Political discussions at work can be polarizing, but they don’t have to be. Kim, Jason, and Amy share insights on navigating political discussions with respect, setting boundaries, and maintaining open dialogue without imposing beliefs on others.
Listen to the episode:
Episode at a Glance: Political Discussions at Work
Drawing on personal anecdotes and thought-provoking statistics, the conversation provides practical tips for managers and employees alike on fostering an inclusive environment where diverse viewpoints can coexist without derailing professional harmony.
Radical Candor Podcast Checklist: Political Discussions at Work
- Even if you don’t agree about abortion or healthcare or gun control, don’t judge the success of a conversation on whether you change the other person’s mind or they change your mind. You just have to be willing to hear the issues from the other person’s perspective. So if you’ve decided to engage, be open to the other person’s perspective. And express your point of view with respect and clarity. All the while not losing sight of the fact that you actually like this person that you’re talking to. Uh, and that’s why you’re having the discussion with them in the first place.
- You can believe whatever you want, but you cannot impose your beliefs on others. So remember that there’s a boundary between what you believe and your right to impose it on others. So make sure that you understand where that boundary is in your organization. And that you’re clear in your own mind about when you are expressing a belief and when you may be imposing a belief on others.
- Managers, it is so important to recognize that in our workplace, we’ve got a diversity of opinions and lived experiences. It’s up to us to foster an environment where everyone feels safe to express themselves without fear of retaliation or judgment. And it’s so important to establish clear boundaries to ensure that personal expressions are voluntary, meaning that no one should feel pressured to participate or share their views. So we want to encourage open dialogue, but only amongst those who feel comfortable engaging in such discussions.
- When in doubt, ask yourself, am I picking a fight or am I building a relationship? Sometimes the most important thing to do when we’re considering discussing politics at work is to stop ourselves. And make sure that the person that we want to talk to about it is a willing participant.
Radical Candor Podcast Resources: Political Discussions at Work
- ResumeHelp’s Politics in the Workplace Study 2024 | Resume Help
- Reacting To Trump’s Bloviating BS With Radical Candor | Radical Candor
- What to Do When Your Coworker Brings Up Politics | HBR
- The Story of Basecamp’s Disastrous Policy | The Verge
- Radical Candor Podcast Swag
- Kim Scott & Tiffani Lee Discuss Using Radical Candor to Improve DEI Conversations | Radical Candor 2 | 5
- Q&A: Why ‘Respect’ Is A Radical Workplace Concept | Yahoo Finance
- Another Contentious US Election Means A Worker Productivity Dip | The Seattle Times
- Talking Politics at Work: A Double-Edged Sword
The TLDR Radical Candor Podcast Transcript
[00:00:00] Kim Scott: Hello, everybody. Welcome to the Radical Candor podcast. I’m Kim Scott.
[00:00:08] Jason Rosoff: I’m Jason Rosoff.
[00:00:09] Amy Sandler: I’m Amy Sandler. Before we get into it today, I want to let you know, we’ve got some great new podcast merch. Thank you, Brandi. Go ahead to RadicalCandor.com/podcast. If you click on the Radical Candor podcast swag collection, you’re going to see stickers and magnets, totes. I mean, who doesn’t love a tote and a mouse pad?
[00:00:32] All right. If you are living in the world today, you are probably having some political conversations about the rapidly approaching, unprecedented U.S. presidential election. Which is continuing to play out daily like a Hollywood movie. So we thought we would talk today about the topic of talking about politics at work.
[00:00:57] There was a 2024 survey from Resume Help and it noted that it’s a topic that’s making people pretty uncomfortable. So more than half, fifty-one percent of workers say they never, or rarely discuss politics at work. Almost half, forty-five percent have regretted having political discussions at work. Twenty-three percent, so almost a quarter of people have decided actually not to apply to a company’s job listing because of the company’s political stance and a quarter have left or wanted to leave their job because of their bosses political beliefs. And just about half, fifty-one percent, believe that workplace political discussions are hurting the work environment. There’s some interesting differences. Uh, folks younger than forty-five are more likely, more comfortable talking about politics. And older folks and women have reported feeling that political discussions impact the workplace more negatively. Uh, fifty-seven percent of women have reported that versus forty-four percent of men.
[00:01:59] Um, but this is a, across the board, a challenging topic. So we thought we would check in on where we are today, 2024. ‘Cause Kim, in a blog post, you wrote this back seven years ago in 2017, shortly after the 2016 election. You gave this advice and I’m curious if you still feel this way.
[00:02:19] So you said, quote, it’s hard to be a minority voice in a super majority. It’s hard to be a conservative in Silicon Valley. And I imagine it was hard to be one of the five people in King County, Texas, who voted for Clinton. This difficulty is tearing our nation, our companies, our friendships, and our families apart. Today, try to have a radically candid political conversation, one in which you challenge somebody’s political position, but still show you care about that person. How is that landing for you today?
[00:02:55] Kim Scott: So I think that it’s interesting. I was speaking with a group of HR leaders who said they dreaded this election cycle because it was going to kill productivity. Uh, and so I think that is a shame. Uh, our election should not kill productivity in the rest of our lives. And it shouldn’t also hurt our relationships so much. We should be able to talk to each other respectfully and to disagree respectfully.
[00:03:28] In fact, uh, I think that John Stuart Mill put it well. He’s, I mean, I’m not going to quote him, but basically he said, if you’re not willing to be challenged, uh, on beliefs. Even beliefs that you have no intention of changing your mind about. Those beliefs are likely to become prejudices. And so there’s a great deal of benefit, uh, to having these disagreements, even if we don’t change our minds because we deepen our own thinking and we, uh, we think in a more flexible way when we’re willing to be challenged.
[00:04:07] Now, I think if I had to edit, so there’s part of me that agrees with what I wrote back in 2017. I would say try to be challenged today. Don’t go out and I would say follow the order of operations, solicit feedback before you offer it, uh, if you have disagreements, uh. And, uh, you know, I also think there’s, we don’t need, there’s a whole host of things that we don’t need to agree about in order to work well together. And so we don’t have to have these conversations all the time, uh, which is very different from saying, we should ban political speech at work.
[00:04:52] So for example, there was someone I worked with and, you know, without saying what my belief is, but you can probably guess, we had very different points of view about gun control. And yet we worked extremely well together cause you know what, we were not, uh, we were not making guns to it. Like, it was not relevant, gun, the issue of gun control was not issued to the, was not relevant to the issue of making software together. So, uh, there’s all kinds of situations where it’s possible to work, and we didn’t pretend like we agreed. It wasn’t like we never talked about it, but we didn’t talk about it all the time because it just didn’t come up.
[00:05:32] Jason Rosoff: I would build on that by saying, any topic that is close enough to our sense of self, like, you know, we tend to associate our politics with our identity. The other topic that came to mind was parenting.
[00:05:44] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:05:44] Jason Rosoff: Um, I’ve seen people get into, like, ruin relationships at work having conversations about parenting. And this was not necessarily because they strongly, even from an outsider’s perspective, like, they didn’t even strongly disagree. They felt, but they just felt like, the places where they did disagree made them so different that they had a hard time working together. Even though parenting had nothing to do with what we were,
[00:06:09] Kim Scott: We weren’t raising our children together.
[00:06:11] Jason Rosoff: Exactly. So I think we would never consider discourage, you know what I’m saying? It would never occur to us to say, don’t talk about parenting at work.
[00:06:22] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:06:22] Jason Rosoff: But somehow the politics were like, we feel like somehow that’s meaningfully different. But I think your point is a good one, Kim, which is like, I don’t think, I think there’s a difference between, as you were saying, between banning or even discouraging people from talking about topics that, you know, might touch on someone’s, uh, you know, identity or experience and, going out and seeking those conversations. Like those two, those are two very different things. And I think there are a lot of people who are considering banning or discouraging people from talking about politics at work. And I think that’s likely to backfire.
[00:07:00] Kim Scott: So back in 2020, we recorded a podcast with Tiffani Lee. And Tiffani and I talked about the fact that both her father and my father had said that we shouldn’t talk about race, religion, and politics at work. And I think that that kind of, uh, ban of big topics at work made it harder for people to relate to one another. And made it, made people feel like they were having to dance around things. I don’t think that was a helpful ban. Uh, but I also am not saying go out and pick fights about race, religion, and politics at work. Like we, that is not helpful.
[00:07:48] But I think, you know, Jason, to your point of view about parenting, a story that I talk about in Radical Respect is a time when I was working with this guy and we’re chit chatting before a meeting. And I had just returned to work from, uh, from parental leave and having had twins five months previously. And this was like my second day back in the office. So we’re chit chatting and this guy says to me, oh, well, my wife doesn’t work because it’s better for the children. And at that moment for me, that was like a gut punch. And this is not exactly a political speech, but it’s not exactly not political speech also.
[00:08:29] And, uh, but I didn’t think he really meant it the way that it sounded. So I tried to make a joke, I tried to use what in Radical Respect I call an I statement. I said, oh, I decided to show up at work today because I wanted to neglect my children. And I was expecting him to laugh and apologize and we would move on.
[00:08:48] But no, he doubled down and he said, oh no, Kim, it’s really bad for your children that you’ve decided to come back to work. So now I know that this is really a belief that he has. And it’s much harder to deal with a belief that you fundamentally disagree with than it is an unconscious bias.
[00:09:12] And so, I used an It statement. I said, it is an HR violation for you, or a company violation, for you to tell me that I’m neglecting my kids by showing up at work. And of course it was at that company. And what I was trying to do with that It statement is show that there’s a boundary between one person’s freedom to believe whatever they want, but they can’t impose that belief on others.
[00:09:35] And I did not want to get into a conversation with him about childbearing because it was not relevant. But I did want to, make it clear that he couldn’t impose his, he could believe whatever he wanted, but he couldn’t impose that belief on me. And saying that had the desired impact, he backed off. And then I said to him, furthermore, it’s my decision together with my spouse how we raise our kids just as it is your decision together with your wife how you raise yours.
[00:10:10] And so again, we don’t need to argue this point but, let’s just use some common sense to remember who’s responsible for what. Uh, and, you know, when you can bring your beliefs from your personal life to work and when you can’t. And, uh, and it was important to have that much of a conversation with him. Because if I hadn’t, first of all, I would have resented him. So I would have been angry, uh, and so I think raising it was important. And it was important to let him know that he didn’t get to decide, you know, whether or not I should travel, for example.
[00:10:52] He didn’t, I guess, uh, and so I think for practical reasons, as well as for emotional reasons, it’s worth having enough of a conversation to, like, make it clear where those boundaries are. Um, but if I had worked more closely with him, or if I had been more friendly with him, I might have wanted to, you know, read his research and share my research with him. But as it was, we didn’t need to do that. We didn’t need to have that much conversation.
[00:11:22] Amy Sandler: Kim, I wonder, as you say that, and having examples of the boundaries, like what’s popping up for me is in those HR folks that you were talking to, or talking about productivity. Like what if you’re a manager and you’re leading a team meeting and someone’s wearing a baseball cap or a shirt that has a political slogan, or they put in the Slack, like, I’m doing this fundraiser or this Zoom for this or that candidate. Like how do managers and companies kind of writ large think about boundaries of not banning speech? But where some people might feel like even advocating for a certain, uh, candidate might actually be an expression of going against someone else’s identity.
[00:12:04] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:12:04] Amy Sandler: Land that way.
[00:12:05] Kim Scott: Yeah. So I think that there’s no objective measure for this. I can’t tell you where the right boundary is for your team. But what I can say is that as a manager, I think it’s a really good idea to make it clear where that boundary is. And decide, are we going to ask people not to wear T-shirts with slogans for one candidate or another, or is that okay? And if it’s okay on one side, is it okay on both sides? I mean, there are some leaders who, will declare where, who they’re voting for. And I’ve had a lot of conversations about whether that’s the right thing or the wrong thing, uh, to do. I’m inclined to be very open about what I believe, and, uh, and yet I can also respect a point of view that says, as a leader, you put undue, you’re not allowed to put pressure.
[00:13:06] I certainly would never put pressure on people who they should vote for, or even ask them who they’re voting for. Um, but, you know, I can understand how some people might say, Kim, you should keep who you’re voting for to yourself. So I don’t know, I don’t think there’s a right answer to where the boundary is. But what I do think is important is that you make it clear where the boundary is, uh, for you and your team.
[00:13:35] Amy Sandler: Jason, how do you think about that for Radical Candor?
[00:13:38] Jason Rosoff: I think we try to encourage people to be willing to discuss, respectfully discuss, any point of view. I think, uh, it’s important to me that if someone, you know, there are people on our team who have different, uh, perspectives. But the moment, I think the important thing to distinguish is like, are, one, can we talk about the idea, right? Like, are we talking about the idea or are we talking about particular people and individuals choices?
[00:14:14] So, for example, extending, Kim, your example of talking about child rearing at work. I think there’s a parallel to that, which is you might have a differing perspective on immigration policy, for example, right? People can have different perspectives on, you know, what does border security mean? What should immigration policy look like in the United States? Those, I think, are important political questions. But if that veers into someone saying, you know, immigrants are killing our country.
[00:14:48] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:14:48] Jason Rosoff: Right? It’s not about the policy anymore. It’s not the idea of the thing anymore. It’s about ,uh, turning that into an accusation about people. For me, like, that’s the line that I would enforce. And not necessarily to say you’re, you know, you are fired or that speech is banned and you can’t say that. But to say, you know, I think it’s important that if we’re going to talk about politics that, you know, we talk about ideas, we don’t personalize these things. And it’s important that you and I, whoever this person is, have a conversation about how that particular statement or point of view, um, has a discriminatory effect. Like it could, how it could negatively affect other people at the company and the company itself.
[00:15:28] Kim Scott: I would say we wouldn’t essentialize about some group of people, any group of people.
[00:15:34] Jason Rosoff: That’s right. In the same way that we don’t want to essentialize, you know, I would say, Radical Candor as a company leans, uh, more classically, sort of like liberal or progressive. And we’re very conscious of not essentializing conservatives, right? Like, we try not to have conversations where we say, you know, people who aren’t like us,
[00:15:57] Kim Scott: Or who disagree about this policy.
[00:15:59] Jason Rosoff: Correct. Are somehow, uh, less than, we diminish, we don’t diminish the people. I think that’s, to me, that’s the line. Like, the moment it becomes essentializing, you’ve crossed a line into away from a political discussion and into a personal attack.
[00:16:16] Kim Scott: And by essentializing, at least what I mean, so I want to make sure we have the same definition. What I mean is saying all the people of this group are some, have, share some trait, which of course is almost never true. It’s never true really.
[00:16:31] Amy Sandler: There was Kim, we had a recent podcast with Guy Kawasaki and he shared one of his, um, uh, podcast episodes and folks that he spoke with uh, I believe it was Mark Labberton. And the guidance was when you are dealing with someone with opposing viewpoints to ask, like, how did you get to believing what you believe rather than why?
[00:16:56] And I thought that was such an instructive way to think about that so that it really is coming from this place of curiosity. And I do think there’s some real, you know, when you think about the Radical Candor framework and you were saying like starting by asking for feedback and asking questions and really being curious.
[00:17:12] So, you know, to me, it seems like that curiosity and sort of how is it that somebody got to that belief, um, can be a helpful way to build a bridge. I wonder if you have any other guidance from what you’ve observed with your conversations over the past few years with Radical Respect about how to build a bridge, maybe with folks that might have opposing viewpoints.
[00:17:34] Kim Scott: Yeah. So I think the first question is, do you need to build a bridge or do you just need to make it clear where the boundary is? Like you don’t have to talk about, you know, how did you come to believe what you believe about whatever policy that probably carries some emotional weight, uh, with it.
[00:17:54] Um, you don’t have to, you don’t have to have that conversation in order to make the boundary clear. But also, in other words, we’re not going to essentialize, but also to respect that other people have other points of view. So I think that one of the mistakes that I have made in the past is to assume that everybody thinks the same way I do, which is a kind of bias.
[00:18:20] And so making sure if I am going to state my position about something, I want to say, I want to acknowledge that other people might think differently about it, and I’m open to other people’s beliefs, um, so there’s that. And then if I do want to have that conversation, Amy, I really, I think saying how rather than why can feel more, uh, can elicit more stories about the person’s life. Uh, that’s part of why I like, you know, how did you come to believe that? And so why feels a little bit skeptical, like, why do you believe that? I, you know, you’re wrong is kind of the unstated, uh, or I disagree.
[00:19:05] And I think the most important thing is to remember that we can disagree with each other and still respect each other enormously. Uh, we can have what Martin Buber calls an I thou relationship. Uh, in other words, I am a lot more than my belief on policy X, policy Y, policy Z. Uh, I’m a human being and, uh, and we share, you know, even if we disagree on some pretty fundamental issues, we probably share more than we disagree with. And remembering to take a step back and look at the whole person.
[00:19:43] I told this story at TEDx Portland, where I was asked to give a Radical Candor talk for a policy group and revealing my bias, I assumed that, oh, policy, how interesting. They must, uh, advocate for all the policies that I agree with. Right before, right before I was getting on a plane to go I was like, oh, these are not the policies that I agree with. And I had a conversation with them before and I said, you know, if you look at my, this was when I was still using Twitter all the time. I was like, if you look at my Twitter feed, uh, you’ll see that I, you’ll notice that I disagree with a lot of, uh, and they’re like, that’s all right. We, you know, reasonable people can disagree.
[00:20:26] And as I was giving the talk, there were really good questions, good engagements, and I had this very clear thought. Like, these people are my fellow citizens, these are not my enemies. And then I was like, why did I think of them as my enemy? Like, have I got, have I gotten so far down the polarized path that I would think of this group of people as. Uh, and it was kind of like a moment in my mind, but then the moment passed and the talk was over and somebody came up to me and said, to me, oh, do you believe acts about policy Y, you know? And I said, yes. And a few more questions. And as, I could tell that this person who was asking me this disagreed with me. And eventually the person kind of cocked their head and said, huh, you don’t seem evil. And I would have thought that they were ridiculous, except that I had just had more or less the same thought.
[00:21:26] And I think we’ve gotten to this place where we assume these strange things about one another. And I would love for us all to take a collective breath and to remember that we can disagree vehemently with one another and still have that Radical Respect, that unconditional regard for our shared humanity.
[00:21:49] Jason Rosoff: Yeah, I think part of the problem is that American politics seems to be stuck in a constant election cycle. So elections are about differences.
[00:21:59] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:22:00] Jason Rosoff: And politics are about like areas of agreement.
[00:22:03] Kim Scott: Yes.
[00:22:03] Jason Rosoff: Like the work of politics is finding the places where you agree that you can move the ball, collectively move the ball forward.
[00:22:10] Kim Scott: Yes.
[00:22:11] Jason Rosoff: And if you’re constantly like, and I don’t, so I don’t blame people for this because I find myself falling into the same trap that you described Kim. Which is like, thinking that the most important thing is to stake out our differences. But that’s not how progress is made at work or in politics or in relationships.
[00:22:27] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:22:27] Jason Rosoff: Like you don’t make progress with other people by focusing entirely on your differences.
[00:22:33] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:22:33] Jason Rosoff: Which seems so trivial to say, but it is like a pattern that we have, uh, that we seem to find ourselves in. And I think it is in part due to the sort of like constant obsessive election type politics, election cycle politics that we find ourselves in.
[00:22:49] Kim Scott: Yes, I was having dinner with a group of people the other day who were voting for different candidates. And somebody said, you know, Republicans and Democrats, we all fix potholes more or less the same way. And I think that that’s really, that was, I thought that was, I liked that.
[00:23:20] Amy Sandler: Jason, I was curious, you know, when Kim was talking about, um, the example of, you know, working well with someone who had a different, um, view on say, gun control. Have you had any experiences working with someone effectively where there was a really clear difference in beliefs, maybe even that impacted identity? Do any of those stories pop to mind of how you navigated that that might be helpful?
[00:23:48] Jason Rosoff: I’ve worked with people who are far more liberal than me. Um, I haven’t worked with, like, I’m so, uh, interestingly, like where I grew up, fair, like relatively conservative. My family’s relatively conservative. A lot of places I’ve worked have, you know, been, I would say, leaned, leaned liberal. And I think the example that’s coming to mind, um, was around the 2016 election. And there were some, uh, I, you know, I was, my, my role was as chief product and chief people officer at the time, so this is like an interesting line for me to try to walk. But there are some people who believed so strongly, uh, in like a particular political view that they were suggesting that we make company changes in order to support that political view. I don’t want to get into the details so that the people can remain innocent. Me included.
[00:24:47] Kim Scott: Or anonymous anyway.
[00:24:48] Jason Rosoff: Anonymous, yes. They were innocent to begin with. Anonymous. Uh, and it was really, it was actually really challenging because I said, you know, I agree with you, um, like, in principle that there’s a debate about this particular policy.
[00:25:05] And I don’t agree that it’s settled, nor do we know exactly what the right thing to do is. So, like, changing company policy based on this particular stance, um, it was related to immigration and what, how we, and when we hired, uh, people who required visas. And I said, I’m unsure that changing this policy is actually going to be better for any of the people who work here or for the people that we would hire.
[00:25:29] And so by, I’m being conservative in this moment by not changing this. By saying we’re not going to change this policy because I want to see how, uh, like how this actually shakes up, like what the actual impact is. Um, so that we can figure out how to adjust the policy effectively, if we need to. And the person certainly respected my point of view. But they were not dissuaded, continuing to challenge me on this particular point of view. We, over the course of 2017, we had like a series of conversations, uh, that, I mean, their argument was pretty persuasive, uh, and, uh, I didn’t wind up changing the policy before I left. But I suspect I would have been convinced over time that they were right.
[00:26:17] And it certainly created some tension in our relationship. But I think actually having the respectful discourse about it and my not turning them away, my not saying I’m unwilling to be challenged on this idea, actually created, uh, like deepened a, one bond. Like we knew we weren’t going to be friends, you know what I’m saying?
[00:26:39] We knew we didn’t see eye to eye and everything. But there was a bond that formed in that disagreement, right? That respectful disagreement, there was a, uh, like a mutual acknowledgement of our shared humanity. Uh, and, uh, I suspect that, um, that person to this day is good at persuading, uh, the leaders that they work for to consider changes in their policies.
[00:27:09] Kim Scott: I think that silence is dangerous around race, religion, and politics.
[00:27:16] Jason Rosoff: Yeah.
[00:27:16] Kim Scott: Think that especially in a world in which some people have more power than others. Uh, that silence, uh, around these topics um, feels threatening and dangerous. It’s when I was writing Radical Respect, I had a couple of days. I don’t know why this happened where I just kept listening to The Sounds of Silence and there’s a new, there’s the old Simon and Garfunkel.
[00:27:46] Amy Sandler: Yeah.
[00:27:47] Kim Scott: But then there’s the new, um, uh, version of The Sounds of Silence. I think you sent it to me, Amy, is that right?
[00:27:54] Amy Sandler: I think I did.
[00:27:54] Kim Scott: Yes.
[00:27:54] Amy Sandler: It was like from a, it was like a metal, Disturbed.
[00:27:57] Kim Scott: Yes.
[00:27:58] Amy Sandler: Is what it was done by Disturbed.
[00:28:00] Kim Scott: We’ll drop a link in. And I must’ve listened to that like a hundred times because I really, I think, Amy, you and I so believe, we both long for harmony, you know. And I think part of what Radical Candor does for both of us is it helps us get to harmony by talking, not by avoiding topics.
[00:28:21] And I think that that part of what part of the reason, at least in my, and I’m not sure I believe so let’s experiment, uh, with this belief. But I think that part of the reason why we’re at this moment where we are so polarized is because we, there are so many conversations that didn’t happen over the last thirty or forty years.
[00:28:48] And it’s sort of like self organizing criticality. Uh, so the idea of self organizing criticality, this is a study of sandpiles and how sandpiles reach stability. And if you let one grain of sand fall at a time, then there’s a lot of little avalanches. Uh, and that’s how you find stability. It’s like a lot of little arguments are how you find stability in a relationship.
[00:29:15] Uh, whereas wetting the sand is sort of like silence or refusal to speak about the topic. It feels like harmony for a while, and the sandpile builds up, and then it collapses, and when it collapses, it collapses catastrophically. Uh, or, more dramatically. So, I’d rather have a lot of little arguments to get to peace, than silence and then one big fight, uh, because the big fight can be, can end badly, I’ll put it that way. It’s harder to recover from a big fight than a lot of little disagreements.
[00:29:53] Amy Sandler: Kim, I was thinking as you were describing that the other, sort of metaphor or image that was coming up with the sand and the water was like just in this era of Social Media and algorithms and snippets. That we get these little descriptors and then we, to your point of essentializing, then we paint a whole picture of who that person is
[00:30:13] Kim Scott: Yes.
[00:30:13] Amy Sandler: From a ten second snippet rather than really looking at, you know, this sort of full spectrum of their humanity. And I think that one of the reasons I think Radical Candor is more important than ever, you know, it’s not just the common human decency. But looking at the full picture of who this person is day in and day out and all these other ways that we might be able to connect with them. And yet the only sort of thing we might see is the hat or the T-shirt.
[00:30:37] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:30:37] Amy Sandler: And then we sort of ascribe a whole thing. So I think, um, to that idea of being really specific of like this, it’s this one thing I might, you know, but I’m putting on a whole personality on top of. And that’s kind of where I thought you were going with the sandcastle was, it was like
[00:30:52] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:30:52] Amy Sandler: This one speck of sand and then I decide that means a whole, um, type of human.
[00:30:57] Kim Scott: Yeah, in the documentary, Origin, which is about the writing of the book, Past. Uh, there’s this wonderful scene where the plumber is wearing a Make America Great Again hat. And she just decides, and in the book it’s even more powerful than in the documentary. But she decides that, she being the author, Isabel, uh, Isabel Wilkerson decides that, I’m looking over my shoulder because here’s the book. Uh, decides that that she’s going to just appeal to the shared humanity with this person. And she talks about the loss of her mother and her husband, and she makes herself vulnerable. And then he fixes the plumbing and, uh, which he had been sort of like, oh, you’ll have to call and, you know. Uh, and it was, it’s such an important moment where we’re not gonna allow this one thing, the hat the guy’s wearing, to get in the way of noticing, uh, a shared humanity.
[00:32:12] And there’s no one rule that I can think of that I would recommend to managers. I think some managers out there are gonna want to say, don’t wear political garb to work. And others will say, do. Uh, during the 2020 election, there were a lot of companies that allowed Black Lives Matter T-shirts, but didn’t allow, um, Make America Great Again, uh, T-shirts. And that’s not an unreasonable, uh, position, but they had to explain the position. That one was about sort of human rights and the other was about politics. Uh, so it’s, so there’s no right or wrong answer. I think the key thing is to be clear about where that line is between one person’s freedom to believe whatever they want. But what, how do you define imposing a belief on others, uh, on your team? Uh, make that clear to folks. I mean, and I don’t, you know, maybe we should try it here. I don’t know what, I don’t know that we have actually, I advise other people to do it, but I don’t think we’ve really done it.
[00:33:24] Jason Rosoff: Yeah. I’m, I think in part, because if someone asked the question, do we, for example, I’d like to, you know, wear a Black Lives Matter T-shirt or a MAGA hat or whatever, I think we would answer it. I think your point is, it’s helpful to be proactive, and I think you’re not going to get like, because you can’t define, because there’s subjectivity here. I think it’s hard to define a policy ahead of time. I think it’s easier to answer, maybe more helpful for the policy to be, you know, political expression, um, is like, you know, the election is coming up. Political expression is a part of the, you know, the, um, of being a citizen of the United States. Uh, and we want to find a way for people to feel comfortable and confident engaging in political expression with that, within some boundaries at work.
[00:34:22] We don’t know exactly what those boundaries are. So if there’s something that you want to do, if you want to raise money, like talk to us and we’ll figure out the right way to help you do that. Um, or not do it if we think it’s not something that is going to be, um, helpful or productive to talk about at work. I’m, I struggle to imagine the policy that you could write ahead of time that would say, oh, these expressions are fine and these expressions aren’t fine.
[00:34:48] Kim Scott: Yeah. Well, I think, I mean, I think you could write ahead of time a policy that said, don’t wear T-shirts or hats that advocate for one candidate or another. Or you could say it’s fine to do that. Like, I think that’s something you could kind of decide ahead of time, whether it’s okay.
[00:35:06] Jason Rosoff: I think you, yes, I think that’s true. You certainly could define it ahead of time. I think if you haven’t been asked the question, then maybe the right thing to do is ask the question. Like, ask the question yourself, which is like, do people, is there something that people want to do in this election cycle so that we can figure out what that policy should be? Because I think it’s sort of like it weirdly invites a disagreement to say like this is allowed or this is not allowed. Like maybe that’s what you want to do, maybe you want to have that conversation. But setting a policy without having the conversation with team first seems like,
[00:35:42] Kim Scott: Yeah, yeah, I think you should have it. Yes. You should have a conversation with the team first. But I do think it’s useful to have that conversation before you’re in the heat of the moment. Like, uh, I was talking to several leaders during the last election where something happened and they’re like, you know. And now they have half the team mad about this and the other half of the team mad about that. And they sort of wished they had thought about it before they were in the heat of the moment.
[00:36:13] Amy Sandler: So this is a helpful moment right now. We’re recording this in August 2024 for folks to be proactive beyond what we’ve already discussed. Kim or Jason, um, going back to Kim, those HR folks you were talking to who are concerned about the productivity, um, uh, lag or drop in the next few months, um, besides being as clear as you can, besides reaching out to folks in advance, any other guidance about a potential productivity sink in the coming months?
[00:36:43] Kim Scott: I would not recommend banning any kind of political speech at work. Because some of the issues that come up in the, uh, in this election may have impact on people at work. So I wouldn’t ban speech and also because you cannot control what people talk about as the leader. Um, I think it’s also fair to remind people that, you know, they have goals at work and productivity, you know, if something is destructive to productivity, then it’s probably, and not relevant to work. It’s probably taking up too much of people’s time.
[00:37:27] And I don’t know, maybe people found the Olympics were a productivity hit at work. Like, I don’t know. Uh, sometimes stuff that’s happening in the world, um, does create a productivity hit and sometimes you need to deal with it. And other times you need to say we’re done, you know, we need to get back to work. You know, so I don’t know, what do you all think? Where would you draw the line?
[00:37:56] Amy Sandler: I have to say, I thought the Olympics was like a joy ad in the workshops that I did, It was a really great connection point ’cause I said, oh, what’s your favorite thing you’re watching and why? And it was just, it was a really nice way to kind of, I think in a time where people do feel like the lack of common, you know, human connection.
[00:38:16] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:38:16] Amy Sandler: It was just such a great way to bring people together. Now, I don’t know if people were watching ten hours a day of sharpshooting. I can’t say, but at least at the top of a workshop, it was an ad.
[00:38:25] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:38:26] Amy Sandler: Jason?
[00:38:27] Jason Rosoff: I think you’re getting at like the, this idea of like when do you move on? So there’s the boundary of like what are we going to talk about or not talk about? And then there’s the boundary of like, let’s say we’ve decided to engage in a conversation. At what point do we decide that that should be over?
[00:38:44] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:38:44] Jason Rosoff: Uh, that we need to, that we need to move on. There’s other stuff that we need to accomplish. And I think we’re tempted to think of this so differently than other things. But to your point, Kim, like, if there was a, this isn’t exactly a thing that happened. But if I, if you could imagine, again, I’ll just, since it’s another, common, although not universal, experience.
[00:39:07] But if you can imagine a group of people develop, like, creating a, uh, parenting Slack channel. And then all of a sudden that Slack channel becomes so contentious that it’s like, you know, it’s taking up all of people’s time. And you can say like, hey, you know, I understand that we’re passionate about this. We have differing perspectives. This isn’t relevant to, like, it’s not critical for us to have this discussion at work or at least not during work hours. So I’m going to ask you all to stop doing that.
[00:39:35] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:39:35] Jason Rosoff: And focus on, uh, get back to work. And I think politics is the same thing. At some point, it becomes very clear that this is no longer productive or helpful. It’s not building relationships.
[00:39:44] Kim Scott: Yeah.
[00:39:44] Jason Rosoff: It’s not moving the ball forward on the work. And so we need to put that aside and focus on work stuff.
[00:39:51] Kim Scott: I’ll give you a case study. And this is a long ago and far away election. Um, but when I worked at Google, there was one point when I, uh, we did the funny thing of the weekend. So everybody would, on Monday morning, I’d have a staff meeting and tell, and I’d invite everybody to tell a funny story from the weekend. And that particular week, my funny story from the weekend was the Saturday Night Live skit, I can see Russia from my house, you know.
[00:40:30] Jason Rosoff: I remember that one.
[00:40:31] Kim Scott: Okay. So I had a particular point of view.
[00:40:33] Amy Sandler: Some of our listeners might not, uh, know the reference. I mean, I know I’m thinking Sarah Palin.
[00:40:41] Kim Scott: Yes.
[00:40:41] Amy Sandler: But Jason, you have a better memory than I do.
[00:40:44] Jason Rosoff: That’s what it was. We’ll find a link to it for the show notes.
[00:40:47] Amy Sandler: Okay. Yeah.
[00:40:48] Kim Scott: Which I thought was funny. And in fact, every, it was fun ,everybody thought it was funny. But there was one, this is the team where there was one person on the team who was much more conservative. And he said to me later, it was funny and it assumed that everybody in the room agreed and shared a particular point of view and that made me feel excluded. And, and so I took that seriously. Um, and I tried to find an equally funny video, that showed the other point of view voting. I don’t even remember this, what year was this? Anyway. So who was the other, it was two that who’s the other vice presidential candidate. So who’s running again?
[00:41:38] Amy Sandler: I think it was,
[00:41:39] Kim Scott: Sarah Palin,
[00:41:40] Amy Sandler: And, I think it was Joe, I think it was Joe Biden. So that’s why I was like, I don’t want to,
[00:41:44] Kim Scott: So it wasn’t that long ago and far away. Uh, so I tried to find one that mocked Joe Biden. So again, and that’s not like both sides ism, it was about making everyone in the room included. Uh, so, but I don’t know how should I have handled that? Should I not have shown the funny Saturday Night Live skit? Like, what do you think?
[00:42:10] Jason Rosoff: It’s hard because it’s humor. I think the risk with humor is always that like someone feels like they’re sort of being punched, you know, it’s punching down.
[00:42:19] Kim Scott: Yeah. Well, and that was what this person felt was exactly like, I don’t have a right to have my belief. And in fact, when my boss is sharing her political beliefs, like that, that felt very threatening to him.
[00:42:36] Jason Rosoff: Yeah. And when, yeah, when your political beliefs are, especially like they’re the punchline to the joke, that’s, I think you violated your own don’t essentialize. You know what I’m saying? Like the, like the, that not everybody’s going to find this funny because of the,
[00:42:52] Kim Scott: Was that essentializing though? I mean, it was just making fun of Sarah Palin. I think it was assuming, but not essentializing.
[00:43:01] Jason Rosoff: Okay.
[00:43:01] Amy Sandler: Oh, Brandi has an ad.
[00:43:03] Brandi Neal: It was a clip made that it was Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin and they were making fun of both candidates. And parody is accepted among all parties. The line that everybody remembers is they were talking about foreign policy and Tina Fey says, and I can see Russia from my house. There are also plenty of jabs at Hillary Clinton, who was played by Amy Poehler.
[00:43:25] Kim Scott: Yes, but I didn’t show any of those.
[00:43:28] Brandi Neal: Oh, you showed the Palin one.
[00:43:31] Kim Scott: I showed the clip, I just showed the one clip.
[00:43:34] Brandi Neal: Yes, yes, I think if you had played the entire clip, that would have been different.
[00:43:38] Kim Scott: Yes, yeah, then it would have been fine, but I did not.
[00:43:42] Brandi Neal: Okay, that’s a good clarification.
[00:43:43] Kim Scott: I chose the part I thought was funny. Yes. So I don’t think it was essentializing anybody, but it was assuming that everybody in the room had the same political beliefs and that one was funny and the rest was not worth showing, right? And that I think was what was problematic with what I did.
[00:44:01] Jason Rosoff: Yeah. And what I would say is like the other guidance that we talked about is to be open to other people’s point of view. And I think you were in the conversation after.
[00:44:12] Kim Scott: After I got the feedback, I was open. But I was not before I got the feedback.
[00:44:17] Jason Rosoff: Correct. You didn’t consider that other people might have a different point of view and might not find it as funny. And I think, like, that, I, from my perspective, like, that’s part of the calculus. When I think about having political discussions, either with people at work or people in my life, is like, do I think the person that I’m going to have this conversation with, is going to feel like their time is well spent in that discussion, right?
[00:44:42] Kim Scott: Yes.
[00:44:43] Jason Rosoff: Do they feel, is it going to come across as a sign of respect for that other person that I’m willing to have this discussion with them? Or is it going to come across as an annoyance? Like, am I going to be pissing this person off?
[00:44:57] Kim Scott: Yeah. Are you picking a fight or building a relationship?
[00:45:00] Jason Rosoff: I think that’s the best simplification. I think that to me, like that’s the calculus that we should all do when it comes to any topic at work that is not directly work related. I mean, even the stuff that’s work related, like don’t pick fights. This is good advice.
[00:45:18] Amy Sandler: I mean, Jason, as you were saying that it was making me think of like before people go into these, you know, feedback conversations. And you think, oh, this person knows exactly what I’m talking about, and they have no idea what we’re talking about. We make so many assumptions that they’re looking at it just the same way that we are. So I think that, you know, lack of making assumptions and being open to the possibility someone might see it differently.
[00:45:44] All right. So let’s, uh, move on to our tips before we do just one final note. Um, we have put in the show notes, uh, the actual clip we were just talking about where in fact, uh, according to Brandi, they’re making fun of both Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin. Uh, Kim only showed the clip about, uh, Tina Fey as Sarah Palin. Um, let’s get into our Radical Candor checklist and start putting Radical Candor into practice.
[00:46:11] Jason Rosoff: Tip number one. Even if you don’t agree about abortion or healthcare or gun control, don’t judge the success of a conversation on whether you change the other person’s mind or they change your mind. You just have to be willing to hear the issues from the other person’s perspective. So if you’ve decided to engage, be open to the other person’s perspective. And express your point of view with respect and clarity. All the while not losing sight of the fact that you actually like this person that you’re talking to. Uh, and that’s why you’re having the discussion with them in the first place.
[00:46:42] Kim Scott: Tip number two. You can believe whatever you want, but you cannot impose your beliefs on others. So remember that there’s a boundary between what you believe and your right to impose it on others. So make sure that you understand where that boundary is in your organization. And that you’re clear in your own mind about when you are expressing a belief and when you may be imposing a belief on others.
[00:47:16] Amy Sandler: Tip number three, building on Kim’s tip, especially when we’re managers, it is so important to recognize that in our workplace, we’ve got a diversity of opinions and lived experiences.
[00:47:27] And so it’s up to us to foster an environment where everyone feels safe to express themselves without fear of retaliation or judgment. And it’s so important to establish clear boundaries to ensure that personal expressions are voluntary, meaning that no one should feel pressured to participate or share their views. So we want to encourage open dialogue, but only amongst those who feel comfortable engaging in such discussions.
[00:47:57] Jason Rosoff: And tip number four, when in doubt, ask yourself, am I picking a fight or am I building a relationship? Sometimes the most important thing to do when we’re considering discussing politics at work is to stop ourselves. Uh, and make sure that the person that we want to talk to about it is a willing participant.
[00:48:18] Amy Sandler: For more tips, check out our YouTube channel and you can not only listen to this podcast, but watch dozens of other Radical Candor videos. Show notes for this episode are at RadicalCandor.com/podcast.
[00:48:32] Praise in public and criticize in private. So if you like what you hear, please go ahead and rate and review us wherever you listen to your podcasts. If you’ve got criticism, please do email it to podcast@RadicalCandor.com. Bye for now.
[00:48:48] Kim Scott: Take care, everyone.
[00:48:50] Jason Rosoff: See ya.
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Episodes are written and produced by Brandi Neal with script editing by Amy Sandler. The show features Radical Candor co-founders Kim Scott and Jason Rosoff and is hosted by Amy Sandler. Nick Carissimi is our audio engineer.
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