Dave Gilboa on evaluating your relationships

- Now for the last part of this assignment, we talked about the train and listing the people who are on our train, both in our professional lives and in our personal lives. So as you look down that list, is there anybody who does not need to be on the train? - Yeah, so we spent a lot of time thinking about this as a business, given that we have 500 people and we've come to realize that there're a lot of people who are sources of positivity and positive energy, and then there's sources of negativity and those negative people, it's amazing how one negative person, the impact that they can have in an organization or on your personal life, and so the way that we've thought about it is the values that are important to us and in the individuals that are part of the company, that should be really a guiding framework for how people act and the values that we cherish, and so some of those values are pursue new and creative ideas, do good, lead with integrity, inject fun and quirkiness into everything that we do, learn, grow, repeat, and so we've defined eight core values as a company and we actually have architected our interview process to ask questions to probe individual values and see how aligned they are with our core values, and there've been instances where we've hired the wrong person or they've been really top performers, really incredibly bright, but they violated one or more of our core values and we've decided that those are the values that we're going to hire and those are the values we're going to fire by. I think it's the same thing in personal life where there're some people that are positive forces in your life and some that are negative and it takes a lot of effort to identify who's who, but once you have, you should really part ways with those people that aren't positive contributors. - So, I love what you said about how basically no matter how high-performing someone may be, if they violate your core values and of what we consider important in our lives, and if somebody violates these core values, no matter how useful or fun they may be, neither ways, it's time to escort them off the train, with no judgements, that's what is so interesting. So one of the lessons in this course is how to let go people of the train, but then, as quickly as you can, forgive them and move on, and I love what you said about your business because the way we are describing of The Huffington Post is, where we have a similar rule, is no brilliant jerks allowed. - That's right, yeah, we say we'd rather have a hole than an A hole, so we'd rather have an empty position. - Dave, I know everyone at home now may be wondering, well, that's easy for Dave, he hired them, he can fire them, but what about me? How do I let people off the train? Do I have to officially break up with them? Sometimes it may require a conversation, but a lot of times you can go back to the sentence, no. When you tell these people no enough, they will also often step off the train all by themselves. Take time with these assignments. These are big. They can really have a transformational effect on your life. So Dave, let's summarize our three assignments. First of all, look at your goals list, circle three must-do's, and cross off the ones you can complete by dropping. Next, find time to fill in your 24-hour pie chart and see where you are spending your time, and make sure you are taking time for yourself. Finally, let the people off your train who don't belong there anymore. Thank you, Dave, so much for being here today. It is really helpful to hear the way you're managing your time and the way you, like me, like all of us, are works in progress and trying to make our lives both more effective and more joyful, so thank you so much. - Yeah, thanks for having me and I wish the best of luck to all your students.