Orwell once said, “Each generation imagines itself to be more intelligent than the one that went before it and wiser than one that comes after it.” Differences of any kind—whether they be race, religion, gender identity, or values—can make us or, if we let them, just as easily break us. Author, speaker, and podcaster Chris DeSantis sits down with Rob and shares his thoughts on the enormous potential value we can all get out of leveraging generational diversity.
Originally Published: July 11, 2022
Episode Notes
In this Pocket Sized Pep Talk, you’ll learn:
- What makes his book, Why I Find You Irritating: Navigating Generational Friction at Work different than others on the topic.
- What distinguishes the stages of life from generation to generation.
- An interesting conversation regarding feedback and performance appraisals, and why they do more harm than good.
- How mentoring changed over the years and why are the young so eager to work with mentors.
- What impact the hybrid workplace is having on the different generations.
You can learn more about this guest at: cpdesantis.com.
Rob Jolles (00:00):
Orwell once said, each generation imagines itself to be more intelligent than the one that went before it. And wiser. Wiser than the one that comes after it. After it differences of any kind, whether they be raised for lived gender identity or values, can make us, or if we let them as easily break us, break us. Let’s have ourselves a pocket-sized pep talk because there’s so much potential value we can get out of leveraging generational diversity. And today’s guest is going to tell us how
Intro (00:33):
A pocket-sized pep talk, the podcast that can help energize your business and your life with a quick inspiring message. Now, here’s your host, Rob Jolles.
Rob Jolles (00:46):
Chris DeSantis is an independent organizational behavioral practitioner, practitioner, speaker, podcaster, and author with over 35 years of experience working with clients in professional service firms both domestically and internationally. His new book is Why I find You Irritating, irritating, navigating, generational Friction at Work came out recently, just May 3rd. That was two days before my birthday folks. So we want to welcome him to the show and have a sale. Some good conversation. Welcome aboard. Chris.
Chris Desantis (01:20):
Thanks a lot, Robert. Thanks for having me here. And by the way, happy belated birthday.
Rob Jolles (01:24):
Thank you. I’m a cinco de Mayo baby, if you didn’t notice. Well, it really is a pleasure. Let’s just dive right in. And for me it all starts with the book itself. I’m a believer that books find us not the other way around. So what drove you to this topic? This topic?
Chris Desantis (01:41):
Well, I, I’ve been working mostly with, at the time, about 18 years ago, I’ve been, I was working mostly with professional services firms and I work a across the whole spectrum of that. But I dealt a lot with young people. And so what I noticed was this crop of young people about 18 years ago, was acting significantly different than my expectation of how they would normally have acted. And that was reinforced by the management. And they were saying in effect, make them like us. Make them like us. And I didn’t think that was necessarily what was going to happen. And it didn’t.
Rob Jolles (02:14):
Well, you were thinking Youthfully, weren’t you? Because I know I’ve been stuck sometimes and can hear almost the get off my lawn, off my lawn. Don’t phrase coming out of my head. So a bully for you for jumping off I think what’s more instinctive, but clearly illogical. So I applaud that. Now, there are other books on this time. What makes this one a little bit different?
Chris Desantis (02:42):
Well, it’s a good question because I, I’ve probably read 50 to 60 of these books or books that relate to this. And I was looking for where’s the space of difference? And what I’m trying to do is I spent a lot more time explaining a couple things. One is where does bias come from and why do we generalize? Because this is about perception and generalization, and you have to understand why humans do that. The other thing, I also, I spend some time talking about societal difference and how that evolves. And the third element that I bring into play here a lot is parenting models. Because the way you are parenting affects the way you interact subsequent to that because your expectations of an interaction are predicated on how you were raised.
Rob Jolles (03:26):
Yeah, yeah. I’ve written some sales books and I’m always trying to push my readers and my editors and my publishers to understand, yeah, we’ll talk B2B and yeah, we’ll do this. But what parent doesn’t need to understand this, what manager doesn’t need to understand this? I find your title. I connect to your title, by the way, because I was smiling when I first saw it and I thought, oh, I got this one. No, I have a, we’re not going to talk about my book a lot, but I’ve got one book called Why People Don’t Believe You. Not Too Dramatically Different. But
Chris Desantis (04:03):
No, I love that title
Rob Jolles (04:04):
Dramatically different. I’m only smiling because I have to be careful when I recommend it to somebody because when I get really lathered up and go, Chris, I got the perfect book for you. Talking to you makes me think I’ve got the perfect book for you. Well, what’s it called, Rob? Why People Don’t Believe You, Chris? It’s almost like a weapon. And so I can see that you have to be a little bit careful. Cause if you turn around and say, Rob, I got the book for you spending time with you, you are going to love this book. What’s it called? Wow. Why People Find You Irritating, irritating. So welcome to the club of how we have to almost apologize or carefully bring that title into a conversation. I’m a couple years out of, and I’m telling you, I’m telling you got to be cautious. Be cautious.
Chris Desantis (04:51):
No, I know. In fact, when I submitted, the publisher asked me for a title. I submitted 37 titles and this is the one that they felt was the one that worked for them. But your point is correct, because when people look at this title, they either have one of two minds. One is, you think I’m irritating or Aha, I’m going to finally find out why they are irritating. But you’re right, I’ve not been into the place where I’ve been able to recommend it, but now I see the conundrum attached to this.
Rob Jolles (05:20):
Oh, the first time I had to I actually was inspired by a group I was working with of 40, 50 people. And the publisher told me, cause I wanted to get a picture of them up in the front of the book, and they said, well, you can do it, but you’re going to have to ask them permission. You’re going to have to be. So I told this group, I said, I’ve got a book coming out was inspired by you. You, I want you to come standing behind me. You all got behind me. And one guy said, what’s it called? And I turned around, I said, white people don’t believe you. And I heard laughter and kind of groaning at this big time. I went, of course not you, but so have some fun with it because I’m telling you, you’re going to walk into that every now and then.
(06:04)
But it’s sweet. You also, by the way, and I want people to hear this, welcome to work world of writing books. Hey, we sometimes nest with a title. Fact is you had a lot of titles, you were a smart guy. Most people will have two or three, one of which they’ve been nesting with for two years to this day. Unless it’s a self-published book, I’ve never met an author who had their first pick of a title, be the first pick by the publisher. But we got to listen to them because they know what they’re talking about. My mine was going to be called, it’s not the Words, it’s the Tune. I snuck it into a chapter title. I gave it some light. But that’s, these publishers know what they’re doing. They’re doing. So again, oh, who is the publisher on this one? Publisher
Chris Desantis (06:50):
On this one. This is Mascot Books, which is an imprint of Amplify Publishing.
Rob Jolles (06:56):
Well, they did a good job of, as a guy who used to teach brainstorming and problem solving, to hear that you were working with 37 7 already want to shake hands with somebody and go, thanks for letting this author expand before he contracted. Too often it, God, what have we got? All right that, here’s two others. We we’re done, we’re done. 30 seven’s, big number. It’s big number.
Chris Desantis (07:19):
I had my first title I thought was great because it was, it’s for business and it was called B to Z, which I thought was Baby boomers to Zoomers. But nah, they didn’t. Nah. Yeah, that went tanked.
Rob Jolles (07:35):
I So you know, I can hear the conversation in your head because I had it with me on one book title and the conversation is this, Chris, love it. And for anybody who’s looking for a book and is in this space, they’re going to love it. The other nine out of 10 who see this book title will have no idea what you’re talking about and who is your 4.2 seconds. So that’s why they tend to net it out a little bit more than we we’re, we’re artists. I want to put a piece of art on the wall. They’re like, aren’t smart. We want people to know what this is about fast. So well, this is the problem.
Chris Desantis (08:11):
Yeah, yeah. It’s the problem with being so close to the topic and sort of that illusion of knowledge. They must know this. They must know. They must understand this. Well until you lay it out for them. I don’t know if they do.
Rob Jolles (08:23):
And it’s not to them. They know what sells. As a sales guy, I’m thinking, yeah, let me get out of your way. I’ve got the inside you tell me about the outside. All right, let’s talk about the inside a little bit. Sure. You talk about different things. Different things. I’m looking at stages of life. Stages of life I I’m familiar with, I’m not familiar with versus generational differences. Differences which you are writing about. What’s the difference between the two? Difference between the two?
Chris Desantis (08:54):
Well, I distinguish between the two. First of all, let’s talk stages of life just for a second. There used to be four, right? You’re a child, a young adult and adult and an elder. Those were the four stages of life right now because of the prolongation of adolescence and the extension of life itself, we’re living longer. The literature has us now down to six stages. The child, the young adult, the emerging adult, the adult, the elder and bonus elderhood, that is 80 plus. So those stages of life are common to man. And I use man in the generic sense. So as a child you are explore more exploratory, and as you get older you become a little more rebellious. And then you start to find out who you’re going to be. And then you conform. And then as you age, you mellow and you become a little more risk adverse stages of life. Generational differences are predicated on what experiences you had that were unique to your awakening phase of life. So for instance, when you were a child, were you a child in a time of abundance? I was born, I’m a boomer. Are you a boomer? As I am? Big
Rob Jolles (09:57):
Time. Right in the middle of it. Right in the middle of it.
Chris Desantis (09:59):
So we knew what was going on. The society that we were all boats were rising. So we’re part of this growing middle class. And all of these experiences we had, we saw people landing on the moon. So we had these flash bulb memories that affect us. Those, those have indel ability in your early years. And so what happens with that is it starts to shape your view, which is distinctive from the stage of life. So it’s almost an overlay to the stage of life, but it makes you slightly different. It’s like, I would call this a temporal culture. It’s unique to our time, if that helps.
Rob Jolles (10:41):
No, it does help.
Rob Jolles (10:42):
Does help. And I’m smiling because I’m going to steal a line from a financial advisor I saw on a stage one time. But as you talk about the stages expanding to more numbers there he said he was talking about social security. He said, what? Killing social security, what’s wounding it? Penicillin. Penicillin. But when I look at these expanding stages, I’m thinking, I think penicillin had something to do with it as well. We’re just living longer. But yeah,
Chris Desantis (11:14):
Because these kids today, I mean if you have children today middle class kids, one in three will live to be over a hundred. So wow. Wow. It’s going to be different. It’s going to be different. And I’ll tell you else, it’s going to be different. We’re probably, although you a have a career that is unique to who you are, but it is a single entity that is the arc of who you are. Over this period of time, these young people might have three of those arcs. So they might work for somebody, they might be an entrepreneur, and at some stage they might have this career of returning, giving something back. So it’s a little different.
Rob Jolles (11:50):
I think that’s hitting the boomers too. I feel that with me. I sort of saw it with my dad became, as he retired, big, big into the lions club and just started, they started working at a sort of thrift store that was run by the Lions Club and they were delivering food to the soup kitchens from the supermarkets and down in Florida where they retired and retired. Boy that’s a, now who has time for that now is I moved through my stages. I’m thinking stages now. I get it. That was just that next stage they went through. But that was the generation, that was the greatest generation. That was the one before us. But I certainly saw that particular stage. And I’m going to shift a little bit. A little bit. Sure. You talk about something that really hits home for me, and that is when you talk about feedback and performance appraisals and I guess how one generation hit another generation hit it but you don’t care for them all that much. And I’m going to tell you right now, tell you right now, nor do I, I’m 30 years, I’m on my own. But I worked for Xerox, I worked X for cse, I worked for a couple big corporations. Corporations. I experienced experienced performance appraisals. Okay talk to me about that because I think you’ve got a fan. I just want to hear your thoughts on it, your thoughts on it.
Chris Desantis (13:09):
Well here, perfect example. You said 30 years ago you worked for Xerox. That was sort of a lockstep company. And so what you had to do is you had to perform what they wanted you to do and then they moved you around almost like chess pieces saying, okay, well we’re going to put you here. We’re going to put you here because you became interchangeable. So you were interchangeable with others because that was part, and by the way, you were part of what I will call the covenant. The covenant was if you do it, I tell you to do the way I tell you to do it, you will have a job for life. So the performance appraisal wasn’t a report card per se, it was just sort of this is what you have to do next year and this is where you have to live up to next year.
(13:50)
So it didn’t make you necessarily outstanding or otherwise. In fact, I think it makes us more commoditized because it makes us so much like anybody else. And so while that worked in that environment, because loyalty was the design that you did not leave that firm, you stayed with Xerox. And so when you stay somewhere and you have these interchangeable sort of abilities, you stay within the framework of that. So the performance appraisal is more smoke and mirrors. It is not a declaration of how we actually going to develop you and what is outstanding and unique about who you are. Oh, so it’s different.
Rob Jolles (14:29):
I also found it found it intimidating. Intimidating. Oh, I found a de-motivating it. Bring up Xerox, love the company and very, you hit it right on the head. The head. You didn’t tie your shoe at Xerox without a process. I mean there’s a process of everything. But even the review process was carefully explained that which one to five you may get a five once in your career career and look at it as a trophy. Trophy. Well what if I want to exceed expectations every year? I can only win a trophy once. And what do you do with your more member it? This is a sales organization. Sales organization, sales people by nature are competitive with themselves as well. It seemed almost like a game that was fixed in a sense. Yes.
Chris Desantis (15:22):
Well, it plays with the bell curve. The bell curve is 10% of us are above average and the 80% of us are average. And then we get rid of those. The bottom Ted, we just get <laugh>. Or in 40 years ago we put ’em in hr. I’m sorry I
Rob Jolles (15:40):
The pip.
Chris Desantis (15:41):
But so the problem with that is it doesn’t leverage what we could do. The hardest thing about feedback is moving from good to great. Yeah. See if you’re good, nobody tells you anything because why would I spend any more time on you? Why would I do that? I’ve got to deal with these squeaky wheels or my high potentials. So we don’t spend time in the performance appraisal system where we could most leverage it. And to your point, it is demotivating. It is adversarial, and it is not based on behaviors, it’s based on conclusions.
Rob Jolles (16:12):
Yeah. Yep. And Chris, maybe you and I’ll do this. We got to write a book called Good to Great Boy. Did you just nailed that. I have to tell you that from a different angle because I taught managers for a while that, and I coached basketball. I coached 52 different teams. I mean I had a lot of teams. Lot of teams. Everybody has the 10, that one out of 10 who’s great, everybody has that one out of 10, that 10 we made, it was a hiring mistake for whatever reason, no matter how careful, we’re probably going to lose one that just probably shouldn’t have been here. Okay, now we got eight more out of that 10. And you see even I’m going to move it to basketball. The coaches that develop that pocket and move them to gray are dominant. I have winning teams in other ways.
(17:01)
That’s where the real leverage is coming from. Not from my superstar, my superstars being guarded by their superstar. Okay? Yes. And yet, and I’ll get off this in a moment, but it’s important to me, and yet managers by instinct are trained to say, why would I want to give recognition to good? It’s not great when they get great, I’ll give them recognition. Recognition, yes. Oh, I don’t know, maybe to inspire so many. Do you want them to be great? Probably a fair feedback. That’s why I love the fact that you climb into feedback fair imbalanced. And finding something, even if it’s small, to tell them they’re great at you think they’ll be not so great at that tomorrow. And maybe it inspire them. Inspire. I think we leave it on the table when we ignore. Good. I think that’s where the wheelhouse of motivation is. Motivation is.
Chris Desantis (17:57):
Oh absolutely. We are on the same page with, here’s my problem with when you give these feedback, this universal performance appraisal, there is always areas, and they firms do this, they’ll say, you need to improve here. Well now you’ve diverted me from where I could be great, meaning I’m good at something. And if you just give me a little more time, energy, and opportunity, I can be spectacular in this one area. But you’re saying I should divert my resource and attention to come up to something, some deficit that should only just come up to average to begin with. Why bother? Why I say good enough is good enough in some categories, but excellent is outstanding in others. And that’s what we should be playing. Because I think work is a team sport, and yet we evaluate you individually.
Rob Jolles (18:44):
Yeah, that’s true. That’s true. Yeah. Boy, I don’t know if you’re big on Twitter, but tweet that one. Tweet
Chris Desantis (18:50):
That one. <laugh>.
Rob Jolles (18:53):
By the way, I’m not taking tweeted we get Twitter. No, I’m giving that one to you because it’s yours anyway. But that’s a great quote. I’d love to see that one around. Alright, I’ll give you another great quote looking at my notes on you. And you talk about embracing lopsidedness lopsided. Oh yes. I’m all ears. I’m all ears. What are you referring to there? Referring to there.
Chris Desantis (19:14):
Well, I lifted this term from a book called Different, and she’s I think moon, professor Moon at Stanford. And the idea here is some brands that, well, brands that are very successful have a lopsidedness inherent in them. Therefore, like a mini car is small, is luxury, Volvo is safety. There’s a lopsidedness inherent in the brand. Well, there’s inherent in each one of us. You have a very strong presence about you and you have a willingness to want to help others. And you have the desire to put what you say on paper. But I got to believe there’s things you’re not very good at. Who cares? Who cares? So I think we are all lopsided, yet sometimes in a business, we try to make people universally great when it’s a huge waste of time. And the young, in my opinion, have been told all of their lives that they are special. Rather than say, you are not, this is what we were as boomers, you’re not so special. Rather than say that, you say, what is it about you that is special that you can leverage for the greater good? That’s what we should be going after.
Rob Jolles (20:21):
Yeah, beautiful. And if I can go back to feedback, what we typically hear is you are really graded blank. If only you could apply that to this. And which is basically, thanks for pulling the rug out from under me. Completely making, I’ll never even remember that. You just gave me some form of recognition and I’m walking out with my head down. Was that your intention? Intention
Chris Desantis (20:48):
Exactly.
Rob Jolles (20:49):
Told him was good.
Chris Desantis (20:49):
It’s like those, it’s like, I’m sorry, go ahead.
Rob Jolles (20:52):
No, no. I want you to go.
Chris Desantis (20:53):
It was like, it’s like the feedback sandwich, which I’m not a fan of that. That’s what, Hey, you did a really nice job here today. Oh, by the way, you burned the building down, but I love that you’re on time. You see? Right. So the, it’s a horrible way to, because again, the negative is louder or they might be so filled of love with themselves, they don’t notice that they burning down the building is a bad thing. The point is, we’re saying that not to them, for them we’re saying that for us to them, right? Because we’re uncomfortable saying what we need to say,
Rob Jolles (21:25):
Which is too bad. I agree. And what, let’s take that sandwich idea and let’s make it half full. Let’s make it half full To me, half full. Half full is taking, working with a negative, working with a negative, but starting with a positive, hitting the negative, an ending with a positive. Positive. And I don’t mean devaluing what we’re saying, but just using it as a transition. So I would flip flop that and say, if we want to use the word sandwich, we can use it for good, not evil, but it’s just even when we talk about ourselves, I work with people who are interviewing and they’re being asked difficult questions. Why did you leave that other job? Things like that, which is the elephant in the room. But to say positively that the company I worked for had a tremendous track record on such and such, and I learned a lot in that area. Unfortunately, what happened during the merger was our department was limited. Factual. Factual. But I’ll always be grateful for the, and finish it, right? Finish it. To me. That’s a better tasting sandwich. Better tasting sandwich.
Chris Desantis (22:37):
And Well, what’s interesting about what you’re saying, Rob, you can say that more readily because it’s not about the person sitting across from you, right?
Rob Jolles (22:44):
True,
Chris Desantis (22:45):
It’s about the person. It has greater difficulty. True. Because I think what you should be saying is, look, Rob, you could be the best salesperson we have ever had, but the thing that’s getting in your way is your abruptness. And so we need to work on that in service of the other abilities that you are, that are going to make you outstanding. So if you contextualize it against what they want anyway, be the best salesman with the skillset that they have now they hear you. But if you just tell them, Hey, you’re kind of abrupt. They’re going, whoa, whoa, whoa. You even recognize that I’m a good salesperson.
Rob Jolles (23:16):
Right, right. And I’m guessing you’ll typically hear that from somebody who’s been in that chair before and been undercut on the praise. Yes. And when it’s fair and balanced, as they say people can hear it a whole lot easier. We’re going to shift a little bit because I love the so connected to this part of your book where you start talking about mentoring. And for me, I tell you, Chris, I barely ever heard of the word mentoring until a few years ago. And every now and early on, people would ask me, who’s your mentor, Rob? And sometimes I’d say, I guess my dad say, no, no. Yeah. I don’t know. So foreign to me, but not foreign to that, to a generation behind me, the generations behind me. Talk to me through that a little bit through that a little bit.
Chris Desantis (24:15):
Well, we knew mentoring as an organic process, meaning that, look, somebody saw you as a young man and said, Hey, I kind of like what you got because it reminds me of me. By the way, we never would’ve said, we would never have said, I want you to be my mentor. But we would’ve said that in reflection, you know what I’m saying? Years later, he actually wasn’t my mentor. So in that sense, the relationship being, it’s sort of bubbled up and all of a sudden in afterwards, we name it. Now the insistence is actually what they want is they want somebody who pays attention to them in terms of develops them and a attends to them in the way their family has attended to them and the way they’re embraced in their own homes. And they just want that extension into the workplace. We’ve used the phrase mentor, but the problem when you use this phrase is it implies intimacy where none has been earned. So if you’re assigned a mentee or a protege, the implication is, I should want to know about your life and I should care about your life, and you should care about mine. Well, it’s only an assignment on paper. Don’t use that word. Language has power. I would use words like advisor or guide or buddy, but mentor is reserved for the intimacy of the experience because it creates false expectations.
Rob Jolles (25:37):
Wow. Well said. And you know, also hit it. I finally broke down, just like you said, when I was asked about mentor, mentor, I had to sort of piece it back. And I went Larry, first trainer at xx, I, no, I didn’t call him a mentor, no. But he fits the definition. 25 years later, I decided, I decided he was my mentor. He was my mentor.
Chris Desantis (26:03):
We never used this language. And no, by the way, we also, this is one of the problems with we resent them for wanting this because we felt we had to earn it. And they think they are entitled to it because that’s part of the misperception of who they are, the resignation of you’re entitled. And I think it’s a very unfair accusation of them when it’s not necessarily true to all of them. Maybe a few who knows.
Rob Jolles (26:29):
And yet I have people now who call me their mentor. At first I was long uncomfortable. I was thinking, does that make me, and I don’t know what is that again, but that’s the language they’re using. The book is called it.
Chris Desantis (26:42):
It does. I would say this though too. I would ask you this though. Doesn’t it feel good to have somebody say, you are my mentor? I mean, there is something that’s
Rob Jolles (26:52):
Oh, yeah, no, I’m honored. Responsibility. I’m honor. Yeah, exactly. I’m almost intimidated by it. What’s up? I’m my, I’m your mentor. That’s in a sense, it’s almost like one of my children. It becomes intimate relationship to me the moment they use mentor. I just thought I was giving you some tips. Some tips.
Chris Desantis (27:15):
Right. But see, that’s the interesting part of the language is that we hear it one way when we are told this and they have an expectation of that in when they walk into that. But they may not get that. Right. So one of my suggestions would simply be, define what you mean by a mentor when you enter into the relationship. So you each have the same definition of what you expect of each other.
Rob Jolles (27:38):
Yeah. Isn’t it interesting? If you ask me that question, I sometimes refer to it as executive coaching executive, which gets into somebody more. I’m not going to tell you how to run your laundromat. Laundromat. I’m getting into your life around that laundromat. And that’s a term in a sense. Maybe that’s generational now that I thought I, I’m not just do.
Chris Desantis (28:03):
Right. Well, it’s interesting because coaching is probably a subset of mentoring, but I think coaching has greater specificity just by its word. I’m coaching you. Right,
Rob Jolles (28:13):
Right, right, right. Well, okay, so now we, let’s hope we’re coming through a pandemic, but certainly has changed us. It has changed. And I used to mean three, four years ago, I would laugh when I heard somebody was working at home. Now we’re all but who’s laughing. We found ways to do it. It’s effective. But it seems like we’re crawling back into more of a hybrid. Yes. Tell me how this is affecting the various generations.
Chris Desantis (28:46):
Well, it’s, let me start with the Gen Xers because they get the least amount of press anyway. I believe they are the only generation designed for a pandemic because they, if you go with the generalization about who they are, this latchkey kid, self-sufficient, figure it out. That’s who they’ve been. So when they had to transition from the office to the home, they just figured it out. Boomers, we are older and our habits are longer and we’re a product of the office when we arrive early, when do we leave late? And we’re empty nesters. So this is more disruptive to us because we also have made, by the way, which is another interesting side note, we made our friends at the office, that’s who our friends are fr we made them. And so what’s interesting, senior management today is saying, we should all go back to the office. This is boomers. And we are hearing that young people are hearing that as an accusation. You’re doing this to me. And they’re not doing that. They’re saying, we’re doing this for you. But there’s a disconnect between these because the millennials and the Gen Z, they have an expectation now based on the pandemic. Nothing collapsed. Why shouldn’t I have greater flexibility with how I operate? My caution there is very simply, be careful what you wish for because you could get that. And then what do you become if you are not here?
Rob Jolles (30:11):
Right. Not only that, and you said this, I just want to reiterate it. Just want to reiterate is that if you asked me about my corporate experience, nine out of 10 stories would be the relationships I formed. Yes. The friendships that I had, the things that we did at the office, the pranks we may have played, all of that. I don’t play a whole lot of pranks on me in a home office. So we’re missing that. And
Chris Desantis (30:43):
I agree with you.
Rob Jolles (30:44):
We are,
Chris Desantis (30:46):
I’ll tell you what else we’re missing is our population in the sense that young people don’t intermix with people my age as much. So we don’t do that. I think of, there was a book called Fractured that had some ridiculous percentage. Something like 6% of us are only interact with people younger than 30 if who are not related to us. Wow. It’s crazy. It’s crazy. And the other thing, to your point, the young people need to make their network early in life. And you can’t make a network remotely you to do a better job if you interact and to your point, make some friends through crucible experiences, those horrible times that we’ve had to work really late. But we recollect that as one of the better times.
Rob Jolles (31:29):
Right. Isn’t that interesting? I, I’ve never really thought about it, but you’re absolutely right. Those stressful times where we all had the band together when we were whining the whole time is the first story that we tell. And we don’t tell it. Frowning tell with a proud smile.
Chris Desantis (31:44):
Yes. Yes. That’s why I would push past some of this grumbling, because that will turn into a unifying, if we all share the complaint, we’re going through a crucible
Rob Jolles (31:54):
<laugh>. Right? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Last question for you. Yes, sure. We talked about mentors. Mentors and how, at least for me, and I think too generationally, we never saw a coming but here it is and it’s a term that we we’re now embracing. How about you? What mentors did you have in your life have in your life?
Chris Desantis (32:17):
Yeah, it’s an interesting, because I’ve been on my own, not unlike yourself. I’ve been on my own for probably about 30 years. So I haven’t had the luxury of mentors. I, I’ve had people that have been helpful. But the mentor I think to your point is right about what did they do for me. So for instance, when I was in corporations, then people that were helping me, I could remember one man, Tom Green, he helped me. I remember him. And he helped me understand that I wasn’t probably perfect for the thing I was doing, but I had a really good gift in one aspect of what I was doing. And he encouraged me. And I thought that was the essence that you should do, find what’s good about the people that are working for you and find a situation you can place them in that they can do that. That was my favorite mentoring experience and I never forgot it. And that was 40 years ago.
Rob Jolles (33:10):
Mine was again with Larry Damons, I never forgot it. He taught, he was invaluable. The lessons he taught me, he was the greatest trainer I ever saw and was so welcoming and warm with his time and his expertise. And yet it took me three decades to realize, I think that was my mentor. Other than that it was my dad.
Chris Desantis (33:34):
Right. No, I, it’s amazing. If you do it, you, you’re, you’re sort of like this quiet guide and then the person who’s experiencing it doesn’t experience it in the moment necessarily, but they experience it in reflection.
Rob Jolles (33:47):
Right. And I do have people that double back. I’ll get an email or a call sometime, met you 20 years ago, met and you really changed this and that. I’m thinking, what’s your name again? <laugh> your name again. I did. But yeah, I think that is a part of this process as well, folks. The book is called Why I Find You Irritating Navigation. Navigating Generational Friction at Work came out May 3rd. How’s it doing?
Chris Desantis (34:17):
Well, I don’t know yet. I’ve been, well, you do this better than I did. Cause I saw it on your website. And I thought, yeah, that’s what I want. Because you encourage the idea of if you’re going to present to large groups, buy the book, right? Because give the book out because the book reinforces the learning. Well, they, that’s been happening. So in the last, I’ve been selling a lot of books just by virtue of the fact they order them in bulk, which I think is great. It’s a little unnerving because people that I don’t, I’ve never been in a book signing and people ask you to sign the book. It just feels, feels so different. It’s a weird feeling.
Rob Jolles (34:53):
I’m going to give you a piece of advice and then we’ll call it a day here. But I’m going to tell you, it didn’t come from me. Came for perhaps another mentor of mine, my father-in-law. And I was always a little uncomfortable about things like that. And he said to me, he said, do you know what courage it takes for somebody to walk up and ask an author to do that? And so frequently it’s followed. It’s some praise around there as well. And my instinct was, oh, please, I’m put my pants on the same way you do one leg at a time. I am. And I learned to be grateful and appreciative, which is exactly what they want not. And so block that instinct. Take pride in it, give ’em a good signature. Tell ’em how grateful you are and make their day. They just made yours.
Chris Desantis (35:45):
Well, you’ve given me some. That’s a lovely piece of advice. Thank you, Rob. That’s really good. And I will do that. You bet. I’ll get past this.
Rob Jolles (35:52):
<laugh> good. And it is, for those of you who’ve ever thought about writing a book trust me, it’s one of the nicest things that we do. We look forward to it. Don’t ever be embarrassed to come up to us and ask for a signature. As you can hear right now, we’re trying to work out how to control our feelings because we’re so overwhelmed with the emotion of that particular experience. So you’re going to buy the book, folks, you’re going to enjoy that book, and you’re going to write a review on that book because that’s the, other than asking a guy like Chris to sign it, the other nicest thing you can do, yes, is write a nice review for him. Chris isn’t going to ask you. So I’m asking you, get out there and write yourself a verified review and you’ll have done a really nice thing for another human being. It matters. So now that’s my commercial. Go get that book and take care of our buddy, Chris, because Chris, I enjoyed the conversation immensely and I’m grateful to had you on the show.
Chris Desantis (36:53):
Thank you, Rob. You’ve been great.
Rob Jolles (36:55):
It’s a pleasure. By the way, how do people get ahold of you?
Chris Desantis (36:59):
Well, they can go to my website, which is cpdesantis.com, or they can actually, I have a podcast with a colleague of mine, Mary Ajay. We have a 30 minute business advice. You write us a question, we give you an answer. It’s called Cubicle Confidential, and it’s anywhere there’s a podcast. Beautiful. You write us a question, Rob, write us a question.
Rob Jolles (37:20):
<laugh> you, be well. Okay. So now, and you’re going to listen to that podcast. You’re going to write a nice review, and then you’re going to remind yourself, Hey, wait a minute. I listen to jealousy. We’re going to write a review on that one because just like books, we like those two. In any case, look folks, we’ll do it again as well as we can next time. As until then, everybody, until everybody, stay safe.
Outro (37:43):
Thanks so much for listening. If you enjoy today’s show, please rate and recommend it on iTunes, outcasts, wherever you get your podcast. You can also get more information on this show and rob@jolles.com.