This soliloquy (transcribed from an off the cuff and conversational delivery) preceded my guest, Michael Brenner on Joseph Jaffe is not Famous on November 9th, 2022. You can watch it here. Please subscribe to the show here.

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I don't normally choose a soliloquy that is literally verbatim the show title or a book from my guest, but how could I not with this? After all, I wrote a book called built to suck.   

Why do mean people succeed or finish first? There are so many mean people. And first of all, meanness is a choice. So is being good. Everything is a choice.

In this world. You can choose to be kind, and you can choose to be cruel. You can choose to be generous, you can choose to have empathy for someone else, and you can choose to be selfish, egotistical and arrogant - it is a choice. It is an absolute choice.

Now, I will tell you, that when we see people acting in a "not nice way," it's typically because something is going on in their lives. I think we should always give people the benefit of the doubt, that is to recognize that when they're having a bad day, they might be a little impatient; a little mean; even a little cruel, but is that an excuse? Is that acceptable?

If meanness is a choice - and kindness is a choice - then even when we're having a bad day, we have the choice whether we want to rise above it or not.

Over the last two and a half years, we've seen people act in incredibly kind and empathetic ways. And we've seen people just batten down the hatches and retreat, and demonstrate that meanness.

But like I just said, it's a choice.

Make that choice when you come to a fork in the road. Take it.

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Excerpt from our interview: "The point of the great resignation was kind of like I've had enough; I don't need to put up with this BS anymore. And that's my advice to folks that work in mean situations. I tell a number of stories in the book (Mean People Suck) about folks that have achieved success, despite working for assholes in many instances, by gaining the support of the folks around them (and I think you've talked about this in your book, Built to Suck, as well.) I talked about the three C's: customers, colleagues and the company - I call it the bull's eye organization: a bull's eye organization is one where everyone is focused on meeting customer needs, and so the impact of a mean boss becomes significantly reduced when the focus is on driving customer experience."

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Michael Brenner is the former VP of Digital Marketing at SAP, he's been a CMO of multiple high-growth startups, is a top Content Marketing influencer, and now runs a fast-growing content marketing agency, Marketing Insider Group. He is also the author of The Content Formula, and Mean People Suck. When he's not running after his 4 kids, Michael enjoys sharing his experiences and client stories to inspire leaders like you to create growth and impact.