Latest / Hope + Possibilities: Trust, Leadership + Strategic Foresight / Exploring Generalist World with Milly Tamati

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Exploring Generalist World with Milly Tamati · Hope + Possibilities: Trust, Leadership + Strategic Foresight

0:00
I'll see you next time.
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Nola Simon: Thank you very much for joining me.
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I'm the host of the Hybrid Remote Center of Excellence.
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I'm Nola Simon, and joining me today is the founder of
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Generalist World, Millie Tamati.
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Thank you so much.
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Hi!
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Hi.
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Nola, I'm so happy to be here.
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It is really exciting.
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And Millie is a really interesting person.
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Currently she lives on a tiny island off the coast of Scotland, but
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she's actually from New Zealand.
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Do you want to give us a snapshot of your life?
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I'm pretty excited.
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Quite sure you can capture it more succinctly than I can.
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Milly Tamati: A snapshot of my life.
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Yes.
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So grew up on a farm in New Zealand, grew up milking cows realized that the farm
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life wasn't for me and I didn't want to marry the neighbor and have a bigger farm.
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And I was like I wonder what else is out there in the world.
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But I had that question, right?
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What do you want to be when you grow up?
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What do you want to do?
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And I had absolutely no idea.
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Like most 16 or 17 year olds so I ended up going to university and
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studying teaching because to me that kind of seemed like interesting.
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It could like flex across lots of different domains.
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The generalist thing is coming through early here.
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And so yeah, I am a fully qualified teacher.
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But when I got my degree, I realized that I really didn't
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want to be I wanted to explore.
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I had grown up in New Zealand and I knew that there was a big wide world out there.
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And I wanted to, I had this burning desire to get out and
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experience it and explore it.
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And so that kind of kicked off a, what was meant to be a one year trip.
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That was 12 years ago of this exploration.
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And so I booked a one way flight to Berlin.
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And I became completely obsessed with new things, new cultures, new languages,
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new experiences, new jobs new people.
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And I have for the past about 10 years, I have been building
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businesses around the world.
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I worked as a tour guide for many years as well, which seems like unrelated
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to anything, but it actually Formed like the basis of my skillset, which
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is like bringing people together, creating experiences, building
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something out of nothing being like really people focused and yeah, I
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fell into the startup world in 2017.
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There was a new startup Kicking off out of the Philippines and they asked me
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to come out and be like one of their first employees That was my first dip
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into the startup world From there.
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I learned everything I knew from them And then I realized I can
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probably just go and do this myself.
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So I launched my first business in Australia And then I've been building
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my own businesses ever since How did
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Nola Simon: you end up in Scotland, particularly Ireland?
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Milly Tamati: Yeah, so my on the travels, I met my now husband and he's Irish,
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but we were living in Ireland for a while, actually, in the middle of COVID.
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And Like everyone in COVID, we were like, what are we doing with our lives?
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What are we going to do next?
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And a job came up to come and make whiskey on this little island.
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And we were like, we're yes people.
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We were like, sure, let's move to this little island and
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figure out how to make whiskey.
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And he doesn't actually work that job anymore.
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He works in a completely different industry and in the climate industry.
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But we decided to stay and now we are so embedded in the community.
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It's like impossible to leave.
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Nola Simon: That is really cool.
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And that's the thing that's what I find interesting about you.
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You have this ability to do things in person and make an impact in your
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immediate community, but you also connect people globally around the world.
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You've got what 71, 000 people following the generalist world.
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Newsletter.
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How many people are members?
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Milly Tamati: We've got, I think around 650 paid members.
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And yeah, about, I think it's about 80, 000 in our wider network.
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So that's across socials and newsletter.
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But like it is amazing.
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The the generalist conversation, like when I started this thing a couple of
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years ago, it wasn't like, it wasn't cute.
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It wasn't cute.
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You'd say the word generalist and you'd get like a dirty side eye,
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like, Why would you want to, why would you want to associate with that?
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And I was like, why would you not want to associate with that?
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I actually couldn't understand.
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I had such a contrarian view to it because from my experience, people who
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had this generalist skillset were amazing.
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Like they had so much to bring and they had the most interesting careers.
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And I just couldn't understand why the world saw this really differently.
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And it's like anything it's easy to say now Oh yeah, now we've connected,
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all of these 80, 000 people across the world, but it didn't start as that.
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It just started as one or two or three.
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And many of those people are still within GW and within my within my close circle.
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So yeah, I think.
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Particularly when people are thinking about like building networks, it can
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feel overwhelming or it can feel like the end goal is to be really huge, but
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really, it's actually a success as well.
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If you connect 10 people, like that's amazing.
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If you can really bring 10 people together who needed to
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meet each other like what a win.
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Nola Simon: Yeah, and I feel blessed because I, you gatekeep how often
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people can get into the community.
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So I'm blessed that I feel I'm a member of it.
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So I'll tell you just shortly, my, my generalist story, and I know
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you know part of it, but I'll just tell it just for the audience.
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For years, people always wanted me to be a teacher.
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Partly it was how I dressed.
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Partly it was because of the weight of my hair.
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But I also am, I was always a gifted student, right?
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I majored in math.
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I minored in history.
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I studied it all in French with a smattering of Spanish on the side.
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So that's your first tip.
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But I'm actually a masker.
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I'm actually I'm not one of the squiggly career set because I actually worked
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for a company for over 17 years.
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And I've been in customer service for over 25 years.
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So I've had a straight narrow path, but it's because I
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was masking the generalists.
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So I I go deep, so I have wide range.
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I took the generalist quiz.
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They have a fabulous journalist quiz.
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If you want to know what type of generalist you are.
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And I actually scored on like the widest range.
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Ooh, interesting.
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But I have the ability to go deep.
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So like the T shaped generalist kind of thing.
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So if you think about customer service, I When you get a call,
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it could be asking anything.
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So customer service, generally, actually people who are generalists
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do well, because you have to know anything that could come your way.
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In a way, it makes logical sense that's where I ended up because.
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I'm really good at being able to feel whatever happens to come my way.
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So that's my story of how I ended up there.
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And if you look at what I'm doing right now with the future of work, that's never
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been more generalist because it could be.
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It could be everything that needs to be addressed to really develop a
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future of work that's going to help people thrive and businesses succeed.
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Yeah that's my story.
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And that's why I was drawn.
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I remember when they first floated the idea of the London Interdisciplinary
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School, I remember and I never wanted to, after I finished university, I never
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wanted to take like a master's because I wasn't interested in going deep.
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Like I, yeah, I majored in math, but I majored in math.
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I chose math as my major instead of history as a major because of the
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STEM bias that exists in the world.
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And
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Nola Simon: it's funny because that often comes up because I read
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more as like a liberal arts person.
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When people first get to know me, they think that I'm liberal arts, and
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they try to discount you that way.
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And I'm like, yeah, but I majored in math.
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And they're like, Oh, I don't know what to do with that.
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Milly Tamati: Oh my gosh, if I had a dollar for every time I heard that
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exact line we don't know what to do, that doesn't fit into our box.
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Nola Simon: No, it doesn't fit into the box, right?
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So I remember reading about what they were planning with the London Interdisciplinary
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School, and I was like, that was the first time I ever was like, if I was
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going to do a master's, I'll do that.
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Milly Tamati: And you have
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Nola Simon: somebody on your team who actually works for
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the school and you, right?
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Milly Tamati: Yeah, I don't work for them.
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We have a close partnership.
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Nikita, who she actually leads partnerships for LIS, the
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London Interdisciplinary School.
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And we've done a few events with them for International General Assay.
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We did a big event that included LinkedIn.
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A couple of the top universities in London.
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So like the work they are doing is so important because they're a
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challenger university, like to disrupt.
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I know that word gets used a lot, but truly to disrupt higher education, kudos,
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because that is a feat to even begin.
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Like you're trying to disrupt organizations that are like
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institutions that are hundreds of years old, particularly in the UK,
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probably similar in the U S actually.
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So I think they're doing incredible work and I'm really excited to
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see now they're getting there.
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I think they've been around for about four or five years.
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So they're actually their students are now going out into the world and it's
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going to be really interesting to see those case studies of where they end
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up and how their careers take shape.
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Nola Simon: Yeah.
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I know it's interesting.
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And of course, because I have.
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It's and everything that my whole life is based in Canada, like I'm not in a
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position to really just come to the UK and do secondary post secondary education.
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So that's why I chose generalist world, because it allows me to really see
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everything that you're developing and meet generalists from around the world.
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But you are actually exploring the idea of education for generalists as well too.
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Do you want to talk about your new venture, which is needed to really
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bring revenue into generalist world and really advance you to the next step?
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Milly Tamati: Yeah, totally.
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I think it's filling a gap, to be honest, like what I think what we're really strong
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at and particularly what my skill set is really what I'm really good at is like
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the creation and distribution of content.
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So we've been able to build this like really strong, engaged, excited audience.
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And then We had our core product as community, as which
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is a community membership.
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We open it a few times a year.
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And what we realized very quickly is that community is hard.
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Like it is so difficult to get right.
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And the last thing you want to do with a community, in my opinion, is
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scale it particularly too quickly.
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So the, like the engineering of like how many people to let in has been
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so like the meetings that we've had, like the thought that's gone into
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trying to get this balance right.
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I'm like, okay, we're growing.
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But we don't want to lose this like beautiful essence.
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of the like culture and the the feeling of generalist world.
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So we knew that we needed some kind of other product.
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And the other thing is not everyone needs community.
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Like some people are like, I'm good.
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I, but I do need the education.
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And so what we did, is we ran a, an understanding generalist survey,
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which I'm happy to share the link.
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And we really wanted to understand what the biggest pain points for
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generalists were, what the patterns were.
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And then we wanted to figure out how can we simply provide tools and tools
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and support so people can work their way through these big challenges.
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And one of the things that kept coming up almost every day, Every
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single time was this like positioning and packaging and like translation
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of your skillset to an employer, to a client, to a hiring manager.
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It's that feeling of Oh I could do everything.
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And that's actually not helpful for the person who wants to hire you to
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hear, like you need to translate it into a language that they understand.
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So a lot, so we basically created this course it's called Unboxed.
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And I was thinking about it over the weekend.
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That I think a lot of courses promise you quick answers.
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So they promise you like, if you watch these five hours, you're
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going to get all the answers and you can copy and paste them.
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And that is not what Unbox is.
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And in fact, I think this is probably like an anti selling point, but it
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is the truth that like the answers.
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Come from the deep work and Unbox will guide you through that deep work.
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It'll help you see the value that you bring.
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It'll help you.
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It'll help shape how you can stack your skills.
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It'll help you run career experiments.
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And these are all things that like, I'm not here on a, on a pedestal being
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like, this is what Korea should be.
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And this is how you should design your path.
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I'm the opposite of that.
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I'm like, you should design your path however you want.
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And it should be unique to you.
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And you don't have to stay in your lane and you don't have to be in the box.
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And because of that, to develop a course around that, it's a little you
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can't really hand people the answers or like the one track of how to do that.
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So Unboxers, a course.
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That explores what kind of modern careers look like and
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what a career for you looks like.
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I really believe that careers don't have to be something that
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you just go to from nine to five and be a little bit miserable.
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Like I think they can be a vehicle to loads of meaning.
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I think from what I can tell, like you get this in the work that you do.
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It's a lot of joy and fulfillment and meaning.
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And I'm like, oh my gosh, if we could help more people.
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create careers like that.
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What a net positive to the world.
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So Unbox, I believe when this episode goes out it'll be live.
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We're opening just for one week.
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So if it resonates, I would love to see folks in there.
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Nola Simon: So it's a standalone course.
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You don't have to be a membership a member of Generalist World to
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actually sign up for Unbox, right?
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Milly Tamati: Correct.
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We, if you just want the course you can purchase the course at
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any time over the next week.
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But we are going to be offering, because basically every time we
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open the community, it sells out.
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So we are going to be offering, if people really want in for our February
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2025 cohort, you can reserve your spot.
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You can get it now.
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And that will mean that you absolutely get a spot next year.
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But if you're not up for the community, no worries at all.
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You can just opt in for the course and yeah, that, that will be available.
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Nola Simon: Okay, perfect.
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Yeah.
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I wanted to make sure I understood and I've seen you're offering
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members discounts, right?
14:33
Yeah.
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Is that correct?
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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That's something that you can find out in the community.
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If you happen to be a member.
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Yes!
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Get
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Milly Tamati: a bee perk!
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Nola Simon: Yeah, exactly.
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That's right.
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And I think that's fabulous because people don't really understand generalism, right?
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And they don't often understand how to translate it into the world of work
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as it currently stands and what it's going to be in the next 5 to 10 years.
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Everything is being disrupted.
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And you think about AI, right?
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Millie ran a fabulous experiment.
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I want to talk about your experiments.
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Actually.
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She's very good at still skills stacking, but also going out to the community
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and asking for ideas and support and just brainstorming in general.
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So she's gifted at bringing people together and just getting
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people to spitball really.
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And so you ran an experiment to get sponsorship for generalist world.
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Because, you have staff, you have expensive, you have technology
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that you have to pay for.
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And you were testing a napkin AI.
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And I did
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this
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Nola Simon: with my podcast because I wanted to see, I'm not a visual thinker.
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At all.
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And so I saw your post about this and I was like, Oh, cool because I've been
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experimenting with Pinterest and I'm like, the thing that I struggle with is
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what visuals to pair with my content.
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And so I took the hundred plus episode titles of my podcast and
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put it into napkin AI and asked it to generate a visual that would
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represent the themes of the podcast.
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Ooh.
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And it came up with this fabulous.
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Visual actually it actually does a deep dive and it gives you like,
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probably like maybe somewhere between 20 and 30 that you could choose
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and present it in a different way.
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And then you can choose whichever one you want.
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But you did this as an experiment.
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You selected one of those visuals.
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And then you asked the community to help you amplify that post so that you could
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get in front of the napkin AI CEO and.
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ask them whether they would like to sponsor the community.
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Now this took off on, I know you had it on LinkedIn, but it
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really took off on TikTok, right?
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Milly Tamati: Yeah, massively.
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Nola Simon: So this is an example of how an experiment can really lead to it.
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Even, I don't know where it ends whether you've had that conversation
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about sponsorship or not.
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It gets so many eyeballs and just draws.
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attention to the idea of generalist world.
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And did you want to talk about that a little bit?
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Milly Tamati: Yeah.
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It's so funny because that one wasn't an intentional experiment.
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That experiment evolved the fly, probably not the best like scientific approach.
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But as a rule, I love experiments.
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I love testing little things and being like, that became the big thing.
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What worked?
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How can I do that again?
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How can I bring other people into the fold?
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So the idea behind Napkin.
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ai, I just found it somewhere, saw a link somewhere and tested it out.
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And the video that you see, I think it's about 15 seconds long.
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That's legit.
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That's literally me on the first time.
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And all those reactions are, I completely legit, I couldn't believe that it was
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instantly I am a very visual thinker.
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And so for me, that's Oh, it was like Christmas seeing these things
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instantly be created these graphics.
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And so I posted it.
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I, it, I think the thing with socials is, pretty quickly if
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something is going to hit and It was hitting immediately on tech talk.
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People were talking about it.
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They were sharing it.
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And so I was like, okay, I'll cross post it to the LinkedIn test out the waters.
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There's always different audiences there.
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So it's not a given that it's going to hit there.
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It landed there as well.
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And what I did from there is that when I started to say, okay, this seems
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to be taking off on both platforms.
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What are my options?
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What can I do here?
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How could this be a win for me, for Napkin, for the community?
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What could that look like?
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And so then I created a follow up video basically saying this is now a pitch.
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My last video for Napkin got, I think it's over four hundred and
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50, 000 views, something bananas.
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TikTok was a wild place and yeah I just had Napkin in it.
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And then their CEO reached out to me and was like, wow, that was pretty cool.
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I hopped on a call with their head of growth and we just had a
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really transparent conversation.
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I was like I really like your product.
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I think it's awesome.
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I think the key to this is.
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Do it so sparingly, like I never shill, like never promote almost any
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product unless I'm using it every day.
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I'm wowed by it.
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I'm not doing it for the bonuses or, I think you, your reputation
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online, you have to be so careful.
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And so for me, this was a great product.
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I knew that people would like it because I liked it.
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I am my target audience.
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And I was like, I know that this could be helpful to folks.
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TBD, that is still in process.
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They're keen to figure out some kind of partnership and
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we're just looking into it.
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So the experiment continues.
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Nola Simon: Yeah, no.
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And I think that's cool, but that leads us to our next experiment, which was.
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Intentional.
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Yes.
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And I will let you guide that one because I want to make sure that it's going to get
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the attention that you want it to have.
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So can you tell us all about our surprise for Thanksgiving week?
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Milly Tamati: Yeah.
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And I think I'll try and frame it from what people can learn and what people
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can take away and what people can do in their own businesses or careers
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that could They could replicate things.
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So the first thing is I asked a question in Slack, we have a team
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channel, and I was like, Hey guys.
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What does it look like to do something weird?
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I was like, let's have a thread, there are no bad ideas, just it doesn't money's
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not an issue, time is not an issue, network is not an issue, just idea storm.
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Let's get all the ideas down.
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If we had no
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Nola Simon: constraints.
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No constraints
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Milly Tamati: what would we do?
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What would we do?
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And one of the ideas that came up was a, we're like, oh we'd
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have a billboard in Times Square.
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And Then I sat on that for a second and I was like, huh, I
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actually think that I know someone who knows how to hook that up.
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And it was simply like a message to them being like, Hey, we're really
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interested in getting this billboard.
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Do you think you could connect us?
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And they said, yes.
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And this is also the power of network.
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Lesson, ask for things, be like, be a good person.
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And then just ask for things.
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And when people need things from you, return the favor if you can.
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So this person was able to connect us.
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It's all through Brex.
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Shout out to Brex who are hooking us up with this.
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And we basically had a call with their partnerships team and we, long story
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short, were able to get a billboard.
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The Thanksgiving thing was a, Surprise.
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We didn't, that was just a cherry on top.
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We had no influence or say over that.
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And then, so we basically then had this opportunity where our very small team very
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small, like people often think generalist world is a lot bigger than we are.
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We're actually really tiny.
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Nola Simon: Six people?
21:56
Milly Tamati: Yeah, and up until the last maybe three months, or maybe a bit
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more, four or five months, it was just me being the full, only full timer.
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And then everyone else was like one or two days a week.
22:06
So it was like hilarious when people would think that we were this massive company.
22:11
So basically our little team is like dancing around our living
22:15
rooms, being like, this is wild.
22:16
We're getting a billboard.
22:17
But because we have our community who is like just the core of.
22:22
everything of everything that is generalist world.
22:24
It starts in the community and everything from there.
22:27
We were like let's ask the community.
22:30
What do they want to have on a billboard?
22:31
This is not, and this is actually a, this is, a philosophy or how I think
22:36
about our community is that it's not like generalist world and then the
22:41
community, they're just one in the same.
22:43
So when generalist world gets a billboard, our people are getting a billboard.
22:47
This is a message from us, from me, from the team, from them.
22:51
And you saw the thread.
22:53
Yeah, I saw the thread.
22:54
Nola Simon: It was so fun.
22:56
Milly Tamati: People were jazzed.
22:57
They were excited.
22:58
And we ended up choosing a slogan that someone in the
23:03
community On that thread created.
23:06
So it couldn't be more like community driven.
23:09
And we thought to make it a little bit fun.
23:10
We kept that, we've kept the final slogan, a bit of a secret.
23:14
I'm
23:14
Nola Simon: interested to know if I'm right.
23:16
I guessed which one I would pick, but I'm dying to know if
23:21
Milly Tamati: I'm right.
23:21
See, this is the fun thing.
23:23
It's if you can find ways to to make things fun The internet these
23:26
days, it's either so self promo y or inauthentic or insincere.
23:31
And it's if you can just find ways to inside these spaces, have these really
23:36
sincere conversations and connections then people, it becomes like, Their
23:41
favorite place on the internet.
23:42
Oh yeah.
23:43
I'm in there.
23:43
I'm in there multiple times a
23:45
Nola Simon: day, honestly.
23:46
And I don't necessarily always write everything, but I read a lot, right?
23:50
Milly Tamati: Yeah.
23:51
There's a lot to read.
23:52
Even I'm like,
23:54
I love you guys.
23:56
I can't keep up.
23:57
Which is a great point.
23:58
Like you've got to be really careful about the scale of how you scale things.
24:02
It's a science.
24:03
So yeah, then yesterday, this is actually A funny little story.
24:07
Yesterday, our team, we had a standup meeting and we were talking about what's
24:12
going to happen with the billboard.
24:13
And we were like, okay, how can we get people involved that
24:15
are like outside of New York?
24:17
Cause we have a pretty big following in New York, but lots of, we're global,
24:21
lots of people outside and we're like, how funny would it be if we created this
24:25
campaign where basically anyone can have a billboard, you just go stand outside.
24:29
We have our squiggle, which has now become.
24:32
We may as well trademark that emoji because it's become
24:35
synonymous with generalist world.
24:36
I
24:36
Nola Simon: saw somebody trying to use it yesterday, and I was
24:38
like, yeah, that's not gonna fly.
24:40
Milly Tamati: That's hilarious, trying to use it.
24:42
Nola Simon: Yeah
24:44
Milly Tamati: so this is how ridiculous our team is.
24:46
We were like, we got really excited, and we were like, yeah,
24:49
let's just go into it right now.
24:51
And Honestly, four minutes after that call, Edger posted a picture,
24:56
and she's outside, she's done the squiggle, she's holding her billboard,
25:00
and I was like, then Emily's up a tree she's working from her bed, she
25:05
looks like that sloth emoji, it's the best thing ever, and we were having
25:09
so much fun, and I think that radiates through everything if we're having fun,
25:14
people want to hang out with people.
25:16
That having fun I was
25:18
Nola Simon: planning it yesterday.
25:18
I was coming home from dropping off my daughter, and I was just driving along
25:22
Lake Simcoe, and I was like, oh cool, look at all the Canada geese on the
25:25
lake, because nothing's frozen in Canada.
25:27
Like you guys have snow in like the UK right now, and Canada has nothing.
25:31
I literally didn't even need a jacket when I was walking yesterday,
25:34
and I'm like planning my squiggle in front of the Canada geese.
25:40
So I have to go back.
25:41
It's colder today, but I think they'll still be there.
25:44
Yes.
25:45
That's
25:45
Milly Tamati: amazing.
25:46
That's amazing.
25:47
And so it's almost like if people listening, think about it as there
25:51
was a big experiment that started.
25:53
The impetus was, Hey, what's my weird marketing things we can do?
25:56
And then from there it was like, okay, we've got this billboard.
25:58
How can we involve the community?
26:00
And now we're.
26:01
It's an experiment with an experiment.
26:02
We're now running this other campaign within that, which is
26:05
like anyone can have a billboard.
26:07
And it's, I think it's just about tapping into we call it being strategically weird.
26:12
Where like you, You could just do things.
26:15
You could just be like, Hey, that'd be fun.
26:19
Do we think that would be fun?
26:20
Cool.
26:20
Let's just go do it.
26:21
It'd be great.
26:22
Even this morning
26:22
Nola Simon: Millie sent me a note just to see, what we want to talk about.
26:25
Because I'm very bad.
26:26
I keep things Very casual, very loose, I forget that people like structure.
26:32
And so she sent me a note and she's but I, if we talk about the Billboard campaign,
26:36
I don't want it to release until Monday.
26:38
And I'm like, we can totally use the podcast to justify the campaign
26:43
and publish this on Monday.
26:45
So that not only do you have like pictures from around the world, but you'll have a
26:48
full blown podcast episode that you can.
26:51
Appreciate
26:51
Milly Tamati: it.
26:52
Nola Simon: Amplify.
26:52
So cool.
26:53
Used to amplify.
26:54
So cool.
26:55
Yeah, exactly.
26:56
That's right.
26:56
And that happened, what, in 10 minutes?
26:58
Not even?
26:59
Milly Tamati: Yeah.
27:00
Yeah.
27:01
We have a saying at Generalist World what if it were as simple as fill in the blank?
27:06
And it's I think everyone complicates things so much.
27:09
Just turn it down.
27:10
Take a breath, take a step back.
27:11
What is the simple version?
27:12
And the simple version is being like, cool, let's hop on a Zoom.
27:16
Let's record.
27:16
Let's publish it on Monday.
27:18
Simple.
27:19
Nola Simon: Yeah, exactly, because you actually published when you're
27:21
talking about the revenue challenges that you've had for generalists,
27:23
where you mentioned, Yeah.
27:25
Come on my pocket, and that's how they, because I'm like, Millie,
27:27
do you want to come on my pocket?
27:28
She's sure.
27:28
Milly Tamati: Yeah, and that is another experiment.
27:31
Yeah.
27:31
Actually for context for listeners I realized my, my whole thesis is
27:35
to build in public and not just build, but to learn in public.
27:38
I am not out here being like, I know all the answers.
27:42
at all.
27:42
I am very much I'm figuring it out, doing pretty well, having a lot of fun
27:46
on the way, and I will share as much as I can so that you can figure it out too.
27:50
And I realized that I had been so caught up in the operations of Generalist World,
27:56
and we've now got a small team that comes with payroll and all that kind of scary
28:00
stuff, that I'd lost my magic a little bit of the transparency building in public.
28:07
Basically my rhythm, I'd lost my building and public rhythm.
28:11
And I wanted to make sure that particularly the GW members had that
28:15
access, had that insight into what generalist world is, where we're
28:20
going, how they can be involved and how it all fits into the bigger picture
28:24
of this future of work, because.
28:26
So many people within the community really care about this stuff.
28:29
And so last month I was like, okay, I'm going to experiment with an
28:34
email just for GNRossWorld members.
28:36
And it's going to be like a behind the curtain.
28:39
It's going to be like raw, vulnerable.
28:41
It's going to go deep on the, I think I called it a little letter, which
28:45
was completely incorrect because
28:47
Nola Simon: it was a little, it
28:47
Milly Tamati: was really long.
28:49
Yeah.
28:51
Nola Simon: So it was the best thing I read last month.
28:55
It was really the best thing, I mean your writing ability is why I'm part of
29:00
the community to begin with, like you just captured my heart with everything
29:04
that you're able to write and convey and like that personally is your
29:09
true gift for, from my perspective.
29:11
So that, I read that and I was immediately like, Millie,
29:15
you need to be on my podcast.
29:17
Milly Tamati: Yeah, literally, actually replied to that email.
29:20
Yeah, I did.
29:21
And just a note on the writing, because I think that's really important we
29:25
have a, what I call like a writing culture at GW, where every single person
29:30
on the team is a brilliant writer.
29:32
And that's not by accident, that's by design because to be a brilliant
29:37
writer, and when I say brilliant, clear.
29:39
They are able to be really clear and they can execute really well
29:43
on their like writing needs.
29:45
And the reason I obsess so much over that and really look for
29:50
that in hires is because it just means they're great thinkers.
29:54
They're really clear thinkers.
29:55
If they can really think things through and then write it
29:57
down, that they understand it.
29:59
And Communication, right?
30:01
Like particularly with AI going Like everywhere, being a great
30:08
communicator is going to be everything.
30:10
Whether you're communicating with people or a machine learning, I think
30:14
writing is going to be perhaps one of the most important skills in 2025.
30:20
To be a really clear, thoughtful writer.
30:22
If I could give advice to young people, it would be just practice.
30:26
Because writing is a skill.
30:27
I think if you, some people come out of school and they're like,
30:30
oh, but I didn't do well in English, or I'm not a good writer.
30:33
You can learn.
30:34
You can learn to be a clear writer and a clear thinker.
30:37
And in fact, a lot of the lessons that you learn in school, Aren't going to
30:40
serve you, particularly in the world of like business and startups and tech.
30:45
Those very like structured sentences.
30:47
It's more about finding your voice and having an opinion.
30:51
I think a lot of the stuff I see particularly on socials these
30:54
days is almost like lukewarm.
30:56
Like it's like people have lost their Their stake in the ground
31:01
or Hey, this is my opinion.
31:02
And then particularly on LinkedIn, I think we've also lost our ability to like debate
31:06
and actually just have differing opinions.
31:08
It's like a little bit of an echo chamber, which I do try and challenge.
31:11
My posts.
31:12
I try and I guess say the quiet things out loud, and I think
31:16
that's often why they resonate.
31:18
It's because if you're thinking something, I almost guarantee others are thinking it.
31:23
They just may not have had the language or the courage or the confidence,
31:27
whatever it might be, to say it out loud.
31:30
Nola Simon: Yeah.
31:30
Oh, yeah, absolutely.
31:32
And honestly, I started the podcast in part because I wanted to challenge
31:36
myself to become a better listener.
31:38
It wasn't necessarily about, yes, there's a speaking aspect to it as well too, but
31:43
what I wanted to learn from podcasting was how do I ask better questions?
31:48
How do I ask deeper questions?
31:50
But how do I listen better?
31:51
Because I like thinking, I like my own thoughts and I found that I was
31:56
interrupting people and that was something that I wanted to actually
32:01
train myself out of, and I wanted to do it in such a way that I was doing
32:05
it publicly to hold myself accountable.
32:08
But I wanted to be able to learn and I wanted other people to be able to learn
32:13
from the experiment as well, too, which is why I did it publicly in a podcast.
32:17
Milly Tamati: Amazing, kudos to you, and I, you just named it, but I was like,
32:20
Nola, that is an experiment, this is a career, like, all of these things the more
32:24
I think about it, the more examples I see, everyone people are just running these
32:29
little mini career experiments, and they don't have, maybe the podcast last, For
32:33
10 years, maybe it lasts for 10 months.
32:35
It doesn't matter.
32:36
You're learning skills along the way.
32:38
You're becoming a better listener along the way.
32:40
And just like kudos to you for having the self awareness of Hey, I actually
32:45
think this might be a skill that I could sharpen, that I could hone.
32:48
What's a cool way.
32:49
What's a what's an experiment that I could run that would help me sharpen that skill.
32:53
So I think that's really brilliant.
32:55
Nola Simon: Yeah.
32:55
And going back to, how long does the podcast last?
32:59
I'm actually, you are like the second to last guest.
33:02
I have one more person.
33:03
And then next year, I want to look at all of the episodes that I've done and
33:08
figure out what I've learned from them and
33:11
then
33:12
Nola Simon: dig deeper.
33:13
So I'm not going to do any guests next year, but it's like, how
33:17
do you take the knowledge that exists in a hundred episodes?
33:20
And then do that deeper, right?
33:23
So I'm thinking maybe I might do essay type episodes where I'm connecting
33:28
everything that we've learned from like various episodes to actually
33:32
deepen and connect and see what avenues we can actually go down.
33:37
So I might actually only release like 12 episodes, like
33:40
more than a month next year.
33:42
But the goal is really.
33:44
It's not necessarily more, because I, more can just be noise, right?
33:48
So what is it you've learned?
33:50
My, everybody wants to publish all the time, but it's I think at some
33:54
point you need to slow down and figure out how you go deeper, right?
33:58
That's
33:58
Milly Tamati: my experiment for next year.
34:01
Yeah, I wonder if an interesting prompt, like the prompt that got you here was
34:06
how can I become a better listener?
34:08
And I wonder if the prompt for the next one is what do I want to learn this year?
34:12
And maybe it's like how to synthesize information or how to distribute
34:17
content, whatever it might be.
34:20
And then that could form the basis of your next experiment.
34:23
Nola Simon: Yeah.
34:23
I'm excited.
34:24
Milly Tamati: I'm excited to see what you come up with.
34:26
Nola Simon: I know.
34:27
Yeah, because I look at some of these podcasts and they have
34:29
800 episodes and I'm like, what does anybody learn from that?
34:33
Because I'm not going to do a deep dive and listen to 800 episodes.
34:37
I find it overwhelming when I look at your podcast that way.
34:39
And I'm like, I don't even know where to start.
34:42
Milly Tamati: Yeah, I hear you.
34:44
And I just need to call out 100 is amazing.
34:48
I think the average most people get to is like 3.
34:51
I know.
34:51
Or 10, like I've heard.
34:53
Yeah, it's really low.
34:55
It's the fabulous quad
34:57
Nola Simon: fade.
34:58
Milly Tamati: The consistency is fantastic.
35:00
And just while it's on my mind you mentioned about asking really good
35:04
questions, which I think you've done in this episode and one resource
35:07
I'd just love to call out because it has been like, I don't want to say
35:12
life changing people throw that word around, but it has been, and it's
35:15
a book that will Stick in my soul.
35:18
It was actually recommended to me by Robert Barris, who is in GW.
35:22
He's a GW and it's called a more beautiful question.
35:27
And I can't remember the name of the author, but if you look up a more
35:30
beautiful question, it's all about the importance of questioning and how like the
35:36
right questions can be like transformative how if leaders can ask better questions.
35:42
That's how you unlock.
35:44
Almost everything and it actually ties into the communication piece as well.
35:47
So if Listeners are really like avid readers.
35:51
Like I am I would strongly recommend trying to get your hands on a
35:54
copy of a more beautiful question.
35:56
Nola Simon: Okay.
35:56
Yeah, no that's a great answer.
35:58
I did there, Michael Bungay Stainer has a book on questions as well too.
36:03
He's a Canadian coach, so yeah, I'll look for that one as well too.
36:07
Because that It's guiding me to but you get information from everywhere and
36:11
that's actually something there's some there's one person I would adore to
36:14
have on my podcast and I haven't managed to land her and Her name's Amy Herman.
36:20
Do you know Amy?
36:22
So she actually is an art historian.
36:24
She started as a lawyer.
36:25
She became an art expert.
36:27
And what she does is she teaches about how to observe from art.
36:32
So she actually teaches the FBI, CAA, police forces around the world by training
36:40
them how to actually interpret art.
36:43
She's an art historian, like she amazing.
36:45
Yeah.
36:46
And so she has two books it's called her book, her company is
36:49
called the art of perception.
36:51
And the, her second book was called fixable.
36:53
So if you're looking for books to actually amplify how you perceive
36:57
and how you question those two, I recommend, and especially for me,
37:01
I'm not a visual thinker at all.
37:03
I'm not an artist.
37:04
I, like I peeked at kindergarten and For me, doing that kind of work
37:09
that really stretches my brain to think, how do I think differently
37:15
and ask questions in a different way?
37:17
I lean into my weakness.
37:19
I love it.
37:21
Yeah, that, those are my two book recommendations for that.
37:24
Yeah.
37:25
Actually three, three right there.
37:26
Sorry.
37:26
Brilliant.
37:27
Too many books we're reading.
37:28
All right.
37:29
For
37:32
the big uncomfortable question, where do you want Generalist World to go?
37:36
Like it, say we're talking like 2030, where do you think
37:41
Generalist World will be?
37:42
What have you achieved?
37:43
What would make you thrilled beyond belief?
37:48
Milly Tamati: Thrill Beyond Belief would be to have like systematic change.
37:52
So change within our organizations.
37:54
I think we've done pretty darn great job on the generalist side, on building
38:00
people's confidence, on giving them language, on bringing them together,
38:03
helping them feel like validated and seen and heard, and now our next big giant
38:10
enormous hurdle is on the system side.
38:13
So that's where do generalists fit in, in, in organizations and how can organizations
38:19
actually leverage their generalist talent, not just squeeze them into this box of
38:23
okay, this is your very narrow role.
38:25
How can we create pathways?
38:27
Basically how can we create amazing pathways for generalists
38:29
to lead these careers that are like expansive rather than narrowing?
38:35
Because not everyone wants to go to a narrow point.
38:37
Some people, like me, I want my career to keep expanding,
38:41
that makes me really excited.
38:42
But there's no obvious pathways apart from entrepreneurship would
38:46
be one way to do it, which is probably what drew me into it.
38:50
But I think there's a real opportunity for organizations to
38:53
get on board as well and to create these pathways for their generalist
38:57
talent, which they absolutely have.
38:59
In their org anyway they just don't know how to promote or retain or
39:04
frankly support that talent diversity.
39:07
So in 2030 I would love for it just to be like, almost not
39:11
even a thing, just like normal.
39:14
For this to be a talked about talked about, acknowledged, valued thing
39:19
in organizations that there is this cognitive diversity and that
39:23
it's really important to actually recognize that and see generalists on
39:28
a level playing field as specialists.
39:30
And see that even though our skills are different in the sense that they
39:35
can be a lot harder to measure and we can often like play in the gaps
39:38
between like departments and stuff that they're incredibly valuable.
39:42
That would probably be my answer.
39:44
Nola Simon: Very cool.
39:45
The lattice, not the latter.
39:47
Milly Tamati: yes.
39:48
Connections.
39:50
Nola Simon: Yeah.
39:50
Not the straight and narrow.
39:52
I like that.
39:53
Absolutely.
39:54
But yeah, there, there needs to be a lot changing.
39:56
And do you think that AI can actually help with that?
39:59
Because I've done several podcasts actually that AI use in hiring and
40:03
how AI can be used to identify.
40:06
skill sets that you don't even know that people actually have.
40:09
Do you think that AI can actually be the magic that actually unlocks the generalist
40:15
skill set, depending on how it's used?
40:18
Milly Tamati: Yeah, great question.
40:19
There's a lot in there.
40:21
My thesis is that generalist thinking plus generalist tooling,
40:27
and by tooling, AI tools really, is the unlock for everything.
40:31
When you give generalists All of this these tools, which make their
40:35
workflows so much more efficient and more creative and give them space.
40:39
For me, that's where like.
40:40
Major innovation is going to happen.
40:42
But in terms of the recruitment side I would say there is a lot
40:46
of people trying to figure it out.
40:48
Recruitment is just a beast in itself.
40:51
Like we talk, like we're talking about like human resources when you
40:55
think about it, like even in the name, like maybe we need to have
40:58
a little bit of a rebrand there.
41:00
I don't know.
41:00
I'm an eternal optimist.
41:02
on all things and that also includes AI.
41:05
I know it comes with potential like really questionable, like challenges and ethical
41:10
challenges as well and implications.
41:12
But on the whole, I think that it can be a force for good.
41:16
How that Like tangibly plays out in recruitment and in the workplace.
41:22
We'll see.
41:23
I know that there's a lot of people really trying to crack that code because I think
41:28
if there's one thing we all agree on, it's that the way that we hire doesn't
41:32
really work, the system is pretty broken.
41:35
The old CV.
41:38
A thousand people applying with a A4 piece of paper.
41:41
I think we can probably do a little bit better than that.
41:43
But we'll see how it plays out.
41:45
I think the next five years are going to be exceptionally fast moving
41:50
and fast changing, like just, I'm not sure how often you're using
41:54
AI, but I am using Claude, all day.
41:57
Yeah.
41:57
All day.
41:58
I am like jamming.
41:59
Me and Claude.
42:00
It's like my bestie.
42:01
I can't remember what life was like before Claude and Claude is probably
42:06
like the equivalent of a three month old, do you know what I mean?
42:09
Yeah.
42:09
Like it's changing so rapidly, so quickly that I think, I'm grateful to have
42:15
spaces like Generalist World because the, what we're stepping into if anyone
42:19
tells you they know what it is, they're just lying or they're guessing, like
42:22
no one actually knows what's coming.
42:24
And so to have spaces like GW means that you're with a group of people who there
42:29
is a deep sense of safety and a deep sense of trust and a sense that, hey, We're
42:34
going to figure this thing out together.
42:36
And we're actually in a better position because we've got each
42:39
other's back because we're in the circle with each other.
42:42
And even though we don't know what's coming collectively we're stronger.
42:46
And that's what makes me really excited about community.
42:48
Nola Simon: Yeah.
42:49
And I just wanted to bring a brief shout out to one of the things that
42:52
happens in general in this world.
42:54
And that, and I haven't been brave enough to do it.
42:56
And that is the hot seat.
42:59
So I've attended two as a guest.
43:01
And what hot seats are really is people come with questions that
43:05
they really want eyeballs on that.
43:08
They, a lot of times it's personal.
43:10
How do I get a job?
43:11
How do I transition myself?
43:12
How do I position myself?
43:15
How do I?
43:16
Identify like the top skills.
43:18
How do I stack them together and tell that story?
43:20
A lot of times that's what the hot seats are.
43:22
But they are intense, but boy, do people come away with honest,
43:28
open feedback lots of process.
43:30
That's why I haven't been brave enough to actually try it.
43:34
What's the most amazing thing that you feel about
43:37
Milly Tamati: hot
43:37
Nola Simon: seats?
43:40
Milly Tamati: I think the most amazing thing is that it is
43:43
one person is in the hot seat.
43:44
So one person comes usually with a specific challenge or problem or
43:48
sticky thing that they need support on.
43:50
And the beauty of generalist world is you have this diversity of people and skills
43:55
and backgrounds and ages and locations.
43:58
And so you're getting this diversity.
44:00
Again, it's a safe place to be like, Hey, I'm feeling a bit vulnerable here.
44:04
I've got this problem or challenge.
44:06
I need help.
44:07
And then you're getting all of these insights.
44:09
And I think what the beautiful, my favorite part of it is that even though
44:14
the person who called the hot seat is getting helped, everyone is learning.
44:20
Like every hot seat I've ever been on.
44:22
I'm like.
44:24
Hot dang, like no one leaves a hot seat without learning something,
44:29
even if they are not the one with the challenge, even if they're not the
44:33
one in the hot seat, everyone learns.
44:34
And so it's a, it's again, just so many examples of community where it's
44:38
just a net positive, where if you bring these people together in a space
44:42
and shout out to Edger, who's our community events and ops person she
44:46
runs these hot seats like clockwork.
44:48
It's And yeah, she's created these spaces where it's a difficult thing to do to
44:53
create a space where people know that they can actually show up and be vulnerable.
44:58
Like we've had some, we've had some deep hot seats where it's, it can
45:02
be professional, it can be personal.
45:03
It's usually a mix of both.
45:05
'cause life exists like that.
45:06
It's complex and messy.
45:08
And it's just really amazing to have this space, which I don't know, it's
45:11
kinda like a group therapy session.
45:13
But we are like.
45:14
I think the hot seats are where the most transformative change happens for people.
45:19
If they commit to that hot seat and they come along that's where things
45:23
can really shift and it's just super cool to be a part of that.
45:26
Nola Simon: Yeah.
45:26
Yeah.
45:26
It's very vulnerable to do and we'll do one at one point, but yeah, it's
45:33
Milly Tamati: No pressure.
45:34
Nola Simon: Takes a lot to to actually do it.
45:36
But anyways, one of the, one of the most interesting things
45:39
I find about generalist rule.
45:41
So is there anything else that we haven't covered that you want to
45:43
make sure that we're talking about?
45:45
Milly Tamati: This has been such a fun conversation, wide ranging, interesting.
45:50
So no, just like if people, if this resonates with people come and say,
45:54
hi, we're a very friendly bunch.
45:56
We've got wonderful people like Nola in the community.
45:58
And so if this resonates the thing is that the great thing about generalist
46:02
world from a product standpoint is people either like deeply resonate
46:07
with it and they're like, what, like, where has this been all my life?
46:10
Or they're like, I don't get it.
46:11
I have no idea what this.
46:13
That doesn't apply to me.
46:15
I fit in and it's all good.
46:16
So like people can like opt in or out pretty easily.
46:20
So if people are listening to this thing, like I'm in the opt
46:23
in camp come and check out www.
46:25
generalistworld.
46:26
com and yeah, we'd love to meet you.
46:28
We're very active on LinkedIn and TikTok to a point.
46:31
So come say hi.
46:33
Nola Simon: Yeah that's how we started chatting.
46:34
So it's fun.
46:36
Milly Tamati: Community people are cool.
46:38
Nola Simon: Thank you so much for joining us and we'll make sure that
46:41
we put everything in the show notes
46:42
Milly Tamati: yay.
46:43
All right.
46:43
so much, Nola.
46:46
I'll see you next time.