Forget The Fluff: Redefining Core Values with Robert Glazer

Summary

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Podcast Summary

Kreatures Of Habit Podcast

Host: Michael Chernow
Episode: Forget The Fluff: Redefining Core Values with Robert Glazer
Date: October 8, 2025
Guest: Robert Glazer, bestselling author and expert on core values

Episode Overview

This episode dives deep into the real meaning and practical application of core values – both individually and organizationally. Michael Chernow and guest Robert Glazer discuss why traditional approaches to core values often fall flat, how to identify and implement actionable personal values, and why getting these right is crucial for happiness, healthy leadership, and long-term success in life and business. Robert shares his framework from his new book The Compass Within, guides listeners through identifying their values, and examines the culture/values connection, including memorable stories about business partnerships, leadership, and even marriage.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Data-Backed Importance of Living Core Values

• Hard Data: People who connect with their core values are 30% happier, and those who link values to work are 52% happier at work (Robert Glazer, 00:00).
• Leadership Trust: Employees trust leaders who live their stated values three times more than those who just talk about them (Robert Glazer, 00:00).
• Authenticity Gap: Stating values but acting incongruently undermines leader trust by up to 80%.

“There's real data behind this, but this can't be the, I’m saying it but not doing it."
— Robert Glazer (00:32)

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2. Why Most Core Values Are Meaningless – And How to Fix It

• Problem with One-Word Platitudes: Companies and individuals often list ambiguous words like “integrity” or “family,” but cannot use these to guide decision-making (Robert Glazer, 01:46).
• Actionable Core Values: The value must be a filter for decisions: “Could you make a decision based on it? Can you use it as a decision-making rubric?” (Robert Glazer, 02:53).
• Personal Example: Robert shares his own actionable values: “Find a better way and share it,” “Health and vitality,” “Self-reliance,” “Respectful authenticity,” and “Long-term orientation” (01:46).

“My dominant core value is find a better way and share it. That's literally why I'm here.”
— Robert Glazer (01:46)

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3. The “Big Three” Life Decisions and Their Orbits

• Framework: Your job/vocation, partner, and community.
• No Fixed Hierarchy: Each influences the others over time (Robert Glazer, 04:09). A value-violating job can strain your relationship and social life.

“They probably rotate around each other… If you're in a job that really goes against your values… it’s probably gonna deteriorate your community, you know, deteriorate your relationship.”
— Robert Glazer (04:09)

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4. Defining and Discovering Personal Core Values

• Mirrored Self-Discovery: Robert’s values work was catalyzed by a leadership program focused on self-discovery, not tactics (06:39).
• The 'Tunnel' Analogy: Navigating life without conscious values is like driving in a tunnel with the lights off—bouncing painfully off walls (Robert Glazer, 07:14).
• Anti-Core Value: Feeling deeply uncomfortable around someone who violates your values is a sign you’ve correctly identified your own (Robert Glazer, 07:52).

"If you tell me one of your values and I make up a character who's the opposite ... your face starts getting tense ... that’s your value being violated."
— Robert Glazer (08:20)

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5. The Power of Parables and Story in Teaching

• Book Format: Glazer’s new book The Compass Within is a parable; this style makes lessons emotionally resonant and relatable (09:23).
• Personal Regret: Robert shares a story of ignoring a core value discord that became a significant personal regret (10:47).

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6. Moving from Abstract to Tactical

• Six-Question Framework: To discover your core values, answer six behavioral questions—covering best work, greatest frustrations, disliked people, eulogy wishes, and more (Robert Glazer, 36:14).
• Theme Validation: Group your answers for recurring themes, then test them with a validator (Can you make a decision on it? Does the opposite make you uncomfortable? Is it more than one word? Can you rate yourself on it?) (Robert Glazer, 39:00–41:00).
• Negative and Positive Triggers: Dislike of certain traits is often the inverse of your own value.

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7. Leading and Hiring with Core Values

• Hiring/Firing for Fit: "These are the values we have. If you want something different, it won't be a good fit." (Robert Glazer, 18:50)
• Changing Workplace Norms: Robert describes eliminating typical “two weeks notice” etiquette via open, honest “transitions” (17:38).
• Toxic Exits Indicate Deeper Issues: Walkouts, toxicity at exit—either you hire badly, or your culture made them that way (Robert Glazer, 21:54).

“If your employees all the way out are always stealing…there are two things going on. One, you’re not hiring really good people… Two, something about your culture is turning them toxic.”
— Robert Glazer (21:54)

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8. Partnerships, Community, and Values-Based Compatibility

• Business Partnership Example: Michael shares a story of a failed business partnership rooted in divergent core values—financial ambition vs. desire for balance/community (51:22).
• Importance of Values Conversations: It is critical for partners (romantic or business) to compare core values before committing (49:33–53:57).

“If these are like magnets… you can work around one point of friction, but if you have three or four, that’s hard.”
— Robert Glazer (49:58)

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9. Living in Alignment: Individual and Organizational

• Company Culture: The true values of a company are what’s rewarded, regardless of stated platitudes (31:32).
• Real World Example: Enron’s wall values (“integrity, respect, be kind”) had no relationship to actual rewarded behaviors.
• Alignment Principle: The healthiest organizations have close alignment between stated and lived values throughout hiring, reviews, and daily decision-making (33:22).

“The great companies are actually aligned between what they think, what they say, and what they do.”
— Robert Glazer (33:22)

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10. Values, Adversity, and Transformation

• Origin of Values: Most values are either doubled-down positives from formative experiences, or the opposite of trauma/absence (24:20, 63:18).
• Purpose from Pain: “Purpose and pain lie very close to each other... there’s some amazing stuff that comes out of bad stuff.” (64:03)

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11. Strategies for Values in Daily Life and Relationships

• Family/Parenting: Align family activities and goals with your authentic values, not with societal “checkboxes” (43:08).
• Goal-Setting: Build long-term goals around your values, then back-cast into annual or shorter-term goals (43:17).
• Community Fit: Where you live and who surrounds you can make (or break) your ability to live by your values (53:57).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Living Values:
  “Could you make a decision based on it and can you use it filter decision making rubric?”
  — Robert Glazer (02:53)

• On Relationships:
  “We could do this again.... Or not.” [on just letting relationships fade when values aren’t aligned]
  — Robert Glazer (16:20)

• On Company Culture:
  “The core values are either the culture is explicit or implicit. So it doesn’t matter what you write on the wall.”
  — Robert Glazer (31:32)

• On Adversity Creating Values:
  "Purpose and pain lie very close to each other."
  — Robert Glazer (64:03)

• On Partnership Friction:
  “One person's hell is another person's happy place.”
  — Michael Chernow (57:17)

• On Personal Practice:
  “My dominant core value is find a better way and share it. That's literally why I'm here.”
  — Robert Glazer (01:46)

• On the Reality of Culture:
  “If your employees are all theft and rage at the exit — either you’re hiring badly or your culture’s making them that way.”
  — Robert Glazer (21:54)

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Tactical Takeaways & Practical Exercises

Discovering Your Core Values (from Robert’s process, 36:14–41:00)

• Answer 6 behavioral questions about high/low points, frustration, and legacy
• Look for themes by color-coding recurring concepts
• For each candidate value, run the validator:
  • Can I make decisions from it?
  • Does its opposite make me uncomfortable?
  • Is it longer than a single word?
  • Can I objectively self-rate it?
• Replace ambiguous words with clear phrases or sentences
• Try this exercise with partners and business team for alignment

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• [00:00] – Data and importance of core values
• [01:46] – Robert’s actionable values
• [04:09] – The “Big Three” framework: job, partner, community
• [06:39]–[08:20] – “Tunnel” analogy and anti-core value concept
• [09:23] – Book writing as parable: teaching through story
• [17:38] – Company transition policy: open, honest exits
• [21:54] – “Toxic” culture and hiring/firing implications
• [31:32] – Real vs. stated company culture
• [36:14]–[41:00] – Step-by-step personal core value discovery
• [43:08]–[43:17] – Family life and values alignment
• [51:22]–[53:57] – Michael’s personal partnership story
• [57:17] – “One person’s hell is another’s happiness”
• [63:18]–[64:03] – Adversity, childhood, and value formation
• [69:04]–[70:34] – Awareness barometer and “benefit of the doubt” as value

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Final Reflections & Next Steps

• Understanding and living by actionable core values is essential for happiness, healthy teams, and purposeful life.
• Run the values discovery exercise for yourself, your team, or your partnership; compare and discuss results.
• Check out The Compass Within (compass-within.com) for further guidance, and access Robert Glazer’s course and newsletter for ongoing insights.

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For more on Robert Glazer’s work, visit robertglazer.com and check out his Substack: Friday Forward.

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“The secret sauce is to say what you mean and mean what you say—and let others decide if that’s where they want to be.”
— Robert Glazer (58:22)

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Transcript

[Robert Glaser]

There's like some interesting hard data around this, especially in the work. So the NIH said people who connect with their core values are 30% happier. Interestingly, the Burnett Value center did a thing that's saying leaders who both talk about values but live by them. That's a hard. Some say them are trusted three times more by their employees. And people who connect the values to their work are 52% happier at work. I mean, there's real data behind this, but this can't be the. I, I'm saying it but not doing it. There's probably, I don't know what the stat is, but they probably trust them 80% less if they say it and not do it. But people want to feel like what they care about connects to what they're doing.

[Michael Chernow]

I'm Michael Chernow and this is the Creatures of Habit podcast. Our habits will make us or break us. It's just that simple. I've lived on both sides of the tracks and have learned that the decisions we make on a consistent basis truly define who we are as human beings. On this show, I will be interviewing some of the most inspiring, motivating and high performing humans I've encountered to share their daily habits, routines and rituals that help them stay on top of their game and ultimately happy. So sit back, relax and pay attention because what you hear over the next 30 to 45 minutes could potentially change your life. Let's go. Core values. Holy smokes. How many times do you hear core values? Right? Like, core values are in some cases the absolute most important thing, but in more cases meaningless. Right?

[Robert Glaser]

I'm 100% with you. Yeah.

[Michael Chernow]

So what are your core values?

[Robert Glaser]

My core values. And again, in terms of, we'll talk about how I define like a helpful core value or not, but my dominant core value is find a better way and share it. That's literally why I'm here, here. Health and vitality, self reliance, which has always been sort of something for me, Respectful authenticity and long term orientation. So very different than the I think people and companies, as you said, often talked about, I think very useless in most cases because companies pick these one word platitudes like integrity, one word only, and respect and whatever and on the wall and people. If I asked a room, I typically have asked rooms of. My problem is I've tried to survey my audience on this and they're too skewed in the right direction. So if you take a blank room and you're like, how many people have any sense of their core values or spend some time Thinking about it, It'd be like 60% of the room had not right then maybe 35 people. Like, yeah, I've thought about core values. I kind of maybe know some of my values or I've thought about it and one or two people in the room could rattle off a list, like I said. And I think they're generally in a different place sort of, you know, mentally and what they're. And very specific about what they're doing. So when you say a lot of people like, yeah, core values, or like, and like, okay, well what are they? Family integrity. Like we could, I mean, family doesn't work in my, in my list. I. The, the book and the framework behind it is around actionable core values and actionable meaning. The number one most important thing is could you make a decision based on it and can you use it filter decision making rubric. Right. And the book is the big three that the character's going through, which is your job or vocation, your partner, and the community or communities that you choose. And if you don't make those and you get those wrong on core values, I think they have a very low chance of success.

[Michael Chernow]

And that trifecta. Job or vocation, significant other community. Is there like in your opinion from doing, diving deep into this sort of work, Is there a hierarchy amongst those three for you? Like, do you believe that one, there's some sort of a succession there, or do you.

[Robert Glaser]

That's interesting. It's a good question. I think communities change, right? Ideally a lot of people don't want the partner to change once they find the right one. No, I think they're kind of like, kind of like moons that like orbit. It's like a gravitational pull. I think at different times they're probably pulling in different directions. I can tell you that. Probably if you're in a job that really goes against your values and it drains you and you come home and you're picking fights with people. Like, it's probably gonna like Jamie and Matt, deteriorate your community, you know, deteriorate your relationship. So they probably like rotate around each other. But that would be my answer. I don't think there's. I mean, obviously again you'd say in a perfect ideal world, like your partner, but these days some people are way into life by the time they've picked their partner. And 50% of people have divorce rate in the US so that's not like a singular constant for most people.

[Michael Chernow]

You know, I mean I've, I've founded now three companies. Yes, I do have My own personal core values that I've gone through a process and kind of figured those out.

[Robert Glaser]

You're in that too.

[Michael Chernow]

What?

[Robert Glaser]

You're in that too. In the room of 100.

[Michael Chernow]

And you know, I do have them written at the bottom of my whiteboard in my office. They're just there. But I think what would be great is to understand how to apply these core values. I love. I've never asked somebody their core values. And each one was a sentence, which I think is a very phrase or. Yeah, like. Or phrase. Right. But a very, very different way of thinking about that. Because really what I. And what I think about when I think about core values is not for every decision. Right. Like, your intuition is going to typically guide you.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah. You'd exhaust your large scale decision making.

[Michael Chernow]

Needs to get dropped into a core value filter bucket. Right. And if it doesn't. If it doesn't get through, like the. If there's one or two that are catching that decision, it's kind of like a hard no. Right.

[Robert Glaser]

As long as you can identify that most people. And this is where I was and how I got down this whole process, which is a long story. But I came to realize I was very value oriented coming out of a leadership training where I thought we were gonna go learn about how to manage people and tactics and otherwise. It was like a big mirror in our face for two days, like, who the hell are you? What do you value? I'm like, okay, this is really important. But then they didn't tell us how.

[Michael Chernow]

Was this a voluntary thing that you paid for to be a part of?

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah, it was a part of Entrepreneur's organization. It was a pretty exclusive leadership training that they did for kind of 20 people around the world.

[Michael Chernow]

Okay, cool.

[Robert Glaser]

So I was like, wow, it's really values oriented. But I can't articulate what they are. And I think that's how most people are. There's awareness of them. We kind of know when a value is being crossed. Like, it's a little kryptonite. Y. My best analogy is if you were driving a car through a tunnel and I turned off the lights, what's most likely going to happen is you are going to drift to the right, go past that yellow line that you can't see, hit the wall, smash up the car a little bit, you're going to push back to the mill, you're going to drift to the left, you're going to get through the tunnel, the car's going to look like shit on the other side. This is how most People navigate core values in life like, ooh, felt horrible, terrible. But I just hit the wall. And the difference is, you turn on the light, the yellow lines are, these are my values. Oh, this person is asking me to get involved with a venture with them. And this clearly aligns or violates along these things, we get more into the rubric. But one of the most powerful things I think in my framework and how I define it, what people say is this concept of the anti core value. So one of the tests is because core value violated does not feel good, right? If you tell me one of your values and I make up a character and I'm like, all right, Michael, I'm going to make up a character who's the opposite of that. You're talking to them at a party and your face starts getting like tense. You know, someone's talking about gratitude and I'm like, this person's talking about their trust fund and how the world is screwing them over and the person just gets like, uncomfortable. Right? So it's an interesting test because it shows that you're on the right path because that's the. Your value is being violated. And it's deeply uncomfortable.

[Michael Chernow]

And it's kind of crazy that there are people like that too.

[Robert Glaser]

Oh, yeah, look, there are some values that we've ostensibly would say are good and bad. Like, again, I don't think integrity is a great core value because I have least six definitions of integrity that people told me. So I'm like, what do you mean? This was the conversation with Jamie and Jack in the book. What do you mean by integrity? Because that's the, you know, that's the thing behind it. But yeah, when you, when you, when you kind of, when you lock into that, it's. It's very interesting.

[Michael Chernow]

I. So you, you have recently launched the Compass within. And I, full transparency, got the book about two days ago and have not read the full thing. I, as soon as I saw you, I stopped you though, because it's like being excited about a book is like, not. That doesn't happen that often, right? Like, I love reading books. Books are great. But like that book, as soon as I cracked it open and it was a story that was telling, sort of a nonfiction that had like a non fictional backbone. It's. That doesn't really happen a lot, right?

[Robert Glaser]

Like parables, it's rare. And some of people's favorite books of all time are parables, including my own. I love Patrick Lencioni. I love Bob Berg's the Go Giver. Even the famous book on operations called the Goal is actually a parable, but they're rare and publishers don't like them, so. But I was pretty adamant that I was like, I don't think. I think if I walked by a book in the store. So the story is I figured out this formula for myself. I actually started training people on at our company and leadership. I was like, wow, this is really working. People are understanding stuff about themselves. They're changing their leadership, they're changing their life. I turned it into a course because people I wrote about kind of discovering your core values in my book elevate this notion of spiritual capacity. Kind of. How do you build that capacity? People be like, this is great. How do I do it? And I'd be like, well, I've got this thing and this. I don't really have an easy way to answer it. So I was like, I should turn this into a book. But if I go through the bookstore and there's a book on values, like, am I going to pick it up? Like, am I going to read it? I'm not sure. It'll be, like, fun to read. And I'm like, I definitely think I can show this more with characters. And so you've had an early look. I've had some friends who had an early look. And what's interesting is, you know, the character is just, again, a little bit of a mirror for people. People are like, oh, my God. That was like. I resonated with that scene because I'm having that discussion with my spouse or I've been in that work situation and it just. It brings these feelings for people. There's a personal story at the end about one of my biggest regrets with one of my kids where I ignored a sort of core value discord with another family and everything was fine. But I kind of didn't forgive myself for that. I'm sure someone reads that and they have a story that, you know, so.

[Michael Chernow]

I have to just have to. Where I think that. So totally different genres. But why I think Seinfeld and Larry David are so brilliant and why I think so many people love those two guys. Even if people don't like comedy, they love that they love Kirby enthusiasm and Seinfeld because they are surfacing real life relatable things that in their case are just annoying.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah. You know, the one for me, like I always say, is the one where they go around, Elaine orders the salad and they all order a really expensive dinner and then they split it. I'm like, how many times you've been in that situation with a friend, you know, at dinner where you ordered a Coke and they ordered a tomahawk steak. And they're like, you owe $45. Right. Brilliant. That's split in four ways.

[Michael Chernow]

And you're like, wait a second. I had a fucking bite of it.

[Robert Glaser]

But you're right about that.

[Michael Chernow]

So in this. As I started getting into the book, like, there were just a number of situations that I was reading that I was like, bing. Like, totally.

[Robert Glaser]

That becomes your ex boss, I'm sure, somewhere.

[Michael Chernow]

Oh, God, I hate that guy. I hate that guy. And I know that guy so well. And I think most people who have had a job in some kind of corporate. Or not even just in general, you have a job where there's a guy that's just kind of, like, toting around the office or around. You know, in my case, the restaurant doesn't really know the menu item.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah.

[Michael Chernow]

But is like, testing you on it. And you're like, dude, I know you don't know what this is. I know you don't know. Let me turn this around on you. You know, I know it. I know you don't know it. And, like. And so it just. It hits those chords. And so I think that is why, like, I was so excited to see you today, because I'm so. I was so excited. I'm so.

[Robert Glaser]

I'm glad. Yeah. I mean, I'm so happy to hear that, because I was like, to. My goal now for the next five years is to help a million people figure out their core values. That's sort of my. Beyond any financial goal or anything. But to do that, I have to get people engaged with the topic. And I felt like this would be a way to get them engaged rather than, hey, you want to learn about core values? But as you said, it's soft. It's misapplied. There's some interesting hard data around this, especially in the work. So the NIH said people who connect with their core values are 30% happier. Interestingly, the Burnett Value center did a thing that's saying leaders who both talk about values but live by them. That's a hard. Some say them are trusted three times more by their employees. And people who connect the values to their work are 52% happier at work. I mean, there's real data behind this, but this can't be the. I'm saying it, but not doing it. There's probably. I don't know what the stat is, but they probably trust them 80% less if they say it and not do it. But People want to feel like what they care about connects to. To what they're doing.

[Michael Chernow]

You know, I mean, I'm gonna just go out there and say it because I think most people that think of core values, they do trim them down to one word. And mine are four singular words. Yeah. So I'm down for that. And because I want to also, I want to understand your process for helping people try to navigate their way or orienteer that map of discovering the core value. Right. Like, how do you do it?

[Robert Glaser]

Right.

[Michael Chernow]

I think, and I've said it so many times on this podcast, there's like 6.5 billion people on the planet that just haven't figured out what their purpose is yet.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah.

[Michael Chernow]

Right. Like, and that's so sad.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah. And it's like as soon as you said that, this image of like a kid's toy with different shaped blocks and different shape holes. Right. And like, everyone, like, people are. That's how you help figure out. Oh, that's my. That's where my piece fits. Right. And I think people are floating around, they don't understand this. When you figure this out. When you really figure it out. And I don't know if you've gotten to the Jamie epiphany chapter yet, but. And for me, it was like, holy shit. Like, it's a stencil. And I start looking back at my life, and I look back at school and I look back at this job, and I look, I'm like, all fricking makes sense now. Like, I shouldn't have done that. I should have done that. Like, like. And so then really what you should start doing. And what I did was I just started. I doubled. Okay. I'm doubling down on these things. I'm walking away from these things. Community is the one for you.

[Michael Chernow]

What was that just So, I mean, you're cool talking about that.

[Robert Glaser]

Look, there were relationships I walked away from. And one of the things, not a breakup, but hey, like, it's very clear to me that this person or this group doesn't. It's like, doesn't want the same thing that I want. So you can. Everyone thinks you have to, like, break up and Jerry Maguire, like, you could just stop applying energy to things and they fade out. How many times do you say, you know, you and your partner, like, you meet up with the college roommate you haven't seen, you hate their spouse and like, we should do this again. Like, all you have to do is not say that, right? No, we don't have to do it again. Like, oh, well, we'll chat, you know, and whatever. So I actually ended up cutting my core values at work in half. I had a lot of policies. So my last book was about. Based on my TED talk on how to eliminate two weeks notice. And like, hey, we need to just change how people leave companies. That is a direct dotted line to my core value of respectful authenticity. I'm trying to grow this company. We have a great culture. And I'm like, this the way people leave in this lying. And this two week, like, this sucks. Like, how do we, how do we do this better? Like, how do we get people to be respectful and tell the truth and authentic? So we built a new program that let people transition and sort of change that. So that's. But that became really.

[Michael Chernow]

What did that look like?

[Robert Glaser]

It was this concept of open transitions. Like, hey, we think this may not work out. And you think that you can work here for three months, like, start looking for a job, we'll do a transition, we'll help you. Like, let's have these discussions. Because most of these things go on well beyond what they needed to. And I ended up doing a TEDx talk about it. And a lot of people have tried this blueprint and they're like, wow, this actually it works to have a real honest discussion with people and provide them a little safety and not walk them through the door. And we were a service business. I just. The thing that people hate is when an account manager leaves. So, you know, for us to have know that person was leaving, but you know, you're. You talk to Michael every week. And so Sarah starts showing up on the call for six weeks and then Michael fades off and then the client already likes Sarah. The worst thing is like, hey, Michael's not coming this week. Sarah is your new account manager. Like, clients do not like that. So that was a perfect day that we cut our core values in half. At work I just sort of. We leaned in and at work I was like, look, this is what we are, this is what we aren't, and this is what we're going to do. And this is what I feel comfortable with. And I think it really changes. Look, the thing that. Where I really want organizations to pay attention to this, you can do whatever leadership training you want. You can tell people, hey, this is what a good leader looks like and this is what they do. But people are going to lead from their values. They are going to do it with knowledge of those values or without knowledge of those values. And those look very different because these are formed from real formative, often Childhood experiences, some traumatic experiences that make certain things more important for you. So you can either tell people that this is who you are and whatever. If you join my team, you know, when I manage people, I'd be like, look, I believe in figuring out a better way and trying to do things better. If you're someone who wants to do the same thing and chill and not improve, you will not like working for me, like, straight up. It's not, it's not the right fit.

[Michael Chernow]

One thing that I do want to say though, and, and I was kind of like, caught on that just sort of I highlighted in the book is so when Matthew, his philosophy is basically that when somebody puts in their notice out the door, like, you got noticed.

[Robert Glaser]

It's a firm culture.

[Michael Chernow]

Yeah, it's a firm culture. It's just like, hey, you let us know that you're leaving. We're not giving you two weeks. You're out today. Why? Because once you've kind of made that known, you're. You're not in it to win it. And you're out. You're out. You're kind of one foot in, one foot out. And we're not a one foot in, one foot out kind of company. Now. I hate that. Like, it just sounds terrible.

[Robert Glaser]

We're going to say you understand it.

[Michael Chernow]

But is there validity to it? Right. Is there validity to someone who is like, is somebody giving you two weeks but they really want to leave right now? Like, how? And so I don't. I, like, honestly, you know, I've never, ever, you know, if I've hired, I don't know, probably 1500 people over the.

[Robert Glaser]

Course of my career, restaurant world, people quit with one minute. Yeah.

[Michael Chernow]

So, but like, you know, I mean, I've hired 1500, maybe more, and I've probably fired 500, maybe 1000. I don't know. But at the end of the day, like, in the restaurant business, if somebody gives you your two weeks, it's really a roll of the dice whether they're just like, trying to be respons. Disrespectful. Because if you were to be like, hey, you know what, like, you could make this your last shift if you want to. They would probably. Some of them would be like, okay. And others would be like, no, no, no.

[Robert Glaser]

Like, well, that's their choice. I think I can see how you would draw that conclusion. Right. But if you roll the tape forward a little bit, how's that going to play out in the company? Well, no one is going to discuss their unhappy. No one knows that you will get walked out. Oh, it's terrible culture. It's terrible culture.

[Michael Chernow]

But I think. But I guess that what I came to me for, that was okay. Instead of, like, cutting people off at the knees, when they give you an opportunity to, like, make some kind of a transition, think about who you're actually hiring.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah.

[Michael Chernow]

And the kind of leadership that they're. What they're walking into.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah.

[Michael Chernow]

Right. Like, that, I think, is the most important piece of the puzzle.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah. And again, if you're a company, it's just a little bit. What is the culture? Things don't work out. People are unhappy. Do you want things to people discuss? People are so worried about employees becoming toxic and stealing stuff and going postal at the end. Right. And it's very funny. Someone said to me years ago, they're like, if your employees all the way out are all the way always as they go out the door, are stealing shit and doing stuff. And otherwise, there's two things going on here. One, you're not hiring really good people, and you should look at that to what you said. Two, there is something about your culture that is turning them toxic that you may want to take a look into. Right.

[Michael Chernow]

So I have been sort of coined the culture cowboy at both businesses. Right. I really, really care. Yeah. I care about how people feel.

[Robert Glaser]

Right.

[Michael Chernow]

Because I know how people feel is going to project how people perform. Now. I do think that there needs to be boundaries, and I do think that there's got to be a sense of assertiveness in communication and there's.

[Robert Glaser]

You're not someone who would want to embarrass someone eventually. Right. And then a lot of people enjoy this parade of embarrassment.

[Michael Chernow]

Right. But you know what, though? I will tell you, and this was obviously learning, you know, little notches on my belt as I was going. Like, I remember so clearly, I had a manager, and I think it was the first year of Seymour's in my second restaurant. And, you know, we were crushing it. We opened the doors. I mean, it was insane. We were top restaurant, New York, New York Magazine, New York Rank, whatever. It was number one restaurant for nine months straight. It was nuts. And I just. I had a manager in there who I knew had the potential to be great. And I would take her, her and I would have. We didn't do one on ones because I always had to have someone there HR wise. But, like, we would do a lot of, like, sort of like mentor, mentee stuff. And finally she. She was like, you know what? I don't think this is right for Me. And she was like, and I want to give you some feedback. And I was like, great. She was like, do me a favor next, you know, for the next person, just be way more direct. Tell me exactly what you want. Don't care about what I feel, how I feel. And I was like, ooh, God. Man, that really hit me because I do think about what I say before I say it.

[Robert Glaser]

And that was also probably something about her values where she needs in her life for people to be direct. And if I sat down with this woman and I talked to her, I bet you there was someone in her life or a parent who never told her the truth. And this is the reality. This stuff shows up for us in our adult life, in the workplace. And I am not a therapist, and I don't pretend to be one, but I can tell you the difference is having done this with so many people, I'm just looking to understand what it was and make sure people realize how it impacts them. We're not going back to talk to your inner child or blame people or any of that stuff. But I can tell you how this shows up in some people. So I've done this work with people who have a core value of trust, and people have a core value of trust or a why of trust, something, you know, build trusting relationships if you ask them. And I've done this because I've done it enough. Hey, Michael, I'm not going to ask you what it is, but did you have a violation of trust in your life? Usually tears rolling down their face tightened up like, look, I don't even know what it is, but just know that this is real for you in your leadership. So trust people as leaders in companies, they have one default way of managing. I trust you or I don't trust you. They have small groups of friends, they sort people. So they are people on their team who were five minutes late to the restaurant. They didn't say anything, but they're like, can't trust her. And she's in the penalty box and she gets treated like crap. And I've heard HR managers afterwards, after we dealt with this, be like. And I was saying, oh, that person, that leader. I know how to trust quarterback. They're like, oh, I could never understand. Like, each quarter I'm being asked to promote this person and fire this person. So that's. If you aren't aware of that and I'm not, you're not going to change that. This is an orienting thing for you and for that person, that trust that is like It's a threatening thing. Like, this is threatening you. Either you're controlling the steering one, you're saying, hey, welcome to my team. Just so you know, trust is really important to me. And when trust is lost, it's really hard to get back. These are the ways that trust is lost. And if you're feeling some distance, there's probably been a loss of trust. Right. Totally different way of doing that. Then you don't realize that this is your default orientation. And by the way, the opposite side of that was they hired a vendor that they trusted from a past relationship and didn't verify their work, and they did horrible work than cost the company hundreds of thousands of dollars. So this is. This adults are. I mean, I tell a story where, like, I knew a lot about these two people and they're arguing about a budget and they're like, really arguing a budget. And this person's values are include all perspectives. Right, because they include all perspectives. Yes, because they. People either their values come from thing we get into the tactical. 90% of the time it comes from something that was really important in your life that you're doubling down on, or you are running 100% the opposite way and it's something that you didn't have. So the include all perspectives person likes to make sure that everyone is heard and they need to be heard. And this person grew up like dirt poor. And their thing is do not waste. Right. And so they're in this fight as adults over this budget. And the real issue is this person thinks this person is wasteful. And that is a trail. I don't like to overuse the word trigger, but that is like a core value violation for them.

[Michael Chernow]

Grinds his gears.

[Robert Glaser]

And this person thinks that they are not being heard and that this person is not listening to the things that they need.

[Michael Chernow]

Nothing to do with the budget.

[Robert Glaser]

And I think nothing to do with the budget. I think across our lives and our workplaces, this is showing up and the people who know it can manage it. Right. That person can be like, you know what this feels like. I just need to make it clear that I'm fine if you don't want to spend that money. But it's important to me that you just hear me out on this. Like, you know, I'm not. And this is the key thing for leadership and leadership development. Because I think this is the missing piece for most people in terms of understanding, like, what's driving them, like so much childhood crap is showing up in the workplace like that. I promise you that woman something Someone wasn't direct with her. They lied. There was someone on our team we were doing this with, and their mother was like a conspiracy theorist. And this person, as an adult now, it's all about facts and data. If you do not bring facts and data to her because her mother told her all this shit that wasn't true. But this is how she manages today. And I bet you this woman had someone who did not tell her the truth. And in this case, it was really important to her to be told the truth, or else it's kind of bringing her back to whatever it was.

[Michael Chernow]

It's so interesting that you say that because in orientation for any restaurant that I've opened now, obviously the first few restaurants were a little bit different because I was really leading the ship. I didn't really know. I mean, I read, you know, the E. Myth Revisited and thought I knew what it meant to be an entrepreneur.

[Robert Glaser]

It's a good book.

[Michael Chernow]

Yeah, it's a good book.

[Robert Glaser]

But I didn't know plaster restaurants, probably the most food services people the most.

[Michael Chernow]

I mean, now I've read it a number of times, like, but prior to opening up a restaurant, I was told of my own business. I was like, someone said, hey, you got to read this book. I read the book and I was like, oh, yeah. Like I'm going to be able to break away from the technician and be on the owner. Of course I am. And as soon as I was the GM of the first restaurant I opened, right? So I. But as I evolved, I like, in orientation, I'm flat out with the team. I'm like, hey, I'm not gonna be here all the time. I'm the owner of the restaurant. I am gonna tell you guys all the things that mean a lot to not only me, but the culture and the success of the business. But I'm not an asshole. So I'm a nice guy. So it's gonna be hard for me to continue to remind you. So what's gonna happen is either you're going to get a first write up, a second write up, and then you're gonna be fired. Because that's like. Like I'm telling you right now, I don't want to be. I have a hard time being an asshole. Like, I am an asshole.

[Robert Glaser]

But you're set. Interesting. You're setting values based boundaries, which is better than rules based boundaries, right? Cause rules are kind of arbitrary. And values like, look, make decisions within our values.

[Michael Chernow]

Well, yeah, Basically I'm like, hey, here the writing's on the wall. The rules are given out to everybody. You have them, we talk about them, we discuss them. They're very clear there' like it's not like there's no like wiggle room. It's like this is the rules. Like, but we have a great time. So like the rules are there so that everybody succeeds and everybody feels comfortable and supported. But I'm just gonna tell you that I'm not the manager or the owner that's gonna be on your ass all the time. So just know that if you get a write up, chances are it's something that you're doing that is gonna get you out the door. And you know, and so, but like I, I think that there are so many companies that succeed with terrible culture.

[Robert Glaser]

Oh yeah, well, companies have. I didn't believe in any of the company core value stuff. Now this is different than individuals. Individuals is me and my values. Companies are all the people and what are our shares.

[Michael Chernow]

But aren't the company values a direct reflection of the founder, CEO?

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah. In a smaller organization, sure. In a Fortune 500 company, not right.

[Michael Chernow]

But don't you think of like there is some remnants of that in a.

[Robert Glaser]

Fortune 500 company, it'd be great if it carried through five generations, but if you have five mergers and a whole bunch of stuff, you know, maybe not. I do some work with companies around augmenting or fixing their, their core values. And a lot of times there's been a merger, there's been a new leadership, like, you know, so companies have culture. The famous story at the end of the book is that Enron, when it like went under, had core values of like, integrity, respect and be kind. And the truth was like, and like the values are either the culture is explicit or implicit. So it doesn't matter what you write on the wall. The truth was that Enron, it was like be incredibly risky, like stab people in the back. And like, you know, those were the actual core value. Those were the actual core values. That was what actually rewarded with was take risk, just go do crazy stuff, be a cowboy was probably one of the core values. So they were saying this. And this is why I never believed in core values from the corporate stand. But I would work with startups. I walk in all these startups, I'd see the same 12 words written on the wall. One of the most awkward stories was I wrote an article on LinkedIn back when LinkedIn was sharing my posts, like millions of people and I had one of these pictures and it was like I'd taken in a company, it was like empathy Respect. And they're like 12, 14 things kind of laid up on the wall. And my whole article was titled why Most Company Core Values Aren't Real. And I wrote this whole scathing piece around the problem with it. And someone who's not reading carefully looks in the comment, where'd you take this picture? These are great. These are just like my company's core values. I was like, oh, he may want to read the article because you're posting this with your company name on it and all kinds of stuff on. So yeah, look, we're all, I have a puppy, we're training a dog. It's like good girl, bad girl, right? We're all children. Like in some ways where we culture, it either rewards behaviors or it punishes behaviors. Right? And that's sort of eventually. And that's. So that's either explicit or implicit. So the great companies are actually aligned between what they think and what they say and what they do. It's not that these things are on the wall, it's we hire with them. You hear about them in our performance reviews, we have awards on them. Like, like the core values are you hear them all the time or people are talking about, we are not going to make this decision because that's not embracing relationships. My friend Gary ridge, who ran WD40, the little spray can oil company for 10 years, actually totally turned the company around, had like a 30% approval rating and in 10 years he got it to 90%, flipped the culture around, stock went up 10x. He was culture guy and he said, which most CEOs could not do. Any of our associates or whatever they call them, who makes a decision in service of one or more of our core values at our company is always safe. That's believing in your values. That's screw the 500 rule page rule book. Like make decisions aligned with our values and you will always be safe.

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[Michael Chernow]

Back to the pod. Let's get tactical. So can you, can you give us, I mean, I probably can't give us the whole, the whole spiel, but like somebody's listening to this and says, okay, I get it. I want to understand what my. At least begin the process of understanding how do I get to my core values.

[Robert Glaser]

Sure. So, but as they'd see in the book or in the discussion, it starts with these six questions. And everyone's always like, what's the six questions? They want to take the notes. So I just [e-mail] 6s I X get six questions right there. So these six questions are behavioral based questions designed to look at like what you the parts of your life, personally and professionally where you did your best work, were most frustrated people you really can't stand. What do you want said at your eulogy? They're designed to get all these stories and behaviors out. So you answer these six questions. And for people who don't want to do the process, look, there's the book. You can read it. There's the course that goes with the book, which you can get if you buy the book. I get it. Some people don't.

[Michael Chernow]

And this is Elevate.

[Robert Glaser]

They won't spend the time. No, this is Compass within. Okay, cool. If you read the book. This whole process we're talking about is in the book. But there's a course that goes with it too, because some people like the scaffolding around it. So it just walks you through all that. So you answer these six questions on six pieces of paper and then what you do is you start to. And obviously there's some more stuff around it, but generally you start to like Take some color marker. Otherwise go look for themes across all these six things because you're going to hear different and you're like, oh, five times. I kept hearing, couldn't make things better, could make things better. People come to me to talk about it better. So you kind of pick a couple colors and you circle up all the themes. Two of the questions are negative questions. Again, what can't you stand in other people? Where are you unsuccessful? So you both look at the negative and then you look at the opposite of that. So what's the opposite of the negative? Because I said before, that violation of something that drives you crazy is usually the inverse of the value. I hate selfish people. Well then something about unselfishness is your value. So. So that sort of gets you to themes and that we're doing this at warp speed.

[Michael Chernow]

But wait real quick. I just want to touch on something because I think it's important to mention. So you say like, okay, I hate selfish people, but there's been so many people in the therapy world, right? Like it's like, okay, so the shadow part of that is like, well, the truth is you're probably selfish, right? So is that something that you consider in this process? Or like if someone proclaims something that they dislike about another person, is it them just like looking in the mirror?

[Robert Glaser]

If they did that, it probably wouldn't show up in the other answers and questions. Right? And so it wouldn't like they're all a little different, but they're designed to produce very similar responses. They're like, because tell me about an actual time when. So I can see that that's interesting. But I think more often, yeah, people could say that. But it does reflect something that really bothers them, right?

[Michael Chernow]

Yeah, like there's no way around that. Right.

[Robert Glaser]

Like if someone's self loathing and self hating, like that's probably a whole different. They probably aren't doing this work anymore. So, so you take the themes and then you start to validate whether it's the right theme. So the thing about my process, most core value things are just lists of keywords online. That's what I found. I think the core thing that makes this different and gets them into actionable is this process that I call the core validator. And the core validator is you have to take each of these themes through four questions. So the first question is. So I look at it and I'm like, okay, I've got like, like eight words here. And like there was this red theme. It seems to be about, I Liked biking for myself to school. I liked working on the project by myself. I didn't like when I was relying on a lot of other people. Like, these are the kind of answers that were there. So the first one is, could I. If I'm looking at this theme and I'm looking at some keywords with it, could I make a decision based on it? Right? Cause this is a decision made. I'm like, oh, well, yeah. So these seem to be very much about things that I can control and reliance. Like, okay, like I can make a decision on that. And then the second, you know, the second one is, does the opposite of it make you uncomfortable? Right. So this is the test of the theme. Because a lot of people get really clever about their words. That's which is the cart before the horse. Like, it doesn't matter if you name it really well and it's the wrong thing. So I can't stand super dependent trust fund baby. Like, you know, people are like, yeah, it drives me nuts. I even joked telling some of the story, like in my house, like, like I always say to my daughter and my wife, I'm like, you guys are good looking but terrible lookers. Like, they're like, I can't find something can you find. I'm like, did you look for it yourself before you asked me to look for it? Right. So just even on a small scale, I'm like, why would you ask me to look for it before you spend five minutes looking for it yourself if it's yours? Like, I just, I think I am the guy. Like, unless they I will drive myself home from the hospital. I don't see why I would ask someone else to drive me out from the hospital if I can drive myself home from the hospital. So. So that's true for me. So I'd be like, okay, I've got the right theme. So now the two questions on end of it again. Is it more than one word? It's sort of a phrase or something unique. And could I objectively rate myself on it? Could I say like, I'm doing this or I'm not? Like in a company that's got to be the test of core value. Could I put it on the performance review? So mine ended up being self reliance? Could I objectively rate myself on it? Like, am I doing a good job of like controlling what I can control and these things? Yes or no? So it sort of meets all those tests. So if you go through mine, if you go on long term orientation again, also meets all those tests. It's A phrase I can judge myself on it. The opposite of it. People who are like, oh dude, I fricking made a million dollars on the crypto bullshit token yesterday. It just makes my, like, that doesn't sound very useful for the world. And so that's the opposite. And again, could I make a decision on it? And you start to identify, like, for me, as I was still running my agency after co, I was always the guy to great, like president number two who would become the CEO. It was sort of the vision traction thing. And I was always working on the next year of our business. And he ran the current year, I worked on the next year. And this worked really well because I like figuring out what's around the corner. Hence my find a better way goal. And after Covid, like, and we had our board meetings, it was like, everything was chaos back and forth. I mean, I'll tell you this in the restaurant business, but we couldn't even plan like more than three months ahead. And so for me, living in triage mode is not fun. Like, and I could actually recognize that I'm really frustrated because like I cannot right now. I can't. No one gives shit about the long term. Like, it's like, what's going on? Are we going to be here in three months? And so I am forced into the short term. I am forced into all the stuff that I don't like doing. And so yes, I have to do it. And we all have to be out of alignment with our values, like at little times. But like you can recognize like this is not my desired state.

[Michael Chernow]

So the core values, how do they impact your like day to day life as a, as a husband and a father?

[Robert Glaser]

So interesting. On the family side, I went and I, I rethought about my business. I thought about myself particularly like health. And I've had like a couple health scares that kept reprioritizing that for me and making it more clear of like why it was on the list. But the father thing was interesting because one of the things that I gave up. So I was a very add didn't like my learning never happened in a classroom, which I didn't realize until much later. Like, oh, I love to learn. I just was super bored with what everyone was teaching me. Like I learned stuff, stuff. So like back to school night I go every year for my kids and my wife. I'd sit there in this little tiny chair, I would pretend to pay attention. I would go to the next class and I'm like, I know this is supposed to be A good parent. But like I'm just, I stopped going. My wife liked it. I'm like, you go, I am good with my kids around those core value things around ropes courses and let's go work on a project together. And it's about getting better and self reliance or your health. Like I, I kind of gave myself permission to stop doing the checkbox things as a dad that I didn't. So I never went to another. I was so much happier not going to these teachers nights. Like my wife likes meeting the teachers and I'm sitting there in class and that 15 minutes of listening to the same presentation and I'm like, I just, I'm not even in the room. Like I'm not paying attention. So I thought about it and when I think about family, when I think about goals, all of my goals are really set to my values. I actually thought I was a good goal setter and I realized I wasn't because I would pick one year goals, I would hit them, I would pat myself on the back, great job. And then I'd be like, these are kind of all incongruous. Like what I really need is like five or ten year goals that kind of align to my values. And I'd say, look, this is really aligned to what I want and so when I get there, I'll be happy. And then that becomes my three year goal, my one year goal. And I sort of work backwards so that the things I'm. A lot of people climb a mountain, climb a goal and realize like, oh, like wrong mountain. That's like the worst feeling in the view. Or I really want a. You know, they tell me family is a goal. And I tell them it can't be a goal, it can be a priority. I mean a value, it can't be a priority. And they like want this vacation house. Like everyone when we do this goal setting exercise at work, everyone in theory wants like a beach or a mountain house. Right? Like, okay, so why do you want it? Be really honest with yourself. Why do you want it? Is it a trophy for your achievement or is it a place for your family to sort of gather or otherwise? Like if you can be super honest with yourself because I think for more people it's a trophy of achievement. Because if it really is a place for your family and to bring everyone together in community, then you really don't want to lose your family and be divorced in chasing this house. Right.

[Michael Chernow]

That, by the way, I just, we have to put a highlight on that. I really want to hear your opinion on that because of how where we are in the world right now, that I think is major and massive.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah, that. And the other thing in the world right now is we are intensely and younger kids intensely tribal. And what a tribe falling for tribalism is. You don't have any anchor or values like this team wants you and you join that team. And. And some of the stuff that people are supporting is so incongruous with who they say they are, which means that they have totally no sense of what they value. They have lost. I actually think it's the missing.

[Michael Chernow]

Because it's this side or that side.

[Robert Glaser]

It'S this side or that side. But you just were out at a thing saying, love all people, and now you're at a hate rally for these people. It can't make sense to you. And you must be living with this incongruity, and it must be really frustrating. Figure out right now you're afraid to say no to this team and that team. And these teams move really quickly. I think what a lot of think about politics, they just say the indefensible values cost you something. At the end of the day, you get no credit. When your values are your boat and the stream are going in the same direction, you're like, look, I'm living my values and everyone's doing the same thing. You know who gets a lot of credit? Jason Fried and David Hynemer Hanson from basecamp. Because in 2022, in the peak of political activism at work, and these are guys who have personal values of fairness and getting along and doing the opposite. You know, they never raised venture money. They were the first, like, remote work company. They were making tons of money with 30 people. They didn't care that they were bigger, like all the things. And politics starts creeping into their workplace and on their slack channels or whatever. And they're like, we don't want this. We'd rather quit than have a company. Because we think it actually makes people uncomfortable and things that they say that they don't mean. So they go. One day, they go. And this is before Elon Musk bought Twitter. And Twitter was used a lot as sort of the cancel vehicle at the time. So they go and they look, we are no more politics at work. We're gonna build great software and you can be political and we can tell you what to do, but we're just. Just not on the company channels. We're not doing it work. Twitter went after them, like, trying to cancel the company. You guys will be on the wrong side of history. You know, they offered, if people didn't like that, they'd give them a package. 30% of the company left and everyone is in there like, are we going to survive? Like, but they were like, we would rather not survive than do something that we really don't believe in. Two weeks later, there's a lot of chirping and tweeting. There's not really any impact on their business. Suddenly resumes start pouring in, in, like for people that don't want politics at work, probably from both sides of the political aisle, but who don't want this in their workplace. Four years later, basecamp is record profits. Everyone's happy. Employees are engaged. People are calling them and being like, dude, we were so wrong. We jumped into this and it's a mess and our business is a mess. And so usually it's the right decision in the long term, but it usually has a cost in the short term.

[Michael Chernow]

So I think a few things that I want to touch on. One is I think it makes an enormous amount of sense for anybody now listening that is either about to launch a business or about to go into partnership with someone. Whether it's a relationship romantic or relationship business, it would be worth the exercise of trying to understand each other's core values and maybe taking the exercise right.

[Robert Glaser]

And if they're like this, I'd be really worried. You can, if these are like magnets, if you have like one point of friction where you know, you're a live for the short term and the other person's think of the long road. Like, you can work around that. If you have three or four, that's hard.

[Michael Chernow]

Well, I'll tell you a funny story. Before I opened up my first business, I said to my partner, Dan said, hey, dude, I think it would be great if you and I took like a real trip together. Like, let's just go on a five day trip and let's make it hard so that we have to kind of like fight to get through the trip. Right.

[Robert Glaser]

Like figure out a way you see people's true stripes.

[Michael Chernow]

Yeah. And so I said, let's go hike the presidential peaks in New Hampshire and Rhode island and. Or no, Maine and New Hampshire. And it was July, so I was thinking, oh, it'll be warm, you know, it'll be hard, but it'll be warm. Maybe some rain. So we got there and it was torrential downpour, sideways raining the whole trip and it was freezing temperatures. And we were ill prepared for it, although, I mean, we had good gear, but not that kind of gear. And before we got going, I said, you know, Dan, and this is my child. Like, we grew up together, right? Of course, you're best friends. You open up, you open up a business together.

[Robert Glaser]

What could go wrong?

[Michael Chernow]

So I said to him, I go, dan, really, at the end of this all, like, what is your ultimate goal? And he didn't flinch for a second. I want to be a billionaire. And I was like. And he was like, what's yours? I was like, I want to be married. House upstate, couple dogs, couple of kids. Super comfortable.

[Robert Glaser]

Build community around food or something like that.

[Michael Chernow]

Yeah, like, I just, like, I just want to be super comfortable married kid, you know, and now, to be fair, I was. This was 2010, I was married already, so I was married. You know, my wife was kind of at the height of her career, so, you know, we weren't having kids at that point. But like, I was young, I was married and I kind of knew that that was the trajectory. Dan, Fast and furious, hardcore chef. Like, he was like, I want to be a billionaire. And I should have known, right? Like a guy who wants to be a billionaire and a guy who just wants to be super stoked.

[Robert Glaser]

And that won't make him happy either. What that will make being a billionaire won't necessarily make him happy.

[Michael Chernow]

Yeah. But the truth is, is that he probably, if you asked him today, so he's changed a lot. And so we built his business together. It was crazy successful. He and I ended up exploding and I left. I sold a bunch of my equity at the company and he and I took four years off of talking to each other. It was terrible. It was gut wrenching. It was horrible. I lost my best friend. A business that was, that could have been an insane business. Now in 2019, I showed up at his door in LA and I was like, dude, I love you. Like, let's. Let's just end this.

[Robert Glaser]

It's ridiculous.

[Michael Chernow]

And so we've been best friends, you know, kind of ever since then, which is lucky.

[Robert Glaser]

But you know, who else was obsessed with being a billionaire? It's interesting was. Was Elizabeth Holmes. That's all she ever talked about, was being a billionaire. Right? And so that would became her. Now this is not your friend, but think about that. Became her orienting star. And when her technology didn't work, it was like, well, this is my goal. This is. You're not going to derail me, so I'm going to lie and we're going to cheat and this is what we're going to do.

[Michael Chernow]

Right? But. But yes, yes, totally. So but, but I guess the, the. What I'm trying to say is, is that I do think that a great first step for anyone looking to launch a business, even with like a C suite or a high level executive within the organization or something like that, it would be worth. Because I do think it would be worth everybody sort of understand core values and on a personal level, because I do think that no matter what you say, like, oh yeah, separate church and state, like the end of the day.

[Robert Glaser]

You will see where you're gonna fight and argue. You'll see where like, look, they don't have to match, but they kind of need to be in harmony. If they're polar opposites, you got a problem. But it also, when you fight it should tell you those things. I think back to the big three. I think people miss this in a relationship. My wife and I are very different hobbies, different interests. She reads no nonfiction, I read no fiction. But around the big things around our family, we're always on the same page around our kids. Like we never had a real. We're not like. And I didn't understand that in my 20s and 30s. I think people look to these superficial things of like, do we have, have the same activities or whatever versus like are we on the same page about the big things? And look the one in that big three people. And I think this will resonate with you. They forget about, I think the most maybe is community, because that matters a lot. If health has become important, if you have a health scare, if you stop drinking, you should not live in Newcastle, England, where they go to the bar at 3pm because you're either going to go and drink and you don't want to, or you're going to go and pretend to be enjoying it. You need to move to Park City where everyone is out and running about all this. So if you're someone who really believes in dying, there's a fake community in this book and you believe in dialogue and you're a real central. You like to hear opinions and you live in a town where it's like you are on this team or that team. That's not the right environment for you. It's kind of exhausting to be in a community that doesn't reflect what you want. Well.

[Michael Chernow]

So, okay, let's talk about like Ray Dalio, right? Like, so someone like Ray Dalio, he's very, very clear, right? Like, it is going to be hell working here. You are gonna. And if you don't enjoy hell yeah, leave, like he basically says. And I know Someone who worked for him for a long time. And she doesn't seem like the person that love, that enjoyed being in hell, but her hell was actually her happy place. Like, she needed someone to be like, yo.

[Robert Glaser]

There are attributes of that culture that match things that she was looking. The best thing you can be is honest. You know, who's good at this. Companies try to be everything to everyone, which sucks. I have two kids who've gone through colleges, and not that they're like, but like when you go to look at a college, I go to look at, like, I have a kid who wants to go look at like a big city school, like Michigan, right? It's not pretending to be Bates or Colby. It's like, here's our value prop. Here's the kid who loves it here. And by the way, Colby and Bates have a totally different proposition. And both of the people probably love their school and they'd probably hate the other school. So there's something she loved about that. She's something with an environment that was truly meritocracy. Or there's some that was high paid. Like, there was something that. What he calls hell, she was drawn to. But more leaders just need to be like, here's who I am. Here's where we are. We are not again, what we are thinking, what we are saying. Think about how great life would be if we are. You thought, and this is a Gandhi quote, he says in the context of happiness. But if what you thought, what you said and what you did were all aligned, like, I look that from a value standpoint. Like, if you're. If you're actually thinking something, you're saying it and you're doing it, you are aligned from a value standpoint.

[Michael Chernow]

Well, I just think that the craziest concept to actually understand is that one person's. One person's hell is another person's happy place.

[Robert Glaser]

Have you ever done this exercise at work where people list the stuff they hate doing and love doing and they just assume that everyone hates the same thing and then they find all these things that they can trade. Like, I hate washing. You know, someone hates. I'm like, I always take washing dishes at someone's house. I actually find it quiet and therapeutic. And people are always like, please let me. I'm like, actually, I like it. Let me wash the dishes. You know, just how life works.

[Michael Chernow]

But it's just so crazy, right? That it's a very, very. It is a basic 101 concept. One person's hell is another person's happiness. And like the Secret sauce. I think in relationships in general, obviously, is communication. Right? Like, you gotta work. This is what we're talking about here. Right? This is what we're talking about.

[Robert Glaser]

And say what you mean and mean what you say. And then let the person determine whether that's something that they would like to be part of. Right?

[Michael Chernow]

Well, I think it's.

[Robert Glaser]

Yes.

[Michael Chernow]

And like, you turn all the cards up, right? You turn all the cards up from the get go. And then when something starts to feel a little hairy, a little itchy, a little painful, you, like, turn the cards back up and you say, well, no, look, here's the thing. I think one of the hardest things, and by the way, I am 100% an absolute culprit of this. It's hard in the heat of the moment to put yourself, even if you know that his or her happiness is your hell.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah.

[Michael Chernow]

Like, my wife loves, loves doing the laundry and vacuuming. Like, she finds joy in that.

[Robert Glaser]

She might. It's crowded, quiet, it's solid. Right. She just.

[Michael Chernow]

It's therapeutic for her. She. It's not that, like, you know, it's just what she actually enjoys doing.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah. Maybe she hates the dishes, right?

[Michael Chernow]

She hates the dishes.

[Robert Glaser]

I love the dishes.

[Michael Chernow]

I absolutely love the dishes. So, like, that's like a very, very like minimal example. But I think that being able to pause, take a breath, put yourself in the other person's shoes for a minute, knowing. And that's impossible if you don't understand what grinds their gears or drives the ship. Right.

[Robert Glaser]

My wife and I have this part of the. I've done a lot with the why framework too, and I think it overlaps with values. I have a better way orientation and she has a right way orientation. And these are very dangerous sometimes. Like, the guy who teaches this told a story where they were planning their 10th anniversary and the right way person spent three weeks laying out all the plants. Funny, because we're planning our 25th trip, laying out all the plans and doing everything. And they get on the trip. And the better way person every day was like, well, could we move the reservation or could we do it early? And he's like, they came back kind of almost divorced. So we, like, we know this about each other and we use the word. She will be like, I've planned out the weekend. Please don't make it better. Like, I know this is what you do, but I need you not to do it right now. And I will be like, look, there is no right or wrong to this decision that you're driving your stuff over like just pick pizza or Chinese food. Like it's just, it's not gonna, it's not gonna make a difference. Or I'll be like, you are really frustrated about this because you're not sure which way is right. And like, you know, I get that but don't, don't take it out on me. So we're not to what you were saying. It's not a. She is not going to change me, I am not going to change her. But those moments of realization of like, hey, this is a real different orientation that each of us have and you could all invent context. This is one of these issues where it clashes and like I can take a step back and understand where it comes from.

[Michael Chernow]

Is it possible or have you experienced or have you witnessed or have you helped someone potentially change a deep rooted core value?

[Robert Glaser]

It's a really good point. And someone asked me, I think most of them are pretty hard baked. I think that ones that appear later on come from probably later life form. If you lose a kid or a partner or something, it may change your entire orientation. But I don't think the, I don't think it's about changing the course. So either something becomes a higher priority in your stack and they have a little higher or I don't think the goal isn't to change it. The goal is to under back to that Trust example after 30 years of learning how to sort things and trust and having that serve you really well and you are not unless you look, you know that like unless someone, you can't. They can change if they want to go through deep conscious change. But I don't think it's about changing. I think it's about. I am just, I have awareness of this now. I'm gonna pay attention to this now. Like, oh, like I am throwing this person. I'm, you know, maybe this person can be trusted and I'm just like jumping at it a little too early because I don't, I don't. The goal isn't to change who you are. Right. It's to not have a strength become a weakness. And I think that strengths overused become weaknesses.

[Michael Chernow]

Do you though believe. Because there are people and I think it's a. You're a product of your environment in some slash many cases. Right. So somebody's environment specifically in their childhood was that of like pain and suffering and abuse and pulling the wool over someone's eyes just to like survive. Right?

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah.

[Michael Chernow]

Like that obviously manifests later on in life for sure. So that someone is maybe they're not a bad person. They've come through a lot, but they've certainly, they have this deep rooted thing where it's like, hey man, if I see an opening, like I'm getting in there. And they don't like it. They don't like it.

[Robert Glaser]

But I think a lot of times what they actually, the pain develops the opposite rather than the same. And obviously we know about the cycle of violence and stuff. I think there's behavior and there's psychotic behavior and tendencies that we have. But if you actually go to the value. So someone who grew up, let's say in a household where they found extreme, they found out their dad was living like a double life, right? Like authenticity rather than being someone that lived a double life. And maybe they would like being authentic is probably something that they are now overcompensating for. And maybe they're this super authentic person. And it actually, you know, I have a friend who says that purpose and pain lie very close to each other. And I think like, we need to, we gotta respect that, that there's some amazing stuff that comes out of bad stuff, right? Oh, yeah. Like you're looking at one, you're looking at one. That situation where someone's like, look, I am gonna go out and drive authenticity in the world. Or, you know, there's a story in the book about, you know, this kid who grew up a single kid of a mom who worked two jobs and, you know, she was in all these after school programs and she was, she's really lonely. And so she went on to develop a world renowned after school program. And yeah, her mom did the best she could. It didn't change the reality that she was lonely, but she used that to go solve that problem for a lot of other people. So. Yes. Are there people that are going to repeat the cycle of violence? Yes, but I think more not when it comes down to actually the value. People tend to go the other way or something that they're trying to plug the hole for. And it's kind of a, again, if you don't do it too much. It's great to be trusting, right? It's a good thing to be a trusting person. But sorting the entire world binary into a trust can also cause problems for you.

[Michael Chernow]

Two things. One, I didn't know that I had this until I, until I actually listened to Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey. And he says in that book, he wrote, said whatever in that book, he's the kind of person that trusts you 100% out the gate and it's your job to keep it.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah.

[Michael Chernow]

There's other people.

[Robert Glaser]

And he's telling people that.

[Michael Chernow]

Yeah, there's the opposite of that. That trust no one and you have to earn it.

[Robert Glaser]

Right?

[Michael Chernow]

I am. Hey. And it's so interesting because I do come from a really, really funky upbringing. I trust 99% of the people out the gate.

[Robert Glaser]

Do you get burned for that a lot?

[Michael Chernow]

Yeah, well, I. Look, it's hard not to be somewhat judgmental, right? Like, obviously, if somebody's gonna walk into the room, you know, with like their pants around their ass and like, you know, one shoe on, I'm not gonna like, be like, yo, man, you know what I mean?

[Robert Glaser]

There's early warning signs.

[Michael Chernow]

Yeah. So. But like, in many cases, most cases, when it comes to friendship or, you know, I do my best when, you know, we're in a partner situation where, you know, my wife's friends with somebody, they're husband, like, you kind of gotta be putting that, you know. So I try my best to like, just give it there and like, it's their role to like, I kind of put the onus on them to keep it. And in business, in friendship, like, I do that. Right? Like, I am. I'm 100% on.

[Robert Glaser]

See, I think you have a core value. There's a couple of things you said. You have to tell me your four one word ones, but I think you have the rest. I think you have a core value of like, benefit of the doubt. And again, we could spend a lot of 1,000%.

[Michael Chernow]

Yes.

[Robert Glaser]

And if we looked into where that came from, I bet there's some interesting stuff. But then you have to be clear to people, look, I am benefit of the doubt. But, like, break that. And like, again, as you said before, I gave you the benefit of the doubt. I told you the rules, I told you what you needed to do and you didn't. You didn't do it. Right.

[Michael Chernow]

And that is also a big issue for me because I am a benefit of the doubt guy. But if you cross that, right, And.

[Robert Glaser]

I bet the problem for you is there were some people weren't clear about the rules or weren't clear about the stuff. And you think they're violating that principle and they're like, I didn't.

[Michael Chernow]

I think I need to do this process with you. But the one other thing that I did want to mention, Dan, what was it? It was. It was.

[Robert Glaser]

Oh, God, it was.

[Michael Chernow]

So this has been such a fun.

[Robert Glaser]

Conversation, but let's just go back to that while you're thinking with that sort of wording, Benefit of the Doubt versus whatever your one word thing was. If you are thinking about that in situations, thinking about a decision that is going. That is a phrase that covers all four of those things, you know what it is. You can judge yourself on it. I think if you be curious in the next week, follow up with me. And you're like, oh, actually I had three or four situations where, like, benefit of the doubt. I was like, that's a. You know, it's more helpful than something like choices or judgment or trust or something like that. Totally.

[Michael Chernow]

Yeah. I'm gonna. Like what I've always, like a little bit like a little. Little note. Little sticky. Sticky note that I. That I been putting on my right side of my brain recently is just turning the volume up on the awareness barometer just a little bit. Right. Like when I hear something, when I see something, when I experience something, you know, it's not one. If I open up a book and it says on the first page that this book is going to change my life. Like, I'm like, okay.

[Robert Glaser]

But that's actually part of Benefit of the Doubt. If you think about it, where what I'm hearing you say is it's not something you automatically grant. You need enough information to award it. And then when you award it, it's like a marker and it's in place.

[Michael Chernow]

And I feel like, because I was just going to say before you said that there are. There is a. There is a little bit of a hurdle.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah.

[Michael Chernow]

Before I grant the benefit of a doubt.

[Robert Glaser]

Correct.

[Michael Chernow]

100%.

[Robert Glaser]

Right. So you're not throwing it around.

[Michael Chernow]

I'm not like, yes. Right. And.

[Robert Glaser]

But you feel really crappy if you've done that little research, done it and then it's violated.

[Michael Chernow]

Yes. And it's so hard for me to come back to it.

[Robert Glaser]

Right.

[Michael Chernow]

So hard for me to. It's so, so, so hard. And my wife. Wife. My wife hates that about me. She hates that about me. I'm also a. Like, I'm going to. I want to do it better. I'm. I'm a. Better than. More than a. Right then.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah. And it's exhausting. Better way.

[Michael Chernow]

Yeah.

[Robert Glaser]

Better way for you. For other people. It's. It's a constant. Often. Please. Never satisfied is the.

[Michael Chernow]

I can't. Like, if we're traveling. Like, I'm not going to. Like, like, if you're in Naples, like, I'm not going to the pizzeria. I'm going to the best pizza in the world.

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah.

[Michael Chernow]

And we are gonna find It. And she hates that.

[Robert Glaser]

Hates it.

[Michael Chernow]

She's like, can't we just have the pizza? We're in Naples. It's the right thing to do. You have the pizza in Naples. And I'm like, yeah, but there's like.

[Robert Glaser]

I'm going there shortly, so tell me if you found it.

[Michael Chernow]

I have. I have. There's Damu, Kele and Di Matteo. Domichele and Di Matteo. Those are the two.

[Robert Glaser]

Try slice from each.

[Michael Chernow]

Slice from each and every. And they are different, but they're bomb. You got it. Are you going to Naples?

[Robert Glaser]

Where else are you going? Yeah, we're going for our anniversary trip.

[Michael Chernow]

Amazing.

[Robert Glaser]

The one we're trying not to get divorced on from my story before.

[Michael Chernow]

I forgot. What, that second one. But, dude, I am so. This was so much fun, and I can't wait to finish that book because obviously there's gonna be a big reveal. I'm assuming there's something really great at the end of the book.

[Robert Glaser]

There's some changes in his life at the end.

[Michael Chernow]

Yeah. I mean, it was sad for me to see sort of how excited he was in the beginning of getting that gig and the promotion and working so well with his boss.

[Robert Glaser]

It was you. It was you. That was some job you had.

[Michael Chernow]

It just felt so good. I was feeling so good.

[Robert Glaser]

You remember being 20 and before you learned about how crappy most cultures were.

[Michael Chernow]

Yeah, it was just like. It was so relatable. It just felt. I was just like, yes, yes, yes. Because it's, like, nice to be able to see a smart person, like, showing up and, like, having a mentor like that they love and then crashing and burning when the. You know, when the guy shows up. That is just the wrong. You know. Anyway, I can't wait to get through the rest of the book. And literally, this was such a fun combo. I try to include some habits in here, but, you know, the way this flowed, I just think, like, you're an expert in core values, and you're an incredible author and you've done a lot. I mean, you do a lot of things. So I think, you know, so anybody that is listening to watching whatever they're doing, definitely. Oh, the book comes out in October, right?

[Robert Glaser]

Yeah, October 14th.

[Michael Chernow]

You can pre buy it on.

[Robert Glaser]

You can pre buy it. And if you go. It's on every site, but if you go to compass-within.com, there's a form just you pre buy it and put in the order receipt, and we'll send you the course, which is normally like 100 bucks. And the course will walk you through it all when it launches. So buy the book, get the course if you pre order it.

[Michael Chernow]

Cool. And people can follow. Robert Glaser like where do you spend most of your time?

[Robert Glaser]

Robert glaser.com Most of my time is on substack. I've got a substack called Friday Forward, which is actually my keystone habit. If you had answered that question. Where I started this little newsletter almost 500 weeks ago and just doing that every week has definitely been like a keystone habit for me. It improved kind of other habits.

[Michael Chernow]

You know what I love about that is that. So I've been writing a newsletter to the Creatures of Habit community for the last 172 weeks. And so I've got a hundred. And probably, I probably have. I try never to make it more than a page, but I probably have about close to 200 pages now. And that is ultimately going to be transcribed into my book.

[Robert Glaser]

It's your book. Awesome. So yeah, Robert glaser.com is the book, the podcast, the Friday 4 newsletter. I'd be happy to hear from anyone. And you're going to send me the four. We're going to solve your core values and you'll share it with the community. Community.

[Michael Chernow]

Thank you so much for coming, man.

[Robert Glaser]

Thanks for having me.

[Michael Chernow]

Super fun, super inspiring combo. I know that you all got as much as I did. I mean, I like, you know, when I'm sitting here and I'm like so engaged, I like can't even hold on to the, to the question that I have. It's just like, you know, I know that that is buzzing through your headphones right now or you're potentially watching this on YouTube or in your car or on a walk on a Saturday morning, which would be awesome. I ask for one thing from you all when it comes to the rent for listening to the podcast, share it with a friend. That's it. That's it. It's the only rent I ask you to pay. I don't do ads on this thing. I don't stop. You know. You know, I really, this is. The creatures have a podcast. We talk about really awesome habits that people might have, but we also bring on experts to talk about really interesting topics that they've spent a good portion of their life really digging into. And it was so much fun getting to sit down with Robert to talk about this core value thing. He spent a lot of his time obviously focused on this and really uncovering and unearthing some things that you probably think about or have thought about and potentially stuffed under the rug. This would be a good time to think about potentially bringing up that. That term that you typically hear in corporate offices about core values, bringing it into your life. I know. I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna take another stab at the core value thing, maybe elaborate and elevate my four singular words that a lot of people think about when they think of core value. So share the podcast with a friend. Share it with your family. Send it to your mom, your dad, your uncle, your brother, your cousin. Grandma probably would appreciate it. Send it to an enemy. Bury the hatchet with this one. This could be a good bury the hatchet podcast. This would actually bring a smile to most people's faces. And if you're feeling super generous, super duper generous, give us a five star rating, write a review. It really does help the podcast grow. I appreciate you guys. I love you guys. Thank you for tuning in. Until the next one, y'. All, Peace.