Former Barstool Sports CEO Erika Ayers Badan joins the show to share insights from her new book "Nobody Cares About Your Career: Why Failure Is Good, the Great Ones Play Hurt, and Other Hard Truths." She discusses the importance of embracing challenges and taking responsibility for your career growth.
Former Barstool Sports CEO Erika Ayers Badan joins the show to share insights from her new book "Nobody Cares About Your Career: Why Failure Is Good, the Great Ones Play Hurt, and Other Hard Truths." She discusses the importance of embracing challenges and taking responsibility for your career growth.
Modern Mentor is hosted by Rachel Cooke. A transcript is available at Simplecast.
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RACHEL: Erika Ayers Badan, did I get it right? Author of Nobody Cares About Your Career, Why Failure Is Good, The Great Ones Play Hurt, and Other Hard Truths.
Congratulations on your new book. So super exciting.
ERIKA: Thank you.
RACHEL: I am delighted to have you with me on the Modern Metro podcast today. I've been looking forward to this conversation.
ERIKA: Thank you. Me too.
RACHEL: Awesome. So before we get into it, I've got a bunch of questions about your book and I can't wait to bring this to the world of listeners, but I would love to get just maybe a Two minute backstory on a little bit about your experience back in the day as the CEO of Barstool Sports and maybe a couple headlines around
ERIKA: Yeah, for anyone who follows Barstool Sports, it's a entertainment, sports, comedy, increasingly lifestyle brand. It was based in Boston. It was founded by a gentleman named Dave Portnoy. I joined the company in 2016, and we had a pretty crazy stratospheric rise from, you About 12 people to over 400 people.
We sold the company twice and meanwhile, it was this chaotic, rowdy kind of blog video network, social network that today is a top, top five, top ten brand on TikTok in the world.
RACHEL: Very
ERIKA: Everything at Barstool was public. So when something went wrong, it was on Twitter. When something went awry, it was playing out in the comments on Instagram. And what that did for me personally, as I was in a business job, I was running the company as CEO, but I was also finding myself in the mix. when employees were having disagreements.
It was playing out as content on the internet and it created a very unique, amazing work experience and a very unconventional work experience, which actually for me brought to life a lot of the ideas that I think most people can take into normal jobs.
RACHEL: That is awesome. And thank you for sharing that. And I think what that does, in my mind anyway, is give you the right, maybe more than anyone else I've talked to, to talk about the importance of failure, because any failure that whether you experienced or you oversaw, something was handled and discussed so publicly.
So you have lived through the pain and presumably also the upswing of that, maybe more than most. And so I'm really looking forward to diving into that. Thank you. So personally, I would describe your book as a book that is full of career advice, but not for the delicate or faint of heart. I am a native New Yorker myself.
And so my favorite kind of love is tough. and I think this book is full of love, but it is very tough love. You are not, being gentle. I wouldn't describe the approach as like soft or meditative. It's very empowering. It's very let's talk about what needs to get done and let's get you moving on it.
Is that the best way to say your
ERIKA: Yeah, that's super fair. There is a lot of love in this book, but. A lot of it is tough, which is that, you are responsible for your career. There is nobody coming to help you. Your problems are not the. They're not because of everyone else. You are the root cause of most of your problems. and also that you can have and be anything you want in life if you're willing to work hard and work at it.
it is a very active read, I would
RACHEL: Yes. Yes, I definitely broke a sweat a couple of times. and I think that's really important. I think I talked to a lot of people in my world, in my practice who will talk about, if my company would just, or I'm waiting for leadership to fix or to do or to change. And I think what this book really leaves you with is it's okay to have expectations of your company and your leadership.
But if you're not going to step up and ask and advocate and make things happen on your own, you're going to be waiting a while.
ERIKA: Yeah, definitely. I think, a lot of times at work it's easier to just sit and complain about what's wrong or what's missing or who's deficient or. Why your coworker is an idiot or why your boss is absent. And I think people get caught in that vortex, which I write a lot about in the book, which is that your environment is relentless.
And if you are spending your day with people who like the status quo, they don't want to change the status quo or people who just want to complain about how things are or complain that management isn't doing what they need to do. If you become that person, like whether you want to or not, you become that person and I always found that I was my worst self is when I was in those environments in my career.
And where I felt the best was when I was trying to make something happen. And that even if the things you're making happen are really small, that's okay. That's that counts and that gets you on the path to creating something big.
RACHEL: Absolutely. Beautifully said. So the way that your book is structured, it's broken into three parts, and I would love to get into that in just a minute. But before we do, before we even get into the main structure of the book, you say something early in the intro part. You say that work is an apprenticeship.
Yeah and I think that idea of being an apprentice is, it's old timey, right? We don't really tend to think about it in today's world, and I think that there's a lot of wisdom in that, and so just in terms of the setup for the book and where that mindset comes from, can you give us a little soundbite on what that means to you?
ERIKA: A little bit of that. There's some full disclosure, but I really think that work is an apprenticeship because I don't feel that anything you get or have at work is owed to you.
And I think what's happening right now is a lot of times people either in work or coming into work feel like, of course, I'm going to get a promotion, or of course I'm going to get this great opportunity. And the reality is that if you don't work your way up the ladder and you don't try to learn from everyone possible, and I, by that, everyone, the chances are that when you get that big break or you get that moment where you can be the thing.
If you haven't done the apprenticeship, you're not going to know what to do when you're there. And that's what I mean by work is an apprenticeship, which is, it's an environment where you can learn from other people. I also call work tuition you get paid for, which is, I really believe is true, which is you are getting paid to learn and hopefully you're in a work environment where you get to learn from people who are really good at what they do.
But also, even if you work for total clowns, you can learn a lot from them too. So the idea that work is a place where you have to learn And you have the luxury of learning and also the luxury of applying yourself and failing. That's what I think makes work so rewarding.
RACHEL: Yeah, I think that's lovely. And it's really wise. And I think one of the opportunities for all of us is to expand our definition of learning, right? It's not always in a classroom. It's not always co coming in a coaching session. It can come from just observing people doing things well, even people doing things poorly and dissecting insight from it.
ERIKA: And also that work is a place where you can, if you open your aperture, if you open your perspective and say, Hey, I'm going to put away my ego. And I'm also going to put away how insecure I am about looking stupid.
Everybody's insecure about looking stupid. If you can put those two things away and then just open yourself to learn from the good, the bad, the ugly, all that knowledge. It can be used to help you
RACHEL: I love that. I think there's a lot in there. I'm pretty sure I did an episode of this show years ago called my secret circle of mentors and I wrote about five, five of my favorite mentors who had no idea who I was.
ERIKA: That's amazing. I love
RACHEL: You got to find it, right? Yeah.
ERIKA: That's amazing. That's so smart.
RACHEL: So let's get into the guts of the book a little bit. I love the way that you structured it, right?
So there's three parts. You've got fundamentally, there's a piece on mindset. There's a piece on doing a great job. And then there's a piece on figuring out if it's time to stay or time to go, right? So I'd love to spend a little time in each of those, if that's cool with you. All right, so let's start with the first part, which is all about the attitude, right?
And what you say up front is that succeeding at work is basically about five things, right? It's who you are, what you offer, how you show up, how you spend your time and how you show care. And I would just love your advice on how do we think about those? How do we juggle those? How do we manage those?
ERIKA: Yeah, I really do think attitude is everything and attitude is everything. someone told me the other day that the greatest shortage on the planet is positive attitude. So I think showing up at work with a positive attitude is, it's not easy. But it certainly is helpful. And in terms of those five things, the biggest one of all is caring.
If, you just care about the quality of what you do every day and the quality of the interactions you have with people you work with, then anything is really possible, like you don't have to be brilliant to do that. If you care, it goes farther than you think. Caring actually goes further than being brilliant.
and in terms of the other pieces, I really think it's all about how you show up. Are you showing up at work with your, on your toes? Are you ready to make something happen? Or are you trotting to work like being dragged in there and you're like, I'm just going to hide at my desk and my cube all day.
So I really think to be. You, have a fundamental choice when you go to work, which is binary. Do you care or not? And are you going to put in effort or not? And are you going to open yourself to learn something or not? And when you have the opportunity to do something, are you going to do it full, bore or half ass?
And that those are all total choices. What I hope for the first part of this book is to really motivate people to say, Hey, if you care, if you show up willing to learn, if you have an open mindset, if you Are willing to put the sweat equity in really good things can happen for you and If you're not willing to one of the things that opens the book is who this book is for and who this book is and You know look if you're like hey I'm entitled to be a vice president because I went to business school or my dad is rich or You know i'm better looking than everybody I work with this book is not for you Like you're not but what this book is for people who, work is hard and it, the other thing I write about is it happens on like a random Monday, a boring Tuesday.
Like it's not sexy. So my hope is this book is motivating to people of “Hey, I'm going to make the most of this.” Not because I love my boss, or I think I work in the greatest industry of all time, but because you want to make something happen for yourself.
RACHEL: Yeah, absolutely. And I just want to make sure that what people take away from what you're saying, and keep me honest here, a positive mindset is not to be confused with toxic positivity, right? Like you can still see the negative in things, the opportunity in things. It's not about blowing sunshine all over everything, but it's about to your point, like showing care and showing up and being ready to lean in and not just leaning into entitlement and waiting for what you think you deserve.
ERIKA: 100%. I don't actually believe in false positivity. look, your workplace for anybody listening to this is probably really screwed up. there's a huge amount of problems. Like I run a company, we have like more problems. I could talk for two years on the problems we have. I, don't think it works.
I don't like false positivity or toxic positivity because I All that's really doing is suppressing learning and suppressing doing. And I have no time for that. So this book is really about, Hey, you have this one life on this planet. Right now you probably have this one job on the planet. What are you doing with this job to help your life?
RACHEL: Now, one other thing that you touch on in part one, and maybe this resonates more with me as a woman, but I don't want to stereotype, but you talk a little bit about apologizing, when to do it, when not to do it, and I think we can always use a little bit of a reminder around that. So what's your perspective on apologies?
ERIKA: I think a lot of times. And I find myself doing this and I agree with you. And it is a generalization that women tend to be like, I'm sorry. Like you say, like you're about to interrupt someone, about to interrupt you. And I'm like, I'm sorry. And if you can just catch yourself before you say that, I think it's important because there's nothing to apologize for.
Like I'm asking for your attention and hopefully you want to give it to me. I also, there's obvious moments when you screw up or you do something wrong or you misstep or you fall short or you make a bad decision or take a bad action that you do need to apologize for and you need, you do need to make right.
But what I, the part of the reason the book is called nobody cares about your career is that I think people spend a lot of time or my feeling is that people spend a lot of time. Worrying about how other people feel about the choices that they make in their life and Apologizing to this general, Hey, I'm not who you want me to be, or I'm not, I don't make as much money as you think I should, or I'm not as far along in a career path as you think I might, I should be, or, and I don't believe in apologizing for that.
I don't believe in apologizing when you haven't done anything wrong. And. Really because your choices don't match to someone else's. I don't think that's a reason for an apology. And I do think for women, we tend to say sorry without actually even being sorry. It just it's a, tit. It's I say the word like too much and I say the word, I'm sorry too much.
RACHEL: Fair. I think that's fair. Okay. Call heard. So let's talk about the second part of your book, what it takes to be great. And I'm going to be honest. You start with a premise that the first time I read it, I was like, I can't believe she wrote that. Duh. And then I sat with it and I was like, no, wait, that's actually really, insightful.
And what you say is we need to know what our company is paying us to do. And I was like, of course you have to know what the company is paying you to do. But the longer I sat with that, the longer I realized. We may all know what a company is paying us to do, but when we look at all the stuff that we're doing and how we are frittering our time away, I think there's an opportunity to check ourselves.
And so maybe you can talk to the person like me who reads that and is wait a minute, did she think she just told me something new? Cause you did.
ERIKA: Yeah, it's funny. And I'm glad you say that because it is like no shit. what is, I say it, the stupidest person at the company is the person who does not know what the company is paying them to do. And that sounds. So stupid and obvious, but you're exactly right. I think when we take a step back, myself included, and you look at all the meetings you went to, all the emails you wrote, all the things you got mad about, all the ways you spent your time, and then you think back to what your company is actually paying you to do, you're like, Oh shit, like this isn't in sync.
And then I think the other piece of it is. We tend to get really distracted at work because there's a lot of bright, shiny objects. You want to, I had this happen to me five minutes before I got on this call. We're looking for an agency to do email marketing for us. And I had a person whose job it is to drive revenue, be like, I, want to be responsible for finding the email agency.
And I was like, But I'm not paying you to do that. I'm paying you to go make money for this company. And that stuff happens every day, all day. You want control. You want to own something you, you get lost in a maze of projects and meetings, and maybe you're not actually creating anything at all, but it does, this book is not rocket science, but I think where people mostly go wrong at work, I am not brilliant, but what I do have a lot of is common sense.
And I think common sense, Is in short supply at work, and this book is a little bit of a reminder of get back to the common sense.
RACHEL: Absolutely. And I think it's so interesting. in my work, I spent so much time with clients and leadership teams struggling with what they would describe as issues of role clarity and accountability. And essentially what I'm always helping them to peel back the onion and recognize is The biggest problem in the workplace is that we all can do lots of things, right?
And it's not about leaning into doing all of the things you could do, or you can do, or you have done. It really is about stepping back and asking yourself, what is the specific unique sliver of value that I am here to offer? And how do I make sure I'm investing as much of myself into that as possible, trusting my peers, my colleagues, the other functions.
To deliver their unique sliver of value. it's amazing how much more we can get done and with how much more impact when we have that recognition.
ERIKA: 100%. I think the other piece, and you probably see this too, is people get lost in what's What is, what are we trying to solve? I think that really often gets lost at work, where the zoom out is also, I think people who can zoom out are really important in a workplace. And the more people can build zoom out skills, the better off you are, because.
What happens you to get into this like rat race of who owns what and so stinks and they're never finishing their end of the bargain and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And it's exhausting versus hey, what are we solving for? What is the simplest, most efficient, most durable way to solve it?
And who owns to your point? Which unique piece of this and then let's stop talking about it and do it. And, I think you can use that same metaphor for, your life and also for your career, which is you get so caught up in all this little stuff, which is work is a compilation of little things, 30 minute meetings.
12 line emails, text messages, slacks, phone calls, whatever, that you forget wait, what am I here and what am I trying to do? And I think it's, and, why am I uniquely situated and capable of doing that?
RACHEL: Absolutely. I think there is a lot of Intel in there, so thank you. All right. So let's talk a little bit about the last piece of your book, which is really about. Staying or leaving. we talked a little bit about how even if your job sucks, you can still learn from it. And I think, that's a really an important reminder to people because sometimes we can get stuck in this, Oh, I need to get out of here.
This place is toxic. This place is terrible. And I think what you were part of what you were saying in this part of your book is even if, you've decided it's time to go. Yeah. Don't lose touch with your willingness to have one foot in the door and find opportunities or moments to take insight, take learning.
I love that.
ERIKA: yeah. Okay, definitely. So I think the whole 3rd section is really do I stay or do I go and what are my motive? Why am I running to something or am I running away from something and why and what? The one of it all but the life raft. I think the life raft is an interesting concept. Nobody asked me about the life raft, but I think the life raft is interesting.
What a life raft is, a life raft is when shit hits the fan, you get laid off, or something happens where you are not in the pole position you are in today. So let's pretend it's a layoff. A life raft is what your plan is. It's, being able to jump from the big vessel or out of the airplane and not land and be drowning in the water, but to land on something semi solid and a life raft could be your network, a life raft could be.
a company you may not work for today, but you've kept a close relationship with and you may want to pick that up when in the time that you need it. A life raft could be a skill that you have or a side hustle that you may have developed. I think the important thing that I talk about.
around the life raft is you want to think about your life raft before you need the life raft. And I think that's the big thing here, which is when things are good, it's very easy to be like, things are going to be good forever. And I don't need to think about anything besides this. But the reality is, the worst things in your life happen on a random Monday or Wednesday, when you least expect it and having a plan of, Hey, if I lost my using the lose the job, if I lost my job.
What would I do? What would, what spending would I cut? Who would I reach out to? one of the things I find is you don't want to just be reaching out to somebody when you want something. You got to stay current with the people who you think can help you and who you can help in return. And so keeping those, Hey, it's good to go out, out to dinner once a month with your network, or it's good to stay connected with blah, blah, blah.
But it's What it means is having a plan for when plan A doesn't work. Yeah.
RACHEL: think. You know my very first job out of college. I was in executive recruiting and I used to realize what I realized in that job was that people who waited until they were desperate to start looking for their next job always made the worst decisions.
We don't make good decisions out of a place of desperation. So to your point, cultivate the people and the resources and the skills and the capabilities around you. And if you never need them, that's great. They're there and it just gives you that sense of security. Okay.
ERIKA: to be a nanny, which I wasn't. I write about this in the book.
I was a terrible nanny. And it was a terrible decision. I took this nannying job and then I got a job three weeks later and the mom was pissed off. So it's if you jump out of panic, chances are you're not thinking clearly and you're not making a good decision and then you're going to have to do it all over again.
The best time to think about a crisis is before you have one, and that's easier said than done, certainly, but a life raft, it just helps you think okay, if I wasn't doing this, what would I be doing? And how would I prioritize my time? relationships so that I ha you
RACHEL: much more in this book that I haven't asked you about, which is why people need to go pick up a copy and read it themselves. But before we close here, do you feel like there's anything that I haven't asked you that you feel like, Oh, this is the one thing that I want to make sure people take away from this conversation?
ERIKA: Ask great questions.
RACHEL: Thank you.
ERIKA: The book is different, I think it’s a conversation for people who want to make a life. It doesn't matter if I am 65 years old or 25 years old. And I also really believe that you can be yourself and be successful. And that this book is, is one person's perspective on how to do that.
RACHEL: Absolutely, and it's, a beautiful story, and thank you for sharing it with us, Erika.
ERIKA: Thank you for having
RACHEL: Oh, this was a pleasure. Thanks for this conversation, and I look forward to hearing from listeners who run out and grab a copy and want to share an insight with one of us or both of us.
ERIKA: Great. Thank you so much.
RACHEL: Thank you.