0:06

A lot of the busyness

0:08

that we all face is self-imposed. It's

0:10

chosen in some ways because for many

0:13

of us there are things we don't

0:15

really want to face. Uncomfortable

0:17

questions about whether we are doing the

0:19

right thing or just not knowing what

0:21

the right thing is to do and

0:23

it's a lot easier to just keep

0:25

doing what you're already doing rather than

0:27

take the time to dig into that

0:29

and interrogate it. That's

0:33

my friend Dori Clark. She's

0:36

describing a sort of fundamental

0:38

state of our always-on, hyper-connected

0:40

existence. We can always be

0:42

doing something. We can

0:44

always make ourselves so busy that we

0:46

don't have time to even consider let

0:48

alone plan for really big goals.

0:52

But when that's the case, what

0:54

do we really accomplish? Our

0:56

busyness becomes a sort of defense. It

0:59

keeps us from realizing what's truly possible

1:01

for any of us. Most

1:04

of the things that are going to matter to us in

1:06

this life will not come as a result of being busy,

1:09

of filling our days with tasks. Our

1:12

most significant accomplishments will

1:14

take thought and planning, patience,

1:18

foresight. So

1:21

today, let's consider what it means to

1:24

think long-term. From

1:27

LinkedIn News, this is Jesse Humpel. Hello

1:56

Monday is our show about the changing nature of

1:58

work. Yes. But even

2:00

more than that, we focus on

2:02

how we must change to be prepared for

2:04

this future. There's

2:07

a particular story I really want to share with

2:09

you today. It comes from

2:11

Dori's own experience. She's

2:13

an author and a professor, and she's building

2:15

a new career for herself as well, and

2:17

that's what we're going to get into, actually.

2:20

A few years ago, Dori wrote this book

2:22

called The Long Game, How to be a

2:25

Long-Term Thinker in a Short-Term World. Almost

2:28

everything around us pushes us towards short-term

2:30

thinking. Small goals. Get

2:33

to inbox Zero. Land that promotion

2:35

within two years. Finish the project.

2:37

Answer your slack. When

2:39

we approach things this way, we only

2:42

ever tackle things we know we can do. Bill

2:45

Gates often gets credit for saying that most

2:47

people overestimate what they can do in one

2:49

year, and they underestimate what they

2:52

can do in 10 years. So

2:55

how might you spend your time? If you

2:57

are focused on what you'll accomplish in the

2:59

next decade rather than next week? Now,

3:03

I fully acknowledge this can be a scary

3:05

question in and of itself, because

3:07

maybe you don't have an automatic

3:09

burning passion big goal. Maybe

3:12

you don't know what you want to do in the next

3:14

10 years. Dori has something to

3:16

say about that. Here

3:19

she is.

3:21

One of the concepts that I talk about in The

3:23

Long Game is really pushing

3:26

at one of the things we

3:28

often hear that people throw off

3:31

as a bromide sometimes about, follow

3:33

your passion. I

3:35

get so troubled by this. Not because following

3:38

your passion is bad. I don't think it

3:40

is. If you're passionate about something mazel. But

3:42

the problem that I see with so

3:44

many friends that I know and so

3:46

many people who are very

3:48

successful is that oftentimes they have

3:51

thrown themselves so much into

3:54

their careers that they might

3:56

hit a point where they say, okay, the thing

3:58

I'm doing right now, it's not I know it's

4:00

not quite right. I'm not quite happy. I feel

4:02

stuck. I feel stagnant." And they

4:05

don't know what the other thing is. And you

4:07

say, well, what are you passionate about? They're like,

4:09

I don't freaking know. I've been working 70 hours

4:11

a week. And then

4:14

they feel terrible. They feel ashamed.

4:16

They feel like this monochromatic, boring

4:18

person. And I just want

4:20

to say it's okay. We don't have

4:22

to bang our head against a wall

4:24

and not do anything until we find

4:26

our passion. What I suggest instead is

4:28

a framework is what I call optimize

4:30

for interesting. Because the truth is we

4:32

might not know what we're passionate about.

4:34

Like, what is your soulmate career? But

4:37

everybody knows at a really basic level,

4:39

if something's interesting to them. Like, is

4:41

math interesting? I don't know. Is wine

4:44

interesting? Do you like travel? Do you

4:46

like music? What is interesting to you?

4:48

And just do a little bit more

4:50

toward that. Move in that direction. Have

4:52

conversations. Learn something. Read a book. Talk

4:54

to a friend who's in that industry,

4:57

whatever it is. I've

5:02

learned a lot from watching Dory

5:04

set audacious goals for herself. And

5:07

there's this one goal she has that we've actually talked

5:09

about a good deal. Back in 2016,

5:11

which kind of seems like

5:13

a long time ago now, a

5:15

friend took Dory to see the musical Fun

5:17

Home on Broadway. Do you

5:20

know that show? It

5:22

was so fun. And

5:25

everybody thought it was great, not just me. I mean,

5:27

it won five Tonys. It was

5:29

an adaptation of Alison Bechtel's graphic

5:31

novel about coming out. The

5:33

music was incredible. Dory

5:38

had never been to a Broadway musical before.

5:40

It was her first. And she woke up

5:42

the next morning after seeing it. And she

5:44

was completely inspired. I was just

5:46

possessed with this feeling, this certainty of

5:48

like, I need to write a musical.

5:50

I need to learn how to do

5:52

this. And so I

5:55

just began going with it. I feel

5:57

like whenever you get a

6:00

very strong sense of something, especially something

6:02

that doesn't make sense, frankly, that

6:05

is a sign you should follow it. Because otherwise,

6:07

where would that be coming from? To

6:09

me, it was just like, oh, this

6:12

is a direction that apparently I should

6:14

follow. And something

6:16

that I am a

6:18

strong believer in, and this is really

6:21

where, to me, long-term thinking and playing

6:23

the long game differs from let's make

6:25

a Pinterest board and read the secret.

6:27

I am not a fan of wishful

6:30

thinking and like, oh, let's manifest

6:32

it. I am a

6:34

fan of coming up with big,

6:37

ambitious goals, but planning for

6:39

it. So I actually went

6:41

and had coffee with a woman once,

6:44

and she was this sort of big,

6:46

like magical thinker. And she's like, I

6:48

have a vision. I have a plan.

6:50

I am going to have a show

6:53

on Broadway this fall.

6:57

I was like, uh, have you been

6:59

off-Broadlight? Like, tell me what is the

7:01

rationale for this goal? Like, I don't

7:03

want to crush anyone's dreams, but you

7:05

know, pre-COVID, this was not in the

7:08

least rational. If you know anything about

7:10

how Broadway works, there are 41 theaters,

7:13

period, that make up Broadway at any

7:15

given time. 20 of

7:17

them plus are occupied by long-term

7:19

shows like The Lion King. They're

7:21

not opening up. It is such

7:23

a narrow band that you need

7:25

to either have a major producer

7:27

behind you or millions of dollars

7:29

in backing. Otherwise, literally no

7:32

way. So she just sounded like she

7:34

was on crack, you know? But instead,

7:36

what I realized is for me, having

7:39

a 10-year vision of getting to

7:41

Broadway, I didn't necessarily know how

7:44

to do it. I didn't know

7:46

what the precise steps were, but

7:48

I knew that it was rational

7:50

that if I were to work

7:53

assiduously on a 10-year timeline, it

7:55

actually could be practical. By

7:57

the time Dory came into the studio, she

8:00

had already been working toward this goal for

8:02

five years. And I have now learned

8:05

how to write musicals. I've been accepted

8:07

to and completed one of the country's

8:09

most prestigious training programs in musical theater,

8:11

finished this show that I'm now shopping

8:14

around and trying to market to people

8:16

and have built relationships over the past

8:18

five years with several dozen producers. So

8:20

I don't know if I'm gonna get

8:23

to Broadway by 2026, but

8:25

it is not impossible. And part of

8:27

the reason is that I

8:29

think we really need to do a better

8:32

job of scoping out our ambitions to begin

8:34

with. There's a story that I tell in

8:36

the long game about Jeff Bezos and a

8:38

2018 letter to shareholders that

8:41

he wrote, where he talks about a

8:43

friend of his that hired a handstand

8:46

coach to get better at handstands and

8:48

yoga. And the handstand coach

8:50

says, the average person thinks it

8:52

takes about two weeks to be

8:55

able to master a handstand. It

8:57

actually takes six months of daily

8:59

practice. I mean, it's a 12

9:01

X differential. And so ultimately,

9:03

you know, no wonder people give up after

9:05

two or three months, they say, oh, well,

9:07

I couldn't possibly do it. It's me, it

9:09

didn't work. It's not you. It's

9:12

that literally people can't do it

9:14

that fast. And so understanding the scope

9:17

of what something takes upfront is

9:19

so essential because it enables you to

9:21

make rational plans so that you

9:23

actually can accomplish the right things. One

9:29

of the biggest reasons that I have sometimes

9:31

failed to name these big swings for myself

9:34

is because I don't actually know how

9:36

to accomplish them. And so I don't

9:38

trust that I will. I'm afraid that I'll

9:40

fail. And I'd rather not try

9:43

than to try and to fail. I

9:45

asked Dory about this. I

9:48

mean, there she was telling me about some

9:50

goal that seemed pretty ludicrous on its face.

9:53

And she was still working out the specifics of how

9:55

she'd do it. What

9:57

if after writing about it in her book, or

10:00

telling me about it in the studio, what

10:03

if it didn't work? What if she

10:05

didn't actually get a show on Broadway? I'm

10:09

actually not too troubled about that possibility.

10:11

I mean, you're exactly right. I put

10:13

it out there in midstream. This is

10:15

not a fate accompli. People can watch

10:17

along and see, oh, is

10:19

she able to pull it off? But

10:22

I have a genuine faith in my

10:24

abilities to pull something off. And here's

10:26

why. Number one, I think a lot

10:28

of people get hung up on things

10:30

like imposter syndrome. There are

10:33

shows that I've seen on Broadway. I am

10:35

like, whoa, I could

10:37

for sure write something better

10:39

than that. I know I'm

10:41

good enough to be on Broadway because 100% it

10:45

is better than that. And so I

10:47

feel totally confident in that way.

10:49

It's really just a question of

10:52

networking and working my angles until

10:54

I can get it on Broadway.

10:56

Now, another point that I make

10:58

in the long game is talking about multiple

11:01

paths to your destination. And so

11:03

this is the key, right? If

11:05

Netflix comes in and Netflix is

11:07

like, Dory, forget Broadway. We want

11:09

your sexy lesbian spy thriller musical.

11:12

I'm not gonna say no. I'll produce that.

11:15

Incredible. Well, you know, we'll talk. We'll

11:17

talk afterwards. But you know, it doesn't

11:19

necessarily have to be Broadway. I'm open

11:21

to a better offer if one emerges.

11:23

And I think that sometimes we get

11:25

so hung up, oh, I have to

11:27

get the job at Google. Oh, I

11:29

have to get into grad school at

11:31

Penn or whatever. There's a lot of

11:33

roots that you can take to get

11:36

to the same place that you want

11:38

that's directionally correct. And that's

11:40

what I'm aiming for. That

11:42

is a pragmatic kind

11:44

of confidence when

11:49

we'd all do well to embrace. So

11:52

here it is now, 2024. We're

11:54

eight years into Dory's 10 year challenge.

11:57

Dory and I got together recently with some friends for

11:59

dinner. and I asked her how it

12:02

was going. Well, I'm

12:04

here to tell you it's going great. She has

12:06

three projects in development right now, including

12:08

that lesbian spy thriller. She's

12:11

pretty sure she'll be able to pull it off to

12:14

have something on Broadway in two years,

12:16

and believe you me when I say

12:18

we will definitely check in with her.

12:22

So now this question is for you. What's

12:25

your equivalent to the theater writing goal? What's

12:28

something that feels so significant that it would be

12:30

worthy of a decade of your attention? I mean,

12:33

if when you're thinking about it you don't feel

12:35

a little quiver in your heart, a little fear,

12:37

you're probably not thinking big enough. For

12:40

this week's challenge you may want to go back

12:42

and re-listen to the dream job episode from the

12:45

start of the year. I'll drop it in

12:47

the show notes. Your

12:49

goal here truly is to think of something

12:51

so significant you don't feel at all sure

12:53

that it could happen. And

12:55

then when you have it, I'll start a

12:57

post as I've been doing for the last month in

13:00

the Hello Monday group on LinkedIn, our

13:03

fifth and final Masterclass challenge.

13:06

Please jump in and add your goal to

13:08

the comments, and while you're there, check out

13:11

the goals around you and let's cheer for

13:13

the people who are choosing to drop them.

13:18

That's it for this week's Masterclass and for the

13:20

series as a whole. I'll put links to the

13:22

full episodes in our show notes. This

13:25

show is a production of LinkedIn

13:27

News. Sarah Storm and Lolia Briggs

13:29

produced it. Asaf Gedron managed sound

13:31

design and engineering. Thanks to the

13:34

entire LinkedIn News team for production

13:36

support. I'm

13:38

Jessi Humpel. I'm gonna be back on Monday

13:40

with a fresh episode of Hello Monday. Thanks

13:43

for listening. You