Three Lessons from a Benevolent Universe

I try to remember that everyone is going through something and has gone through something.

No matter how wealthy or poor, how powerful or meek, how healthy or sick—everyone suffers. And at times, suffers brutally. Grief, loss, and addiction affect everyone—whether it's presidents or paupers.

This is the first lesson I learned about suffering: if everyone suffers, and suffers gravely, then I have an opportunity to help them mend just by treating them with dignity. And practically speaking, I can’t handle having a different MO for people who I like and respect and trust, and for people who I distrust or even find repulsive.

My soul can’t code-switch in the same way that my language can.

If I try to selectively treat some people with dignity and not others, it feels like my character splits in two—like a self-inflicted Jekyll and Hyde. I lose myself. So I try to offer the same dignity to everyone. It’s all or nothing—not because it’s easy or even comfortable, but because it’s the only way I know how to stay whole.

What to make of suffering itself, though?

I had this thought experiment in the past week—which has been the most intense we may have ever had. Our family is entering a season of tremendous challenge, and equally tremendous joy.

And as I look to the horizon ahead, I had one of those raw, reflective daydreams that stripped my heart down to naked honesty.

Let’s assume there is a higher-order being that influences our lives, orchestrating at least some of the suffering and joy we experience. Let’s further assume that this being actually does care about us and wants us to thrive.

If you are a theist, that being could be a benevolent God. If you are a non-theist, maybe you still hold space for the idea that something greater—life itself, the universe, some force beyond understanding—is trying to help us grow.

If we assume that there is a benevolent being that truly cares about our long-run best interest, and that being is intentionally influencing the suffering and joy in our lives, there must be some reason.

So what are they trying to teach us?

I can never know for sure, but I think it’s something like this—something about how we are in relation to others:

Learn to take care of yourself.
Take care of others.
And let others take care of you.

Or—
Learn to be a light.
Help others find their light.
Let others find the light in you.

Or even—
Learn to laugh at yourself.
Help others laugh.
Let others help you laugh.

Each part of the triad points to a different kind of human bonding.

To love the self is to become a vessel—open to love, radiant with light.
To love others is to offer them that light.
To let others love us—that’s the hardest. It requires trust.
It asks us to believe that we’re worthy, and that others are safe enough to let in.

Again, I don’t know for sure, but I don’t think that benevolent higher being is trying to teach us this—though too often, our actions wrongly suggest otherwise:

Learn to make money.
Take money from others.
Prevent others from taking your money.

Or—
Learn to live in the shadows.
Put others in darkness.
Fight the people who put you in darkness.

Or—
Learn to create fear.
Project fear onto others.
Shield yourself from the fearful others.

The first triad is a lesson inviting us into trust, love, and connection. The alternative traps us in a cycle of fear.

The first is an open hand; the other is a dagger at the neck.

The point is in how we are in relation to others. I don’t think the suffering and joy the benevolent being is throwing our way is to teach us to be in a state of conflict and exploitation. I think what they’re trying to teach us is to be in a state of harmony and intimacy.

Every experience of suffering and joy follows this pattern of pedagogy:
Experience love.
Love others.
Let love in.

Not one, not two, but all three:
Learn to love (an act of the self).
Love others (an act onto others).
Let love in (an act of others onto us).

We can’t graduate with just one of these lessons—we need all three. Hinduism has taught me this. So has Catholicism. Even my reflections as an indifferent agnostic in my early twenties taught me this.

Life has taught me, through all gives and takes from us, that we need all three threads of this triad, braided together.

As I grapple with the road ahead for our family, we are starting down tremendous suffering—but probably more than our fair share of joy, too. In prayer, contemplation, and written reflection, I’ve come to this conclusion again and again—including this week—and more strongly every time.

Maybe there is nothing out there. Maybe there is. Your beliefs and your guess are as good as mine. But it is helpful to think as if a benevolent being is trying to teach us something.

Because the conclusion I’ve come to—over and over—is powerful and instructive:

All this suffering and joy reminds us that the meaning of it all is to refine our relation to others—
By experiencing love,
Loving others,
And letting love in… again and again.

Stale Incumbents Perpetuate Distrust

In a society where trust levels are low and have been falling for decades, have you ever wondered who stands to gain from this pervasive and persistent distrust?

My hypothesis is this: low trust isn’t just a social ill—it’s a profitable venture for some. Over the years, I’ve noticed different groups that seem to benefit from distrust, both within organizations and across our culture. In this post, I’ll share my observations and explore who profits from distrust. If you have your own observations or data, please share them as we delve into this critical issue together.

Adversaries

The first group that benefits from low trust is straightforward: our adversaries. Distrust and infighting often go hand in hand. It’s much easier to defeat a rival, whether in the market, in an election, in a war, or in a race for positioning, when they are busy fighting among themselves and imploding from within.

Brokers

Another group that profits from distrust are brokers. Though they often don’t have bad intentions, brokers make a living by filling the gap that distrust creates. By “broker,” I mean someone who advocates on our behalf in an untrusting or uncertain environment. This could be a real estate agent, someone who vouches for us as a business partner, a friend who sets people up on blind dates, or someone whose endorsement wins us favor with others.

Mercenaries

Mercenaries are a less well-intentioned version of brokers. These people paint a dark picture of a distrustful world and then offer to fight for us or provide protection—for a price. Mercenaries never portray themselves as such, even if that’s what they really are.

Aggregators

Aggregators are people or organizations that build a reputation for being consistently trustworthy, especially when their rivals are not. Essentially, they aggregate trust and communicate it as a symbol of value. A good example of aggregators are fast food brands. When traveling abroad, people trust an American fast food chain to be clean, consistent, and reasonably priced. Many brands across industries thrive because they’ve built a trustworthy reputation.

These groups are fairly straightforward, and many of you might find these categories intuitive and relatable. However, they didn’t seem to cover enough ground to explain the persistent low trust levels in our culture. As I thought more about it, I realized that the largest group benefiting from distrust might be hidden in plain sight…

Stale Incumbents

Now, let’s consider the largest group that might be benefiting from distrust: stale incumbents.

Imagine someone you’ve worked with who always slows down projects. They resist learning new things and believe in sticking to the old ways. They’re nice, but their team never meets deadlines or finishes projects—they always have a believable excuse. This person is a stale incumbent.

More specifically, a stale incumbent is someone in a position who is out of ideas or motivation to innovate. Their ability to keep their job depends on everyone being stuck in the status quo. Here’s how it works:

1. They get into a comfortable position.

2. They stop learning and trying new things.

3. They run out of ideas because they stopped learning.

4. They try to hide and let new ideas fade.

5. They allow distrust and low standards to settle in.

6. When new people ask questions, they blame distrust: “It’s not my fault; others aren’t cooperating.”

7. They make the status quo seem inevitable, doing the minimum to keep their position and discourage change.

8. They repeat steps 4-7.

Stale incumbents need distrust to hide behind. They want to keep their comfortable position but have no new ideas because they stopped learning. A culture of distrust is the perfect scapegoat: it can’t argue back, and people think it can’t be changed, so they stop asking questions and give up. The distrust also makes it harder for new people to show up, innovate, annd expose the stale incumbent.

Ultimately, stale incumbents can keep their jobs while delivering mediocre results. This staleness spreads, making the culture of distrust harder to reverse because more stale incumbents depend on it. It’s a cycle of mediocrity, not anger and fear.

I don’t have experimental data, but I do have decades of regular observation draw from. I believe stale incumbents help explain the persistent low trust in America. Many people started with energy but never found allies, and the stale culture assimilated them.

The good news is there’s hope. If distrust is due to stale incumbents rather than malicious actors, we may not face much resistance in bringing about change. The path to change is clear: bring in energetic people and help them bring others along. It’s hard, but not complicated. By fostering a culture of learning, innovation, and trust, we can break the cycle of mediocrity and create a more trusting and dynamic society.

'I'm So Busy': A Signal of Organizational Distrust

I cringe whenever I ask someone “how’s it going” and they reply back with, 'I'm soooo busy.’.

Sometimes, it’s stated sincerely. But too often it’s a humblebrag, a ploy to assert status, or a facade for someone who really isn’t accomplishing much of anything. For instance, a colleague might constantly mention their packed schedule in meetings and emails, yet their actual output barely reflects the supposed busyness.

Almost always, “I’m busy" is not what someone actually means. When I hear, 'I've been so busy…,' I often wonder if what they really mean is something like:

• “I don’t know what’s actually most important, so I’m doing a little of everything.”

• “I want you to think I’m important, so I’m going to act like I am by giving the appearance that people have asked me to do a lot of stuff.”

• “I don’t know how to delegate or coach people, so I’m doing everything myself.”

• “Our organization doesn’t value results, just the appearance of results so I have to make it seem like I’m working really hard.”

• “Our culture isn’t trusting, and I’m afraid to be transparent and specific with you about my job.”

• “I don’t trust you enough or have the time for you now, so I’m making polite small talk about something other than the weather.”

• “I’ve given up because no matter how hard I try, my leadership doesn’t make a decision or ever say no to anything.”

• “I don’t know what my job actually is so I’m taking shots in the dark to try to put in an honest day’s work.”

• “Help.”

I’m quite skeptical of the phrase “I’m just sooo busy.” This phrase often serves as coded language for deeper issues. I avoid using it to ensure my words match my true intentions, and perhaps you should too.

While 'I'm just sooo busy' might seem trivial, it often masks deeper issues of mistrust and miscommunication within an organization. By saying one thing but meaning another, employees reveal a culture that does not support straightforward, honest dialogue. This should concern us all—not just as a nuisance but as a symptom of larger, systemic problems.

Hearing this phrase shouldn’t just pass by unnoticed. It should prompt us to adopt a more curious and compassionate approach, asking ourselves: What is really being said here? And why isn't there room for honesty?

Let’s challenge ourselves and our workplaces to foster a culture where transparency and trust are the norm, not the exception. What would have to be true for your organization to become a place where 'I'm busy' is no longer a common response?

The Art of Spotting Bullshit: A Guide for the Impact-minded Professional

If we’re type of people who care about making a positive contribution - for those we’re serving, for our enterprises, and society - it’s important to sniff out bullshitters so we can surround ourselves with people committed to and capable of making a difference.

Why? Because to make an actual impact I need to surround myself with people who actually are able to accomplish something (and be that type of person myself) rather than people who are all smoke and mirrors. Bullshitters may initially impress with their confidence and eloquence, but ultimately, they leave you facing the consequences alone. So if we want to increase our chances at making an impact for those we’re serving we have to do something simple, but often challenging: avoid bullshitters.

But the problem with a good bullshitter is that they’re good at bullshitting. Moreover, many capable people aren’t good at promoting themselves - precisely because they spend most of their time solving problems and helping people rather than bullshitting.

When you’re in the trenches with someone, day after day, it becomes easier to tell whether they’re a bullshitter or not. But we often have to decide whether to hire someone, promote them, work for them, or partner with them without being in the trenches with them first.

And so sniffing out bullshitters is actually a really important skill. So if you’re the sort of person who cares more about making a contribution than you do about promoting yourself this post is an invitation to you. How do you sniff out a bullshitter?

To get us started, here are some of the techniques that I’ve experimented with over the years:

• Ask them, “Can you walk me through it from start to finish, in detail?”

• Listen for jargon and corporate-isms which don’t have actual meaning. If someone can only speak in code and with overused corporate cliches, it usually means they don’t know what they’re actually talking about.

• Look at how individual contributors - especially someone’s non-managerial direct reports - talk about them. If they can’t tell you specifically why someone is capable, they probably aren’t. People who work on the front lines directly with products or customers have the most reliable radars for detecting bullshitters.

• Ask them, “can you tell me what aspects of that accomplishment were luck and which were the result of intentional decisions?” I haven’t asked this question in an interview yet, but I want to. Even bullshitters can accomplish things if they’re lucky - but probably can’t fake intention if no intention ever existed.

• Look for complex slides with lots of words or highly complex and ambigious objective statements. People who are able to explain complex things simply have done the work to hold an opinion.

• Look for a track record of bouncing around. Bullshitters can’t stick with a job for more than 2 years because once people realize they are bullshitters they know it’ll be easy for them to be laid-off or fired. Anyone can fake it in a job for a year or two. Of course, there are exceptions, especially when the person in front of you has a non-traditional background or extenuating personal circumstances.

• Do they gossip? If you don’t have anything more productive to say, spinning stories about others is an effective sleight of hand to distract people from one’s own lack of vision, intellect, or leadership.

These are just some tells I’ve seen as a pattern over the years. What has helped you detect bullshitters?

In closing, I’d like to be fair to a close cousin of bullshitters: storytellers. Storytellers root in the truth and aim to serve collective goals through the narratives they share. Bullshitters in my experience are quite the opposite - I’ve found them to be narcissists who care more about themselves than others.

Telling stories is really important in organizational life because stories help us do things like: make meaning of our work, motivate us to act, and learn from past mistakes. Story tellers matter because telling stories is an essential part of making an impact. The difference is subtle, but important: story telling moves a team or constituency forward, bullshitting only moves an individual person into positions of higher status and authority. Bullshitting is hype without substance, storytelling is substance.

I hope I’m not a bullshitter, I suppose I don’t know that for sure (after all, I do spend a lot of time writing and talking). I do know, though, that I don’t want to be. And I do know that bullshitters often get ahead and get a lot of credit, at least for awhile. And I do know, finally, that I want to leave this world better than I found it.

I figured that by putting a bat signal out on how to suss out bullshitters, we can more easily get the ourselves and others in a better position to make a contribution and at least make it less likely we accidentally hire, partner with, or work for a bullshitter.

I've shared my strategies, but I'm always learning. What are your tried-and-true methods for identifying bullshitters? Share in the comments below.

The potential of Government CX to improve social trust

Several times last week, while traveling in India, people cut in front of my family in line. And not slyly or apologetically, but gratuitously and completely obliviously, as if no norms around queuing even exist.

In this way, India reminds me of New York City. There are oodles and oodles of people, that seem to all behave aggressively - trying to get their needs met, elbowing and jockey their way through if they need to. It’s exhausting and it frays my Midwestern nerves, but I must admit that it’s rational: it’s a dog eat dog world out there, so eat or be eaten.

What I realized this trip, is that even after a few days I found myself meshing into the culture. Contrary to other trips to India, I now have children to protect. After just days, I began to armor up, ready to elbow and jockey if needed. I felt like a different person, more like a “papa bear” than merely a “papa”. like a local perhaps.

I even growled a papa bear growl - very much unlike my normal disposition. Bo, our oldest, had to go to the bathroom on our flight home so I took him. We waited in line, patiently, for the two folks ahead of us to complete their business. Then as soon as we were up, a man who joined the line a few minutes after us just moved toward the bathroom as if we had never been there waiting ahead of him

Then the papa bear in me kicked in. This is what transpired in Hindi, translated below. My tone was definitely not warm and friendly:

Me: Sir, we were here first weren’t we?

Man: I have to go to the bathroom.

Me: [I gesture toward my son and give an exasperated look]. So does he.

And then I just shuffled Bo and I into the bathroom. Elbow dropped.

But this protective instinct came at a cost. Usually, in public, I’m observant of others, ready to smile, show courteousness, and navigate through space kindly and warmly. But all the energy and attention I spent armoring up, after just days in India, left me no mind-space to think about others.

This chap who tried to cut us in line, maybe he had a stomach problem. Maybe he had been waiting to venture to the lavatory until an elderly lady sitting next to him awoke from a nap. I have no idea, because I didn’t ask or even consider the fact that this man may have had good intentions - I just assumed he was trying to selfishly cut in line.

Reflecting on this throughout the rest of the 15 hour plane ride, it clicked that this toy example of social trust that took place in the queue of an airplane bathroom reflects a broader pattern of behavior. Social distrust can have a vicious cycle:

1. Someone acts aggressively toward me

2. I feel distrust in strangers and start to armor up so that I don’t get screwed and steamrolled in public interactions

3. I spend less time thinking about, listening to, and observing the needs of others around me

4. I act even more aggressively towards strangers in public interactions, because I’m thinking less about others

And now, I’ve ratcheted up the distrust, ever so slightly, but tangibly.

The natural response to this ratcheting of social distrust is to create more rules, regulations, and centralize power in institutions. The idea being, of course, that institutions can mediate day to day interactions between people so the ratcheting of social distrust has some guardrails put upon it. When social norms can’t regulate behavior, authority steps in.

The problem with institutional power, of course, is that it’s corruptible and undermines human agency and freedom. Ratcheting up institutional power has tradeoffs of its own.

—

Later during our journey home, we were waiting in another line. This time we were in a queue for processing at US Customs and Border patrol. This time, I witnessed something completely different.

A couple was coming through the line and they asked us:

Couple: Our connecting flight is boarding right now. I’m so sorry to ask this, but is it okay if we go ahead of you in line?

Us: Of course, we have much more time before our connecting flight boards. Go ahead.

Couple: [Proceeds ahead, and makes the same request to the party ahead of us].

Party ahead of us: Sorry, we’re in the same boat - our flight is boarding now. So we can’t let you cut ahead.

Couple: Okay, we totally understand.

The first interaction in line at the airplane bathroom made me feel like everyone out there was unreasonable and selfish. It undermined the trust I had in strangers.

This interaction in the customs line had the opposite effect, it left me hopeful and more trusting in strangers because everyone involved behaved considerately and reasonably.

First, the couple acknowledged the existence of a social norm and were sincerely sorry for asking us to cut the line. We were happy to break the norm since we were unaffected by a delay of an extra three minutes. And finally, when the couple ahead said no, they abided by the norm.

We were all observing, listening, and trying to help each other the best we could. In my head, I was relieved and I thought, “thank goodness not everyone’s an a**hole.

It seems to me that just as there’s a cycle that perpetuates distrust, there is also a cycle which perpetuates trust:

1. Listen and seek to understand others around you

2. Do something kind that helps them out without being self-destructive of your own needs

3. The person you were kind toward feels higher trust in strangers because of your kindness

4. The person you were kind to can now armor down ever so slightly and can listen for and observe the needs of others

And now, instead of a ratchet of distrust, we have a ratchet of more trust. Instead of being exhausting like distrust, this increase in trust is relieving and energy creating.

—

At the end of the day, I want to live in a free and trusting society. If there was to be one metric that I’m trying to bend the trajectory on in my vocational life - it’s trust. I want to live in a world that’s more trusting.

This desire to increase trust in society is why I care so much about applying customer experience practices to Government. Government can disrupt the cycle of distrust and start the flywheel of trust in a big way - and not just between citizens and government but across broader culture and society.

Imagine this: a government agency, say the National Parks Service, listens to its constituents and redesigns its digital experience. Now more and more people feel excited about visiting a National Park and are more able to easily book reservations and be prepared for a great trip into one of our nation’s natural treasures.

So now, park visitors have more trust in the National Park Service going into their trip and are more receptive to safety alerts and preservation requests from Park Rangers. This leads to a better trip for the visitor, a better ability for Rangers to maintain the park, and a higher likelihood of referral by visitors who have a great trip. This generates new visitors and adds momentum to the flywheel.

I’m a dataset of one, but this is exactly what happened for me and my family when we’ve interacted with the National Parks’ Service new digital experience. And there’s even some data from Bill Eggers and Deloitte that is consistent with this anecdote: CX is a strong predictor of citizens’ trust in government.

And now imagine if this sort of flywheel of trust took place across every single interaction we had with local, state, and federal government. Imagine the mental load, tension, and exhaustion that would be averted and the positive affect that might replace it.

It could be truly transformational, not just with what we believe about government, but what we believe about the trustworthiness of other citizens we interact with in public settings. If we believe our democratic government - by the people and for the people - is trustworthy, that will likely help us believe that “the people” themselves are also more trustworthy. After all, Government does shape more of our. daily interactions than probably any other institution, but Government also has an outsized role in mediating our interactions with others.

Government CX is a huge opportunity that we should pursue, not only because of the improvement to delivery of government service or the improvement of trust in government. Improvement to government CX at the local, state, and federal levels could also have spillover effects which increase social trust overall. No institution has the reach and intimate relationship with people to start the flywheel of trust like customer-centric government could, at least that I can see.

Photo by George Stackpole on Unsplash

Preventing Trust-killers

There are three general types of problems.

Type A problems are where the state of the art isn’t good enough. Even if we executed to the fullest extent of possible we’d still fall short. Cancer is like this. Even if the state of the art was applied with full fidelity, tons of people would suffer and die early deaths.

Type B problems are where the state of the art solutions would be good enough, but something’s not going to plan. Many operational problems are like this. We have a process, but life is messy so things go wrong even though the issue was “never supposed to happen.” So we fix the problem, improve our ability to execute, or both.

Type C problems are the ones caused by bad actors with nefarious intent. It’s the problem that arises because someone tries to screw over someone else, on purpose, because they can get away with it. It could be someone taking credit for a colleagues work, or a person running a Ponzi scheme which defrauded investors of billions of dollars. In a Type C problem, the bad actor knows what they are doing is wrong, unfair, or sub-optimal, but they do it anyway.

A good way to judge a team or enterprise is by looking at the proportion of time spent on each type of problem. Organizations that are well led and well managed tend to spend a lot of their time on Type A problems. They create systems and coach people well to minimize Type B problems, and they simply don’t tolerate Type C problems and the people that cause them.

Well run organizations and their leaders know that Type C problems are trust-killers which make working the more important Type A and Type B problems infinitely harder.

Luckily, creating safeguards to prevent Type C problems is not complicated. All it takes is the team or its leader articulating a set of values, behavioral norms, and performance standards that that make it clear how we’ll act and how we won’t. Then, the leader has to coach people up to those standards and remove people who continually violate them.

This may take courage, but it’s not complicated.

To me, thinking through the “how” of work, might be the most underrated activity in all of management and leadership. And it can be so easy - even talking for literally an hour with a team about “how are we going to act and how are we not going to act” can make a huge difference.

Photo Credit: Unsplash @quinoal