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venomous-ko · 4 years ago

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Wine Drunk while watching Godzilla vs Kong

Some major spoilers up ahead!

Mans really just annoyed the shit out of his coworker until he left so he could hack shit, huh?...I love it! 🤣🤣

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You mean to tell me that the explanation for why Godzilla attacked the one tech company site by the dude who studied Kaiju communication and behavior for a living is just, “sometimes people (and creatures) change”???? Like some dumbass justifying a toxic person/relationship??? Like excuse me???? Why are the literal teenagers making more sense than you?????

Also, we’re all in agreement that this facility is either housing Ghidora’s dead head, Mecha Godzilla, or Mecha Ghidora, right?!?

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Lol! “Apex Cybernetics!” That’s not foreshadowing! 🤣

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Apparently, I didn’t get my fill of white nonsense from Falcon and Winter Soldier, bc someone decided to put this blonde-hair-blue-eyed little bitch in charge! That’s not ganna go wrong somehow. 🙃😑👀

Like this bitch literally wanted to send a fucking child into unexplored hollow earth territory without a second thought! 🙃🙃🙃🙃 I was literally like 🖕🖕🖕🖕🖕🖕 for that entire convo.

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I’m sorry! This conspiracy man just met these teenagers, and his first impulse was, “yeah, theses seem like some good people to break into a tech conglomerate with!” 🤣🤣🤣🤣

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Why are these people surprised Kong knows sign language? These are people who study Kaiju (and presumably other animals in order to draw conclusions about certain behaviors) for a fucking living!!! We have primate species that recognize and communicate in sign language already! Why is this surprising???!?! Like...has NO ONE except this precious child tried this????

Also, nothing bad better happen to this child.

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That ship literally fucked around, and Godzilla let it find out! Lmao!

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Kong: Hey, Godzilla...look at me...

Godzilla: >:[

Kong: ...bitch.

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Precious girl: Thank you, friend 🧏🏽‍♀️

Kong: ☺️😴

THIS GIRL IS TOO PRECIOUS!!!!

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Bitch-ass White Man: How’s Kong with heights?

BITCH, you really ganna try that?!?! You really think you ganna find any aircraft(s) that are ganna be able to support all that weight?? Never mind any other problems with Kong trying to nope the fuck out of that situation and all kind of other hosts of problems!

And if you do somehow have one (or multiple) WHY TF DIDN’T YOU USE THAT BEFORE KNOWING FULL AND WELL YOU RAN THE RISK OF GODZILLA MERCING KONG’S ASS IF YOU TRAVELED VIA SHIP!?!?!?!

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Down the Hell Naw tunnel we go!

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“I think it’s romantic,”

I fucking love Millie Bobbie Brown’s character!! 🤣❤️🤣

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WHY IS THIS TEENAGER SMARTER THAN EVERYBODY OMG!!!!! 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

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“This is page one in the ‘Playing God’ handbook, right?”

I’ve decided I love this character! 🤣

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WHY YOU GETTING INSIDE THAT THING—Oh god! 😨 Why y’all got eggs!?!? This is like if Weyland-Yutani succeeded in getting Xenomorphs! 😬

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Oop! Locked in! THIS IS WHY YOU DON’T HIDE OUT IN MYSTERIOUS ROOMS!!!!

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Oh shit! Apex Cybernetics think they on that Wakanda shit now!

Also, why was that one Apex Cybernetics bitch bitching about how one of those HEAV crafts could power Vagas for a week if y’all clearly have a whole network or transportation using this tech!

And I never understood how tech companies kept that shit to world domination shit! Build a public transportation system with that shit! Boss man said he likes ideas that make him rich! Pretty sure that would do the trick!

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WINE BREAK!!!

Saving the rest of the last bottle for coking Gumbo, so gotta open up a new bottle

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Aw, Kong is so sick of this bullshit! 😂😭

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“It’s not working”

Bruh! Give it more that two seconds!

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HOW DARE Y’ALL USE KONG’S LOSS AGAINST HIM!!!! HOW DARE Y’ALL!!!

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HEAV go Brrrrrrr Shoooooooooooom!!!!

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LMAO!!! Monarch has their own brand of bottled water!?!?! Idk why that amuses me so much!

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This hallow earth portal thing is some Pacific Rim bullshit right here, lol!

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NYOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMM

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Are we...are we really Ice Age: Dawn of Dinosaur-ing this shit rn??? 😂😂😂

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“It’s beautiful,”

Of course it’s beautiful! No hoomins have touched it! Lol

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Y’ALL GOT FUCKIN DRAGONS IN THIS BITCH!?!?!?!!! 8D YO!!! SIGN ME THE FUCK UP!!!!

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*marvels at the creature creation ideas*

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Kong’s first thought: *nom the dragon guts*

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THE ROCK HAND OMG IM GANNA CRY!!! 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭 It’s the same gesture the Precious Girl did OMG!!!!

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“We going in?”

“Yeah”

The BALLS on this child!

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“AAAAHH 😐”

*fear*

LMAO!!!!! I’M FUCKIN WHEEZING!!!

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“Sacrifice Pit”

OMG 🤣🤣🤣

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I KNEW IT!!!! MECHA-GODZILLA MOTHERFUCKER!!!!!!!! 8DDDDD

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YO PACIFIC RIM RAN SO MECHA-GODZILLA COULD FUCKIN SPRINT!!!!!!!!

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YO IT’S A GOOD THING I AIN’T SEEING THIS IN THEATERS BC I’D BE FLIPPING MY SHIT!!!!

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“Humanity, once again, will be the apex species,”

THERE it is!

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Why Mecha-Godzilla so skeeny?!? He need ta be thicc if he ganna take down REAL Godzilla!

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*Ryan Bergera conspiracy voice* Is this the real reason Kong was contained!? So this douche could snatch up Skull Crawlers without Kong intervention???

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OH SHIT!!! I think this thing is emitting alpha waves (or whatever we’re calling it) and THAT’s what set Godzilla off!!! He fought Ghidorah, heard this shit and went, “Nu-uh, bitch! NOT AGAIN!!!”

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Monarch dude: Yo, Godzilla’s headed to Hong Kong for some reason?

FUCKIN CALLED IT!!!

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This look like the door to fuckin General Grievous’s lair,da fuq?!? 🤣🤣🤣

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I got waaay too emotional over that handprint, y’all! 😭😭😭

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Y’all, the fucking art history major in me is fuckin screaming at this temple scene! The fact that some of these Kaiju not only had the urge and drive and capacity to build a fucking temple around this power source or some shit and create weapons like the axe that Kong just fucking Excalibured the shit out of that one skull crawler’s skull fucking implies the fact that there is intelligent civilization amongst these fucking Kaiju and all that shit! I want to know more about this shit! Take that you fucking racist-ass white historian motherfuckers!

(Note: I definitely needed to use talk to text for much of this bit, because there was no way I was going to be able to contain all my excitement in just typing, alone, lmao)

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BRUH!!! Why y’all exiting g the HEAV without no breathing apparatus or lead suits or nothing!?!?! In previous movies, y’all implied that these Kaiju lived in environments in which their environments were hella radioactive compared to our own!!!

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Kong is s the true heir to the iron throne, Lmao!

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FUCKING CALLED IT!!!! THEY HAD GHIDORA’S REMAINS IN THERE SOMEWHERE!!!!

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OH FUCK!!!! Y’ALL AINT JUST SENDING OUT ALPHA VIBES WITH YOUR MECHA-GODZILLA!!!! YOU SOMEHOW USING GHIDORA’S HIVE MIND OR TELEPATHY SHIT TO DO IT!?!?!?! AAAWWWWW SHEEEEEET!!! Y’ALL ARE BONED NOW!!!! FUCKIN BONEROWNED!!!!

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Godzilla! My bruh! My dude! You didn’t HAVE TO get up right where that bridge was!!! 😂😂 Ya douche bag!!!

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At the same time, tho, I can just hear him going, “Ah! FUCK! NOT AGAIN!!! Sunova bitch!! Motherfuckin!! STOP BUILDING sHIT SO DAMN HIGH!!! Goddammit!”

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You know, with all the Bright twinkly lights in Hong Kong, I can’t help but think of the sequel to the original Gojira movie ( that I can’t remember the title of ,rn) where he was fucking triggered by fucking lights. And I wonder if this little scene where he’s stomping all through Hong Kong is a tribute to that or whatever. But I’m probably overthinking it.

[Sober Edit: it was Godzilla Raids Again]

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*GASP* HOLY SIHIIIT!!! The axe is made out of Godzilla skute!?!?! GOLY BALLS THAT’S NOT ONLY COOL BUT CONTRIBUTES MORE TO THE FACT THAT THESE KAIJU (likely Kong’s species, in particular) WERE REALLY FUCKING INTELLIGENT AMD TJOUGHT, “Imma beat this muthafucka with their own spiky thing! Bc that’s what screws us over, so, why WOULD’nt it hurt them!?!” I need SO MUCH MORE of this Kaiju/Kong culture studied and shit! HOLY FUCK!!!

It even fucking glows!! Like ... they managed to fucking piece together that its glow was a fucking warning sign like Sting or some shit!!!! Holy fuck!!!!

Also, how does that work? How are the skutes still connected even after dismemberment???

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NO FUCKIN WAY WRE YOU—AAAAAAAAHHH!!! Excalibur that shit my boi!!!!

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I FUCKIN LOVE YHIS MOVIE HOLY SHIT!!!

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“ that’s Apex property now,”

Excuse me bitch! Are we really not gonna listen to the scientist who saying “hey we don’t understand the shit out of this fucking power! Maybe we should hold off on taking some fucking samples!”

Are we really just gonna ignore that shit???????

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Kong said: TRY ME BITCH!!!!

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Oh thank the GODS this Serizawa dude is taking precautions like his old man! Also, what is his relation to Ken Watanabe’s Serizawa!?!?!

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UH OH!! SOLDIER DUDES GETTIN ATE!!!

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OH SHIT!!! PILOT JUST GOT ATE!!! FUCKIN DRAGON BASEMENT UP IN THIS SHIT!!!

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BITCH YOU REALLY GON THROW A ROCK AT IT!!! FUCKIN NONSENSE OF THIS BITCH!!!

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LOVE AND FITE ME ENERGY IS STORED IN THE ATOMIC BREATH

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“Shoot him!”

WHY!!!???!! He literally had NO problem with you before then!!!

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Why does white man who don’t know anything about this vehicle suddenly know how to pilot this shit!???!?!!!!!

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Y’all love had SO MUCH wine!

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The FUCK this dude got a flip flop phone for!!!?!????!!!?

Da fuq!?!?! 🤣🤣🤣🤣 yeah that’s the most unrealistic part of this entire fucking movie! Not the fuckin Kaiju robots. Not the fucking hollow earth bullshit! The fucking flip phone! LMFAO!!!!

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“Maintenance! I’M MAINTENANCE!!! This bitch ain’t buying it”

That made me laugh WAY FUCKIN harder that it should have!!!!

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Y’all really ganna try to shoot at a kid!?! REALLY!?!?!??!

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GAWD, I’m so glad I impulse bought these oatmeal bites from Dominos! 🤤😋

[Sober Edit: I have no idea how my autocorrect managed to convert “Parmesan” to “oatmeal,” but okay! 😆😅]

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Kong be like, “Hey, bitch!!! You lookin’ for me!?!?”

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Find you a partner that bites your neck like Godzilla does! Lmao!

Sorry, I’ll be crawling back into my hell hole, now.

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EAT YOUR FOOKIN VEGETABLES GODZILLA!!!!!

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Did Godzilla just axe throw with his fuckin teefs!!!????!?!?!

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THIS IS THE FOOKIN MONSTER VS MONSTER FIGHTS IVE BEEN CRAVING SINCE KING OF THE MONSTERS HOLY SHIT!!!!

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“Really? Groupies, again?”

First of all, again!?! What happened last time???

Secondly, where tf are YOUR grpupies, asshole! No need to judge! Ya cunt!

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“There can only be one alpha,”

Really! You really gotta bring your toxic masculinity into a fuckin monster fight, my dude!?!

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Kong said, “Yeet! YEET SELF!!!”

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I am living for the feral fight scenes!!!!

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Kong’s expression , tho! 🤣🤣🤣

Like, “Can you ducking NOT, Godzilla?!? Can you, like, fucking chill??!!? Aight, fine! ASDASHKLSDJKLDZJL ADKLKDZDJ!!!!!!”

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Awwwww! Godzilla let Kong go, bc he knows what it’s like to be the last of his species! 🥺🥺🥺🥺😭😭😭😭

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“This is how we [...] win!”

Oh, honey, you ‘bout to die! Lmao! 😂

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Oh god! I knew he was going to use the sign for “coward” at the most inappropriate time! Lmao! At least the Precious Girls is smart enough to know what Dumbass White Man means, lol

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Oh, thank god we do t see this dumbass in any sequels!

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Dammit, he escaped!

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This girl is too good!

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Did y’all really think you were ganna break into a semi-sentient Mecha-Godzilla by GUESSING ITS FUCKING PASSWORD!!?!?!?!!!!???? 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

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YEAH!!!! TEAM-UP COMING THROUGH!!!!!

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“I was hoping to die with adults, but that’s okay,”

🤣🤣🤣

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“I’VE GOT TO DIE WITB YOU AND SOBER!!?!?!”

GOD, I love this movie!!!!

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OOOOOOHHHH HOLY SHIT!!!!! 😱😱😱😱😱 He powering up the axe!!!!!

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YOOOOOO KONG WENT PREDATOR/YOUTJA ON MECHA-GODZILLA’s ASS!!!!

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Kong said, “I’m done, y’all! Imma take a nap!”

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“Dad. Uh...Bernie.”

I fucking love Bernie!!! 😂😂😂😂

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JIA NOOOO!!! Don’t go running between two disgruntled Kaiju bby!!

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Yo, why do monsters have less toxic masculinity than we do??? Lol!

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Yaaaaaay! Kong has a new home!!

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WELP!!! I fucking loved this movie, and I highly recommend it to everyone!!!

#SPOILERS #Godzilla #godzilla vs kong #King Kong #kaijuverse #my posts #my drunk ass #godzilla vs kong spoilers

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savetopnow · 7 years ago

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2018-03-16 17 BUSINESS now

BUSINESS

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deborahaphillips54303 · 4 years ago

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The 'Bon Appétit' Test Kitchen and the Myth of the Happy Workplace

The Bon Appétit Test Kitchen and its so-called "cinematic universe" has been described as follows: a "bright spot" in a "sea of garbage," the "internet's favorite cooking show," a form of "Sunday therapy," "an unstoppable force," "meme gods," and even "a Green New Deal fantasy," whatever that means.

Every night, "I check in with the chefs at Bon Appétit like I’m catching up with old friends," Louis Peitzman wrote for Buzzfeed in 2018. Another piece from earlier this year claimed the secret to Bon Appétit's YouTube success was that "everyone is just so damn likable." And having been graced with the crew's presence at the company's "Best Weekend Ever" late last year, writer and Who? Weekly host Bobby Finger recalled, "I felt not just starstruck but crazy. I mean actually deranged!"

Those are just the fawning articles. The Test Kitchen also has fan-run meme pages, an official merch store, two subreddits, and two more devoted specifically to personality Brad Leone and Gourmet Makes star Claire Saffitz. Saffitz, the kitchen's most beloved host, has been described as "the internet's collective crush," about whom people say things like "I would die for Claire" and imitate for Halloween or TikTok fame.

Man Repeller reported late last year that the channel was the fastest-growing in YouTube's food space, with more than 40 million views per month and over 5 billion total minutes watched. It currently has 6 million subscribers. As its hordes of doting fans propped the Bon Appétit Test Kitchen on the highest pedestal, the magazine's staff turned into micro-celebrities, their interpersonal dynamics became objects of obsession, and overall, the workplace was seen as a wholesome culinary ideal. What the Test Kitchen's cult of celebrity obfuscated, however, is that the Test Kitchen is just that: a workplace, like that of any other large—and therefore likely imperfect, if not problematic—institution. So honestly, what did any of us expect?

twitter

As the world found out in industry-shaking fashion this week, the reality of the Test Kitchen isn't the bastion of good that its stans have willed it to be. Last weekend, writer Illyanna Maisonet posted an exchange with Editor-in-Chief Adam Rapoport in which he effectively told her that Puerto Rican food wasn't trendy enough for the magazine to cover, and it read as another example of the brand's diversity problem. On Monday, after writer Tammie Teclemariam posted an old photo of Rapoport and his wife Simone Shubuck dressed in costumes centered on Puerto Rican stereotypes (in the photo, which Shubuck captioned "#TBT me and my papi #boricua," Rapoport wears a silver chain and durag), staffers blew open the door on the company's toxic culture, which has been emotionally and financially unsupportive of people of color. Rapoport—who, amid claims of brownface, maintains that he did not color his skin for the image—resigned the same day.

As assistant food editor Sohla El-Waylly wrote on Instagram on Monday, not only was she hired for her role at the rate of $50,000 per year despite her 15 years of experience (and the high cost of living in New York, where the company is located), but she was "pushed in front of video as a display of diversity" and not even paid for those appearances. Per Buzzfeed, El-Waylly and other hosts of color weren't paid for their video work, which is arranged through contracts with Condé Nast Entertainment, while white video stars were compensated. As the floodgates burst open, Twitter users soon dug up drinks editor Alex Delany's old internet history, which included a 2013 Vine of him saying the F-slur, a Confederate flag cake he'd posted to Tumblr, and a series of sexist tweets.

A damning report from Business Insider on Wednesday showed how far the brand's problems extended. From conversations with 14 former and current staffers, writer Rachel Premack concluded that BA was a "locus for exclusion and toxicity." Ryan Walker-Hartshorn, Rapoport's assistant for close to three years and the only Black woman on staff, was repeatedly denied raises from her $35,300 base salary and treated by Rapoport like "the help," in her words. "There is a big difference in terms of how they monetarily value the white employees versus the people of color," El-Waylly told BI.

On YouTube, BA's channel landed at exactly the right time. Compared to other food channels, which increasingly felt over-produced, the Test Kitchen videos were less polished; they had more personality; and they made the filming and editing processes clear. BA's videos resonated philosophically as well. Saffitz's Gourmet Makes, in which she attempts to recreate popular processed foods, is visibly an arduous and frustrating multi-day process, and at Mashable, Morgan Sung described Saffitz's series as an example of "probably the healthiest, most productive way to approach issues," while Quartz called her the "ultimate life coach."

Though the Test Kitchen's transformation into a celebrity force has been good for business, it's also set things up for exactly the reckoning that's happening now.

As with the recent situation involving Alison Roman (who got her start at BA), Chrissy Teigen, and Marie Kondo, the Test Kitchen's growing popularity and prestige outside the insular food world has complicated our ability to talk about its issues with clarity. Just as the bigger conversation about Roman and who tends to profit from cooking global food (the answer: white cooks) was largely portrayed as just a celebrity "Twitter feud," the changes at BA have been framed as the oversimplified result of a "brown face photo sparking anger" or the resurfacing of a "racially insensitive photo." The celebrity culture of the Test Kitchen begets the treatment celebrities get at gossip rags: reductive, lacking in nuance, and sounding the alarm for critics of "cancel culture." It's more than that, though.

The Test Kitchen's gargantuan online presence overrode its offline truth, as it projected and leaned into what people wanted to see, which was an Office-esque sitcom in which a friendly band of coworkers snickers behind the bumbling boss's back. As writer James Factora suggested in a tweet preceding all of this, perhaps the Test Kitchen's popularity is related to the widespread obsession with The Office. While Factora's tweet reads tongue-in-cheek, it's not wrong, and the love for the show perpetuated the illusion that a toxic workplace can be laughed at and lived with.

The Office has funny moments, but in a way, it led society astray. It suggested that a bad boss who makes clumsy, insensitive comments and makes life hard for employees can be a point of humor, instead of a toxic presence that could be booted. Who does that benefit except bosses? As BA turned the Test Kitchen into essentially its own sitcom, with each cooking star becoming an Office-esque talking head, it furthered the false notion of the perfect workplace, and people online were quick to gobble it up. The interactions between co-workers, even when off-putting, became meme fodder and pushed stans to throw their support behind their chosen star.

The idea that everything gets bad once it gets big sounds like a line ripped from Portlandia, but it is a maxim that applies to everything from emo bands to hashtags to dog breeds to cooking hosts. The higher the platform we give something, the more it can fall, and the discourse around the Test Kitchen seemed unprecedented in its fawning, at least within the food sphere. (Though we might have learned from situations like the downfall of Mario Batali.)

When we laud any product or person to this extent and make it an object of cultural obsession, it becomes easier to ignore the flaws and the parts of the conversation that don't fit what we want to see. This is true for the Test Kitchen, which could never really have met the inflated expectations of goodness that stan culture built up around it; people saw the perfect workplace because they wanted a perfect workplace. The problems at BA are institutional, but stan culture allowed people to compartmentalize the Test Kitchen as something separate and authentic.

In response to all of this, BA's parent company Condé Nast—a 111-year-old company with 6,000 employees globally at the start of this year—has announced that it will be "accelerating" its first ever diversity and inclusion report. On Tuesday, Amanda Shapiro, the editor of BA's Healthyish spinoff, became the brand's acting deputy director, and on Wednesday, the editors of BA said in a statement, "We want to be transparent, accountable, and active as we begin to dismantle racism at our brands."

Still, former staffers have identified Shapiro and other remaining BA employees as complicit in "toxic" behaviors. Despite calls for Matt Duckor, Condé Nast's head of programming for lifestyle and style, to step down over the unfair pay system and his mocking tweets about the gay community, he remains employed, as does Alex Delany. Both of them have issued social media apologies. With this new context, though, the joking tweets and fawning memes about the Test Kitchen don't hold up as well.

No surprise, Test Kitchen stans have responded to this all with even more memes and lionizing statements: "Update: we went to war for Sohla from the Bon Appétit test kitchen," reads one popular tweet. The height of the pedestal hasn't changed, though who's on the pedestal has. But as Bon Appétit changes, will its fan culture change also? To grapple with all of this new knowledge, it should.

Follow Bettina Makalintal on Twitter.

via VICE US - undefined US VICE US - undefined US via Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network

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cyberpoetryballoon · 4 years ago

Text

The 'Bon Appétit' Test Kitchen and the Myth of the Happy Workplace

twitter

Though the Test Kitchen's transformation into a celebrity force has been good for business, it's also set things up for exactly the reckoning that's happening now.

Follow Bettina Makalintal on Twitter.

via VICE US - undefined US VICE US - undefined US via Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network

0 notes

carolrhackett85282 · 4 years ago

Text

The 'Bon Appétit' Test Kitchen and the Myth of the Happy Workplace

twitter

Though the Test Kitchen's transformation into a celebrity force has been good for business, it's also set things up for exactly the reckoning that's happening now.

Follow Bettina Makalintal on Twitter.

via VICE US - undefined US VICE US - undefined US via Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network

0 notes

melodymgill49801 · 4 years ago

Text

The 'Bon Appétit' Test Kitchen and the Myth of the Happy Workplace

twitter

Though the Test Kitchen's transformation into a celebrity force has been good for business, it's also set things up for exactly the reckoning that's happening now.

Follow Bettina Makalintal on Twitter.

via VICE US - undefined US VICE US - undefined US via Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network

0 notes

carolinechanson97838 · 4 years ago

Text

The 'Bon Appétit' Test Kitchen and the Myth of the Happy Workplace

twitter

Though the Test Kitchen's transformation into a celebrity force has been good for business, it's also set things up for exactly the reckoning that's happening now.

Follow Bettina Makalintal on Twitter.

via VICE US - undefined US VICE US - undefined US via Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network

0 notes

latoyajkelson70506 · 4 years ago

Text

The 'Bon Appétit' Test Kitchen and the Myth of the Happy Workplace

twitter

Though the Test Kitchen's transformation into a celebrity force has been good for business, it's also set things up for exactly the reckoning that's happening now.

Follow Bettina Makalintal on Twitter.

via VICE US - undefined US VICE US - undefined US via Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network Mom's Kitchen Recipe Network

0 notes

disc-golf · 6 years ago

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How to Delegate for Maximum Productivity

TL;DR

Systems determine business success, not talent; build the right systems to ensure your development, sales, and service run smoothly

When you hire, be sure your candidate has skills that have a place in your company and can contribute to your longterm goals; don’t just hire for a position or a task

Maintain open communication with employees and provide both positive and constructive feedback for improvement; if they are not performing well, move them elsewhere in the company where their skills will be better put to use

Spread project execution across a larger group, giving many people the change to contribute and a clear view of how other employees work

Know what you should delegate and what you shouldn’t; stay in control of your finances and brand

Don’t confuse delegation and abdication; proper delegation allows you to retain oversight and control, while abdication turns success or failure entirely over to someone else who doesn’t have a vested interest in your company

Recently, I had the privilege of sitting down with Jonathan Cronstedt, President of e-learning company Kajabi. Cronstedt has several successful stints as CEO or founder under his belt, so I wanted to talk about the pervasive problem of bad (or no) delegation in the entrepreneurial world.

To best illustrate the lessons he learned in this arena, I decided to retrace his career steps, starting in his college days…

In the early summer of 2002, Cronstedt landed a sales job at Fletcher Jones Motorcars.

The job was, as he recalls, very regimented: “Everything funneled through the Business Development Center at the dealership, and all of the calls were scripted. It was very systematic.”

That systematic approach was a form of “designed delegation” that ensured sales representatives never left clients in the lurch—a follow-up was always delivered by staff members whose specific job was to maintain communication with prospects and customers.

This model had a huge impact on Cronstedt, who moved on to employ the same systems and strategies in the mortgage industry.

He admits that being on the “receiving” end of these marching orders made him bristle initially. But that might just be a characteristic of the sales industry: “I think sales people in particular don’t like to be told what to do,” Cronstedt said. “They think it’s their talent, not the systems they work with, that makes them successful. But they very quickly begin to realize, as I did, that it’s the systems, not the talent, that make the sales.”

This team-based approach to success was also key to Cronstedt’s successful leadership at Independent Financial Mortgage, just a few years after he left Fletcher Jones. But there were differences, too.

For instance, the Business Development model at Fletcher Jones would never have allowed managers to dip into sales, even if they were technically in charge of sales reps. For Cronstedt, that didn’t quite fit in the mortgage biz.

“Even when I built and managed teams to handle increased work, I never stopped originating loans myself. You need to know how to do something yourself before you delegate it,” he explained to me.

That led me to another question in Cronstedt’s meteoric rise: Scaling is great, and so is staying connected to the day-to-day work, but how do you know when it’s time to bring on new talent?

“When you run out of hours in the day,” he said, succinctly. “If you can’t continue to achieve individually, you’re going to have to find a way to scale the performance to meet the goals you’ve established. That comes through systems improvement or people improvement—preferably both.”

Cronstedt is quick to point out, however, that as he moved from auto sales to mortgage and beyond, what became clear was the need to constantly evaluate the systems and workload across the company. It wasn’t a quarterly thing—it happened every day.

A lot of the reshuffling of work hinged on a very simple question that Cronstedt regularly asked himself: “What tasks that don’t require higher-level skills or training can I take off the plates of senior employees and managers? How much more could they accomplish if they didn’t have to worry about those things?”

This kind of delegation touched on his own workload, as well. “Fortunately,” he said, “letting go has never been hard for me. I was more than willing to turn tasks over to someone else—if that helped the systems work as they were built to.”

“I think entrepreneurs have a hard time letting go,” he continued. “They’re too connected to everything. And even when they do, they often don’t have systems in place to set their employees up for success. So, their employees fail and the whole thing becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. ‘See,’ they say, ‘I knew I should never have delegated that work.’”

So, I echoed, the systems make or break the company.

But there’s another way to ensure an employee is set up for success, he added: Hire the right people.

Easier said than done, of course, but that’s why there’s a system in place for hiring, too. “If we hire well, we’re confident in a candidate’s abilities. We won’t leave them hanging, even if they’re not being successful. We’ll try to find another place in the company where they will be successful.”

For Cronstedt, the guiding metrics for a successful sales hire were easy to define. But not every role can be judged easily by hard and fast numbers. Still, he argues, you need to put numbers to the hiring process—you need to be able to say, “I’m hiring this person to have X measurable impact. That means they need to have Y qualities or credentials and have accomplished Z in their career.”

At this point in our discussion, I played devil’s advocate, curious how the system would work in Cronstedt’s mind if the employee believed that he or she wasn’t being given the right kind of opportunity. “What if you place them somewhere that you think is a good fit, but they disagree?” I prodded.

“Feedback should be open,” he answered. “But that goes both ways. Take Netflix, for example. They managed to successfully move from their DVD model to streaming video and hire incredibly talented individuals while operating in a Silicon Valley world where the benefits war was often unsustainable. How? Well, one of the reasons is their open communication. If you do a good job at Netflix, you’re going to know. And if you’re doing a crappy job, you’re going to know—and know quick. That’s true across the company.”

This regular check is what keeps employees on point, and identifies mismatched skills and tasks as soon as they start to drag down performance. It also creates a culture of affirmation for employees that are very successful.

But that kind of feedback has to be bi-directional, Cronstedt says. At Kajabi, he has instituted an open-door policy for the company. This gives employees and managers the opportunity to address both good and bad performance right away—and find a fix. No more holding on to these problems for yearly reviews (that may or may not happen).

And there’s an even more ingenious way of keeping responsibilities visible across the company: Spread product execution across the organization—without siloing tasks that leave coworkers in the dark about other employees’ productivity. Cronstedt says it’s far better to spread a project across a group instead of leaving it to a single person or only a few people. Not only does this promote collaboration, but it gives employees a sense of what other skills are employed across the organization. With an open door communication policy, they can always go to the boss and say, “I think my skills could be better used here.”

“What about being a manager of managers?” I pivoted. “How involved are you still in the daily workings of the company so you can effectively train managers to lead a productive, efficient team?”

“I let a lot of it go,” he told me. “What I’ve found is that getting my hands dirty with day-to-day tasks as I’m training or guiding a manager doesn’t really build rapport or help them succeed. I like to think of it this way: ‘I’m hiring you to do this job, but I’m going to set up guardrails to make sure you are successful.’” When the right time comes, Cronstedt says, the guard rails come down.

Again, he points to the delegation issue with entrepreneurs. In some cases, as mentioned before, entrepreneurs who are emotionally connected to their entire business have a hard time letting go of work and don’t set employees up for success when they do.

But other times, they delegate eagerly—without really knowing what or why they’re delegating. Cronstedt mentioned advertising as a common example.

“A lot of entrepreneurs I know will delegate Facebook advertising, but they’ll have no idea what the outcomes should be, what their desired ROI is, or what time investment is involved. Now, I’m not going to set up a Facebook campaign myself as president or CEO of a company, but I know where it fits in my business model and I know what to expect from a given investment. Many entrepreneurs don’t, so they’ll fire an ad consultant or employee after a short period of time just because they’re not getting the results they want.”

I might have dug a bit deeper on this point, asking Cronstedt what specific areas entrepreneurs tend to delegate in ignorance, but I thought it best to close with a pointed question about 2018 delegation tips for those eager to launch their own companies.

“What is timely advice would you give ambitious startup owners in 2018?” I asked.

“First, don’t delegate things you don’t understand. Second, know what you should delegate and what you shouldn’t. For example, I think delegating accounting is great, but delegating the checkbook is not. If you’re not on top of the finances of your company and you’re assuming somebody else is going to mind the store, that’s a huge gamble.”

“Also,” he added, “I think outsourcing marketing is one thing, but outsourcing the establishment of your brand/story is not something I would let another person do. That’s yours.”

Cronstedt closed on a note of caution: “Be aware of the difference between delegation and abdication,” he said. “If you are delegating properly, you have some level of strategy in mind—some responsibility, oversight, and monitoring of execution. You start abdicating when you think things like, ‘Oh, I hired that person, so now I don’t need to touch it ever again.’”

During our conversation, Cronstedt mentioned several resources for entrepreneurs and startup owners that are helpful for management, organization, and delegation. Here’s a summary of those resources:

On organizational communication and culture: “Powerful” by Patty McCord

On productivity: Ari Meisel (arimeisel.com)

On organization and efficiency systems: “Work the System” by Sam Carpenter

On management and solution-building: “The Goal” and “Theory of Constraints” by Eliyahu M. Coldratt

On successful routines and productive habits: “The Perfect Day Formula” by Craig Ballantyne (FREE)

For more information about Jonathan Cronstedt and Kajabi, visit newkajabi.com.

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