Dr. Julie Gurner: Standards, Rules, and Curating Friendships
What this covers
Watch part one here: https://youtu.be/C5D6HAskUaE
On the second of two special episodes, acclaimed executive performance coach and doctor of psychology Dr. Julie Gurner goes in-depth on a variety of strategies and actionable advice that will help you perform up to your potential, including he standards we set for ourselves and others, cognitive ruts, curating friends and relationships, fighting up front, what success means, and much more.
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00:00 - Intro 00:58 - The consequences of high standards 06:44 - The dangers of basing your identity on what you do 08:28 - How to remove blindspots in life and work 11:43 - How to have hard conversations 16:59 - Julie’s strategies prior to confronting someone 22:25 - How to overcome emotions on days where things go wrong 25:25 - How to end toxic relationships 27:44 - Red flags to look for in bad relationships 29:35 - How to fight up front 32:58 - How to get out of ‘cognitive ruts’ 39:35 - What Julie has learned from her work that’s made her life different 41:52 - What is success for Dr. Gurner
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Dr. Julie Gerner argues that high-performing leaders must detach their self-worth from outcomes, address problems early through collaborative framing rather than conflict, and escape cognitive ruts by deliberately exposing themselves to diverse perspectives outside their domain.
- Emotional attachment to work distorts decision-making and shields leaders from valid criticism; detachment increases objectivity and competence
- Early intervention through 'us versus the problem' framing reduces defensiveness and prevents compounding damage from delayed difficult conversations
- Cognitive ruts trap exceptional people because they reinforce existing patterns; breaking out requires deliberately consuming ideas from outside one's field
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Emotional closeness and attachment to business prevents leaders from seeing valid criticisms and operational problems, because they take feedback personally about the business rather than as objective operational issues
“if it's close to you it's going to change how you operate it's not going to give you the greatest objectivity that you're going to need to make the best decisions... people start getting too precious about you know the business and people how people talk about the business if there's like maybe there's genuine criticisms of your business that are pretty valid and it can Shield you from seeing some of those things you could be taking it personally and when it's really about an operational issue with the company that you run um you could be missing problems because you refuse to see it things in a certain way”
In forensic psychology, the principle is that if someone tries to kidnap you into a vehicle, your best chance is to fight immediately, because once you're in the secondary location, you can't predict what will happen and it will be worse than the initial fight
“one of the things in forensics that they tell you you know just a good rule of thumb is that hey if you're ever walking along and you know somebody tries to kidnap you pull you into a van or a truck or a car or whatever your best chance is if you fight up front right like this is the chance you have because once you go into that vehicle wherever you are taken uh wherever that secondary location is you don't know what's going to happen and it will be worse right you it will be worse you can't predict it you don't know it it's it's just it's a bad thing so you want to do everything you can to not get in that vehicle”
Seeing business or important projects as things you do rather than who you are provides increased competence and better decision-making, because emotional attachment skews objectivity and decision-making
“I think that it's very useful to see business or things that you care deeply about are the things that you do not who you are and I think it actually gives you an increased level of competence when you're able to do that because you're able to when you're emotionally too attached to things it skews your decision making it skews how you invest in it”
CEOs and leaders commonly experience deep, brewing frustration that their teams don't hold the same standards, engagement, or obsession they do—and this frustration persists even when KPIs and cultural systems are in place to measure performance.
“I think that it is a primary pain point for a lot of the people that I work with that they are frustrated endlessly that people do not in their companies hold the same standards that they do they put it as a point of culture they have you know kpis and other types of things that should be measuring it but there's always this kind of deep Brewing frustration that they're not as engaged as obsessed as any of those things as they are”
Leaders must set intention before entering meetings about how they want others to feel; if they bring frustration or negativity, they contaminate the emotional field and undermine their own goals—emotional leadership requires intentional emotional discipline
“I try to um help people think about their intention going into things how do I want people to feel do I want them to feel my frustration or do I want them to feel like you know they're engaged in a company moving forward... if you're bringing your bad mood to the table you're blocking the very outcomes that you want”
In relationships, delaying a conversation about a red flag is even worse than in business; if you're dating someone, notice a red flag, rationalize it as being non-judgmental, and avoid the conversation, six months later the problem compounds and exiting is painful and difficult because your lives are further mingled together.
“in relationships it's often honestly it's probably worse right like you're dating someone you kind of have a red flag but you're like oh I don't want to be too judgmental and you let it go and now we're six months down the road and it's terrible and you're trying to find a way out desperately and it's going to be a real challenge um as your lives are further mingled together”
The foundation of radical candor is that you must care deeply about a person to be able to challenge them directly; without genuine care, hard feedback becomes punishing, shaming, humiliating, or dominating and is counterproductive
“in the basis of radical Candor a book that's often taken pretty out of context because they're like you know I'm being candid I'm being radically candid um but that you really do have to the basis of it is you have to care deeply to be able to challenge directly and that somebody has to know that you care deeply about who they are in their role that you care about their performance that this is coming from a place that's meant to make them better right and if it's not coming from that place and it's coming from a place of punishing or shaming or you know humiliating or dominating it's not a really effective thing to do it's a counterproductive thing to do”
Leaders cannot have perfect vision of their own performance, but other people can provide frameworks that help them see more clearly; leaders should gather feedback from multiple levels (direct reports, skip-level, board members, people who haven't worked with them) to get 360-degree perspective
“if you're a leader you don't have 20 20 Vision on your own performance but other people likely can add to your framework to get you there you just have to be able to be open ask questions receive feedback... you have to make sure that you want real feedback around and creates systems where you're getting real feedback around it”
Highly successful outliers tend to have higher standards for how they spend their time, the work they accept, relationships, and everything else compared to average people, which is why they occupy elevated positions
“one pattern that I I've seen in outliers or Highly Successful People is that they tend to have higher standards than other people but their their standards for how they spend their time standards for the work that they accept or expect out of themselves and others for relationships sort of for everything it's like the bar is raised”
Anonymous feedback from employees in 360 reviews produces significantly more honest information than non-anonymous feedback; anonymity creates freedom for people to give candid criticism they wouldn't otherwise share
“I'll do mostly direct reports some skip levels some people who have never worked with them at all so that I I hear what people kind of the whisper network is and what their reputation is sometimes board members so I want to know people who are above them below them uh various people in their ecosystem and I guarantee them anonymity right like no one's going to get this feedback I'm going to ask you a bunch of questions about this person how they communicate how they lead with where their areas are and the amount of information you get with anonymity is it's amazing right like I mean the reports are like 13 pages long it's it's a it's incredible because you know for the first time they feel like they're free to give absolutely”
The FIRE (Financial Independence Retire Early) movement represents a non-traditional way of thinking about retirement and finances that many mainstream thinkers wouldn't have conceived of within their domain's traditional thinking
“sometimes those non-traditional ways end up blowing up uh like for example the fire movement right like the financial Financial independent retire early group yeah you know had a different way of looking at finances but you know some people like them some people don't but I think that what's so cool about it is it's a different way of looking about retirement how cool is that”
Leaders should reframe difficult conversations from 'me versus you' conflict to 'us versus the problem' collaboration; this reduces defensiveness and makes leaders more approachable, enabling genuinely hard conversations
“rather than let's just say Ted is his uh the marketing department is missing its numbers I don't want to say when Ted comes in Ted you're missing your numbers right like what's going on um I want us to instead of being me versus you I want to pull him to my side and be like hey this is US versus a problem you can do this at home you can do it at work you could do it anywhere and to be able to say hey Ted I noticed that you know our numbers are we're kind of missing here in the marketing department can we like let's do some problem solving around how we can really pull these up so it's a we you know you're intentionally pulling someone to your side you're forming a collaboration against the problem so rather than me and then you are the problem it is I'm pulling you to my side of the table and it's us together versus this problem”
Success for Gerner means having enough money to never think about needing it, which provides optionality in time, future choices, location, and the ability to help others at scale
“success is having enough to never think about to never think about needing it right like and to be able to like monetarily anyway and to be able to have the optionality that I wish for across various areas of life and you know the thing for me is that money provides some optionality um but success means that you have optionality in a range of things time uh they have optionality in your future and what you choose where you live where you uh how you help others the kinds of help you can offer to others the scale at which you can offer help to others”
Exceptional people pull in ideas from outside their field and domain; Steve Jobs learned from calligraphy, exceptionally great marketers steal from artists and affiliate marketers, and web3 pulls in traditional finance elements; this cross-domain inspiration is what creates breakthroughs
“let's say you're a marketer and okay you're a marketer on Twitter and you're a marketer you have marketing friends you go to marketing conferences you go to marketing forums you read marketing books and you wonder why you're not an exceptional marketer and it's because like you're in a rut you know you all you see is this certain content in the certain tunnel and what you'll notice is that people who are exceptional are pulling in like you know Steve Jobs used fonts from a calligraphy course right that he took like that like people who are great will find ways of pulling in exceptional things from outside of their fields outside of their way of thinking outside of tradition outside of you know what is common”
Constraints and scarcity force creativity; people in difficult circumstances figure out unconventional solutions, but in comfortable lives with existing mastery and confidence, there's no forcing function to figure things out differently
“that's one thing that was really great about having some insight into prisons is how great people can be when they I mean it's it's kind of a bad situation right but like it forces creativity it absolutely forces creativity so you if you want something you figure out a way and you know in our comfortable lives there's nothing that forces us to figure it out so we're really comfortable we have some Mastery in like you know marketing and we feel very confident very capable”
Leaders step into a role and are expected to play a part; if leaders cannot leave personal problems aside and show up effectively, they are not being good at what they do and are drawing away from effectiveness, even if nobody cares about their full self at work
“but as a leader and this is a I think it's kind of controversial to say but like you step into a role right they call it a role for a reason you you are stepping into a part you are expected to play to be effective in this organization and if you can't do that you're not being very good at what you do right you're you're kind of drawing away from the effectiveness that you could have and sometimes stepping into that role means that you leave a lot of other things on the side it means that you don't bring your full self to work nobody cares nobody wants that and like you bring your best work self to work”
Cognitive ruts are thinking tunnels where people cannot see any other way of operating; they repeat the same patterns and can't see alternatives; the goal is to 'get on the wall' of the tunnel to see outside it, then eventually escape
“I think about it almost like a rut because they can't see any other way like they literally can't see any other way of operating and so they're just they're in this tunnel they're in this rut and they're just going to think about things the same way... if you feel yourself bumping against yourself... look at how you think because you're probably in a tunnel somewhere and so what you want to start to do is to expand yourself into places where you're going to get some movement there right like you don't get out of the tunnel right away you kind of go up on the wall a little bit and then you go back into it you get up on the wall and you see a little hope maybe sometimes outside of it and you get back into it and then eventually you're going to kind of pop out of that”
Feedback is received differently depending on whether the receiver perceives the giver as 'all in' or just doing a job; if a leader perceives feedback from someone who seems transactional, the leader will interpret it very differently than feedback from someone fully invested in the mission.
“I wonder if your feedback is more receptive going back to what we said earlier about working a job versus being all in you're all in with the people you're working with yeah and so giving feedback is a very different place from somebody who's all in versus somebody who's working a job so that would create a little bit of contention at work too where you know if I perceive you as working a job and you're giving me feedback then I'm going to take that very differently than your friend who's telling you hey I got your best interest at heart here those genes don't work for you”
How high standards are communicated and enforced matters more than having standards themselves; leaders should inspire people to rise to potential rather than use fear and intimidation, because people want to please and perform for leaders they respect
“how that's translated can sometimes be important too like especially if you're a parent uh and if you're a CEO like how you bring people to the standard that you expect is incredibly important you don't want to do it through like kind of fear and intimidation you want to do it through a way where people feel inspired to rise and to hit their own potential because you are there the person that they believe sees something in them that they do not see and that can pull people to operate at higher levels too they want to please you they want to perform for you”
Non-high standards at work unconsciously signal to others that the work is a job rather than a career, which leads to people treating you more transactionally and giving you fewer opportunities than they give fully invested colleagues
“it's also an unintentional signal you're sending at work if your your standards are not above average let's say then you're signaling to people sort of unconsciously that this is a job for you and not a career and therefore I would expect and I don't know if this is true or not you get treated more transactionally at work because if you're going to take it as a job and I care a lot and I'm fully invested and I'm all in and this is a job to you and you're sending this unconscious signal to me that this is a job to you well then I'm going to treat it as a job to you but if you're in the boat and you're rowing with me and you're all in then I'm going to treat you differently and you're going to get different opportunities than if it's a job to you”
The broader theme across cognitive ruts, standards, and excellence is that true growth requires recognizing what's limiting you (usually yourself), being willing to challenge your assumptions about what's possible, and intentionally seeking perspectives from outside your current domain to break through ceilings.
“and so I hope that people are always challenging themselves because it seems like you know not to criticize LinkedIn but the content of it can be really rote and boring and it you can see how these ruts happen right when we criticize these big corporations sometimes we can see how it happens because you look at the maybe conferences are upcoming or things that are happening and you look at the list and you're like oh my God this could have happened like five years ago and been exactly the same um what's challenging things what's pushing people out of that rut uh what is kind of challenging them personally professionally and how can they think about this more effectively”
Most people will not meet the high standards of exceptional leaders, and leaders should expect employees to achieve approximately 80% of their own standards rather than 100%, which is still productive because most people won't even reach that 80% threshold
“they're not going to be most of the time but can they hit a bar that is eighty percent of what your expectation might be and is not going to be enough and I think for some people they're just still going to carry that frustration and for other people they're going to recognize that hey if people can give to the certain extent it takes it off my plate it takes it still pushes the business forward and it will it is productive because most people won't even meet that bar right”
Being in a survivor mindset rather than a victim mindset is critical; hard feedback should position people as survivors who are overcoming challenges, not as victims being done to, and positioning feedback this way keeps people engaged
“it's the difference between victim and Survivor right like you want people who are always in Survivor mindset not in victim mindset and even I think about that all the time aside from being intentional and maybe um but the words you're using and the place you're coming from right the place of pulling people forward and being better”
When leaders receive feedback and immediately dismiss a topic as unimportant, this dismissal itself is a signal that the topic should be revisited, because resistance to feedback often indicates the area needs the most attention
“if you have someone who comes to you and say you know I'm going to talk about everything but product we could talk about everything but product that's to me as a signal like we need to talk about product right like that's the the flag so a lot of times when I get these out of hand dismissals like oh we don't talk about that that's that's not important I'm like oh that's interesting right like that's very important”
LinkedIn content and corporate conference lineups often show stagnation and rote thinking; examining them reveals how cognitive ruts happen in organizations because people recycle the same ideas without challenging themselves
“I can see how these ruts happen right when we criticize these big corporations sometimes we can see how it happens because you look at the maybe conferences are upcoming or things that are happening and you look at the list and you're like oh my God this could have happened like five years ago and been exactly the same um what's challenging things what's pushing people out of that rut uh what is kind of challenging them personally professionally and how can they think about this more effectively”
People can accept hard feedback from people they know are in their corner; the jeans analogy shows you trust the friend who tells you those jeans don't work because you know they want you to look good, not because they want to hurt you
“people can take hard feedback from people that they know are in their corner and so you know it's kind of like and it's this really silly analogy but I'll use it anyway but it's like if you went to go try on jeans you don't want the friend who tells you you look great in every pair of jeans you want the person who's like wow you should definitely should not buy those right like and you trust them and you don't get angry at them because you know that they're actually looking out for the fact that you should look they want you to look good”
If you are looking for a partner to build with, you look for different traits and qualities than someone who just clocks in and clocks out, and there's nothing wrong with people who clock in and clock out as long as they can perform their task, but they will only reach a certain level with that mentality
“I think that that's a hundred percent true and I think it should be true right I mean if you are looking for a partner to build with you're going to look for different traits and qualities than somebody who just kind of like clocks in and clocks out and somebody there's nothing wrong with people who clock in and clock out if they're able to like perform their task and do what they need to do but they are only going to reach a certain level with that type of mentality”
People have bad moments, bad hours, but do not have to have bad days; leaders can intentionally decide whether a bad event will bleed into the rest of their day by making a conscious choice about how to reset
“is was this a bad 10 minutes or was it a bad hour or is it going to be a bad day right like I think that having a bad we all have bad moments bad minutes bad hours but we don't have to have bad days and it's how do we you know you make a decision at some point that things are going to bleed into the rest of your day and I think you have to make again it's with intentionality you have to make a decision of like all right I'm really ticked off about X and you know I'm here to do X Y you kind of you reset in a very intentional way”
To break out of cognitive ruts, Gerner personally ensures she reads widely across disciplines including autobiographies, biographies, artists, philosophers, and other fields beyond performance and psychology, to challenge herself and enable novel thinking
“what I try to do personally is that I try to make sure that like everything I'm reading isn't just about like performance or psychology you know I'll read like autobiographies and biographies about people and how they thought about things but also I I definitely follow and read artists and I definitely follow and read people who are in other fields and philosophy and and other things because I need I need to see and be challenged all the time in what I'm pulling in so that I can think of something new and novel or put things together in new and novel ways”
Tom Brady elevates the people around him because they want to play with and perform for him, even though many people dislike him; great leaders have this ability to elevate others rather than just punishing them for not meeting standards
“you know Tom Brady tends to elevate the people around him because they get to play with Tom Brady even if there's a lot of people out there who hate Tom Brady but nonetheless he does tend to do that and people step up their game because they want to perform they want to be his receiver they want to score a touchdown with Tom Brady”
People naturally hold high standards for things they deeply care about without consciously thinking about standards; this is observable in how different people curate restaurant choices based on how much they care about food
“I think everybody has high standards when they care enough... when we care about something no matter if it's the restaurant we're picking the work that we're doing and we really care about it like deeply care about it then we we hold ourselves naturally we're not thinking about a high standard we just naturally hold ourselves to a higher standard of you know the people scrolling Instagram looking at photos of food before they pick a restaurant rather than just looking at the reviews right like there's a higher threshold for because they care about food”
Gerner brings in coaches/psychologists to help CEOs because they're the right specialist for helping leaders understand themselves; when there's a technical problem (engineering), you bring an engineer; when the problem is the leader, you bring a psychologist who can unlock the next level of performance.
“a lot of times people will bring me a board because you know if you have an issue with you know engineering not functioning optimally you bring in an engineer and I guess you know I my background is in Psychology and I'm the person they're going to bring in to figure out them so that they're able to move to the next level and whatever that means”
Gerner sets goals with clients before engagements begin and measures her success by whether those goals move; because she doesn't like to lose and treats each client as her calling card/piece of work, she is deeply invested in client wins beyond the transaction.
“I have them set goals prior to our engagement like what are the two or three things you want to see out of us working together and so everything I'm doing is really around those goals because I measure myself to those you know like I don't like to lose so I want to see these things move and I'm invested in them not in them not remaining the same so I mean there's a we are both tied into making sure these goals happen and I'm incredibly invested every person walking around I see is my calling card so and my piece of work in some ways”
Before difficult conversations, Gerner thinks intentionally about how to present information and what language to use because she's aware of the capacity feedback has to either harm or empower; she never wants to kick someone around or harm them, but wants them to see challenges as opportunities.
“I do always think with intention about how I'm going to present certain information uh because I know the capacity it has to either like I don't want to I don't want to kick someone around where they're going to be harmed by it I don't want to impact them in any negative way if I can help it I want them to see it as an opportunity or a challenge”
People are the greatest driver of their own success and the greatest limiter of themselves; they limit themselves by reinforcing the same thoughts and imaginary rules about what they're capable of
“if you are the greatest driver of where you end up you're the greatest kind of engine to your business in your world and in your relationships um then you also are also you are also the greatest limiter right so if you start whether it's with these imaginary rules or with how you think about things or how you think about yourself you know people get into you know years and years of thinking about things in the same way they'll think about you know what they're capable of what they can do uh whether they're able to have these hard conversations um they'll just over and over and over again they tell themselves the same message”
High expectations with enforceability prevent people from accepting bad relationships, bad work environments, and bad employees, and this standard-setting behavior is beneficial for the leader, their company, and models good behavior to others including children
“if you don't have expectations there you will just put up with everything right I mean you don't expect anything for yourself with high expectations with kind of enforceability around that you're not going to put up with a bad relationship a bad work environment a bad employee a bad you know all of these types of things and you hold that bar and I think that's really beneficial for you your company for example uh for modeling to others for kids um I think that having a high bar is important”
Most people phase out toxic friendships by just not engaging until the other person stops asking, or they ghost; Gerner prefers being upfront by telling people directly that she's busy with other priorities and won't have bandwidth
“most people if they end up phasing these people out of their lives by just not engaging and eventually people stop asking you know like they get the hint um or there comes that moment excuse me ghosting them right I mean like or they respond and think oh you know I'm too busy or I'm doing X or I'm doing why um and so I'm a I guess that I'm a fan of of being somewhat upfront like you know I'm really busy focusing on X right now and so I'm really not going to have the time to be doing you know X Y and Z”
People violating boundaries you set, not respecting your stated limitations, or actively being unsupportive are red flags that indicate a relationship should be reconsidered
“people who violate the boundaries that you set are a big one right like hey I really need to work on this project tonight and you tell that to your friends or you tell that to others and they're like hey do you want to go out do you want to do this oh can you wait Can the project be pushed back can they do this or that um you know that to me is a flag people who don't respect what you set up to begin with um people who are not actively who are not supportive are sometimes a flag you know it's one thing to ask smart questions it's another thing to kind of reduce you in any way”
Early intervention in business relationships and hiring issues saves exponential cost on the back end; delaying difficult conversations with employees compounds problems that could have been addressed quickly at the beginning
“having the conversations early having the collaborations rather than conflict early addressing problems early in your business in your life in your relationships whatever saves you so much on the back end that you can never predict if you're able to address an issue with an employee that like all of a sudden you have this gut feel man this guy's not going to work out this woman's not going to work out and a lot of times okay I'm going to monitor them right you want to give them benefit of the doubt so you monitor things aren't going well you put it off now they're on a pip or some kind of plan put it off and before you know it you have this person on your team and it could be a very high level employee like maybe it's a CMO or somebody who's like really could influence your bottom line and now you have six months your metrics suck your brand is doing worse your profits are down and it's because you didn't you couldn't have that hard conversation earlier that would have saved you all of these detrimental places that this person has taken you”
Persistent patterns of energy drain from a relationship—where you consistently feel negative, disengaged, or unmotivated after interactions—indicate the relationship is taking from you like a vampire and is a significant sign to consider ending it
“do you notice there's a pattern that like every time you talk to this person you have that same like sap of energy and it's like a vampire of sorts and you know you don't feel like energized and positive and optimistic and whatever I mean everyone goes through a hard time so maybe your friend's going through a divorce and you you want to be there for them yeah but if it's a persistent pattern where like you're walking away feeling negative or you know kind of not engaged or not energized and they're kind of taking from you um I think that's a really big sign”
Tim Ferriss's Four Hour Work Week made people think differently about how they allocate time and about outsourcing, demonstrating how non-traditional approaches can reshape how people operate
“Tim Ferriss in his four hour work week made people think a lot differently about work and and how they allocate time and Outsourcing um so we can all find different ways and different you know hacking ways to be able to think”