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The Tim Ferriss Show
#658: CEO Coach Matt Mochary — Live Coaching with Tim, Why Fear and Anger Give Bad Advice, How to Perform Personal Energy Audits, The Power of Accountability Partners, Delegation Tips, Strategies for Hiring the Right People, and More
Mar 1, 2023
02:25:22
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Quick takeaways
- Separate decision-making from implementation for better decision-making and effective selling.
- Show empathy and support during the firing process to minimize the negative effects of termination.
- Evaluate candidates based on their past performance and gather feedback from former managers during the recruiting process.
- Trust initial impressions and prioritize energetic connections when making hiring decisions.
- Conduct an energy audit to identify energy-raising activities and eliminate energy-draining tasks.
Deep dives
Separate Decision from Implementation
The podcast episode discusses the importance of separating the decision-making process from its implementation. Often, people conflate the two, causing difficulty in making decisions. The podcast highlights the need to evaluate decisions based on past performance and the willingness to scare potential candidates away from the realities of the job. By doing so, recruiters can ensure better decision-making and effective selling to attract top candidates.
Firing Well
Firing well involves recognizing the trauma and major life impact that job loss can have on an individual. It is crucial to show empathy and support during this process. By assisting the individual in finding their passions and interests and helping with their job search, employers can minimize the negative effects of termination and build a strong reputation for being supportive and caring.
Recruiting Best Practices
Effective recruiting involves evaluating candidates based on their past performance and conducting reference interviews with former managers to gather relevant information. Anti-selling, or outlining the worst aspects of the job, can help disqualify candidates who are not genuinely interested in the role. Once a candidate is interested, effective selling involves getting to know the candidate and addressing any concerns or fears they may have, as well as involving their partners in the process. Speed is also important in the recruiting process to ensure top candidates are secured before other organizations can attract them.
Minimizing Time Spent with Lawyers
The speaker shares his belief in minimizing the time spent with lawyers during the hiring process. He explains that he conducts short interviews and relies heavily on his initial impressions to make hiring decisions. He discusses the importance of trusting his instincts and prioritizing energetic connections with candidates. The speaker acknowledges that using analytics and references to override initial impressions is a challenge he is working on. He emphasizes the need to trust immediate reads and prioritize intuition when making hiring decisions.
Learning from Past Managers
The speaker emphasizes the value of gathering feedback from past managers during the hiring process. He highlights the importance of asking former managers if they would hire the candidate again and listening to their reasoning. Despite concerns about legal implications limiting honest feedback, the speaker shares that he has had many revealing conversations with former managers that matched the candidate he hired. He emphasizes the significance of this feedback in making informed hiring decisions.
Conducting an Energy Audit
The speaker discusses the concept of an energy audit, as learned from Diana Chapman. He explains that individuals have limited energy, and the key to being more productive is to focus on energy-raising activities and minimize energy-reducing ones. By marking each hour of their schedule as energy-positive or energy-negative, individuals can identify trends and eliminate activities that drain their energy. The speaker provides examples, such as avoiding meetings that are not well-run and eliminating energy-neutral tasks, to illustrate the process of conducting an energy audit.
Running Effective and Efficient Meetings
The speaker presents three types of meetings and highlights the importance of efficient and productive meetings. He explains that most meetings are solely verbal and often inefficient, with limited participation from quieter individuals. However, by encouraging participants to pre-write their thoughts and opinions, meetings become more effective as everyone's contributions are thoroughly considered. He suggests making meetings even more efficient by requiring written agendas and pre-reading materials and balancing verbal and written communication for improved decision-making. The speaker also emphasizes the value of providing feedback and conducting in-person discussions when delivering constructive feedback.
The Power of Legitimate Jobs and Free World Organization
Legitimate employment can address the root cause of criminal behavior and eliminate the need for resorting to illegal activities. Free World, a growing organization, focuses on providing job opportunities and helping individuals break free from a life of crime.
Finding Fulfillment Through Coaching and Setting Boundaries
Coaching offers an outlet for meaningful contribution without the burden of starting new companies. By coaching others, individuals can be involved in important conversations and strategy without having to take on the full workload. Setting personal boundaries, such as working for free and avoiding equity investment, helps maintain the joy and purpose in coaching, while also preventing the potential for slipping back into old habits or getting trapped in operational roles.
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New Year's Resolutions: Accountability Beats Extensive Planning Most of the Time
3min
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Focus Made by Athletic Greens - The Ultimate All in One Nutritional Supplement
3min
25.
The Energy Audit in Assessing Past Performance and Manager Questions by Derek Sivers
2min
Brought to you by Athletic Greens’s AG1 all-in-one nutritional supplement, Helix Sleep premium mattresses, and FreshBooks cloud-based small business accounting software.
Matt Mochary (@mattmochary) coaches the heads of top Silicon Valley tech investment firms and companies on how to be the best leaders and build the best organizations possible. His philosophy and method are captured in both the Mochary Coaching Methodology (which is available as a free Google Doc) and in his book The Great CEO Within, which is available on Amazon and online (also as a free Google Doc).
As a former founder, CEO, and investor, Matt knows firsthand the challenges of those roles as well as solutions to the most commonly encountered problems. His coaching is not questions-only; there is real guidance. Matt specializes in helping CEOs and their companies (or investment firms) transition from freewheeling startups to dominant enterprises.
Please enjoy!
This episode is brought to you by FreshBooks. I’ve been talking about FreshBooks—an all-in-one invoicing + payments + accounting solution—for years now. Many entrepreneurs, as well as the contractors and freelancers that I work with, use it all the time.
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This episode is also brought to you by Athletic Greens. I get asked all the time, “If you could use only one supplement, what would it be?” My answer is usually AG1 by Athletic Greens, my all-in-one nutritional insurance. I recommended it in The 4-Hour Body in 2010 and did not get paid to do so. I do my best with nutrient-dense meals, of course, but AG further covers my bases with vitamins, minerals, and whole-food-sourced micronutrients that support gut health and the immune system.
Right now, Athletic Greens is offering you their Vitamin D Liquid Formula free with your first subscription purchase—a vital nutrient for a strong immune system and strong bones. Visit AthleticGreens.com/Tim to claim this special offer today and receive the free Vitamin D Liquid Formula (and 5 free travel packs) with your first subscription purchase! That’s up to a one-year supply of Vitamin D as added value when you try their delicious and comprehensive all-in-one daily greens product.
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This episode is also brought to you by Helix Sleep! Helix was selected as the #1 overall mattress of 2020 by GQ magazine, Wired, Apartment Therapy, and many others. With Helix, there’s a specific mattress to meet each and every body’s unique comfort needs. Just take their quiz—only two minutes to complete—that matches your body type and sleep preferences to the perfect mattress for you. They have a 10-year warranty, and you get to try it out for a hundred nights, risk-free. They’ll even pick it up from you if you don’t love it. And now, Helix is offering 20% off all mattress orders plus two free pillows at HelixSleep.com/Tim.
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[05:36] Fear and anger give bad advice.
[10:23] Dispelling dating dread.
[17:19] The power of prediction.
[27:07] Next actions.
[30:56] Turning conversations into action items.
[33:36] Accountability for introverts and extroverts.
[38:20] What is Focusmate?
[40:23] Separating decision from implementation.
[44:43] Firing well.
[51:33] Effective and efficient recruiting.
[1:01:41] Getting honest feedback from past managers.
[1:04:10] The energy audit.
[1:10:36] Running effective and efficient meetings.
[1:18:56] Reducing and removing energy-depleting obligations from the calendar.
[1:34:01] Assistance with assistants.
[1:44:37] Why did Matt stop making documentaries?
[1:55:30] Why Matt's building a startup.
[1:59:52] Rules, guide rails, and exit protocols.
[2:03:26] Downregulating anger and feeling the pain.
[2:19:16] Parting thoughts.
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For show notes and past guests on The Tim Ferriss Show, please visit tim.blog/podcast.
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Past guests on The Tim Ferriss Show include Jerry Seinfeld, Hugh Jackman, Dr. Jane Goodall, LeBron James, Kevin Hart, Doris Kearns Goodwin, Jamie Foxx, Matthew McConaughey, Esther Perel, Elizabeth Gilbert, Terry Crews, Sia, Yuval Noah Harari, Malcolm Gladwell, Madeleine Albright, Cheryl Strayed, Jim Collins, Mary Karr, Maria Popova, Sam Harris, Michael Phelps, Bob Iger, Edward Norton, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Neil Strauss, Ken Burns, Maria Sharapova, Marc Andreessen, Neil Gaiman, Neil de Grasse Tyson, Jocko Willink, Daniel Ek, Kelly Slater, Dr. Peter Attia, Seth Godin, Howard Marks, Dr. Brené Brown, Eric Schmidt, Michael Lewis, Joe Gebbia, Michael Pollan, Dr. Jordan Peterson, Vince Vaughn, Brian Koppelman, Ramit Sethi, Dax Shepard, Tony Robbins, Jim Dethmer, Dan Harris, Ray Dalio, Naval Ravikant, Vitalik Buterin, Elizabeth Lesser, Amanda Palmer, Katie Haun, Sir Richard Branson, Chuck Palahniuk, Arianna Huffington, Reid Hoffman, Bill Burr, Whitney Cummings, Rick Rubin, Dr. Vivek Murthy, Darren Aronofsky, Margaret Atwood, Mark Zuckerberg, Peter Thiel, Dr. Gabor Maté, Anne Lamott, Sarah Silverman, Dr. Andrew Huberman, and many more.
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