Bryan Power on Exits, Loyalty, and Why Your Goodbye Matters More Than You Think

Speaker A: What's up, everybody? Welcome back to another episode of hr. Ah, heretics. Today we have Power Hour with Brian Power. What's up, Brian? Good to see you, bro.

Speaker B: Third time at the show. Thank you again for having me.

Speaker C: I just have to say, I saw Power Hour on my calendar invite, and I was like, what the. What the. I thought it was just an inside joke. And here we are branding it like, Dear Heritage.

Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, this is. I will. I gotta take credit for this one. I'm a. I'm a drive time radio guy, and so, like, you gotta have, like, shticks for the regular people who

Speaker C: come on Power Hour. Let's go, you guys.

Speaker B: The last time I was on, we did Kelly's Least favorite Corporate lingo, and you said it was gonna be a thing, and I don't think you ever did it again. So we have to bring it back to make it a go.

Speaker C: Let's close today with another. Another lingo.

Speaker A: Great. Exhilarating. All right, Brian, you are now unemployed. Congratulations.

Speaker B: Unemployed. Thank you.

Speaker A: And as part of your unemployment, you decided to write the diatribe on how to quit, which has gotten, like, it's all over my LinkedIn. Interestingly enough, I'm working on a search right now, talking to a finalist candidate, and was like, hey, like, you know, he's thinking about how to transition out of his company. And I was like, oh, let me send you this thing. So I've already seen it. That's everywhere. So you are now, like, you know, the new Shakespeare. Everyone's seen your stuff. Give us the rundown on the why, like, what drove this article.

Speaker B: Yeah, it's something I think about for a while. And I said at the beginning, like, I didn't want to write it while I was working because I thought my team would think I'm quitting because it's about quitting. And that's kind of weak. But also, I just didn't want to deal with it. But it's always a topic that I think is not discussed enough, which is, what are some things you should consider when you quit? And then, you know, as I've gotten older, I turned 50 this year. I'm really realizing a lot, particularly of younger employees haven't been taught stuff, and they haven't been able to learn stuff by working in the office with other people. This is the type of thing you would pick up through osmosis of, uh, just being able to chat with people at work, which I think is one of the downsides of so much remote work, is that just kind of Cross pollination of how to do things. And as I've, you know, teed off on wishing younger people knew how to do more stuff, I've also come to realize it's the burden and the responsibility of people with loss of experience to share. So I was like, you know what? Instead of complaining about people leaving the wrong way, I'm just gonna say these are my thoughts. But it was really just trying to get something off my chest. I was struck by how many people commented they had never, I don't say been told because that means they should have heard it from me but had never seen it written down. You know, so that was validating in taking the time to do it. You know, the point of the article is you can really screw up your time at a company with very little time left at a time when you think you've actually put pencils down. And then inversely is maybe less common. I've seen people who just got crushed by the company, fired for performance clearly not working out. And the way they manage themselves in the last two weeks changes that entire reputation to where people are going out of their way to really help you find your next thing because you're just such a pro. And again, you're in the people space. You have a front row seat to this type of stuff. But it's so important because the pain you witness when people screw this up unnecessarily is real.

Speaker A: That was my story. Like I, I told you, Brian, when you wrote this, like, my response back to you, my comment on LinkedIn was like, I wish somebody had given this to me 10 years ago. And it turns out it's not, it's not an intrinsic thing. Like, you need to actually watch other people do it. You need to see mistakes. You need to see it done super well in order for you to do it well. And I'm so happy you wrote this down. Like a couple things. I had like a ton of highlights in this thing. But like in your first paragraph, you say no one teaches employees how to leave their company. And it's so true. And you need to be taught, like, you're not going to just get it right the first time having flight and completely blind on the thing. The other thing that you said really early in it is you said your exit often becomes the entire story of your time at a company because it's the last thing people remember.

Speaker B: It's the last impression they.

Speaker A: Exactly. So, Kelly, we've talked about this a little bit in the past, but like, this is, uh, it's. It's hard to get right.

Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah. I love the article, Brian. Like, no wonder this is power hour. Like, this was a power article. And the question I have, um, you know, we can talk about the reasons why your points are all very salent and appropriate. Like, why do you all think this is not more widespread? I'd love to diagnose, like what happened

Speaker B: here of two ideas. And I think again, part of it for me is, as you mentioned, beginning. I just left next door after seven years and I focused so much on the transition, more than I ever have at any company before. And so that also, I think was a motivation to write this. I had a great exit and transition. I felt really good about handing things over. Like, the timing, that's just like not that common. I get sometimes people have a new job, they are going to in the timing of responsibilities being handed off is murky. Everyone's motivations change. Like, I'm going to rethink this. Companies should spend time on how to leave the company they're running because it's going to be different strokes depending on where you are. We talk all day about the way you should do certain things at the company. This is a really important moment. Even, uh, just kind of playing the handoff, you know. The second point is I think people, once they quit is like, both sides become selfish if you're not being thoughtful about it. So the boss is like, are you kidding me? I have to deal with all this stuff now. Like, do you know what my fricking week looked like? And now I have to deal with this too. So there's like potentially resentment and the other person's like, hey, I gotta go, you know, I'm outta here. I'm not doing anything else. And that just changes the dynamic and introduces so much risk.

Speaker C: Yeah, I think that, you know, if I zoom out a little bit, like, by the way, which is also a terrible corporate lingo. Zoom out. And I just said it. So I'm just gonna. It's not my answer later, but it's one of them. But if I zoom out a little bit, I feel like we're evolving to making this stuff less taboo. Remember, you know, years ago when it was, you're at this company and you want to present that you're in forever. Like, I'm going to be here for 20 years and I'm gonna. And then the books came out where it was, you know, tours of duty and these like rotational concepts that it's okay and you should be a great company to be at. And more importantly, A great company to be from. And like, the past five years, I talked about that very openly. Like, we want to be an amazing company to be from. And all these leaders go off and do great things. Great. And now I think what you've unleashed here, because I don't do it here at Supio, and I literally, like, I'm toying. Do I put it in the onboarding sessions? Probably not. But there is, uh, whether you talk about under career pathing or growth or development or learning, there is something to be said about, like, when you probably leave here, here's how to think about doing that. I love that Evolution.

Speaker B: Yeah. I, uh, mean, as I thought about it, like, all the pain between a manager and employee is on expectations that are off. Manager think that person's doing one thing, the person thinks they're supposed to be something else. And in this situation in particular, they're really divergent, you know, and it's everything from the person's like, hey, I'm going to do the right thing here. But, like, I got to go and I want to get out of here. So, like, minimum. And the manager's like, hey, you got to hang on and keep doing everything until I'm actually ready. And it also is a bit adversarial now because the incentives and loyalties have just been disrupted.

Speaker C: And.

Speaker B: And yeah, to your point, Kelly, this is what I've thought of, is you just say, hey, let's just kind of set this up at the beginning here, that when you leave, this is kind of what we think the right baseline is. And then you work around that versus this total improvisation on everybody's part otherwise.

Speaker A: Yeah, but, Kelly, you nailed it, right? Like, the expectation mostly is still when we give you an offer letter, you're gonna work here for the rest of your life. Like, that is what companies want. That is truly what people want. And so when you think about the dynamics involved with that, it's complicated. Companies don't want you to leave. They expect you to be loyal. And so there's kind of this, like, shit, I'm gonna, like, break somebody's heart here, and they're not ready for this. It's like the thing we never talk about that goes underneath the rug that just festers over time. And then I surprise people with it, and it's like this big, weird, you know, life event thing. Versus, to your point, I do think it's modernizing. Brex just had this amazing recruiting ad around, like, wanting quitters. Yeah. So Joel and Heather nailed it. They just absolutely nailed it. And it's about a launchpad. It's like, you know, to your point, about places that you want to be from. But I do think it's a lot of this is loyalty based and companies still expect loyalty. And if you expect loyalty, then you can never talk about this thing because it's not loyal.

Speaker C: I think you're completely right that it's not just like, yay, let's all just go talk about quitting tomorrow. That's not what this is. It still is very complicated and there's emotions and all the shit that goes along with that. But I think this is kind of our job in these companies. Like, I'm doing it here to make things that are under the table or this or that, bring it out on the table in the right way at the right time with the. You know what I mean? With the right staging. But this is stuff that we can. This is like the value in creating these modern companies where people do feel motivated and safe and excited about the present and the future. Like, we can actually shape this stuff. And I think that's something that shows up in how we work too. It's like, if you have a company where you don't ever fucking talk about single points of failure or when this person leaves, not like, uh, if this person quits. No, when this person leaves one way or another, what happens? Are we spending time talking about that? So there are ways you can kind of, uh, do this, where you can bring it out in the open. But look at this whole AI, like frenzy. Like our two year average tenure is now like 14 months, I think. So crazy. It's. You're fools not to, I think. And if you don't, I think you'll be caught more on your heels than otherwise going forward.

Speaker B: Yeah, I was trying to. I was trying to think of like, where could you just steal, you know, templates, just do this, you know Your point, Kelly? You're like, in motiva. How could I do something like 30 minutes and have something up and running? And you know, when you rent an apartment, the terms of like handing the apartment back is in the lease. You know, it's like you gotta restore the paint to the original color. And anything on the wall you gotta put. It's like some very basic standards. And I'm like, you can totally do something like that in an offer letter. You're like, look, whatever, you quit, you could quit in six months, you quit in six years. But these are kind of like our base level expectations on how you're gonna handle it. It'd um, Be better than nothing. It'd be better than nothing, you know, because to your point, Nolan, like, it's. Nolan, you're right. The assumption is this is the last offer you're ever going to accept in your career. You know, working for us forever. And it's not true. You know, you're probably going to leave at some point.

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker A: But you're blowing up the ego of the founder. There a lot of this is just like the founder. The founder cannot accept that reality. Like, yeah, ah m. And they have to have. And this is where honestly, Brian, you doing this, I think this is going to go around the founder circle and make people realize, like, oh, shit. Like, yeah, these people aren't going to be working here for forever. And so I actually think, like, that's helpful.

Speaker B: Yeah, I do think the whole nature of what it means to have a job is just changing so much. It's always been changing, but it's very turbulent. In the last five years, Work from home, um, changed it so much and AI is changing it. More layoffs change it so much. You know, and the fact the company. Every company has discussions every six months at least on moving on for some people at the company. And it's fine, fine that that's happening. But then when it's reciprocated, you know, to your point, Nolan, it's like, wait, you're going to quit? Like, this is disloyal, you know, how dare. How dare you. How dare you no longer believe. You know. So I don't know. I think there's some right sizing.

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Speaker C: Yeah, you said something in the article, Brian, that you know, that I think connected to a hot take I had a while ago that managers shouldn't find out during the resignation conversation how someone has been feeling. Yeah, and this is kind of remember when I went a little bit, a little bit wild Nolan on exit interviews and I was like if we find out what, what's been going on with the undercurrents like during the person's last hour when HR people do exit interviews, that is a problem. It's kind of reminded me of that because if you can create these cultures and connect with people and kind of assess and diagnose and create, create, you know, at least safe spaces if not one pocket of like getting you can, you know these things even before someone resigns. And it may not even be about that person, but it's themes about the culture and the team and those undercurrents. So I just kind of chuckled when I read that because I was like yes, same thing for freaking exit interviews.

Speaker B: One thing that surprised me so obviously got a lot of public comments, a lot of love, really feeling validated. Uh, all of the sidebar was about the discussion about be open and start with your boss. If people were like really couldn't have done that. Like my boss was a frickin disaster that just would not have worked. And like my boss, I had no support from them and like I know what you're saying, assumed good intent but I clearly was not being reciprocated. My manager was looking out for me and so I needed to put like my shield up and get out of there. And I could not get into. I totally understand this where this position where you tell your boss you're leaving and they go to war against you because you've now made their job more difficult and now they're vindictive and you've got to get out of the building because they're going to make this whole story about how you were going to get fired anyway. And like I was shocked at the text I got made me sad because I tried to say I think this is the right way to do it, but that's such a valid set of cases. The manager capability on this, which is what you're talking about, Kelly. It's like when you find out in the exit interview, you're like, come on,

Speaker C: this is my last. I'll shut up after this. But I wrote this down before we started. We don't do preps. We just. We just go. This is why people love this. Um, but I wrote down because we talk a lot about how employees should leave a company and, like, you know, and all the things they can do wrong. And the industries are small, and I agree with all that. We don't, uh, nearly talk about how managers also fuck this up. And it says so much about you as a leader, how you respond and react to that news. And believe me, if you're doing that stuff, Brian, like, no one's gonna. No one's gonna work for you, follow you anywhere. And that's one of the first things I look for in leaders that we hire, is who will follow you. What kind of leader are you? And come across a ton of them. Like, that's. Yeah, the old Seinfeld. Like, that's a shame.

Speaker A: But on the loyalty piece, you don't get points as a manager when a good person leaves at most, right? And so it's so much easier to just be like, oh, uh, like, they. They were shitty anyways. Like, we can replace them, right? Because they're covering what the company thinks is the original sin, which is letting go. Like, you didn't hold on to the great person. Why aren't they going to be here for forever? And so managers have to go into CYA mode. That's what. Like, that's the thing underneath. The thing is, it's all about company loyalty at the end of the day. And this employment contract is being rewritten in real time. We just haven't had enough cycles through it for a manager to be like, yeah, like, it's better for them, Mr. CEO, Mr. M. Or, uh, Mrs. CEO. Like, this is the right thing for them.

Speaker C: Yeah, There's a lot of nuance underneath that, though, Nolan. You know what I mean? Like, scenario A is, you know, a plus star employee, um, that's been there eight months, and the manager is a total disaster and, like, a total loser, and they have to leave because that person's terrible. Scenario two is. I mean, I've had this. Someone's been with you for over two years, three years, they're growing, they're kicking ass. And they get a number one opportunity. And the culture and the programs and the philosophies are set up as such that I've been talking about this at, uh, leadership calibrations for the last eight months. Like, hey, this person is, like, on it. Like, I'm planning for the backfill because they're probably going to sail on their wings or points.

Speaker A: Yeah, I totally agree with you, Kelly. Like, you're exactly right. I still think it's not safe at most companies for managers to say things like, they've reached their terminal ceiling here for, you know, whatever reason, I think it is best for them to leave.

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: Like, it's not something to say.

Speaker C: That is our job to help turn that. If, uh, you can't leave, leave.

Speaker B: And I think, I think they're, again, feeling my age. There's some immaturity that happens when someone good quits that there's like this insecurity about, well, they can't be that good, otherwise they wouldn't be leaving. Or, like, what does it say someone's leaving? We can't let that get out because that might change the story. It's, like, really too much. It's like, people, It's a great thing to work with great people, whether it's for two years or five years or longer. It's actually really bad to work at a place where no one ever leaves. You know, it gets really calcified. New people coming in and picking up the flag and running downfield is a great thing. And you got to create some movement. So, like, mass attrition all the time isn't really what I'm saying. But, like, we can just calm down. If someone did a good job for a couple years and decides they want to try something else with their career, that we don't need to have this whole narrative about what it means about the company or the individual that is now totally changed by the fact that they are moving in a different direction. Yeah.

Speaker C: Do you guys want to know something funny? I, I do this at every, I've done it every company the last 10 years is when I start to that exact point. Brian of. Oh, they're great. Oh, they resigned. Well, they're, you know, I, I, I asked for the attrition list as far back as it goes, and every unregrettable termination, I, like, dig into. I'm like, tell me, tell me about this. And I swear, like, 30% of them get overturned.

Speaker B: 30. That's low. I mean, uh, we, at one point, I can't remember, is it next door before, like, I wouldn't let the manager answer the question, or if they answered it, I couldn't let them answer for six months because regrettable was really like, now I have all this shit to do, you know, and I regret that, you know, and then the story change. It's just not a good time to ask at the moment of transition, is this a good or a bad idea for the company itself? Just give it some time and you get to a better, better discussion.

Speaker A: That's. That's such an interesting insight. Okay, so there, There was a lot around, like your reputation, uh, you know, being made after you announced. Like, I. That's. I think that stuff, like, is so true. A lot of big learnings in my career. The really, I think, interesting one that flew under the radar is the no long goodbyes. And you told this story. I'm going to read this paragraph because it's so good. You said. The best advice on timing that I ever got came when I transitioned out of my first manager role. I was distraught about what my team would do without me and thought I should stay for weeks, if not months. The HRBP that I shared an office with looked at me dead in the eye and said, let's say you're literally the best manager in the world. And I'm being kind by starting with that. Then they might still be thinking about this. On Friday, it was Tuesday. By Monday, they'll be fine. That is the truest thing, right? Is like, uh, no matter what the moment is, it's like, oh, my God, it's crazy, crazy. When the announcement happens three days later, everyone's moved on. It doesn't matter who you are.

Speaker B: It's true. That could be really tough. I mean, I'll never forget. That is one of the best tough love comments I've ever got from a teammate. It. I mean, it hit like a hammer, but it was, it was clearly so true, you know, And I was just like, why? Too much. But the truth is, when you feel that people move on, it's. It's very risky for you because you're like, hey, hey, hey, wait a minute. I thought like, you, uh, know, yesterday, you're really upset. Like, how come you're not so upset? Like, I have left yet, you know, and people are kind like it does. There's a little bit of people are now moving into the new reality. It's not like a showing their true colors thing. It's now like, you're not on the team. They got to figure that out as quickly as they can and don't. You shouldn't. I don't think you should judge people when they move on to their new reality quickly because it's just kind of your own ego or being selfish to want it to be drawn out. And this is why I think when people stick around for too long, here's what I think happens. People give notice and the manager's like, no way, I'm not ready for this. You got to give me more time. A minimum of a month, at least two months. But they're really like trying to create the space to figure out what to do. And every time I've seen this, once you solve that problem of, okay, now we need to know what to do, which can be like a week, the other person should just really move out as quickly as possible because there's, there's only downside risk now. Downside for the person who's trying to sit in the chair, downside for this person to basically light themselves on fire on the way out the door. But it's not about, like, how much time they gave. It's about what needs to actually happen.

Speaker C: You know, what is the best thing you all, uh, would. If you're in the audience and you're planning on resigning, right, Versus accepting a resignation nation or as managers, what is the best thing that someone can do for you when they resign?

Speaker A: The number one thing now, I literally use this today with that candidate who I referenced earlier, is you take Brian's article and you give it to the manager and you say like, hey, I found this resource. I think this playbook makes a ton of sense. Can you read it, digest it, and let me know if you agree to run this play.

Speaker C: I love that. My add to that is when someone comes to me and says, hey, it's time. And by the way, I've come up with like a whole plan of transition work ideas. I'm like, oh my God, you've built a half bridge that I can like latch onto. That's incredible.

Speaker B: I think, you know, people, leaders know this. When you need to move on from somebody, there's this entire run of show how it's going to go down. There's, uh, basically a change management plan when anyone, a leadership change is going to happen or a reorg or whatever. Like, just because the employee is the one initiating doesn't mean you don't need a plan like that. And you're right, Kelly. When someone's like, hey, everything I'm responsible for, here's the best option, here's what to do, and you're at least investing in making the transition to success versus, like, I quit. My last day is next Friday. Someone else got to figure it out now. Good luck with that. You know which. Which is going to breed resentment.

Speaker C: Yes. And if you're a manager just going about your day like duckies and horsies, no one's ever gonna leave. You're cooked. As my kids would say. You're ear. Yeah, you're cooked. I'm not gonna say six, seven. It's terrible. I do it every three weeks. Like, I don't think anyone here is leaving, but I'm like, I'm upset. What if they leave? How am I have my thing? What? Like, that is how a leader should run their team.

Speaker B: That's great, Kelly. I am surprised how much of, like, a great idea that is that other people don't do, because I did that too. I'm constantly scenario planning, okay, if they leave, who do I have today that I can put into that job? And it's gonna be a terrible battlefield promotion, but at least I'm starting to work out the playbook of, like, what I'm gonna do? And you're right.

Speaker A: Like, I'm amazed.

Speaker C: Secret, selfish. Sorry.

Speaker B: Yeah. But I'm amazed how many people are just, like, assuming no one's ever going to leave, and then they're like, holy, this person quit. And I. I'm not ready. And so I do think that's another thing where people leading organizations, you just got to constantly be running through all the time what you would do, and then it's not as big of a deal when it happens.

Speaker C: Maybe we have to learn it. Like, I. I learned it the hard way because I am. I am traumatized by getting totally around this totally, like, ultra paranoid at all times.

Speaker A: So, Brian, the part that you didn't cover was maintaining relationships after you leave. So, yeah, uh, maybe this is. This is me. But, like, literally, I remember when I left Doordash, who I didn't want to be was Matthew McConaughey and Dace and confused hanging outside the high school, like, I'd already, like, I'm out of there. But, like, I'm still, like, hanging out with the people there. There is, like, this. I still kind of feel awkward about that thing. And I think even, like, maintaining the relationship, like, you have to give, like, some distance. But, like, you clearly were in the trenches with these people, and so, like, the right amount of touch points with that for me was super awkward. I don't know if you guys have ever felt that way in your Career. But it's like, you gotta, like, give that team space to go do it. But it's also not like, goodbye. I'm never talking to you forever.

Speaker C: Yeah, I just.

Speaker B: Yeah. I think, um, McConaughey.

Speaker C: Because I love that.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: All right, all right, all right.

Speaker B: I think, um, you want to, like, you definitely want to be there for people who may need your help after you left, but even that, you want to make sure they know it's clear, like, I'm not here anymore. You. You kind of need to do it. And so, um, that's a tough space to try to negotiate fair for everybody where they don't feel like you just totally dumped it on them. But also, like, you're. You did move. You did move on, you know, and so they gotta. They gotta figure out new ways forward. But then the second thing is just the actual relationships. Like, I think the time goes by pretty quick, you know, And I think you can reach back out to whoever you want to stay in touch with once you've kind of, you know, the calendars turn. And I think I regret not doing that more than doing it too early, because then you're like, I haven't talked to this person in, like, years now. Now it's almost like someone from high school. It's like, it took.

Speaker A: What the hell is wrong with me? Why didn't I maintain that? I should have maintained that thing and. Yes, exactly.

Speaker B: But then I think also. But I also think people, like, some people are like connectors. You know, they're the people who reach out to people they used to work with over time. And people appreciate when someone does it. You just gotta put it out there.

Speaker A: Yeah, 100%. All right, let's. Let's transition to some other tech news. So if you work in our space and people and talent, and you've been living under a rock. The biggest news of the last week was that Growth by Design, uh, which was founded by Adam, Joe, and Mike was acquired, Aqua hired. I'm not exactly sure, like, what the thing was, but that firm is now no more. And Mike and Adam, as at least it's been told to me by friends, are now working at Cursor. Um, that's, like, a pretty dope and huge thing, uh, that I did not expect. Brian, what's your take on that move?

Speaker B: Yeah, so I, uh, think Adam. Adam. Those guys are the first people I know at Cursor, so I'm really just a spectator of the company. They had this article everyone was reading about inside Cursor that was in Colossus magazine, that's like a deep dive of working there. They're one of the fastest growing uh, AI companies in a space that's growing like lightning. They are definitely a pacesetter, uh, and they're a young organization that's just doing lots of things their way clearly. And I have huge respect for that because especially in this frothy AI market, a lot of people are trying to cut and paste their way to higher valuations. And again just from the outside, Cursor seems to be really cutting their own path and buying, you know, getting Growth by Design off the table. And inside was a jaw dropper, you know, they nextdoor was a customer of Growth by Design. I've had tremendous respect for Adam. I've known all of them. But Adam in particular is an absolute monster in the talent space, like a legend. And they've helped like hundreds of tech companies. And you uh, know the reason they did that is because like one company wasn't enough for them. They're going to help all these companies at once. But that just is even more impressive for Cursor to be able to convince them to come join what they're doing. And you know, I was telling you before, it also is hurtful to all the people that dependent on Growth by Design to help grow their organizations because this now huge capability is off the market and inside of uh, a customer of one Cursor. So I was just. That's really impressive. I think that is going to be even more of a net positive for Cursor which is already doing a great job with recruiting, uh, great people, uh, in a fascinating way. You know, one thing that they talk about in the article, so again I can't validate in this, is that they kind of brag about spending a quarter of their time on recruiting. And so many startups that I talk to, I talk to the recruiting leaders and their challenges. They can't get people at uh, the startup to spend more time on recruiting. They're like they want their recruiters to do everything and this is like definitely the common thing. And the companies that dominate. Every person believes it's personally important to impact getting more people, great people to join. It's not like I'm in meetings all week and I'll forward an email template, an AI drafted email template to someone with nine other offers. You know, that's like the level of effort. So the fact that Cursor already had this huge recruiting culture and added these like true legends from talent was caught my attention. Absolutely.

Speaker C: I don't Think I have, um, much to add. I just. To me, my first reaction was that's a really creative move. You know, you're used to these companies acquiring other, you know what I mean? Tech to tech. Right. Other tools. And I thought it was a really interesting, um, almost like a leapfrog kind of like, wow, hard right turn. And I think it turned a lot of people's heads. So I'm actually interested to see, see what this starts. Um, you guys know how this industry is or maybe we should acquire, like. I, I'm interested to see what, what this, um, unleashes.

Speaker A: Um, yeah, so there's one analog that I can think of which was the Bink. Robin Hood. Robin Hood acquiring Bink, uh, back in the day, you know, famously, I, I think that timing was, you know, there's two parties in this transaction, right? There's the, there's GBD and then there's cursor and the Bink and Robinhood transaction. You know, you talk to anybody who is like, Bink timed it perfectly. Like, and then the market crashed and then basically like every, you know, all recruiters were getting laid off at the time. And so like, you know, if you're in that business like that. A friend texted exactly this to me earlier this week. He's like, it's always better to leave a little bit early from the party than to leave too late.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: And I thought that was like spot on.

Speaker B: Yeah, I mean that's um, you know, that's like got the benefit of hindsight. But I remember that time when Robinhood announced that being totally distraught because bank had dozens of really good end recruiters that were all over the industry and all of a sudden those on site contract recruiters resigned that day and were all going to, to Robinhood which just amped up and became. They just jumped to having. It was something like 40 or 50 engineering recruiters who were in the flow of all these pipelines of all these other companies. So yeah, I mean then the market flipped like next, the week after that or whatever. But I remember when I heard that, I was like, what am I going to do? You know, that was such a, such a huge move that, to your point, Kelly, like you talk about it, but not a lot of companies are willing to make a move at that scale.

Speaker A: There's gonna be copycats though. Kelly. I think you're exactly right. Um, you know, I'm running talent searches right now. It's very clearly a need at the top end to where people have great jobs. They don't want to move or there's just like not enough people who are ready for like that next thing. And if you are a talent leader, there's a ton of agency involved in building your own business. And now I think people see that, that, you know, this GBD hole that's been left to your point, Brian, like they've helped hundreds of companies and now gone. So now all of a sudden there's going to be a vacuum there that needs to get filled, which is going to I think probably accelerate more people building their own business and then more companies therefore being like, who do we go for? Like if you're the top end, like cursor, super hot, you know, $30 billion valuation, you're like 300 people who do you call for help now who's gonna want to come do that thing? Because that's not a Google, like nothing against Google, but that's a hundred thirty thousand person company. This is three hundred. That's a completely different problem set that I think Adam is so uniquely capable of solving. So I'm, I am fascinated to see how this thing plays out. I do think it's like a pretty gangster move from all parties involved.

Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. Um, on a good note as well, I mean we talked, you know, ad nauseam about the layoffs and especially recruiting teams, you know, and I really like the upswing this is going to create. Right. The demand is going to increase for recruiters. A lot of folks that have been struggling are going to get back in the game. Like I like that momentum.

Speaker B: Yeah. It's interesting. I've always thought, yeah, I've always thought that recruiter availability is the best canary on where the market's headed. And I see more and more recruiters have jobs now than did before. Okay. It's all anecdotal. I don't have like the report of what's the unemployment rate of recruiters, but I just, I've seen a lot of people that had a tough go in 23 and 24 are uh, working now and they're also working at good comp and many of them are working at good companies. And like when that changes, you know, things, people have started to make different decisions, but it's like a six month leading indicator. And I just think right now a lot of the recruiters are flat out and they're all competing against each other and it's a lot. So everyone talks about like frothy bubble. You never know when that's gonna stop. It's dumb to try to call it, but right now it just Feels like the motor is running. You know, people, people are really competing.

Speaker A: I uh, will, I will take the other side on that. So like right before this conversation I was talking to a friend that's in the consulting. He, he does tech consulting as comp consulting. And one of the things I was asking about comp and like what, what are you saying? And he goes, uh, for every AI company, 90th percentile is the new 50th. And I go, well that's, that's interesting because like the math doesn't math on that. If head counts were what they were 10 years ago and clearly they're not. He's like, they're not like headcounts are smaller. If you look at public tech companies, it's basically flat since 2022. And what he said and what he was really concerned about, he had a number of examples of where people were like really getting hurt at the lower and mid tier. He goes, it's just going to keep, it's going to basically skip lower and mid tier and keep flowing to the top. So like the best will continue to accrue a ton of value. And that value used to trickle down in the form of like, oh, there's recruiting coordinator jobs open, their sourcer jobs open. Now there's like very, very few of these jobs and more people across the company. To cursor's point, everybody should be involved in recruiting. You should spend 25 to 45% of your time. We had that thought at doordash too. So I'm not sure it's going to be this like big trickle down effect. I think it's more going to be, you know, value gets really accrued to the top end of the market. That's my take.

Speaker C: I actually don't think we're saying opposite things. I think what, what the difference here, Nolan, is the timing is the timing of things. So I think what I heard Brian and I saying is compared to the enterprise, SaaS just blow up, you know, 23, etc, 24. This is a uptick as far as the number of companies, mostly AI, there are other industries, but the number of, the number of companies back in growth mode that are like seething to hire talent and get recruiters is different than it was two years ago in a, in a positive way. Now over time, to your point, as AI comes in or whatnot, that might be true, yeah.

Speaker B: I think it's uh, okay. My take is clearly, uh, entry level roles have been hit very hard. You know, like right now people have just turned it off. I think that's a big mistake, but it's what everybody's doing. And the reason I think it's a mistake is the, the kids say kids, because my 50s, the kids coming out of college are learning this stuff so fast that the companies are going to need this skill set. One of my favorite takes, of course, a bunch of times now, um, I was at a conference three weeks ago and this woman was on stage. She's in charge of AI transformation at Ah, JP Morgan, I forget her name now, but they have 250,000 employees and her take was in three to five years. People are going to expect when they join a company that agents do all the manual work and the take right now is that agents are going to replace all those people. What's really going to happen is people will know how to manage agents and build agents to do things. And if you have not built out that infrastructure at your company, people are going to look at you as like an old company, you know. And uh, I was kind of like, wow, that's this weird thing. But it is true. And I do think though, it is going to take a long time for these companies to effectively deploy artificial intelligence and how they do things. And you see this with just how much juice there is on people trying to find deployment. People at consulting companies, all the AI companies like Anthropic and OpenAI, they're all trying to hire people to go to their customers and help them figure out how to do it. And it's not like people like Kelly and me like, have been trying, but like we're freaking busy and it doesn't work out of the box, you know. And so that means it's not going to happen in 12 months where like AI does everything and all the jobs go away. But these people who will be really AI native skills will be so valuable to help push that from underneath that. I just think it's gonna come back around.

Speaker C: It's like the new era, remember like digital transformation and all that. There's like, there's a job like digital transformation and they would just like get inserted into these companies to help. It's kind of similar to that, just.

Speaker B: It is. But the difference. I've been thinking about this because you're right, there's always been solutions, engineers, stuff like that. But. But the technology they were deploying was pretty much out of the box. It does this and you can customize a little bit, but not much where what you can do with AI. And I was so customizable, you really need someone smart to Think about what you want to build inside of your company. And again, no one has experience doing it. It's like two years.

Speaker A: Well, and none of it gets to the last mile. None of it goes to the last mile.

Speaker B: Exactly, exactly.

Speaker A: That's the main thing. Um, Ari Emanuel was on the Invest with the Best podcast, which just launched like yesterday or the day before for. It's so good. It, like, I, I'm listening to this podcast more and more. It's a phenomenal. This is the same Ari from Entourage. And one of the things that him and Patrick were talking about on the episode, which I, I hadn't thought about, but I totally agree with, is AI, I think is disproportionately helping the best people become even better and kind of bringing everyone else to this like, median place. And so, Brian, to your point, I agree with you. Um, I strongly agree that there's so much alpha with these new grads if companies will invest in them. But everybody wants results today. Which goes back to the comp conversation, which is why everyone's paying 90th, because it's like, I don't want to wait, I don't want to have a long feedback cycle if I hire somebody to ROI in their employment. And I think it's very short sighted. Everyone's just trying to condense the feedback cycle to give me value today and they're not thinking longer term. Um, and I think a lot of these companies are going to get burned by that because they're going to have a very small bench and they're going to wish they would have done that. I've been talking to recruiters about this for a long time. I think that's why we have a shortage in recruiting, because we're not investing in new grad hiring where there's so much talent.

Speaker C: Okay, well, let me take the other side of that. Just living in one of these companies, Nolan. Yeah. Time is not a luxury that a lot of these companies have given the pace of the competition, um, the pace of, of folks investing in these. I mean, we look at Supio, we're like, boom, Eve, boom. Another quarter million boom. 60 million like it. This is a race. And of course we're trying to kind of calm it down and go a little bit slower to go fast. But that, that is. Sounds nice. It's funny because Nolan always tells me, I'm the, I'm the, you know, utopia one. Sounds nice. But in reality with this situation, at this exact moment in time, with this AI thing, it's a little bit harder practice I agreed.

Speaker A: I think it's like, uh, this is bite sized for me. This is not, excuse me, it's not go hire 30 new grads for 100% company. It's higher. Like two have them do some sort of like rotation thing that are just like elite kids, right? Like, there's so much talent available there that one of the things we did at Doordash is we had this launch team and we, we had an intentional decision to over hire on that team just slightly so we could have slack that we could deploy in other areas of the company that were feeling pinched. You just get generalists and the thing with generalists are going away right now and I think there's, there is still so much room to be had for like that type of person. What do you think, Brian?

Speaker B: Well, I think on to Kelly's point, the thing that I've always come back to is like, you're going to hire people with no experience and they're going to have like three to five years experience before you fricking look up and you're like, we don't have time to train them. But that time goes by really fast. And people no experience learn really fast. So if you do a good job with it, and they also don't know what they don't know, so they don't spend three years telling you to do it the way their last company did it, which is a ton of friction you get from experienced people. But the reality is, to Nolan's point, everyone's trying to hire the people with 10 years of experience. You're not gonna get them. You're not nearly gonna get as nearly as many as you think. Even if you are a leading tech company right now, you're not getting as many as you want because everyone wants them. And so you could easily spend three or four years not getting the people you say we can only hire and you're in the same spot. And. But if you just do both, at some point these kids become experienced at your company doing it the way you think that they should do it. And, um, the time goes fast is, is definitely what, uh, I've seen again and again and again.

Speaker A: It does, exactly. Time does go fast, especially if you're at a winning company. Like, if it's growing super fast, it's very easy to think short term, but like, you have earned the right to solve the longer term problem and you have to be thoughtful about it. Um, that's my take, Kelly. You want to do the, uh, what is it? Slogans.

Speaker C: Let's go Brian's squatting at Crunchyroll and he's going to get kicked out in about six minutes. So let's do the. Let's do the cringy corporate logo. Now, remember, when you say the phrase, you have to use it in a sentence as well. Very important.

Speaker B: Okay, I'm ready. Do I go first? Because I'm the visitor.

Speaker A: You could go first. Brian. Yeah. You're the guest.

Speaker B: Yeah. Kelly, you went last time. And I've been thinking about this since the last time I was. Because this is the one I actually wanted to do. And I thought about it as soon as we hung up the phone. So the expression I can't stand is I don't disagree. And people say this all the time in meetings, and they say, like, nolan will give a hot take. I'm like, well, Nolan, I don't disagree with you. And, uh, I basically have said nothing. I've said, nolan, you're in bounds. I've not shown any support for what you're saying, which would be like, nolan, I agree with you. You know, I just say, like, I don't disagree, and I can actually act like I'm participating in. In the meeting on the team, but I'm doing nothing. I'm staying neutral. And so many of these companies suffer because people are just playing neutral all the fucking time. And no one leans in or out on any of the debates. And the expression I don't disagree symbolizes that terrible behavior that happens at bigger and bigger companies. So I really. Now I just call people out when someone says. I'm like, no, but do you agree with me? I know you don't disagree. You would have disagreed. But do you agree? And people are like, well, wait, wait, wait. Like, do I have your support in what I just said? And it, like, shocks people because it's nice to say nothing but sound like you said something good. Okay.

Speaker A: In fact, you agree with me. Is that right? Like, is what I'm hearing. You agree? Yeah.

Speaker B: Do you agree? And when people are like, well, no. And I'm like, okay, so. So you pretended to agree, but you didn't say anything. That's mine.

Speaker C: So you pretended to agree.

Speaker A: That one's good, Brian. I like that. That one's spot on.

Speaker D: Yeah.

Speaker C: One that's been pissing me off lately that I just think is just such a dumb. I don't necessarily agree with the concept. I just think it's such a dumb word, and it just elicits just laziness and just pure. I don't even know what that means. Is I don't have bandwidth. Oh, what the. What, what are you, what are you talking about? You don't have, uh. I don't have the bandwidth.

Speaker B: This is so good to say.

Speaker C: I don't have to say anything else. I mean, I think I've had this

Speaker B: conversation so many times. I actually think it's a signal of someone who is a new manager or a new director and it's just not good at, uh, talking about how they need to prioritize and retireitize. It's like, you have plenty of frickin bandwidth. You could totally do this. You just don't want to say you're not going to do something else or you don't want to do it.

Speaker C: Totally plus one. You, uh, know what? I will say something else and then I'll stop. Don't say I don't have the bandwidth. Fucking say. How important is this? And one does it need to get done 100%?

Speaker B: That's such a good.

Speaker A: Or, or say I'm prioritizing these things right now. Which would you like me to like? Do you want me to not prioritize these and prioritize something else?

Speaker C: That's the follow up on, uh. Look, I get it. How important is this? What does that have to get done? Here's the deal. What do we want to do? I'll figure it out. But great.

Speaker A: The one that's been, the one that's been driving me crazy is like, I'll circle back without any deadline. Like, no, no deadline. It's. It's basically filler to say like, yeah, like let's just kind of end this conversation while, while the, the car just keeps going. It's like I've stepped out of the vehicle. I'm no longer driving. The car keeps going, and this vehicle is no longer in my possession. That's good.

Speaker B: And right now. And right now you get the, right now you get the holiday version, which is let's circle back after the holidays. You know, it's just like completely like, see you in January.

Speaker C: Let's circle back after the holiday.

Speaker B: Good luck.

Speaker C: I love let's circle back. You know what it also does? It's such like, it's such a lame way just to silence everyone.

Speaker D: Like, do you guys hear.

Speaker C: But whenever I hear, like there's six people around table. Let's circle back on that. No one says anything. It kills the whole thing.

Speaker B: Totally.

Speaker A: Because it's a euphemism, um, for this is never gonna get discussed again.

Speaker C: Right.

Speaker B: Let's send this into outer space. I agree. These are. Those are good, dude.

Speaker C: I love. I'm, like, tearing up laughing. I want a T shirt that says, let's circle back.

Speaker A: Uh, Brian, good to see you, brother. Uh, thank you, too. I think we have to have you back on, like, every couple weeks now,

Speaker B: so just whenever you want.

Speaker C: Well, you made it Power Hour, so

Speaker B: thank you very much for having me.

Speaker A: See, HR Heretics is a podcast from Turpentine, the network behind Econ 102, Moment of Zen, and Turpentine VC. Subscribe five stars. Share it on Apple, YouTube, Spotify, anywhere you get your podcasts. All the things.