0:00

To me, the whole nature of

0:02

feedback, particularly in a creative context,

0:04

is just I'm trying to figure

0:07

out whether I actually hit the

0:09

mark. And I need a lot of

0:11

people to give me feedback to figure

0:13

out whether I really hit the mark

0:15

because any one person can love

0:17

or hate pretty much anything. One

0:20

draws with a Sharpie. The

0:22

other nerds out with spreadsheets.

0:24

but both share a passion

0:26

for helping real financial advisors

0:28

get better. Join the industry's

0:30

preeminent blogger Michael Kitzas and

0:32

client communication expert Carl Richards

0:34

as they share their unique

0:36

perspectives and advice on how

0:38

to more effectively serve your

0:41

clients. Be more intentional when

0:43

building your own business and

0:45

make sure you actually have

0:47

a life in the process.

0:49

Without further ado, here are your

0:51

hosts Kitzas and Carl. Greetings

0:56

Michael, how are you? I'm doing well, Carl.

0:58

I'm doing well. We're just, I don't know,

1:00

chugging along in the later stages of

1:03

winter here, at least DC area, like

1:05

February, March time frame is the tail

1:07

end of winter for us. I think

1:09

it goes a little bit later for

1:11

you in Utah. Yeah, you start to feel,

1:13

I was talking about this other day. I

1:16

was like, man, in March, you start to

1:18

feel a little hope. You know, like

1:20

you made it through, right? Like, like...

1:22

And then you get like another foot

1:24

of snow? Is that how it works

1:26

there? Okay. We have this experience every

1:28

couple years where I get to mow

1:30

my lawn on my birthday, April 24th.

1:32

I get to mow my lawn and

1:34

then go ski. Right, like those days

1:36

are really fastening because, you know, we

1:38

get snow up in the mountains that

1:41

anyway. Yeah, things are good. Let me

1:43

ask you a question. I think it'd be

1:45

fun to talk a little bit about.

1:48

I'm always interested

1:52

in how we take and

1:54

incorporate, like,

1:56

okay, I've got

1:59

a thing. people in the

2:01

world are gonna see. And by

2:03

thing, I mean, like, it could

2:05

be as simple as my business

2:07

card. You know, my business card,

2:09

my website, do we still call

2:11

them like a mark, our marketing

2:13

brochure? Yeah, we got some, we

2:15

saw some of those might be

2:17

a PDF, but you saw a

2:19

email to people. Yeah, like we

2:21

could almost sort of move up

2:23

the spectrum, right? Like a business

2:25

card, a website, a marketing brochure,

2:27

a white paper, you know, a

2:29

book. a podcast like social media

2:31

posts like your stakes your stakes

2:33

are getting elevated there on how

2:36

many people see it but I'm

2:38

guessing that's kind of the point

2:40

of the theme right yeah yeah

2:42

yeah yeah only so many people

2:44

see my business card a lot

2:46

of people will see my my

2:48

podcast here my podcast see me

2:50

on social media Yeah, so as

2:52

soon as you go to make

2:54

a thing and it actually could

2:56

even start earlier you like your

2:58

logo Right or the name the

3:00

name of the man that's a

3:02

good one anytime you're naming something

3:04

Yeah, you know the name of

3:06

the firm the name of a

3:08

book and you go to do

3:10

it and one of the things

3:12

you do is you ask people.

3:14

Yep. For feedback you ask them

3:16

I've stopped using the word I

3:18

typically don't use the word feedback

3:20

anymore I use the word reaction

3:22

which I'm like I'm curious about

3:24

your reaction which was really actually

3:26

quite helpful But as soon as

3:29

you do that you you get

3:31

surprise surprise you get feedback and

3:33

and and particularly as it gets

3:35

more public like like something like

3:37

a book or a post on

3:39

social media or whatever But even

3:41

as fundamental as something like a

3:43

logo and you share it with

3:45

three or four of your friends,

3:47

inevitably somebody says something that you

3:49

don't like or you didn't think

3:51

like. And the reason I'm thinking

3:53

about this is I've got a

3:55

new book coming out in October

3:57

and I've worked on the cover

3:59

design, the title and the cover

4:01

design. and I've shared it with

4:03

some people. And yesterday, one of

4:05

my friends, who I'll just call

4:07

Aaron, and he said, like, hey,

4:09

before I say anything, I want

4:11

you to know that opinions are

4:13

like, what do we, I think

4:15

we, we can't, we can't exactly

4:17

use the right language here, but

4:19

opinions are like a certain anatomical

4:22

part of our body. Everybody has

4:24

them and they all stink, right?

4:26

Yep. So and then he shared

4:28

some feedback and he was like

4:30

I think the title is pretty

4:32

boring It's like oh And I

4:34

got two or three different and

4:36

like I had two different versions

4:38

of the book cover and I

4:40

sent it out and the feedback

4:42

came back split Yeah half the

4:44

people loved like made strong arguments

4:46

for one and half the people

4:48

made really strong arguments for the

4:50

other one. Yeah So I'm just

4:52

I was feeling Tuesday a couple

4:54

days ago I was like you

4:56

know feeling a feeling I remember

4:58

a lot 10 years ago and

5:00

then I sort of got over

5:02

it and then I felt it

5:04

again which was sort of this

5:06

like never mind or like forget

5:08

it or kind of tied up

5:10

in knots or like nobody likes

5:12

my stuff and this book cover

5:15

stupid and the title is dumb

5:17

what am I even thinking in

5:19

the little imposter syndrome and I

5:21

know now to go on a

5:23

walk. Go to bed early, get

5:25

up the next day and everything's

5:27

fine, but I'm curious how you

5:29

handle, like when you go to

5:31

do public work. First of all,

5:33

how do you solicit feedback? Yeah.

5:35

Do you? How do you solicit

5:37

feedback? And then what do you

5:39

do with it? Because I'd love

5:41

to sort of walk through some

5:43

of the tips and tricks. We've

5:45

both done lots of public work.

5:47

Yeah. And so I thought this

5:49

would be helpful for people to

5:51

hear. are sort of running my

5:53

through my head around this under

5:55

this like overall theme around the

5:57

feedback and taking in feedback. So

6:00

there's a saying that I have

6:02

around what we do with our

6:05

Teamer internally it kits us around

6:07

feedback because I am a From

6:09

a business perspective. I am like

6:12

a table pounding advocate of Your

6:14

business needs feedback loops Any time

6:16

you do a thing you need

6:19

some way that you're going to

6:21

get feedback from people about whether

6:23

the thing was useful valuable helpful

6:26

on target delivered well, right? We

6:28

get different feedback in different ways

6:30

depending on what it is so

6:33

like Anything we launch has a

6:35

survey attached to it, has some

6:37

questions attached to it, usually a

6:40

little bit that are, you know,

6:42

rate this on a one to

6:45

ten scale kind of thing, and

6:47

usually some that are a little

6:49

bit more open-ended, especially if it's

6:52

something new, because when you're doing

6:54

something new, somebody else you don't

6:56

even know what questions to ask,

6:59

you just need people to give

7:01

you some unfiltered feedback, so we'll

7:03

ask things like what's one thing

7:06

we could change that would have

7:08

made this better. and just like

7:10

try to get one thing, one

7:13

thing, one like concrete, something we

7:15

could have done. So I want

7:17

to end like I love data

7:20

and feedback. And on the flip

7:22

side, one of the challenges that

7:24

I found with a lot of

7:27

our team as I started to

7:29

implement this is, you know, we

7:31

do a thing, it would go

7:34

well. And someone. had some pretty

7:36

sharp criticism somewhere in that in

7:38

that feedback, right? Like scored well,

7:41

but one person... about like how

7:43

much it sucked because of this

7:45

that and the other thing and

7:48

then we all do what pretty

7:50

much human beings do like you

7:52

forget the 99 responses that said

7:55

it was good and you fixate

7:57

on like the one person that

7:59

just ripped you to shreds and

8:02

and so one of the like

8:04

sayings I've kind of adopted around

8:06

the the the business is once

8:09

is an anecdote twice is a

8:11

consistent twice is a three times

8:13

it's a trend. Once it's an

8:16

anecdote, twice it's a coincidence, three

8:18

times it's a trend, which basically

8:21

means even if we're hearing some

8:23

sharper feedback, you have to hear

8:25

it multiple times. More than once

8:28

or twice. Anybody can hate anything

8:30

once because human beings are wonderfully

8:32

varied in their views and experiences,

8:35

and frankly, we'll be having their

8:37

own... day and life happening. You

8:39

don't know what journey someone's on

8:42

at the moment that they happen

8:44

to interact with you and give

8:46

you some point of feedback that

8:49

may or may not be a

8:51

reflection of you or may or

8:53

may not be a reflection of

8:56

what's going on in their world.

8:58

So all of it just to

9:00

say, like the first thing to

9:03

me when I think about feedback

9:05

is that I want multiple data

9:07

points. Of course, you're like gritting,

9:10

of course, I'll like build this

9:12

into a spreadsheet if I can,

9:14

because I've got to get back

9:17

spreadsheets. But like I'm very wary

9:19

to put too much weight into

9:21

any one point of feedback. Now

9:24

there's some time, so I do

9:26

that, maybe I'll talk about that

9:28

separately in a moment, but when

9:31

I think of like the general

9:33

case, you know, you're putting things

9:35

out there, especially when you're. When

9:38

you're putting things out there in

9:40

public, right, you know, we redesigned

9:42

our website, we're updating our logo,

9:45

we're doing this thing on social

9:47

media or podcast, like, you know,

9:49

you can't please all the people

9:52

all the time, right? You, you,

9:54

we all say that and anytime

9:56

you do anything. any level of

9:59

public that hits home real fast.

10:01

You can't please all the people

10:04

all the time. And so once

10:06

I kind of accepted that reality,

10:08

then Logical My Brain Me kicks

10:11

in. I'm like, well, if I

10:13

can't please all the people all

10:15

the time, what is the acceptable

10:18

percentage of people that I have

10:20

not pleased before it's actually a

10:22

problem? And so... then I start

10:25

going to like to like, okay,

10:27

well then I got to gather

10:29

a broad level of feedback. So

10:32

I can really say, look, you

10:34

know, if 80 or 90% of

10:36

people like the thing, that's probably

10:39

still pretty darn good in the

10:41

grand scheme of things. A lot

10:43

of stuff out there is very

10:46

successful with way less than 80%

10:48

of the people liking it. So

10:50

if they're, if 80% like it,

10:53

that's probably pretty good. And I'm

10:55

going to let go of the

10:57

fact that 20% of the people

11:00

aren't going to like anything because.

11:02

humans are humans and wonderfully varied.

11:04

So my go-to on this is

11:07

I need some volume because one-off

11:09

feedback feels too one-off to me.

11:11

I love that. I want to

11:14

try something just because I'm curious

11:16

how you'll respond. Because I, I,

11:18

this is really interesting. So a

11:21

couple years ago, it was probably

11:23

like eight years ago. a

11:26

friend of mine who's

11:28

a tenured professor at

11:30

a university talked me

11:32

into, he tried to

11:34

talk me into the

11:36

PhD program. And what

11:38

he wanted me to

11:40

study, because I guess

11:42

lecture at a couple

11:44

different places. And what

11:46

I often am talking

11:48

about is the kind

11:51

of creative, like, what

11:53

it feels like to try to be

11:55

who you really are and express that

11:58

in the world, because a lot of

12:00

that's... I think of that as financial

12:02

planning, right? Like I'm trying to help

12:05

you find out what really matters to

12:07

you and then do things. And so

12:09

it's like, and a lot of what

12:12

I love thinking and talking about is,

12:14

what does it feel like to make

12:16

a thing, you know, whatever the thing

12:19

is, a business, a website, a podcast,

12:21

and then say to the world, like

12:23

Seth Godin says, like here I made

12:26

this, I hope in that word so

12:28

powerful, like I hope you like it.

12:30

And so as part of this consideration

12:33

of getting in this PhD program, I

12:35

went to the fall seminar. And there

12:37

was like, you know, these are small

12:40

groups at the PhD level. There's like

12:42

eight people in the professor's teaching. And

12:44

I got like three or four weeks

12:47

in and there was just all this,

12:49

a lot of what you were talking

12:51

about. It's like what smart people do.

12:54

You know, get a lot of feedback,

12:56

have data, do surveys, do customer research.

12:58

Like this is all in the. you

13:01

know, product market fit, like all in

13:03

the entrepreneurial startup world. But it felt

13:05

so foreign to what I was thinking

13:08

about, because what I was thinking about

13:10

is like, I have a thing that

13:12

I cannot, there's no way I cannot

13:15

put this in the world. I don't

13:17

really quote unquote care what anybody else

13:19

thinks. And so I started thinking of

13:22

it as like, there's, and this is

13:24

super over simplifying that there's these two

13:26

versions of business. One is much closer

13:29

to art and one is much closer

13:31

to the widget factory. Like, and you

13:33

know, you're an analyzing competitive landscapes, getting,

13:36

doing customer research, doing surveys, getting feedback,

13:38

getting data. And that's what I think

13:40

that's what smart logical people do. And

13:43

then there's this other end where you're

13:45

like, no, I want to do this.

13:47

And I have a friend who had

13:50

a donut shop. on Abbott Kenny in

13:52

LA. So like some of the most

13:54

expensive real estate in the world, don't

13:57

shop, right? And she could care less

13:59

what you. your opinion of

14:01

her donuts. Now this breaks down

14:03

when you go to like well you

14:05

mean you could care less well

14:07

if nobody buys your donuts you're

14:09

not going to no longer have

14:12

the shop and she would say

14:14

then I'll close the shop.

14:16

So it's interesting to Which to

14:18

me gets to like someone was

14:20

liking the donuts. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

14:23

So it's someone. So it's really

14:25

like the lines are not even

14:27

close to clear. They're probably exactly

14:30

the same business. It's just a

14:32

different version of getting data. So

14:35

here's the thing I want to

14:37

just I just want to I'm

14:39

interested in. You know, because if

14:41

I I've learned mostly. Most of

14:43

the time when I'm reaching out for

14:46

feedback. Like, okay, I've got a book

14:48

I'm going to put in the world,

14:50

I've got a cover. I think it's

14:53

important to be clear about

14:55

when you're actually looking

14:57

for reaction slash feedback

15:00

that might inform the

15:02

decision versus when you're looking

15:04

for to put ground under

15:07

your feet because you're scared.

15:09

And I think whenever I'm

15:11

looking for to put ground

15:13

under my feet because I'm

15:15

scared. Like the feedback's

15:18

not going to help the

15:20

feedback's probably going to make

15:22

it worse actually Go on a walk

15:24

do something else go meditate go do

15:27

your yoga like whatever meet with your

15:29

counselor Any time up because I think

15:31

that kind of space in the creative

15:34

process and by the way creating an

15:36

ra firm as a creative act Yep

15:38

I would also say even at some

15:40

level a financial plan is a creative

15:42

act. That little slice of it that's

15:45

the creative act is going to always

15:47

feel groundless. You know, like because you're

15:49

doing new and novel things, you're helping

15:51

somebody craft a set of values and

15:53

goals that are new to them. But

15:56

then there's this rest of it that

15:58

so I think distinguishing between. Hey, I

16:00

actually want feedback because I remember

16:02

Morgan Housel Morgan Housel when he

16:04

decided to write this book that

16:06

sold a few copies You know

16:08

millions and millions of copies which

16:10

puts it in point zero zero

16:12

zero one percent of all business

16:14

books Morgan called and asked me

16:16

what I thought of other people.

16:18

I'm sure what I thought of

16:20

the title the psychology of money

16:22

I told him that's that's that's

16:25

a really bad title. Nobody will

16:27

ever buy it Which is pretty

16:29

funny, so call me for business.

16:31

You know what's sad? Think about

16:33

how many more books he would

16:35

have sold if he had taken

16:37

your advice. Yeah, yeah, that's great

16:39

idea. So a little while ago

16:41

when I was working on the

16:43

title of my book, I said,

16:45

can I, I texted Morgan, I

16:47

was like, hey, can I run

16:49

a title past you? And he

16:51

said, do it. And I was

16:53

like, oh, you mean I can

16:55

run the title class? He's like,

16:57

no, name it, name it, whatever,

16:59

whatever you're thinking of naming it.

17:01

Right because everybody's gonna have a

17:03

million opinions and they're all gonna

17:05

be wrong and he's he's nice

17:07

enough that he didn't remind me

17:09

You know throw it back in

17:11

my face. So I it's really

17:13

interesting to figure out when is

17:15

the feedback valuable when are those

17:17

surveys valuable and When are they

17:19

just an effort to make you

17:21

feel secure about a creative act?

17:23

Good luck with that one Well

17:25

say I like your spreadsheet. I

17:27

mean there's still a piece of

17:29

me that says like it's it's

17:31

both I don't even I'm not

17:33

even sure I distinguish those. Like

17:35

I'm trying to find, like yes,

17:37

I'm trying to validate a creative

17:39

act when, when we put those,

17:41

when we put those surveys out,

17:43

again, just, but I want some

17:45

volume of data because creative things

17:48

are creative and hit different people

17:50

differently, right? Donut Chop Woman knew

17:52

that she was going to do

17:54

her thing in a certain way

17:56

and it was going to make

17:58

a lot of people unhappy or

18:00

so I don't know if, if,

18:02

If only one out of every

18:04

10 people actually like the way

18:06

that she does donuts. She's got

18:08

to ask a lot of people

18:10

to make sure that she can

18:12

actually get to to find the

18:14

10% who like it. But the

18:16

reality is if you know 10%

18:18

of everybody in Beverly Hills comes

18:20

to buy your donuts every day

18:22

you have a ridiculously successful shop

18:24

because that's a lot of people

18:26

like 10. Right. I mean, an

18:28

advisory firm has. 50 to 100

18:30

ongoing clients per advisor. So like

18:32

cool to be clear if you

18:34

make a thing that 99.999% of

18:36

the population doesn't like you'll have

18:38

too many clients. Yeah, right, right,

18:40

right, because we can't even serve

18:42

0.001% that would be way too

18:44

many people. Yeah, yeah. And so

18:46

like you need a, you need

18:48

a volume of, I mean, just

18:50

like that's my, you know, driven

18:52

style to it. Like I need

18:54

some, I need some volume of

18:56

feedback. And I find particularly in

18:58

this context when we're, when we're

19:00

trying to create. I mean, whether

19:02

you're creating art, whether you're creating

19:04

a business, it's me, it all

19:06

kind of falls in the same,

19:08

in the same frame, right? I

19:11

actually appreciated what you were commenting

19:13

around entrepreneurs, like the way entrepreneurship

19:15

is often taught to young people.

19:17

is go out into the world,

19:19

find people who have problems, and

19:21

then see if you can build

19:23

a solution for their problems. And

19:25

if you can solve their problems,

19:27

you can charge the money for

19:29

the service of the widget or

19:31

whatever it is, and congratulations, you

19:33

have a business. So that you

19:35

spend time searching for problems. Those

19:37

of us who create tend not

19:39

to quite approach it that way.

19:41

We create something that we believe

19:43

is a solution. It's at least

19:45

a solution our head to something

19:47

we've experienced personally usually. Like, we

19:49

make a solution. And then you

19:51

have to go find whether enough

19:53

people have that problem that you

19:55

can actually sell it and make

19:57

a business out of it. Donut

19:59

shop lady was like, this is

20:01

how I make donuts. Now I

20:03

have to find out whether enough

20:05

people on this earth that are

20:07

willing to buy my donuts and

20:09

Beverly Hills to be able to

20:11

afford my shop. Because the question

20:13

for her is like, I know

20:15

what I want to create in

20:17

this world. Now I just have

20:19

to find out whether enough people

20:21

out there who will buy it

20:23

to create a financially viable business

20:25

where again. to like it, I

20:27

need enough people to like it,

20:29

that I can do this in

20:31

a economically viable manner. And so

20:34

when I start looking for feedback,

20:36

like I'm just trying to find

20:38

out whether enough people find this

20:40

useful. If I know who I'm

20:42

supposed to serve, I'm going to

20:44

mostly ask them and not like

20:46

random strangers on the street. But

20:48

to me, the whole nature of

20:50

feedback, particularly in a creative context,

20:52

is just I'm trying to figure

20:54

out whether I actually hit the

20:56

mark, whether I actually hit the

20:58

mark, And I need

21:00

a lot of people to give

21:02

me feedback to figure out whether

21:04

I really hit the mark because

21:06

any one person can love or

21:08

hate pretty much anything. Yeah, yeah,

21:10

so interesting. I think it's interesting.

21:12

There's an element and I'm there

21:14

it's not it's not either or

21:16

it's both. And maybe. Maybe a

21:18

single person could actually be engaged

21:20

in both, but I often do

21:22

find too, like, there are people

21:24

who operate just, they operate differently,

21:26

they're both right. Right? And one

21:28

of them, I think, is an

21:30

internal focus of like, no, this

21:32

is, I'm really clear, this is

21:34

the thing I wanna do, I'm

21:36

gonna do it. And then I'm

21:38

going to find out if there

21:40

are enough people to, and if

21:42

there aren't enough people, it's not

21:44

like I'm going to change the

21:46

thing, it's just means it's not

21:48

going to be a business. It'll

21:50

be a hobby. It'll be, you

21:52

know, whatever else. And then there's

21:54

a more external. like, and there's

21:56

a lot of like, a lot

21:58

of the recent research around sort

22:00

of like demand side sales, like

22:02

really understanding where demand is coming

22:04

from and why there's demand, is

22:06

this other side of like, you

22:09

know, let's see what the problems

22:11

are, and then let's build a

22:13

solution. And you're pointing to often

22:15

what you do is this sort

22:17

of like scratch your own itch

22:19

model of like, look, and this

22:21

is again another thing that Morgan

22:23

said. is he's writing for an

22:25

audience of one him yeah i'm

22:27

gonna write the thing i want

22:29

to read right and then i'm

22:31

gonna go out and find and

22:33

he just happens to be lucky

22:35

that there's a lot of people

22:37

that i want to read the

22:39

same thing and then you find

22:41

out whether people right you know

22:43

we we we we create the

22:45

advisory firm that we would want

22:47

to be a client that's right

22:49

and then we go find out

22:51

whether anybody else wants that as

22:53

as as well and again to

22:55

me like that's That's the

22:57

greater process, that's creative nature for

22:59

what we do when we're trying

23:01

to create, right? I make a

23:04

thing that I believe is a

23:06

solution, and I find out whether

23:08

anybody actually wants to buy it

23:10

as the solution to their problems

23:12

and will pay me for it.

23:14

But the reason why I start

23:17

getting focused around feedback and like

23:19

volumes of feedback is because of

23:21

those scripts that start running, right?

23:23

Like if I've got doubt... I'm

23:26

going to hyper focus on the one

23:28

or two people who say something negative.

23:30

Well, I wasn't really sure anyways. Oh,

23:33

I'm like Bob didn't like it. Screw

23:35

this. I got to throw it in

23:37

the towel. Or we come the other

23:39

direction. The reality is like, I'm so

23:42

convinced it's right. For me, other people

23:44

must want this. And I found one

23:46

other human being who said it was

23:48

a great idea, so I'm going to

23:51

keep sticking with it, even though everyone

23:53

else is saying, we don't want it,

23:55

we don't like it, it's not going

23:57

to work. And you can get in

24:00

trouble the other way as well, which

24:02

is I... one person to validate me

24:04

which feels really good because I was

24:06

so passionate about my idea and then

24:09

I spend months or years trying to

24:11

make money in my passion that's not

24:13

actually economically or business viable or if

24:15

we're talking an advisory firm context because

24:18

I'm clinging to the one or two

24:20

people who say yes I'm not actually

24:22

looking at the volume of feedback which

24:24

is people just aren't buying this it's

24:27

not showing up the way that It

24:29

needs to be valuable for them, which

24:31

again is why I so quickly come

24:33

back to, I really want to look

24:36

at some volume of data because it's

24:38

so easy to get swayed by one

24:40

or two people who love it or

24:42

one or two people who hate it,

24:45

depending on whatever mindset you're coming to

24:47

the thing with in the first place,

24:49

that if you want to get a

24:51

clearer picture. You need a higher quantity

24:53

of responses. I'm really only a fan

24:56

of one response, but just like it's

24:58

a, you know, it's a really expert

25:00

oriented situation where someone can really give

25:02

me expert feedback, then maybe I will

25:05

narrow in a little bit. But otherwise,

25:07

just like, feedback has to have some

25:09

volume behind it because always our human

25:11

brains just. We see what we want

25:14

to see was the confirmation bias kicks

25:16

in whichever direction that we want and

25:18

you'll grab whatever one or two data

25:20

points prove the thing that your brain

25:23

is trying to prove Yeah, I agree.

25:25

Let me let me just let me

25:27

propose something I want to just make

25:29

one other claim and then let's do

25:32

two or three rapid fire like how

25:34

do you deal with feedback, right? Like

25:36

what's your best way of dealing with

25:38

feedback? I'll give one or two you

25:41

give one or two but One thing

25:43

I just want to sort of, as

25:45

we tie up the philosophical discussion around

25:47

it, like, I think what all the

25:50

stuff you just said, it makes perfect

25:52

sense and I think it's really smart

25:54

and I think it's probably the way

25:56

people should do it. dot

26:00

dot dot and it's not the way

26:02

I operate best. Okay, so how do

26:04

you operate? I won't be surprised

26:07

to anyone that you might not

26:09

take like the high volume spreadsheet

26:11

approach that I do. So and

26:13

again I want to be clear.

26:15

Yeah, that's actually the smart way.

26:17

I think the way I do

26:19

it is wrong. Like and this

26:21

is here's an interesting quote I

26:23

was playing around with the other

26:26

day. It's and this is from a

26:28

book called a. Zen mind beginner's mind.

26:30

So it's a little bit of

26:32

sort of Zen thought. It's quite

26:35

usual for us to gather

26:37

pieces of information from various

26:39

sources Thinking in this

26:41

way We are increasing our knowledge

26:44

and I think you could replace

26:46

that with saying thinking in this

26:48

way. We're increasing our confidence

26:50

about the thing and then the

26:52

the next line is actually following

26:55

this way we end up not

26:57

knowing anything at all Wait, say

26:59

that whole thing again? It's quite

27:01

usual for us to gather pieces

27:03

of information from various sources, thinking

27:06

that this is the way to

27:08

increase our knowledge. And again, coming

27:10

from Zen, right, actually following this

27:12

way, we end up not knowing

27:14

anything at all. And I think

27:16

an analogy you could make real

27:18

quickly is like, if you go to

27:20

shop for new running shoes, and we've

27:23

all had this experience, pick anything

27:25

you want, and you go read

27:27

the reviews. And if I go

27:29

read the reviews on Amazon or the

27:31

running shoes, I leave more confused than

27:33

when I started. I know there's lots

27:35

of ways for this to fall apart

27:38

and it's actually not what you're

27:40

saying. The data thing is really

27:42

smart. But this quote sort of

27:44

points to like, I, one of the things

27:46

I'm trying to do lately is, and

27:48

I realize this again Tuesday night when

27:50

I reached out for a bunch of

27:52

feedback. I was like, wait, I don't

27:54

want this, I, I am just gonna

27:56

make a thing. and then I'm going

27:58

to shelter myself. protect myself

28:00

from feedback. Like I don't want to

28:02

go on Reddit and read what people

28:05

think about the society of advice because

28:07

people think it's so, you know, like,

28:09

I'm just gonna make a thing that

28:12

I care deeply about. And I think

28:14

we could spend a whole other hour

28:16

talking about that. It's not right or

28:19

wrong. It's just a, it's just, and

28:21

I've, so. That's a that's a one

28:23

of my core operating principles now is

28:26

like attend we talked about this quote

28:28

years once ago could the Confucius quote

28:30

attend the way in isolation like really

28:33

focus on the quality of the work

28:35

the thing that you really love make

28:37

sure it has the craft make sure

28:39

it feels good and then say to

28:42

the world I hope you like this

28:44

and then hide yeah which is so

28:46

I don't I don't disagree with rapid

28:49

rapid, rapid fire tactics. I don't disagree

28:51

with that in the, in the creative

28:53

process. Again, like I don't, I don't

28:56

actually, well, I'm kind of iterative in

28:58

everything that I do, but like, if

29:00

I'm creating a thing, I'm creating a

29:03

thing in my head, like I have

29:05

to get it out. There comes a

29:07

point where like once I put it

29:09

out in the world. I mean first

29:12

of all people will vote with their

29:14

feet or their dollars about whether like

29:16

this is a thing that you want

29:19

to buy and pay for right I

29:21

tend to come to this from a

29:23

very business perspective like if I created

29:26

a thing that's a viable business that

29:28

people will pay for the the service

29:30

or the offering or whatever it is

29:33

and so I'm not really a fan

29:35

of You know creating with feedback. It's

29:37

like trying to craft art by committee

29:40

like it just ends out being boring

29:42

and and and not pleasant But once

29:44

you create the thing I mean I

29:46

guess in the pure sense like art

29:49

once you make it it's made and

29:51

out in the world business to me

29:53

is more iterative If I can make

29:56

a thing and take feedback and then

29:58

make it even better, and version 2.0

30:00

can be better than 1 and version

30:03

3.0 can be better or 2.0, so

30:05

I assume there's room for iteration. That's

30:07

when I want the feedback. Passing. Yeah,

30:10

I think what this points to is

30:12

maybe it's just, you agree on the

30:14

principle. It's a function of where's the

30:16

line on the creative act like yeah

30:19

like what at what stage does it

30:21

come because I'm I'm very much not

30:23

a like feedback in the drafting phase

30:26

at all. I like that because I've

30:28

got a there's a thing my head

30:30

what's supposed to be right like we

30:33

get a vision and usually it's some

30:35

version of this is what I would

30:37

want if I was consuming it but

30:40

but then eventually. Yeah, this is the

30:42

business context like, but if you want

30:44

to get paid for this, at some

30:47

point you have to find out what

30:49

the rest of the world thinks about

30:51

it. And you don't have to solve,

30:53

you don't have to please all the

30:56

people all the time. But you do

30:58

at least need to find some segment

31:00

of people who like this, right? So

31:03

in, even in a context, like our

31:05

platform, look, huge swaths of people thinks

31:07

it's ridiculously too long, but... Then there's

31:10

another segment of people that say, I

31:12

love this stuff because everybody else doesn't

31:14

go deep enough and this finally goes

31:17

as deep as I want. So if

31:19

I ask everyone, lots of people will

31:21

dislike it, lots of people do, we

31:23

get that feedback regularly. And I don't

31:26

care about everyone. I care that there's

31:28

enough people to like it that I

31:30

can get paid for it. And once

31:33

there's enough people that I like it

31:35

that get paid for it, the only

31:37

people whose opinion and feedback and feedback

31:40

I care about. are the people who

31:42

consume it and like it in the

31:44

first place but could still help us

31:47

get better and do it better right

31:49

so I don't care about the fact

31:51

that some people just don't like long-form

31:54

content because I'm not here to serve

31:56

them there are people who do like

31:58

long form content. Now with people who

32:00

like long form content, I really don't

32:03

want to know what their feedback is.

32:05

How can I make this even better

32:07

for you? But I'm not going to

32:10

ask everyone because then I'm going to

32:12

ask a bunch of people who just

32:14

think all of anything long is dumb

32:17

and takes too long and they're not

32:19

going to give me helpful feedback, which

32:21

I guess is an indirect way of

32:24

saying like careful who you're asking for

32:26

feedback. Yeah, I love that. Particularly if

32:28

you're going to iterates. Based on their

32:30

feedback like make sure you're asking feedback

32:33

from people who at least like to

32:35

be in the neighborhood in the first

32:37

place Yeah, I love that it's so

32:40

interesting because that really helps because My

32:42

like if we were drawing this on

32:44

a on a Continuum, you know, I

32:47

just see the business as an art

32:49

project Right, and so you see the

32:51

business a little bit more like a

32:54

business. I see the business a little

32:56

bit more like an art project. Both

32:58

of those are perfectly awesome, right? And

33:01

then it's just a fine tuning of

33:03

how, like my one tip for seeking

33:05

feedback, my one tip is try to

33:07

design experiments around getting feedback where you

33:10

get revealed preferences instead of stated preferences.

33:12

Correct. So like instead of maybe asking

33:14

somebody. You know just Send the thing

33:17

and see what the reaction is and

33:19

even instead of that even asking them

33:21

for a reaction just literally like Send

33:24

the thing I mean as an example

33:26

right like even our platform you what

33:28

we don't we don't we don't ask

33:31

advisors what topics they want to hear

33:33

more we put some topics out and

33:35

then we look at what actually gets

33:37

engagement. That's a perfect view more of

33:40

what they actually respond to That's a

33:42

perfect example. We just did this for

33:44

the society topics. Somebody said, you know,

33:47

have you ever thought of asking everybody

33:49

the topics are? And we were like,

33:51

we actually do. We just do it

33:54

much more sophisticated. We actually watch what

33:56

you respond to. We see click rates.

33:58

We pay attention to the words you

34:01

use. Yeah, same thing. And just in

34:03

the, I did the same thing in

34:05

the, in the client context when we

34:08

were, what does more client face like

34:10

we, what, what reports are they grabbing?

34:12

What parts of the plan presentation are

34:14

they engaging with and which parts of

34:17

their eyes glazing over and the parts

34:19

their eyes are glazing over like they're

34:21

just literally not engaging with that. So

34:24

we should probably either make that part

34:26

a lot better or just get rid

34:28

of that part or break it up

34:31

or find some other way to do

34:33

it. Right, the clients give so much

34:35

body language in how they're engaging in

34:38

planning meetings, like you can do it

34:40

right down to the meeting level, what

34:42

do you bring to the meeting? How

34:44

do you engage with them? It's all

34:47

a version of revealed preferences. Love that,

34:49

love that. And then the, my last

34:51

suggestion is, it's very close to your

34:54

everyone versus the specific person idea, but,

34:56

but I think, as you're getting feedback.

34:58

Well, one is I love your idea

35:01

of the data like Jason Fried at

35:03

base camp says, you know, don't cut

35:05

on the first don't scar on the

35:08

first cut. It's always surprising to me

35:10

like we'll get one bit of feedback

35:12

and suddenly we could be off rebuilding

35:15

everything and then somebody will go wait,

35:17

wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, how

35:19

many times? Oh, we've only heard that

35:21

once. So I love that. The last

35:24

thing I'll say is. I

35:26

think the axis on which I'm evaluating

35:29

whether I'm going to take feedback is

35:31

thoughtfulness. So if it's an, if it's

35:33

unthoughtful, meaning like, like, I can't tell

35:36

you how many people I've gotten feedback

35:38

around my books, that it's very, very

35:40

clear from the feedback that they didn't

35:42

read the book. Well, that's unthoughtful. Delete.

35:45

Now I'm on a spectrum of like,

35:47

is it critical? Or is it positive

35:49

or negative? I, both of those, in

35:52

fact, if it's thoughtful and negative, that's

35:54

gold. Right, right? Like if somebody took

35:56

the time to be thoughtful and feedback

35:58

and they just didn't like the thing,

36:01

I'm super curious. Now, it probably won't

36:03

change the thing, but it will probably

36:05

help point out areas where I could

36:08

have been, I could have been distracted.

36:10

I could have, no, I could have

36:12

gotten it a little wrong. Like, oh

36:14

shoot, you're right. If I, if I

36:17

had, how did that person, what was

36:19

it about the thing I did that

36:21

result, how was I complicit in that

36:24

experience they had? Is there something I

36:26

could change just a little bit like,

36:28

oh, that color, you're right, or that

36:30

word, you're right, or that example of,

36:33

I mean, why did I have to

36:35

put a gender example in that article

36:37

about remodeling the kitchen? Like the gender,

36:40

I get this long email about gender

36:42

and you're like, oh, you're totally right.

36:44

You read or have missed the point,

36:47

but it's because I confused you by

36:49

having that gender thing in there. The

36:51

gender was not the point. I'll pull

36:53

the gender thing out. Now you get

36:56

the point about the remodel. You know

36:58

what I mean? Like that kind of

37:00

loop. Yeah, I, again to me, a

37:03

lot of it comes down to who

37:05

are like, who are you getting feedback

37:07

from. Are you getting feedback from the

37:09

people you actually wanted to be reaching

37:12

and serving who had a reasonable chance

37:14

of like liking the thing or buying

37:16

the service or engaging the firm or

37:19

getting the point or appreciating the art

37:21

in the first place? If it's someone

37:23

that I wanted to reach I really

37:25

care about your feedback about how I

37:28

can do it better, if you're one

37:30

of those people who just doesn't like

37:32

the kind of thing that I'm doing,

37:35

like that's totally cool, you be you,

37:37

I'm gonna be me, but like I'm

37:39

not really looking for your feedback for

37:41

your feedback. Because you're just not into

37:44

what I do in the first place.

37:46

I this was maybe one of the

37:48

most important things Seth Goans taught me

37:51

a lot of things this was one

37:53

of the most important things he ever

37:55

taught me which was just a simple

37:57

line It's not for you Yeah,

38:00

right like that group you can feel

38:02

completely full permission to either say

38:04

or at least think Oh, that's

38:06

okay. Thanks that feedback was

38:09

really, you know, thoughtful Thank you

38:11

and it turns out this thing's not

38:13

for you Right, I love that so let

38:15

me that's okay. Maybe it's not for

38:17

you. Yeah, yeah, this this let me

38:19

just mention one thing. This is kind

38:22

of crazy based on what we've

38:24

talked about but when you hear

38:26

this I will probably have the

38:28

final book cover I

38:30

would love people's reaction to it.

38:32

So if you would like to send me a

38:34

reaction to the book cover Send me an

38:37

email hello at behavior gap.com. I

38:39

will send you the cover and we

38:41

can have a little chat That would

38:43

actually be helpful And then in the

38:45

future we'll do another episode and

38:47

see what the feedback is that you got

38:49

right and whether it could change and

38:52

I don't know if I could change

38:54

it because it might be final, but

38:56

it would be really useful and this

38:58

will be Probably a couple weeks from

39:00

here anyway. So that was super fun

39:02

Michael. I think that's really helpful. Thank

39:04

you, Carl. Yeah, cheers. Want more from

39:06

the guys with a Sharpie and

39:08

a spreadsheet? Subscribe to the podcast

39:10

on your favorite app so you

39:13

don't miss a minute. And if

39:15

you're interested in going even deeper,

39:17

be sure to check out Carl

39:19

Richards at Real Financial Advisors.com. and

39:21

stay on top of the issues

39:23

that matter most to the financial

39:25

planning industry by visiting Michael Kitzas

39:27

at Kitzas.com. Thanks for joining us

39:29

on Kitzas and Carl, and we'll see

39:31

you in our next episode.