Scott’s Thoughts on Joe Rogan, Year-End Reflections, and Hiring Great People

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0:00:46 2025 was a wild year for the tech industry.
0:00:49 AI seemed like it took over everyone’s brains.
0:00:51 It was the only thing anyone wanted to talk about.
0:00:54 NVIDIA became the most valuable company in the world.
0:00:57 We had some huge new video games.
0:00:58 The Switch 2 launched.
0:00:58 A lot of people got it.
0:01:00 There was just a lot going on.
0:01:03 And on The Verge Cast, we are talking about the best,
0:01:06 the worst, the most important, the biggest heel turns,
0:01:09 all the stuff that happened in 2025.
0:01:14 And making maybe a few predictions about what’s going to happen next year.
0:01:17 All that and more on The Verge Cast, wherever you get podcasts.
0:01:30 Right now is the AI gold rush.
0:01:34 And that means everybody who builds an app, a platform, a piece of software,
0:01:39 a gizmo that somebody, anything, everybody is trying to put AI everywhere.
0:01:44 And for two weeks in a series on The Verge Cast, we are talking through what that looks like.
0:01:47 We’re talking to developers about what they’re building and how they’re building it.
0:01:53 And whether AI actually does make sense everywhere or is just going to ruin everything in the process.
0:01:57 That’s the AI miniseries on The Verge Cast, wherever you get podcasts.
0:02:01 This series is presented by MongoDB.
0:02:06 Welcome to Office Hours of Prop G.
0:02:08 This is the part of the show where we answer your questions about business,
0:02:10 big tech, entrepreneurship, and whatever else is on your mind.
0:02:12 If you’d like to submit a question for next time,
0:02:15 you can send a voice recording to officehoursofpropgmedia.com.
0:02:18 Again, that’s officehoursofpropgmedia.com.
0:02:21 Or post your question on the Scott Galloway subreddit,
0:02:23 and we just might feature it in our next episode.
0:02:28 Our first question comes from Spongebob Spackpants.
0:02:29 That’s what we love about Reddit.
0:02:30 And they say,
0:02:34 Scott, have you entertained or been approached about going on Joe Rogan?
0:02:37 I think your message would actually resonate a lot with him and his audience.
0:02:39 What are your thoughts on Rogan?
0:02:46 So my first thought is that everybody in podcasting should probably send a royalty to Joe
0:02:49 every time we do a podcast, because I do think he blew open the medium.
0:02:53 And also, he’s enormously successful, good at what he does.
0:02:54 I give him credit for it.
0:02:56 I don’t think he’s a bad actor.
0:02:57 I don’t think he’s purposely malicious.
0:03:00 The other thing I like about Joe is that he has,
0:03:04 he’s sort of set a vibe for podcasts,
0:03:07 and that is podcast culture, I think, is a little bit more gentle.
0:03:08 And I try and practice this.
0:03:12 And that is, I don’t try to play gotcha with who are my guests.
0:03:14 I try to present them in their best light.
0:03:17 I’ll occasionally push back, and it’s a fine line.
0:03:21 But I want to let people run and give them the benefit of the doubt,
0:03:25 and then push back enough to challenge stuff that my listeners are probably asking.
0:03:28 But I don’t want to be a food fight.
0:03:32 I don’t want to be Abby Phillips or Fox and, like, trying to call people out for a TikTok moment.
0:03:34 I don’t do that.
0:03:36 I’m not looking for sparks.
0:03:38 And I think Joe kind of set the tone there.
0:03:43 I think he’s, generally speaking, pretty—he attempts to position people in their best light.
0:03:47 I think it was a huge mistake for Vice President Harris not to get down there.
0:03:55 She should have taken the bus down there if needed, and it would have saved her three weeks of going on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox for three hours.
0:03:56 This is actually legitimate.
0:04:01 It would have taken her—she would have had to go on those programs three hours a night on cable news for two weeks
0:04:04 to match the exposure that Trump got on Rogan.
0:04:05 Now, this is the problem, though.
0:04:14 And this is, quote, unquote, my issue with Rogan, is that he will bring on Sanjay Gupta to talk about the COVID vaccine,
0:04:18 and then he’ll bring on some fucking quack and create a false equivalence
0:04:25 and create a scenario where people start questioning the legitimacy of whether or not—or the veracity of the statement
0:04:33 that this quack who’s been debunked and basically had his licenses removed—of saying that mRNA vaccines alter your DNA.
0:04:41 And I feel Spotify and Joe didn’t match the size and influence of his platform to fact-checking.
0:04:47 And the reason I have not gone on Rogan, nor will I go on Rogan, nor will I ever be invited on—
0:04:49 basically, everyone like me has been invited on Rogan.
0:04:55 And the reason why I have not been invited on Rogan and will not accept an invitation, which is not coming,
0:04:59 is during COVID, I pulled down all of my podcasts from Spotify.
0:05:05 And the reason for doing that was I lost someone who I cared a great deal about to COVID.
0:05:12 And they had decided, along with their girlfriend, that they were part of this anti-vax narrative.
0:05:13 I think they were misinformed.
0:05:17 I think they were influenced by media that was spreading misinformation.
0:05:25 And I think the manosphere did an especially good job of hip-checking or creating false equivalents
0:05:28 or not being very honest about what the science said.
0:05:30 And also, we got it wrong.
0:05:32 When I say we, America got it wrong.
0:05:37 There was some narrative that was just false or just—it became that you couldn’t trust institutions
0:05:37 anymore.
0:05:39 First saying that, no, you don’t need masks.
0:05:41 Oh, no, everyone has to mask.
0:05:43 Oh, you won’t get COVID with this vaccine.
0:05:45 No, you would get it.
0:05:48 You were just likely not going to die from it if you got it.
0:05:55 Anyways, this person close to me was an anti-vaxxer, came down with COVID, series of really unfortunate
0:05:56 circumstances.
0:06:00 I don’t know if it was poor health care, but this was someone who should not have died
0:06:03 of COVID at this age.
0:06:09 And long story short, was on a ventilator, took him off the ventilator, thought he was getting
0:06:11 better, crashed and died.
0:06:20 And then approximately seven months later, his girlfriend killed herself and left an orphan
0:06:20 boy.
0:06:26 And this has been obviously difficult for a lot of people.
0:06:31 And I want to be clear, I don’t hold any platform or any podcaster responsible for the death of
0:06:32 an individual around COVID.
0:06:40 But I do hold Spotify and Joe responsible for not, again, matching their fact-checking and their
0:06:46 fidelity to the truth around really sensitive issues as their platform has grown.
0:06:51 Anyways, for me, it’s very much a mixed bag.
0:06:52 I don’t think he’s a malicious person.
0:06:55 I think everybody on the media knows him a great deal.
0:07:03 But I do think Spotify and Joe were reckless with other people’s health and created unwittingly
0:07:07 greater death, disease, and disability than was necessary.
0:07:09 Well, that got serious fast.
0:07:13 Question number two also comes from Reddit.
0:07:15 NaturalSwimming294 asks,
0:07:16 Hi, Scott.
0:07:20 With the year coming to an end soon, what would you say are some of your highlights and what
0:07:21 didn’t go as planned?
0:07:23 That’s a really generous question.
0:07:26 And then it took me a minute off mic to just sort of ponder on it.
0:07:31 So I’ll start with professionally what went really well.
0:07:36 My book came out as the number one New York Times bestseller.
0:07:37 Notes on being a man.
0:07:38 That was very exciting.
0:07:41 It was a lot of work and it culminated in that and that was very rewarding.
0:07:43 I had never hit number one before.
0:07:44 I’ve hit number five, but I’d never hit number one.
0:07:45 So that was really exciting.
0:07:48 The live tour for Pivot was really rewarding.
0:07:50 We did seven cities and seven nights.
0:07:52 Live podcast.
0:07:53 Who would have thunk it?
0:07:56 I wouldn’t have thought people would show for a live podcast, but it was really nice to meet
0:07:59 people and quote unquote engage with the fans.
0:08:02 We hosted about 15,000 people across seven venues.
0:08:06 So those were sort of, I think, the professional highlights.
0:08:08 We’ve hired some really good people.
0:08:09 Our business is strong.
0:08:11 So professionally, things are going well.
0:08:16 On the downside, professionally, I didn’t make that much money this year.
0:08:18 I usually make a bunch of money from investments.
0:08:26 And this year, I invested in a Bitcoin treasury company and most of my stocks have just been
0:08:26 flat.
0:08:30 So I think I got spoiled making a lot of money and it feels like this year, everyone’s making
0:08:30 money but me.
0:08:31 So that’s kind of disappointing.
0:08:34 Although, why the fuck do I care?
0:08:34 I have enough money.
0:08:38 It hasn’t changed my life, but still it weighs on me mentally when I’m not making good money.
0:08:44 So that’s sort of, I guess, the net net of my professional life.
0:08:50 Personally, look, the worst thing that happened, my father passed away a few months ago.
0:08:51 Not surprising.
0:08:55 95 lived a very robust, kind of the American dream.
0:09:02 But like, you know, I had, like many people, a kind of a complicated relationship with my father
0:09:05 and him passing stirred a lot of those emotions and I was just sad for him.
0:09:13 But that was obviously, now, you know, my only family really is my sister by my dad’s
0:09:14 third marriage other than my own kids.
0:09:20 So that was, that was difficult as it should be.
0:09:25 The best thing, I’m trying to think, the highlight personally for the year was I did a college
0:09:31 tour with my oldest and it was just me and him.
0:09:36 And over like 10 days, we went to seven cool little towns ranging from Evanston.
0:09:42 Madison to Chapel Hill and Charlottesville.
0:09:44 We just had, it was just so nice.
0:09:49 We’d check into these little weird hotels, grab dinner, and then do a school tour in the morning.
0:09:56 And it was just really rewarding for me to spend that much time with him.
0:10:05 And also very, what the term is, melancholy or not sad, but this little kid who used to bomb
0:10:09 into my room in the morning on the weekends and crawl in bed with me and then wake up and
0:10:10 say, Dad, let’s make a plan.
0:10:18 It’s now, you know, six feet one and walking around, you know, Northwestern’s campus asking
0:10:20 questions around about their biology department.
0:10:26 It’s just, it’s both incredibly rewarding and quite frankly, sad.
0:10:30 And I like the notion that kind of grief and anxiety are the receipts for love.
0:10:31 And I’m feeling some of that.
0:10:33 But that was the best.
0:10:34 I had a great summer.
0:10:36 I lead a life of privilege.
0:10:37 I did amazing things.
0:10:40 I’ve gone amazing, you know, places and stuff, done cool stuff.
0:10:44 I spend most of my money on experiences, not on things.
0:10:50 But anyways, but that was the highlight was the college tour with my son.
0:10:52 What a nice, what a nice question.
0:10:52 Thank you.
0:10:55 We’ll be right back after a quick break.
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0:13:18 Raise the runners.
0:13:19 Raise the sails.
0:13:20 Raise the sails.
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0:13:51 Welcome back.
0:13:52 Welcome back.
0:13:53 Our final question is from Dan.
0:13:54 Hey, Scott.
0:13:56 Dan here from Melbourne, Australia.
0:13:59 You often say that greatness is in the agency of others.
0:14:03 And I was wondering if you could share some advice on how to find those others.
0:14:11 I imagine you have no shortage of high-quality applicants wanting to join your teams now, but what advice would you have for small businesses that are just starting out?
0:14:17 In a saturated job market, how can a small business without much reach attract truly great people?
0:14:18 Thanks for all your work.
0:14:20 Oh, hey, Dan from Melbourne.
0:14:23 I just decided I’m going to be the mayor of Melbourne, Australia.
0:14:24 I think I could move.
0:14:25 I think I’d be big in Melbourne.
0:14:26 Melbourne.
0:14:29 So, look, it’s easy to say that the team is everything, right?
0:14:32 Team with best players wins.
0:14:33 Greatness is in the agency of others.
0:14:35 But then the question becomes, well, how do you find great people?
0:14:42 And what I have found is you’re constantly posting, telling people you’re looking for people when you are looking for people.
0:14:50 And my approach to hiring, and I’m not sure it’s the right approach, but it’s my approach and it’s worked, is I tell people, everyone I know, do you know anyone smart?
0:14:51 Really good.
0:15:01 And it doesn’t matter if they’re looking, but I’ll say to people, especially we have a strong kind of referral system in our company, who are really smart people you know in your peer group.
0:15:04 And let’s bring them in and tell them about our company and see if they’d be interested in joining us.
0:15:07 I do not really believe in the power of interviewing.
0:15:15 I mean, that kind of bottom and top 10%, the tails of people in interviews, occasionally you meet someone and you’re like, okay, this is obviously not a fit.
0:15:18 And occasionally you meet someone and you think, Jesus Christ, this person is just so impressive.
0:15:22 Anyway, I’m pure about reference hiring.
0:15:32 And that is, and I always tell the story, but Ed Elson, who’s my co-host at Prop G Markets, or now that he’s hosting five days away, I should say I’m his co-host.
0:15:39 But essentially this woman, Joanna Coles, called me and said, you must hire Edward Elson.
0:15:43 And that’s my British, my woman’s British impersonation.
0:15:44 And I said, well, for what role?
0:15:47 And she said, it doesn’t matter, you idiot.
0:15:50 She basically said, you got to hire this guy.
0:15:54 And if somebody I trust calls me and says, you got to hire this person, I’ll hire them.
0:15:57 I find reference hiring is absolutely the way to go.
0:16:02 But I’ll make it clear to the person, all right, this isn’t a friend or someone you want to do a solid for.
0:16:08 This is someone you think you know that if I hire pretty much sight unseen, they’re going to work out.
0:16:10 Now, everyone has to interview them.
0:16:13 Everyone has to agree that they would like to work with them.
0:16:23 But for the most part, if someone if I get a really strong reference hire from someone who either works with us or someone I trust, that person has got kind of a 80, 90 percent lock on the job.
0:16:27 Because I find reference hires are absolutely the way to go.
0:16:28 So what do you do?
0:16:31 You spread the word that you’re looking for people.
0:16:32 You don’t wait for people to call you.
0:16:37 You find really good people and then you ask to meet with them and you just get on the radar.
0:16:38 Hey, this is what we’re up to.
0:16:41 If you ever want to know more, we have a lot of respect for you.
0:16:41 We’ve heard you’re great.
0:16:47 And also, when you do find good people, the only way to get them to act like owners is to make them owners.
0:16:49 I usually give away equity.
0:16:52 And then I will plot a path for them.
0:16:58 I think young people want to come to work to be to learn and to develop economic security for them and their families.
0:17:06 So the best reference hires for people looking to join, whether I should join this firm, is I’ll talk to the people at the firm or the people who used to work there.
0:17:12 And I’ll sit down with an employee after they’ve, you know, they’ve worked out for a year and I’ll say, OK, this is the strategy for the company.
0:17:15 This is our strategy for you.
0:17:21 This is where you’ll be in three years professionally from a position standpoint, a responsibility standpoint and also a financial standpoint.
0:17:23 And just be very explicit.
0:17:25 And sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.
0:17:33 But they knowing that, A, you demonstrate excellence and that you want them to win is very intoxicating for them.
0:17:36 At Prop G Media, I think we have 25 or 30 people now.
0:17:39 And I think we’ve had maybe one or two people leave voluntarily.
0:17:41 Anyways, thanks for the question.
0:17:46 That’s all for this episode.
0:17:51 If you’d like to submit a question, please email a voice recording to officehours at Prop G Media dot com.
0:17:53 Again, that’s officehours at Prop G Media dot com.
0:18:00 Or if you prefer to ask on Reddit, just post your question on Scott Galloway subreddit and we just might feature it in an upcoming episode.
0:18:05 This episode was produced by Jennifer Sanchez.
0:18:07 Our assistant producer is Laura Gennere.
0:18:09 Drew Burrows is our technical director.
0:18:11 Thank you for listening to the Prop G pod from Prop G Media.
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