Episode 136 · 15 October 2024 · 54:31

WordPress drama and the CEO big birthday crisis, PLUS Oliver Yonchev's Hot Take on A.I. - This Week in Work, 15th October 2024

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Intro and weekly roundup preview
news roundup#intro #weekly-roundup #podcast
News Roundup: The Big Birthday Crisis
news roundup#news #birthday #crisis
News Roundup: WordPress vs. WP Engine drama
news roundup#wordpress #wp-engine #drama #tech-news
News Roundup: Remote work vs. in-office connection (Cornell study)
news roundup#remote-work #in-office #cornell-study #connection
Hot Take: Oliver Yonchev on AI
hot take#ai #hot-take #oliver-yonchev
Workplace Surgery: Proving the ROI of wellbeing initiatives
workplace surgery#wellbeing #roi #workplace-surgery
Workplace Surgery: Employee engagement vs. satisfaction
workplace surgery#employee-engagement #satisfaction #product-manager
Workplace Surgery: Balancing client demands and employee wellbeing
workplace surgery#client-demands #employee-wellbeing #agency

Show notes

WordPress Drama, the CEO Birthday Crisis & Oliver Yonchev's AI Hot Take — This Week in Work, 15th October 2024

This Week in Work — Al Elliott and Leanne Elliott (Chartered Occupational Psychologist) break down why CEOs approaching milestone birthdays see company performance dip, the WordPress vs. WP Engine feud that's shaking 40% of the web, and new Cornell research that challenges what we think about remote connection. Plus, Oliver Yonchev's bold Hot Take on AI — and a Workplace Surgery covering wellbeing ROI, engagement vs. satisfaction, and balancing client demands with team burnout.

🔥 Stories Covered

1. The Big Birthday Crisis: Do CEOs slump at milestone ages? Leanne digs into a study featured in Fortune exploring how CEOs approaching milestone birthdays — 49, 59, 59 — see a significant dip in company performance. The research suggests the psychological weight of these "9-ending" birthdays triggers reassessment, risk aversion, or distraction at the very top. Al, approaching his own 49th, has thoughts.

2. WordPress vs. WP Engine: A very public feud Al breaks down the drama between Matt Mullenweg, founder of WordPress, and WP Engine — a hosting company that powers a huge chunk of the 40% of the web built on WordPress. What started as a dispute over trademark and community contribution has escalated into public accusations, plugin blocks, and a whole lot of noise. Leanne's verdict? A "pissing competition between male leaders" — Elon and Zuck vibes included.

3. Do we really bond better in person? A new study from Cornell University challenges the assumption that in-person interactions create stronger connections than video calls. Leanne walks through the findings and what they mean for the remote work vs. return-to-office debate — and Al wonders what the results would have looked like pre-pandemic.

🔥 Hot Take: Oliver Yonchev on AI

This week's Hot Take comes from Oliver Yonchev, entrepreneur and former CEO of Flight Story, the global marketing group founded with Steven Bartlett. His bold prediction? AI will be capable of doing pretty much everything humans do — and doing it better — within two years.

Oliver argues that Moore's Law is accelerating AI capability at an unprecedented rate, pointing to how quickly ChatGPT has evolved since 2021. He makes the case that small teams and individuals are now capable of more than at any other time in history — and that the technology itself is neither good nor bad; it's what we do with it.

Leanne pushes him on jobs at risk, and Al raises the counterpoint of accidental human innovation (penicillin, anyone?). Oliver's response? Both — there'll be both disruption and creation.

💬 Workplace Surgery

Three listener questions, tackled live:

Wellbeing ROI: "I own a consulting firm with 8 full-time employees. Last year we introduced several wellbeing initiatives like flexible hours, mental health days, and a meditation room. How do I prove the ROI to my finance team?"
Engagement vs. satisfaction: "I'm a product manager at a software development company and I really do like my job and my team. But I keep hearing that employee satisfaction and engagement are different. What's the actual difference?"
Client demands vs. team burnout: "I run a small digital marketing agency with 14 employees. We've been growing rapidly over the past year, and I'm struggling to balance demanding clients with my team's wellbeing. How do I keep clients happy without burning people out?"

Leanne's advice spans measurement frameworks, the psychology of engagement (hint: it's about energy, not happiness), and the uncomfortable truth that sometimes you have to fire a client to save your team.

Resources mentioned:

Well-being: Productivity and Happiness at Work by Sheena Johnson, Ivan Johnson and Carey Cooper

🥚 Episode Password

Al and Leanne have started hiding a little password in the show notes. Find it, email them with the password, and you might just win something... Send it to hello@truthliesandwork.com.

Connect With Us

Get in touch, book a call, or find Al and Leanne on LinkedIn — all in one place: truthliesandwork.com/connect

Mental health support: findahelpline.com — UK: Samaritans 116 123 · Mind 0300 123 3393 — US: 988 — Australia: Lifeline 13 11 14

Truth, Lies & Work is part of the HubSpot Podcast Network.

Full transcript

Expand full transcript

Al ElliottThe dirty little secret is that most businesses think they know their customers. They have the data, the records, the history, but it's scattered across 3 teams and 4 systems. And in our case, it's about 216,000 spreadsheets, which means nobody can actually use it.

B — REVIEWWhat you should be doing is using HubSpot, because why? HubSpot connects it all— every interaction, every support ticket, every conversation— into one platform every team can work from. So when sales talks to a customer, marketing already knows the full story. And when you know more, you grow more.

Al ElliottNice. Check out hubspot.com, the agentic customer platform for growing businesses.

B — REVIEWHello and welcome to Truth, Lies and Work, the award-winning psychology podcast brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals.

Al ElliottMy name is Leanne.

B — REVIEWI'm a chartered psychologist.

Al ElliottMy name is Al. I'm a business owner.

B — REVIEWWe are here to help you simplify the science of work and create amazing workplace cultures.

Al ElliottYes. And a quick reminder, if you like guest interviews and hearing stories of how organisations big and small have built amazing workplace cultures, then you want to come back on Thursday because they're definitely right up your street. We'll bring a brand new interview every single Thursday. We've got a great one coming up this Thursday, although we are trying something new, potentially a livestream on the pod. Never been done before by us, probably by clever people.

B — REVIEWSo if we don't bring you a livestream, it didn't go so well. We'll bring you an incredible interview.

Al ElliottAnd if you like to keep up to date with the latest news around the workplace, then you're in the right place because every Tuesday we bring you Weekly News Roundup and of course our world-famous Weekly Workplace Surgery where I put your questions to Leanne.

B — REVIEWAnd we are also back with our new segment Hot Takes where we uncover the truth and lies of work with the help of psychologists, thought leaders, business leaders, basically getting their bold insights, their controversial predictions, or maybe an unpopular opinion. Nothing is off limits. We want to know what is really happening in the world of work, what is broken, and what on earth is coming next. Uh, we've started pretty strong. We've had Phil Agnew, uh, behavioural science expert and host of the Nudge podcast. Uh, we had another incredible podcaster, Sonia Thompson from Inclusion and Marketing. Very interesting hot take on inclusion. Um, and this week we are, we are continuing the momentum. Our hot take this week is from none other than Oliver Yonchev. If you're one of the few people in the world who hasn't heard of him, Oliver is an entrepreneur, a speaker, and former CEO of Flight Story, the global marketing and innovation group he founded with some dude called Stephen Bartlett.

Al ElliottGot a podcast, I heard.

B — REVIEWSomething like that.

Al ElliottI'm not sure he's still doing it.

B — REVIEWNo. Um, so yeah, stay tuned for that.

Al ElliottBut first, it's your favourite time of the week, Leanne. It's time for the news roundup.

B — REVIEWCue the jingle.

Al ElliottI will cue. Okay, Lee, what have you seen?

B — REVIEWThis week I came across quite an interesting study, um, that was showcased in an article from Fortune about milestone birthdays. And as somebody who is, who is in the midst of a milestone birthday, um, I thought I'd share it. So the study is called The Big Birthday Crisis. It's authored by Stefan Kramer and examines the performance dips that CEOs experience as they approach milestone ages like 49 and 59. So the data covers over 800 CEOs across various different industries and demonstrates a clear trend. So as CEOs near these significant birthdays, their companies see reduced firm value, lower operating performance, and a decrease in long-term investment. So serious commercial implications. Now you might be thinking, well, why would a birthday cause such a business issue? Well, the researchers show that milestone birthdays tend to trigger deep reflection on life achievements, personal identity, and career success. So according to the study, these CEOs become more introspective, potentially questioning their direction or whether they've accomplished enough. So this life audit can lead to distraction from day-to-day responsibilities, leading to declines in firm performance. And the numbers don't lie. CEOs nearing these milestone birthdays, their companies they were overseeing on average saw a reduction in firm value of up to 2%, which might not sound like a lot, but if you've got a billion-pound company in your control, that's a lot of millions and millions of pounds. What I thought was interesting as well is the study also dug into the language used by CEOs, and it was much more emotive as they approached these milestone birthdays, more authentic, more reflective. Their mood is changing, and they're bringing that changed mood to work. I think it's really interesting. Um, because I think you might be listening to this and going, isn't it good that leaders are being more emotive, more authentic? You know, authenticity is seen as a strength. Yes, but it's that cultural shift, that change in behavior that makes us all nervous. We don't, we don't like sudden and unexplained shifts in behavior, particularly from our leaders. Um, so for any business leaders listening, it might be worth staying mindful of how personal milestones can affect professional decision-making. And for boards and executives, this study perhaps underscores the importance of supporting CEOs during these times, whether that's through executive coaching, temporarily delegating key decisions, or creating a structure that allows CEOs to channel their self-reflection productively. Now, this is completely anecdotal, Al, but I did a little research.

Al ElliottGo ahead.

B — REVIEWUm, I did a little research to see if there was any real-world evidence that these 9 ending birthdays may hold some weight. Um, And I came across a couple of examples that I thought were quite interesting. Um, so first of all, Jeffrey Skilling, former CEO of Enron, infamous Enron, resigned at the age of 49, right before the massive scandal that led to Enron's downfall. Then we also have Adam Neumann. Remember Adam, co-founder of WeWork? Faced significant turmoil as he approached 40. Um, very, very many questions asked about his leadership style and erratic decisions during that period. Um, and even Steve Jobs, um, was outed from Apple at the age of 30. So there you go, Al. Thoughts?

Al ElliottWell, as someone who has had a 29th birthday, a 39th birthday, and coming up quite swiftly a 49th birthday, I totally agree. I think it gives you this— it's this sort of point in, in your life where you go, okay, what do the next 10 years hold for me? And also, rather morbidly— um, morbosely, that was a— that's a new word you just made up, Al— rather morbidly, How many 9 birthdays have I got left? Um, which is not too many, not by, not, not the amount of gin I drink anyway. And I think that, um, I think it does, it gives you the opportunity to sit there and go, have I done everything I wanna do? Do I wanna do things differently? And I noticed like I, I went bankrupt at 29 and started my second company at 29. Um, 39, did we not move abroad? No, we moved. I can't remember. We didn't.

B — REVIEWNo, you were much younger than that, but I was, I was coming up 29 when we moved abroad.

Al ElliottYeah. And I think when it comes to 49, I'm definitely gonna be reassessing things. Of course, We'll still be doing the podcast, you know, that's still, that's, that's a good thing. So if you've got someone who's coming up to a significant birthday and they work with you or for you, perhaps just be a little bit sort of prescient about what's going on and perhaps just give them a little bit of support, maybe. I don't know, just keep your eye on them.

B — REVIEWAlways nice to keep an eye on those, those close to you, isn't it? Absolutely. Good advice, Al. What have you seen this week?

Al ElliottThere is a, I think it's called a shitstorm. I think that's the technical word. A bit of drama in the WordPress world. Just a bit of context. They're the website people.

B — REVIEWThat's right.

Al ElliottJust a bit of context. WordPress powers about 40% of the web, so 4 out of every 10 websites you go to will be WordPress. So they're not a tiny company. There's a guy called Matt Mullenweg who is the guy behind WordPress, and he's planning to be going head-to-head with another company called WP Engine, which is one of the biggest hosting companies for WordPress websites. The main issue seems to be that Matt doesn't believe that WP Engine, this host, is contributing enough to the WordPress Foundation. And of course, he's taken to Twitter to tell everyone his thoughts. Things got a bit heated. Those who pushed back on Matt's decisions got blocked by the main WordPress account. I know, just completely blocked. And when another— all right, Elon, he's been taking some lessons. When another contributor said they wouldn't be helping anymore, WordPress came back with a snarky, sorry, who are you? Not exactly the kind of response you'd expect from a brand that genuinely relies on their community. Open source, just in case you don't know what that is, open source tends to be that a community can, can, uh, contribute code to it and make it better. And that's what has happened with WordPress. So it's now on version 6 or 7, I think now, and the majority of the recent stuff has come from the community. In a really bizarre turn of events, just a couple of days ago, WordPress essentially took over a piece of software built for WordPress. It was built by WP Engine, changed the name, and then just basically claimed full ownership for it.

B — REVIEWWhat?

Al ElliottYeah, I know. It's called a plugin. Those of you who know WordPress know what plugins are, and the plugin is called Advanced Custom Fields, which is one of the biggest plugins in the store, now no longer belongs to WP Engine or to the original guy, which I think his name was Eliot Condon. Um, I had to be careful how I said that word. Uh, but, uh, yeah, just ripped out of his hands. Now, this whole situation does raise an interesting leadership question. Is it a good thing for a leader to publicly dig in their heels like this, or is it more about ego? Now, on one side, you've gotta respect a leader who stands up for what they believe in. Like, Matt built WordPress on the idea of open source software. So I do get why he's a bit passionate about making sure companies are giving back. Yeah. But here's where it gets a bit tricky. At what point does leadership turn into ego? Blocking people who disagree with you or firing back with sarcastic comments, that's not how you build trust or foster collaboration. When you start shutting down criticism or brushing off contributors, you're not leading, you're controlling. And that's where things can start to go a bit sideways. Now, I just wanna, you mentioned Steve Jobs before. Let's just think about Steve Jobs. He was known for being pretty uncompromising, but his drive was always about making the best product for Apple's users.

B — REVIEWYeah.

Al ElliottPeople followed him because his vision pushed the company forward. Jobs wasn't about personal control in that sector. He was all about creating something that mattered. Now, to be fair, granted, by all accounts, he was a pretty terrible manager and not a great human being, but in that context, he did leading well. In Matt's case, it feels like the fight is less about improving WordPress and more about holding onto control. When leadership becomes more about protecting your territory, than encouraging new ideas, you risk losing the very, very people who make the platform for what it is. So maybe if you're a leader, ask yourself, am I, am I taking this stance for the community or for myself? Because I feel like that's the line between real leadership and just wanting to be in charge. What do you think, Lee?

B — REVIEWHow old is Matt? Out of curiosity.

Al ElliottI don't know.

B — REVIEWDo you want to have a little look?

Al ElliottYeah, have a little look.

B — REVIEWHis name's Matt.

Al ElliottMatt Mullenweg.

B — REVIEWMullenweg. What a name, Matt.

Al ElliottUm, interesting, while you were looking at that, I saw something on Twitter or X today where there's this drug or this kind of thing where a lot of leaders go into the desert and take this hallucinatory thing, um, and they come back and it's kind of changed a lot of people for the bad, for the worse. And apparently some— someone dug up an article where they'd done some research into— I don't even know how to say the word. I've seen it written down, ayahuasca or something. And he was one of the people who funded the research. Do you know how old he is?

B — REVIEWWell, I'm sure it's a complete coincidence that Matt just turned 40.

Al ElliottNo way. Yeah, just proving—

B — REVIEWanecdotal, guys, anecdotal. Yeah, I mean, maybe that has had something to do with it. Maybe he's reflecting on his life's work so far and isn't entirely happy that some people in his— from his perspective, are maybe leeching off him a little bit. I don't know. I don't understand the technology enough, but it sounds like that's kind of the general vibe, that Matt's a bit annoyed at his other company for kind of not giving back as much, or not. Is that right?

Al ElliottYeah, but there are plenty of companies out there who use WordPress, um, and they don't give back. Um, there are plenty of companies out there who use WordPress, like Google, who do give back. I think it's— to single one person out is daft. Um, it just feels like he's, he's going through something at the moment. He's really, really not handling this well. Uh, there's a guy called DHH, um, David Heinemann-Hansen, who invented Ruby on Rails, which is another open source product. And he's— and he did a really weird video today saying, my response, and essentially saying, you've made loads of money, but then I've made loads of money, but then you don't give back, but then I give back. And then also there's all kind of weirdness around—

B — REVIEWPissing competition between male leaders.

Al ElliottYes, that's exactly what it is.

B — REVIEWIt's like Elon and Zuckerberg, isn't it? Going on about the freaking cage fight. Cage fight.

Al ElliottThat's what would solve it.

B — REVIEWFight, boys.

Al ElliottAnyway, Le, enough nerdery. What have you seen?

B — REVIEWWell, of course, everywhere the debates around remote work, return to office is continuing. I actually saw an article very like in the last hour or so that I would have included but didn't quite have the time to read through and prep properly, basically saying that now Amazon are making 14,000 more layoffs and really the whole RTO mandate was just a cover to reduce headcount, hoping that they get that natural attrition. Classy move, Amazon, as always. But anyway, I did actually come across an actual study, a scientific study that was very well timed. So as you know, one of the big arguments for people coming back into the office, dragging everyone back, is that it's much harder to form the same kind of connection over a screen, um, compared to in person. Person— the assumption is in person is superior when it comes to building relationships. And yeah, there is something to that, isn't it? It feels intuitive that physically to be in the same room with somebody, you, you can, you know, maybe pick up on other cues and, and create that bond. Um, but there's a new study from Cornell University published in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, which basically calls bullshit. So the research led by Marie-Catherine Mignot set out to compare whether people form different or less accurate first impressions of others during video calls, so like on Zoom, versus face-to-face interactions. So the study involved over 1,000 participants participants who were asked to meet others in 2-minute getting-to-know-you sessions, either over Zoom or in person. And after each meeting, participants rated the other person's personality and how much they liked them. What the researchers also did was make all the participants take a Big Five-based personality inventory before these kind of meet and greet things. So what the researchers found, um, was, was Surprising perhaps to our intuition, people were just as good at picking up on each other's personalities via Zoom as they were in person. Not only that, but they also liked each other just as much whether they met through a screen or face to face. There is a caveat though. The study did reveal that some traits like assertiveness and energy were more easily perceived in person, but on the flip side, traits like originality or openness were actually judged more accurately on Zoom. So the researchers thought that that might be because video calls can provide extra contextual clues, like what's in somebody's background. So think books, art decor, um, that could hint at a person's creativity or intellect. So yeah, what was interesting though is that in all scenarios, if the video or audio quality was poor, people had a much harder time reading the other person's personality, which could have a huge, huge impact, especially in settings like job interviews. Imagine being judged less favorably simply because your connection wasn't the best. And this could actually then bring in a real serious issue in terms of diversity and inclusion, because it could even exacerbate the socioeconomic divide, particularly for people without access to high-quality internet. Or those in a rural area or those from a lower income. So yeah, some really interesting points raised in the study, both in terms of our assumptions when it comes to forming connections in this digital age and also potentially the downside of video and particularly internet connections could actually be creating some bias and discrimination in the recruitment process. I thought it was really interesting. I'll leave a link. Our thoughts.

Al ElliottYeah, I'd be interested to see what would happen if we had tested this 5 years ago before the pandemic, uh, because after the— during the pandemic, everyone, including like elderly parents, our parents, uh, were on Zoom, um, and they got used to it. So I wonder if maybe it is something that's evolved over the last 5 years. Um, but it makes sense. Um, and I think it's the same with like a YouTube video. I've watched lots of stuff. I nerd out on people on YouTube videos that do well, and they always say that if you've got good video but poor audio, they never do as well as someone who's got great audio but not as good video. So I'm guessing that, yeah, add everything together, you get a beautiful connection, you get a lovely background. That's why we spend so much time on our backgrounds as well, I think, because we want to, uh, we want to talk to you guys.

B — REVIEWWrite in, tell us, what can you tell about Al and I from our backgrounds? There are some little clues actually, in terms of— there's clues about where we're from, clues about our wedding. There are clues about— what else, Al? Will you tell us, listener?

Al ElliottYeah, you tell us.

B — REVIEWYeah, viewer, listener, you're probably— you're not gonna be able to do that, but go over to YouTube, let us know.

Al ElliottOkay, after this very short break, we have a hot take from none other than Oliver Yonchev, former CEO of Flight Story, the global marketing and innovation group founded With Stephen Bartlett. You do not wanna miss this.

B — REVIEWDid you know that the UK's number one management podcast, that's us by the way, and the UK's number one marketing podcast are both on the same podcast network?

Al ElliottWe actually have a lot in common. We both use behavioral science to help people do better at work.

B — REVIEWAnd we both had to wrangle Rory Sutherland on an episode.

Al ElliottAnd 2 out of 3 of us are devilishly good looking. And you're not going to say which. Phil, host of Nudge, UK's number one marketing podcast. It's brought to you— we need to do this in threes—

B — REVIEWthe HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals.

Al ElliottSeamless. Seamless. Tell us about your latest episode, Phil. We've just done an episode on fake fandom and how New York indie bands are paying agencies to create fake TikTok videos about how much they like their work. And we talk about the behavioral science behind fandom and how that encourages people to enjoy the music and all of that good stuff, and do some big things about how this affects the world of politics, business, and brands as well.

B — REVIEWIt is. It's such, it's such a good show. Of course, you'll hear all the stuff you want to hear about how to grow your business by using behavioural science in your marketing. But there's also just some really interesting episodes that will be right up your street. Personally, I enjoyed Can Balsamic Vinegar Make Beer Taste Better?

Al ElliottIt can.

B — REVIEWAnd Are We All Just Status-Seeking Monkeys?

Al ElliottOh, yeah. Go and listen to Nudge wherever you get your podcasts.

B — REVIEWBut come back.

Al ElliottYeah, come back. Definitely come back because Nudge isn't as good as this. So come back. I'll cut that out. Keep that in.

B — REVIEWAnd welcome back to Hot Take, our brand new segment that we started in October where we're asking entrepreneurs, business owners, leaders, thought leaders, psychologists for their hot take in the world of work. What is true, what is false, and what on earth is going to happen next? This week we have the incredible Oliver Yonchev. Oliver is an entrepreneur, speaker, and former CEO of Flight Story, the global marketing and innovation group he founded with Stephen Bartlett. For over a decade, Oliver has been at the forefront of marketing and technology, helping guide the management teams of many of the world's most successful companies. Are you ready for some name drops, Al?

Al ElliottGo ahead, go ahead.

B — REVIEWHis clients have included Amazon, Apple, Coca-Cola, TikTok, Twitch, Disney, and Uber, to name just a few. I sat down with Oliver this week and asked him for his hot take, and well, it is spicy. Um, Oliver has given us an extremely bold prediction about AI and where it's headed. Um, yeah, let me tell you, it's definitely one that will get you thinking about your job, your future, and pretty much life in general. Um, so strap in. Oliver, over to you.

Al ElliottI'm a failed indie rocker, lifelong marketeer, technology enthusiast. I've spent a career trying to understand people, learn how to effectively communicate with people on the internet, and very much I've anchored my professional endeavors to what comes next, the future technology. I was a benefactor of social media becoming increasingly important in the world. And I want to be a benefactor of this new wave of technological innovation, which is generative AI, and what this means for what I do as a marketeer, but also what it means more broadly for people in general.

B — REVIEWI mean, with that in mind, I'm hoping we're going to stick to this, this AI theme. But Oliver, what is your hot take?

Al ElliottSo my hot take is that AI will be capable of doing pretty much everything that you do, you being symbolic for most people, but better within 2 years. Pretty much everything you can do, I think AI will be capable of doing things better than you within 2 years. My favourite thing to do is make predictions about the future because you can't prove me wrong today. So I don't have to do the walk of intellectual shame for another 2 years. When I'm proven wrong. So a couple of things. So there's a principle called Moore's Law, which dictates that technology doubles in its potential and capabilities every sort of 6 months. What we are seeing with AI is this is happening at an accelerated rate.

B — REVIEWMm-hmm.

Al ElliottAnd if you just go back to, you said ChatGPT there, ChatGPT, go back to 2021 when it was first introduced, it was the first time in a while where we all had an aha moment. It was a bit of a wow of, oh, this is actually really useful. It's emulating intelligence. It seems intuitive. And then if you think of the last 2 years, or 2 to 3 years, we've seen such advancements. These models now are capable of reasoning. They did a study recently. Mensa is the gold standard of Intellect and the O1 model, which was released by OpenAI, that gives up some of its capabilities— speed, it runs a little slower, it validates things, it shows you its thinking pattern— that answered about 2/3 or more than 2/3 of the test correctly, and it had an IQ of 120, which far surpasses the average person.

B — REVIEWWow.

Al ElliottSo you look at that and go, okay, well, that's today. If you'd have done that test 6 months prior, that would have been considerably less intelligent. And if you look at that curve and you see the rate of change, you can assume that we are going to reach a level of general intelligence, AGI, which is the kind of utopia at the point where machine is capable of thinking better than a person. And we're arguably going to reach that point within, you know, the next 12 months.

B — REVIEWIs this mainly around knowledge-based work, presumably?

Al ElliottSo, so many things. Professional services, absolutely knowledge-based work, but lots of things. When we talk about AI, a lot of the attention is around generative AI, which is one component that's really going to influence, you know, what they're very good at today is narrow tasks. So AI is very capable of rationalizing huge amounts of data, making sense of them, and then making that data useful in language, in image, in video. And there's multimodality to AI today. So you go, okay, they're very good at those types of things. But AI is very vast. There's huge advancements in robotics. There's huge advancements in predictive AI. Looking at, you know, making accurate predictions on what could happen in certain fields. So undoubtedly professional services will be affected. And there's this misconception that AI is new, as a thing that post-ChatGPT suddenly has come on leaps and bounds. And admittedly, there has been more capital, more investment, more attention, more noise, more minds working towards furthering the AI cause since ChatGPT. But the term was coined back in 1967, and we've all been interfacing with AI in a very meaningful way for a long time. The simplest example I can give you is when you go on to Netflix, your recommendations are different to mine. That's an AI algorithm deciding what's better for you based on your wants, needs, and desires. Your social feeds, are an amalgamation of humanity, and it's curating what it believes is more relevant for you to keep you watching your phone. And you can extrapolate this across all advertising, many other, many, many other fields. So AI is not new, but some of the new applications of AI are really transformative in a meaningful way. And probably the best example that kind of really I suppose was a wake-up call for me was the explanation of thinking about the economy at a macro level. So if I said to you, what are the 2 primary economic costs in the world?

B — REVIEWThere are 2.

Al ElliottThere is energy. What is energy? To create and produce everything around us and move goods and services, that involves energy. And the other is intelligence, human ingenuity, working power, man's thoughts, all of these things working together. And if I said to you, the cost of one of those things is being reduced exponentially at a rate thought unthinkable, suddenly that changes the entire system that the world of work is built upon. And there are much smarter people than me who will coin statements like AI is as impactful as electricity or the internet. These are titans of technologies, world leaders that are getting behind this message. And you're seeing it in policy, you're seeing it in impact, you're seeing it in the amount of investment in the space. So, as much as it sounds hyperbolic and crazy to say AI will be capable of doing things better than you within 2 years, I don't think it's that crazy. And also, just because it's capable of doing those things doesn't necessarily mean it will. That's the point. Capable and it will, they may be 2 different things.

B — REVIEWSo, as an entrepreneur, Are you excited about how this developing technology can shape the world of work, or are you fearful?

Al ElliottI think as an optimist, generally, I'm really excited. The technology is neither good nor bad. I often liken my firsthand experience to social media. Social media, if you think of the influence that that's had on individuals, on business, on political discourse, on the world around us. It never started that way. It started innocently as a place to connect us online and create better online experiences. That was where it started. And of course, as you start to— as that went, as it expanded as a capability, and the outcome of that was individuals now had a voice.

B — REVIEWYeah.

Al ElliottThat were not gatekept by large institutions and platforms and media entities and publishers. That was a wonderful thing and a lot changed. There were some negative things that came along with that. The unintended consequences, you could argue phone addiction and the rise in the mental health crisis. There's a lot of baggage comes with transformation. So I'm not naive to the fact that AI will have risks associated with it. And there are many of them. But as an entrepreneur, it has the potential to be a wonderful leveler. Right now, I'm at a disadvantage to the world's biggest companies because I don't have the resources. I don't necessarily have the knowledge or the know-how. If you empower me and augment my life with artificial intelligence and lots of capabilities, suddenly that's an incredible leveler.

B — REVIEWYeah.

Al ElliottAnd I believe that small teams and individuals are now capable of so much more than any other time in history. So if you have a great idea and you have knowledge and you have the right gusto, I think you can achieve a hell of a lot more with technology than you ever could in history. And that, for me, is encouraging.

B — REVIEWFor any skeptics listening or anyone who's just listening going, so AI is going to be better at me and my job in 2 years' time, where does that leave me? Are we going to see huge job losses? Are we going to see— how does that shape it? Or is it more about how organizations will use the technology?

Al ElliottThat's a loaded question. Generally, if you look to history, whenever there's been a major technological revolution, some jobs are lost, they become completely redundant, and many jobs get created. But most of all, I think most things just evolve. What we do. In my profession as a marketeer, the role of a marketeer looked very different 30 years ago. The expectations were different, the tools that we use. Fundamentally, the role is the same, you know, connecting with people, selling goods and services through communication and different platforms. But what we do is very different, and that's a consequence of technological innovation. So, if I think about what does it mean for most jobs, I think everybody's job is going to evolve to some degree. I think one of the only defendable things that people have is our imperfections. AI systems, we tend to think of intelligence as one thing. Intelligence is different. A bird flies different to an aeroplane. It's different mechanisms. And I think there isn't just one form of intelligence. So for us, one of the beautiful things about humanity is our imperfections, how emotional we are. For those reasons, we're irrational. And I actually think that gives us many advantages in a world that's simulated by machines. So do I think that jobs, that there are going to be some challenges to certain professions? Yes. But I also think this will maybe push forward a new set of rules and institutions where we accelerate the sort of gig economy and the freelance economy, and more and more people are setting up their own businesses. They realize that there isn't security in traditional institutions, and that can be a wonderfully freeing thing as well. We come to accept the world around us, but maybe if things change in a meaningful way, we can create something better.

B — REVIEWLike I said, bold prediction. Um, and I, I, I pushed Oliver there, and I must admit, I, I agreed with pretty much everything he said, but that's boring, isn't it? If I'm like, oh yeah, I know, you're so right. Um, I think the thing that, that at first I was a bit like, really? And then when I thought about it, it was like, yeah, probably. It's just how that basic point that AI probably does already outperform humans, and if not now, it certainly will in, in 12 months' or, or 2 years' time. Um, I absolutely loved what Oliver then also said about will it truly replace human intelligence and intuition? And his point was like, no, because there's always going to be that aspect of creativity or emotional intelligence or mistakes and errors that actually lead to further innovation. Um, so yeah, I thought that was a really nice, really nice way of kind of saying yes, artificial intelligence is becoming is going to become increasingly important and increasing part of our lives. But that might actually reinforce what it— what the importance of being human and the value that we bring to the world of work. As somebody who constantly seems to be arguing with various leaders about the importance of humanity in the workplace, it could be that AI has my back. Who knew?

Al ElliottA lot of accidental stuff. Humans have done things by accident. Has created huge innovation. I think penicillin was invented by accident when he forgot to screw the top of the lid on. Um, I can't remember his name. Scottish guy. Do you know his name?

B — REVIEWNo. We'll move on. Which one?

Al ElliottPenicillin guy.

B — REVIEWOh no, I've forgotten his name.

Al ElliottSorry. Alexander Fleming. I think that's his name. And the other thing to consider is this Moore's Law idea that, uh, that Oliver brought up. Um, and Moore's Law, I, I think roughly Oliver explained much better than me, but things sort of halve in size and double in power every 2 years or something. This is happening so much quicker. With AI, so we are getting the point where we've got the AGI probably in the next sort of like five years. We could be frightened about that, or we could look at ways in which we can create guidelines, guide rails. Sorry, or you could just simply look at and go right. What can that take over, and what can we move up one level and start thinking about and start being human about? Because let's be honest, AI is phenomenal, and I use it pretty much every single day for certain tasks. But I think here's here's a thought for you. Notebook LLM, or Notebook LM, I think it is, by Google's new experimental thing they'll probably turn off next week, um, that can create a podcast out of a PDF. However, does that mean that our podcast is more valuable because we put the effort into actually recording it? I think, well, not our podcast, but a human podcast perhaps. So I think that's true. That is true.

B — REVIEWYeah, I mean, the, the job thing, I had to push Oliver on that. Jobs at risk, I know that's what people worry about, particularly in the current climate and the increasing layoffs that we're seeing. And I think the point is the same, you know, it's the same risk as there was 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 30 years ago, as technology has, has started to, um, start to advance at such a pace. You know, the jobs that, that many of us do now weren't even around when our parents were joining the workforce. I think it's just a natural evolution of work. Yes, there will be certain jobs that humans may well be made redundant from, but that should hopefully create a whole load of other jobs that we can step into.

Al ElliottI think the last thing to consider on this is that if you stop thinking of AI as one big thing and start thinking of it as maybe autonomous agents, that's a really nice way to look at it. There's something which OpenAI have released this week called Swarm, as in a swarm of bees, and basically it's how to manage Lots of different AIs or lots of different LLMs to do specific tasks. And so that's a really smart way to do things, I think, because number one, you can test them much easier. Number two, you can actually have some human overview over the individual parts of each task that's doing. But thirdly, you can start to create a chain of outputs that will be better than handing over human to human, again, allowing that human to move up into a more supervisory role perhaps, rather than actually technical. We'd love to know, hear your thoughts. Uh, Leanne, we're posting this on LinkedIn, so have a look on LinkedIn. Look at Leanne or Truth, Lies and Work, whichever page. I can't remember which. I think you pretty share it.

B — REVIEWBoth.

Al ElliottThere'll be both. Tell us what you think. I'm really interested in what you— what your thoughts are. What can be replaced? What can't be replaced? It's now my favorite time of the week, which is the world-famous Weekly Workplace Surgery, where I put your questions to Leanne. Leah, are you ready for question number 1?

B — REVIEWBorn ready, Al.

Al ElliottBorn ready, baby. Okay. I own a consulting firm with 8 full-time employees and Okay.

B — REVIEWYeah.

Al ElliottLast year we introduced several wellbeing initiatives like flexible hours, mental health days, and a meditation app subscription. While I believe these are making a positive impact, I'm struggling to quantify their value. My finance team is pressing for evidence that these programs are worth the investment. I've noticed fewer sick days and people seem happier, but I can't translate this into concrete financial benefits. I want to continue supporting my team's wellbeing, but I need to justify the costs. Can I see an ROI on this, Leigh? You get asked that quite a lot, don't you?

B — REVIEWOf course you can. Of course you can.

Al ElliottGreat. Question number 2.

B — REVIEWYeah, no, I mean, it's, it's yes. I think, I think this is the frustration and where we see things like wellness washing and, and, you know, some people pushing back against some of the, the wellbeing benefits that are being put in is because we can't really see the impact of them. Um, whereas really, if we're doing wellbeing properly, if we're approaching wellbeing from a— as an occupational psychologist would approach wellbeing, then evaluation is going to be baked into that from, from day one. Um, so yes, oopsie that we've not done that from day one, but don't worry, there are some things we can do to kind of roll back and look retrospectively what the impact is. Before I go on to that, first of all, I just want to say bravo to you. You said freelancers, right?

Al ElliottMm-hmm.

B — REVIEWThat's really cool. Good for you. I wish, I wish so many more organizations would would do that with freelancers. They get so much more engagement, so much more effort. Yeah, longer tenure. It would just be fabulous. And especially as we're moving towards more towards a gig economy, it's going to be a really important thing. Um, I'm not going to comment too much on the wellbeing initiatives you've put in place because I don't know enough detail about them and the quality of them and the science behind them. We all know that some wellbeing interventions are more impactful than others. But in terms of measuring that impact and measuring that ROI, think of any performance metric in your business that you report on. Any revenue, profitability, customer satisfaction, employee engagement, absenteeism, presenteeism. Um, what else do you report on, Al?

Al ElliottUm, all the other isms.

B — REVIEWAll the other isms. Any, any commercial or people-based metric in your business that you track, you should see an impact, a positive impact on that performance if you're investing in employee engagement and wellbeing. The reason I say employee engagement and wellbeing is the two are really closely correlated. So, if you have high levels of wellbeing, you're more likely to be engaged with your work. If you're more engaged with your work, you're more likely to have high levels of wellbeing. And it's that engagement that's really kind of the commercial backbone of people and culture. So, yeah, look back retrospectively through some metrics that you record anyway, that you'll have those data points 6 months ago, 12 months ago, and see if you can find any patterns. Of course, it's going to be— it's going to be correlation, not necessarily causation, but it should give you enough data points to take to your board and say, look, there has been some impact. There's a phenomenal book on well-being by Sheena Johnson and Kerry Cooper that talks very much about well-being through a commercial lens and, and measuring the impact and ROI. I will leave a link because it is a phenomenal resource course, if you are looking to do a lot of this yourself, if you're not in a position where you can engage an occupational psychologist to work with. Um, some really good, good advice in there. Um, but yeah, that's, that's kind of in a nutshell what, what you can do, um, and we should be doing. And evaluation, as I said, is, is probably one of the most, oh, like, over— overlooked aspects of consulting. Um, if you're working with a consultant and they're not telling you how they're going to measure the impact of their work, then they're probably not a very good consultant. Because even if, if, you know, I work with a client and go, right, 6 months' time, 12 months' time, we're going to measure the impact, and there hasn't been an impact, my immediate reaction isn't going to go, oh, they're not going to pay me again. My reaction is going to be, why? We should have seen— the science tells me we should have seen an impact. What variable has we not— have we not accounted for? What shift or change happened in the business for, for this to be the case? So yeah, any consultant with their salt is going to, going to have evaluation baked in from day one.

Al ElliottAbsolutely. And you say that you're a consulting firm. You haven't written what exactly what you consult in, but think about your own customers who have said, where do I see the ROI on this? And if there's something tough to prove, an ROI that's tough to prove for your own customers, you'll have definitely found a way to prove its worth or at least justify its expense.

B — REVIEWAnd you know what? It feeds into other— it actually feeds into other metrics. Look at ESGs, for example. Um, I think that, um, environmental, social, and governance goals, um, that have been set for businesses globally. Um, and I think that it fits in very nice with that S, the social, in terms of just being a responsible business and looking after the well-being of your team makes, makes sure you're a responsible business. Again, if you want to push back to your finance people, you're actually legally obligated in the UK to measure stress within the workplace and do about it if it is escalating. And that's under HSE compliance regulations. And also, was it Harry Cramer that said growth isn't always about, um, money value, it can be about quality? And I thought that was really nice. Growth, business growth can, can be about quality, and that's, that's really cool to remember, I think.

Al ElliottQuestion number 2, Lee. I'm a product manager at a software development company, and I really do like my job and I love my team. However, our CEO has been talking a lot about improving employee engagement. They've used those sort of bunny ears, the inverted commas here recently, but I'm not entirely sure what this means and what the difference is between employee engagement and employee satisfaction. So that's the first thing I think this would be good for you to give us your thoughts on. I've always focused on keeping my team happy, campaigning for good salaries and fun perks, but apparently that's not enough anymore. This person's sounding a little bit jaded. The leadership team is considering Investing in some new engagement initiatives, but I'm skeptical. How is this different to what I'm already doing?

B — REVIEWI think the fact that you're asking the question probably means that there's, there's some learning to be done around employee engagement, because you also could potentially be right, um, in that there's lots of providers out there that will talk about employee engagement and provide employee engagement tools, and psychologists like me and others will look at it and go, That's not employee engagement. That's not measuring what you say it's measuring, and that has no useful application in the workplace whatsoever. There's a surprising amount of them out there and some incredibly popular. I won't name any names, but you'll have heard of them. In terms of the difference between— Can I name a name? No.

Al ElliottCan I suggest it might begin with a G?

B — REVIEWNo.

Al ElliottCarry on.

B — REVIEWSo, in terms of the difference between employee engagement and employee satisfaction, Employee engagement is a phenomenon we observe in the workplace, um, which is basically meaning that if we create an environment that is positive, that then translates into positive thoughts and behaviors, and that then translates to positive individual and organizational performance. That entire process is employee engagement. Job satisfaction is a attitude or belief I might have as part of being an engaged employee that I find satisfaction in my job. But knowing if I'm satisfied is kind of like the what. It's like knowing if your customers are satisfied, or even better, knowing that your customers aren't happy, but you don't know why. It's not very useful data. You're going to have to go back and try and unpick that and figure out why they're not happy. So it's a similar thing, really. A a proper employee engagement tool that's backed by science and is predictive workplace behavior and performance, it's going to not only tell you how people are thinking and feeling and the impact that's having on performance, but why they're thinking and feeling in that way and what you can do about it, whether that be improving relationships, providing a clearer mission, more role clarity, less stress in the workplace. Um, and then you can push and pull, and you can feed that into your operational strategy, your people and culture strategy, your recruitment strategy, your well-being strategy. Um, it provides you all the data you need to, to basically run your business, the people aspect of your business, indefinitely. Um, so that is a difference, and that is why, um, your leadership team might be looking to, to implement it. And I think it's just time to get curious, um, because I think if, if you're leading these things, it sounds like you're passionate about them, it sounds like you're enthusiastic about you believe in them, you want to make sure that you're backing the right, the right tools, the right interventions are truly going to have the impact that, that you really want them to have. Um, so try and stay open-minded, try and stay curious, um, and see what, what these leaders have got in mind.

Al ElliottI love that. And you say that you're in software development. So what I, I really like, Leanne, what you said about the, um, the difference between employee engagement, employee, and job satisfaction. It's kind of like if you are building applications for people to use, bits of software people to use. You could say, how satisfied are you with the software? 8 out of 10. But then they only log in once a week. So they only use it when they have to use it. It's a different metric. So I think just take it and put it in the context of your world. See, and that should hopefully make things make sense a little bit more. Are you ready for question number 3, our final question?

B — REVIEWI am.

Al ElliottI run a small digital marketing agency with 14 employees. We've been growing rapidly over the past year, which has great for business, but I'm starting to see some concerning signs among my team. Our clients are demanding more and more, often expecting immediate responses and quick turnarounds. To keep them happy, we've been working longer hours and even weekends, but I've noticed my employees are looking exhausted. There's been an increase in sick days, and a couple of my best performers have said they might be looking for other opportunities, citing burnout. I want to keep our clients satisfied But not at the expense of my team's well-being. Help, Leanne, what do I do?

B — REVIEWUm, don't keep your clients satisfied at the expense of your people's well-being. You said that's— that you don't want to do that. Don't do it. That's what you're doing currently. Um, I think it's about red flags, isn't it? I think there's, there's things that we can ask as a business owner and go, is, is this okay? Is this going to escalate? Or is there things we can look at as a business owner and go, oh no, no, this is broken, the wheel's about fall off and we're about to crash and burn. Um, red flag number 1 is that people are telling you that they're burnt out. Red flag number 2 is that people are taking more sick days. And red flag number 3 is that some of your best people are saying they're going to leave unless things change. If that isn't enough motivation to start to put your people before your customers, I'm not really sure what, what else will be until you'll be in a position where you're forced to put Um, your, your people first, or indeed you won't have the people to put your customers first, so it's all going to fall apart anyway. The tricky thing is, I mean, 14, it sounds like you've had some, some rapid growth. 14 is that number where, where kind of that business maturity, um, shift is needed from kind of startup to scale up, from people, um, from processes, from operations perspective. It could be the growing pains of that. Maybe it's that you're going through a very busy time and there is a, there's there's a deadline to this, 2 months' time it's going to be over for whatever the reason is. Um, I would be nervous even 2 months. I'd be nervous at 2 weeks at this point, to be honest, the way things have escalated to. High workloads are one of the biggest causes of burnout. High workloads are not sustainable. And if you're gonna sit there— and I've sat in meetings with business leaders, board directors, who have rolled their eyes when I've said that— and I've gone, yeah, but what do you think is going to happen? People are going to leave, and they have. It's the, it's the biggest source, one of the biggest sources of burnout. It's not sustainable. You're going to have to figure out a way to bring workloads down, whether that's going to be streamlining processes, removing any bottlenecks or, or clunky processes, bringing in other technology to streamline some processes, bring in physical people, extra resources, look at maybe contractors or freelancers to get those roles filled quickly and to provide the extra support quickly, particularly if it's taking you some time to actually bring new people into your business. Um, or really look at whether your customer demands are unreasonable. There is a point where as a business you'll start to outgrow your customers. And, you know, typically, I'm largely anecdotally, but also I'm sure everyone listening will go, yeah, yeah, yeah, The customers that are the biggest pain in your ass are usually the ones that pay you the least. So it might just be time that you've outgrown some of those customers, and it's better to let them go now and retain and protect the well-being and engagement of your people. There's lots of ways to go about it, but I think ultimately this is going to need a really quick, sharp intervention to take away some of this high. high workload before, before people, um, really start to crack. It sounds like they're already cracking, but maybe before they, they crash and burn. So that would be my thought. Try and get some extra resources in, try and streamline some processes, um, or maybe it's time to sunset some of those customers.

Al ElliottExcellent advice. I love how your advice also verges onto the general business advice as well as the people. This is really cool. I think what Leanne's saying is absolutely right. You have to think about this. That there's nothing you can do now to fix this unless of course you can offload a load of this like we were, like Oliver was saying, a load of this to AI. That's possible. Now that might be, you can carry on the status quo if you do that, but if you don't, people are gonna leave and you go, well, let me just go back to my customers and say we can't, you know, we can't service them the way we used to. They'll leave. Well, someone's gonna leave if you carry on like this. Your customers will leave or your people will leave. And imagine you sit, you fast forward 6 months, 2 of your best people have gone, you're back down to 11, you have to quickly recruit to fill this customer demand. The customers are going to be even more angry because you can't fulfill the current demand and you're also splitting your time trying to find someone else. Why have you not got enough people to satisfy the demand from the clients? It could be that you have promised too much to the clients. It could be you're not charging them enough and therefore you've not got enough money Uh, to, to, to go and get, you know, more people and add to your team. Or it could be maybe that you just want to keep more money yourself and you're not willing to invest in getting more people. I'm not saying that is the case, but usually if you've got a lack of resource to, to, to, to service the demand, it's usually down to you're not charging enough or you're not investing enough in your team.

B — REVIEWIt is, is, is about the business as well. You know, it is about the organization. It's all one thing. It's all interconnected. It's not— they don't exist in, in silos. Operations and processes impact people's time and quality of work. Um, you know, particularly in a service-based business, your people are essentially your product. So how you're investing in them and their development and their, their sense of balance is going to impact the level of service and quality of work they can give to customers. It all feeds in. Which is why it blows my mind that there's businesses out there with 20, 30 people and they've never even really thought about people and culture. You've been really lucky so far, you know, if you've not mindfully thought about that. It is all part of, all part of the same ecosystem, the same organizations. These, all these things intertwine.

Al ElliottAbsolutely. So that's the end of the world-famous Weekly Workplace Surgery. We'll be back next Tuesday. In the meantime, a quick reminder, if you like to hear stories stories of how organizations big and small have built amazing workplace cultures, then our Thursday episodes are right up your street.

B — REVIEWAnd if you like to keep up to date with the latest news around the workplace, then Tuesdays are probably the one for you. We bring you our weekly news roundup, of course our world-famous weekly workplace surgery, which if you do have a question for the surgery, you can email Truth— no, what is it? hello@truthliesandwork.com.

Al ElliottSmooth.

B — REVIEWYes, um, and submit your question. You can keep it anonymous. I'll answer it. That's what the surgery does, as you've just heard. And we're also back with our hot take segment, where we uncover the truth and lies of work. That get a little tickle.

Al ElliottLittle tickle.

B — REVIEWI've got a great one for you next week. Dr. Audrey Tang is back with her hot take.

Al ElliottWe love a bit of Tang over here in in truth lies truth lies towers. That didn't roll off the tongue as quickly as I or as easily as I thought it would. Lee, is there anything to add before? Before we say goodbye to these lovely people and let them go about their day?

B — REVIEWNo, I think that's probably it. Um, subscribe if you wouldn't mind clicking whatever bells and buttons you need to do that on whatever platform you're listening or watching on. If you liked it, leave a review. If you didn't, send a private email. Um, and if you have any guest suggestions, let us know. Um, if you want to be a guest, let us know. Any topics of conversation that you think could be interesting, always on Look out, uh, get in touch. All the links are always in the show notes.

Al ElliottTalking of links in the show notes, go and check out what Oliver Yonchev is doing now. He's, uh, he's just a genuine superstar. I've got a proper man crush on him. He's so cool. Um, and, uh, go and find out what he's doing because it's really interesting stuff. Go and follow him on LinkedIn.

B — REVIEWAnother reminder, I know we talk about some, some what can be quite heavy themes in the podcast around kind of pressure and high workloads and burnout and stuff like that. Just a reminder, we always leave some resources in the show notes, um, to mental health support services that you can access completely free of charge in the UK, USA, and across the world. So if anything has kind of got you thinking, just take a little look. There might be something useful.

Al ElliottDefinitely. So check out those show notes. You'll be amongst very few people who do that according to our stats. So we will see that. No, I just said that for comic effect. I can't tell.

B — REVIEWShould we start leaving a little password in the show notes?

Al ElliottYes. So just check the password. If you send us an email with the password for this, um, for, for this episode, then we will send you a prize, probably a signed photo.

B — REVIEWYou wouldn't want one of them. We'll send you like a £20 voucher for something.

Al ElliottWhoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, hang on. There'll be something in between signed photo and— we're going from—

B — REVIEW£20 British pounds.

Al ElliottWe went from, from no value to now, hang on, £20.

B — REVIEWWhat do you mean no value? How dare you.

Al ElliottBye guys, bye.

B — REVIEWBye, love you, bye.

Al ElliottYes, yes, I've forgotten what I say now. Hang on one second.

B — REVIEWUh, an inclusion because it could exacerbate the—

Al ElliottExacerbate? Exacerbate.

B — REVIEWI think there's a mosquito in here.

Al ElliottI thought it was just a fly, but obviously there is something flying past. I mean, sure that surely, surely, where have I got bread from? So I'm gonna move on. That was an abrupt stop, wasn't it? Do you wanna just, just jump in and go, yeah. So if you wanna follow Oliver, check the links in the show notes. Happy you are at work and satisfaction's about— have I got that right way round?

B — REVIEWFinish the sentence and then I'll be able to tell you what it is.