Lenny's Podcast: Product | Career | Growth
00:44:42 · Molly Graham, Lenny Rachitsky
Interestingly, one of my biggest realizations was that delegating something to a robot is not the same as giving it to a human because you cannot get rid of the oversight. Right? It's more like delegating something to someone on your team. You still own it. Yes, we've gotten more efficient because the robots can do X, Y, and Z for us, but it's not the same as giving it away to a human because we still own the oversight. We still own the sort of final product. And that means the mental tax stays with you. So yes, in some ways I can do more, but psychologically I still have all the burden of all the stuff that all the robots are doing. And I think that does make it quite different because it just means you don't have as much space to then go on to the new things. The cost of oversight is not zero. Do you know what I mean? Again, I wonder if this is part of what's going on with some of your burnout data is just, "All of a sudden I'm overseeing all these robots and maybe all these humans and it's more." So anyway, I think that's one of the biggest differences is just it isn't exactly the same. It's the difference between transferring a Lego to someone where you genuinely get rid of it versus delegating a Lego to someone. [00:46:02] S0: It's so funny the way you described it where you need to disconnect from the responsibility of this thing now. And it's the opposite now where somebody else is doing this, the AI, but you're still responsible. [00:46:15] S1: Yeah.
00:46:15 · Molly Graham, Lenny Rachitsky
[00:46:15] S1: Yeah. [00:46:15] S0: And so it's like having this Lego tower with this little robot coming through and, "Okay, I'm going to work on this now," but you still have to represent this tower to your boss. [00:46:16] S1: Yeah. [00:46:26] S0: And so I could 100% see this metaphor. Make it clear why it sucks.
00:46:30 · Molly Graham
[00:46:30] S1: If you're a manager, it's a familiar feeling, right? Your team got twice as big and now you just have these weird little robots that occasionally fuck up the tower and you have to be like, "No, no, no. No, no, no. That's not what I said," which is like, again, managing an intern. You get it. But if you're not a manager, if you've never been a manager ... And I do think it's important to name that, like I said, managing robots, those skills are very similar to managing humans. They have less feelings, but it's all the same skills of oversight and giving them context and correcting their work and coaching, and all those skills are the same for managing a robot as they are for managing a human. And a lot of people don't like that shit. So many people actively chose not to become a manager. Do you know what I mean? And so there is exhaustion that comes with if you don't enjoy delegating, if you haven't worked on all these skills for many, many years, then suddenly you are in that stance of management. But it just means literally everyone in the world is a manager now and all you're doing when you're delegating to robots is delegating just like you would to another human on your team. So I always say the max people should be managing is 10 to 12 employees. I've managed bigger teams than that and it was not a good look. And I don't think there's any data that says that people can manage more than that now. And if you count robots, I'm worried for people's psychology, you know what I mean, in terms of the amount you have to hold in your head.
00:48:01 · Lenny Rachitsky, Molly Graham
[00:48:01] S0: Yeah, I build a lot of randoms ... [00:48:01] S1: ... balance you have to hold in your head. [00:48:01] S0: Yeah. I build a lot of random stuff, and I have all these different agents running. And on the one hand, it's so awesome. And all these things get done, and it's just like, "Wow, look at this thing go. I did all these things." And then also I get pinged all day for all these guys. They're like, "What about this? Okay. Well, I'm stuck here. Oh, is this good?" And then I'm like, "Okay, I got to look through this all." Actually, so I work with an actual human engineer also, and it makes you appreciate a human awesome engineer that you could just give a rough idea to, and they could run with it and do an awesome job versus, "No, this sucks. Okay, let's try again and then sit there for five minutes and wait." [00:48:37] S1: It is the difference between managing junior employees and managing senior employees. Do you know what I mean? [00:48:41] S0: Yeah. [00:48:42] S1: AI right now, pretty junior employees. It's not my favorite form of management. I always say, "Give me the high performers, I can turn them into these incredible rocket ships." Managing interns, managing folks that are brand new to the workplace is pretty tiring. And I do think that is what it feels like managing AI. And it's so different, like I said, than throwing a Lego at someone and running the other direction, which you can do with your senior engineer.
00:48:42 · Molly Graham, Lenny Rachitsky
[00:48:42] S1: AI right now, pretty junior employees. It's not my favorite form of management. I always say, "Give me the high performers, I can turn them into these incredible rocket ships." Managing interns, managing folks that are brand new to the workplace is pretty tiring. And I do think that is what it feels like managing AI. And it's so different, like I said, than throwing a Lego at someone and running the other direction, which you can do with your senior engineer. [00:49:07] S0: Such a good point. Okay. We'll get to actual advice. Here's what you should probably do. But before we get there, what else is different about the original advice around giving away Legos? The first one's so good. You made it so obvious why it is very different to give your Legos away to a machine because you're not actually giving away. They're just going to do the work, and then you're still responsible for it, and you have to oversee it.
00:49:28 · Molly Graham
[00:49:28] S1: Yeah. And I think the second thing that's really different, and we talked about a little bit already, but my message was always you give things away because the only way you can make space for new opportunity is by giving things away. Do you know what I mean? And that has two assumptions under it. One, that it's good to give things away. And two, that there's new opportunity on the other side. And I think this, what I talked about with the fear narrative is one of the things that's driving me nuts in the world. And we talk about it a lot in Glue Club is just this dominant narrative that all these jobs are going away because of AI and all these layoffs that are branded as AI. That is not going to support anybody being in a stance of like, "Yeah, let's delegate everything to these robots. Let's give them every piece of our brain and our data so that we can have all this new opportunity that's coming along." I think it is the hardest conversation to have right now. And to your point about there's lots of people out there that are really excited, there are. And I want that for everyone because this is an incredible moment. I've been in technology for almost 20 years and I've seen a lot, but this is one of those moments. This is the mobile phone on steroids where it's like all sorts of businesses are going to be created. I'm a believer that a lot of jobs are going to be created because of this technology, but I think we've got to start having that conversation in order to get to the place where everyone can be leaning in. Everyone can say, "Oh, it's great to automate all these tasks that I hate because it gives me more time to do the things that I love." Which is, I think to your point about the people that feel amplified by it's like, "Oh, I don't have to do all this boring ass work. I can just focus on the things that bring me joy. I can focus on the things that I'm great at." That's what we want. But while there's this narrative out there that media companies are propagating that says there's nothing for you on the other side, do you know what I mean? We've got universal basic income. Everyone needs to be supported by the state because no one's going to have a job in 10 years. Who the fuck wants to give Legos to robots if that's the narrative? No one. I've heard of it.