Q&A: Get to Know Ryne

0:00People are the most consequential and dangerous forces on Earth. Well, personality psychology is about the nature of human nature. It's about people. And wouldn't that be useful to know? I can't think of a more important problem.

0:19You're listening to the Science of Personality podcast, brought to you by Hogan Assessments, the global leader in personality and leadership. Guided by your hosts, Hogan Chief Science Officer and world-renowned personality psychologist, Dr. Ryan Sherman, alongside Hogan's PR manager and resident storyteller, Blake Lepp, this podcast explores the impact of personality on life, leadership, and the nature of human nature.

0:47Hello, everybody, and welcome to the Science of Personality podcast, episode 138. This is normally where I'd introduce my co-host, Blake Lepp, and he would introduce this episode's topic. But because you got an in-depth glimpse two weeks ago about Blake's life outside the podcast, I guess this week it's my turn. Because I've been on the road for much of the second half of 2025, scheduling has been a bit of a challenge. So while I was recently on a two-week trip to Asia, Hogan marketing director, Valerie Stone, stepped in as a guest host and interviewed

1:21Blake for our previous episode. Now she's back at the end to do the same thing for me. But before getting into this conversation, if you wish to give us any ideas for upcoming episodes, or if you want to ask Blake or me a question, shoot us an email at hello at the science of personality.com or follow the Science of Personality on LinkedIn. Now, let's get to it. Valerie, welcome to the podcast. I know you were here last time and you shared some details with Blake, but what could you share with the audience this time? I know we're going to talk

1:55a little bit about my career path, but maybe you could share a little bit about your career path and how you got to Hogan with our audience before we get into it today. Yeah, sure. Well, thanks. First of all, thanks for having me back. I had a great time with Blake last time and so looking forward to this episode with you as well. So just to share a little bit about my career path, how I landed here. So I've mentioned in the last episode that I got my bachelor's in marketing at Oklahoma State University and my whole goal that entire time was to get to

2:28Nashville. That's all I cared about. I just wanted to go to Nashville and work in the music industry. And I'm a musician myself and I've always had an interest in business and marketing. And so I kind of wanted to bring those together. And so I set my last semester up to where I just had an internship credit. And so I ended up getting an internship at a record label in Nashville and I moved there, didn't know anyone, found the cheapest apartment that I could find in the safest part of

2:59town. It was about the size of a shoebox. And I just had a lot of ambition and showed up 40 hours a week to work for free. That's how it was back then. I don't know if that's how it still is in the music industry, but internships were unpaid. And if you didn't want to show up, then there was a line of people out the door who wanted that free unpaid internship as well. So anyway, so I did that and learned so much and actually ended up getting hired full time to the mailroom, which I realize is kind of like the trope story for everyone who starts out in the

3:34in the music industry. But that's true. It did happen to me. So I handled the, you know, the shipping, incoming, outgoing types of shipping things. And then I ended up just working my way up into national promotions, which is at the time it was essentially radio promotions. Now I think it probably encompasses more things like streaming and and things like that in the ways in which the music industry has changed over the last several years. But that's what I did. I my whole job was to get our artists songs played on the radio. So I built relationships with with, you know,

4:06radio program managers. I did promo tours with our artists, promo concerts, and just really loved it. And then, you know, similar to Blake's story in the last episode, I was also affected by the recession in around 2008, 2009. And my job was consolidated. And so I ended up moving back home to Tulsa, where I'm from. And I found out what a lot of young professionals with marketing degrees found out at the time, which was that companies were consolidating marketing roles, mostly into either marketing and sales, or marketing and graphic design. And I'm not a sales person at all. So my

4:43interests were way more on the graphic design space. So I actually went back, you know, I had been applying for jobs and not even hearing back from from anybody. And so I decided to go back to a community college for a semester. And I learned all of the Adobe programs and, you know, learned InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop, things like that. And, you know, kind of got the experience that I needed to be qualified for some of these more graphics focus jobs. So anyway, fast forward, I did a little short stint on the marketing team at a commercial real estate firm, which was

5:13not for me. But while I was there, one of my co workers knew that I was interested in finding a different opportunity. And she sent me a job posting for this company called Hogan in Tulsa, for a job called the it was the brand manager job. And I had never heard of Hogan. But I went to their website, and I saw that they allowed you to bring your dog to work. So I was immediately interested. So anyway, did it the old fashioned way applied for the job, got the interview, met the team. And,

5:44you know, 13 years later, I'm still here. So that's kind of my my story behind the scenes of how I landed where I'm at, at Hogan. Well, I love that story, Valerie. And I, you know, for our audience members, you know, I don't know if you and Blake talked about this last time, but don't know. But Valerie is actually quite a talented musician. We had a Hogan's Got Talent contest. What was it? Maybe two years ago now, something like that. And I don't think it's

6:15unfair to say that Valerie shocked the audience with her talent, both playing the guitar and singing. Everyone was really impressed. And she was the hands down winner of the Hogan's Got Talent competition. I don't even know if there was a winner. But if there was and there was a prize, it would have clearly been Valerie. So well, it actually there was a winner and it was me and I got a $50 gift card to Amazon. So there you go. Yeah, that was that was fun. I think a lot of people, you know, you have different responsibilities at work. And I think, you know, a lot of people who

6:51don't know me don't know that that's kind of my background and a kind of a past life that I lived. I was in a rock band where I ended up meeting my husband. And so I think it was shocking to a lot of people. They're like, Oh, we think of her as a librarian. She's pretty quiet and just behind the scenes. But turns out she sings and plays guitar. So that was that was fun. What would you say is the biggest difference between you and Taylor Swift? Oh, yeah. Oh, you know, maybe like a billion dollars. I don't know. Yeah, yeah. Well, do you want to get started here? Yeah, sure. Happy, happy to go

7:23anytime. All right. Well, so last time, I asked like this question. So I'm going to ask you the same. So if you wouldn't mind, I'm just curious to hear a little bit more about your upbringing. And can you tell me and the audience about where you're from? And what was life growing up? And what were some of your interests? Well, yeah, sure. I mean, I guess we can go pretty far back on this. So yeah, I grew up in a really small, what's that? All the way back. All the way back. Yeah. Well, as far back as I can remember anyway. So I grew up in a really small town in Illinois, population about 12, 1400 people,

8:01something like that. And, you know, it was such a small town that, you know, to us, the big city, the city, you know, when you're going into town was, you know, a population of about 100,000 people. So this was sort of a farm sort of country of Illinois. There's a cornfield across the street from my house. My family weren't farmers. Of course, every other year it was soybeans because they rotate the crops. So you get corn one year, soybeans the next year. And, you know, went to a

8:33small high school, a small public high school where I was involved in athletics, played golf and basketball and baseball and, uh, went to, uh, another small college in, uh, in, in, in Western Illinois. Um, but, uh, and I know we'll talk a little bit about that later, but yeah, I mean, really, uh, my main interests when I was, uh, young were, uh, in things like history. Uh, I found, um,

9:04uh, well, and yeah, that was probably the major thing I was interested in was, was about history when I was young. Um, but I, I found school relatively easy. Um, I did pretty well. I was, uh, uh, talking to, uh, somebody the other day and it occurred to me that the first time I ever got an A minus was in, uh, college. Uh, so I had all A's through middle school, through high school, that kind of thing. So I, I took school pretty seriously, but I was also, um, pretty focused on athletics. Uh, spent a lot

9:37of time, a lot of summers playing baseball. That was the main sport that I played. Um, and yeah, I mean, it was just sort of a typical farm area kind of upbringing. You know, it's, it's a little different from certainly growing up in the city because traveling anywhere meant you had to have a plan, right? So you, you couldn't just go to the grocery store. You had to make a list because you didn't want to drive 20, 30 minutes to the grocery store and then forget something and have

10:09to come back. Or, uh, you know, just to go to school was a 15, 20 minute drive, um, you know, at 50, 60 miles an hour to, to get to school every day. Um, because that's just the way the school was set up. I'm sort of a rural kind of community. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. I, um, I spent some time out in the country living out in the country. I understand what you're talking about, uh, very, very closely. And I live back in the city, if that tells you how that went for me.

10:39So tell us about, you know, after you graduated high school, uh, where did you go to college and tell us about kind of your, your college path? Yeah. So I went to, uh, to, uh, a college called Monmouth college, which again, a small, uh, Presbyterian liberal arts school in, uh, Western Illinois, it's Presbyterian by affiliation, but, uh, there wasn't much religious component to the school. Uh, and I went there because it was a place where I could play baseball as a place that wasn't, it was about a four hour drive from where I grew up, but it was a relatively small school.

11:12And one of the appeals to me of a small school was that I knew I could spend time with my professors that I was concerned because there were big state schools near where I grew up. Um, but my concern was that, well, at the time it was common practice that your student ID number was your social security number. Nobody would do that today. Um, but I was just concerned that a professor would just see me as another social security number. This is just another social security number taking the test. And I wanted to get to know my professors. I wanted to spend time with them. I wanted to learn

11:42from them sort of in a more one-on-one kind of approach. And so, uh, I chose this, uh, relatively small school that was actually quite affordable, uh, despite being private. Um, and, uh, well, went there, uh, majored, well, I'll talk a little bit about, um, yeah, I, I, well, I guess I can talk a little bit about what I majored in there. I majored in, in history and psychology because of my interest in, in history. Uh, and then, um, after I finished up there, I went to, to graduate school at UC

12:16Riverside, uh, in, in California, uh, spent five years there and then, uh, went on, um, to get to an academic position at Florida Atlantic university. And then, uh, later at Texas tech university before, before I joined Hogan. Yeah. So you've, you've made a few stops. So I'm curious, what was it like to go from small town, Illinois to California? Well, that was a pretty dramatic change. It's a good, good question. So actually when I was a, what was I, uh, sophomore, it's either a sophomore or junior,

12:51sophomore and junior in college. Um, I was starting to look at graduate schools cause I knew, okay, cause I majored in psychology and there's sort of a long story about how I, why I majored in psychology. But, um, once I had decided to major in psychology, it became clear that, uh, the way to get a real, to have a career path in psychology was to go get a PhD. Uh, and I thought, well, I would like to be a college professor. This would be a great job. Let me go get a PhD. So I'm starting to look at PhD programs and the area of interest to me, the area of research that I was interested in, because

13:24that's what PhD programs are all about was an interpersonal perception or judgments of other people. How do you understand what somebody else is like? How do you make a judgment of someone else's personality? And there were two leading researchers in this one was in Connecticut. One was in Southern California. Um, they both had books. I read both their books. I liked the book better from the guy from Southern California. And I thought, well, I'd like to go out there. So I applied for a psych high research grant. And this is one of the things that I think a lot of undergraduate students don't know is there are a lot of little grant funding mechanisms out there that I don't think

13:57very many people apply for. At least I don't think my application was very good, but somehow I got it anyway, which makes me think hardly anybody applied. Um, so, but I got some funding to spend a summer out at UC Riverside. So this paid for me to live out there and, and, and to just basically pay for rent out there. So I spent the summer working in this lab, uh, basically for free in the lab, uh, and just learning a little bit about graduate school life. And ultimately that's what got me accepted into the program. The professor said, Oh, you know, Hey, I'd love it. You know, if you'd want

14:29to come here, this would be great. And so when I was applying for graduate schools, that actually was the only school I applied to. Um, and, uh, yeah, so, so I got it. And so, but yeah, your question, I mean, it's dramatically different, right? So Illinois, um, the weather is just awful. You get about 10 really good days a year in Illinois, you know, like maybe five in the spring, maybe five in the fall. Uh, and I, but when you grow up there, you just think this is life. This is how life is. And

15:02when we moved, uh, I moved there with my, uh, well then fiance, but then shortly thereafter wife, um, it was like, why does anybody live anywhere else? It was so amazing. It was just like 80 to 90% of the days were just amazing. It was like, Oh, you could be outside all the time eating outside. In fact, I just had some family in here last weekend in Tulsa and we went to a place to eat and we, as you know, we had good weather here lately. Um, they wanted to eat outside and I was like, this is a

15:36terrible idea. There's like bugs and things. And of course there were bugs and things flying into our food. I'm just like, this is why nobody sits outside here. So, but in California there, we sat outside all the time. Cause there's just, I mean, it's like where we were, it was sort of desert, like there's no bugs. It's beautiful weather. I mean, it was just really, I mean, most many restaurants had more outside seating than inside seating because that's just where everybody always sat outside. So you spend a tremendous amount of time outside. We went hiking all the time. We went to the beach all the time. We were 20 minutes from Disneyland. So we would go to Disneyland all the

16:13time. We were annual pass holders there. And that was a lot of fun when you're in your twenties going to Disneyland and riding all these rides. And, um, so, you know, it was just a really fun place to be. Uh, I remember, um, I remember distinctly golfing in like 70 degree weather and looking up and the distance and you could see the mountains and they were just covered in snow. Right. So this, this, it's just beautiful sites of, you know, these, these, um, you know,

16:45snow capped mountains while you're in shorts and a t-shirt playing golf, which is just pretty amazing. Yeah. That's, that's pretty cool. Yeah. California is, uh, it's, it doesn't seem like it should exist, you know, what you look at all, everything you look around at you, you know, snow capped mountains, and then you're not too far from the ocean either. It just, it's, it's beautiful. So yeah, I was, you know, my story going from Tulsa, Oklahoma to Nashville and having that experience of just, Whoa, there's so much more out there. And those new experiences,

17:16especially when you're so young, I was just curious to hear from, from you about that. Um, you know, your similar experience. Yeah. Well, it's definitely an eyeopening thing and I would encourage people to go, you know, go, go, go check out some other places, go somewhere else, find out what else is out there. Absolutely. Uh, I'm just curious too, if, if you hadn't have landed, it sounds like, you know, your path, you're interested in history and then psychology and kind of all of these various things kind of led you here, but I'm just curious, uh, if you weren't

17:47in this field at all, what's the alternate universe career you think you'd be doing? You know, I have thought about that some of the time. Uh, a couple of things that, that, uh, you know, I've, I've, I find really interesting. I don't know that I could do it, but I greatly admire the standup comedian. Uh, I think, ah, these people are so smart and they're so quick on their feet and they're so well-prepared and organized, but, and it just, you know, the entire thing is

18:21amazing. It's here's a microphone now entertain us. Right. And you just go, okay. Uh, you know, it, to me, that's so much different from other kinds of entertainers, right? You know, uh, the, the athletes like, okay, well you get, you know, equipment and there's a whole set of rules and all kinds of organizations, you know, for, for the standup comedian, there, there's nothing right. It's just, um, you know, you, you and your ideas and your thoughts and you're supposed to make us have, so something like that might be sort of a dream kind of job. But I think, uh, you know,

18:55other jobs I thought about, uh, sort of more realistically, I thought for a while that I think I could have worked in economics, been an economist. I have a lot of interest in that. Wow. What a spectrum here. What's that? What a spectrum here we're talking about. Yeah. Well, comedy economics. Yeah. It could go either way. Well, I mean, you know, I, I do enjoy the, um, you know, analyzing data, um, looking about, looking at that, that kind of thing. Um, and, and I felt like, you know, I, I had a, a professor of

19:28mine when I was at Monmouth college, who was an economics professor. I didn't take any classes with him. This was again, the beauty of a, of a small school. We had no classes together at all. I never took a class in economics, but we would go to the bar together sometimes on Friday afternoons and, uh, we would have a couple of beers and he would teach me economics. And so I learned a whole bunch of things about economics just from sitting with him at the bar. And I thought, ah, this is a really interesting field. I had, I never really had any exposure to the topic, uh, prior to, to,

20:02to college, but I thought, you know, that could have been something I got into in an alternative universe. Interesting. You know what I think is interesting about that answer is in some ways, your job kind of brings those two things together and not that you are doing standup comedy, but I have seen you, you know, some, at some of our all employee meetings, somebody hands you a mic and you're just on the spot. You got to go and you've got to entertain and you, you do it, you do a great job of it and you engage the audience. In addition, I mean, I think we've alluded to it here. Um,

20:34but you're, you're our face to the globe, uh, you're globe trotting on behalf of Hogan all the time. And, you know, you're entertaining audiences and, you know, yeah, you're, you've got your presentation ready and, and your, your slides and all of that stuff, you know what you're talking about. But in some ways, you know, that aspect of your interest with standup comedy and then over on the other side of analyzing data and, and, you know, the obvious tie in with, with data science. I think it's interesting hearing you say that and how kind of those two worlds collide in what you do day to

21:08day in some ways. Yeah, I agree with you. I don't think they're that dissimilar in some ways, although I would not, uh, I would not try to compete with today's standup comedians, but, uh, but I do think part of giving a good talk is, is providing some entertainment, right? It's there, there has to be some educational value, but also some entertainment value as well. All right. So let's talk about what did it look like coming out of college and what all did you do between finishing your PhD and then joining Hogan? Yeah. So when I was finishing up my PhD, I was like 90% convinced that I was going to

21:48go into consulting. Uh, I had been, uh, well, I think we did an episode on this. I had a significant amount of time spending graduate school. I spent playing, uh, online poker, uh, and, uh, learned a tremendously. I have heard this. No, what? Oh, we haven't talked about this before. Yeah. Yeah. No, this is interesting. I've heard, I've heard bits and pieces, but yeah, sure. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, there, there's lots of lessons that poker can teach you, uh, about life, but also about just,

22:20uh, how, how to think, uh, how to make decisions, how to solve problems in real time. Um, you have to make decision after decision after decision, and you have incomplete information, right? So, um, I spent a tremendous amount of time doing that. And I spent a lot of that time also studying and learning about poker on, well, in those days, there were things were called poker forums. I think they still exist, but no, I mean, it's kind of like, you know, pre Reddit version of things. Um, and I had a

22:50tremendous number of posts. I, I, I'm, I could probably still log in and go look, but it's thousands and thousands of posts on, on poker and, and just thinking about poker and helping people solve problems. And some of those were about specifically about probability problems. Some were, were poker related, but some were just, you know, broader, you know, problems to try to understand, you know, different things about probability and mathematics. And, uh, actually, uh, oddly enough, somebody from, uh, uh, McKinsey consulting reached out to me and said, Hey, look, I know you're getting your PhD,

23:25but what are you doing afterwards? We're looking to hire people. Uh, and, um, and they, and, and so he, he was talking to me pretty soon. This is somebody I never met. Right. But he said, look, I like the way you reason through problems. I like the way you explain problems. I like the process you use. Um, you know, you might consider a career in consulting. So I thought, well, you know, that sounds pretty good because I didn't know what the job prospects look like on the academic market. And so that's what I thought I was going to go do. But, uh, just for fun, I thought, well, I'll apply for these academic jobs. Uh, and I got one and that was the first job I had out of grad

24:00school, which was at Florida Atlantic university in Boca Raton, Florida. Um, I was a professor of social psychology there. I taught social psychology, personality psychology. Uh, later on, I started teaching IO psychology there. I actually brought the IO psychology course to that didn't exist there before. Uh, and I taught, uh, some statistics, quantitative courses there, did, did some research there, had a really, uh, highly functioning lab while we were there. Uh, we were quite productive,

24:32uh, and then, uh, got an opportunity to, uh, what I would say, upgrade my career by moving from, uh, I don't know if it was an upgrade in living, but I moved from Boca Raton to Lubbock, Texas to get a job at Texas tech university. And Texas tech was an amazing place. It was a great university had amazing colleagues. Um, and it was a place that really cared a lot about their faculty and they really cared a lot about their students. Not that the other places didn't, but there was just a noticeable difference in things like the campus and, um, and, and the student quality and the,

25:07the concern for the, for the facility, facility, uh, sorry, easy for me to say facilities. Um, and you know, it was just a great place to be. And, um, I was, we were, we were actually really happy there. My, Georgina, my wife and I, we built a house there. Um, because the cost of living in Lubbock, Texas was about the third, one third, the cost of living in, in, in Boca Raton, Florida. And so we built a house, uh, you know, we picked out everything we wanted floors, walls, you know,

25:39every, every, every single aspect of outlets, uh, lighting fixtures, every aspect of the house we picked out. And, um, we lived in it for six months before we, we sold it to move to Tulsa. Uh, yeah, because, uh, Bob Hogan called and said, Hey, uh, got this job. Do you want it? And, um, and, you know, even though it was hard to, to pick up and move, having just moved there, um, you know, we think it was the right decision. Yeah. Well, talk a little bit about your connection to Dr. Hogan. And, you know, I don't,

26:11I don't know that Bob Hogan just picked up the phone and called you randomly. Where did, where did you guys first, uh, first meet? So I think it was 2009, I think is the right year. I've looked this up before, but I always somehow slips my mind. Um, so yeah, I think that has to be two, six. Yeah. It had to be about 2009. Um, I was, uh, a graduate student at UC Riverside and

26:41there was a conference and it was the first ever conference. There was a sort of standalone conference for this group called the association for research and personality. The association for research and personality had for many, many years. And actually Bob Hogan was one of the founders of this, of this association, but it had for many, many years been a pre-conference at a larger conference. So it was just a small group that would meet before this bigger conference. They decided in 2009 that they were going to have their own standalone conference. It was going to be separate from the larger conference. And the first ever one was held in Evanston, Illinois.

27:15And, uh, I went, I flew there and, um, I was standing with my advisor and one of my colleagues, uh, from graduate school. And, uh, he said, Hey, my advisor said, Hey, there's Bob Hogan. Would you guys like to meet Bob Hogan? And we said, Oh, you know, sure. And so he walked us over and said, Oh, you know, Hey, Bob and Bob knew my advisor. His name was David. Actually, we've had David a funder on the podcast. Um, and he said, Oh yeah, Bob Hogan, you know, you know, and so I

27:45introduced myself and, uh, he said, uh, well, what do you want to do with your career? You know, if you know, Bob, you know, this is the kind of thing he likes to ask people. And I said, well, you know, we don't know, you know, maybe he said, would you ever think about working for me? And at the time I said, well, you know, maybe, I don't know. Uh, it's possible, you know? And he said, you know, then, uh, again, if you know, Bob, he says, Oh, it'd be, you know, more fame, more fortune, more power, more anything you want. If you come, you know, come work for me. And so,

28:16okay. So, uh, and from that point on, we just sort of always stayed in touch. So we just sort of been in the same network of people. He would share ideas and things that he'd been working on. And I would share things with him. We've just exchanging personality, uh, uh, research, right. Just saying, here's, here's the latest that we've seen on personality, um, and, uh, shaping our ideas. And once I moved to Florida, uh, he, he, him being in, uh, North Florida and Amelia Island,

28:47uh, was only about a three hour drive from where I was living in Florida. And so a couple of summers, I drove up and said, you know, um, you know, I'm not just saying this cause I work for him now, but at the time I said, you know, the greatest living personality psychologist lives three hours from my house. It would be crazy if me as a personality psychologist didn't go spend some time with him. And so I would just go up and spend a couple of days at his house and he would share whatever the latest things he was thinking about with me. He would give me a book here or a book

29:20there and say, here, go read this, go read this. And I would take those things and go read them. I mean, some of the books he gave me were like the Hogan tech manuals and the Hogan guide. So, um, so, so that was really my, my, um, introduction and, and, and again, we've just exchanged many emails over, over many years. Yeah, that's really cool. So, you know, coming out of academia and then joining Hogan in 2018 as our chief science officer, that's a, that's a pretty

29:50big change and a big shift. Can you talk a little bit about what that looked like for you and maybe what are some of the biggest challenges that you've, you know, kind of faced going from that perspective from academia into a leadership role in a business setting? Yeah. So first of all, it was tough. As I mentioned, we had just moved to Texas. We had just built a house. Um, I mean, I felt incredible guilt, uh, when I went to go tell the department chair that I was leaving, you know, they just, I mean, they invested a tremendous amount in getting me there.

30:25Yeah. So to just be there for a few months and to leave them to where, uh, you know, this was, this was a, um, senior level hire, right? This was not a junior position that could be easily filled that this was, you know, at the, at the, um, higher level, uh, in their department with tenure. Um, so that was another part, right? Um, yeah, I'm sitting in this job that, yeah. And Lumbach is a nice place. It's a nice place to be. Um, you know, with this brand new house, two little kids,

31:00you know, we're sitting there going, man, we've got this setup with tenure. Um, I'll probably be promoted again in a few more years. Um, things, things were looking really, really good. So why would you go disrupt that? Um, you know, and ultimately it was just about the opportunity to, to make an impact. Um, when you're a professor, you can have a lot of impact on your students. That's probably the main people that the professors impact and that's important. But, um, I knew in this

31:33role, I'd have the opportunity to make a much bigger impact on, on people in their lives. Um, you know, I tell people that one of the things that I think is amazing about the work we do at Hogan is that when we do our jobs, well, we have an impact, um, on the future of organizations and the biggest organizations, the world, which impacts all the employees of that organization and impacts all the investors in that organization, which quite frankly, many people have things like 401ks and when

32:03your 401k is invested in the S and P 500 and we're working with a lot of the companies in the S and P 500, the work we do has a huge impact on the global economy. Yeah. And you know, for, for me, that's, that was just too good of an opportunity to say, ah, you know, this is a place where I can make a bigger impact on more people's lives than, than, than working as a professor. And so that, that was really, um, the, the main thing. Plus, you know, again, I really admired Bob and I really

32:36admired, um, you know, uh, the way he thought about problems and the work he had done. And so, you know, so for me, that, that was the major, uh, the major thing that, that made me leave. But in terms of challenges, uh, yeah, I think there are many, I think we, well, I don't know. I think I underestimated the number of challenges, which I think is probably not unusual for me. I tend to think, well, I don't know. I tend to be optimistic. I think you kind of go, okay, yeah,

33:08no, this won't be that hard. That won't be that hard. I tend to underestimate how difficult things will be in general. But, um, in some ways it was not unfamiliar territory, right? Because I had led a lab, a research lab, right? I'm, I've led scientific groups for many, many years and leading data science is no different really from leading any other scientific group. Uh, you know, there are more people you have to coordinate with and collaborate with across other parts of an organization. Um, whereas in academia, you really don't, you can just kind of run your own thing in

33:41your own lab, but, but running a scientific team is something that was very familiar to me. So I felt very comfortable with that part, but certainly, you know, there are differences in, in working, uh, in academia versus working in, um, in, in a, in a business setting. I mean, I will say that I did have some experience working in a business setting because when I was in academia, I did moonlight as a consultant. So I did consulting for maybe three years. Um, I spent most of my summers

34:11doing consulting work, uh, when I was in academia. So I had quite a bit of experience working with people in a, in a more business oriented setting, um, which, which definitely helped. There were lessons learned. Mistakes were definitely made when I was a consultant. And, uh, I learned quite a bit from that. Um, and you know, of course I made mistakes when I, when I got to Hogan too. Um, and so, uh, but, but I think the, the, uh, uh, you know, as we talked about in the, uh, in the episode on decision

34:46making and poker, you know, the mistakes are really an opportunity for you to grow, for you to learn, to get better, go, Ooh, okay. I need to do something different next time. Um, and so, so that's, that's what I would say is I think some of the biggest challenges were, um, just, just getting familiar with working with people in a business setting. I remember my first talk, Valerie was in, um, well, I really wish we had it recorded because I would love to go back and watch how awful it was. Uh, it had to be just terrible. Uh, this was in Budapest. I wasn't even actually

35:19on the payroll yet. Uh, Bob had me fly to, to Budapest. Uh, you know, I mean, all I had read was the Hogan guide and the tech manuals and I hadn't even spent a day in the office yet. Uh, I was still living in Lubbock and, um, he had me fly to Budapest and give a talk, uh, to this, you know, a distributor summit. Now me not knowing anything, like, I don't know, it was just like giving any other talk to anybody else. But, uh, you know, looking back on it, go, wow, that was actually a really important audience to be giving a talk to. But, uh, so I don't know how that talk went.

35:56It's hard for me to imagine it was very good, but, uh, well, you're still here. So I think maybe it was okay. Well, maybe there was some, some, uh, a little bit of a leash for a new guy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So as our chief science officer here at Hogan, can you tell our listeners a little bit more about what your job entails and maybe what a typical day or a week looks like for you?

36:20Yeah. So, uh, you know, the major things that we have to do is, uh, is, is create and maintain our assessments, right? So the assessments are the core of, of our business. That's an, and the assessments from my point of view include not just the items, but it also includes the scoring. It also includes the norming, um, and includes things like benchmarks around those. So all of the data that goes into assessments, it also includes the validity data that goes into our assessments because that's what helps provide those interpretations. And so the major job

36:54is, uh, ensuring that we are continuing to improve our assessments, continuing to offer the highest quality in terms of accuracy, in terms of reliability of our assessments possible. And, and I'm, you know, I do that through, I don't do that all by myself. I have a great team of, of PhDs and, you know, and a variety of fields and IO psychology, quantitative psychology, personality psychology, who, um, who work on these kinds of problems every day. Um, but,

37:25but that's probably the main gist of the job. We also, uh, on, on the data science team, we have, um, we do custom research, custom solutions for clients. They'll bring us a job and they'll say, Hey, we'd really like a custom solution, a custom profile for people working in this role. And we do the research around that. Um, and then of course we have a massive amount of data, uh, that we collect from millions of people across the world every year. We collect criterion studies, we do performance reviews, we collect data on reputation, 360s, and maintaining all those databases and making sure

38:01they can speak to each other. They're easy to access. Um, and a lot of that data produces knowledge that produces white papers, technical reports, uh, ROI case studies, building those out and, uh, maintaining those and having read it readily, uh, accessible, uh, so, so that we can answer questions that might come in, uh, is a huge part that sort of knowledge maintenance, uh, is a big part of what happens in data science as well. So my main job is to oversee all of those tasks. Um, in addition

38:35to, you know, you ask, how do I spend a typical day or week? And my first thought was, well, most days I spend on an airplane, but, uh, but not, not right now. Um, but I do spend, uh, uh, quite a bit of time, um, speaking with our distributors around the globe, meeting with them, meeting with their clients, um, helping them out with events. Um, you know, I, I have also done so many virtual speaking engagements last night. I just had a speaking engagement with the university of Chicago.

39:05Um, so, uh, that's a big part is, uh, and I never really liked this term because it feels self-aggrandizing or arrogant or something is, is what we would call thought leadership, right? Is, is, um, you know, sharing the latest in research and knowledge that we have around personality, leadership, and organizational effectiveness. Yeah. It's interesting actually timing of this, um, because I just read through our most recent APAC newsletter and got the lowdown of how you've just spent your last couple of weeks.

39:38And it seems like you were pretty busy. I was tired after reading the newsletter. Uh, they worked me pretty hard. I think, uh, you know, three talks a day is pretty exhausting. Yeah. That's quite a bit. Yeah. No, but that's honestly just, uh, that's something that I appreciate about you so much. And, you know, Blake and I talked about it on our, on the last episode, just from a PR perspective is that you are such a great representative of, of Hogan and your ability to tell the story that, you know, taking things like the data and what the data say

40:14and turn that, turning that into something that matters for people. And, and, you know, back to this big broader purpose that we have of actually trying to advance the science of personality, uh, you know, in the, in, with the goal of improving people's lives, you know, it's so, it's so important. I just appreciate that you're willing to, um, you know, be that face and, and be that storyteller, be that standup comic on the spot for us. Um, so anyway, I just wanted to say that on, on, from my perspective, you know, from a PR side, you jump in, um, and, and answer

40:47questions and do such a great job with communicating with journalists and really representing the brand well. So, um, I don't know, just adding that in, that's not part of the outline here, but. Well, no, it's okay. You know, Valerie, I do spend some time thinking about, you know, what, and I, I like to watch really good talks. I like to watch really good speakers and I like to watch what they do. And, um, you know, one of the things that strikes me, uh, maybe this is part of the reason why I like standup comedians as well, is that I'm just starting to come to this idea that

41:21some of the best speakers in the world is people who are really good communicators and it's because they have the ability to take the audience's perspective. That's what's really critical is if you can understand what your audience thinks or knows, right. This also goes back to sort of my fascination with interpersonal perception, right. Is how do we judge other people? How do we understand other people? Can we understand what other people are thinking? I think the really great speakers in the world can read the audience really well and understand them, understand their background,

41:54understand what they're thinking, and then say things in a way that, um, that they can understand, right. That, that audience can now understand because they can take that perspective. And I think that's a, I haven't seen any research on this, but I think that's an underrated area in speaking skill. I think when you look at speaking skill, you go, what about their charisma? What about their charm? What about their intelligence? What about, you know, um, their ability to command an audience or something like that? But I, I am coming more and more to this conclusion that some of the best speakers in the world are really good at taking their audience's perspective.

42:30Yeah. And absolutely. That's also fundamentals of marketing too, is understanding your audience. You know, you can have, you can have a compelling message, but it won't land unless you know your audience and know the needs of your audience. And so that translates very well to, to speaking as well. So let's shift gears here for just a second. And, uh, you know, Blake and I talked about his own Hogan scores and, um, you know, and, and how Hogan is, we have a big focus on the dark side

43:01or derailers. Um, can you share anything that you've learned about your own dark side personality characteristics and how they play out at work? Well, uh, so I was first assessed in, uh, geez, when was it? Uh, it was before, uh, 2013, let's say 2014, something like that. And this is the first time ever taking Hogan assessment. I was a personality psychologist. I'd taken many personality tests. I'd help construct personality tests, but taking a Hogan assessment was really quite different, quite a unique experience and, uh, got back my Hogan scores. And, uh, I was very

43:38proud of my HDS scores because I scored pretty low on most of them. I think I scored, um, sort of in the average range on, on a few. Um, and I only scored high on one, I scored high on diligent. And of course, you know, in my mind, this is the best one to score high on, right? You know, because you know, everybody, well, you know, there's this thing in personality about personality being egocentronic, which means that, uh, we, we tend to, to like our own personalities. We tend to think those are the best ones. Um, so, you know, I, I scored 95 on diligent and, you know, that does

44:13stand out for me. I remember the first time this really became a problem. I'm sure it was a problem before, but I remember distinctly the first time it was a problem was when I was leading my own lab at FAU. Um, I realized I was preventing progress from happening because my students were sending me their papers and I had built this really productive lab. They were really working hard. They were sending me drafts of papers and I didn't have time to review them all in the detail that I would want

44:45to review them. I would want to sit there and go over word by word, sentence by sentence, rewriting, rewriting, rephrasing, because I was a coauthor on this paper. So to me, it was just as much my paper. It was their paper. And so I was trying to write this paper the way I wanted to write it. And I realized I can't do this and get enough papers out. We're not going to be productive. If I insist on micromanaging this entire process. And so what I had to, what I learned for myself there was that I had to learn to let go. I had to learn to just trust my team. I had to learn to realize that maybe even if my way

45:21was a little bit better, first of all, it might not be better. I just maybe think it is, but even if it was better, it wasn't worth, like, it's not going to make the paper that much better that it's worth the time and worth the delay it's causing on other people's careers. Because I'm essentially holding their career back because they can't get the papers published that they need to get published so they can get the jobs that they want to get. And so for me, that was a real eye-opening moment, right? And I had taken the Hogan assessment, so I knew I was a 95 on diligence. I knew this was an issue for me, but this

45:54was the real first time I went, oh, I'm overdoing it on the diligent and I need to let go. But I'll say that there are other scores on scales that have been more, I think, more eye-opening for me. Like that one, I kind of always knew I was a little bit perfectionistic. When I got feedback, the first time I got feedback on Hogan's assessments was from Dr. Hogan. So you can imagine what that was like.

46:24Wow. And it was so interesting because the first thing he saw on the HDS is he goes, ah, you are low-skeptical, low-reserved, and low-cautious. And I was like, yes, I'm so good. Shouldn't I be proud of this? And he said, yeah, here's the problem. There are people in your organization that don't like you. They're your enemies. You think they're your friends and you keep running your mouth, telling them all your ideas. And I went, holy shit. He's right. I was

46:57like, immediately names came to my thought, you know what? I know those people don't really like me, but I share stuff with them anyway that I probably shouldn't. And it was like, these are low scores on the HDS, this pattern of low scores that I would have never, you know, had he not pointed this out. I would not have seen this. Um, you know, I didn't have the expertise at the time to understand, uh, how these could have this, this kind of an impact. Again, I think mostly we think low scores in the HDS are good things, but in this case, he identified this pattern that was, I went,

47:31oh yeah, that is a problem for me. I know exactly what you're talking about. Um, and so, you know, for me, that was really powerful. The other one that I know for me is a, is a, sometimes gets me in trouble is I'm a, a five on dutiful, uh, meaning I don't, uh, I don't do well with authority figures. I don't do well with people telling me, you know, what to do. Um, I tend to want to be independent and do things my way. And so those are the ones, uh, that, that have made a, made a difference for

48:02me, made an impact for me, understanding those and thinking about how those, um, impact my life. Yeah. It's so helpful to just know, you know, to have this data. I said this on the last podcast, but we, you know, we really do have, and not just us, anyone who has access to their own personality data, it really is kind of a cheat code in some ways, you know, um, just the, the self-awareness that it provides. And especially for those of us who are in management positions, it just really helping to better understand how you're perceived by, you know, the people on your team is just so

48:37important. Um, you know, just, uh, helping us figure out how to be better, better leaders, better, uh, you know, just motivate the people on our team to do the things that we need them to do. So, yeah, it's just, it's super interesting to hear these kinds of specific stories come out. And I will say too, uh, you know, your low dutiful, I think is made up by Blake's high dutiful. So that's how, that's how we keep things moving as far as the podcast goes. Um, so speaking of that, Blake gave a pretty in-depth overview on the evolution of the podcast from its conception

49:10to where we're at with it today. Um, but that was from his perspective. So I'm just curious, how do you remember this process playing out and what do you think of it today now that you're five and a half years into it? Well, I should just say for our listeners, I did not listen to Blake's answer to this. So I do not know what he said. So I'll have to go back and listen to it. You've been busy. It's fine. You've been busy. It's all good. Um, so, uh, you know, what I remember is sometime in 2019, I don't know if it was mid-year or late year 2019. Um, we, we got

49:43pretty, Blake and I had a conversation somewhere there where we got pretty serious about maybe we should do this podcast thing and we put it on the, on the plan, right? It was sort of on the 2020 plan and then COVID hit and, um, that, you know, it was already on the plan, but I don't know that it was moving, but once COVID hit, it was like, you know what, we're, we're, we, everybody went home to their home offices. Let's do this, right? This is the time to do it. And so we, we bought, well, Blake bought, um, what, what I think are now some pretty

50:14cheap microphones, but we didn't know where this was going to go. So we just said, let's get started. Uh, yeah. And the microphones were so cheap that, uh, in the, in the room that I'm in now has high ceilings. Uh, there was a really bad echo if I tried to record from that room. So we actually had to, I would record from my closet all the time because in the closet was a room where there was no echo. So all the time I was recording from the closet, but of course, you know, uh, since then we've upgraded my, I think we've upgraded mics two different times. And now we're on these, um, what I think are really high end mics.

50:47These are the mics you see, um, or, you know, all the top quality podcasts use these microphones. Uh, and now I can record from my, my office rather than having to go to my closet to record. Um, so, you know, I think that's part of the evolution. I think other part of the evolution is when we first started, we didn't really know where this thing was going. We just said, well, let's just talk about some of the things that we're seeing or hearing and see where those go. But now we've got a pretty structured and, you know, and we've learned a lot along the way that, you know, what, what are the benefits

51:19of having a structured outline for a podcast, but not having a scripted podcast. Right. So I think that that's been an important lesson. Um, you know, I, I think, uh, we've, we've learned lessons about, uh, you know, guests and how to prepare guests. We've learned a lot of lessons about technology and technology issues that can come up. Um, you know, uh, yeah, but, but I mean, that's, that's sort of my memory of, of how we we've gotten here today. Yeah. Yeah. It's a, it's a fun story to think about. And I, I recommend to you and to others

51:55listening, if you didn't listen to the podcast where Blake shares his, his side of that story. Um, it's, it's kind of fun and it's fun to hear both of you guys talk about it because I was involved just kind of, uh, you know, on the sidelines trying to help figure out how do we get this off the ground? And so it's, it's interesting to hear from both sides of, of that coin from your, well, it's also a testament to Blake's persistence because, uh, you know, he is the one and maybe it's that high dutiful, I don't know, but he is the one who's always like, Hey, Ryan, uh, we need to record another episode. Like I would forget, I would go, Oh, I forgot.

52:29You know, he's the one who's really just, you know, Hey, let's get some guests together. Let's, you know, and I, and I help brainstorm some of this stuff, but Blake is really persistent and really, uh, the one who, who makes this go, uh, you know, week after week after week. Uh, cause I would, uh, you know, I would get unfocused and wander off into something else. Well, but speaking of that, so your relationship and your rapport that you have with Blake, you know, what was that like before the podcast and what is it like today? And also I'm just curious,

53:00you know, Blake's not a trained psychologist. Um, you know, he's coming from the PR. He's coming from a totally different perspective. So what were your concerns or were there any concerns about how that would ultimately work? Yeah. Uh, I'm just teasing. Just so our audience knows Blake is listening while we're recording this. So that's just a little jab at him. Uh, no, look, uh, so actually, you know, you asked about the roots of the podcast and, um, in some ways I felt like the real roots of the podcast came from just discussions, Blake and I would have

53:35around all kinds of stuff. A lot of times it was sports related, but it was all kinds of things just around the office. Right. So this was all before COVID we were in the office all the time and I would walk by his desk and we would banter about, you know, whatever debate, discuss whatever kinds of topics were on our mind, exchange ideas, or, you know, him being, uh, running PR, there would be articles, the requests that would come in from different, uh, PR things. And, and we would talk about those, discuss those kinds of things. Like, Oh, you know, um, you know, maybe this could be,

54:07you know, this is kind of a thing that could be a podcast. And actually, you know, I, from my perspective, one inspiration is the show that's on ESPN. I used to watch, I don't get to watch it anymore, but I used to watch this show all the time called pardon the interruption. It's been on for 20 plus years now. Um, where these two writers at the Washington post, that's where they started. They were both writers, sports writers at the Washington post. Uh, and they would have that kind of banter. That's how that show started. They started with them having some banter at the

54:38Washington post and they said, Hey, well, you guys should make this a show. And so they do. And they do a daily sports show, uh, for 30 minutes, uh, every day. And it's just these two guys bantering about different things on sports. And, and as Blake and I would have those conversations, it kind of reminded me of that. I kind of, this is kind of like this, this kind of has that same feel. Um, and, uh, yeah, so, so I think, you know, that's part of it. Yeah. And I don't

55:08know that a podcast with two psychologists would be better, quite frankly. That's fair. I think that's fair. You know, I, I think it, it is useful to have, uh, someone who's not a psychologist who can take a different perspective who can say, well, what about this idea? Or what about this? Or what about what, you know, my aunt said or something like that, that doesn't coming from a, you know, a database perspective, I think, you know, makes, makes the podcast better. It makes, um, you know, as I was saying before, you know, part of, uh, communication skills about, uh, being able

55:42to take the perspective of your audience. And so I think having multiple perspectives, his perspective and my perspective on the podcast, uh, with different backgrounds, uh, actually does make, uh, make for a better podcast overall. Yeah, I agree. So before I get to my last question, I'm sure the listeners are curious about what your life looks like outside of Hogan. Um, so can you share about what are some of your, uh, your hobbies or your passions and what do you do on the weekends or while you're on vacation? Yeah. So vacation, I don't do very much, but we

56:18occasionally do some things as a family. Uh, you know, uh, when you fly around a lot, you accumulate a lot of airline miles. So occasionally, well, the whole family will full fly somewhere together. Uh, but, uh, you know, I would say my major passion outside of work is, uh, is coaching my son's baseball team. So I've, um, uh, I've been, I was an assistant coach a few years ago, the last two years, I've been the head coach of, uh, of his baseball team. And, and I'm going to coach their baseball team again this spring. We'll see if it's my last go at it

56:53or not. If I get fired, I don't know. But, um, it it's for me, that's a real passion, real joy. I had, uh, I was part of an incredible baseball program, uh, growing up in Illinois. We were one of the first serious travel baseball programs in the central Illinois area. Um, we had great coaches and they're all dads. Uh, we had great kids, great teammates and, and great families and great parents that supported it. And, uh, it became a bit of a phenomena there and, um, ultimately led to

57:26multiple, um, high school state championships because our, our travel team was also our high school was affiliated with the high school team. And, um, you know, so it was just such a great experience. And I remember sometime when I was in college, I would go assist with that program a little bit. And, and I remember one of my coaches who was one of the dads who still coaches in that program now, by the way, many years later would say, well, you want to give back, you know, you want to give back, you want to give back. And, you know, that's what it feels like for me now is this

57:58opportunity to give back to, you know, what, what people gave me, you know, when I was a young baseball player and learning about not just about baseball, but, you know, also about, about life. I mean, I'll give you an example from a tournament we played last year. Um, we played against the team in this tournament that, uh, was actually one year younger than us. They were one year younger team and that we had played them before and they beat us pretty badly. And we played them the first game of this tournament and they beat us really badly. And then we didn't play very well the next game.

58:32Um, but on Sunday we were in sort of elimination play and we, we got on a roll and I gave the team a speech because basically we were standing around watching the ball go by, just not really swinging the bats. And, and I said, I told them like, look, I don't care if you strike out. I don't care if you swing and miss. I want guys, you know, aggressive swinging the bats take, you know, and, and what the main message I told them was about taking control, about taking ownership over your outcomes. Quit letting the umpire decide your outcomes for you. And ultimately we won the championship. We came

59:07all the way back through bracket play and won the championship in this tournament. And afterwards, that was the main thing that I talked with these kids about. It wasn't about, oh, this was a great play you made or good job, or we've got to work on this more. It was about what it means to take control of your life, what it means to not let other people, um, decide things for you, not to, to say, oh, well, what can I do? This is, you know, how life has been handed to me. And, and look, we, we all know that sometimes bad things happen to people in life and things outside of our control

59:41happen. Um, but trying to get these young men to understand, um, that there are things you can control and taking control of your own life, how empowering it can be when you decide I'm not going to let somebody else do it for me. I'm going to take charge of my own outcomes. Um, you know, and, and so for me, uh, that, that's a really rewarding experience and, and, um, I enjoy, I mean, if they would pay me what Hogan does, the coach use baseball, I think that's all I would do.

1:00:13Yeah. That's your, that's your, uh, answer to the alternate universe career. Yeah. Maybe that is it. Maybe that is it. Well, and that's, that's so cool. And I think that that is also what's so important about youth sports is those types of lessons that you learn along the way. And I guarantee you that those young men did not just hear you give that speech in context to that game, but that's something that they're going to carry with them. Hopefully, you know, um, as they, they move along in life and

1:00:46even outside of, you know, they get older and move into the workforce or become parents or all of these things that, that there'll be faced with. I think these are the types of like building blocks that are so important for young kids, um, you know, to have a connection to, and to hear that from an adult. So that's a really cool story. I'm glad you shared that. So for my final question, so looking back on your career so far, what accomplishment are you most proud of and what goals are you excited to pursue in the future at Hogan and beyond? Yeah. You know, you sent me

1:01:18these questions in advance, Valerie, and I knew right away, this is going to be the hardest one because, um, you know, I, I, I don't really think I'm too proud of very much, uh, that I've done. Uh, I will say that I'm really proud of some of the work that our team has done. Um, I talk, um, with a great deal of frequency about our global norms. Um, in 2019, we made the greatest global personality norm that had ever existed in, in, okay. All right. So maybe that's not an impressive

1:01:52thing. Okay. The global personality norm that's ever existed in humanity. It's not like, okay, it's the first ever rocket on the moon, but it was really, you know, an impressive, uh, amount of work to make that global norm in 2019. And in 2023, we made it even better and we launched an even better norm just because we knew we could, nobody was asking us to, nobody had beaten our previous record, if you want to call it that in 2019, but we knew we could do better. And, um, we, we did. And to me,

1:02:29I'm really proud of that because, uh, we know that, that our norms are, you know, what we give, uh, we give that insight, we give that interpretive insight to our assessments. And, um, when we can make those better, when we can, and we've seen people send back reports, you know, with their scores on the new norms and said, Oh, look at this change or that change. But we know that those changes are all for the good. We know those changes have led to more accurate understandings of selves and, and, and colleagues and teams. And so, uh, I, I'm just really proud of, of, of that work. Um, and I would

1:03:07say, I'm also just really proud of the work we get to do for our clients every day. Um, you know, uh, we, we have people reach out to us and they tell us, you know, Hey, uh, use your assessments totally changed my life. Uh, use your assessments and look at the outcome. This guy, I mean, we've done work with, uh, we've talked about on the podcast, we've done work with professional sports teams where we've helped them identify their next coach. And that's made a dramatic difference in the, in the performance of those teams. But we do that with organizations all the time

1:03:41and we get to hear about them. We don't always get to share them because some of that information is, you know, private client information. Um, but for me, that's, uh, you know, I talked about coming to Hogan to make an impact and getting to see that impact that we're making. Um, that that's probably the thing that I'm most proud of. Yeah, that's very cool. Well, thank you, Ryan. This has been very insightful. I've enjoyed getting to know you a little bit more. Um, and so I guess that does it

1:04:12for the science of personality podcast, episode 138. Be sure to join us in two weeks for another fun and informative episode. Cheers, everybody. This has been the science of personality podcast brought to you by Hogan assessments. You can access all episodes on our website, the science of personality.com or on the streaming service of your choice. See you next time.