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Beyond Hard Work to Meaningful Impact · Sales Pipeline Radio

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All right.
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Well, welcome everybody to another episode of Sales Pipeline Radio.
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I'm your host, Matt Heinz.
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Really excited to have you here.
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I've got a great guest and a great topic today.
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If this was the eighties in a sitcom world, Eric, we just need
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a very special episode of sales.
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We're not going to talk about pipeline.
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We're not going to talk about demand gen, but something that I
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would argue is much more important.
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If you're watching us live today watching, thanks so much for joining
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us in the middle of your work day in the middle of work week.
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You can be part of the show.
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If you're listening and watching on LinkedIn or YouTube, put a comment
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in, we will see that we can respond to that comment, question for Eric.
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It can be a rebuttal on what you're seeing and hearing today.
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We'd love to hear and see that if we like it, we'll reference you
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can bring you up on the show here.
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So thank you very much for participating as y'all always do.
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If you're listening, watching on demand, thank you so much for downloading and
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subscribing every episode of Sales Pipeline Radio, you can find past,
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present and future at salespipelineradio.
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com.
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I'm very excited today to have speaker, author, Eric Nerlich, I'm excited
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for the talk about his new book.
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You can see it behind them.
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And I've got a copy here.
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"You Have a Choice" Beyond Hard Work, Meaningful Impact.
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I, I'm forgetting now where and how we got introduced, but I think I read
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this book and, you know, a handful of times, you know, you read something that
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really has deeper meaning than just what we're trying to get done day to day.
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sometimes we have an opportunity to learn from people that not only bring
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us that wisdom, but unfortunately have lived part of that hard life
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that they're trying to help the rest of us see in the void as well.
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So.
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Thank you for doing this and being here.
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start with your background, your origin story, which I think really sort of sets
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up and introduces the book and the topic.
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Yeah.
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Well, first of all, thanks Matt for having me on the show.
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I'm really excited to be here and, and have a chat about this.
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A little over 10 years ago, I was working at Google and burning out badly.
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I've been working 80, a hundred hour weeks for too many years, a
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couple, three years at that point.
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And there's only so long you can actually maintain that pace.
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And my body physically gave out at some point and I was lying in bed sick and
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going, what am I doing with my life?
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I had been so focused on earning a promotion that I had
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like sacrificed everything.
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Didn't have time to see my friends.
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I didn't have any hobbies outside of work.
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I didn't see my family.
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In fact, the time when I broke down was Christmas.
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I'd planned to go see my family and instead I was lying in bed, sick with
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103 degree fever is this the life I want?
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I mean, I've worked so hard for this promotion.
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I've been putting in everything I could for three years to get this promotion.
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And it's so important to me, but why?
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I didn't have a good answer.
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It was just the next thing on the list.
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You know, you get good grades to go to college, get good
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grades in college, get a job.
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You get a job to get the next job.
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You go to the next job, get a promotion.
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You next step, next step, next step.
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It's always been about hitting the next step.
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But then I finally questioned, do I want this next step?
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What am I giving up to get, to this next step?
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And in that moment, I realized that I had a choice.
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I could keep doing what I was doing and destroying my body and giving
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up all my social connections, or I could start saying no to my job.
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And that was the first time that had ever occurred to me as a possibility.
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It was like, wait, is that something I could do?
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I don't know.
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I've never considered this idea, but I tried it out.
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For some reason, I was at the point where I was ready to try it out.
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And I went into my first one on one in January and I told my manager.
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I'm not going to work that hard anymore.
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They're like, what do you mean?
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I'm done, not doing that anymore.
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They're like, well, are you saying you can't handle the work?
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I'm like, yeah.
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Okay.
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Well, if you can't handle the work, I'm going to find somebody that can.
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understood.
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That means you're not getting that promotion.
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if you can't handle the work, you're not meeting expectations.
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I'm that is what that means.
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And so that's what happened.
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They took away half my team.
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My performance rating got slashed.
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I lost my chance of promotion.
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And all of my fears had come true.
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I'd been worried that was going to happen.
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I was going to lose the respect, lose my team, lose all these things.
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And it all happened.
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And the part that was amazing was that it felt great.
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I felt freedom after that.
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I had a life back.
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I could go see friends.
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I could take up hobbies.
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I could see my family.
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And I realized, oh, these are consequences I'm willing to accept.
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It's taking a step back in my career to embrace the rest of life.
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And that realization almost over a decade ago now has led me now to a place where
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I live a life that I control, that I want, where I do stuff that is meaningful
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to me each day, make enough money to get by, have time with my family, and
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generally live a pretty good life.
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I'm pretty happy with my life.
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And this book is my attempt to share what I went through in my own journey and what
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I've shared with my coaching clients.
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I'm an executive coach that works with leaders to be more impactful.
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And what I've learned in my own life and what I've learned coaching
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others is now embodied in this book.
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It's such a powerful story.
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I have so many questions.
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We're just going to scratch the surface on this I just encourage everyone to read
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the book to be inspired by Eric's story and really think hard about what part
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of that story might be part of yours.
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I think there was a lot of long time, Eric, where my wife knows
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this now, I would say, Oh, you and family are first, but they weren't.
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Work was what gave me joy, you know, and but in the idea of a promotion,
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the idea of what came next, the idea of making more money that was it.
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And, you get to a point where you're like, is this really all life is about?
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Is this really why I'm here?
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And I think for people that are still focused on the hustle and focus on
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the hard work and the next step and look, all power to 'em, everyone's
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got their thing, that's fine.
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But I think to be able to think about, if they were to step back and
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say, I don't need that promotion, I don't need that next step.
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There's a fear of missing out.
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There's a fear of what you're not going to have because Eric, you could
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probably have more riches and bigger houses and boats and whatever, if
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you would've stayed on that track.
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But there's a difference between what you missed out on and what you get instead.
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And that trade off I think is very difficult.
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It would have been impossible for me to think about that at various
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stages of my life and career.
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Can you talk a little bit about that part of it?
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Yeah, absolutely.
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It was unthinkable.
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It was something as I said, like I had never considered the possibility
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that I did have a choice until this critical burnout moment.
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And There's this cultural conditioning that more is better.
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There's no such thing as enough.
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I always have to go for more, go for the next, keep on going.
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And that's drilled into us from childhood age.
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Like we celebrate people that are monomaniacal people.
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I just put one thing and go for it at all costs.
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And stepping away from that feels very dangerous.
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As you said, there's this fear of missing out.
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And I mean, I'll be honest, that was really hard for me.
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I mean, I walked away from a very well paying, very prestigious job at Google.
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I was the chief of staff for the search ads team at Google.
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So I'm at the time I was running a hundred billion dollar plus business.
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Like there's nothing I will ever do.
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That's bigger than that.
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And I was getting paid a lot of money to do it.
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And I walked away from that to become a self employed coach.
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I make a fraction of what I used to make and I'm home at 6 PM
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every day to be with my kids.
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And I actually enjoy myself each day.
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I'm not stressed out every day going to work.
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I was willing to make that trade.
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And not everybody will be.
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That's fine.
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Make the choices intentionally is what I'm asking people to do and realize
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what options you're not considering, because something I say in the book is
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like, every day you show up at work as a choice, you can just quit that day and
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you don't cause there's consequences.
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You have to figure out the financial situation.
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You have to figure out insurance, but that's still a choice.
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Then it becomes like, Oh, I'm showing to work because the financial
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security and the insurance are worth more to me than the freedom.
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Okay.
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That's the choice I'm making.
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Sometimes it's not an easy choice.
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I've locked myself in with financial commitments.
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I bought a too big a house.
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So now I have a huge mortgage I have to pay.
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That's a choice also.
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I may have to keep this job that pays me a lot of money,
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but I hate to pay that mortgage.
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Or I can move to a smaller house, take a different job.
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It's not easy choices.
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I think that's the part of people miss.
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It's like, well, it should be an easy choice.
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I should be able to have everything I want.
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I should be able to do it all.
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And at a certain point you have to make choices and trade offs and priorities.
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So that's what I think the real message of the book is.
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Make those choices intentionally.
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I would imagine that there are people that you worked with at Google that
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both thought and maybe still think you're nuts, but also are envious
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of the life you're living now.
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And for people that look at that and think of that as a choice
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and think, well, what will people think if I give up on this path?
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What will people think if everything I work towards everything I've
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worked for, I walk away from?
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As I say that, I hope that other people think, okay, that sounds more like
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it's more about me than about them.
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It sounds more about my ego necessarily than what anyone else thinks and
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who cares what everyone else thinks?
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But that's a big barrier for people to get through.
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Have you experienced some of that?
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And I'm curious, forget people that have read the book, people you worked with,
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people on that Google train with you, has that had an impact and in conversations
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and experience that you've had with them and that they've had themselves?
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Yeah.
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So a few things come to mind.
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So about a year before I left Google, my manager sat me down and said, okay,
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to get your next promotion to director, I see this opportunity for you.
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Here's this greater scope you can take on.
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You can take on this and this and this, and that's how we're
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going to get you promoted.
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And I looked at her and said "Nope".
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She was like, what do you mean no?
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I don't want to get promoted.
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What, what do you mean you don't want to get promoted?
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I'm like, no, I don't want more scope.
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I'm happy with what I have.
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I'm in a good place in life.
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I don't want to change that.
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And it just, she just looked at me.
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She couldn't understand what I was saying.
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Of course you want the next promotion.
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That's the way this works.
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You have to want the next promotion.
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She just like, couldn't understand that I was telling
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her, no, that's not what I want.
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So that's an example of like people that just didn't get it.
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But what will people think?
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And the real question I have is, which are the people that matter?
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There was one person that mattered in this decision.
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My wife.
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Because she was going to be impacted.
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We were pregnant with our first child.
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And I was like.
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I'm thinking about leaving Google to become a self employed coach.
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And I know that's probably irresponsible.
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I'm supposed to be a provider.
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We need the money so forth and so on.
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And she was like, yeah, of course you should do it.
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Quit Google.
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I'm like, I'm sorry, what?
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I'm fortunate.
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My wife's an engineer at Apple.
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We're fine.
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Like, even if I didn't make money, we'd be fine.
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But she was like, look, I see you on the days when you come back from your
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Google job and you're stressed and you're exhausted and you're miserable.
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And I see on the days when you do even one coaching call and
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you're lit up, you have energy.
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You're excited about the world.
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And that's the man I want to be in my life.
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I'm like, Oh my God, I love you so much.
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First of all, but she was a person that she had to live with the consequences.
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Other people, my mom was like, how could you give up Google?
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This is the culmination of your career.
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This is everything you've been working for your whole life.
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I'm like, yeah, and I've been there and I've done that and I'm done.
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So I think it's really important to separate people from who
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is going to be affected?
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Who really needs to be in on the decision?
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Talking today on Sales Pipeline Radio with Eric Nehrlich
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author of this fantastic book.
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"You Have a Choice"
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You talked about this rock bottom that you hit 10 ish years ago.
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And would hope that not everyone would have to get to a rock bottom
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to see this as a choice; to see this as something they can do.
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What are some of the warning signs that people may be approaching rock bottom?
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What are some of the things they should be looking for that maybe they see
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in the mirror that can be indicators that your body is about to revolt,
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you are reaching a point at which this could be a threat to your existence.
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Yeah.
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I was just actually talking to a client earlier today that was
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in that downward spiral where he had too much to do at work.
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So he was working long hours.
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So he was stressed out.
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So he wasn't sleeping well, which meant he was less productive the next
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day, which meant things took even longer when he got further behind.
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And I'm like, this will not end well for you.
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There's no, there's no way this ends well for you because it's like, you're
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getting further and further behind each day you work because you're tired
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because you're exhausted and you're still accepting new commitments.
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And that was what I counseled him on.
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At some point you have to say okay, I am overcommitted.
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I cannot deliver on everything I'm being asked to deliver on.
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And that may sound like, oh, I could never say that.
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And that's the real fear of people.
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Like, well, if I say that to my manager, they're just going to fire me.
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And they might, and that's a risk.
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And that's the question are you willing to take that risk?
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But if you come back and you say like, you know what, I have
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these 10 things on my plate.
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These three seem like the most urgent and most important.
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How about I commit to getting those three done in the next week.
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And then we look at the rest of the list next week.
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That shows prioritization, that shows initiative, that shows leadership.
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And it's the only way to get out of this thing.
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Cause if you're trying to do all 10, you're going to do all 10
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badly, but if you pick three and say, I'm going to deliver on them,
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you're going to show dependability.
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You're going to show forethought, you're going to show that you
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can deliver on your commitments.
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And I think that is so critical.
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But again, I didn't figure this out until after I burned out my next job, when I
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was this chief of staff at Google, I had this relationship with my manager where I
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could say like, yeah, okay, these are the three things that got going on this week.
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You just asked me to add this thing.
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What can I drop of the three?
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And we would have that conversation and I was very upfront about it.
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Cause that way I knew I wouldn't get overwhelmed, but it took me
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hitting rock bottom to really learn to have that conversation.
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You hit rock bottom and didn't immediately quit Google, you just started
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prioritizing yourself and pushing back and you lost the trajectory you're
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on but you still worked at Google.
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Sometimes I think you have these black or white expectations that either I
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follow this path and keep my career or I'm dead or I have nothing right.
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And it's never that level of trade off.
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I think people feel if I say no to that sixth thing, if I say no to this extra
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work, then my boss is going to fire me or was no longer going to believe in me.
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That's rarely the case either, right?
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It's somewhere in the gray area, but in that gray area, you're
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able to prioritize what you want.
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And the more you do that, the more that muscle builds and the more you're able
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to advocate yourself with confidence.
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To find that right balance.
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Yeah just kind of building on that, who are the people that matter?
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And this is so important in a work environment.
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if you're saying yes to everybody, you're going to get overwhelmed.
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Especially if you're competent, this is the curse of being competent.
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More work flows to you because you're competent.
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You do good work.
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The reward for good work is doing more work.
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So then at some point you have to say like, okay.
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Who do I really need to deliver on?
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I'm going to deliver for my manager, my VP and other people will have to wait.
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And that is a skill that most people don't learn.
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They're either like, I have to say yes to everybody, or they start
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indiscriminately saying no, and they like piss off the people that are
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really the important stakeholders.
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So learning to prioritize, these are the people requests come first.
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Everybody else has to wait.
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That's another really helpful skill as you progress in your career.
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Got just a few more minutes with Eric Nehrlich.
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He's the author of the book, You Have a Choice, Beyond Hard
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Work to Meaningful Impact.
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So we've been talking mostly about this self realization, right?
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The path you were on you're coaching to help people see this for themselves.
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Let's say someone listening is a manager seeing someone at the risk of
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burnout, seeing someone who is, Icarus getting a little too close to the sun.
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How do you recognize that?
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And is there an appropriate way to have a conversation with them?
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Look for some people, they just might want to keep doing that.
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But how do you have a conversation as a manager, as a boss, as a
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leader to help people see where the right balance is for them?
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That's a tough one.
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I think partially it depends on what is the relationship you've already
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built with that person, have you shown that you care about their welfare?
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Otherwise it can come across like, how do I get more work out of you?
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And that can come across the wrong way.
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So, and it also matters how you show up.
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Like, what do you do?
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Are you working all hours of the day?
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That manager that asked me, if you can't handle the work, I'm
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going to find somebody that can.
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They were working, I don't know, 16, 17 hours, most days.
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And that was the example they were setting.
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And they just said yes to everything.
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My later manager, the one that I was chief of staff for, he could prioritize.
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He's like, okay, this is what I'm going to get done this week.
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And I'm going to say no to everything else.
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He could say like, yep, we're going to rejuggle.
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And this is what I'm going to deliver.
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Cause this is the time I have available and I'm going home to my family at 6 PM.
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And he did as a VP at Google, which was not that common.
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But to your question, like, how do you handle it?
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I think you look at it and say like.
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Hey, it seems like you're not always delivering on the things that
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you say you're going to deliver.
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It seems like you're overcommitted.
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What can we do?
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And this "we" is really important.
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We are going to work on this.
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Because it's not, you're doing bad.
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You're not delivering.
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It's Hey, it feels like I'm giving you too much to do cause you're not
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always delivering on what we agreed to.
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How can we work on that together?
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Awesome.
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Well this has been amazing.
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I'd highly encourage you for yourself, for those that you love.
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Get a copy of this book.
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"You Have a Choice".
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I got mine on Amazon.
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I'm sure there's lots of places you can get it online, but
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definitely go give it a shot, Eric.
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Thanks so much.
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Where else can people learn from you?
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What are the things you're thinking about writing about working on now?
18:18
Yeah, the best place to find me on the web is toomanytrees.Com.
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From there, you can sign up for my newsletter, which I send out every
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couple of weeks to share what I'm thinking about, learning about
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reading about all in this area of personal development and leadership.
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So I would love to share those insights with you.
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Awesome.
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Thank you, Eric, so much for being here and for sharing your
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story, both, here and in the book.
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this is the stuff I think at the end of the day, some of the
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most important conversations we have with and for each other.
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Thank you everyone for listening and watching.
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We'll be back next week for another episode of Sales Pipeline Radio.
18:46
My name is Matt Heinz.
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We'll see you then take care.