Are You Experienced? The Search for Talent, Great Leaders and the Future of Work

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Spencer Levy
‘Tis the season, folks – the dog days of summer, when we take stock, recalibrate our thinking and start to look ahead. It's the time of year when we typically do an annual mid-year outlook episode featuring CBRE’s reporting and analysis on what we know and what's to come. And in fact, we’ll feature it on the air next week. But on this episode, we consider the future with an award winning author and visionary thinker.

Jacob Morgan
There is, you know, the Marvel Avengers, and you have Thanos. And he, like, snaps his fingers. And as soon as he snaps his fingers, kind of the world changes. And it sort of feels like that happened.

Spencer Levy
That's futurist Jacob Morgan, who has literally written the book on the topic of the future of work. In fact, that's the title of the first of his four bestsellers. Coming up, a popular thought leader offers enlightening perspective on the future of work, business leadership, corporate culture, employee experience and more. I'm Spencer Levy, and that's right now on The Weekly Take.

Spencer Levy
Welcome to The Weekly Take. And this week, we are joined by Jacob Morgan, author and futurist. Best-selling author of four books, including the current book, The Future Leader. Jacob, thank you so much for joining the show.

Jacob Morgan
Thank you for having me.

Spencer Levy
It's great to have you, Jacob. And for the benefit of our audience. Could you just tell us who you are and what you do?

Jacob Morgan
Sure. The areas that I focus on are leadership, the future of work and employee experience. And really, I do everything that I do because I want to help create leaders who we all want to work with and organizations we all want to be a part of.

Spencer Levy
Jacob, what's really great about what you've done is that you are not just a future thinker. You were way, way ahead of everybody, because I think the hottest topic in business today might be the future of work, the workplace. And you started writing about this over a decade ago. Tell us what got you interested in the topic.

Jacob Morgan
Yeah, this all started way back in the day when I had my first job out of college. I graduated from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and I double majored in Economics and Psychology. And I was very excited to join the corporate world, and I thought I was going to make a difference, make an impact, you know, the usual spiel. And I interviewed for this company in downtown L.A. and they gave me this fantastic story that I would be traveling the country, meeting with entrepreneurs and changing the world and meeting all these business leaders. So I took this job, took the job based on the story that I was told. And a couple of months into my job, I'm doing data entry and cold calling and PowerPoint presentations. And the pivotal moment for me was when one of the top executives at the company came out of his beautiful corner office on Wilshire in Fairfax in downtown L.A., and he shouts from across the room. He's like, Jacob, get over here. I’ve got something really important for you. And he calls me over and he's like, I have something really important I need you to do. And he takes out his wallet and he takes out a $10 bill and puts the $10 bill in my hand and says, I need you to go down to Starbucks and get me a cup of coffee. And by the way, you can get yourself a latte as well. And I thought, what the hell is going on here? And it was at that moment, around 15 years ago, where I decided, you know what, I don't think I want to work for anybody else ever again. And I wanted to go off on my own and do my own thing. I suppose looking back, I should be thankful to that executive and that cup of coffee, because who knows where I would have ended up?

Spencer Levy
Well, Jacob, I guess we all have similar stories. When I was a young lawyer in New York City, I remember during a closing, I had to park the car of one of our clients. I remember spending most of my first year as a young lawyer in the copy room. So I guess it's not always glamorous, but what it does is teaches you about the culture and about who you are and what you want to do. And I changed. I changed from being a lawyer to being a banker, not because of that particular experience. But I realized that there was a broader world out there. And I think that your book goes into that broader world and how that broader world has changed. Now, what I find interesting about your book, among other things, is correct me if I'm wrong, but it came out in 2019, just prior to the pandemic. So tell us about that and what you might have changed about it had you written it today?

Jacob Morgan
Yeah. So I think The Future Leader actually came out 2020, March of 2020, I believe, and I was really looking at how leadership is changing over the next 5 to 10 years. All of that is still very true and very applicable. The only difference is the timeline has changed. In other words, it's not about being the future leader, but all these skills and mindsets that I talk about in the book are essential for being a current leader. So the timeline has shrunk, but that would be the only thing about the book that I would change.

Spencer Levy
Well, that's really interesting, because I think that a lot of people that are in the business world would disagree with you. They would disagree because they would say the world changed in the last two years. And the way I frame it is a little bit different. What I've seen in the last two years is a labor versus management issue, in that labor got more power and they are asserting it in the form of hybrid work, more work from home, those sorts of things. But you do address that in your book about, even pre-pandemic, you saw a rise in Labor's expectations. Could you address that?

Jacob Morgan
Yeah, I mean, I noticed that even when I wrote my book, The Employee Experience Advantage, which I think came out in 2017, half a decade ago. And even at that point I started noticing some of the changes that we were seeing, because part of what I do is I speak to a lot of business leaders. I work with a lot of companies and executives, and I always ask them what they're seeing inside their companies. And even around a half a decade ago, they started telling me that they were noticing this shift in, whether you want to call it power or influence, but they were noticing that employees, that labor, were having more of a say in what was happening inside their organizations. They were asking for certain things during the interview process. These executives would be telling me that the employees are now asking them about stuff. You know, traditionally it's the company that says. Where did you go to school? Tell me about your experience. Tell me a time when you had to deal with failure. It was very much everything about the organization asking the employee and all these executives would start telling me that, hey, you know what? The employees are now asking us questions. They want to know what kind of culture we have. They want to know about our leadership style. If we have coaching and mentoring, if they're going to have purpose and meaning and impact. So I think it's been a trend that we've been seeing for probably around seven years, but really, really amplified over the past two years. And I mean, I just hear insane stories from my friends, from executives who are trying to attract and retain talent and it's a completely different landscape.

Spencer Levy
I'm looking at chapter six and you talk about purpose. The Weekly Take, we had as guests on this show, the head of real estate for Allbirds. We also had the head of real estate for Sprouts, and that's all they talked about, was about that how their brands are associated with purpose and meaning. How important is that in the modern workplace?

Jacob Morgan
It's huge. I mean, I think this has always been important. I mean, just as humans, we care about purpose and meaning, but it's really becoming more in the forefront inside of organizations because it's where the connection comes from. It's where I think a lot of the humanity, the humanness comes from. And I honestly think if you were to have this conversation ten, fifteen years ago and talk about purpose and meaning, people would be like, what the hell are you talking about? Like, go do your job. You're being paid to do X, Y, Z. But today, across the board, we've just been seeing a lot of changes. Whether you look at discussions around climate, social injustice, whether you look at wars, whether you look at pandemics. There's just been this big shift, I think, in the world. And a lot of people are realizing that there's more to life than work. And I know it sounds kind of like a weird thing to say, but it's almost like, you ever watch those Marvel movies.

Spencer Levy
I do. And we can talk about that, too, but I prefer the DC ones because I'm a Batman guy, but keep going.

Jacob Morgan
So there is the, you know, the Marvel Avengers and you have Thanos and he, like, snaps his fingers and as soon as he snaps his fingers, kind of the world changes. And it sort of feels like that happened. It almost feels like somebody snapped their fingers, and collectively, everyone in the world woke up one day and they're like, hey, wait a minute. I don't just care about my paycheck anymore. Like, I want to contribute to society. I want to know how I'm making a difference. We're just looking at things differently. And of course it wasn't overnight, but that's just kind of how it feels because this conversation around purpose and meaning is everywhere. Conversations around sustainability and improving communities is everywhere. So it's huge. The big question always becomes, whose responsibility is it? Who's responsible for your purpose and meaning? Is it you? Is that the company? Is it both? And I think it's a shared responsibility. I think on behalf of the organization, organizations need to do a better job of telling stories, letting employees know how the work that they're doing is making an impact. They need to do a better job of communicating the mission and vision of the organization, aligning that to the values that the employees have. So there's a lot of work that they can do there. On behalf of the employees, employees also need to speak up. Employees need to be more open minded. Employees need to come to work trying to come up with solutions, right? It's very easy to come to an organization and say, hey, you know what, there's no diversity here. Hey, you know what? My employee experience sucks. My leader’s terrible. It's like, there's this children's book that I read to my daughter every night. It's about this little penguin that goes around, and he's like, my beak is cold, it's dark here, it's snowing. And at some point a polar bear coat goes over to him and he's like, hey, you got to stop complaining, man. You got to appreciate things that you have and notice the things that you have and suggest changes and put some effort into it. Don't just walk around unhappy. Employees, I think, need that accountability. You want diversity and inclusion. Don't just point it out, come up with a solution. You want to have a better employee experience. Communicate that with your leaders, participate in employee resource groups, participate in the company surveys. Let your voice be heard. If you want that purpose and meaning, you're not going to get it just by being silent. So I think there's a lot of accountability and responsibility on both parties to make that happen.

Spencer Levy
Well, the children's book I read to my kids is If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, and I'm not sure the exact relationship of that book to management theory, but…

Jacob Morgan
It's a good book.

Spencer Levy
… I’m gonna come up with one by the end of the show today.

Jacob Morgan
Well, I already got the analogy for you there. And it's kind of like when you focus on giving your employees things. So, for example, if you purely create an organization where you are going to give employees, hey, show up to work today and you get free food, show up tomorrow, you get hot yoga, show up the next day, you know, you get some other free thing. And if you keep giving and creating an organization that's purely based on these perks and benefits, not by changing the core workplace practices to your company, that's what's going to happen. You're going to give a mouse a cookie, and eventually they're going to show up to work and they're going to say, what else you got? I already have free food and hot yoga. I want more. And instead of it being about the work, about the impact, about the culture, it's about what things can you give me? And that's not a sustainable way to create a company.

Spencer Levy
Well, I'm glad I didn't use the analogy Make Way for Ducklings, which is another book I read to my kids, because I'm sure you could have come up with a clever way to link that as well.

Jacob Morgan
Probably. We should do a whole podcast just about kids books and how we can tie that into what's going on in the business world.

Spencer Levy
Sounds good. So one of the things that you write about is communicating with your employees and new forms of communication. And we're here obviously on a podcast. I'm a big social media guy, as are you, Jacob. Talk to me a little bit of how leaders can best communicate with their employees.

Jacob Morgan
Well, it's interesting because communication is one of those things. It's not new, right? I mean, of course, communication has been around since the dawn of time, creating paintings in caves way back in the day. But what's really changed now are the different ways, the different mediums that we can get our message across, and the number of mediums is only increasing. And so as a leader, what that means is that you need to know how to get your message across regardless of the different platforms that you're using. I remember I talked to the CEO of a company in Japan and he was telling me this story. He was like, you know what? On average, an employee might see me live for 20 minutes a year. A year. That's it. Because that's how big his company is. And he says, you know what? In that 20 minutes when I'm with that employee, I need to make sure that I can get my message across. And leaders, I think, have really been struggling with this over the past few years, especially with the pandemic. And I've seen this firsthand. Leaders who are motivational and inspirational and you see them on stage and they captivate a room and everyone's like, oh, my goodness, this person is so great. You put them behind a webcam, and it's a totally different person. There's no motivation. There's no inspiration. They're reading a script. They're a shell of themselves. And so that's a very good example of, whether you're virtual, whether you're in-person, whether you're text, you need to get your message across and know how to use these different mediums for what they're intended to do. So classic example, right? You get this, like, five page email and you're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. This is probably good for an in-person conversation. Or sometimes I hear stories of employees who, you know, their leaders send them a text and they want like these big project updates and status updates. And now all of a sudden you're responding and you're writing like a one page essay with your thumbs on your phone, right? So you need to know what channel is good for what. If you're going to fire somebody, don't text them like a sad face emoji and be like, see you later, right? So you got to know what channel, what platform you got to use and how to get your message across regardless of what that channel is.

Spencer Levy
I teach public speaking. In fact, I have a class right after this. And what I tell our students is that when you're on Zoom, you're going to communicate a lot differently than when you're on stage. Most people haven't gotten that memo, and maybe memo’s another thing we could talk about, but they haven't gotten the memo that...

Jacob Morgan
What’s a memo again? Memo? What exactly, this is like a handwritten…

Spencer Levy
Exactly. Exactly. I'll go introduce you to the telephone, which is next to the fax machine. By the way, I've had many colleagues who did not take their fax number off their card yet.

Jacob Morgan
Oh, my God. You don't still have a fax machine, do you?

Spencer Levy
Do we even have a fax machine around here? I don't think so, but yeah, you never know.

Jacob Morgan
Intercoms too. My dad used to tell me stories when he was working in the aerospace industry. They used to have intercoms and when somebody wants to see you in their office, they just page you across the entire company.

Spencer Levy
We still have that, by the way. So occasionally…

Jacob Morgan
Do you?

Spencer Levy
… you will hear the intercom go off.

Jacob Morgan
I like it.

Spencer Levy
So let's go to what you call the “Notable Nine”, which are the key skills for a leader. I could read them all: Global Citizen, Servant, Chef, Explorer, Coach, Futurist, Technologically Teenager and Translator. And then my favorite one of all, which is Yoda. So why don't we start with my favorite one, Yoda? What does it mean to become Yoda?

Jacob Morgan
Well, first of all, I'm glad you read those, and you didn't put me on the spot and make me remember all nine here. You're very kind to me, Spencer. So Yoda is really about emotional intelligence, which comes down to two big elements of it, which are empathy and self-awareness. Empathy is really about putting yourself in somebody else's shoes and understanding their perspective and where they're coming from. It's not about saying I'm sorry, it's about saying, I understand how you feel. Self-awareness is not only how you view and understand yourself, but it's, how do other people view you and understand you and if there is alignment there? So those are the two things for the skill of Yoda.

Spencer Levy
Another thing I think that you talk about a lot in this book is humanization, and I guess emotional intelligence and becoming Yoda is part of that. But another thing you mentioned here on page 115 is that, “Employees spend 10% of their time pursuing things that they are interested in”. And I was like, wow, that's pretty unfortunate. And I mentioned this in the following context. We had two guests on the show that said the same thing. One of them was Carla Harris, terrific author, a Senior Executive at Morgan Stanley, and the other was our own CEO, Bob Sulentic. They both said that when they go to work, they don't really feel like they're working because they love it. It's sort of like a hobby. And in my mind, what they've become is a word that I use when I teach public speaking, which is “maximum me”. How do you maximize you, your skill sets, not only so that you can give maximum value to the organization, but you could be happier. Talk about that, Jacob.

Jacob Morgan
Well, it's always easier for top executives, right? And I actually learned this concept and this idea from the former President of Microsoft in the United States, Kate Johnson. And she shared this insight around being an implementer versus an owner. And really what starts to happen is, the more senior you become in an organization, ideally you become more of an owner, right? You, your vision, your project, your ideas, you own it. But when you're entry level inside of an organization, a lot of people think more like implementers. They don't feel like they have a sense of ownership. They don't feel like it's their mission. They don't feel like they're doing anything else except for taking orders and doing what they're supposed to be doing. So the more senior you are, the easier it is for you to become your “maximum me”, because you are not so much doing the menial work of creating stuff. You're kind of like the architect designing the house and somebody else is going to build it. If you're the architect designing the house, it's much easier for you to be your “maximum me” because it's your, you know, what's in your mind? What do you want it to look like? How do you envision it? And it's more fun. It's more creative. And of course, you can feel more of that sense of pride and ownership and purpose and meaning there. So I think this is a challenge that a lot of organizations are trying to figure out. How do we get everybody to feel that way? And I think one of the big ways that you can do this is, we need to create more autonomy and more accountability, right? I mean, I have a virtual team of 12 people that I work with. They help me create a lot of content, whether it's graphic design, whether it's podcast editing, video snippets and stuff like that. And when I first started to run my business, I would be the bottleneck for everything. I want to approve every video. I want to see every graphic. I want to control how it gets done, the colors that are used, where the cuts are, the caption, like, everything, everything, everything. And what I started to realize is the employees that I worked with were like man, this kind of sucks working for you, man, because we, like, have no say, no voice, no creativity, and it created bottlenecks. So at a certain point, what I started doing is saying, look, I trust you, right? You know where we want to go. You know what we want to build? You decide how we're going to build it, you decide how to edit the video. You decide the colors that you want to use, how you want this to be laid out. And if there's a problem, then we'll talk about it after. And all of a sudden I noticed better content being created, more content being created, more creative ideas, more unique things that I didn't even think about being able to get done. So I think one of the things that leaders need to do, and this is a hard thing to do, I get it, because you got to release a little bit of control, is to help create that vision, that destination of, here's where we're going, right? Here's where I want us to end up. I don't know how we're going to get there, but together we're going to figure it out. And I want you to help me figure it out. You tell me what we need. You tell me how we're going to get there. And I think if organizations can do a better job of giving more of that autonomy, more of that accountability, more of that freedom, more of that flexibility, we will see more of that start to happen.

Spencer Levy
Well, sticking with the Star Wars analogy, it reminded me of the line by Obi-Wan Kenobi telling Luke to let go. And I think that’s a hard thing for leaders to do, is to let go, not only of the command and control of many of their employees, but letting go of what they believe or their individual expectations as a leader. And there's a terrific line here in your book that sometimes people that are leaders are two people. They're the person at home and then they're the person that's in the office. And then your book suggests you're better off being one person. And the way I would express that is, quote unquote, keeping it real. What's your point of view?

Jacob Morgan
Well, this is a big focus area at the moment for my new book that's going to come out next year. So to give you a little bit of context, I don't think I've actually shared this with anybody yet. So it's going to be looking at vulnerability, specifically from a leadership context. I've interviewed, to date, over 100 CEOs from the Fortune 500 list, 100 CEOs from there, and CEOs in other parts of the world as well. And I asked them all these questions around vulnerability and so on and so forth, and authenticity comes up quite a bit. And one of the big things that all of these executives keep pointing out to or keep highlighting is this idea of being a single version of you. And it's funny because they all acknowledge that this isn't something that they were comfortable with doing earlier in their career, but this is also something that they all acknowledge is something they have to do now. So yeah, being a single version of you is crucial. It's hard, it requires being vulnerable. It might not always go according to plan. Not everybody is going to respond in the way that you want them to respond, but you have to do it for precisely that reason, because this is what creates trust. This is what creates psychological safety. We're human beings. We know when you're faking it and when you're not, when you're authentic and when you're not. And we want to work for leaders who are human beings, and that's not going to be possible if you're not a single version of you. And so I think this is one of the I mean, heck, I'm writing a whole book around it, right? This is one of the reasons, one of the biggest things that I think is going to be influencing and impacting leadership over at least the next decade and beyond. It is that piece of being vulnerable. As far as what that means, what that looks like, how to do it? I'm going to be exploring all that sort of fun stuff and getting some really cool stories from executives. But I mean, this to me is the number one priority for leaders around the world.

Spencer Levy
Jacob, let me turn some of your ideas into my business. And I'm in the real estate business and I'm walking around my office here today and my producer sitting to my right said, boy, there's a lot of exterior offices here. It looks like a traditional office. But when we go to some of our newer- build offices, they're wide open. There’s, I actually like sitting in the open area, in the lunch area, and just see people as they walk by. So if you were to and again, I know it's not your business, real estate, but if you were to take your ideas of being a great leader and put it into real estate design, do you have any thoughts there?

Jacob Morgan
Yeah. So it's one of the things that I talked about in The Employee Experience Advantage, and I gave an acronym for that, which was COOL for COOL Office Spaces. And each one of those letters stands for something, but one of them was “L,” leveraging the multiple workspace options. So one of the things that I think is most impactful when we think about workspace design is giving people options. I think there was a study that was done, and I can't remember the company that did it, this was a couple of years ago. But I think they found that during the course of day an employee, on average, performs 21 different types of activities, whether it's having focused time, whether it's collaboration time, whether it's client time, regardless of what it is. 21 different types of activities throughout the course of a day. Now, the analogy that I used in the book is a house. You have a house with different rooms, and every room serves a purpose or anything. You have a kitchen, you eat, you have a dining room, you have a bedroom where you sleep. Like every room serves a purpose and you do a different activity in each room. Inside of our organizations, we don't think like that. Inside of our companies, we say, you have one little box to sit in and you do every single one of your activities in that box. It doesn't make sense. It's like having a house with one room, which is just a kitchen. And I say, you know, you got to sleep in the kitchen, you got to eat in the kitchen, you watch TV in the kitchen, you entertain guests in the kitchen. Everything's got to be done in this room. Nobody's going to want to live in that kind of a house. So I think the best advice for organizations is to think about how employees work and design different options for them depending on how they work. Why not have some spaces that are maybe open, some spaces that are maybe a little bit more closed or bullpen- like areas, some places that are maybe a little bit more outdoors or maybe there's some greenery there. Some places where you can get a group of people together, put them in a room and have them focus on ideas. I think different workspace options is really what we need to be thinking about. And it's funny because, you watch science fiction movies at all?

Spencer Levy
Oh, that is the title of my current presentation, is science fiction. So I can go through that for days.

Jacob Morgan
Oh, okay. So I love science fiction. And whether you're watching something like Westworld or The Foundation on Apple, or even Severance, for goodness sakes, which is on Apple TV, which is, if you haven't seen it, it's very like old school offices in there. But even in that show, whatever, whenever you watch any kind of movie that's projected somewhat into the future or TV show, you don't see, offices are gone. Even Westworld right now, there are no scenes where skyscrapers have vanished, replaced by homes, and everybody just wakes up in their pajamas and sits at a laptop or like plugs their mind into some sort of a universal computer. Offices are still around. I don't think offices are going to go away, but I think what we do need to think more about is those different workspace options, that flexibility. And one kind of bonus piece of advice for organizations. One of the ways that you can tell if you have a great space is you write down your values on a sheet of paper and you walk around and you see if your values are coming to life. And so whenever I give talks, there's a couple thousand people in the room. I always ask everybody, I say, somebody shout out your corporate values. And somebody says something like trust, or they say collaboration or putting the customer first. And I say, all right, who else in this room has trust as a value or putting the customer first or collaboration? And you see, like, dozens of hands going up everywhere. And I asked them, I said, do you think your company is the only one with those values? You think your company is the only one who says put the customer first or trust or do the right thing? If so, then you should be suing everybody else because everybody has the same values as you. So what matters is how those values come to life. So in other words, if you say trust and collaboration, if you walk around your space, do you see that happen? Do you see trust? Do you see collaboration? Do you see, having fun or doing the right thing, or are those just words that we use? So I think that's another important thing for companies to think about is, design those multiple workspace options depending on how employees work, but also, not just from a space perspective but from a cultural perspective, make sure that your values are actually manifested in the spaces in which employees work. Otherwise, what's the point?

Spencer Levy
One of the things you talk quite a bit about in your book is artificial intelligence, technology, the relationship between your employees and technology. You even have a quote here, I believe, from Elon Musk, which said he went too far in some of his plans, put too much automation in there. How do you explain to a leader what is enough, what is too much automation, or A.I.?

Jacob Morgan
Well the analogy I use in the book is a chef. If you've ever gone to one of those fancy restaurants where you see the chef back there, one of the things that you always see the chef doing is they're tasting the food. For leaders there are two ingredients that they really need to balance when it comes to this - humanity and technology. Right. Just two ingredients, we could do it. You need to make sure that you use technology in a way that brings people together, not pulls them apart. Like don't use technology for the sake of using technology. Use it because it brings people together. And the way that you measure that balance is you got to be in the kitchen with everybody else. Talk to your employees and ask them, do we need more of this? Do we need more of that? What are the areas where you're struggling with? What are the areas where we can make your life easier? Where are the areas where you think there's too much automation or not enough? Like you got to be in there with an apron on, standing in the kitchen with a spoon, just like everybody else, tasting the food and getting that feedback. And I think that's one of the areas where a lot of leaders struggle. So you got to balance the humanity and the technology, but you got to be in the kitchen with everybody else.

Spencer Levy
Well, there was an old football coach for the New York Football Giants, Bill Parcells. He says, if you want me to make the food, you’ve got to let me pick out the groceries. And I think that Bill Parcells and many of the old school coaches took a completely different leadership style to what you're advocating here today. And many of them got results winning Super Bowls. How do you respond to that?

Jacob Morgan
Hey, you know what? What worked in the past doesn't necessarily work in the future. And I've talked to a lot of leaders about this, too, and they said, you know what? We used to be like that. We used to lead those types of companies. I mean, I can't tell you how many CEOs I talked to who said, I used to be the command and control CEO. “I used to tell everybody what to do and have them do it. No questions. Don't question me. Don't bother me. Like that's how things get done. And I always ask them what changed? And there's always some pivotal moment that causes them to change. Transformations happen, and they will happen either from a business perspective, they’ll happen either through something that happens in your personal life. It can be a competitor that overtakes you. Something will happen, you're going to lose talent, but something will wake you up to tell you that the way that you are leading doesn't work. Literally every CEO that I've interviewed for the book that's coming out next year, over 100 of them, the majority of them have told me they used to be that kind of a leader. And almost all of them have said that something, some pivotal moment happened that transformed who they are as a leader. Some realization happened that made them realize that that way does not work. And I know there's still a lot of leaders where that hasn't happened, but it will.

Spencer Levy
So Jacob, we are just about out of time here. And I loved your book and I kept flipping pages. I could have spoken to you for 2 hours. Any final thoughts on leadership and the future?

Jacob Morgan
Yeah, I think probably the best piece of advice I have, just speaking from an individual perspective is, you don't need anyone's permission to lead. You don't need anyone's permission to practice the skill sets and mindsets that I talk about in the book. You don't have to go to your H.R. team and say, hey, is it okay if I practice empathy? You don't need to go to your boss and say, hey, is it okay if I practice the mindset of the global citizen and think big picture? You don't have to ask anybody. You can be a future ready leader yourself. But it takes the time, the effort, the accountability. And so the best piece of advice I have for everybody out there is do it, right? As Nike says, just do it.

Spencer Levy
Well, I'd add one other word. I’d add courage. Sometimes it takes courage to step out of the box of expectation. So, Jacob, on behalf of The Weekly Take, wow, what a fantastic book, The Future Leader. And looking forward to your new book. Jacob Morgan, author and futurist, podcaster, terrific guest with incredible advice. Thank you for joining the show, Jacob.

Jacob Morgan
Thank you for having me. I had a lot of fun.

Spencer Levy
For more from author and futurist Jacob Morgan, you can find it on our website, CBRE.com/TheWeeklyTake. We’ll share more about his bestselling books and other work, including his latest, which is called The Future Leader: Nine Skills and Mindsets to Succeed in the Next Decade. You'll also find more on our show, including ways to share The Weekly Take with your friends and colleagues. And don't forget to subscribe, rate and review us wherever you listen. We'll be back next week with that important episode I mentioned at the top of the show, our annual Midyear Market Outlook for 2022. Whether you're an owner, occupier or investor, our team will share the advice and expertise that is guiding CBRE. You won't want to miss it, so tune in for that next week. Thanks for joining us. I'm Spencer Levy. Be smart. Be safe. Be well.