they send you the art?
0:30:54 Yes.
0:30:57 Does it take months and months and thousands of dollars?
0:30:58 No.
0:31:02 So first of all, to get those kind of those classic Wall Street Journal head cuts,
0:31:06 they’ve tried to introduce some AI that could just take a picture and do it.
0:31:08 Not even close to the artists.
0:31:12 And first of all, even if you could make it look like that, you could never make it feel like that.
0:31:17 The head cut artists are so amazing and Noli is incredible.
0:31:23 So you send a picture and it’s got to be a certain quality of image because they’re really using that.
0:31:25 It’s almost like engraving.
0:31:29 And then we just got them back and we were like, holy shit, this is how it works.
0:31:30 Like we had the same question you did.
0:31:32 Like, how does it work?
0:31:35 But I wanted those in there because I thought they were beautiful.
0:31:35 They were.
0:31:36 They are beautiful.
0:31:37 Yeah, they’re beautiful.
0:31:38 Yeah.
0:31:39 Your book is beautiful.
0:31:41 And even like the cover is beautiful.
0:31:42 Do you want to hear about the cover?
0:31:44 The cover is beautiful.
0:31:45 Do you want the cover story?
0:31:46 Yeah, of course.
0:31:53 The subtitle had the word pattern recognition in it in the beginning because I think pattern recognition skills
0:31:55 are going to be very important moving into the future.
0:31:58 And so I thought I want a beautiful pattern on the cover.
0:32:01 And I that’s my wallpaper in my room in Austin.
0:32:03 It is.
0:32:03 Yeah.
0:32:09 And so I literally called the creators of that wallpaper who own the company Mind the Gap.
0:32:11 They’re Romanian.
0:32:13 They’re located in Transylvania.
0:32:18 And I said, can I use that wallpaper for the cover of my book?
0:32:19 And you know what they said?
0:32:20 Let’s go.
0:32:23 And so, yes.
0:32:24 Wow.
0:32:24 I love art.
0:32:27 I love art and creativity.
0:32:28 We have that in common.
0:32:29 I love.
0:32:29 Yeah.
0:32:31 I mean, creators are just.
0:32:33 I really love this book.
0:32:34 Creators are resistors.
0:32:34 Yeah.
0:32:39 And you know what else is proof about how we’re on the same bandwidth?
0:32:40 We dress alike.
0:32:42 We got black and jeans.
0:32:44 And I mean, where are your cowboy boots?
0:32:46 But I don’t have my cowboy boots.
0:32:47 Do you have cowboy boots?
0:32:48 Like 10 pairs.
0:32:49 All right.
0:32:50 So let’s end up here.
0:32:57 So let’s have this scenario that, you know, I’m a high school senior or an incoming freshman.
0:32:59 I’m listening and watching this.
0:33:14 And besides my education and, you know, tush pushes and sumo, I would like to ask, Brene, knowing what you know, seeing what you see, how should I prepare myself to be a leader if I’m just entering college?
0:33:24 I thought about this a lot when I was writing the book, because there’s a chapter on grounded confidence that kind of drills down into what are the skills and mindsets for grounded confidence.
0:33:28 And it took me six weeks to write that one chapter.
0:33:30 It was so hairy.
0:33:34 When I stood back from it, I thought I was going to think about the leaders that I work with every day.
0:33:38 But the first thing that came to mind were my kids who are 20 and 26.
0:33:54 And I think what I would tell someone going into college right now is we’re unwittingly, and some people wittingly, building a world where there are going to be thinkers and consumers, creators and consumers.
0:33:57 And we want to be on the thinking creating side.
0:34:05 Your attention, your thinking, and your focus are commodities that algorithms are desperate to get a hold of.
0:34:06 Protect them at all costs.
0:34:07 Read.
0:34:10 Don’t let anyone talk you out of liberal arts classes.
0:34:10 Take them.
0:34:18 Be mindful of how much time you spend consuming versus creating.
0:34:29 And getting real tactical, when you write a book, are you sitting down with Microsoft Word, or do you have some like 18-carat nib Mont Blanc pen, and you’re writing on parchment?
0:34:31 How do you write a book like this?
0:34:32 Microsoft Word.
0:34:34 But missing Word Perfect every day.
0:34:36 I was a Word Perfect fan.
0:34:37 Yeah.
0:34:37 Yeah.
0:34:39 But I mean, I’m just a Word writer.
0:34:40 Huh.
0:34:41 Yeah.
0:34:42 Microsoft Word.
0:34:44 Do you start in an outline format and you just dive in?
0:34:45 Oh.
0:34:48 Do you want to hear about, it’s a massacre?
0:34:49 It’s a post-it note massacre.
0:34:54 Like hundreds and hundreds of post-it notes.
0:34:58 I take over, I commandeer the entire house.
0:35:01 There are hundreds and hundreds of post-it notes.
0:35:03 And you know what?
0:35:05 You post all the notes and then you type them in.
0:35:08 I post them on windows and doors and refrigerators.
0:35:18 Because as a grounded theory researcher, I’m trying to understand categories, big, fat, qualitative categories, and the properties that support those categories.
0:35:23 And so I’m coding data, then I’m writing it out, then I’m looking at it.
0:35:24 It looks like a crime scene.
0:35:27 Now we can get sponsored by 3M.
0:35:32 I mean, it’s not rare for them to send me things.
0:35:34 Because I use so much post-it note.
0:35:35 I mean, like, yeah, crazy.
0:35:39 I hate to bring this to an end, but I must.
0:35:40 So thank you, Brene.
0:35:41 It was so fun.
0:35:42 Oh, man.
0:35:43 Thank you for all your great work.
0:35:45 Okay, so I want to thank you.
0:35:46 Thank you.
0:35:56 I want to thank Madison Neismaner, my producer, Jeff C. producer, Shannon Hernandez, sound design, Tessa Neismaner, researcher, all my friends here.
0:35:58 We have a great team, Brene.
0:36:06 Man, it is an honor to have you on my podcast.
0:36:08 It’s an honor to be here.
0:36:09 It’s fun.
0:36:15 This is Remarkable People.