Gail Davis: Our guest today is Dr. Todd Dewett. His business card says he's a speaker, author, motivator, agitator, muse and madman. A retired award winning management professor he now speaks and writes [00:01:30] full time for global audiences. His unique brand of edgy leadership has resulted in quotes in the New York Times, Business Week, Time, Forbes and many other outlets. He uses straight talk and memorable stories to build leaders, better teams and better lives. Welcome and thank you for joining us today Dr. Dewett.

Todd Dewett: Hey, thank you so much for having me.

Kyle Davis: Awesome, well just like we did off air [00:02:00] right before we went to record, I would like it if you could give the listeners an opportunity to have an understanding of what it is that you do and your background, kind of how you came up in the world and how you get into speaking, because it's quite remarkable.

Todd Dewett: Yes sure, happy too. A quick bio to get to the point where I say what it is I do. So standard undergraduate business guy in love with the fact that business makes the world go round and loved it so much in fact went to the [00:02:30] University of Memphis and bowled up at the University of Tennessee with a MBA before recognizing of course, got to get a job and I was pretty lucky. I got on with the world's largest consulting firm which was Anderson at the time now referred to as Accenture and then jumped not too much later over to Ernest and Young and in both cases was on the management consulting side.

Now I'm really one of the luckiest people you'll ever talk to. I got an opportunity to be with such a large world class firms and the exposure they give you in short order is just [00:03:00] amazing and what I learned in those few years was that business is fascinating. Understanding business people is fascinating and I did not fit the traditional business role and I started thinking about what to do and finally the solution came to me. The solution was to keep loving and studying and helping business but do it in a different way. I left Ernst and Young and went to one of the better places on the planet to study business people that's the Department of Management in the Maize School over at Texas [st hemen 00:03:29].

Four years later [00:03:30] I had a PhD in organizational behavior, I had a license to go study men and women at work and why they do what they do and that lead me to a job in Ohio unexpectedly I didn't know much about the mid west but for 10 years at a really, really amazing place called Wrights State University in Dayton, Ohio. I had the privilege to teach graduate courses in leadership related courses to a whole bunch of people and I'll be honest with you I felt guilty. I couldn't believe people were paying me so much [00:04:00] money to teach people things I loved, that helped their lives while also asking them to write dorky papers that I loved doing as a scholar. It was a perfect fit for me and they let me wear blue jeans. I couldn't believe, this so I thought for sure I would do this forever until I was 75 and they wheeled me out of the classroom and put a little watch on my wrist and that would have been frankly delightful.

Unexpectedly, life has it's own plans for you so may be three or four years in, the phone started ringing [00:04:30] and on the other end were former students, inviting me to speak at meetings and conferences because they remembered the loud story telling guy in class and how they thought that would be so useful for business events and I did that for free like a rookie, for multiple years before finally someone said to me "Wait a minute what's your fee." This is a true story, I'm not making this up and I said "Ah, ah, ah." I didn't know what to say and he said "Well I've got $300 dollars." I said "That's perfect." [00:05:00] And I went and did a gig for $300 some 13 or 14 years ago and I was just amazed.

I got to my car and laughed that someone would pay me to try and enlighten people through stories and then slowly but surely I took it serious to the point that in 2013 I was [inaudible 00:05:19]life senior professor. Great six figure job forever and I had to let it go because speaking and writing was taking over and for family and business reasons, I choose a new vibrant home that I love here [00:05:30] in Houston, Texas and I got to be honest with you when you embrace your dream it sounds kind of simple but for me it's not, it's amazing how more honest you become and how much more clear frankly your vision becomes and how good things start coming your way when you don't half invest in some of your dreams but you fully invest and I did that.

That was about the time to end the bio in the overindulgent answer to your question, that was about the time that I got a phone call from some people [00:06:00] and a company called lynda.com who were very quickly purchased by LinkedIn, I'm sure you've heard-

Kyle Davis: I'm quite familiar with Lynda and LinkedIn, yeah.

Todd Dewett: Yeah and of course LinkedIn has now been purchased by Microsoft and I told them what I was up too much like I'm telling you and though I've got to love their expertise side, I love their credentials, I love the sound of your voice have you ever thought about making online courses and I said no. So they convinced me to do that and that was just a small handful eight years ago and what happened blew me away, we now have 33 [00:06:30] courses online at LinkedIn Learning and I've had them watched by almost 10 million people in 180 countries which is unexpected and beautiful. I get emails everyday from people who want to say thanks or ask a question about those things, so I'm a guy who tried to be a professor and somehow became an online star and a speaker to boot that's growing every year.

Kyle Davis: If I remember correctly I think you've also done a TED talk, correct?

Todd Dewett: I did a TEDx talk-

Kyle Davis: A TEDx talk yeah.

Todd Dewett: To be special [00:07:00] enough in the next five years to may be get the big stage at TED but I had real fun, nine minutes I think is was they gave me to do a TEDx talk, yes.

Kyle Davis: I'm curious in all the years that you've done this, what has been since this quest to understand business people, what has been the biggest change or changes that you've seen over the years until present?

Todd Dewett: That's a great question, not much. Here's what changes. The slang changes, the [00:07:30] attire changes, the technology we use to do what we do changes. Truth is most human relations change very slowly whereas all the dressing around changes very, very quickly. When I was being completely [inaudible 00:07:46]years ago not thinking about coaching or training or speaking at all, the basic lessons from the big piles of research that we have about men and women at work look very similar today. People like to feel that they have a voice in their work, they like leaders who collaborate instead [00:08:00] of dictate. We know why people have conflict and how to solve them, we know what great communication looks like etc so the most interesting thing to me, is that I still have a thriving career explaining basic human issues to men and women at work and frankly because there not common sense even though there not complex there not common sense and that gives me a job.

Kyle Davis: That's good.

Gail Davis: It's funny you say that because I was looking at one photograph of you and it shows you tossing [00:08:30] the rule book, so what's behind tossing the rule book out?

Todd Dewett: Well I happen to be driven just by genetics to be loud, boisterous and honest to a fault so for example, I often talk about fit, in careers that is to say given who you are whatever that is, do you fit [mechwell 00:09:21]naturally or are you inclined to do a particular thing. In corporate America I did not fit as an insider. I'm a beautiful fit as an outsider sharing messages people need to hear [00:09:00] so fit for me is everything and breaking the rules, whether I use to be an administrator or a professor break the rules and questioning why we're still doing the status quo those are very natural things for me and then as the speaking thing began very unexpectedly it kind of became a brand for me. As the boomers are starting to retire, all the millennials are starting to take over power positions in organizations. They really do relate to the plain speaking [00:09:30] guy, that is me as opposed to the highly I would say overly polished suits that use to dominate.

Kyle Davis: No one likes the suits. I'm saying that as a millennial, no one likes a suit. We like blue jeans, black v-necks, chuck taylors and no suits.

Todd Dewett: I'm sitting here wearing chucks, that so funny. Listen millennial, I have to tell you, I'm doing well and I'm grateful for that but every year in the last two or three years, I've had at least [00:10:00] two or three instances where big clients, who I won't name who you've heard of have gotten very excited about hiring me, to put me on stage and then some prat somewhere looked at a picture of me wearing may be a snap shirt instead of a button down shirt, blue jeans instead of something else and of course they noticed the tattoos and they nixed the gig, they wanted me to cover them up and that's a really serious generational comment if you think about it but that's changing.

Kyle Davis: God forbid you have a tattoo.

Gail Davis: [00:10:30] Well that might lead us to a topic you love to talk about which is authenticity so give us your speil on because I know that's a big focus of your work.

Todd Dewett: Sure, for me talking about tattoos dovetails very nicely because the reason I started thinking about it in a professional context in terms of helping others do what they do was because of something that happened to me many years ago at one of those big consulting firms that I mentioned to you. Long story short, [00:11:00] I had a boss after a client made a comment about seeing one of my early tattoos and not liking it. I had a boss pull me aside and frankly kind of just ripped me up one side and down the other about what it means to manage impressions correctly. What it means to be professionally, socially smart and basically said you're never going to show those silly tattoos again. That was a massive moment for me, about what it means to manage impressions versus being authentic there's an interesting obvious [00:11:30] tension there.

The landscape since then has changed very, very much and a dear friend some 10 years after that happened kind of threw that reality in my face when she said, that advice may be was good for you. May be when your boss gave it to you many years ago but not anymore and she said "Do you know why?" And I said "Why?" I think you should just take your jacket off, roll up your sleeves and intentionally show your ink because people like real and it was fascinating to have someone remind me of that [00:12:00] basic truth and I've kind of been on a tirade running round the globe making sure others consider their own version of that ever since.

Kyle Davis: I have a buddy of mine who works in investment banking in New York City and he's a military veteran with combat deployments and so he's pretty heavily tattooed but he's kind of like my dog, I've just got a dog and we'll talk about that in a moment but you know super nice guy, super chilled. You'd have no idea what his background was but sometimes [00:12:30] when he means business, he'll roll up those sleeves and people are just like, oh you have some other sleeves and it has gotten him the respect sometimes that he needs.

Todd Dewett: His body.

Kyle Davis: Yeah, so I kind of come to think about that I do think that at least with tattoos and even sometimes with attire and everything else I do feel that that's a generational thing. I think it's also at some point in time kind of like a cultural thing. I know that when I was working in [00:13:00] TAC in San Francisco, I could get away wearing a hoodie and baseball hat to work and it was no big deal but when I tried to pull that same stunt, it was called a stunt, I thought it was just me dressing for work, when I did the same thing for Startups who I worked for in New York they were like this is New York man, button downs and I was like whatever.

Todd Dewett: [inaudible 00:13:28]in San Francisco with Linkedin recently and they were still so chilled and laid back it was spectacular, but you're right [00:13:30] those regional differences are massive. I've got to re-phase that comment you made and say it's really a human thing, we feel so much of a need, most of us, even the millennials even though it's a little less for them. We feel such a need to manage impressions and do so airing on the conservative side and the result and this is what kills me as a scholar, the result is that we go to work every day and happily engage in truncated relationships predicated on certain professional [00:14:00] exchanges and happily passionately excluding personal exchanges of almost any kind, which means you're just dying to have mediocre teams. So when I talk about authenticity, I say well just look at San Francisco to pick up your comment in, look at Silicon Valley and look at the way all the people at these firms we allege are the greatest on planet earth are encouraging their people to act and behave and it's definitely not about posturing and managing impressions it's about making real authentic connections.

Kyle Davis: I think to [00:14:30] that point, so often I watch people just get sold based of of somebody what they say, how they say it, their pedigree, what they wear when in reality that person is not the right soft or sales person, they're not the right recruiter, they're not the right, you name it whatever just because they look the part may be they perceive to be fitting the part, when in reality if you just bump into a guy like [00:15:00] I did at a local restaurant who just happened to be wearing this one little logo thing and I was like oh you're a developer let's talk.

It's a completely different conversation and it's so much more for me exhilarating and exciting when you're able to have that conversation with somebody and you know that they know what they're talking about versus somebody giving you this overly polished, not to bash on TED but it's the same like TED talk that they give every single time, I'm tired of hearing that what I want to hear is I want to hear something fresh, new and unique [00:15:30] and really in the moment and something that's captivating and smart and authentic and just not this buttoned down suit, it doesn't have to be a suit but just this person who presents in a way, they're saying all the right things but in reality, I know that they're lacking. They may know how to do [rivion 00:15:53]rails if we're talking about developing but they just don't know what they're doing.

Todd Dewett: I like the words vulnerable and [00:16:00] honest and off script you know what I mean. So here's a funny thing I love to share with people when they're thinking about listening to me seriously and managing impressions less not just giving the TED talk but having a real off the cut extemporaneous in the moment conversation I like to tell them that this is true, you know this, it's true. If you're not managing impressions conversation is easier because it takes so much energy like you're a fake actor when you're trying to project a very specific polished professional image. There's moments [00:16:30] you need to do that, I don't disavow that but actually it's over play takes tons of energy and if you want the conversation and connections that you're talking about you're not supposed to let go of that polished crutch you've been carrying around and just engage.

Kyle Davis: I have buddies of mine who do some pretty hardcore software sales out in New York and one of things that they do to disrupt meetings or they do it in person is that they almost always show up late, they're almost always wearing jeans, [00:17:00] they're almost always wearing a button down without a tie and no jacket, just everything to just make them look like they just don't know what they're doing. Then that softens up the person that they're meeting with and I mean I'm not going to name the company but they're just closing deals left and right just by doing it like this and it's very impressive.

Todd Dewett: I've had the exact same experience. You disarm them by looking like a person instead of a warrior ready for business battle.

Kyle Davis: Yeah, you don't have to put on that three piece button down.

Gail Davis: This is [00:17:30] all so different than my early career. I started to work for Ross Perez company EDS, oh my gosh, I think I worked there eight years before I didn't have to wear a dress to work and the women wore navy blue suits, we had these white stark shirts just like men did, we had these little rosette bow ties. I mean there were more rules, crazy. So it's been fun to evolve in the business world, go from super [00:18:00] strict corporate to entrepreneurs though, it's been fun.

Todd Dewett: That's pretty amazing because they were actually well known for how robotically conservative everyone was. In fact I was at the tale end I think, the very tale end of the Ernst and Young era where they still largely believed in that type of approach to business accruement and in fact, I was once hauled to the adult equivalent of the principal's office, which of course is [00:18:30] the HR office because a managing partner had a problem with a portion of my grooming habits, which was at the time a goatee and that was against the rules.

Gail Davis: Yes, yes.

Kyle Davis: That's so horrible, how are you supposed to do no shave November with corporate sponsor of the company that you work for, I mean how you supposed to do that?

Todd Dewett: Times are always changing.

Gail Davis: It's funny they do, but I think when you grow up in an environment like that professionally there's some of those [00:19:00] core values that, I don't know it's hard to change.

Kyle Davis: I'm going to completely disagree with that, I just think that is just absolute nonsense. You can go to the best institutions in the world, you can go to MIT, Harvard,[milemont 00:19:15] of Columbia and everybody's rolling out of bed, they're wearing sweatshirts, they probably haven't brushed their teeth yet, they're still hungover and those are going to be the people that are going to be your bosses in five to ten years and if they can do it like that, I think you can do whatever you want but I digress.

Okay, [00:19:30] whatever. I do think though when it comes to and I don't mean to get onto the dressing aspect of it, but when it comes to authenticity I think today's generation and what I've seen in my startup career prior to transitioning to the GDA life, is when it comes to startups the one thing I was always hearing from recruiting when I was in school and everything else was we're all about transparency, radical transparency open and honest, flat [00:20:00] organization you can talk directly to the CEO and that has always been my experience.

Whereas all my friends who went the more traditional route and even when I was interviewing for the more traditional companies whether it was in consulting or investment banking there was this two year pipeline where you either ... Oh gosh what's the phase that they use in consulting, push up or push out, within that first two years you don't get that face time and you don't get that transparency and so it's very different cultures [00:20:30] kind of clashing and I can tell you all my friends who went from this more consulting or IT background into startups, they love it but there was this transitional period.

Todd Dewett: Well there's a couple of factors that are probably going on there. First of all on the corporate side when someone tells you things like we're open and transparent and you have access to the CEO, most of the time they mean it but in acting it is very, very difficult and that is the nature of large organizations. I love to tell them, hey look you're full of it, the way the world works when your bureacy is as large as yours [00:21:00] must be as I know everyone doesn't have access in reality to the CEO and it's not what matters. What matters is the average level of competence and authenticity for the managerial class in that organization as a whole. If the average is high in terms of skills on the hard side, task side and on the people side you're a world class organization whether I have access to the CEO or not. It's really about the average manager in the organization. If the average is high the culture is amazing and we call them the Silicon Valley folks [00:21:30] that we often put on a pedestal.

The reason they love startups usually is because they're very smart, they're very aggressive, they want to get ahead faster not slower and there's far, far fewer rules, much, much less red tape, the smaller the [inaudible 00:21:45] is.

Kyle Davis: Yeah, I agree with that. I work at Square which is one of Jack Dorsey's companies, he's the guy who founded Twitter, one we had access to him immediately and that was when we had 1,200 or so people, he gave us guided [00:22:00] tours, it was really very kind of cool. I'm sure since they've gone public it's changed. I remember my manager being the same age as me now to caddy out this I did go to school a little bit later than most people, I took about four years off but my manager was my age. I didn't think there was one director level person who was over 30. Now they've done some re-shifting of the board over there, I don't think there's one member of the senior executive team who's not a board member [00:22:30] that's over the age of like 45. It's a very young, smart, vibrant, talent rich company and you're right to the no rules and it comes back to the added which is just fail fast. We'll support you, we'll allow you to do this but do it, do it fast, fail fast.

Todd Dewett: That's one of my favorites and I have to tell you, we use to talk about these smaller more progressive or younger firms as if they were anomalies. I want you to hear this especially since you're a little younger than me, I'm almost 46 now. I have to tell you anyone in their '20s and '30s, most of the millennials, they face something that [00:23:00] has never been seen before when you think about more progressive issues of attire, of failing fast, of continuous education etc. They face something no-one's ever seen before and that is a generational shift that is radically off the silver synonymy. The boomers in numbers that are hard to get your hands around are leaving over the next decade and you sir and your buddies are taking over.

That's young people, women and minorities taking over in numbers never before seen because that's really [00:23:30] what's happening in terms of the demographics of the country. So I love to say this when I talk to whether it's coaching or sitting on stage in front of a thousand people, man you're going to have to put up or shut up millennials because you're going to be given the keys to the kingdom far more than most generations before you.

Kyle Davis: Yeah, I just look at all the Silicon Valley companies, I'm just using those as an example but there just so salient, I think every single one of them, the founder is under 40. I think they say the optimal age, if you want to start [00:24:00] a unicorn which is a billion dollar startup is 35 but you look at the guy who's the Snapchat CEO, he's what 24. I swear I thought of that idea before he did. I want that picture deleted now.

Todd Dewett: I have to tell you this, in defense of middle age people like me, if you do some googling you'll find a fascinating list of people who at 40 plus found fascinating new careers and became icons in their own right. Even though youth is an advantage, I think [00:24:30] that's true in that conversation, I have to tell you that attitude and perseverance and the willingness to take a risk is absolutely within the region of anyone at any age.

Kyle Davis: I completely agree. I think the only reason why I brought up the age though was because it just shows that the person doesn't need experience. I take that back. You don't need 20 years of corporate experience to know what to do, you don't need that amount of experience to do the right thing, is what I was trying to say. You have all these companies that are just [00:25:00] crushing everybody and stealing your lunch and they're managed by young aggressive people who just know what to do. I just think that's a takeaway.

Todd Dewett: In terms of innovation, I would add on to what you said and I agree by also saying that one of the awesome assets associated with being in your '20s or even '30s, you don't have as much to lose. Fascinating truth, you're not married, you're don't have kids, you have fewer debts etc that makes you not fear trying something [00:25:30] and messing up near as much as a person in their '40s, '50s or '60s.

Kyle Davis: Yeah and again not to take business away from older people and sound like I'm agist, there are plenty of companies that are founded by much older people that are doing phenomenal and I would go work for them, if they wanted me to but hey that's neither here nor there.

Todd Dewett: No, it's funny what you've said is going to be a key to your future because as the massive 15 year transition of boomers out of the economy happens, they are repositories of [00:26:00] expertise that the take over millennials will have to figure out how to effectively tap into before they fully retire and that is all about what it means to build rapport and make connection and a productive relationship.

Kyle Davis: It's that series A round when you start getting real investors and then you have to have them sit on your board, that's those guests.

Todd Dewett: There you go.

Kyle Davis: Wow, that's a bunch of startup jargon, everybody's going to be like what was this for the last 25 minutes.

Gail Davis: One of [00:26:30] the members of my team told me they saw a LinkedIn post that you did today about I think it was a work space learning report is that something that you've posted today Todd?

Todd Dewett: Yeah, so LinkedIn when they purchased Lynda.com about a year ago give or take, they launched LinkedIn learning a rebranded version of that and they not only want to provide world class content but they want to get into analytics, big data and related notions the way well learners and [00:27:00] HR should. So they are starting to dive in, in terms of surveys and other research methods to their users and they've got millions and millions of them to find out how they're using that product and how that product could be bettered. In general the landscape of learning and development and what it looks like. So some people over at LinkedIn put together kind of state of the industry report and tapped me in and two or three others to really offer some advice on top of all the statistics they were compiling and they put that up there today for the world, and [00:27:30] quite quickly it's getting some good traction.

Kyle Davis: I've heard some interesting stories from friends of mine who've either done business with LinkedIn or worked with LinkedIn and their use of data is just absolutely insane but since we're talking about onboarding and HR what do you see with regards to ... How do you bring people on, what makes successful learning? I know one of the things that my mom has worked with here on doing [00:28:00] is, is simplifying the onboarding process but what makes for good onboarding? Is it giving everybody the branded hoodie and the nice laptop or is it you know purpose and having everything down to the minute.

Todd Dewett: Let me tell you swag never hurts but purpose is what matters. It's kind of funny you said that, I'll say this for your listeners, this was not a set up that they were just given to me but I have a course on that, one of my 33 courses at LinkedIn is on onboarding.

Gail Davis: [00:28:30] Oh really, good.

Todd Dewett: Absolutely and I'll give you one of the punchlines which is a really useful thing to share, some people call it transparency or in the literature back when I was still a scholar full time they use to call it a realistic job preview or what I would call a combination of authenticity and transparency. Shoot straight instead of bullshitting, how'd you like that?

Kyle Davis: Breach.

Todd Dewett: What it's really like instead of what somebody wrote very nicely about what you want to say to them is right. Let me give you an example this is crude [00:29:00] and off script but I'll do it anyway. [inaudible 00:29:03] grad school the first time I worked for as an intern between year one and two of my MBA, I worked for a small software firm and it had about 30 people. During the interview, a very hilarious informal interview between me and the president of this firm. He said look do you understand something, the floors here are dirty and the urinals stink, you understand that right. I was then, not now, I was taken aback by the blunt authenticity [00:29:30] of that statement which I found to be frankly characteristic of how they spoke there which was to say full of candor instead of BS. Of that and what we know about most onboarding that is successful, they try to streamline, they try to perceive your questions before you ask them and put resources digitally in your hand as soon as humanly possible and most importantly kill the BS, kill the red tape that's not absolutely required and tell honest truths about the place, because when people show up they do not [00:30:00] want large amounts of unmet expectations and the more you're shooting straight the more they walk into a place that looks like well they kind of already understand it.

Kyle Davis: So you're saying that onboarding should be digitized?

Todd Dewett: To the extent possible, but old school version of onboarding was multiple, multiple days of sitting on your butt with other strangers that worked for other parts of the company listening to the most horrifying lecturers you've ever [inaudible 00:30:28] from HR about insurance and other things. Lots [00:30:30] of that can be reduced, streamlined and digitally packaged absolutely.

Kyle Davis: Yeah, I'm a huge fan of digitizing the onboarding process and also the use of LMS or learning management software solution. You know to just quiz as we go along to make sure that the uptake is there.

Todd Dewett: Got it.

Kyle Davis: Well, I think, I really don't have anything much more to add to this, [00:31:00] do you have anything mom, no?

Gail Davis: No I loved it, it's great and it's fun meeting someone who is not afraid to show their ink, who approaches, like you said businesses somehow it's always changing and somehow it always remains the same so the fact that you're approaching it from a very authentic stand point, I think that's something people crave.

Todd Dewett: Well I think you're right and it's why I'm still speaking and growing, so thanks for saying [00:31:30] that.

Kyle Davis: So I think the keys to take away are these. Be authentic, cut the crap, be you know what ... Shoot from the head and be honest and set realistic expectations, I think those are some nuggets we can take away from this.

Todd Dewett: That's serious advice right there, absolutely.

Kyle Davis: I should charge for that.

Gail Davis: Yeah, may be you'll get on the stage one of these days after you've glean all this wisdom.

Kyle Davis: I'll put together my reel.

Todd Dewett: Good luck with that.

Kyle Davis: [00:32:00] I know how to use final cut pro I'll be fine.

Gail Davis: Thank you so much Todd, it was great getting to spend time talking to you and I hope that sometime when you're up in the Dallas area, you'll stop by and may be we'll have you on again in the studio.

Todd Dewett: That's great, thanks so much guys.

Gail Davis: Thanks.

Kyle Davis: Thanks, so if you're all interested in learning a bit more about Todd please contact GDA Speakers, you can do so by calling 214-420-1999 or going to gdaspeakers.com

If you want to read [00:32:30] the transcript from today's podcast you can go to gdapodcast.com

Or you can also see other episodes that we've done as well as blog posts and who's coming up and everything else under the sun that's related to this.

Thanks

Gail Davis: Be authentic.

Kyle Davis: Be authentic.