Rob and Sherry talk about building healthy working relationships. They discuss hiring new people, how to manage well, and intrinsic versus extrinsic motivation.

Rob and Sherry talk about building healthy working relationships. They discuss hiring new people, how to manage well, and intrinsic versus extrinsic motivation.

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Episode Transcript

Sherry Walling:

So you wanna do a goal-setting episode?

Rob Walling:

That’s what you were saying. I said I didn’t want to do a goal-setting episode.

Sherry Walling:

I have goals. I’ll set goals.

Rob Walling:

What goals?

Sherry Walling:

I’m gonna take a nap, that’s my goal.

Rob Walling:

Your goal is to go back to sleep?

Sherry Walling:

Yeah. I’m having a really weird sleep day.

Rob Walling:

What’s going on? Yeah, you woke up and then went back to sleep. That was very odd.

Sherry Walling:

Well, I’ve been diligently working on this writing project, and I’ve been getting up at 5:30, which is a newer schedule for me. Usually I’m up at 6:30. So I did my writing, and got some good stuff done, and then I was just so tired. So I went back to sleep from 7:00 to 8:00.

Rob Walling:

That’s kind of a good way to do it, I think.

Sherry Walling:

Well, normally that’s my workout time, but I slept instead of working out.

Rob Walling:

Yeah. But you got stuff done, because by the time it was 7:40 or 7:20, you already had a bunch of stuff done, so it’s not a bad way to do it, I think.

Sherry Walling:

Since my sole ambition in life right now is to go back to sleep, what else are we gonna talk about? Because I don’t think that our listeners really will be inspired by that as a goal.

Rob Walling:

Yeah. As admirable as it is. We wanna talk about building a healthy working culture, or healthy … almost like a healthy working relationships, and so you can think of this … Originally, I think you’re trying out, building a healthy company culture and that actually sounds a little more grandiose than I think we want to get to.

 

I was really thinking about, even if you’re a team of two, you’re co-founders, or you have your first hire, this is an important subject to talk about. It’s like working relationships, work style, and how to do that well starting from the very first person that you’re working with.

 

We know most listeners of the podcast are not managing massive teams, big companies of a few hundred people, but this stuff is important whether you’re managing one person or whether you’re managing ten or 15, and that’s really what we wanna talk about today.

 

I think I’ve seen a lot in my career of where this has done really well, where this has not done well, and I’ve tried to borrow and be more similar to the working relationships that I’ve enjoyed, and you as well. You’ve lived through them yourself and then you’ve dealt with a lot of clients now who are seeing both sides of this coin.

Sherry Walling:

Yeah I think that’s really true. I’m also remembering when we did our co-founder series, and we talked a lot about co-founder relationships, and realizing that that kind of relationship, your work relationships, whether it’s with your co-fou

Rob and Sherry talk in depth about the topic of therapy. Sherry sheds some light on questions like, when should someone think about going to therapy, what happens in therapy, how to find a therapist, and the differences between therapy and consulting.

Rob and Sherry talk in depth about the topic of therapy. Sherry sheds some light on questions like, when should someone think about going to therapy, what happens in therapy, how to find a therapist, and the differences between therapy and consulting.

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Episode Transcript

Sherry Walling:

I got up at like 5:45 this morning to work on my little writing project.

Rob Walling:

Yeah, how’s that going?

Sherry Walling:

You know, like writing projects go. I wish I was a little bit further along, but I feel really motivated to get it done, so hopefully I’ll continue to find this really great schedule of getting up early and not being distracted by small people, and get some good writing finished.

Rob Walling:

Seemed to work so far today. That is your ebook on raising entrepreneurial kids, is that right?

Sherry Walling:

Yep, that’s the one.

Rob Walling:

If you’re listening and you’re interested in perhaps hearing … it’s some of our combined thoughts from stuff we’ve talked about in the past, as well as a lot of your new thoughts that you’re putting down. Folks can come to zenfounder.com, enter your email address, and you’ll definitely be the first to hear about it, although the first to hear about it aside from our patrons, folks who support ZenFounder with a patron pledge. They, of course, receive free copies of the stuff we produce, so that’s at supportzenfounder.com. If you get value out of this show, we’d appreciate a pledge. But, also buying the eBooks and such that we produce also will help support the show.

Sherry Walling:

And it makes me not feel so bad about the world.

Rob Walling:

Why do you feel bad about the world?

Sherry Walling:

I’m just kidding. It’s just an ego stroke.

Rob Walling:

You’re just trolling everyone.

Sherry Walling:

Please love me! Please buy my book! Please!

Rob Walling:

And leave iTunes reviews while you’re at it.

Sherry Walling:

Oh my God, okay. Let’s actually do something with this episode.

 

Today I wanted to dive in to talk a little bit about something we’ve never talked about on the show in depth, but it’s surprising because of how much of an expert you are on this topic, but it’s talking about therapy. And basically, what it looks like to go to therapy, what happens in therapy, how do you know you have a good therapist, the difference between therapy and coaching or consulting because you do both and they are in fact different things. So, given that you are a trained clinical psychologist with a PhD and Masters in Psychology and you’ve been practicing now for how long?

Sherry Walling:

I became licensed in 2008. But that was after five years of intensive practice under supervision.

Rob Walling:

Right, so you kind of started as a trainee in 2003. So you have quite a bit of experience under your belt at this point. I remember growing up, let’s say in the 80s, people would talk about going to a psychologist, a shrink, they would call them, and there was just a really negative perception of it, I think. That maybe you were weak or that something was wrong with you if you went to therapy. I feel like that, at least in the circle I

Sherry and Rob talk about the topic of gratitude.  They both list things they are grateful for and also explore the science behind having gratitude and how it can positively influence your mind and body.

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Episode Transcript

Sherry Walling:

Hi, folks. This week we are reviving an old episode from the archives, an episode that we did last year about gratitude. And in this episode Rob and I talk quite a bit about the science of gratitude, some of the practices of gratitude, and we thought this would be a timely discussion. For those of you who are U.S. based listeners, this is our week of celebrating Thanksgiving. And it’s a time when we celebrate abundance with good food and gather together with friends and family. And it’s good, it’s right that we should honor and enjoy the resources that available to most of us who are listening to this podcast. And for some of us, it’s been kind of a hard season to be very grateful. It feels like there’s a lot of chaos and a lot maybe going wrong in the world around us.

 

And I think for me, one of the natural outpourings of a practice of gratitude is a sense of generosity and a sense of sort of knowing my own resources and my abundance, and then being able and interested and wiling and concerned about sharing some of those resources with other people who are, in some cases, desperately in need of them. Throughout this past year I’ve had the opportunity to begin doing a little bit of work with an organization called the International Refuge Assistance Project. This is a group of attorneys and law students who are willing to help people around the world pursue refugee status in the U.S. and Canada and Europe.

 

And through this work, I’ve been able to meet some of the refugees who have resettled here in the U.S. and I have to tell you that in 10 to 15 years of being a psychologist, working in refugee camps in West Africa, working with members of the American military, the stories coming out of Syria are among the most desperate that I can even imagine. And I’ve considered it a great honor to be able to help even in small ways, support the work of this agency.

 

So if you’re in a place where you’re enjoying your Thanksgiving and you’re aware of your abundance, consider this as one of the many options, the many points of need in the world where people can use your resources and are really very much in need of help. I also want to mention had grateful Rob and I are for you all, for the folks who listen to this podcast, who support the podcast. You talk about the podcast. It’s been such a pleasure to make this a part of our lives and make you a part of our lives. And we’re grateful that we get to do really interesting work with amazing folks like you. So if you’re a U.S. listener, have a happy Thanksgiving. And for the rest of you around the world, I hope that you will enjoy this discussion of some practices of gratitude.

Sherry Walling:

What are you grateful for?

Speaker 3:

My mom. My whole family, actually.

Speaker 4:

You and daddy and Fisher and people who will take us in when we’re selling our house and a lot of other things.

Rob Walling:

I am grateful for cold, chilly mornings and being surrounded by friends and great food.

Sherry Walling:

Why is it important to say thank you or express gratitude?

Speaker 3:

Because it’s right and it’s respectful and it makes everyone

Rob and Sherry have a conversation about internal conflict, specifically how our different internal voices shape our behavior and approach to work. They define some theories about the topic as well as offer strategies to help keep sight of your "true self".

Rob and Sherry talk through some strategies for solving big, complex problems. Rob shares a situation in which he and his co-founder had to work together to solve a problem, which further sparks the idea of how to work well with others and the benefits.

Rob and Sherry talk about the differences and definitions of introversion and extroversion. They try to bring awareness to the importance of finding out where you lay on the spectrum and how it affects things in your life.

Rob and Sherry share updates on what they have been up to in their respective business lives since the move to Minneapolis. They talk through some of the new things they are tackling stemming from the changes and what they have learned in the process.

Rob and Sherry talk about the emotional toll of living in an uncertain world and the protective steps you can take.