The Long and The Short Of It

Episode 270 - Quests

Transcript:

Pete: Hey, Jen.

Jen: Hello, Peter.

Pete: Do you by chance remember the game Zelda?

Jen: Peter, I am a child of the 80's. Yes, I remember Zelda.

Pete: Oh dear. Good, good, good, good, good. Okay, so I was randomly reminded of Zelda a couple of weeks ago, because I had a leader in a workshop say that navigating his organization was a bit like going on a quest. And that turned into this metaphorical Zelda-based conversation that I think you'll get down with. But also, I think you might have some insight into it. So, I want to talk to you about quests. I want to talk to you about Zelda, and how we can learn from those games of the past.

Jen: Ah, a blast from the past. This is The Long and The Short Of It.

Pete: So, I guess I'll paint a bit more context. I had a room full of senior leaders, and we were having a conversation about some of the frustrations or the challenges they have within their current roles within this very giant organization. And everyone was kind of sharing, "Oh, it can be hard to get stuff done because there's so many stakeholders, and you've got to engage this person, you've got to engage that person. And then, you know, you've got to have a meeting, and you've got to put together a pack." And then this guy (this brilliant, brilliant person), out of nowhere, was like, "Yeah, it's like going on a quest. You know, you set off on this journey with this goal in mind, like, 'I'm going to create this change.' And then you meet someone along the way who, you know, sells you a rock, and you realize that this rock is needed to pass the next gateway. And when you get to the next gateway, there's seven other people that you have to meet, and you have to have a conversation with each of them about different things. And it all just unfolds in front of you. And none of it, you could have predicted." And that, for some reason, reminded me of Zelda. It reminded me of other games like Pokemon and all sorts of quest-based games. And it became this really fun and I actually think really interesting metaphor for thinking about leadership, specifically for them and navigating their organization. But I think more broadly, and even I think in your context of, you know, working with so many freelancers, of navigating a career. It feels all like it's a bit of a quest, and I just want to like talk to you about it and unpack it.

Jen: I love this metaphor. I find this utterly charming. I'm into it. So the first thing that comes to mind is, the first time you play Zelda or any game, you have to start at Level 1.

Pete: Right. Oh.

Jen: You just have to sort of like figure out, "What is this world? And what are the rooms? And what do these buttons do? Oh, I hit this and suddenly I jump. Or if I hit it a different way, then suddenly I'm walking backwards. Like, what is happening? I don't even know the rules of this game."

Pete: Oh, I love this. Yes, yes, yes. I love that very obvious throwback to the starting of a game. And I feel like it's...the context I'm thinking about, if it's like, if I'm a leader, I'm kind of thrown into mini-quests all the time. Like, I'm entering into a new project that I haven't done before and all of a sudden, I'm starting this project with new stakeholders, and I'm like, "What does the jump button do in this context? Is it useful in this context? If I go left, what happens? Versus if I go right, what happens?" And you're right. There's like this, I guess it's like a discovery phase, an experimental phase of, "What are the rules of engagement within this new quest that I've just entered?" That's so true. So the other thing that comes to mind for me if we're thinking about the start, is, you only have a really small percentage of the map. You know, like the map that maybe gets unlocked as you go through the levels?

Jen: Right.

Pete: It's like you're on Level 1 and so you have like, I don't know, 1% or 10% of the map available to you. So, you don't know the lay of the land fully.

Jen: That's right. And then you complete a level, and you're talking to your friend about it in seventh grade, and you're like, "Wow. You know, it took me four days to get through that level." And they're like, "Well, did you use the secret door?"

Pete: Oh, the secret door.

Jen: And you're like, "Wait. What? What secret door?" "Yes. If you jump twice underneath the dragon statue, there's a secret door." Like, "What? If someone had told me that, it would have only taken one day." But then the next time you decide to start over from the beginning, you know that that door is there, so you're able to walk through it with a little more ease.

Pete: Ah, the secret door. I'm always like, "How do people discover these secret doors?"

Jen: How?

Pete: I think that secret door metaphor, I find particularly useful for the context of leadership, and especially the context I was talking to this team about, so let me just try and explain it. Basically, what we were talking about was because this organization is so large and because everyone is sprinting in their own lane...like, we had a roomful of senior leaders at the same same level, many of whom didn't actually know each other. And so what I recognized in my context (which is often the case in the workshops I'm running) is, my goal is to try and create that conversation that you had with your seventh grade friend, to be like, "Where are the secret doors in this organization?" And that is, in my mind, a useful way to get stuff done as a senior leader. That there is no universal map for navigating any organization, for leading any particular team, but there are tricks and tools and techniques and information and secret doors that we can uncover through the people that we meet along the way. And so, I'm kind of obsessed in a leadership context with, how do you create the conditions for you to have those kinds of conversations with the people in your organization? Because lamenting the fact that you don't have the full map and that there is no universal right way to navigate this change is not going to get you anywhere, because that's just the nature of the beast of these big organizations, especially in the context of the environment we live in in 2023. Things are only going to get more confusing. The map that you have access to is only, I think, going to get smaller and smaller as things get more ambiguous with new technologies and all sorts of things. So I really like this idea of having conversations with other people, like you did in seventh grade, to help find the secret doors. That is brilliant, Jen. I love that.

Jen: Yeah. And I feel like it's worth saying that I never felt like that was cheating.

Pete: Right.

Jen: I felt like I was like in on some inside information, but I didn't feel that I didn't deserve to advance to the next level if I found the secret door.

Pete: No, especially if you found it in that context. I had a few...maybe in later games, I had a few like cheat codes, I remember, for certain games, that would unlock the whole map from the start. And it kind of takes the fun out of it. Like, "I now know everything about what's going on in this environment," versus the like, "Ah, I have to wait a day to have a conversation with someone to learn about the secret door, that I then need to discover for myself." Like, that's the joyful part. The process is the fun part. That's where the learning is.

Jen: Pete, I'm realizing right now, you and I played different generations on different game sets, because there was nowhere to enter a cheat code into my original Nintendo, where you took out the cartridge and blew on it when it stopped working.

Pete: I remember that. I remember that. Oh, that's so funny. I mean, this is why I asked you, "Have you heard of Zelda?" I wasn't sure if Zelda is like a my generation thing or your generation thing. Like, I don't know.

Jen: I think I was in sixth or seventh grade when the original Nintendo console with all the cartridges came out.

Pete: Those cartridges.

Jen: Okay, Pete, so I'm sure this applies in your world. This definitely applies in my world. When I'm working with clients who are freelance artists, so they're constantly turning over new experiences and having to pursue new opportunities, and they reach a certain new level, if something happens that feels like a "setback", the initial impulse is, "Damn it, now I have to start all over." Now maybe I'm making this up and my memory's filling in gaps that may or may not be there, but I kind of have this memory that you could choose to save your progress or not save your progress. So in the case of my clients, that, "Damn it, I have to start over," is like the equivalent of clicking, "No," when it says, "Would you like to save your progress?"

Pete: Why would you do that? I never understood why we would do that.

Jen: Well, if you wanted to start all the way over at the beginning and get some really quick wins.

Pete: True. True, true, true.

Jen: You know, sometimes you get those dopamine hits, you're like, "I could do Level 1 in 2.2 seconds."

Pete: That's so true.

Jen: So as you think about building a career and making professional progress or artistic progress or personal progress, you can choose to save your progress along the way, and not feel like you have to go all the way back to square one. And part of that is taking stock of what you've learned, and the people you've met, and the turns that you've taken, and the tools you've acquired.

Pete: Mmm. That feels really rich. I think a couple of things come to mind for me. One is, it's remembering the skills, the tools, the techniques that you've used in prior levels, and seeing if they apply to the new levels. Because they very well might. I could think of so many examples where I've had an aha, where I'm like, "Oh, that thing I did in 2011 is really applicable to this particular challenge I'm trying to solve right now." And it sort of takes a minute to remind me of that. But I think there's the flip side too, which is if you're always relying on the same skills that got you through Level 1, then you might not be open to how to navigate Level 24. Because the basic skill that you had in Level 1 needs to have been built upon or improved upon, or a new skill needs to be developed to get through Level 24. Like, what got you to where you are won't necessarily help you get to where you want to go.

Jen: Isn't that the name of a famous book? What Got You Here Won't Get You There?

Pete: Probably. I probably borrowed it from somewhere. I feel like the other thing that's implied in what you said about saving progress is, in a quest game, you die all the time.

Jen: Yes, it is so true.

Pete: Okay, if I use the context of like leadership or in a career, like you make mistakes all the time. In a quest, you die. You go, "Oh, weird. I didn't jump at the right time. That's annoying. I'll get respawned. I'll get my way back to that particular obstacle that I mucked up. And I'll try it again. And hopefully, I'll get through it." And I think that's so useful to think about in a career, in a project, in a leadership context, because we spend so much time and energy trying to avoid mistakes, and we spend so much time and energy trying to avoid...obviously, I'm not talking about literal death in the context of projects...but feedback, or the project not going the way that you want it to go. Like, these mistakes that you make along the way are ultimately the thing that will enable you to then get to where you want to go. So, they're kind of...not to be embraced, always. But they're sort of unavoidable, I think, if we're making progress.

Jen: Well, yes. I mean, I think part of going on a quest is you haven't gone there before.

Pete: Right.

Jen: And so, you can't know what you don't know. But then when you know, you have to know that you know, and use what you know.

Pete: Right. Right, right, right. I mean, I feel like there's a tie in to imposter syndrome here somewhere, where like you are an imposter because you've never been on this quest before, and so what does it look like to show up with a posture of excitement and eagerness to learn through the experience, not to be afraid of the fact that you don't know what you're doing? Because that's kind of everyone when they're doing something new, doing something for the first time. And this sort of speaks to something else we talked about in this workshop I was referencing, which is, the kinds of people that were in this room (and I think the kinds of people that listen to this podcast) are growth-minded people who love to learn, who love new projects, who love to make new change. And so, when they find themselves...which we all do, I'm including me in "they"...frustrated that, "I don't have the full map. I don't know the Step A, B, C, D to help me get to where I'm going. And that's annoying," I think it's also worth remembering, that's the fun part. The journey of figuring stuff out, the journey of like spawning into a new map in a quest and having to figure out, "Where do I go? Who do I talk to? What jump do I need to do," that's the fun part of leading. It's like the messy human part of making change happen. And if you had the inverse of that, like I mentioned, if you had the cheat code, if you knew exactly where to go, if you knew who to talk to and how to get everything done all the time, I think you'd get bored.

Jen: Yeah.

Pete: Time to swap the game out for a new cartridge, I think.

Jen: Time to blow on that cartridge. Okay, Pete, something I find myself guilty of...I was actually just saying this to someone today, and I found myself guilty of this in the days when I did play video games. And gosh, it's been so long. Now, it's really making me want to figure out how to play a modern video game. I would earn new tools.

Pete: Yes.

Jen: But because I didn't know how to use them, I wouldn't use them.

Pete: Mmm-hmm.

Jen: So, you would like earn the magic boomerang. But then it would sit in my avatar's backpack, because I'm like, "I don't know which button to push to use the magic boomerang. I don't know what it does."

Pete: "What do I use that for?" Yeah.

Jen: "I don't know who it slays. So, forget about it. I'll just use my rusty old tool that I picked up in Level 1..."

Pete: "My pick axe." Yeah.

Jen: "...that is slow and not very efficient." And I found myself saying this to someone today, that I logged on to my Zoom admin and I saw all these new buttons and new features, and I was like, "Yeah, I'm not going to use any of those. I don't know how any of those work, so I'm not going to use those." And I was like, "Really, Jen? You could probably take ten minutes to watch a YouTube tutorial and figure out how to use the new tools you've acquired." In this case, I'm talking about technological tools. But we pick up new relationships. We pick up new social skills. We pick up new hard skills. We read books. We listen to podcasts. We have experiences. But if we don't know how to use those newly acquired relationships, experiences, etc., we might just let them sit in our backpack.

Pete: I love that so much. Yeah. What are the skills and knowledge you have acquired over the journey that you're not using or that you need to use to get to where you're going? And maybe, what are the skills that you don't have access to right now that you need to acquire to help you get you where you're going? I think your technological example is such a brilliant one. Because I think of, you know, the probably over talked about world of AI and large language models and things like ChatGPT. But I think that that is such a great example where you see, I see people kind of going down one of two directions. One is, "Oh my god, I don't understand how this works. How the hell does it know everything? And the answer to everything? And all I need to do is ask it a question? I'm too overwhelmed. I'm never going to use that tool." And I see people like using it every single day, like, "Oh my god, this is incredible. I'm going to use this new tool all the time." And I mean, the most effective use of it is probably somewhere in the middle, like a lot of these things. But I feel like that's such a great example of we've acquired a new tool, the world has kind of acquired this new tool or become aware of this new tool. So, what are you going to do about it? How are you going to use it? How is that actually going to help you get to where you want to go on this quest of yours? Whatever that quest may be.

Jen: Who knew that video games had such an incredible Venn diagram overlap with life and leadership?

Pete: Honestly, when he started talking about this, he literally...like there was twenty-five people in the room and everyone started nodding their head, like, "Oh my god, you are describing navigating this organization so beautifully," just by using the metaphor of, "It's like going on a quest. You know, and you meet like the old wise wizard who has been around for forty years, who knows the answer to every question, but you're only allowed to ask him one question."

Jen: And now, of course, I'm like, "What Does Mike Tyson's knockout video game have to teach me?"

Pete: Or Mario Kart, what can Mario Kart teach us about...yeah.

Jen: Oh my gosh, this has been such a fun trip down memory lane. I have a feeling that on the heels of this, when you and I both go secretly find a way to play Zelda tonight, we're going to have a whole slew of new ideas about this overlap. And listeners, I'm guessing you're going to have the same experience. So please, feel free to email us: hello@thelongandtheshortpodcast.com. We want to hear about your quest.

Pete: We do. And in giving us some ideas, maybe we'll go on some more quests of our own. I feel like each episode that we have is like a mini-quest, Jen, where one of us has an idea of where we might go. And then, the other one kind of follows along blindly. And together, we sort of figure it out together and we find the hidden door.

Jen: Well, you can walk smack into the hidden door and I can't jump quite high enough to hit it. So, we need both of us. Two player game here, friends.

Pete: And that is The Long and The Short Of It.