Good Old Days: Recognizing When You're Living Your Best Work Life

Have you ever thought about whether you're experiencing the "good old days" of your career right now? That question frames this week's exploration of workplace dynamics, leadership expectations, and what makes HR professionals stay or leave their roles.

The conversation kicks off with Warren and CeeCee sharing the chaos of packed schedules and the surprising speed at which the year is passing. CeeCee reveals insights about her company's new podcast initiative focused on generative AI—highlighting how audio content has become a powerful learning delivery method that meets employees where they are. This innovative approach represents a shift in how companies engage their workforce and deliver professional development.

The hosts then dive into a hilariously awkward workplace situation at Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop headquarters, where bathroom etiquette became a company-wide conversation. This springboards into a deeper discussion about leadership communication styles and how executive behavior sets the tone for organizational culture. When leaders discourage even simple acknowledgments like "thanks" or discourage feedback, what message does that send?

At the heart of the episode is a thoughtful breakdown of "24 Reasons Why HR Quits," examining how HR professionals often face impossible expectations: fix toxic cultures without authority, implement changes without resources, and take the blame while receiving none of the credit. Warren and Cece offer candid perspectives on these challenges, sharing personal experiences that illustrate the very real frustrations HR faces when positioned as scapegoats rather than strategic partners.

The most poignant segment comes when both hosts reflect on their career journeys and realize they may be experiencing their "good old days" right now. This rare moment of professional contentment—working with brilliant colleagues, feeling valued and recognized, and doing meaningful work—stands in stark contrast to past experiences where effort went unacknowledged or where colleagues deliberately made work appear more difficult than it was.

Whether you're in HR or any professional role, this episode offers valuable perspective on recognizing and appreciating positive work environments, understanding what truly drives employee satisfaction, and knowing when you've found your professional home.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to Jaded HR
• 4:37 Podcast Launch and Work Communication
• 8:38 Patreon Shoutouts and Podcast Recommendations
• 16:27 Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop Office Bathroom Drama
• 22:44 24 Reasons Why HR Professionals Quit
• 37:33 The Good Old Days: Career Retrospectives
• 49:24 Recognition vs. Rice Krispie Treats

Transcript

Andew 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: 0:43

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.

CeeCee: 0:53

I'm Cece.

Warren: 0:54

Yay, we're just talking. It feels like it's been forever, but it's been our regular two weeks. I don't know why, it feels, like it's been so long since we last talked, but just so much going on in work in the world and everything else like that. It's just like and here we are. We're recording this on August 12th. It's the middle of August. The summer is pretty much done.

CeeCee: 1:20

I don't like it.

Warren: 1:21

I don't like it.

CeeCee: 1:23

I was telling Warren off air that my company does fiscal calendars and my manager reminded me yesterday. She's like oh yeah, some mid-year reviews are in September and I'm like September is a million years away and I was like, oh no, it's next month, so I got to get on it.

Warren: 1:39

Yeah, yeah, it's just so crazy how much time is flying in my just not keeping up with what the date is. We're having our financial advisors are coming to the office actually this Thursday and I forgot it was this Thursday and they were booking. You know you could do, through signupgeniuscom, a slot to go meet with them individually. They'll talk to you individually, no cost. We do that at least once a year. But the financial advisor you call them, they'll talk your ear off any, any day. But just Monday our slots filled up and somebody asked for more slots and it was like, oh yeah, I was thinking that we're having it on the 14th, the day this podcast launches, and I'm like, oh, that's so far away. And then, as I'm sending the email, I'm like, oh, that's this upcoming Thursday. And I'm like, sorry for the short notice, but can you add us a few more slots in these appointments? We have more people that want to participate in that. And they did. They were great. It's just wow.

CeeCee: 2:43

Time is crazy. That's crazy, I know. I'm just like. I just feel like this year has flown by so quickly. We're like close to 2026 and I'm very unsettled by that. Oh, why?

Warren: 2:53

Why would you be unsettled?

CeeCee: 2:56

It's just going so fast. Oh okay, it's going so fast.

Warren: 2:59

Bad happening in 2026. I put something on my personal calendar besides a doctor's appointment on in January of 26 already. I'm like it's crazy, Crazy.

CeeCee: 3:10

So I don't know about you, but this week I have appointment. I have an appointment every day this week. It's like either doctor's appointment for me, I have a checkup for the baby, and the cat has to go back for a recheck, because my, our cat was in the. My gosh, I didn't happen last week. Our cat was sick and we had to take her to the the vet, and she stayed overnight and that cost us like a thousand dollars and she ended up having a uti and oh my god. But anyway, like that's part of owning an animal, though, yes, what are you gonna do? But yeah, so like this week I'm just back to back to back, like trying to juggle work meetings, but then also like trying to sneak out of the house for a doctor's appointment. Trying, it's just. It's just a long weekend.

Warren: 3:53

Thankfully we don't have anything this weekend, so I like just want to sit in front of the cat, in front of the tv and veg on the couch I'm still waiting for that weekend for myself, but I I don't have that's not my this week is appointments, but September sometime I have a dentist appointment, a follow-up for my surgery appointment, and things like that. I'm just thinking how crazy everything is. And I'm actually going to go see my dermatologist again. Is why not? I've met my deductible and out-of-pocket max, so hey, let's go. Might as well go. Let's go to the dermatologist. I'm trying to get that appointment. She's so booked up though I'm basically going to be on the wait list for cancellation.

Warren: 4:34

But yeah, it's crazy out there.

CeeCee: 4:37

Crazy Other than that my podcast for work launched, oh yes, so that was exciting I'm doing for those who don't know I'm doing, I'm an L&D, so I work on the L&OD team, which is learning and org development, and we launched a podcast because my company is very into the use of generative AI and believes it is a skill that everyone should be well-versed in, no matter what role that you're in.

CeeCee: 5:02

So I'm doing a podcast on the best, like how to use it, and you know, every podcast my different guests is someone from the organization who's either a super user or, like you know, the chief CH I'm sorry, the chief, the head of IT, or who else like someone from council, but it's interesting conversations and we've never used that medium of you know learning and it's really well received. So, if no one has done it yet, I think it's a really good delivery method for learning, especially HR business partner. And she said she listened to my work podcast and then she was like it was very different from you know, and I started laughing because I was just like, yeah, I could imagine me showing to that podcast like I talk on here, like that would last for like two seconds.

Warren: 6:01

No F-bombs in the work. One Come on, we've got to spice that up.

CeeCee: 6:04

No F-bombs in the work. One, come on, we've got to spice that up.

Warren: 6:07

No F-bombs, oh man, so yeah, but that's really cool. I really admire when companies do things like yours, are doing that to further engage and meet the people where they are. And if they're because as I walk around our office, I would say more than half of the people have their earbuds in and many of them are listening to podcasts as I ask, hey, what you listening to? You know, I'm just curious what you're listening to. And there's like all sorts of podcasts that mainly, it seems, podcasts they're listening to. But they're listening to all sorts of the stuff and it's and they're multitasking, I mean it's, it's more probably noise in the background. They're still getting their work done. Just like I mentioned, I have Food Network on at home. Is my noise TV, my wife's?

Andew Quilpa: 6:57

is.

Warren: 6:57

Investigation. Discovery Channel is her white noise.

CeeCee: 7:00

I'm Gilmore.

Warren: 7:00

Girls, gilmore Girls, oh gosh. Aren't they bringing that back, or is there going to be? Like a special reunion or something along like that I think I saw on social media. I don't.

CeeCee: 7:14

This is just me being on my soapbox. Sometimes stories just need to end and we need to be okay with that. So I know they did the reboot in like 2016. It was great. I enjoyed it. We do not need another reboot. If anyone from the Amy Sherman Palladino camp is listening to this, I would be interested in an Emily Gilmore prequel series where we like focus on Emily when she meets Richard and all that that I might be interested in, but we're done with the story. Let it lie. We don't have to reboot everything and that is off my soapbox.

Warren: 7:49

Well, rebooting. You know how many times now have they rebooted Dexter and I'm actually, I will say this current Dexter resurrection I'm enjoying. For the most part it's better than the beginnings one, the origin one, when he was a kid. And so I'm enjoying it, but it's yeah, it's something else. Let's see. One thing I want to try and do going forward is get our thank yous early on, because so our Patreon supporters may not make it. You know, like 80% of our listeners make it through like 85% of the podcasts, and I think when they start hearing us wind it down.

Warren: 8:32

people are okay, Next click and things like that. So I want to put the shout outs to Hallie, the original Jaded HR rock star Michael and Bill for supporting us on Patreon. You can, too, just follow the show notes. It's very much appreciated. And also our thank you to the Underschool Orchestra for use of the theme song Devil the Devil and Andrew Kolpa who does the intro. So yeah, get those out of the way so people can get their recognition early on, before everybody starts hanging up on us.

CeeCee: 9:02

I'm going to start saying one crazy thing at the end of every episode, and you'll just have to listen to the end to hear it. And it could be anything, who knows?

Warren: 9:09

Now one podcast I listen to. It's one of my favorite podcasts. They end their official episode and then there's this like tone and then they go on the host they're talking about. It can be anything. We've talked about the Italian restaurant, they someone went to last week and they just it's, it's pretty good, sometimes it's related, sometimes it's just anything they talked about and it's like another five, ten minutes. I'd like that as well, but gosh, I was gonna say something else based on what you said. I forget squirrel, but anyways squirrel. Well, squirrel, but anyways Squirrel. That one. Well, I found two stories to discuss Disgust, disgust, oh, yes, anyways To discuss. The first one is from a site called she Knows and the author is Alice Kelly and this is from July 31st. And we've said any number of times you don't work in HR until you've dealt with poop.

CeeCee: 10:14

I know HR Besties says something about that Poop and porn.

Warren: 10:17

I think it was Jamie on HR.

CeeCee: 10:18

Besties has a poop story.

Warren: 10:22

If you're in HR and you don't have a poop story, you haven't earned your badges yet. That's true.

CeeCee: 10:27

By the way, really quick shout out to Jamie on the HR Besties, because if anyone hasn't heard or listened, first of all, they're fantastic, you should listen to them. Second of all, she has the most insane layoff story that I have ever heard. She's been laid off, she's looking for a new role, but it is a story of bad HR doing bad HR and there are bad actors out there and it makes me sad. But you know, if you, if you know of any really good HR roles, send them to HR Bestie Jamie.

Warren: 11:01

Yeah, you know I'm a couple of weeks behind on my podcast right now, but I did see on social media a clip of them talking about what had happened and it's mainly Leah and Jamie doing the talking in that clip. I was like really, but it's bad HR like that that gives the true HR professionals who are out there busting their butt and working hard. They're the ones who give it a bad name and especially spoiler alert or whatever you want to say if you're lying and falsifying, creating falsified documents or whatever you want to say to that. I was watching that clip. It must have been on Instagram or something. My jaw was just dropped like really, you know really yeah.

CeeCee: 11:50

So if you haven't checked them out, go check them out. She'll give you the whole story yeah, but here's the deal. If you check out their podcast and you like it, you still have to come back and still listen to our podcast.

Warren: 11:59

Yes, yes, absolutely, absolutely. And that's one thing I like about the podcast universe, because there's so many podcasts out there and I don't think you necessarily compete with other podcasts in which I went through my list and I unsubscribed from some podcasts. Now some of them are like the Hustle Work Environment podcast, which hasn't released an episode since 2022. And I guess Corporate Pizza Party hasn't released an episode in like six months and I took those off my list. I'll keep my eyes open to see if they do put anything else out. But a couple of others I've been adding them. I added your Stupid Op stupid opinion based on your recommendation right yeah, it's.

Warren: 12:47

It's quite funny. Now I know they've done some stories of locations in cincinnati. I'm waiting for them to do for us a location of somewhere I might be familiar with. They haven't done that quite yet, so I live okay.

CeeCee: 13:00

So for those of you who don't know, your stupid opinion is a podcast which is just that they read stupid opinions that people leave on reviews and I think it speaks to my love of and this is going to come off very jaded, but I used to run the what is it, the annual engagement surveys, and some of my favorite things was to go through the comment because A there's a lot of good stuff in there and there's also a lot of very unhinged things in there and people will say the most ridiculous stuff in there and it's confidential and we can't see who's leaving what comments, but it's a hoot just seeing what some people just leave uncensored.

CeeCee: 13:45

So if you're someone who loves a good engagement survey and loves reading comments on surveys, you should also go listen to that podcast. But I do live six minutes away from episode one where they talk about the worst Wendy's. It's right down the street. Oh, wow, yeah, anyway, it's right down the street.

Warren: 14:03

Oh, wow, yeah I.

CeeCee: 14:03

Anyway.

Warren: 14:05

I like it, and then their adult toy or whatever product that they do every week.

CeeCee: 14:10

The personal item of the week.

Warren: 14:11

Personal item of the week. Oh my gosh.

Warren: 14:14

There's been some where I'm like yeah, exactly none of this sounds enjoyable for anybody is that's an actual product and and a lot of them they're getting on amazon. They're not like going to some I know crazy snm online shop or something like that. They're, it's just amazon and I'm like, oh lordy. But yeah, sometimes I get bored is the only downside about that podcast. They go awfully long, like we do. They're starting to read so many comments and so I sort of yeah, okay, I got the gist of this place. Let's get to the personal item of the week, just to make myself cringe a little.

CeeCee: 14:54

So anyhow, Anyway, I'm sorry I derailed you.

Warren: 14:58

Oh no, no it was a great derailment, but anyways, Gwyneth Paltrow, she owns that company Goop. Ah yes, the poop, and that's notorious for some of their very special fragrances.

CeeCee: 15:11

Yes, yes, yes.

Warren: 15:12

Of their candles and such, but we won't get into that here. That can be saved for their personal item of the week. This article from she Knows apparently Goop has some potty problems at Goop and so apparently Gwyneth Paltrow sent an email to the entire staff. It says, quote found pee on a toilet seat at the office. Someone tinkled. Make sure to clean up after yourself. I'd appreciate it. And I'm just like yeah, that, oh, that was not an email, that was on the company's Slack channel, anyways.

CeeCee: 15:50

Was it from Gwyneth or was it from corporate communications that I need to know? We have our internal Slack, we have Slack and I'm just laughing because, like only certain people can do the all team channel and that's like corporate communications and stuff. But I'm like I'm wondering did it come from Gwyneth? Yes, Did it have like her name and her icon? And it was like please wipe up after your tinkles.

Warren: 16:15

If you tinkle and you sprinkle, be a sweetie, clean the CD Gosh anyways. But yeah, this is according to someone named Adele. She wrote a biography on working, I guess at Goop and Gwyneth Paltrow, and goes on, but anyways, she goes on to say that allegedly many who work excuse me, she goes about the behind the scenes of the company and things like allegedly many who quote work up the nerve to go into her office allegedly experience impatience of an attitude. Odell writes If an employee replied to one of her emails with thanks or on it, she'd tell them not to send those emails because they're a waste of time. So now I've heard I don't know if it was Steve Jobs or somebody else was that hate? And maybe it's no, I think it's. Bezos actually hates those emails. Yeah, I'm telling you what to do. Just get it done, don't you know? Give me okay.

CeeCee: 17:15

No, thank you.

CeeCee: 17:16

Yeah, no thank yous and things like that, but which is interesting because I will say one of like, early in my career, one of the first initiatives that like the team put out was this whole. What was it? It was like these certain things. So it was like end on the fives. So you didn't like you're being handed at like five till whatever. So you gave people a chance to like go to the bathroom or something. And the other one was don't reply all and you don't need to say thanks like we got it like. So you don't have to like even reply all and say thanks or this was great, or blah, blah, blah. It was just like mail, like just we're just gonna do it right, but honestly, like I miss a nice thank you you can send me. Also, you can just confirm that you got it Like. Oh, got it On it.

Warren: 18:04

Yeah, see, I like that. I like I don't. If my I have a whopping two employees under me and if I shoot them something to do and they don't reply, got it on it. I trust they're going to do it. So up to date, I don't have a reason not to. If situations changed and they gave me reason to say, hey, did you get that last email or something, then that'd be a thing. But I would say 99 plus percent of the time I just hey, can you knock this out for me real quick? And next thing, I know it's done before I get a thank you or anything like that. But sometimes they do. Yeah, I'll get that taken care of. Let's see here. Also in the book, odell writes, this hostile dynamic was subtle but damaging within the company and almost no one, the board included, was willing to tell her no. And that's a problem when you have people who are just too afraid to tell people no. I mean, is Gwyneth Paltrow that? I don't know.

CeeCee: 19:21

I don't know anything about her. I don't, whatever. This is just my personal perception. She seems insufferable, honestly, like she just has that. Like her and Katy Perry, they just kind of seem like women who drank too much of their own Kool-Aid and think a lot of themselves, like and that I mean just people in general women who drank too much of their own Kool-Aid and think a lot of themselves like, and that I mean just people in general like even.

CeeCee: 19:48

You know, I don't know why I said two women, but they just seem like two individuals who, like, just think very highly of themselves and I don't have patience for that in anybody, Like if you take yourself too seriously and you know your own biggest fan in a very egotistical way and assume that everyone else believes the same thing. I just don't have patience for that and that's what I feel about. I'm so sorry.

Warren: 20:07

No see, I don't know enough about Quinteth Paltrow. I don't either, but she doesn't seem like why would you? I'm trying to think of somebody who might intimidate me to the point of like, oh no, no, but if I'm working for you and you're hiring me to do a job, sometimes that job is to give you advice hey, let's load, let's hit the brakes here, let's rethink this, or are we sure we're doing it? This is what we want to be doing, and things like that. Or even just flat out, no. I had a long discussion about exempt versus non-exempt with a manager not that long ago, and of course, the manager wants them to be exempt. And I'm like no, and I was trying to tell them. I was giving them every opportunity to convince me and they never convinced me. I said no, this person's hourly, but they're going to be working a lot of overtime. Okay, well, they'll make a lot of overtime then. Good for them. Yeah, it's going to be working a lot of overtime. Okay, well, they'll make a lot of overtime then.

Warren: 21:01

Go for that, yeah, it's going to be a lot of travel involved. That's why they're going to have so much overtime. And I'm like you know you haven't convinced me and I'm not hard to convince and I like finding I'm comfortable working in some gray areas as long as I feel that my, my, I feel pretty strong. Okay, we're okay. You know it may not be absolutely perfect, but we're, we're okay and I think, being in a lot of leadership roles, you have to learn to accept some gray areas. But sometimes no is no, no means no. Sometimes I listen to weird podcasts I've never heard of before when he's on them and things like that and stuff like that. So just because he thinks differently and he does things differently and I like that, I like hearing his thoughts on things. I don't have to agree with him, I just like hearing his thoughts. Sometimes I was like dude, you're off base, but still, you know.

CeeCee: 22:18

He was my favorite on Shark Tank. Does that count? And he just still. You know he was my favorite on Shark Tank, Does that count?

Warren: 22:21

And he just retired from Shark Tank. He's not going to be doing it any longer. So yeah, and he's a fraternity brother of mine, but not the same college not the same mom.

CeeCee: 22:30

Yeah, you're saying.

Warren: 22:31

Not the same college, not the same year, I'm old but I'm not. Anyways, not going there, but anyways. So that was one story I had. The next story I had came to me from LinkedIn and the author's name is actually Warren Wang, like the WW name there, and he has 24 reasons why HR quits. So I want to go through this and hit these 24 things real quick. Get your thoughts and see if any spark any discussion there. Treat HR like a department, not a partner, and I don't under you know they treat it like a. I guess you know HR should be your partner in things.

CeeCee: 23:12

I guess is what they're saying.

Warren: 23:13

That's what they're saying yeah, I don't know, that's not a big deal.

CeeCee: 23:15

Yeah, like I get that. I'm not your order taker, I'm here to partner with you.

Warren: 23:19

Yeah, yeah Boy, reject their decisions in front of employees. Now that I don't know how frequently that happens. I don't think I've ever had that happen to me personally. No, I hope most people don't have that situation. Once again, I will have discussions with my bosses and give my opinion and sometimes I get told no, and I'm like you know. I made my opinion, thought known and you're you know you can take the action based on that or not based on that. So force HR to be the bad cop without support.

Andew Quilpa: 24:00

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Warren: 24:06

How many times does HR need to send an email that's directed by, or some form of communication or new policies forced by the C-suite that HR is like let's not do that, let's think of something else, let's try something else.

CeeCee: 24:18

Or even just like I don't know, like HR being the ones to always like we're, like always the scapegoats.

CeeCee: 24:25

It's always like oh, you know, we're firing people because of HR and it's like, well, no, like we don't make those decisions. So it's actually, you know, we are just kind of told what to do there. I mean, don't get me wrong, but there is probably some. If there's like a layoff or something, there's a lot of consultation. But I mean, it's not like we're walking around the halls being like you. I don't like how you look, Get out of here.

Warren: 24:48

Exactly.

Andew Quilpa: 24:49

You smiled funny.

Warren: 24:50

Get out of here, yeah, expect HR to fix what leadership won't address. Now I have not experienced that either. I hear it so often that you know HR has got to fix the culture problem. Culture seems to be the number one thing. You see that it's not something any one individual or any one department is going to fix. It's a team effort. It is Give them the authority, but give them no authority, but expect them to lead. And so far all these have a similar theme. You know, if you want to lead, you have to give some authority to you know, whip people back in line or get them otherwise motivated to that. Never back them up and wonder why they leave. We were discussing a few episodes ago that HR in corporate world has the highest turnover rate of any corporate function and I found that hard to believe. But you know, you did the research and found it. You know good old chat GPT says that is accurate. So you know that is accurate.

CeeCee: 26:02

So you know, according to my podcast episode that aired today, the best prompt is to ask it to source itself, so you can do your due diligence and check sources because it is wrong. So I hope you didn't believe those facts at face value, Warren.

Warren: 26:15

They came from you, though. So I believe. Of course I believe, but I use gemini, and almost always it has links that you can follow to figure out what and look at what they're citing as their source. But anyways, once again, similar theme put them in a spotlight and then leave them to fail. Too many projects, oh, hr is going to take on whatever the situation is and then have fun with that. We're not going to support you other than here it is Reward them with more work but no recognition. But I think that's anywhere you work. I don't think that's unique to HR.

CeeCee: 26:54

Yeah, there was just a video I saw today where it was like how to burn out your high performers in the way where they're like saying Absolutely. You know your high performers are going to get things done faster and quicker, but you're just going to pile on more work and then yeah, this one.

Warren: 27:10

I have some thoughts on Expect magic when no real resources are provided.

Andew Quilpa: 27:17

Hmm.

Warren: 27:17

So sometimes you get some nebulous marching orders of do this or find this or whatever it is, and that's all you're given and it's up to you to figure it out. You're not going to get a roadmap for every problem that comes your way and sometimes you know resources may be thin and you just have to figure things out on yourself, do things yourself, that you might not be in your comfort zone or anything, but I kind of like things like that. Just ooh, point me in a new direction and let me see.

Andew Quilpa: 27:56

I don't know.

Warren: 28:00

That's me. This is another one. Treat them like office admins, not strategic thinkers. And I think this one goes back to once again hiring those people. Oh, you were so good in our customer service department, you'll be a great HR manager. You're so good in doing whatever other function administrative function You'll be a great HR person. And I think that's why they get treated like admins and such. Yeah, overload them with admin tasks and not strategic focus. The exact same thing. So his 24 reasons list is not really 24 reasons.

Warren: 28:38

Once again covered this one to a degree. Give them zero budget but expect world-class talent yeah, but HR is. I've never worked anywhere that HR has been over budgeted. So but I think, once again you go, if you go to any department marketing, accounting, any of them they're going to say, yeah, we, we don't have enough budget, we want more. Everybody wants more. But I think HR probably gets the shoulder into the stick on that a lot. Make them fight for basic compliance like it's a favor. You know, like I mentioned earlier that conversation I had with exempt versus non-exempt.

CeeCee: 29:16

There's like it's black and white check, like it's kind of black and white guidelines, yeah, that kind of stuff. There's six factors.

Warren: 29:19

You have black and white check Like it's kind of black and white guidelines, yeah, that kind of stuff.

CeeCee: 29:22

There's six factors you have to look at. No.

Warren: 29:26

Yeah, let's see I'm going to try and skip some of these. There's some that are duplicates here. Expect them to heal toxic environments with no tools. We spoke about it earlier A toxic environment. If it's an environment problem, it's an everybody problem. If it's a toxic person, yeah, HR can deal with that.

CeeCee: 29:48

I don't know how you think about it, but yeah, it is an everybody problem, but I feel like it more so lies on leadership.

Warren: 29:54

Top management.

CeeCee: 29:55

Because people are learning it from somewhere and it's being the behaviors are being accepted by someone. So yeah, like I think the burden of that probably lands on, like, the top level. It does not land on HR.

Warren: 30:11

I absolutely agree. Well said, expect them to same thing. Expect them to fix burnout while rewarding overwork. I mean it's a no-brainer with that. Dump every office problem on them and walk away administrative type thing. Ignore every workplace issue until it's a full-blown crisis. You know early intervention like drug. You know the drug commercials from the 80s and 90s. Early intervention can prevent this If you address early.

Warren: 30:44

I use the example of one of my manager trainings telling about my point is to address problems earlier and I say you know, if an employee is doing A and you want them to do B, address it as soon as you notice the problem, because the longer you wait, the further A and B get from each other and there's a point where you can't fix it.

Warren: 31:03

You know there's so much time and money or resources or they've just been going the wrong direction for so long. And the employee? I bet they may, worst case scenario, they get their feelings hurt for a little while. But I think ultimately they'll appreciate being put on the right track and despite all you see about quite quitting and all this other stuff, I do not believe people come to work with the intention of doing a bad job and this is like the least jaded you're going to ever hear me. I think everybody comes to work trying to do the best they're capable of doing and sometimes to raise that capability they need a good management team or a good leader, mentor or something like that who can stretch their capabilities and grow them. So that's my little soapbox.

CeeCee: 31:49

I will say that some people are motivated a little differently than others. There's different levels of motivation to do their best. But I agree with you when you say no one wakes up in the morning and says I can't wait to suck at my job. Like I can't wait to cause issues for everybody, like I think so.

Warren: 32:08

Now causing issues? The drama kings and queens out there. I think some of them. I think they're looking. You know what are they? They twiddle their thumbs all night. Oh, yes, I'm going to create some drama at work.

Warren: 32:22

Anyways, change policies consistently, constantly and expect them to keep up. Cut their team, but increase their workload. Same as you know. Punish them for speaking up about uncomfortable truths. Blame them for bad hires, but never involve them in the hiring. Hires, but never involve them in the hiring. I had a situation we just were sending an offer yesterday to an employee. We've been working with them for months and from the word go, at the very beginning, zatar isn't getting involved. But we extend the offer and I'm talking to him about, okay, we accepted the offer. And then, okay, here's what's going to happen. You're been in, you know can't catch him, you know to follow up with him and anyways, long story short, he continued that trend. But as soon as he started being difficult, I was like I was telling the hiring manager. I said I got bad feelings about this guy. And then, yeah, we, we rescinded the offer, call them hr, but never give them a real seat at the table, the seat at the table, the seat at the table thing.

Warren: 33:43

The seat at the table Cliché you want to know something.

CeeCee: 33:45

That was like literally the first thing I learned in grad school.

Warren: 33:50

How to get a seat at the table.

CeeCee: 33:51

HR has to have a seat at the table.

Warren: 33:54

You know nobody, you know a couple semesters into grad school. Nobody's brought that up to me. Once again. The last two are, you know, similar to what's been covered before Demand, culture change without leadership actually changing and push toxic managers forward with the expectation and expect retention to improve. So yeah, some of those are good. I mean that could have been a top 10 list of reasons why HR quits?

CeeCee: 34:24

Honestly, there were some things that were like a little repetitive.

Warren: 34:26

Yeah, yeah.

CeeCee: 34:27

I just said the same thing in a different way, but they're all great Like. I agree with all of those.

Warren: 34:33

It's. You know I enjoy cooking. I told you my my noise is food network and I'll download recipes. And it kills me If you go to like all recipes or something like that, a recipe for something that you only want. The recipe it's 10 ingredients or less, but you have to scroll 300 pages deep because they have to put.

CeeCee: 34:54

This casserole was what my grandmother served on every special occasion.

Warren: 35:00

I can't tell you the warm and inviting scents that whiffed it through, that, like, just tell me how to make the damn casserole, that's all I want Exactly, but I figured it out because the more verbiage and the longer the pages, the more ads they can put up there and pay for that stupid recipe. That didn't work out well.

CeeCee: 35:26

By the way, we like have a storm brewing like the thunder is right over our house.

Warren: 35:28

That scared me. I apologize if you can hear that. Oh, I didn't hear it didn't hear a thing, wow, but no, those were the two things I had to cover I found interesting in the hr world this week or the last two weeks this week or the last two weeks.

CeeCee: 35:45

So I was. You know we're talking about other podcasts before and I, being the complete fan of the office, I started listening to rain wilson's podcast called soul boom what is the gist of that?

Warren: 35:54

because I know he's big in the sci-fi universe and he's. He's got a lot more going on than just the office.

CeeCee: 36:03

Yeah, so Soul Boom, I think it. He used to like run an online creative called Soul Pancake and it was all very like positive stuff and he was part. Now Soul Boom is something different and basically he talks about how he had issues with severe depression and severe anxiety when he was working in the office. Like theoretically, he had everything in life that anyone could ever ask for, but he still found himself very unhappy. So it's basically his way of finding purpose, I guess like finding purpose in life, and he like talks to a lot of individual guests.

Warren: 36:42

I heard that one.

CeeCee: 36:44

Like right here, but it's a lot of like wellness and mental health, wellness and stuff like that, like wellness and mental health, wellness and stuff like that and self-discovery. So he had ed helms on and then helms talked about a lot of stuff that he dealt with, like dealing with adhd and a late life diagnosis with that. But anyway, they were talking about the office and they were reminiscing a little bit and he asked you know they talked about and talked about Andy Bernard's. One of Andy Bernard's famous last lines was I wish there was a way that you could know that you were in the good old days before you left them and they had like a little conversation about that, like what to them was a good old day. And I was like, oh, like thinking about all the companies I used to work at. I just thought it would be interesting to just talk about, as far as company goes, like what was your good old day, like what was the best time and your favorite company and your favorite people to work with.

Warren: 37:43

So I was telling you all fair. I had a very similar conversation with somebody very recently so I'm like prepared for this with somebody very recently. So I'm like prepared for this. So what I did in this conversation is I started back in my first true professional HR position. I did third-party recruiting that company. It was fast-paced, it was fun. I mean, we had a kegerator at work, we drank Bloody Marys at work, we partied hard, we worked hard. But it was a great environment. I didn't necessarily fit in as well there. I was a little awkward and I was only there a few years, but it was a good environment. I liked the company, I liked the people. I just never felt like I truly fit in. So that was a good experience. Then after that I worked at a staffing agency. Once again, I liked the people I worked with but I didn't like the staffing agency side of it. That just wasn't me. I was only recruiting, I wasn't doing sales or anything, but it just wasn't for me that aspect.

Warren: 38:52

I joined the CPA firm and I was a recruiter then and the first couple of years I was in love with it. I was doing recruiting. I loved it. Well, I wouldn't say I liked some of the people I liked one of the people in my HR team. I did not like my HR team terribly much and I actually sought to move myself out. We moved from like the fifth floor to the ninth floor and there was only so many offices available and they said someone in the HR team is going to have to move over by IT. And my hand shot up like a rocket and I'm like, yes, put me with IT. So that was good and it ended.

Warren: 39:32

Really I hated the way that job ended. They they brought in a director level above me without ever letting me know they wanted a director level or someone to act like that who was a PETA and drove me out quickly. I and it's fine as I I think he was going to fire me before I, after that, went to the law firm. I really the law firm was the first place I worked for that I thought I could see myself actually retiring from. I liked it. I liked a lot of the attorneys. I liked especially the labor and employment attorneys. I liked them a lot. I knew of them and I've worked with them in the past, both because they were the CPA firm's attorneys and I've worked with them, unfortunately more than my share of occasions with that, but I like that. It was just not the best HR environment. I don't think it was only two of us plus a payroll person and we were the personnel department and we did everything on excel spreadsheets and that just personnel yeah, obviously, assistant personnel director.

Warren: 40:41

I worked at the hospital. I've told that story. They lost their license within weeks of me starting and I got laid off six months later. But that was just awful. The university I've worked there. I really I'll say this on the air I went in with a thought of this is going to be temporary for me.

Warren: 41:00

I had a very bad preconceived idea for profit education and once I got in and saw you know, there's good players in the game, bad players in the game, and this university was a good player in the game. I liked a lot about it. I loved my HR team, probably the best HR team that I will ever work with. Patrick was on that team. I've had other members in season one were guests with me. The team was great, the university was good and things like that. But the water park it was what it was. That wasn't the right job for me.

Warren: 41:37

But now where I'm at now, I think I'm actually long story. I think I'm actually in that point where I'm in the good old days and I can recognize it. I love the work I'm doing and you know, I know there's a couple of people from my office who listen to this and I'm not saying this in a brown nosing way. I love the work I'm doing, I love the company I'm working for. I love my boss. She gives me virtually unlimited freedom and allows me to do pretty much anything I please, as long you know, with it I don't ask anything stupid, I don't think.

Warren: 42:13

But it's, and we mesh very well, we, we think very similarly on things, and so I think I'm in the good old days now and I, I once again, I, I see this place as hopefully my final, my final piece of employment before I finally do retire. So I hope I'm correct in saying I'm living in the good old days. I have two employees. I really enjoy them both. They're, you know, great. I'm very pleased with them. I don't have to hard manage them, it's just everything's going sunshine and roses, and I've been there for six and a half years now, so it's not like I've got the new car smell still there.

CeeCee: 42:58

I love it. I was thinking about this too, I would say, when I used to work for I'll just say the name, it doesn't matter anymore when I used to work for Luxottica, which was like a big eyewear company. That was some of the most fun I've had and I will say I think it was because I was earlier in career. I worked on the recruiting team and recruiting is a hoot and then I got to like jump off the recruiting team and go into, like the learning and OD space and we were doing things there that were very ahead of its time. So like we were doing things back in I would say, 2012 ish. Like we had a.

CeeCee: 43:41

We had a diversity and inclusion person at that point, which before, like then, like not a lot of companies had that and then we also just like did a lot of like leadership competencies and stuff like that, and it was like I'm still using things I did there presently because we were so ahead of the curve there that it's kind of like sometimes, you know, I still pull on those past experiences. But I mean, honestly I was, I was in one of my co-workers weddings a A co-worker was in my wedding Like it was just like a fun time. But I'm going to say what you said. You stole my answer, warren, because I was going to say that I think also I'm currently in the good old days, like you know. I'm just kind of thinking this is the first time in a very long time where I feel like I'm working on things that I find to be super fun and what I wanted to do, and I'm doing things that are impactful and I am getting not credit, but people see the work I'm doing and acknowledge it and the recognition.

CeeCee: 44:48

And I don't think I've had that for a very long time and I'm going to like I don't want to sound like this bitter ex-employee, but I've been in situations where I'm going to be really honest, like I don't think that direct manager was my sponsor in rooms I wasn't in and it was like things would get done, but I was never given credit. They took the credit for being the leader, of getting it done and they didn't really want to take the spotlight away from themselves. Or I got into a big I mean, I got into a big argument not argument like that was dramatic, but I kind of like was very carefully trying to take something out of an old manager's hand and he basically just shut it down. He goes I know what you're doing and I'm never going to give this up. And I'm like, ok, like Sit people in a room for two hours and listen to them. Like have them just watch a video of you talk for two hours because you're the leadership expert.

CeeCee: 45:52

Like, oh, like why am I here? I don't know. Anyway, it's just like stuff like that where I don't know. I'm just in a really good place right now and I like I trust my boss. She's amazing. My manager is amazing. I work with very smart people. I would say like I also need to be the person like I need. I'm also one of those people that if I see someone doing something that's like less than mediocre, it will drive me insane and I can say like this is the first time in a while where I am working with equally brilliant people. Nice.

CeeCee: 46:27

And yeah, it just feels good, I'm in a good place.

Warren: 46:31

No, that is absolutely important. You know, one of the places I've worked, even though I was earlier in my career, I felt that I was the star on the team and you know I shouldn't have been a star. I was too early. I knew at that time I'm too. Why am I feeling this way? It's just other people were doing the bare minimum and you know, mistakes were accepted and even laughed at. Okay, well, I don't like that. And part of my history and experience. I really, once again, I'm not trying to be sappy or anything. I'm trying to be the manager to my two employees that I always wanted for myself and I feel I can do some.

Warren: 47:23

You know we have a recruiter I recruited for over 10 years. I've got that and I know recruiting's changed and evolved and things like that. I like working with her and getting her thoughts and ideas and she does a seminar and as soon as she does a seminar, it's over. I'm like, oh, tell me about it, I want to hear and things like that. And another thing, not to toot my own horn or anything on Mondays we have a corporate meeting of all the corporate department heads, so you have IT and contracts and all the accounting et cetera all there, and my recruiter one of the VPs sent me a very nice email about how my recruiter was doing an excellent job helping him fill these urgent positions and things like that.

Warren: 48:08

This VP sent a beautiful email about our recruiter and I wanted to share that with everybody here to say you know, let everybody know that she's getting recognized so they can recognize her, and I think that also develops the trust. When they need a job field, they know that they can. You know that builds the trust. Okay, I can have confidence in her. She's knocking it out of the park for this division, this VP, so they should have the same expectations when they have an opening and things like that. I think that's important. I don't know I've been unrecognized, I've been sort of I don't know what the right word is I've never been in bad. I've worked with bad people. I've never been in a bad environment or bad. I don't know what the right word is, but yeah, it's.

Andew Quilpa: 48:59

Yeah.

CeeCee: 49:00

I will say if I've told the story before, you can stop me and edit this out. So I worked with an individual who was very much highly praised for doing very like basic things and not and I don't mean to be rude, I'm I'm meaning this in a way of like there was nothing at the company, so a basic of something was better than what there was, which sometimes that's awesome. But this person kept getting praised and praised and praised and praised and they like got a trip to the President's Club, they got to go to Hawaii on the company dime for like, literally like just do your job just do their job, and not only that, but doing work that I personally did earlier in my career like that caliber of work.

CeeCee: 49:57

so there is a piece of me that's like listen, kudos to what has been created, but is it really like a trip to hawaii worth right?

CeeCee: 50:07

yeah but anyway, not my, not my rodeo, like you know. Whatever, we're just gonna let them do their thing. And I would get a little frustrated. I get. I get frustrated when people always say I'm so busy, I'm so busy, I'm so busy oh, my hair is on fire like I'm just so busy doing all of the things, all of the things busy all the time. And it just like just shut up and do your work like I don't need to hear it. But anyway, this was this person's MO, just constantly being busy.

CeeCee: 50:36

And I do remember like I worked on a project with them close to me leaving the organization, and one of the things was like, oh, we need to do this every year, because every year it needs to be done. But whatever, and I'm like, well, if we took the moment to do it right and make it good and right I don't want to say too much because of people, but like, let's say, we're creating a training. I was like, oh, like we do this training every year, people always complain about it. No one ever will. I'm like, let's do it, let's do it right and put some time and effort into it, and then we won't have to do it over and over and over.

CeeCee: 51:08

So I got put on a project with this person and this person literally was like we worked through it and they said they started going to the story about a Rice Krispie Treats commercial and I remember, like there's this Rice Krispie Treats commercial and I know exactly what they were talking about. They were talking about this commercial from the 90s or early 2000s and the mom, like is just overwhelmed with life and she was making her family a dessert. And she was just like is just overwhelmed with life and she was making her family a dessert. And she was just like, oh my God, like leave me alone, I'm going to close the door, I'm cooking dessert. And she opens up a box of the pre-made Rice Krispie Treats in the wrappers and like unwraps them and places them on a plate and uses that time for like self-care, like I'm going to read a book and a magazine. But then, like before she brought the plate out to her family, she's like threw flour on her face and like messed her hair up. Like oh mommy, mommy just made like slaved over. And she said that's what this is. And I said, excuse me, she goes.

CeeCee: 52:08

No matter what we do, we need to make it look like we did a lot, what we do. We need to make it look like we did a lot. And I was like I'm done. I'm done If this is the person who gets trips to Hawaii, who gets promoted, who gets stupid accolades for doing very remedial work. I'm out Like I cannot do this. And it's like in that moment she they told me what their game was and I was and I saw that person in a very different light. I was like okay, so we're being a little manipulative and lazy. And I also saw like the organization as just being like this is the behavior we want to celebrate. And I was like I actually do take pride in my work. I put a lot of effort, I think strategically, I do all of the things and I wasn't promoted in three years and I left.

Warren: 53:00

Yeah.

CeeCee: 53:03

And so, anyway, I have an inside joke with a former co-worker of mine, who we know, this individual, and the joke is we make soufflés, we don't make Rice Krispie Treat and like just to you know, we we're, we make souffles.

Warren: 53:22

I've I've worked with people like that as well, and it's it's annoying.

CeeCee: 53:26

The balls to tell someone like hey, like the balls to say it, I was just a little pissed like the balls to say it.

Warren: 53:34

I was just a little pissed, well. Well, I'm glad we're ending the show on a jaded note because this has been so unjaded overall. But, like I said, we're both in the the good times now, so it's hard to be terribly jaded jaded with that. So, yeah, anyways, let's here. We did our thank yous already, so just want to wrap things up. Please listen, send reviews. I discovered recently that we have reviews on Spotify and unfortunately they only give us ours. But we got like a 4.5 or something rating on Spotify, so keep that up.

CeeCee: 54:07

Oh no, no, it's a 4.6. Don't short sell us.

Warren: 54:10

Okay, not going to decline on us and things like that. So keep those up, leave them on review on Apple and we will read them on the air, but, as always, morn.

CeeCee: 54:23

Butterscotch Penelope Tulip Pants. That was your weird thing. If you listened all the way to the end, that's what you heard.

Andew Quilpa: 54:31

I don't know who lost. Weird thing If you listened all the way to the end, that's what you heard. I mean, I didn't lose a lot.

Warren: 54:35

And we're both here helping you survive each of our one what-the-fuck moments at a time. Bye.