Year End, Annual Review Season and THE Ohio State Disappointment

Ever found yourself caught between holiday parties and year-end reports, trying to balance the chaos of personal life with professional duties? That’s where we kick off this episode of Jaded HR! We’re celebrating our podcast achievements, reminiscing on memorable episodes, and sharing personal stories like my new “cool HR” title earned during a night out in Philadelphia. Plus, dive into some family fun with tales of brewing beer with my son, who’s back home for winter break. Join us as we embrace the festive frenzy while planning for an exciting 2025 filled with fresh content and even more candid conversations.

In the realm of performance reviews, we’re shaking things up by ditching traditional numerical ratings in favor of real-time, narrative feedback. Our engineering company is all about fostering open communication and transparency, which has helped create a drama-free environment. We’ll share insights and potential improvements to this system, like revisions to feedback, as our team grows. It’s all about keeping things fair and straightforward while encouraging fruitful dialogues between managers and employees, ensuring everyone’s on the same page.

Switching gears to a hot topic in HR, we’re unraveling the recent salary rollercoaster at Ohio State University. After a Texas judge halted a planned salary threshold increase, Ohio State reversed pay raises, leaving many employees financially strained and sparking potential legal battles. We’ll compare how our company approached these regulatory uncertainties with caution, sharing strategies to navigate such changes while maintaining employee morale. To sprinkle some humor on this serious topic, I’ll recount a funny personal anecdote about using new slang, reminding us all of the generational learning curve we frequently encounter.

Chapters

• 0:02 HR Podcast Highlight Review Process
• 8:31 Performance Review Process Reflections
• 19:03 Salary Changes at Ohio State
• 29:27 Ohio State University Pay Cut

Transcript

Andrew Quilpa: 0:02

Had you actually read the email, you would know that the podcast you are about to listen to could contain explicit language and offensive content. These HR experts' views are not representative of their past, present or future employers. If you have ever heard my manager is unfair to me. I need you to reset my HR portal password, or Can I write up my employee for crying too much? Welcome to our little safe zone. Welcome to Jaded HR.

Warren: 0:45

Welcome to Jaded HR, the podcast by two HR professionals who want to help you get through the workday by saying everything you're thinking, but say it out loud. I'm Warren.

Cee Cee: 0:54

I'm Cee Cee.

Warren: 0:57

All righty, we're experiencing some fun technical issues and it's going to be weird, as I like getting your facial reactions and expressions as we discuss this. So, now that we're limited to bandwidth or whatever's going on, it'll be interesting, but we will persevere. This is blind reaction Before we get. Yeah, blind reaction. So our podcast host the company that hosts we pay to play our podcasts online is Buzzsprout and they came out with their. You know, everybody got their little things from their podcast players and their music apps and things of how much you listened and stuff like that.

Warren: 1:38

So, as a podcast producer, we got our stats for 2024. And it was some pretty interesting things. We were discussing that. Of our top episodes, the number two episode for 2024 was emotional intelligence, hr's new jedi mind trick where, uh, your hubby kevin was our co-host and, yeah, the other, the number one, and he I think that was in in June when he did that. But the number one and I don't know numbers with us was job deal breakers and that was one that was we recorded like back in February.

Warren: 2:14

So it had a lot more time to get the, the extra downloads because, you know, just had more time. Yeah, we, we had some good we're, you know, nationwide if you go to listen notes we are in the top five percent of all uh podcasts listened to. Now my coffee when he was on uh spoiled the thing that if you've done more than like 10 episodes you you're probably going to be in the top five percent, but anyways. But for our podcast hosts, we're in the top 25% of all the podcast downloads at least for downloads in the first seven days after releasing.

Warren: 2:51

So we're in the top 25% there and we had some good stats for the year. So looking forward to a really good 2025. And, like I mentioned last time, we have idea for, uh, another thing that'll be interesting. So, yeah, keep keep listening, keep telling your friends and, excuse me, help us keep keep growing. So, yay, and speaking of keeping growing, thank you to our patreon supporters hallie, the original jaded hr, rock star bill and mike. So thank you very Yay, we'll get them their things out of the way, so, yay. So what has been going? It's been a couple weeks since we last recorded what's going on in your world.

Cee Cee: 3:31

I don't know. We are entering that weird time that is between, I don't know, like the holidays are coming up, so I feel like this is the week where, when I hear any like calendar notification go off, it better be either rescheduling or canceling, but do not add to anything this week, because this is. I feel like this is the last working week of the new year before everyone tends to start checking out next week. So just let, let me get through this week, let me get my stuff done, and it has to wait until January 2nd, otherwise.

Warren: 4:15

Exactly, it's crazy. I was telling you off air. It's just been crazy, crazy for me. Personal life, work life, all the Christmas stuff going on, just a lot of crazy stuff. I only went to one of my company's holiday parties.

Warren: 4:34

I went to the one in Philly this year. I had to tend to my mommy, who's being a pain in the ass to me, but I had to take care of her for a week so I didn't get to go to my my local offices Christmas party, but still had a good time doing that. I was Sony off there. I got labeled as cool HR finally. So by far and away I'm the oldest person. We did our Philly Christmas party. We went out for an after party and we went to a dance club in Philly where I was by far and away the oldest one there by 15 years, probably very easily, but I had a good time with it. And then I don't know the names of any of these places right now and then we all walked over to the oldest bar in Philadelphia from like the 1860s or something like that. We went there, hung out there for a little while before calling it a night. But yeah, I had a good old time. So I got. I got officially labeled cool HR, so now I got to live up there at reputation, I guess. Anyways, that was a lot of fun. I've got to my son's home for the winter break, so that's been. That's been fun and interesting. He's been helping me with my hobby of brewing beer lately so we're coming up with some recipes to brew while he's home. And, yeah, I've been applying to internships with him and trying to work with him on those internships. So we will see Love it.

Warren: 6:03

But professionally you were talking you're in the same review process and annual increase process we're in and oh man, it's such a headache it is. And when people don't do the simple things they're supposed to do like, for example, a bandit juror is supposed to contact HR and say, hey, I met with whomever, I'm going to meet with whomever, go ahead and release their review to them. That way they get their review to review before they meet with their manager and have the discussion and then they can have a good conversation about it. Well, yeah, I've got a couple of managers and they're stereotypical. If I know something a manager that's not going to do what they're supposed to do I can pretty much, without even looking at the data say it's this person, this person, this person, and yet those people are holding up the process and, like these people's, increases are effective January 4th, so you got to get talking to them, like yesterday.

Cee Cee: 7:00

So, anyways fun stuff with that. So you release annual evaluations to employees before the annual discussion.

Warren: 7:11

Yeah, interesting. So it's a three-step process and the employee does their review and then it goes to the manager. The manager does their review and they're supposed to incorporate some of the employee's comments and thoughts in their review and what the manager puts down. And then it goes to HR for holding until the manager says, okay, I'm ready to meet them because I'm with them and the manager will tell us and we release it to them, like the day before or theoretically the day before, so they have a chance to read it over, so they can be prepared for the discussion, and then they have their discussion. And, yeah, we've got a handful of managers, like I said, I could have named them six months ago who have not contacted me to release their reviews yet. And yeah, time is ticking.

Cee Cee: 8:03

That's interesting because we do I'll let you start the review because we do self-evaluation, manager evaluation, and then that gets put on hold because we go right into talent calibrations and then, once talent calibrations are done, we unhold it and then the managers have their conversations and then the manager releases after the conversation and I think, like I just care pros and cons to both. I always like the idea of like I don't I, by the way, there's no right or wrong but like I always feel that people don't like reading it first might be like some kind of I don't like reading it first.

Cee Cee: 8:45

Might be a like some kind of um, I don't know it's. It's harder to read tough feedback than it is to hear it. So to be in the conversation and to hear it without the defense or coming up with some kind of argument like let's have a conversation, be in the moment, don't think about what I'm about to say next, and then it's like a more in-time dialogue and then we'll release it after.

Warren: 9:09

So I completely get that and that was a discussion when we had, when we decided to do it this way. We don't have a lot of you know, I've mentioned before I work for an engineering company there's not a lot of drama, there's not a lot of angst and things like that, but so it's all pretty cut and dry and I dare I say I have most of the managers trained pretty well about real-time feedback In the manager training. I say a million times the final review should be extremely anticlimactic. You've had these things. You say, okay, warren, we discussed this, this, this, you've done this, you've done that, you've improved here. You need some work here. Da, da, da, da, da. And it should be just a recap of everything you've said through the years. So it should be really quick and easy. Now, does that happen all the time? No, but we're getting kind of good at it. We're not there. We're getting kind of good at it.

Warren: 10:09

But also with our reviews, we don't have any rating systems, we don't have stars, we don't have scales of one to 10 or anything like that. It's all narrative review. So you cut out the angst of oh, I gave myself a 10 out of 10 and my manager only gave me a seven out of 10. When they mean the same things. It's just, you know, when you give them the review, you know a rating, you know people are going to rate themselves really high, you know. And the manager may not have that same thing. So it's all narrative based, which means it's highly subjective. But once again to manager training. You know you stick on the topics and we don't have any sort of forced rating at all. If the manager feels like his entire team deserves the highest level race, then they can do that. Or, you know, if they want a single hey, warren, you screwed the pooch too many times this year. You're hanging on by a thread, whatever it is they want to say. They have a lot of discretion towards that, but we don't have those type of issues, knock on wood. So it works for us. But once again, also, on top of everything, we're only 170-ish employees, so it's pretty easy to do. So it's I like the system. Now, if we got up to hundreds of employees, we might have to rethink it, because you know every single review is a an opportunity for something to go very wrong in this, this model. But for now, where we are, it works.

Warren: 11:43

I like it overall. I like it. It could. Um, okay, I start the.

Warren: 11:49

I have a document at Google doc that I, from the moment I launched the reviews. It's called the. You know, in this case, 2024 review post-mortem. So I've already. This is what we can do better. This is what I can do better. This is how I, what you know. I want to change it for next year little tweaks and things like that. So, and along the way, I work with my assistant, like any ideas you have for you know, some improvement.

Warren: 12:12

You know, once you launch these reviews, unfortunately they're out.

Warren: 12:16

They're out in the world and you, you can't call them back, even if a manager says something they shouldn't say or they want to go back and they thought they submitted it and they want to go back and they go. Oh, I should have said this. So that's something I'll try and incorporate next year a place where we can send it back to managers or even employees. I've had employees say, oh, I wanted to say this in my review. I said, well, just write it down and save it for your discussion and things like that. So there's some improvements to be done, but it works. It's unique, it's different, but I think if we were in an environment that was more dramatics and more I don't know what the word is just, yeah, drama. And, like I said, overall the managers followed their direction fairly well. You know, I was complaining about the ones I know that I can name without even looking at the data, who hasn't told us to release theirs yet. And they're not bad managers, they just get caught up in their own little world.

Warren: 13:15

I guess more than anything else. They just need a little push every once in a while to get them there where we want them. So it they do pretty well, I guess. But yeah, if it grew to three, four hundred, five hundred employees, this, this process would be really, really tough to do in and you go too big. I think subjectivity becomes more of a burden than it is now, because and I've I've only had one person really argue come back to me and argue about their review once and I was like well, I don't manage you, but I can see absolutely everything this manager is saying. That was what I wanted to say. I said what I did say is this is a discussion for you and your manager, and if you don't feel it's fair, discuss that with them and say, hey, I don't like this because X.

Cee Cee: 14:06

Y Z.

Warren: 14:07

But if the employee goes in open-minded and even one employee did come to me this year, even, and this, what sort of ideas? They came to me asking for help, how to, how, to you know, improve on this? And I'm like these are, these are technical items and I am not an engineer, I am not, you know, is there training you need or want, or is there any sort of developmental programs? I said that's what HR can help with, but these look like really granular, hands-on items that you're probably going to to work with their manager. Yeah, more, and I didn't manager on, because I, you know you can put all these acronyms and jargon in there and it's just to do to me I, I think, like I'm always curious about how people do performance reviews at their organization, because we're in the middle of ours right now.

Cee Cee: 15:00

So so, like I like the company about 7000 employees, so we have like, yeah, we can't we? We actually, when I first started there, it was one of my big projects was like to revamp our system and what was? The idea of getting rid of ratings altogether was thrown on the table and I did some, like you know, research just to kind of see what people were doing out there and I was our size. That kind of sounds like a nightmare. No, so we, it was a compromise 7000 people.

Cee Cee: 15:32

Yeah, and it was a compromise of we were at a five rate, like a five scale, but we went down to three scale and I would say about 90 percent of the company likes it and we don't like. It's not numeric, so it's it's either outstanding, achieving or needs improvement. But, I'm sorry, needs development. But yeah, like like 90 percent of the people like it. I think we have a small, a very small amount of people who don't like that. Achieving is like broader, so to speak, but then again the other like whatever, 8% don't care, but for the most part the three works for us pretty well.

Andrew Quilpa: 16:21

So but yeah, it's just an organization, yeah.

Warren: 16:25

Well I say we don't have a rating structure. We do have one overall rating that you can give yourself and it's directly tied to your annual bonus. Okay, outstanding, there is no below meeting expectations, because a manager should. This is part of our management training. You should be managing up or managing out your people who are not meeting expectations as a manager, so we don't have anything If they're not meeting expectations.

Warren: 17:02

You should be working with HR and either developing a performance improvement plan, working with HR, and either developing a performance improvement plan which, no, the goal of an performance improvement plan is not to get you out the door necessarily, it's that we want to improve your performance. I mean every state and at will, state pretty much other than Montana and you can say you know what, warren, this just isn't working, you're not meeting our goals, bye-bye, and you don't really even have to say that, just say we're done. But when you go through the process, I mean doing a well-thought-out, legitimate performance improvement plan is real work. It's work for HR, it's work for the manager and it's work for the employee who's receiving it. So it's not something that's going.

Warren: 17:42

If I want to get rid of someone, let's just get rid of them. Don't play the stupid games. Give them a performance improvement plan that are going to in designed to fail. That's I, I, that's what you see online with these wonderful people on tick tock or wherever. Oh, if they you get a performance improvement plan, you're trying to get fired. I've told the story.

Warren: 18:01

Before I worked somewhere we had a long time employee. He was employed the year, like many, many moons ago, and his performance continued to go down, down, down. And he said to me directly that performance improvement plan is exactly what I needed. He said I became complacent, I became lazy, I just wasn't applying myself and that gave me what I needed. And, honestly, that's what a good performance improvement not saying because I did an awesome job or anything, it was all on him but that's what a good performance improvement plan is you set them up for success, not failure with it. Anyways, interesting.

Cee Cee: 18:53

Long, long talk on that. We've talked about this before. There's a lot of real bad advice on there for Gen Zers on TikTok and stuff, so you know.

Warren: 19:03

Oh, what's the new term I saw today? You know how they're, you know quite quitting, oh, rage, rage, staying. What is it? Oh gosh, there's a new term I saw, saw today where you're staying to be unhappy.

Cee Cee: 19:19

I'm like really, you're staying out of spite out of spite, I don't know.

Warren: 19:24

Well, carry your ass out. I mean, it's probably because kids, they're growing up just a little bit. They've moved out of mommy's basement and they have to pay the rent. Oh shit, I hate this job, but I got to pay my rent, I got to pay my car payment and things like that. I forget. I forget what it is Rage something.

Cee Cee: 19:42

Wait, there's a word for that. I didn't know we were labeling that because I've been experiencing that for years, just actually really do like my job and I really do like my company. But I'm just as a joke, but that's funny.

Warren: 20:00

We have to label everything and make it trendy. Yeah, exactly, I didn't even click on the full article. But well, speaking of full articles, our little topic for today is what's going on at the Ohio State University, right?

Cee Cee: 20:13

now, so just a full. I am usually a hair flip, a fun HR. I don't really get to have so much fun doing deep dives into these kind of topics, so I am excited to hear from your perspective of what is going on.

Warren: 20:33

Well, so everybody was preparing for the salary minimum salary increase that was supposed to take effect in January 1. And even in my company we had a few people who would have been below that salary threshold, and I don't recall what that number is anymore. I think it was like $55,000 or something like that.

Cee Cee: 20:55

So if someone theoretically was like under that salary threshold, then they would no longer be non-exempt. No, they would no longer be exempt, they would be non-exempt.

Warren: 21:05

Right, okay, and I'm not going to be able to find this, but last month a Texas judge threw it out and said no, the salary requirement is not going to be put into place. It was thrown it out. Well, some companies, including the Ohio State University, decided that they were going to go ahead and fix people's salaries and they gave increases back in November, anticipation, not knowing that this judge was going to throw it out of out. So all these happy employees I think it was something like 350, 400, I forget the number of employees got their increases to bring them up to the minimum threshold to remain exempt. And well, after the judge threw it out, what did Ohio State do? They reduced those people's salaries back again.

Warren: 21:58

But here's the thing they were so gracious. They told them they didn't have to repay the difference for a month and a half or whatever they were, and of course, this came from hr. So hr is getting the black eyes and you know hr had nothing to do with it. It was I don't know what you call it at a university, the board of uh trustees or something like that, that decided this information is. You know, hr is more the executor of plans versus the initiator of of things like this is I.

Cee Cee: 22:33

I would put money on it, hrs please don't do this, please don't yeah right like this is kind of the right, like that's so weird so all these people got raises and they were like happy little campers because they figured that they were like bumped up and that Ohio state was like just kidding, we don't have to do it anymore. So we're not going to do it.

Warren: 22:57

And that's pretty much what the email from HR read. Oh, they said they are going to, in accordance to the law that was just passed, that it wouldn't have to. They weren't going to do these raises any longer and actually I just found the the data.

Warren: 23:13

So the the current weekly salary is 844. Oh, excuse me, the current salary requirement is actually yeah, it is currently $844, but the judge who threw it out has it go to the pre-July 1, 2024 rate of $684 a week. It was going to be $1,028 a week or 50. I think that comes out to like $54,000, $55,000 a year. You're an HR. You can do the 20-80 math or the times 52 math on that to figure that out. So this was a significant increase for some people. And then to take it away and you know what I just thought about this. They're taking away people's money right before the holidays.

Warren: 24:00

And you're saying oh, look at me, it's a fat raise and I'm going to spoil my kids a little bit more. I'm going to spoil myself a little little bit more. I'm going to, you know, spoil myself a little bit more.

Andrew Quilpa: 24:10

You know treat yourself, treat yourself, treat yourself 2024.

Cee Cee: 24:15

Just kidding, oh my gosh.

Warren: 24:19

Well, adding insult to entry on this, I didn't read the article. I only saw the headline that the reducing of this taking away this pay and reducing these people's pay has disparate impact on minorities minorities. So I think we're going to see some lawsuits out of this, not based on the exemption level status, but taking away pay from there's a certain group. Minority groups were affected differently than other groups. So I think you're going to see a lot of fun out of this one. A lot of fun out of this one, but that I don't know. That's just so. If you've given the raise and the law changes back, you acted too early.

Warren: 25:08

A we at my company were looking at it. We only had, I think, five or six people that would fall below this, and we came up with a game plan for each of them. What we're going to do some would get increases, some wouldn't get increase or get increases to bring them above that, and some would not, and we'd make them non-exempt and we had a plan that worked in place and we were prepared to execute that plan on January 1. And that was what we were going to do, and you know. Then the judge backed out and you know how much well, I actually there was an article. It was going to cost several million dollars a year not tremendously a year to keep this in place. But yeah and then. Okay, here's the other thing I've seen all over social media. Well, you can pay your football coach this much and your basketball coach this much, but you can't play the players, and that's a whole farce of a situation because the booster club is floating most of these coaches' salaries versus the school.

Warren: 26:18

The school is paying them high salaries, no doubt about it. But if you have a coach making $10 million a year, the bulk of that's coming from the private organizations of the booster club, et cetera. So yeah, the coach is still making probably a million or more from the school, but not as much. Their money comes from multiple sources. As someone who follows that stuff online because A I'm an HR nerd and B I like sports and following that type of information as well- it's just disappointing because, there's something about that that seems so.

Cee Cee: 26:53

That's handled correctly. It seems so disingenuine. We're not giving you a raise because you deserve it. We're giving you a raise because the government's making us. But now that they're not making us, then never mind, you don't get it. If I was an employee of theirs that just got screwed like this, I would be looking for another job, Like 100%. I'd be like screw you guys, you jerks. I am fucking out of here. So congratulations to the Ohio State University for killing the culture in one foul swoop.

Warren: 27:30

Yeah, I'm going to keep my eye on this. I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't switch back. Oh, I'm sorry, we didn't think this out all the way through. Sort of like a Christmas vacation where he changes his mind from the jelly of the month club Okay, you'll get your bonus of last year and 10% or whatever he does to it. I wouldn't be surprised if and if, for nothing else, to keep their asses out of lawsuit house. Now you know, yeah, it'll cost him a couple million dollars a year to do that, but that's a whole lot less expensive than a discrimination lawsuit.

Cee Cee: 28:04

I'm curious about the disparate impact part, because it makes sense it does. I'm just curious about the ins and outs of it, of how that's coming about. And you're right, it could be major lawsuits. So I don't know.

Warren: 28:20

And now I admitted I didn't read the article. I'll have to find that article, maybe elaborate on it in the future. But yeah, I think there'll be an interesting story to follow going into the new year. And I mean, just think things out. Don't act, you know, just shooting from the hip up. We don't have to do this anymore. Let's take these people's money away.

Warren: 28:42

Okay, this is something we should probably have a discussion about. Weigh the pros and cons, and you know how is it going to affect our culture, our company, our morale, and it's also going to affect the morale of people who it didn't affect. You know, my best friend might be one of the managers or exempted-level employees who now has got a pay cut and you know that sucks. And now my work bestie is going to be out looking for another job and get a better job at I don't know another school somewhere. It's going to impact so many levels. And then applicants, are you going to want to apply to that? It's making national news. Everybody hears about it, I'm sure in the what are they in Columbus Ohio? I'm sure everybody in that area is talking about this.

Warren: 29:36

And oh hell, I'm not going to go work for a place that does this to their employees I'm just gonna say I bet you, michigan, didn't do this to their employees oh, a little rivalry that's for my friend emily oh, and speaking of throwing money out the window, the university and it's probably going to be picked up by the athletic boosters had to pay I forget how much $100,000, $200,000, a big amount for the fight they had after the end of the Michigan game. So you know. But once again, and that's probably just going to be one donor saying, oh, screw it, it was good, I'm going to, you know, pay, I'll give you the couple hundred thousand dollars just to get rid of this font. That's how things work in the booster world and things like that. So yeah, it's going to be very, very interesting. So yeah, the Ohio State, you really stepped in one here and, like I said, I'm not blaming the HR people there.

Warren: 30:39

I'm sure this was the equivalent of their C-level. I don't know if they come board of governors, board of trustees.

Cee Cee: 30:46

whatever it is, made this decision and HR just had to execute their decisions and this kind of goes back to those conversations where it's like, because people are like HR is not your friend, well, it's like we're not your enemy, and I guarantee you there is at least one or two HR people in that room giving their advice of like this is a very bad idea. Please don't Don't do this, and I guarantee you or I would like to think that they were advocating and unfortunately they were not part of the decision process.

Warren: 31:20

Can we table this discussion and think about it a little further before we take any rash actions? Maybe talk to some attorneys to see what exactly is going to, what our risks are here.

Cee Cee: 31:32

Well it's just you give someone a pile of money and then you take it away, like you don't put the genie back in the bottle. After that point, people have already no-transcript. Like no, they. People feel like they deserve the pay increase that they get. So when you then take it away from them like try taking candy away from a baby Like it's the same thing, like they've now adjusted their lifestyle it's hard to go back and I would be looking for another job. So and I can say that because, honestly, I did not go to college in the Midwest, so I went to college in South Florida and I got my master's in the Northeast. I have no skin in that game. But Ohio State University, the Ohio State University. You should be ashamed of yourself.

Warren: 32:46

Yeah, yeah, exactly. I think that's the title of our episode.

Cee Cee: 32:52

Call it.

Warren: 32:53

The Ohio State World Team.

Cee Cee: 32:55

It should be like the, the capital T-H-E disappointment.

Warren: 33:03

The disappointment, Okay, the disappointment, and you know you've got to think also, going from say someone was at the very bottom of that scale. They went from $800 a month to $1,100 a month, that's $300 a month.

Warren: 33:23

Some people might've done something like buy a new car and finances oh, I can get you know, you're probably getting not getting a brand new car, but you're getting a nice used car for for that type of money. And now they've made this commit financial commitment based on the school did. And now they've made this financial commitment based on the school did. And now they're going to be hurting.

Cee Cee: 33:43

You know, I didn't even think about that. Like $300 a month could be life changing. And if someone, let's say, upgraded their apartment, assigned a new lease in that amount of time with this new pay increase, with this new pay increase, and now all of a sudden, like, maybe they are paying like $100 a month, $200 a month more, which in the grand scheme of things Doesn't sound huge. But I mean, if they were, then their pay was cut and they can no longer afford to live in that apartment.

Warren: 34:15

Honestly, they're forced to find a new job Because that's what they've done?

Warren: 34:18

You signed that lease? Yeah, I would think at some point in my career. I mean, like I said, $1,100, it's $55,000 a year. I'm not going to do the full math here, but I remember once upon a time oh, I can't wait to make over $50,000 a year, but now the way inflation is, everything is gone. I mean, mortgage rates are ridiculously high, Interest rates on anything car loans anything is ridiculously high right now. $55,000 is not all that much, and that $100, $200, that's a big difference in these people's lives. So it's I don't know. It's going to be definitely worth watching what happens out of this.

Cee Cee: 35:11

I would hope that Ohio State changes their mind, because wow, it's not a cute look Not cute, not the mirror, as the kids are saying oh gosh, oh, I'll have to tell you offline.

Warren: 35:26

I learned some new slang this past week and I was telling my kids this and they were just cringing uh, with my new, my new slang.

Cee Cee: 35:37

So, anyway, okay, so I have to say this story because this is so funny and it's it's even funnier because it happened to someone else this week and now I have to share because I'm not the only person. Okay, so about, I want to say 10 years ago I was running a like a training. I was facilitating a professional development session for our college intern cohort and during that, like, we were talking about time management and how, like, you only have a finite amount of time during the day room for what matters like has the most impact, but then also what matters the most to you. So I kind of made people go through like and chart out like what are taking up space in their life. And someone wrote on there that was you know. I was like, oh, that's funny, I loved Netflix and Chell. So not knowing what Netflix, and Chell really meant.

Cee Cee: 36:31

And then, of course, as we're debriefing and going through it, people are saying I called it out and I said it, just like that, I'm like I do love a Netflix and Chell through it.

Cee Cee: 36:39

People were saying I called it out and I was. I said it, just like that, I'm like I do love a Netflix. So this whole room of like 20 somethings are like cracking up because I did not understand anything and I was like, oh, I'm, I'm cool, hr. So finally like oh, thankfully one of them stopped me after and was like hey, just let you know, like Netflix and shows, not what you think it is. And that was the day I started to feel like I was no longer a hip 22 year old and I was like it is happening, I'm not one of an old millennial, but it's funny because to someone I know this week and it was the same thing, and this individual is a little older than I am, so I would say like she's probably in her like early 50s, but anyway, she was just like she made the same mistake and I was cracking up and I'm like A kids are still using that term, hilarious and B I'm not the only one.

Warren: 37:47

Yeah, and see, I like, especially when my kids are around and I can embarrass them, I'll say something completely stupid. I would probably say to my kids hey, go home and Netflix and chill in front of their friends. Would probably say to my kids hey, you want to?

Warren: 38:01

go home and netflix and chill in front of their friends just get a real out of the kids and things like that. So I the beauty of all the mental abuse you can invoke on your kids. Oh, yeah, it's, it's, it's great. So, anyway, oh man. So we are not going to be recording in two weeks. I think we said our next week record, first week in January. So January 6th, 7th timeframe.

Warren: 38:29

So I want to wish all the wonderful listeners who made this awesome 2024 year great to come back on. I guess that means we publish January 9th-ish. I'm looking at a calendar so we'll see where that goes. We have some new plans which actually we need to talk about and see how we're going to execute these plans and things like that. So, oh yeah, it's going to be a lot of fun and yeah, so y'all have a happy holiday season. Whichever religion you choose, you can have a great one, and a happy new year and things like that. So come see us again in 2025. That I'll say. The voice artist at the beginning is Andrew Kolpa and the intro and outro music is Double the Double by the Underschool Orchestra. As always, I'm Warren.

Cee Cee: 39:21

I'm Cece.

Warren: 39:23

And we're here helping you survive HR one. What the fuck moment at a time.

Cee Cee: 39:28

See you on the other side 2025.

Warren: 39:33

Yes, alright, so oh.