What do you get when one cohost is in Vienna, Austria and the other is in Orlando, Florida? Pure podcasting gold, baby! Throw in the fact they’re talkin’ Humanly raising, Vidcruiter acquiring, Yale rehabbing (kinda), Google employees whining and Bud Light still losing, and you’ve got the best podcast you’ll hear today (probably). One man’s pork tenderloin is another man’s schnitzel, this week, on Chad & Cheese.
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INTRO: Hide your kids. Lock the doors. You're listening to HR's most dangerous podcast. Chad and Joel Cheesman are here to punch the recruiting industry right where it hurts. Complete with breaking news, brash opinion, and loads of snark. Buckle up boys and girls. It's time for The Chad and Cheese podcast.
Joel: Oh, yeah. It's National Detroit Style Pizza Day, Chad. Ah, Detroit style pizza. The bronze medalist of the pizzas. You're listening to The Chad and Cheese podcast. This is your co-host, Joel Motown Cheesman.
Chad: This is Chad. Did I just see the Vienna Vikings? Sowash.
Joel: And on this week's show, Humanly raises, VidCruiter acquires, and Bud Light is taking it from both sides. Let's do this.
Chad: Is there really a bronze pizza? I mean, seriously, any pizza?
Joel: Oh, it's New York. It's Chicago, and then it's Detroit in the bronze... The bronze category.
Chad: Still good? Yeah. Not gonna turn it down. Yeah. Welcome to Vienna Kids. Joel and I were just talking in the green room. I was on the tram, a little public trans kind of thing. It's what we do here in Europe and I saw a fucking billboard that had the Vikings on it, like the Minnesota Vikings, and I got out. Joel, and I got out, I looked at it. No, it was the Vienna Vikings. Apparently they had a European League of Football. Think they have 12 teams and the Vikings were the same color, logo. I mean, they were last year's champion, so I guess, they can do whatever they want. Hell, I don't know.
Joel: That has to be the saddest football league in the world. There are 12 teams?
[laughter]
Chad: Well, I don't know. The XFL and the USFL are pretty sad right now, too.
Joel: Yeah. Much more intriguing is your diet while you're in Austria.
Chad: Oh, yeah.
Joel: I mean, I'm enjoying the pictures of, I guess, fritters or...
Chad: Schnitzel baby.
Joel: Tenderloins.
Chad: Schnitzel...
Joel: Or whatever.
Chad: Yes.
Joel: Schnitzel, yes. Pork tenderloins basically.
Chad: Schnitzel or some Buko. I mean, they've got amazing beers, wines, eating amazing foods, meeting amazing people. The culture. I mean, we went to museums, all the art churches stuff. I mean, it's just fucking awesome. It's our first time to Vienna. So we're both pretty hyped up.
Joel: Are the hills alive with the sound of music Chad? Is the question.
Chad: Well, of course they are. [laughter] Why wouldn't they be?
Joel: I'm fortunate enough to be in Orlando, also known as the Vienna of Florida or the Vienna of the South. And I also am surrounded by priceless works of art in my hotel room...
Chad: I can see. I can see. Yeah.
Joel: As you can see, only on the YouTube channel kids, can you see the priceless works of art? My daughter is in the national volleyball tournament.
Chad: Yes.
Joel: So it's like tons of teen girls screaming and mama drama everywhere.
Chad: Oh my God.
Joel: It'll be a fun four-day experience for me.
Chad: That sounds like hell in Orlando. Oh my God. Woof.
Joel: Yeah.
SFX: Doesn't anyone notice this? I feel like I'm taking crazy pill.
Chad: Well, that leads into my first shout out. Go figure Vienna and...
SFX: Shout out.
Chad: The team from Jobiqo. Yeah. So our flat was rented out for two weeks and we needed a place to go. So, we've never been to Vienna. We're gonna go to Kraków next week. But this is our first stop. So, like I'd said before, wonderful food, the museum's history, churches, amazing public transportation, down the road is this amazing Turkish bakery.
Chad: It just, the food is amazing. But anyway, Jobiqo is here. If all those in the industry understand Jobiqo, they're a job board platform and they provide to many job boards that are out there. Hundreds of job boards that are out there. We spent the day with Martin and the team had lunch, amazing drinks, dinner, that kind of thing. Special shout out to Ling Wu over at Jobiqo, who set up a Google Maps list. It's the first time I've actually seen one of these things. It has literally a list of sightseeing, bars, restaurants, it helped us tremendously in being able to see Vienna. So thanks to Jobiqo, thanks to Ling Wu, Martin and the team. And shout out to Vienna.
Joel: And I don't hate you at all, and I'm not jealous whatsoever.
[laughter]
Chad: All right. All right. All right.
Joel: I love that you use our place is rented. So we had to go to Austria to get away for a while. Like, Jesus.
[laughter]
Chad: What?
Joel: Jesus. All right. My shout out Chad. It's official.
Chad: It's a thing.
Joel: It's official, student loan payments are set to restart in October.
Chad: Oh. God.
Joel: Says the education department, interest on the debt will begin accruing even sooner.
Chad: Fuck.
Joel: In September, around 40 million Americans have debt from their education. The typical monthly bill is roughly $350 for that student loan. And loan debt in the US totals nearly $1.8 trillion. And this is gonna put the screws on those borrowers. They've had a nice little break, but it's time to get back to work. The party is over. "Student loan payments are set to start," says the education department. Shout out to those poor bastards paying student loans.
Chad: Yeah. It's amazing. I thought about this this morning. How we always tout GDP over happiness and actually the US literally inflates our GDP by things like this. This is actually 6.5% of our GDP. Is something that other countries get for almost free, if not free. So we inflate our GDP because we make our citizens pay for the shit. Healthcare, close to 20%. That thing that most other countries, they get paid. So we talk about taxes and how we don't get... We don't have to pay those high taxes. You stupid motherfuckers, we still pay that shit. Look at... There is over, what was it? 1.6 trillion, trillion in debt. That's fucking taxes kids. That's fucking crazy. Anyway, you're hurting me here. I wanna talk about fake priests. Shout out to fake priests.
Joel: Fake priests? Okay. This is a first.
[laughter]
Chad: Stick with me here, kids. This is crazy.
Joel: I'm with you.
Chad: A restaurant in California has been ordered to pay $140,000 of back wages and damages to employees after it hired a priest to extract workers' confessions. Apparently, Che Garibaldi, who operates two locations of a Taqueria Garibaldi, hired a fake priest to hear confessions during work hours to get the sins out. That was the thing. They wanted to get the sins out. Including asking if the employees had been late for work, stolen any money from the restaurant, or had bad intentions toward the employer. Taqueria Garibaldi, and three other restaurant owners. Some others got into this fucking shenanigan bullshit. They were ordered to pay $140,000 back wages to 35 employees, the restaurant will also have to pay, listen to this, oh wow this is gonna kill 'em, $5,000 in civil penalties.
[laughter]
S?: Just a tip.
Chad: $5,000. Yes. I mean, it's fucking crazy. Shout out to fake priests. I don't know who the struggling actor was. Who actually did this, but, wow. This is a new low.
Joel: Shout out to getting the sins out. I'm all for that.
[laughter]
Joel: All right, Chad. Well, we've talked about commercial real estate crashing. Thanks to the work from home movement.
Chad: Yes, we have.
Joel: Well, say hello to Picklemalls.
Chad: No.
Joel: That's right. Picklemalls, empty malls and stores are being repurposed into Picklemalls offering pickleball courts, one of your favorite. In case you missed it. Pickleball is a popular sport that combines tennis, badminton, and ping pong attracting players of all ages apparently. The initiative aims to utilize vacant spaces and support the growing pickleball trend across the country. Chad, is pickleball going to save us all?
Chad: Pickleball is worse than badminton. Have you ever watched badminton? I mean, it's an Olympic sport, don't get me wrong. But have you ever watched badminton? It is boring as hell. You've got the little shuttlecock thing that just kinda like flies really slow. Pickleball is fucking horrible. So yeah, could it save us? If it saves us, then great. I'll be wrong, but it's a horrible sport.
Joel: I'm gonna put the odds at...
S?: 60% of the time it works every time.
Chad: That's high. That's high.
Joel: What they need to do is bring back Jarts the '70s classic, and people will start dying and we'll have less people and less things to deal with, I think, if we just did that. I don't know.
Chad: And we grew up with jarts and dodging jarts as our friends threw them at us. [laughter]
Joel: What a crazy-ass game, man.
Chad: We'll be fine. We'll be fine.
Joel: Right in the big wall down the sidewalk while your friends throw jarts at you to try to dodge them was a fun game in my neighborhood. [laughter] Well, you know what else is a fun game, Chad?
Chad: What?
Joel: Winning free shit from us.
Chad: Ooh, I like free shit.
Joel: And if you haven't played, you gotta go to chadcheese.com, click the free link and we will send you booze, t-shirts and all kinds of fun other things. Some announcements for this month's winners. Our whiskey winner goes to Jane Curran, our beer winner, that's sponsored by Aspen Tech Labs by the way, our bourbon giveaway is sponsored by Textkernel and I'm enjoying water on this week's show from my Textkernel...
Chad: Ooh, love it.
Joel: Water jug. That is Chris Russell, the mad scientist of recruiting has won some beer.
Chad: Lucky bastard.
Joel: And our birthday celebration went to Brittany Porter this month. And that is sponsored by our friends at Plum. And if you haven't gotten a free t-shirt yet, our homeboys and homegirls at JobGet are helping us give away free t-shirts. And by the way, kids, if you haven't left us a review on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you enjoy our podcast and particularly if you're a YouTube junkie, like Chad and I are, make sure you like, follow, leave a review. It's our oxygen. It's how we get better period.
Chad: Don't forget about getaways kids, because there is a $250. That's right. We're gonna give away little credit card, little Airbnb credit card once a month from the Chad and Cheese. Powered by Abode HR. So you need to get away kids, you need to go to Austria. I don't care.
[laughter]
Chad: You can go somewhere. Go to Orlando, right? Take your Airbnb card. You use it wherever you want. $250, you're gonna get it. But you can only do it if you register chadcheese.com/free or just click 'free' in the upper right-hand corner.
Joel: Love it.
[laughter]
SFX: Really? Can you feel the tension in the air right now?
Chad: Uh-huh.
SFX: I know I can.
[laughter]
SFX: I can feel it all the way down in my plums.
Joel: I think that guy is in Florida actually.
[laughter]
Joel: He was at the restaurant. All right. So that means birthday announcements, everybody. Another trip around the sun, go to fans Tom Bickle, Brittany Porter, Heather Myers, Colleen De George, Jenny Schiacha, or Schiacha, however we're pronouncing it today. Sean Pauls Ceph, Mary Ellen Slater and Cepi Nayeri, one of our big fans on this show.
Joel: Oh yeah. Love it.
SFX: Happy birthday.
Chad: And don't you forget about what events. That's right. Knebworth Park coming up July 6th. RecFest.
[music]
Chad: If you don't have tickets, yeah sucks to be you 'cause it's sold out. 5,500 people packing that fucking place. I think they're like 10 stages. Chad and Cheese are gonna be on the disrupt stage. So come find us. We're gonna be talking about tech all day. We're gonna be emceeing that stage. But just because you missed RecFest in Knebworth in London doesn't mean that you have to miss it kids. You can go to Nashville, that's right, in September, the very first time RecFest comes to the US is going to be in Nashville. Just go to Chadcheese.com, click on 'events', the entire fucking hero image. Click on the 'sign up', go get it. We've got a 50% off code. Bring the whole gang. This is a team bonding exercise and enjoy some time with Chad and Cheese at the Disrupt stage.
Joel: And don't forget a whole bunch of TA professionals being overserved for the Basement Jack's concert in Knebworth.
[laughter]
Joel: Definitely gonna be a good time.
Chad: Topics.
Joel: All the topics that are humanly possible, everybody. All right. Seattle start up Humanly raised...
Chad: Oh, it's bad.
Joel: $12 million in a series A round. This brings total funding to roughly $23 million. That's according to CrunchBase. It's platform automates recruiting functions including candidate-screening and communication. The company is investing in conversational AI to enhance efficiency and equity in the hiring process. The funding will support the expansion of engineering and their go-to-market teams. Chad, what's your take on the Humanly news?
Chad: I think we've already given, humanly, a double applause during firing squad. So Humanly is a...
Joel: Oh great tell Chad. I went back.
Chad: Oh, did you?
Joel: You were a golf clap. I was an applause. So...
Chad: Dammit. Okay, so I might be a big applause. Now, I have to be, because the chatbot revolution is in full effect kids, and you can thank OpenAI and ChatGPT for the attention and the heightened funding in that area. Here's what caught my eye from the GeekWire story. "The company is also introducing AI into analytics features for human to human conversations. These tools which run during live calls, generate insights and send follow-up emails. Now, two weeks ago we talked about Teleperformance AI and the co-pilot for customer service reps, which allows quicker uptimes, which means less training and getting them to the phones faster, faster call times so they can actually help the AI, helps the customer service individual index the information and get to resolution faster, higher quality calls, more accurate resolution."
Chad: So again, indexing the information is one thing. Being able to provide accurate information, is something entirely different. This co-pilot piece is, I'm saying the future in literally the next step, right? If we're talking about, everybody wants to know how we use ChatGPT, this is the next step. It's the co-pilot. It's, before it takes everything over, but it's the co-pilot. 30% faster calls from teleperformance means more calls can be taken and less heads are needed on the phones to achieve a better result. Not to mention, imagine how much less stressed a customer service representative is, 'cause that job fucking sucks. When you don't have to sit around and try to index and find, frantically find the right information, right? It's automatically being cued to you by the AI. Now imagine taking the same type of model to where? Oh yes, recruiting. It just makes fucking sense. This is incredibly smart and it's one of those things the right time. You gotta be at the right time and you gotta be skating to the puck and these guys are doing it.
Joel: Less heads Chad, less heads.
Chad: That doesn't sound like fun.
Joel: On One hand, this is a really feel-good story to me. They've grown organically. I gave them big applause. I'm still excited about the business. They have a really great team that's there. They're not taking on too much debt. I mean, what they've raised has not been insane. The fact that they've been able to raise money in a high-interest environment is great for them and I think speaks well to the company. It feels a lot like Qualify or some of these companies that grow organically and have good leadership. And we both love CEO, Prem there at, Humanly.
Joel: On the other hand, it feels a little bit like a knife in a gunfight. We have Paradox that's the apex predator in the space. We have got almighty Veritone, coming into the space with a lot of AI tools that Humanly can never even think about sort of building. They feel like just that it's not gonna be enough as this thing expands. Conversational AI is arguably the future of interviewing and recruiting and onboarding and all these things that's gonna happen. So a company like Humanly, while a great story, just doesn't feel like there's enough juice there unless they go super focused on like, "Hey, we're the healthcare provider." "Hey, we're the sales per... " Whatever it is. They need to go really focused, otherwise they're gonna get gobbled up by a Paradox, a Veritone, somebody that has bigger pockets, maybe an ATS that needs to plug this into their platform. So from that perspective, if acquisition is the main goal, like, I think they're definitely gonna be acquired and be a piece...
Joel: To a bigger puzzle. Till then they've got this nice bridge funding, they can continue to build the product and survive any bumps in the economic road. So for me, it's all good, but they're not gonna go public. They're not gonna be a billion dollar company. They're gonna be a nice story. A nice little lifestyle business that's gonna get eaten up by bigger fish at some point down the road.
Chad: So we talk about Paradox and how they are moving toward the ATS realm, right?
Joel: Yep.
Chad: How do you get some money? How do you look sexy for all those other decrepit fucking applicant tracking systems that are out there so that they can start to prospectively try to keep up with the new hot, sexy of the Paradoxes of the world, right? You buy these guys.
Chad: That's what you do, right? I think the co-pilot, again, the whole co-pilot idea, and we'll talk more about this in the podcast, is something that, already works first off. We have business cases that demonstrate that. And if you start to talk about what are you gonna be working with less? Less recruiters. We start downsizing recruiters. How do we augment the recruiters that we have now get them 30% better, 60% better? How do we do that? Well, it's gonna be this type of tech. If you have an old, antiquated, applicant tracking system, it's probably not, but you feel like it is. But they don't have this kind of tech, they don't have a co-pilot.
Chad: This is, I think, a prime fucking target for acquisition and that bridge funding. That's a solid gold fucking bridge, man. That's a lot of money.
Joel: Yeah. Yeah. And by the way, Prem, if you listen to last week's show, don't pull a spark higher co-mate and go buy an... Don't go buy an ATS of your own.
Chad: Don't go.
Joel: Don't be an ATS. Wait for an ATS to go buy you. I think that's what Chad is saying.
Chad: Yes.
Joel: All right. Can I interest you in a Canadian company story?
[background conversation]
Joel: That's right. Calgary-based, I believe, VidCruiter, an interviewing platform has acquired AI startup Engage Solutions to enhance its video interviewing platform with real-time intelligence. Engage's ethical AI technology, improves interview performance, reduces bias and promotes equitable hiring practices. The company says the acquisition strengthens VidCruiter's position in interview intelligence and talent identification. Terms were not disclosed. Shocking. Chad, what are your thoughts on this marriage?
Chad: Yeah, I think it's interesting that they're still going heavy on the DEI route, the anti-bias thing when... We heard AI, was really sexy at one time. Everybody was slapping it on their stuff. And then next thing you know was DEI and everybody was slapping it on their stuff. And now it's generative AI or the ability to co-pilot. So the one quote that I pulled outta here that I think that makes a hell of a lot of sense is Engage analyzes the interview process and interviewers not the candidate. So that's where the problem starts. Not with the candidate, but with the goddamn interviewer. That's where bias creeps in. But also you get really bad interviews, but guess what, guess what they have? This is gonna be a co-pilot for all of those interviewers going in. So just because you turn a dickhead manager into a great interviewer, that doesn't make him not a dickhead manager though, right? [chuckle]
Chad: You can only do so much to fix the people. Okay? Anyways, engage interviewing solutions, and I really focused more on Engage around this because they seem to be the heavy tech player that we're gonna come into and help augment the interview side with adaptive AI that improves the interview process. TensorFlow engine that evolves right alongside you. It's a machine learning scenario and real-time insights to obviously help the interviewer. To me, again, this is another co-pilot opportunity, but it's more focused on where the problem is. It's not the candidate, it's with the actual interviewer. So I think this is incredibly smart. I think, again, we were talking about it last week. If Engage actually, could have gotten in front of this and started skating to this puck a little bit quicker on the generative AI side of the house, maybe they didn't need to sell but this is where we're at.
S?: That escalated quickly.
Joel: So a little bit about VidCruiter. They were founded in 2012. They took some seed funding back then, COVID happened, everyone was like, "Video-interviewing is the thing." And I think they just stumbled into timing. Like, "Holy shit, we got an actual business now." They actually had a press release a few years ago, about hiring 100 people. Like no one does press releases about, "Hey, everybody, we're hiring 100 people, just so you know." So they're up to 200 people. So they doubled in size. That's all good news. Now you have Engage, which comes along, Stanford-built, so it's got the Stanford name on there. And they're a DEI tool. Again, another COVID darling, right? Everyone needs video. Everyone needs DEI. Two, three years later, everyone's going back to work.
Joel: DEI is on the back burner because it's just not in the budget anymore. It's not in the lexicon of society as much as it was anymore. So now you have one company that was flying high in COVID, and now maybe on lesser prosperous times, you have another one that flew up during COVID and is now on less prosperous time. So I guess the strategy here is like, "Let's get together, the bar is closing." Two companies had a great time, but now they have to realize, "Oh shit, we gotta sober up and actually do something that works. Let's go home together. Let's have a good time. Let's sleep it off. Let's hope that the world comes back to no more recession talk, no more inflation." We got an election coming up.
Joel: "Maybe if we join forces, the whole video-recruiting DEI thing is gonna be hot again. It'll be back in the lexicon, back in the discussion. And we will be boats and hoes and champagne and cocaine." I think that's the bet that's going on here. I'm certain there was very little money that went into this acquisition, probably a little bit of an acquihire, although I'm guessing the Stanford guys wanna go do something much more cooler.
Chad: More unlikely.
Joel: Than Engage. But otherwise nothing burger until the world goes back to 2021. And it's all about video and DEI.
Chad: It is interesting because when Entelo bought, what was the name of the company? It was Take The Interview and then they rebranded as something fucking.
Joel: Yeah. Convey IQ, I think.
Chad: Convey IQ. Yeah yeah Convey IQ. So they had some money that they actually got along with that acquisition. It's interesting that that didn't happen, right? Because they're gonna need a boost. It doesn't matter. And back to the co-pilot piece, it's pretty awesome, but it's just not as sexy as the co-pilot external. So, yeah. We'll see how it rolls.
Joel: We'll see what happens. Let's take a quick break, shall we?
Chad: Yes.
Joel: Now for something totally different, Marcus Harvin, a parolee and Yale College fellow, graduated with an associate degree in general studies from the University of New Haven. Through a partnership between UNHS' Prison Education Program and the Yale Prison Education Initiative. The program aims to provide education and transform the lives of incarcerated individuals, offering a path to college degrees. Harvin and his classmates are the first to matriculate from this partnership, which is part of a national consortium of 15 schools and prison systems. Chad, your thoughts on the news?
Chad: This story is amazing from the fact that an individual who committed a crime is now turning it around. And can see the light at the end of the tunnel. So that is amazing for him and six others in this program. But how fucked up is our system? Let me count the ways, Marcus Harvin, the focal point of the story was a drunk driver in an accident nearly killed two kids then that's fucking awful. But he spent six years in a Maximum Security Prison. Maximum security. Dude, he wasn't a rapist, didn't conceive a plan to murder anyone. His dumb young ass got behind the wheel while he was drunk. And then he finds himself in Max Security. In my eyes, here's where it gets worse. Yale's endowment is $42.2 billion. And we're talking about six people in this program, right? That should be 6,000 in these programs working towards 60,000 inmates in a US incarceration system that has close to 2 million at this moment right now. So this to me is inspiration porn for the alumni and people who want to talk about progress. But if you wanna see progress, here's what you do. Kids. Princeton has 37.2 billion in endowments. Stanford, 37.8, Yale 42.2, University of Texas, 43.6 billion, Harvard, 53.2 billion. That's the top five. Over $200 billion.
Chad: That we could be creating and helping thousands of communities inside, that are incarcerated, and outside. But we're talking about this inspiration porn. I love that these kids, these men got an opportunity to turn it around, but six doesn't even scratch the fucking surface over $200 billion five schools. What would happen if we started to, I don't know, give back to the community instead of our alumni?
Joel: Yeah. Yeah. So you mentioned some of the numbers. One in half million Americans are currently incarcerated. Approximately 70 million people in the US have a criminal record. We'll all remember the site 70 million jobs in sort of honor of that. Nearly 60% of formerly incarcerated individuals are unemployed one year after being released. On the other side of this we have a lot of universities that are struggling. You mentioned some of the successful ones. They're not all Texas Yale and Stanford, right? We talked about college debt being repaid. That that's coming back in the circle. What a great government program if we actually subsidized educating some of these formerly incarcerated individuals. Schools would benefit, those individuals would benefit, society would benefit. What a great program. So when I run for president that's gonna be my platform. Just kidding. [laughter] I am not getting in the ring for president. I promise you. Now...
Chad: No.
Joel: But look, it is progress. And I know you like to say it's nowhere near the progress that we want.
Chad: Dude, it's inspiration porn. It's it's not progress.
Joel: It's technically a little bit of progress, Chad, we ask a lot about... A lot of companies and we talk about MOD Pizza. We love them. We need companies to do more. We need government to do do more, and we need colleges to do more. And why not have some sort of a partnership around this where everybody wins. I hope that a name like Yale brings a lot of attention to this. This isn't Tennessee Tech, this is Yale, right? So let's see more universities do this, more government programs aim towards this, subsidize more education, and we all win. But until then, yes, it is a little bit of porn.
Chad: Bred the wealth. Yes.
Joel: It's a little bit of porn. [laughter]
Chad: It's a lot of porn.
[laughter]
Chad: For six dudes. I'm so happy for them, but, fuck, man, we can do so much more.
Joel: Yeah. How many state universities, how many community colleges, they can make so much money just like get some of these folks into college, get them in the system. Well, from that story to an overeducated, a bunch of whiny asses. And by the way where Chad and I find most of our porn. Let's talk about Google.
[laughter]
Joel: The employees are expressing frustration and venting on the company's internal forum about the strict enforcement of return-to-office requirements. Google's crackdown includes tracking employee badge swipes, which some employees feel is treating them like school children. The backlash came after an internal memo from Google's HR boss when she informed employees that the company would closely monitor office attendance and that poor attendance records could impact individual performance reviews. Employees are sharing memes on the forum to criticize the new policy and mock their bosses for attending meetings virtually while enforcing office attendance for employees. The Titan returned office policy has raised tensions within Google which currently underwent layoffs and cut some of its office perks. Chad, what's your take on this news out of Google?
Chad: They're continuing to boil the frog. They're working their way back to everybody back in the office all the time. Check my work not my badge, just pretty good bumper sticker. That's great rallying cry for them. Yeah. They literally are treating them like kids. If I'm hitting my project goals, the fuck are you here to talk about? As a matter of fact life isn't lived inside the office building, which means work doesn't have to happen there either for many of us, not all of us. The New York Post actually posted about some YouTube hypocrisy that was happening. And that, to me, I thought was amazing. The YouTube bosses were on a virtual call talking about return-to-work policy.
[laughter]
Chad: See they were on the call. This didn't hit them in the brain. They were on a virtual call talking about return to work. So this goes back to, and we've said it several times, the beatings will continue until morale improves at Google.
[background conversation]
Joel: Well, first of all I'm sure all the warehouse workers at Amazon, pinging trash cans feel really bad for the Googlers...
[laughter]
Joel: They'd have to go back to work. But look, you're right. If you're going to lead you first must lead by example.
Chad: Oh yeah.
Joel: That's a tried and true idea that you and I have heard through our whole lives. You can't tell people to get back to work from a Zoom call. You just can't do it. It's like the DJ Goldman Sachs. What was he, at a country club? And he saw employees there and he is like, "Hey get the hell out of here. Well, get back to work." Like you can't be at the club and tell everyone to get back to work. It doesn't work that way.
Chad: Yeah.
Joel: The other thing that strikes me is these people got a job at Google. Why don't they just leave? That's the ultimate voting. Like, "I'm out of here dude."
Chad: That they will, yeah.
Joel: They should. I...
Chad: Yeah they will.
Joel: That always that always strikes me. But back to your point, I'm feeling more and more the work-from-home revolution, it's bloodied, it's down. It may not be out. But it is beaten up, man. Traditional businesses are like, "Get back in the office." The commercial real estate crunch is coming, and the voice of like, "Get back in the office," is gonna be more, it's being portrayed as a moral issue from Elon Musk.
Chad: He's an idiot.
Joel: They're trying everything to get back.
Chad: They are. They are.
Joel: There was an interview with a Tech Exec recently that was like, "Well, it worked at the beginning because we were more productive, and everybody was really on on it. And now it's digressed into long lunches at Chipotle, hooking up for dates," or whatever. So everybody is back to work. Google's no exception. Everyone's gonna have to swallow it and deal with it, or just join the gig economy, start a podcast. I don't know. You do have options, but it feels like the world of work-from-home, the frog is boiling, it's almost ready to be plated. I am disheartened by what has happened with work-from-home, and a poor economy, God help us if we go to war at some big scale like... Then it's really over. But yeah, right now it's bloodied in the club.
Joel: It's on the floor, bloodied, it's not pretty. I don't know if it's gonna survive, Chad.
Chad: I think we still have the Airbnbs of the world. We still have all the organizations that are using this as a catalyst to get great talent into their organization. I tell you, any company that's out there today, especially listening to this podcast, dude, I'd be going directly after those individuals. I'd be looking on LinkedIn, I'd be going to hireEZ or wherever the fuck I can, right? Seek out to actually start pulling those candidates in and I would nail the shit out of them. And guess what? I don't give a fuck if you and your wife are banging at home during lunch. I don't care if you're doing your laundry. If you get the code out, if you make your sales, if you do everything that we need you to do, I don't care.
Joel: Get the code out, people.
[background conversation]
Joel: And we'll be right back.
Joel: All right, Chad, it's been a hot minute since we've talked about Bud Light. With a new wrinkle in the story. The Saloon, a gay bar in Minneapolis, has decided to stop serving Anheuser-Busch beverages, including Bud Light, citing a lack of integrity from the company. The decision was made due to the way Anheuser-Busch handled the backlash over their partnership with influencer Dylan Mulvaney, which led to a drop in sales and market value. The Saloon owner expressed a desire to do business with companies that support marginalized communities and have integrity. Other gay bars in Chicago have also committed to no longer serving Bud Light. Anheuser-Busch executives have acknowledged the controversy and emphasized the importance of bringing people together during divisive times. Damned if I do, damned if I don't, Chad. What's your take on this news?
Chad: So last Saturday here in Vienna, a reported 250,000 people marched in the biggest pride parade in Europe. It made me think, "Why didn't Bud Light double down, attend the pride parades all over the world with these limited edition cans?" That would have emboldened the brand to the community. But no, Bud Light, they picked a lane and then they changed lanes. One thing you cannot do, you can't pick a fucking lane, change lanes, and then expect everybody, especially when you're a brand as big as Anheuser-Busch and Bud Light, that nobody's gonna notice, right? It's why we were adamant on the show about Anheuser-Busch not backing off, especially because it was a fucking limited can promotion. They didn't change, this isn't going from Coke to new Coke. They didn't change anything other than the can, right? So this to me was just a demonstration of weak leadership at its worst. And the poor CMO got her head chopped off because of this, and she's probably happy today because these motherfuckers don't know what they're doing.
Joel: This is an all around just disaster. By the way, did you know Stella Artois is an Anheuser-Busch beer?
Chad: No, I did not.
Joel: Anyway, there are quality beers in there somewhere, one of my favorites, Stella, and the namesake of my daughter, by the way. Anyway, Garth Brooks has a new bar in Nashville. It's called Friends in Low Places Bar & Honky Tonk, and he is gonna be serving Bud Light almost in protest of this decision. He says, "If you're an asshole, there are plenty of other places on lower Broadway to go."
[laughter]
Joel: Now, of course, Garth has gotten some pushback, obviously, from that. I have to feel like, part of me says there's gotta be a huge amount of fear for companies to go political. Like, the default now is gonna be, "Don't touch it. Don't look at it, don't smell it, don't go near it."
Chad: But this isn't political. This is just a person's choice to... That's the thing is we've politicized this, and it shouldn't be.
Joel: Yeah, we do. It's not the company's fault.
Chad: It's ridiculous.
Joel: It's people are assholes. We're all assholes. Now, I have to think if Bud Light had... If they could turn back the clock, I think what they would have done is they would have gotten a Garth Brooks, or the manliest guy possible, like Sam Shepard, or the ghost of Patrick Swayze, I don't know. And they would have put them in the commercial with Dylan Mulvaney, and it would have been a funny, like, we're at the bar, beer's for everybody, we all love beer no matter where we're from or who we are.
Chad: Or who we are.
Joel: And I feel like if they could have done it differently, they might have sort of built a bridge between meathead male and progressive transgender celebrity, and somehow it would have worked. We would have laughed it off, it would have been funny. Of course, we can't go back in time. That's what it is, but I applaud Garth Brooks. He's gonna get pushed back from this, unfortunately. Again, for the reason why you can't go into politics unless you're like a Nike. Nike with Kaepernick that worked, because Nike understood rebellion, siding with their core customers was a good decision. So the Nikes of the world will continue to get political, but I fear that more companies won't touch this with a 10-foot pole, and that's a shame for society and for the greater good of everybody. By the way, Chad, RecFest, as you mentioned, is coming to Nashville soon.
Chad: Yes.
Joel: You don't think Garth Brook was... Garth was calling us assholes, do you?
Chad: No, I was gonna ask if he had a bull in his bar.
[laughter]
Joel: He better have Stella, 'cause we're coming and we're riding the bull, Garth. We are friends in low places my friend. From Orlando and Vienna, we out.
Chad: We out.
S?: Wow, look at you. You made it through an entire episode of the Chad & Cheese Podcast. Or maybe you cheated and fast-forwarded to the end. Either way, there's no doubt you wish you had that time back. Valuable time you could have used to buy a nutritious meal at Taco Bell, enjoy a pour of your favorite whiskey, or just watch big booty Latinas and bug fights on TikTok. No, you hung out with these two chuckleheads instead. Now go take a shower and wash off all the guilt, but save some soap because you'll be back. Like an awful train wreck, you can't look away. And like Chad's favorite Western, you can't quit them either. We out.
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