Podcast Season 5, Episode 6: 'Radical Candor' Rescued From an Abandoned Apartment

On this episode of the Radical Candor podcast, Kim, Jason and Amy dig into the digital advice mailbag and answer questions from Radical Candor listeners and readers. What happens when people think you're too young to lead? How can you stop paying the a**hole tax? How can you be more present at work when everything is stressful all of the time? Listen to find out!

Listen to the episode:

Radical Candor Podcast Episode At a Glance

Folks regularly write into our advice email with questions about how to practice Radical Candor. So, on this episode, we’re going to reach into the Radical Candor advice mailbag and answer some of your questions. 

Question 1

Hello! I discovered y’all when my partner, who works at an apartment complex, found your book in an abandoned apartment. She brought it home and it just seemed so fitting given my current situation. Funny how things work! All that to be said…

I’m currently 28 years old and am the manager of a small(ish) company in [the South]. We have 10 employees currently but do some fairly large business, about $1.7M per year.

I am currently in year three of a four-year transition to become the owner of the company and will be 30 at that time. While I feel incredibly blessed to be in this position, and 95% of it is great, I really struggle with garnering respect from potential hires.

I have had on multiple occasions people say they “didn’t want to work for a kid” to my face. And I suppose I get that. But it weighs on me heavily at the same time. Are there steps I can take to set an example of maturity and leadership?

For the more tenured employees that work for me, they all say I do a good job and it’s just a matter of growing gray hair. Perhaps it is. I figured if anyone has some solid advice, it would be the wonderful folks at Radical Candor.

Question 2

I have an insurmountable problem, it won't matter how much I apply Radical Candor when my CEO undoes everything I do.

I'm now leaving my fourth job working for someone who has never read any management books and is making very basic mistakes, like publicly humiliating people, thinking that job satisfaction is irrelevant because they are paying and that's all that matters, refusing to buy the tools people need to work, randomly breaking processes without warning, explanation or apology, demanding employee install spyware on their computers and refuse to pay for the time they went to the toilet.

I keep reading books like Radical Candor but I feel it's useless. What's the point of learning to have better one-on-ones when my boss tells me "They are just contractors, they do as they are told, stop having 1:1s with them" (I still have them, just in secret). This has been my life for the past seven years.

Do you have a solution?

Here I'm thinking that maybe there's a job board or networking group where you only get access if you buy into the ideas of Radical Candor, where a CTO like me can find a CEO that's not destructive.

Question 3

First of all: your work made me a better person and my 40-person startup company a better company.

Second: I feel like I am shit at communication. People give me feedback about feeling stressed and pushed when meeting with me about work. They also feel I am rushed and unavailable. (Obviously, this is the gist of their stories between the flowers and the sandwich spread).

Generally, I feel my leadership communication is quite shit, lol! Do you have tips on resources or practices I can perform to become a better communicator as a leader?

Radical Candor Podcast Checklist

1.  If you get feedback along the lines of I don't want to work for a kid, take a moment to try to be curious about where that might be coming from. It can be useful just to ask directly, why don't you want to work for a kid? What is it about working for a kid that worries you? Try to get that person to be more specific because you might be in the presence of some really good advice about things you could do differently to make the team work better.
2.  If you are deciding whether or not to accept a job offer, trust your gut on what you feel about the person who is going to be your boss. It is really important. If you're not dying to work for this person, do not take the job if you can possibly help it. Or, find someone else who's worked for that person and ask them what it was like to work for the person.
3. Try getting into an argument with that person before you take the job and see what it's like to disagree with the person.
4.  If you're feeling rushed and stressed when you're communicating with other people, go ahead and block some think time on your calendar so you can focus on what you need to get done. Or just to clear your head a few moments of just taking care of yourself you can put wander time on your calendar to walk around so you can engage with folks in a more relaxed manner. One tip that we have for you is to schedule virtual office hours once a month.

Radical Candor Podcast Resources

• So You're Younger Than Your Direct Reports…
• Relationships, Not Power, Drive You Forward
• How to Apply Radical Candor to Your Hiring Process to Build and Retain a Great Team 
•  How to Choose a Radically Candid Boss
• You Don’t Have to Pay the A**hole Tax: How to Avoid Working for a Bad Boss
• Absentee And Micromanagers Make Equally Bad Bosses—Here's 1 Thing Successful Managers Do Instead
• Mindset: The New Psychology of Success: Dweck, Carol S.
• 6 Ways to Leverage the Untapped Potential of Think Time

Have questions about Radical Candor? Let's talk >>
————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————–