The Rabbi and The Shrink

#27: Amanda "Jo" Erven - Speak the Truth, Even if Your Voice Shakes

September 02, 2021 Rabbi Yonason Goldson and Dr. Margarita Gurri, CSP Season 1 Episode 27
The Rabbi and The Shrink
#27: Amanda "Jo" Erven - Speak the Truth, Even if Your Voice Shakes
Show Notes Transcript

What's the single most effective way to avoid ethical pitfalls?
Why are so many people afraid to talk about ethics?
Has the world gotten less ethical?

These and other critical questions for success are answered when ethics auditor Amanda "Jo" Erven joins The Rabbi and the Shrink.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/amanda-jo-erven-ace/
http://www.auditconsultingeducation.com/
http://www.totalqualityauditing.com/
http://www.cpebookclub.com/

#27 Amanda “Jo” Erven


1:30 Changing one person’s mind contributes to a better world

It’s hard to sell ethics because people don’t have a definition and are scared by the word

Have an ethics icebreaker 


Ethics may not be simple, but don't  have to be complicated


6:00 Three ethical character types

The Big Me

The Ethical Rationalizer

The Everyday Ethicist


People who call themselves ethicists tend to be less ethical


10:00 Unethical behavior encourages others to behave unethically

Create your own ethical value statement or mantra

We can’t change our circumstances except by changing ourselves


14:30  Be ethically pro-active which is pro-self

Too many people don’t know their own values


16:00 Where do we start to put ethics into action?

We don’t have to be experts

Sometimes we’re scared to do what’s right


18:00 Individual, leadership, and organizational ethics

The seven deadly ethical sins

“Move fast and break things” mentality

Disingenuous leaders -- always speak the truth, even if your voice shakes


20:30 Have things really gotten worse?

We are definitely more self-absorbed today

We don’t feel shame, but we rush to shame others

The contradiction of AirBNB


24:15 Beware of conflicts of your own interest

Ethics is threatened by fear and entitlement

The ethics of COVID

Dan Ariely’s research: thinking of the 10 commandments makes us more honest


28:30 Find your trusted advisor

Facing and embrace your adversity

Teaching surly students in Budapest, Hungary

When we have to defend our behavior, we think more about our choices


33:00 Doing the right thing feels really good

Ethical discipline protects others and ourselves


38:00 The word of the day:  miscreate -- to produce in a way that is defective

Good intentions without disciplined execution can have disastrous results


40:00 Everyone deserves a better-than-good life



Welcome to the rabbi in the shrink. This is Dr. Margarita Gurri the shrink Dr. Red shoe. And this is my favorite Rabbi Yonason Goldson. And today we're delighted the rabbi's found for us. A really interesting ethicist. Her name is Jo erven. She's a CPA with a bunch of creative energy. I know that's a category Buster right there. It is my daughter who's a CPA, and she's actually very creative. So but I'm allowed to tease on that. You're you've, you've come by this world of ethicists and wrote a book, your third book becoming the everyday emphasis, naturally, and I believe you were disappointed in how people are behaving, and you are helping your clients. So welcome, Joe. Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited to be here with both of you. Well, we're honored. So please tell us about your mission. You've written three books, tell us first about just overall, your journey to do this. So I think you hit the nail on the head, I was in corporate America for many years seeing behavior that I didn't agree with. And I decided that the best way to go about influencing was to start training and talking about it. And you know, I'm a big proponent in changing one person's mind is is good for the future. So I tried to teach my way of ethics of becoming the everyday ethicist. You know, one person at a time to change, hopefully society and organizational behavior. But three years ago, is when my journey started, really. So it's been a whirlwind three years of teaching and speaking and writing, and I've loved every minute of it. Well, you're taking the world by storm. Your first book was on Total Quality auditing. And I like that wherever you go, you bring clarity, and some of your own something, your own auditing system of Proposition, you're creating systems that help us claim your clarity, because you know, that's a hard thing to do. And then the second book was the second edition of as your road, your choices is more on self development. I put the links in the chat to everyone can check them out and buy her book. Rabbi, what do you have to say, I know you were very excited about having her on? Well, you know, usually we have people who are in different areas, and we look for ways to apply ethics to their particular fields. Having a guest to his field as ethics sort of moves us a step ahead before we start, so to recalibrate a little bit, but I remember something that one of my inspirations in the business, David Horace Sager told me, he said that he talks about trust, he says, really, I talking about ethics. But it's hard to sell ethics. Because people either feel they don't need it. Or it's too late. Ah, I think they're scared by the word just Well, that's what I was going to ask you exactly. You know, there's, I think that many people don't have a definition. And they also have a sense that it's setting a bar too high for them. And therefore, they'd rather avoid the discussion altogether. So how do you how do you broach the conversation? How do you sell the value of ethics to people who may not be so eager to buy the product? Well, I I actually have them acknowledge that right off the bat, because I think that's important. And mind opening, I do an ethics icebreaker, I have everybody really define what ethics means to them, which might sound like a silly activity, but it it just gets their mind thinking and they have to put something down. So I give a couple examples to you know, if they're totally stumped. I've had somebody write down that ethics is the most complicated, confusing topic that that he's ever been trained on. And so I thought that was very eye opening to me, because it was this point where I could start to overcome some of his confusion, and maybe it helped with that. So I think just by having people express what it means to them, it also shows me where they've come from, you know, you get a lot of ethics is doing the right thing when nobody's watching those kind of slogans that we've heard, but it really is. To me, it helps frame the issue before we even start talking about it, and eases their mind a little bit. I, you know, I say you can talk about trust, honesty, integrity, it doesn't have to be ethics. It can be character. I talked about our three character choices in life, because I know that ethics word is a little bit scary sometimes. Yeah, you ever voted? Well, I'm sorry, Rabbi. You have a quote in your book that naked says that ethics. And ethics may not be easy, but it doesn't have to be complicated. Yes, Maxwell. I'm almost 100%. One of the one of the great, so yeah, yeah. And I said it best. He said, If a squirrel is falling, catch it. And I love that with the little picture and the humongous acorns you write very well, very compellingly. It was I think everyone should read your book. And the rabbi's the grappling on the great end mine on speakers of every day, the ethical speaker, I think that, so tell us about the three character choices because you made a quote, even come in consequential things matter. Please talk to that and your three choices. Sure, I, it started with my second book that you talked about your road, your choices has six fundamental choices that I think we all have in life. And the third choice that I happen to talk about is character. And so it came from that second book. And then obviously, I expanded wanting to expand that thought process and the ethics book, the three character choices, I have to give credit for the first character choice to David Brooks. So I'm gonna I'm gonna hold up the book, I always hold up the road to character. He in chapter 10, the title of the chapter is the big me. And as I started thinking about this concept, you know, he pointed out decades ago, people were more selfless. They put themselves last it was all about the betterment of society and community. And I got to thinking, well, there is a lot of big me examples I could use today. So I just really grasped that concept, whereas he goes kind of back in time. It's a great history lesson. This book, I kind of take it and run with it. And I talk about all the big knees that are out there every time we read the newspaper. However, the good news is, as Dan Ariely and other behavioral psychologists show us that hopefully there's not as many bad apples or big knees out there, most of us really lie in that middle character choice, which I call the ethical rationalizer. That is, you know, just as small as a, you know, this big store makes enough money, I don't have to go back in and pay for this $2 item that they forgot to bring up. We rationalized so much of our behavior each and every day. And I called it the everyday ethicist, because it is every day, like you said, it's, it might be seemingly inconsequential things. But I know that yonathan writes in his book that it's a slippery slope. And that is where this the world gets in trouble. So obviously, the third character choice is becoming the everyday ethicist, someone who doesn't compromise their integrity at any cost. Who lives by the motto silence is not golden. You know, those are just some of my favorite things to say about the everyday ethicist. So in a nutshell, those are the three interesting and somewhat disturbing, more than somewhat, I've seen studies that suggest that people who call themselves ethicists tend to be less ethical than people who are average and of course, definitely present company excluded. But it's and I think, I can't remember her this Mr. Jonathan Hite, that the section of the library that reports the most missing or stolen books is the ethics section. Wow. So you know, there is this tendency that we have as human beings to intellectualize and you're talking about rationalization in my keynote, I talked about the three enemies of ethics and the first one is rationalization. The more we study in an abstract sense, the more equipped we are to rationalize our way into unethical behavior. And so your formulation of the everyday ethics, which is our tagline as well, is taking those ideas and bringing them down into the practical what happens when I get undercharged? What happens when somebody makes an error in my favor that goes unnoticed? It's those decision points that really steer us in one direction. The completely agree it's a little things. The scary part for me as a psychologist is watching people grapple with the gray to take the rabbi's book. I see them encouraging others to be unethical. Here is pirated video. Here is I got Amazon sent me two of these here have one it's free, things like that I'm I'm flabbergasted actually, that people are in Spanish we call it Flo Hito. They're soft on, on whether that's wrong. And I and I am reading your book, I had an idea. And I don't know if it was brilliant or not. But at two in the morning, it sounded brilliant. It was maybe when we think of ethics is every day, then people who think of themselves as special, don't think of themselves as every day. And so then maybe it doesn't, it doesn't apply to them. So for instance, in schools, you drop off kids, and there's a lane to drop off. There's always someone who double parked there. And my mother would always say I bought a seat the poor woman she's so special. Meaning we have to be nice to her cuz she's special. She was actually saying this woman thinks she's as too arrogant. And we have to pray for her because she's missing the point of life. I mean, that was that was my mother's take on it. Instead of being sarcastic, she would have us pray on him. And we would. So I have to laugh that Botha Sita she thinks she's special. Please comment on that. How do we get the point out to everyone that everyone's special? And everyday if this is for everyone, and it's not a low brow thing? Well, I think it, I think it all starts with us. I think that the one thing I leave my audiences with is you we're not going to leave my session without your own personal value statement, ethical mantra, whatever that is, I actually kind of got, Can I grab mine to show you guys really quick here. I tried to make it funny. So this is one of my favorites. lives so that you wouldn't be ashamed to sell the family parrot to the town gossip. Right. This is, you know, I always say I don't care what it is, but I want you to frame it and put it on your desk. You know, to me, it's about it. We are only in control of ourselves and our own. You know, I love the power of ethical management has a great quote in it that, you know, we may not have the power to change our circumstances, but we can change and change our own circumstances. I mean, it's it's kind of a circle, but I just think there's a real power in us each developing. Maybe it's our own special ethical mantra. But I think you're certainly right now you've been showing everyone else's books, your book. All right. I mean, we need equal time. Okay. I'm just saying, I could start holding up mine to you sure I can. I can do my I can do it, too. There we go. Actually, we should do a one with all of us the same. We need a screenshot holders, the people Oh, people listen to the audio. We're not going to be getting this really but no. So those of you who are listening to the audio, we were basically all showing the book of becoming everyday ethicists. And then Joe, in a spirit of generosity showed the rabbi's grappling with the gray. So that's that's a good thing. I agree. I love it. Thank you very much. In Judaism, we have a concept called tikkun olam, which translates is repair the world. And we may have talked about this in the past, but it doesn't mean save the save the whales and save the snails and save trees and save the bees. It means I am the world that I'm responsible for. And I am imperfect because I'm a human being. And human beings are by definition works in progress. And so I take responsibility for making myself into the best version of me that I can become. And that is the greatest contribution that I can make to the world. Because the better I am, the better my peace of the world is. And it's not just for other people now I get to live in a better world. So it serves me as well. I like to say that being selfless is being selfish. I think you hit I mean, that's perfect. I have an entire stance I actually call it pro self. So being proactive, I think is the most important thing any of us can do. And that is that's in my audit practice. I want auditors to become more proactive, not reacting to what's happening. At their organizations after it already happens, I want them to help them better to begin with. So pro self is proactive and selfish, meaning that make your own choices for you. And that's, you know, I think that is how we can, quote unquote, change the world, perhaps one one person at a time. So which goes back to one of the first conversations, the good Rabbi and I had is that many people, and this is what we're all doing in our trainings. Many people don't really understand their own values and ethics, they borrowed them from someone else. and with any luck, they borrowed them from someone wonderful and ethical. But often that's not the case, you know. So it's interesting, Joe, and I know a friend, Julie Thompson, who started the auditing Alliance. And here's somebody who is doing what all three of us are talking about, take some action. But not everyone has to start their own organization to share educational moments and auditing best practices. What Can someone do to be an everyday ethicist without being scared of this obligation? Where do we start Joe? Well, I think we're all challenged daily. And I think it can be as small as the oversight of getting the wrong change, or, you know, not having the item rung up, or, you know, the waitress or waiter leaving the the drink off the bill and bringing it to their attention. It's, it's just there, it happens. I'd say every day, I have someone reach out to me, and tell me a story about something that happened to them. Those are my favorite emails to open. And I think that people after they start talking about ethics, they go to a good ethics trainer here, a good speaker, they recognize it more, they see it happening in their daily lives. And I think that it all, it all builds. So I mean, I don't think they need to go out and start reading all these books that I keep holding up on ethics, I just think they need to start recognizing it, the first step to fixing anything, is awareness of the problem. And there's a problem in society today, I will, I know that our listeners and viewers can achieve that. I think it's scary to have to think you have to be a rabbi, or you have to write three books on ethics. I think the everyday little choices, I think that's something we can all do, including the little ways we lie on our taxes or lie to our family. Let's face it, many times we lie because we don't know how to say no, comfortably. And so one of the things I do with my ethics trainees teach people how to communicate, and the rabbi talks about it in his writings, ethical communication, you know, how do you say something that's hard to say? You wrote something that hit me hard, the seven deadly ethical Sins of organizations, we've been talking mostly about individuals. Is this a good time for you to comment on the seven deadly organizational sins? Sure. I yeah, I think that the book that becoming everyday ethicist has three slices we already talked about. The three slices are individual ethics, leadership ethics, because I think we're all leaders in one way or another in our lives. And then a huge piece of it is organizational ethics, because we all are part of some sort of organization that can be the company you work for and Association. And what I did was essentially, there happened to be seven, I call them the seven deadly sins, but it's things that I've been seeing over and over again happen. So for example, one of the deadly sins that's out there quite a bit today still is the move fast and break things mentality. It has become this way of corporations of big companies to say let's, let's move so fast that we may not even test things appropriately. We are not caring about people's data privacy or data security. They're worried more about their profits than their purpose. What is their purpose, some of them don't even know their purpose. So really, the, to me, the seven deadly organizational sins are mentalities that just keep reoccurring in society today. And I basically tell auditors and anyone else that reads the book, just to be aware of them, watch out for them, start speaking up, start pointing them out. Another one is disingenuous leaders. That's a hard one. That's a hard I mean, they could use your training on communication because it's hard to speak up. Another one of my favorite mantras, by the way is always speak the truth even if your voice shakes. You know, add your own. I read that one day and I thought, Wow, so just a little extra stop. sentence or phrase to always speak the truth makes such a difference. It acknowledges that it's hard. So I always tell people when you're making up your ethical mantra, make it yours. And I think like you said, a lot of people borrowed it for from someone else, but just make that tweak. Well, the rabbi did a whole TED talk on that concept. He was one of our first discussions. We have something from Charlotte, in our chat. When you say there's a problem in society today. Is that in contrast to earlier on, or is it also still today? What do you both think of that? Joe? First, and then Rabbi? So there's a problem in society today? Is that contrast to earlier times? Or is, is it also still today? How are you guys interpreting that? I think that's I think that's what you means. Yeah. Really? earlier generations are Yeah, that's how I interpreted to. So here's the one thing that I've always kind of said, Could you imagine veterans coming home from World War One, World War Two and bribing to get into a college? No, they were just happy that they got their grant to go to go to college. And, you know, I just I feel like it is it really has been a shift to some degree. That's not to say that there weren't bad things happening decades ago, maybe it perhaps hasn't just it didn't come out as much back then. But I think research and studies have shown that there was a, a much more focus on society, other stakeholders than oneself. So now we kind of have this self, a little bit more self serving beliefs and attitudes in society today. I think I think that touches very closely to this other core, in my book proverbial beauty Abbot chapter on shame. And we tend to think of shame as something as very negative. But the capacity to feel shame what Mark Twain say, human beings are the only creatures that blush or need to. And our society is one I mean, with with the, you know, social media, every there's no privacy anymore. There's no concept of a private life, we just put everything out there for everyone to see. And we can't be judgmental, like to get into that. Because I know that's something you touched on in the book. If we're not making judgments, and we're not keeping anything private. There's no sense of shame and shame is what it's it's part of our moral compass. If I have no reason to be ashamed, then why should I be concerned about anything I do anything I say or what anybody thinks. And I think that that's something that previous generations had, there was a reticence there was a sense of personal privacy, there is a sense that I don't want to be perceived. So it's true, there were still people doing bad thing. But at least there was a feeling I can't tell everybody, but I can't let people find out. And that at least kept a check on society. You brought an example in your book that I really wanted to get into. Because this organizational idea that you mentioned that Airbnb, and I wasn't familiar with this, that they had encouraged customers, or vendors to use tricks to avoid zoning and tax issues. Now, that in and of itself is not so surprising. Except that what is the what is the uniqueness of the Airbnb model? It's a whole industry built on trust. That's what makes it work. Why do I let somebody into my house? Why did I go into a stranger's house? Because there's a whole system set up to ensure that both the client and the vendor are trustworthy? And so the people who started the business, they have that mindset? How do you get the disconnect? They have that whole model, and then ethical behavior. They have the mindset when it benefits them. Yes. And I think that's where I try in my culture consulting to point out where they are living their own conflicts of interest. And I think that is what I think that's what happens at a lot of those organizations. So we have another comment from Charlotte that I think is noteworthy in terms of historical context. I think the focus has changed. She says, There were so many other unethical issues in generations past Jim Crow sexual harassment, child exploitation, just to mention a few. So with COVID Now I'm seeing an exacerbation of some ethical dilemmas, because there's a sense of fear and entitlement. And I think when we come from a place of fear and lots of change, we sometimes forget to consult our basic ethics or basic values, and we just wants to survive. I'm seeing more and more companies getting sued because of sexual harassment. From joking that was done from zoom, because you don't have the same context. So maybe you get too familiar. I there are a lot of issues to talk about. What are you seeing Joe as the trend now, as we're beginning, hopefully, to come out of COVID? What can we see in terms of the need for ethical understanding and ethical training? Well, I think one of the most important things to recognize is where the problems have been. And COVID was the number one that acfe the Association of Certified fraud examiner's does the top five frauds in in the year and in 2020, COVID was number one. And they listed it's very interesting year, because usually it's one big scandal. So wire card was, I think, number two, and that's a big accounting scandal that happened in 2020. So you normally see just one big company in the headlines. Well, in 2020, it was COVID. And it was a list of all the things that happened. benefits, fraud, unemployment, fraud, PPP, loan fraud, telemedicine frauds huge. So I mean, the list has now grown to vaccine card fraud. So I think for me, it is awareness of it. I know that I am a huge fan of Dan Ariely because he brings to our attention that even students that are taking an exam, if they try to recall the 10 commandments, before they take the exam, they may not even be able to list 10, but they list 10 of something. And the propensity to cheat goes down to 0%. Because they're asked to recall their their ethics. I think that just being aware and reading about what's happening and the behaviors in society might serve to deter people from that behavior. They have that maybe I was thinking, as you were talking, you understand about the word accountability, we all have to hold ourselves accountable. And I think when we see other people doing things, we might really realize, well, we can't do that we're not we need to hold ourselves accountable. So you know, I'm going off on tangents, but they say the number one preventative measure for fraud is to talk about it. And so, to me, I think we all need to start talking about it more. And I think that, you know, that's, that's maybe one of the keys. I don't know that that's going to stop COVID crimes if people continue to read about it. But I think, you know, society needs to be educated on what's happening out there. Well, the good thing is, is the Robert and I have this basic understanding that we're never going to be out of ethical dilemmas. The answers aren't as important as asking the questions and pursuing it because no one's perfect and things change. But we find that people are less comfortable talking about ethical dilemmas. And how do you started? So what's one less piece of advice? How do what would be the best way? Let's say I'm an employee or a leader or an organization? How do I start that uncomfortable, comfortable conversation about exploring an ethical dilemma? Well, I am a huge advocate of finding your trusted advisor. And I think that is huge in any dilemma, but especially in ethical dilemmas. Yes. That talking through it, talking through it with you. Are you honest that I mean that anyone in your network that you that you trust that you admire that you respect? I think that's step number one. I and I talk about that, in in facing and embracing adversity. You know, finding an advocate is one of my top steps. So I think that that would be my first piece of advice when facing something. You know, the gurus will tell us we have to get out of our comfort zones. And we don't like to why because it's uncomfortable. But having those uncomfortable conversations, as he say Joe is is really what nudges us in the right direction. And then you mentioned the 10 commandments, which reminds me of one of my favorite stories. When my first year teaching with my wife, we were in Budapest, Hungary for a year. And we had a lot of kids were just wonderful kids. My wife had one class of high school girls, they were Just the silliest, most unpleasant group of girls. And on one occasion she couldn't make class she asked me to cover her class for what I'm going to do with these girls. For one class period, I walked in and I wrote on the board, it's okay to steal as long as you don't hurt anybody. And I asked them, Do you agree with this? Well, took a minute or two to get to the English problem name English barrier. But eventually the guy said, No, we don't agree with that. I said, why not? Oh, I was expecting your typical, you know, it's wrong to do it. But they made it very easy for me. One of the girls said, well, it's in the 10 commandments. I said, Oh, you agree with the 10 commandments? Yes. You follow the 10? commandments? Yes. I said all of them. said yes. Well, no. So which ones do you follow? Well, they only knew two. Which is not uncommon. So I wrote all 10 on the board. So which ones do you agree with? And so we spent the next few minutes going through the list, and we ended up with six that they agreed with? So those six we have to follow? Yes. Okay. You follow those six? I'm gonna follow these six, I checked on six different ones. They got very upset. Of course, why are you upset? Well, you're a rabbi. So you got to choose your six, I get to choose my six. But look at the ones you chose, you didn't even choose don't murder, you got to use choose your six, I get to choose my six. I had them climbing the walls. Because they couldn't articulate a reason why I shouldn't be. And of course, because there was no reason why. Finally, we got towards the end customers will tell us the answer. I said, What's the question? The bell rang, and I said, Well, thank you girls. We didn't teach us anything I said. You You taught them more than they will more than they realize, then I'm sure many of them realize and remember now, I will never forget that non teaching them. You know, when we make these these again, it goes back to the rationalizations that comes back to the double standards. We want, we want other people to be ethical. But we've got a host of reasons why our ethical indiscretions are somehow defensible. And when we get called on it in a nice way, you set the straw man however you do it, then that at least gives us the chance to re examine. Are these Am I really do I really have a sound defense of my own behavior? Or maybe I should take another look? what i what i love that you kind of are hinting at a little bit, I feel like or maybe I'm just pulling that out is there is a reward for ethical behavior. And I you know it, I'll tell a little bit a little story. So my brother in law, sister in law, went to buy a lawn mower recently a riding lawnmower at a at a store, a big store. And when they had the person load it into their truck, they realized that they loaded the model up from the one we had just bought. And they sat there looking at each other. What do we know, they know their sister in law teaches ethics. So I know what they do. So they told the gentleman, the young, young, we happen to be a young kid who loaded it and he said, Thank you so much, because you just saved my job. Because I made another mistake earlier today. And and I really think I would have lost my job. And when they told me that story, I just got chills a little bit. Because when you're rewarded for acting ethically, it makes you feel so good, that you want to continue doing it. And I think that the more people again, it's about every day, everyday lives were challenged. How can you just, you know, really grasp on to those good, good memories like your class, those good reminders that we've gotten throughout our lives that acting ethically, that being every episode that making that good character choice is more of a reward than you can imagine. You can get that it would help because we all know that it's not always physically and fiscally profitable to be ethical. Sometimes it costs us money, time and energy, and all sorts of relationships to do the right thing. I do think, though, that kids have more of a sense of, of inherent fairness, but it's always skewed. So the problem is, even though they like the idea of right or wrong, it's often very skewed. If anyone's played a board game with a kid, they can see right away, that the rules are applied in an interesting way. And learning how to be ethical without being ashamed or rewarding people, when they say, Oh, that was good, that's nice that you pointed out that your sister forgot her turn or whatever, things like that. It's very, very important. You know, that's the point. Go ahead, Robin. You know, my father was very mathematically inclined. And he would always add up the restaurant bill in his head, just to get an estimate of what it would be. And he actually learned that from his father in law, who was an accountant that did the same thing. And on one occasion, identified a big discrepancy in the in the restaurants, favor. So he was doing it as an exercise, but it's also a way of protecting himself. But many years later, I heard a story of a fella whose father did the same thing. And so I asked him why he did it. And he said, because if the waitress makes a mistake, adding up or recording the, the amounts, they could take that out of her pay. And so, you know, your story of of, you know, the tractor or the lawn bar, right, it is the same thing, you know, by by being disciplined in ensuring fairness, I protect myself, but I also protect others. And if I don't see that, if I'm not just doing it for me, but I'm doing it for the value of fairness, it turns it into a whole different exercise. It does when you bring other stakeholders into the equation. Absolutely. And we applaud you for your books and for your mission and for your teachings, and for your very kind and fun and relatable way of introducing ethics to even reluctant ethicists. And we're delighted. So Rob, I believe it is time for the word of the day sir. drumroll please. Do that. So well, Nick, you have to be Hispanic. So we know what a miscreant is. It's a person of low character. But there's a verb Miss create. And it means to produce in a way that is somehow defective. So we have mentioned numerous times the famous road that is paved with good intentions. And often when we have good intentions, but we are not disciplined in the execution. We aren't circumspect IV, in looking at all the angles, that what we intend to produce, ends up being damaged, defective, inadequate, or sometimes downright dangerous or harmful. That we want to be creators. It's really one of the tenants of Judaism, that human beings were created in the image of God which means that we are partners in creation. And that means it is our job to create a better world a more perfect world. And that requires good intentions. But it also requires that moral and ethical discipline to have checks and balances do have you know, when they say don't always have a buddy system when you go swimming? How buddy system in life that people that you know, have ethical sensitivity, don't be afraid to ask others that you trust that are trustworthy, right? Am I getting this right? Am I seeing the whole picture? Because in our subjective view, we will rationalize we will convince ourselves of anything that seems to be in our own best interest. And in fact, we're not only hurting others, but we're hurting ourselves. I love that Word and I think it fits right in. So Joe, you've got lots to say, what is one final thing you want to say to all of our everyday ethicists out there? Well, my motto is good things come to those who wait, but don't better than good. And I do think everybody deserves to live a better than good life. And I think one way we can all do that is by thinking about our decisions, our choices, our character, our ethics each and every day. So don't wait. Start now. I love it. Thank you, Joe, for sharing your wisdom with us and anything we can do to support you and your mission. please do let us know where you. And doctor, the last word. The last word of the day is. Thank you, Joe. I think that you brought to life in a very human and easy to read way in your book, becoming an everyday ethicist. The bottom line for me is what you said, if we just take a look at what it is that's happening, what we're doing, how we're contributing it to it, what other people are doing, and if we don't know what to do, consultant advisor, I don't think ethics are complicated. My father would say, they're simple, not easy. My father would say that all the time. And I think ethics are not simple. And as the rabbi talks about grappling with the gray, you have to be comfortable mucking around in the gray in order to see the light. And so my last word is ask questions. Be patient. And you will be demonstrating that you are already an everyday ethicist, you can only get better if you keep trying. Those are my thoughts. Thank you, Joe, for having us on. And you put us in a wonderful frame of mind by setting the tone and we're just grateful. Thank you so much. I'm grateful. Thank you for having me. Yeah, thank you, Rabbi as always, you're the best of the best, huh? You're the best. The second best. Ah, okay. Well, I thought I was right but I'm wrong. So you know, okay. But can we can be the best. And then you Joe could could be the best. Besides the fun. We will see you next Tuesday at 1230. For the rabbi in the shrink every day ethics unscripted. You can find us in podcasts. You can find us on our YouTube and Vimeo, the rabbi and the shrink is our website calm and our emails podcast at the rabbi in the shrink send us questions. See if you can stump us and and invite us to help everyone explore things. Again, Joe, thank you so much rabbi, as always be well everyone