Alex: For me, I define a changemaker radically inclusively.
Alex: I simply say a changemaker is someone who leads positive change from wherever they are. And so there’s no mention of roles or of titles, and it’s this identity we can layer on top of our existing ones. So you could be a changemaker lawyer, a changemaker physicist, a changemaker doctor, but also be a changemaker parent, a changemaker sibling, a changemaker friend.
Alex: It’s a way of seeing the world around you
Alex: And your opportunity in shaping it.
Renata: we usually start on
Renata: the podcast is of course, um, giving you an opportunity to share
Renata: with the audience a bit about your career background and what led you to be doing what you do today.
Renata: So why don’t we start there
Renata: tell me how you
Renata: became Alex Budak in 2023. What led you to be teaching now and writing books? You can start from wherever you want.
Alex: Well, like so many things, it’s a long and windy path with a lot of jumps and some good luck along the way, But
Renata: Alex, that’s the best thing. You know? Why? Because, um, we need to normalize that in career understanding and career planning. Yeah. We, we see
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: sometimes
Renata: those, um, graphs, you know, those
Renata: wiggly graphs
Renata: that people are putting on LinkedIn about how careers progress. But it would be nice
Renata: to give, um, an actual example of what that looks like.
Alex: Yeah, I’m a big believer in the power of the non-linear career, and I think mine has, has very much been that. Uh, so I grew up in the Silicon Valley Bay area in the United States, and so entrepreneurship was kind of always
Alex: part of the ethos of where I was. But, uh, I was never on my own inspired to start a company because at that time I thought, well, the only reason you’d be could create a company is just to sort of maximize profit.
Alex: And for whatever reason, I just didn’t. Really motivated me. Um, but I was quite motivated about change and social impact. And so I set out to do graduate school in public policy in Washington, DC and I think within the first week or two that I got there, I realized that I was a little too entrepreneurial for most of my classmates.
Alex: Um, they were wonderful and they’ve gone on to do amazing things, but I think I realized that I see the world a little bit differently. So I took a little time off between my first and second year of graduate school and spent some time living in Omnipod, India. And so while I was in Omnipod, um, I got involved, I traveled a lot, but also did some volunteer work.
Alex: And I am not overstating the impact that I had with volunteer cause I had played a very minor role. But we did some work with girls from the local community using sport as a tool to teach them about healthy habits and about leadership. And that’s where my sort of first light bulb went off, where I realized that there are these people, these change makers, literally all around the world.
Alex: That wanna make a difference, but just too many barriers getting in the way. Before then and a bit inspired by many of my public policy friends. You said that the change had to come from the big institutions, the world banks, the IMFs, and there is a place for that to be sure. But I left Anaba so inspired by the way that this group just sort of took action for their own community.
Alex: They saw a need and they just sprung in and and did something about that. So that became sort of the red thread of my whole career, is supporting and giving a platform to change makers around the world. I came back to the US and that’s where I got inspired to co-found a social venture. Um, my co-founder is based in, in your, sort of, in your country at least.
Alex: He’s based in Sydney. And so we had, uh, a startup that used together, kind of us and Australia. It’s called Start Some Good, and we set out to try to support early stage social ventures so people that had an idea wanted to create change, but just knowing there’s too many barriers getting in the way. For any of your listeners that may have been on the entrepreneurial journey themselves, you know, it’s exhausting, it’s exhilarating, it’s like a rollercoaster every single day.
Alex: And so, quite honestly, after a few years of it, I got burned out. I realized I was no longer the leader that our team needed. Um, and so I decided to take a step back and that was a very hard thing to do. My co-founder Tom, was very understanding, but it’s very hard to let go of your baby. But again, sort of the good fortune and good luck of things at the time.
Alex: I fell in love with a woman we’d been dating for about a year in Washington DC and she got a job offer to move to Stockholm, Sweden. Um, I had been once, she had never been. We visited in summer. It was beautiful. The long summer nights, we moved together in winter and have never been colder in my life. Um, but it was a great opportunity to sort of transition from being the startup founder to then I, again, with great gratitude, had the chance to run an incubator to support Swedish social entrepreneurs, people that were fusing impact and business and.
Alex: What I realized there is that, you know, technically my job was to advise them on business strategies, revenue strategies, impact measurement. But really it was my first chance to teach. I was teaching people, I realized that I had learned so much in my own entrepreneurial journey, but I just too busy doing things to reflect on what I had learned.
Alex: And so this incubator gave me a chance then to sort of reflect on it. So I did that for three years and then my wife and I decided, okay, time to move back to the States. We moved back to the San Francisco area and then again through some good luck. Good fortune. Ended up at uc. Berkeley’s Haas School of Business.
Alex: I’m a pretty unlikely person to be at a business school. Um, I’d never taken any business classes in my life. Um, but the culture of the school attracted me and the opportunity for impact. And so I ended up there and then I made the pitch. I made a pitch to teach a class, which is really the class I wish I could have taken when I was a student.
Alex: Uh, I called it becoming a change maker. And so how you can lead positive change from wherever you are. And, and we were talking a bit before we started about the. Uh, beauty of teaching and there’s nothing more meaningful I’ve ever done professionally than, than teaching. I just live for those moments in the classroom where students have that light bulb that goes off and they realize that they can be a change maker.
Alex: And it’s exhausting and it’s energizing at the same time. And I just find so much joy in meaning now, um, in teaching. And even though this is my first time with this sort of professor hat on, I realized that really throughout my career,
Alex: I’ve been teaching just in many different forms.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: Yes. That’s wonderful.
Renata: What do you think are the strengths that you have that, um, support that teaching and the.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: Uh,
Renata: winding road
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: in,
Renata: in your career that has, you know,
Renata: do you see yourself as a resilient type of personality or grit? What is it that you think is the, the core in the DNA that helps you make those changes
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: and,
Renata: and move forward?
Alex: I think there’s a
Alex: couple of things. So the, the first is that one of my core values
Alex: is
Alex: creativity. And I kind of like
Alex: creating things new and I’m very comfortable with ambiguity and with
Alex: risk taking. As I look back on my career, almost everything good that’s happened, whether that’s moving to Sweden without knowing anyone there, or making this pitch for a class, even though I’d never been a professor before.
Alex: Um, it all came to the other side of, of a risk. Um, and so I think that’s where things start is sort of that. Comfort level with the uncomfortable, but then I also lean on my other core values. And so my second core value is service. So everything I do is really in service of others, and that’s why I love teaching so much is that, um, it’s a chance for me to support the development of others and what’s more meaningful than that.
Alex: Um, and then the, the third is, um, being very inclusive. It’s something that I think comes naturally to me, um, but I really deeply see. The value in every single person. Want people to feel comfortable, feel like they can be themselves, feel like they have a sense of belonging. And so I really bring that into my teaching as well.
Alex: Um, it comes in big ways and small. You know, I remember myself being someone who’s more shy, more reserved, and feeling like, A lot of teachers ignored me. They kind of forgot about me just cause I didn’t raise my hand. And so I bring that consciousness into my classroom and think about how can I help others feel like they can come alive, make it safe for them to come alive and make it safe for them to take risks.
Alex: And so I sort of, what I love about teaching, I guess, is the chance to bring those values to life
Alex: a, in a meaningful way.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: Yeah.
Renata: I love the way
Renata: that you told your story.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: It, it,
Renata: it seems, you know,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: when,
Renata: when people are listening to your story, they may have an impression that everything went really smoothly all the time. And I want you to,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: uh,
Renata: bring us to a point in time where, You had one of those sliding
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: door
Renata: doors, moments when you had to make a,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: a
Renata: change.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: What was,
Renata: what was it that helped you, um, move over the line and, and make a decision? I have lots of people that listen to this podcast that are reconsidering their careers, taking sabbaticals or career breaks or just, um, you know, experiencing unemployment and it might be helpful for them. To have some examples of people that have been that, that sort of crossroad as well.
Renata: Do you have any example that you could share with us
Alex: I feel like I’m constantly at crossroads, so I feel like, um, it’s a, a constant in my, in my
Alex: life. But one that comes to mind of course, is the decision I made to leave start some good, the social venture I had co-founded. So, this was my baby and I, I put so much love and care and work into it. One of the things that I’m not proud of is that I was working probably 90 hours per week.
Alex: I hadn’t taken a vacation, um, your American listeners would be like, yeah, that’s normal. But having traveled living elsewhere in the world, that’s not normal. That’s not healthy. And I’m not proud of that. But I was just really overworked. And I remember it came to sort of a breaking point for me. I was living in Sweden at the time.
Alex: My wife and I had traveled. We were in Budapest, Hungary. I was technically in charge of our technology stack, even though I’m not a technologist, and we had outsourced some development and normally my job would be to do quality assurance, kind of check everything, make sure everything looked good. I was just so exhausted.
Alex: I wanted to get out and explore the city with my wife, then girlfriend. And I just sort of was like, oh, whatever. I’m sure it’s fine. So I said, yep, let’s launch it. I pressed the button we made went live, and we brought the entire site crashing down. Literally, the whole thing just crashed down and I realized that I just wasn’t being the leader that our team needed, that it’s so easy to say, like you kind of work up the pinnacle and like, oh, I’m the co-founder.
Alex: I’m leading this organization. That’s where I’m supposed to be. But it became so clear to me in that moment that I wasn’t living the life I wanted to live. I didn’t wanna be working 80, 90 hours a week. I didn’t wanna not be taking vacations. I didn’t wanna let my wife down while I was trying to solve the tech problem I wasn’t even qualified to solve.
Alex: And it was in that moment that I realized it was time for me to move on. Now, I don’t wanna make that sound easy because it was a hard decision to make. It was deeply emotional. Um, There’s a lot of ego wrapped up in a decision like that, and so it was not an easy one, but that moment I think helped me see that work was one part of my life, but not my entire life.
Alex: And if I continued on this path, I was crowding out everything else besides the
Alex: startup, and that’s just not who I wanted to be.
Renata: Yes. I love that.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: It’s, it’s a mix.
Renata: When I hear you saying it, it’s a mix of,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: um,
Renata: the emotional. Attachment
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: because
Renata: that you have to a business or a job. I had that too. When I left Brazil, I sold my business to my employees and it was like I was living, uh, behind
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: a,
Renata: a baby. You know? I felt so guilty and there is, you make something that is not real.
Renata: Tangible to you so that you can care about it. It’s part of our human brain, I suppose. It just feels like a person, doesn’t it? It feels like a baby. You mentioned it a couple of times and I totally get it. And the other thing I noticed when you were explaining it’s that sunk cost dilemma that we have that, you know, you put so much effort into it for so many years and now you have to let it go.
Renata: And I know that a lot of career changes. Um, fear for that as
Renata: well. You know, what have I done? You know,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: I’ve,
Renata: I’ve done so much, but you take things with you, don’t you? There’s so many transferable experiences and skills that you can take from a project that you have to let go.
Alex: Yeah, that’s right. My grandmother liked
Alex: to say that nothing is ever wasted. And so all of your experiences you bring
Alex: with you in meaningful ways. You know, I think back on university where in high school I never loved learning. I felt like I didn’t want to just take science classes or math class. I didn’t know why I was doing it.
Alex: When I got to university and got to take classes, just fascinated me. And so I take all these classes that seemed random, like I took a class on seeking of Brazil. I took a class on the geography of Brazil just because I was curious about it. And you never know the way that those new ideas, the understanding of different cultures or the insights that you have will continue to, to pay it forward.
Alex: And I think, um, you know, Brene Brown talks about that. Part of her creativity comes from having a large opportunity set. She sort of introduces herself to a lot of different variables and you don’t know what those variables will make sense of in the moment, but you can pull on them and make patterns of them when you have enough of them.
Alex: And so that’s a mindset that I like to think about is like collect as many interesting experiences and ideas as you can, and then new
Alex: interesting ideas will come from it.
Renata: Mm, that’s fantastic.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: Did you,
Renata: you got me at Brazil’s geography, did you really take that subject or was that an
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: example?
Alex: No, totally real. It’s a geography major, so I love
Alex: studying geography and in fact political, economic,
Alex: cultural, geography, and so I learned all about the development.
Renata: all right, so I’d love to talk about change making.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: I,
Renata: I have your book here with me. Um, congratulations. It’s a beautiful book. Um, I love it. I think, um, it’s helping me so much rethink what I’m teaching, um, as well. We mentioned before, we’re both, um, at the moment, um, teaching. I’m at Monash University, at u at
Renata: Berkeley, and
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: I
Renata: I want you to explain to the
Renata: listeners what is changemaking, how did you define it,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: and,
Renata: and who are changemakers in this world.
Alex: Well, first of all, thank you for your kind words. I’m so glad the book is
Alex: resonating with you. Um, the concept of changemaker developed for me as I sort of emerged from my first identity as a social
Alex: entrepreneur. You know, that’s one amazing way to make change, but I think that so many of us, and I think especially here in the Silicon Valley, tend to put the lone entrepreneur, the lone innovator upon a pedestal, something we sometimes call hero entrepreneurship, but I realize that change actually takes all of us.
Alex: It takes the COO and the CFO and the product person, and the accountant. It takes all of us fighting for change from wherever we are. And so the Changemaker emerged as a more inclusive way for us to think about how we can make a difference in our careers, communities, and our lives. So for me, I define a changemaker radically inclusively.
Alex: I simply say a changemaker is someone who leads positive change from wherever they are. And so there’s no mention of roles or of titles, and it’s this identity we can layer on top of our existing ones. So you could be a Changemaker lawyer, a changemaker physicist, a changemaker doctor, but also be a changemaker parent, a changemaker sibling, a changemaker friend.
Alex: It’s a way of seeing the world around you and your opportunity in shaping it.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: Hmm.
Renata: And, um, what made you decide change making was
Renata: an important area of study? I mean, to write a book and to be teaching about it. Do you remember a moment where it sparked
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: and,
Renata: and you went and pitched it to Berkeley, or did they come to you?
Alex: Yeah, no, I, I, I pitched
Alex: it, which is quite an unusual way to go about becoming a faculty member because normally you become a
Alex: faculty, you sort of take over an existing class. Maybe there’s a negotiations class or an
Alex: econ class, and you sort of come in and you
Alex: take it. Uh, but no, I went a very different way, which is this class.
Alex: And again, I used some empathy kind of thinking about like, what do I wish I could have studied, could have learned when I was. Just leaving university. Uh, but also I collected all the stories of all the people I had met along my own Changemaker journey. All the books that I had read. And, you know, I’d be lying if I said, I knew this would work.
Alex: I didn’t. I just thought it was worth pursuing. So. But I still remember the day where I went in for my very first time of teaching the class. You know, it’s funny because we often hear narratives and stories about the student, and the student’s first day of class, but we almost never hear about it from the teacher’s perspective.
Alex: And so for me here I was, um, a brand new professor, had met a business school, had never taken a business class in my life. Uh, you know, lots of imposter syndrome, lots of wondering if I even deserve to be here. Um, teaching a brand new class that’s very different from anything else that’s being taught at Berkeley.
Alex: Um, and unsure how students would respond to it. And so I remember I walked up to my classroom, opened the door for the first time, and what I saw there almost moved me to tears. I saw that not only was every desk, every seat taken, that there were students literally sitting in the hall in this, uh, stairs and sitting on the window sills, like just students were packed and there, way more students were in that classroom.
Alex: They could possibly take the class. And that’s where I realized like this is an opportunity here, that people are hungry to be change makers, to find a sense of meaning and purpose, the leadership skills for impact, and that that became my new
Alex: calling to support them in their own journeys.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: I, I get you. I,
Renata: I think also there is, um, a mix of, um, generational interest. I find that this, uh, new generation in their teens and early twenties are so keen to work hard to serve. You know, there’s, um, such an interesting, um,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: A,
Renata: a great number of people coming up with service and better, um, betterment of the world as their, their, their values.
Renata: I see this cause I do strengths assessment tests all the time
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: and,
Renata: and when I do it with students, um, I see that happening all the time. I haven’t done enough research to understand if it happens to every, uh, youngster and, and as they, um, grow older, their career drivers and personal values may change, but I, you know, um, don’t remember being this keen, you know, when I was that young, um,
Renata: to, to make so many big changes in the world.
Renata: So I think that things like the pandemic and climate change are really impacting the psychic. Do you see that happening as well?
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: Like to.
Alex: Yeah, it’s such a privilege that I get to know these students so well. I get to know ’em over a 15
Alex: week semester and meet with ’em in office hours, and I think I get a good sense of what motivates
Alex: them, what drives them. And I think you’re exactly right. I mean, the data show, like a Gallup poll found that 70% of Gen Z that they would only work for companies that share their values.
Alex: So they’re much more values driven, or at least expressing their values in a much deeper way than I think other generations. And I think there’s a unique concoction of things that they’re facing. You know, I often tell my students that they have every reason to feel upset when they look at the world that they’re inheriting from climate justice, to racial justice, educational, economic inequality.
Alex: They have every reason to feel upset, but I try to help them find their own sense of hope, despite that, their own sense of agency in doing something about it. And I think they really do feel called to action that. Um, they look at something like climate and it’s not theoretical to them. It’s their life on the line and they feel really inspired to do something about it, and that in turn really
Alex: motivates and inspires me.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: Mm.
Renata: Alex one thing that I have noticed as well, and I think, um, I can’t say it’s, uh, a population, white population, um, issue, but something that happens with people that reach out to me because there’s a self-selecting process.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: That goes in,
Renata: that happens
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: when,
Renata: when you are out in the market as a career coach trying to attract clients.
Renata: I tend to attract clients that are, of course, very keen to, uh, learn new things, interested in taking control of the career outcomes. Sometimes they come to me very deflated, but it’s really interesting to see how excited they are about the next 10, 20 years ahead of them. Even if they’re in their sixties, right.
Renata: So my clientele are in their late forties, fifties, sixties, very keen
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: to, uh,
Renata: to make change for themselves and for
Renata: others. How do you, um, explain change making for professionals that are halfway through their careers? What is it that they can do and how would they go about it?
Alex: First of all, can I say I love that. One of the themes of my book is something called Students Always to Say. They were always learning, always growing. And so I love to see people forties, fifties, sixties, I hope seventies, eighties, nineties as well, that they’re always thinking about how they can grow and, and change that really, I.
Alex: Inspires me in the book, I tell the story of Delores Cueta, who’s a labor leader, who’s still a changemaker into her nineties, and I love, love seeing that. Um, I think there’s a couple ways we can approach Changemaking at that stage in one’s career. And I think it’s impossible to think about changemaking without recognizing the change we’ve all been through, which is the Covid pandemic that if you think about a traditional company, Uh, plenty of companies were thriving as of February, 2020, but then as soon as Covid hit, the status quo was no longer tenable, that if a company and organization didn’t evolve, they didn’t try new things, they didn’t change, they likely wouldn’t exist.
Alex: And we saw many companies and organizations that went out of business. I think there’s a similar analogy you can make for our own lives. Now, you could make the case and say, oh, I wish that there wasn’t so much change. I wish that the world would slow down, but that’s just not realistic. The reality is that through technology, other changes we’re just moving faster and faster than never before.
Alex: And so the question then is not can you slow down change? Can you just kind of bunker down and try to hold on amidst the change? But rather can you make it work for you? Can you navigate shape and steer change to make it work for you and for those around you? Um, I’m not saying it’s easy, but I’m saying that’s the big opportunity that we
Alex: have here.
Renata: That’s the whole point about your book, isn’t it?
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: I, I,
Renata: I want people to, um, get that, um, I might even use what you just said as an extract in a little short clip because there’s so much change happening in the world. People may look at the job title and say, I can’t cope anymore. I’m burning outta change.
Renata: But the change that is intentional and that you can
Renata: control. Is much more manageable than that, than just being in the flux of changes that are happening to you happening, you know,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: uh, you
Renata: and you are constantly reacting to them,
Alex: Exactly right. Yeah, exactly right. I like the quote from singer songwriter Joan
Alex: Baez. She says, action
Alex: is the antidote to despair. And so I think change makers are able to
Alex: find a sense of agency even despite hard things that are going on.
Alex: And as I.
Renata: Didn’t know
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: that,
Renata: that that was a quote from her. Excellent
Renata: Sorry.
Alex: And, uh, you know, I think Acto, when as a faculty member had to pivot to
Alex: teaching online, um, my class was Tuesday morning and Monday about 3:00 PM we got an email from the university saying, okay, COVID is hitting. We need to now teach remotely. And again, we had no idea if we’d be teaching remotely for a week or a month or a year, right?
Alex: I said, okay, time to start teaching remotely. So I had less than 24 hours to pivot from in-person instruction to remote. And so I tried to lean into that and sort of talk about, hey, You know, let’s figure out this stuff together with my students. And I won’t forget what one of my students said, 21 year old, she said, here’s the good news is that no one knows what they’re doing right now.
Alex: So what a great opportunity to try things out. And that’s really stuck with me because I think we can so often think that other people are navigating change better than I am, or other people know what to do. But the truth is none of us do. And so if they can do it,
Alex: why not you?
Renata: Yeah,
Renata: no, you’re absolutely right.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: And um,
Renata: and your student was right too.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: I,
Renata: I feel like, um, for the past three years, we’re all students, aren’t we? We’re always, you know,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: just
Renata: some of us, a few steps ahead of others
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: and,
Renata: and hopefully lifting others as we learn new things about how to operate in a hybrid world and a more remote, uh, workplace environment.
Renata: Here in Australia, we didn’t experience so much of a great resignation, but. You would be interested in knowing this? Cause I know you’re curious about these things. We’re having quite, um, an astounding number of senior, uh, male leaders. You know, men resigning from high profile positions in Australia. Just in the past year we had two, um, premiers.
Renata: Those are equivalent to your state governors. We had, um, um, Sports coaches resigning very much into Ted Lasso kinda way. Uh, we had, spoiler alert, if you haven’t watched the last episode last night, um, uh, CEOs, you know, um,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: and,
Renata: and we are calling it the, um, heat resignation instead of the great resignation.
Renata: And what we have also found here with, um, local researchers, Well, Australians aren’t resigning, but they’re definitely burning out and there’s, you know, equivalent research happening in the
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: U
Renata: us. I read a Harvard, a business review article this week about managers burning out and, uh, what we need to do to support them as they support workers.
Renata: So
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: cons,
Renata: considering that and all of these changes and the misalignments between
Renata: what. Employers want workers to do and what workers are asking to do. How can professionals take better control of their careers in and be their own change makers, do
Renata: you think?
Alex: I mean, that’s a, a huge question, a huge opportunity. I mean, I think so much of it starts
Alex: back with empathy. So to quote another
Alex: Harvard Business Review article that really stuck
Alex: with me, uh, Patty Sanchez found that 50% of C-suite executives, when. The leading change don’t actually take into account how that change will be perceived by people on the front lines.
Alex: So in other words, these people are sitting in an office somewhere and they’re sure they have the right answer, but they haven’t actually thought about, well how will someone that’s 3, 5, 10, 14 levels below me actually perceive that change? Um, and I think that’s emblematic of the way we’re going about so much of what we do.
Alex: You know, I agree. I think being a manager right now is a really hard thing to do cause none of us know exactly what we’re doing. Are we going back to hybrid work? Are we going back in person? Is it totally remote? How do you build community? How do you build connection? How do you look out after your.
Alex: Colleagues, mental health. Um, and so I don’t have all these answers except I do think that in general our workplaces and our careers be better suited to have a bit more empathy, to be able to understand where others are coming from, and a bit of the humility say, look, I don’t know exactly what I’m doing here.
Alex: None of us do. Let’s figure it out together. And I think when you extend that invitation, I think a lot
Alex: of people want to grab that hand with you.
Renata: Yes. I think this type of, environment that we have right now suits a certain style of leadership that allows for vulnerability, authenticity, more of the servant style of leadership as well. Um, and they’re out there in the ether. People read about them, but adopting them is something else because it requires a healthy ego.
Renata: And,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: um,
Renata: also maybe some cultural
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: adaptation.
Renata: Adaptation. I have clients all over the world, including, you know, Southeast Asia, middle East, Europe,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: and,
Renata: and,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: um, it, some,
Renata: some of these theories are more. Easier to read than to practice.
Alex: Yeah.
Renata: It’s interesting to see
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: how,
Renata: how that will, um, come about. But
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: I,
Renata: I read your article about AI and ei, you know, the need for.
Renata: Artificial intelligence and emotional
Renata: intelligence, um, to sort of go hand in hand. I’d love for you to expand on that. I’ll put a link in the episode show notes so that people can go and read it. What made you write that such an interesting take?
Alex: That I see so many people freaking out. about AI right now, and again, understandably so, right? If a new technology comes in, has it potentially to displace
Alex: everything, and I think it’s important we take stock of.
Alex: Anything that’s scary. Well, how does it work and how does it not work for us? That it’s not everything and it’s not nothing.
Alex: It’s somewhere in between. And so how do we, start making sense out of it. And I don’t know any of your listeners, I played around with chat GPT I think it’s incredible. I love the power that it has, but I also recognize a lot of it’s drawbacks that it’s not perfect and it’s so easy to be very binary in our thinking that either it’s nothing, I don’t need to worry about it, like I’m gonna retire before it becomes a thing.
Alex: Or that like, this is everything and forget about anything else we do. Like this is it. And I just believe that, you know, uh, the famous quote, virtue lies between two vices. That there’s sort of balance on both parts. That there still is an essential human aspect of. Life and of leadership, and we shouldn’t forget about that.
Alex: Um, we should think about how do these two compliment each other rather than being in a war. And so I see AI plus EQ as being that middle path forward where we get the best of both worlds. We isolate and extend what’s fundamentally human. Um, our empathy, even some of our creative thinking, um, alongside the ai, which can do a lot of the rote processing and pattern matching, um, which is things that perhaps were not as well suited to do.
Alex: Um, and so it’s an argument really more than anything for nuance and for the essential value that humans
Alex: can and do and still will bring to the world.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: How can you
Renata: have you thought of how AI can help change makers? Have you sort of provided your students or your colleagues with some examples of how to use AI for change making
Alex: That’s a great question, and to be honest, I’m still trying to
Alex: figure out myself. So if any of your listeners have ideas, would love to hear from
Alex: you. Uh, but one of the
Alex: ways that I’ve
Alex: used it in my classroom is we do an assignment, which is called Changemaker of the Week. So each student throughout the semester chooses one changemaker who inspires them, famous or not.
Alex: And they have to use critical thinking and persuasive communication to make the case to the class for why this person is a changemaker. And one of the things I find students struggle with is finding the right changemaker. There’s always the famous names. So someone always chooses Barack Obama. Someone always chooses Gandhi.
Alex: But I’m really interested in the lesser known change makers. This semester I had them use chat GPT to tell them a bit about the type of changemaker who would inspire them. So say, you know, I am 22 years old, I’m looking for a changemaker who works at the intersection of environment, um, water and sport, and is ideally from the African continent and is a woman.
Alex: And then chat, GPT puts together incredible list of change makers. And when I looked at it, it’s people mostly that I hadn’t heard of. Um, it also comes up with a slight description about who they are, and I think that’s a wonderful place to start. Then it’s up to the students to research them, to get to know them, to even reach out to them on social media.
Alex: But, um, it does such a better job than if you were to Google, you know, five unknown change makers. It would be far too vague and be the same five people over and over, uh, using chat. BT came up with really, really,
Alex: good recommendations.
Renata: Oh, that’s fantastic. I can see that applying for job hunting as well. I need to use that example that,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: um, that, um,
Renata: Instruction in different ways to find, you know, individuals that people should be following on LinkedIn or learning from. So thank you for that. That’s a great tip.
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: What
Renata: have you thought of,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: um,
Renata: other big trends that you think will
Renata: be
Renata: impacting change makers in the future?
Renata: Things that may affect their ability to be successful in what they’re trying to achieve?
Alex: Well, of course I come to this from the faculty perspective, and so I’m really interested about what’s happening in the future of
Alex: education and education technology. And I say this, you know, I work at a big traditional university, but I think that. Something that’s so exciting now is that you don’t have to be at a big university to get an amazing education.
Alex: I’m really interested in different forms of education, whether that’s certificates, micro courses, on demand learning, lifelong learning. The idea that you sort of do all your schooling upfront for 18 years or 22 years and then you’re sort of done is so old fashioned. And I’d say this even to my MBA students, that whatever they’re learning now, Most of it 10 years from now will be out of date.
Alex: Like ideally, some of the leadership stuff that I teach might still be around, but you know, if you’re learning data analysis now, data analysis 10 years from now will be totally different. And so you’ve gotta keep learning and keep growing. And so I’m excited to see the many different ways that education becoming more accessible.
Alex: So, Um, of course the community aspect of a university still matters, but the wealth of knowledge that you can get for free at your fingertips on YouTube or in curated programs on Coursera is just mind boggling to me. And to me that’s very exciting because there’s so much gatekeeping in universities.
Alex: It’s all about keeping people out. And so my approach is more how can we get people in? And so I love any more
Alex: inclusive approach to education, and there’s so much of it right now.
Renata: Alex, do you have plans to create a micro certificate, a short course, or join a platform like Coursera?
Alex: Yeah, it’s an interesting idea. I’ve certainly thought about it. Nothing in in the immediate works, but
Alex: something I’d absolutely consider to, again, make the
Alex: ideas more accessible. The book that I wrote was really my first attempt
Alex: at taking the magic of the
Alex: classroom and making accessible to all. But yeah, I think there may be a chance to do something digitally,
Alex: uh, from here as well.
Renata: That would be wonderful. So we’d like to, uh, finish off asking our guests for advice that they could provide professionals that are currently between jobs. You know, people that are, have. Redundant. So many of my clients and listeners from the US are listening because they’ve been made redundant recently.
Renata: Lots of restructures happening in tech, FinTech consultancies, banking, um, with the, um, ideas that you have. Generated for your course and for your book. In terms of change making,
Renata: it may be an interesting opportunity for them to reflect on the future of their careers and see if they can incorporate some of those as part of their plans.
Renata: Do you have any advice for them on how to do that?
Alex: Well, I certainly hope that the book could be helpful to you as you have sort of a renewed identity, a way of thinking about who you are and the value that
Alex: you bring to a job. Because the world needs more change makers in every sector, every role.
Alex: Needs more change makers. But I think the advice that I would leave you with is that having been on the job search side myself, it can be so frustrating and so demoralizing and it’s so easy to take each rejection personally that you get to that final stage, you don’t get it and you think there’s something wrong with me.
Alex: So I learned this the other way, which is, um, For all intents and purposes, I shouldn’t be at uc, Berkeley. Um, I applied for a job there initially to run a leadership center for them and had a final round interview. Seemed to go really well. They said, okay, Alex, this is on a Friday. Said, okay, we’ll be in touch early next week.
Alex: Um, you can expect to hear from us. So saying, great. Sounds like it’s really positive. And then Monday rolled around, nothing Tuesday, nothing Wednesday, nothing Thursday, nothing. And then finally Friday, you’re in that awkward position where you send one of those. Hey, just wanted to circle back and see how other things are going.
Alex: Email, and they got back to me and said, Hey Alex, sorry. Um, it turns out you ended up in second place. You know, you should feel very proud of yourself because there are a lot of good candidates, but you’re in second place and we offered the job to someone else, so, you know, keep in touch. Good job, but sorry.
Alex: And so, you know, that’s hard to hear because it’s nice to finish in second place out of however many people, but second place doesn’t come with a job. That’s what I wanted. Um, but then three days later I got an email and the subject line just said, development with three dots. Dot dot. I opened up the email and it said, Hey, Alex, um, remember we told you you were in second place?
Alex: Well, we offered the job to the first in, in first place, and she declined. So the job is now yours. And of course I accepted on the spot. I was thrilled to join. But to me that was a reminder that rejection just is not, cannot be personal. Who knows why they chose that other person over me. What was it? Was it some minor thing?
Alex: Was it something she had you just do not know. But the bottom line is that even though I wasn’t actually offered the job and for all intents should not have had even had the job, it didn’t mean I couldn’t do the job. And so going forward from that, I’ve learned that despite every rejection, um, it doesn’t say anything about you.
Alex: It’s not personal, and it
Alex: doesn’t mean that you don’t have value or that you couldn’t do the job.
Renata: I love that. That’s such
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: a,
Renata: a real experience and so many of my clients are experiencing exactly that and are making that sort of, um, realization as well. I often tell people that,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: At the,
Renata: at best they have a 50% chance of a job because if they’re at the tail end of a job interview for a role, there’s potentially one other candidate just as good as you.
Renata: You know, and you have to respect your competition. And people tend to, uh, forget that they’re there because they never see them. It’s such an interesting type of, um, competition. If you’re playing tennis, you can see your opponent in front of you. If you’re surfing, you can see all the other surfers surfing with you
Renata: in a competition.
Renata: But when you’re job hunting, you don’t see them, but it’s a competition
Renata: and you are being marked. And it doesn’t mean that the other surfers aren’t good. They’re great in fact, but they won’t always win.
Alex: Exactly right. That’s a nice analogy.
Renata: Yeah,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: it’s,
Renata: it’s so great
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: and,
Renata: and when I tell my clients at best you have a 50% chance, most likely you have a 25 or 33% chance. don’t realize, yeah, I hadn’t thought of that. And that’s both great and bad. You know, some people may see that as, uh, a glass half empty and be deflated by it, but other will say, well, If it doesn’t happen, then I,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: I
Renata: know why, you know,
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: and,
Renata: and let’s move forward.
Renata: So ideally, what we want then is to ensure that the mindset is at the right place. So people don’t feel that failure is, uh, problematic, but it’s part of the journey of getting a job.
Alex: is exactly right.
Renata: Thank you for sharing that. That’s wonderful. Alex, it’s been a pleasure having you here. If you ever decide to write another book or create
Interview__The_Job_Hunting_Podcast_with_Alex_Budak_and_host_Renata_Bernarde-Renata_Bernarde-webcam-00h_00m_02s_649ms-StreamYard: a,
Renata: a short course that my clients can and listeners can enroll into, please come back to the podcast and let’s talk about it.
Alex: I would love to. Thanks so much for having, this was a really fun conversation and appreciate the chance to join with you and to share thoughts on change making
Renata: My pleasure.
I hope that you enjoyed this episode and that you keep in touch. Please subscribe wherever you found this podcast, and if you’re inspired and motivated to keep going, check out other episodes. You can also learn more about my services as a career coach in the episode. Show notes and on my website, renata bern bernardi.com That’s R E N A T A B e R N A R d e.com
