I'm Back! New Beginnings

After eight and a half years with Amazon and decades in corporate life, I've made the decision to step away and pursue a more balanced life focused on different forms of wealth beyond just financial success.

• Crossed 1,000 podcast downloads milestone after last episode
• Expressing gratitude for my incredible DC Security team at Amazon
• Reflecting on valuable leadership lessons and frameworks from corporate life
• Travel experiences taught me that people worldwide share fundamental values despite cultural differences
• Sahil Bloom's "Five Types of Wealth" book changed my perspective on time allocation
• Establishing new habits like daily bushwalking in the Blue Mountains
• Training for a 28km Cancer Council fundraising walk in October
• Planning a vocation that allows more time outdoors while maintaining income
• Next episode will focus on career coaching and mentoring

Thank you for following JD's Journal. Until next time, I encourage you to live your best life and be good to each other.

Transcript

Podcast Introduction and Updates

JD 0:10

Hi folk , and welcome to the JD's Journal podcast where , every couple of weeks , my guests and I share some of our life's journey , our successes , our failures and the valuable lessons that we've learned and resources that we've gathered along the way . I'd like to start by acknowledging that this podcast is being recorded on the traditional lands of the Dorug and the Gundagara people . We pay our deep respect to elders , past , present and emerging . This land is and always was and always will be Aboriginal land . The stories , opinions and recommendations here on this podcast are intended to inform and entertain you . Whilst it's always the intention to provide good advice , it should always be applied with your own good judgment and your feedback is always appreciated . The podcast is deliberately mostly unscripted and unedited and self-engineered by little old me , so you can definitely expect there's going to be some glitzers from time to time . Hopefully the nothing that takes away from the content being presented . Anyway , enough of the formalities , let's get this episode going .

JD 1:10

Hi listeners , welcome to the JD's Journal podcast , or should I say welcome back . It's been a long time since the last episode and up front I want to apologize for the extended hiatus . I'm not going to bore you with the details , but let's just say that work , travel and other aspects of life consume me a little bit more than usual , so it's great to be back . I have so much news to share in this episode . First of all , you will have heard a new theme song for this episode or for the podcast in general . A very good friend of mine , thomas Ho , reached out to me and very graciously offered to build a brand new theme , in fact , a new intro and a new outro as well , and I love them both and I'm so excited to share them with you today and going forward . I also want to share that just after the last episode back in September , we broke the 1,000 download barrier , which I know for a lot of podcasts is not a huge number , but for this little baby of mine , it was very exciting just to finally cross the line on a thousand downloads , and let's hope that we can get that moving even further as we start to rebuild

Leaving Amazon After Eight Years

JD 2:12

this podcast . So the big news for me is that after nearly four decades working for large US multinationals and eight and a half years with Amazon , last week well , actually two weeks ago now I stepped away , and for good . This is a massive change for me and I'm incredibly excited about this next chapter of my life .

JD 2:33

But before I want to share the kind of details on what the change looks like , I want to take a moment to really reflect a little bit on the past but not too much , but just a little bit to kind of share some experiences . Firstly , the past eight and a half years have been amazing . I've had the honor and the joy of working with some of the best people across the globe , including my most recent team , spread across 14 countries in Asia Pacific , japan , china , middle East and Africa . Not only are these wonderful people and then so inspiring for what they accomplish every day . They're just good people who are genuinely great to be around . Saying farewell to this team was so much harder than I'd expected . I really love them and I will miss them terribly , but I will be cheering them on from afar and continuing to monitor progress , because I know they're going to continue to do incredible things going forward . I also want to take a moment to say a huge thank you to so many people who commented or messaged me in relation to my announcement about leaving Amazon . I've been completely overwhelmed with the kindness and the generosity of the messages that I've seen , and I have a feeling that those will be a tonic that I turn to when I'm having doubts or lacking confidence in my future . So thank you to everybody who provided me with your messages for your very thoughtful sentiments . As I say , they are a gift that I will continue to appreciate .

JD 3:57

To be completely honest , you know , when I made this transition from data center operations to physical security back in November 2020 , I was completely unqualified and unprepared for the role . Some might argue that and frankly , I wouldn't push back that hard that I'm probably still not qualified for the role . There goes my imposter syndrome again and I'm going to acknowledge that'm going to move on anyway . My point is that , as is always the case as a leader , any success that I've had over this period and the fact that I survived as long as I did in the role is really completely on the shoulders of the incredible people , their knowledge , their wisdom and their patience , which allowed me to regularly be the dumbest guy in the room , and I'm quite comfortable in that position . But I've got to say this team really helped me over the last four years and I appreciate them for that .

JD 4:53

I've got so

The Global Traveler Experience

JD 4:54

much to be thankful for from my career , you know , obviously , beyond the income that it's provided . I've had the good fortune to work with some incredible leaders and some change makers and , yeah , some who are not so much but I've learned so much from these leaders the habits , the mental models that they use to change the world for better and that spawn leaders of the future , that have spawned new leaders in that period , and also the behaviors that should be avoided , and so , again through this podcast , my aim is to share some of those experiences and some of those gems that I've picked up along the way . I've learned many new frameworks and mental models , many that I expect to employ for the rest of my life and some that I definitely intend to share via this podcast in future episodes , but hopefully in ways that are accessible and applicable both in a professional and a personal context . The Amazon leadership principles , for example , were one of the major reasons why I chose Amazon back in 2017 . And while I feel like they may have lost some of their luster recently , I believe that they are a powerful foundation that other companies and communities should be mimicking in a way that suits their needs . Tenants is another thing that may be a little bit less well understood , but I've observed as an incredibly , extremely valuable mechanism for establishing the critical guardrails for teams and programs , and I intend to share this framework with you in the future as well .

JD 6:20

Through my careers at Microsoft and Nokia here , and then at Amazon , I've been so blessed to experience the multiple countries that I've called home or where I've been a regular visitor as part of my work , the magnificent diversity of people that I've been able to work with . Many of them are now lifelong friends . I've relished the vast array of cultural and culinary experiences I've had along the way . Vast array of cultural and culinary experiences I've had along the way , and , frankly , anyone who's followed me on my socials knows that , while my travel has almost exclusively been for business purposes , I've definitely taken every opportunity to take time out to see the sites and immerse myself in local cultures , and if you look at my tummy , you'll know that I've been loving the local culinary delights as well .

JD 7:11

They say that the best way to cure racism is to travel , and I , frankly , couldn't agree more with that . The more years that I've spent on the road , it's been more obvious to me that , when you strip away the politics , the media and the often negatively distorted stereotypes that we are subjected to people are ultimately the same . They want the same things . They share the same values . Generally , I still believe that , fundamentally , all humans act with the best of intentions . Their value systems may be slightly different , or significantly different in some cases , and unfortunately , as we're seeing so painfully in the current turmoil across the globe , we are , as people are , too easily coerced to be hateful or harmful through misinformation and manipulation , and so I do believe that being a world traveler helps people understand and have context that goes beyond that . This was very much for me , brought home so clearly during one of my most recent visits to China a country I love , by the way .

JD 8:10

During one of my most recent visits to China a country I love , by the way I'd been strolling through a large shopping center that , frankly , could have been any city-based shopping mall or shopping center . The store's the same , the major retail outlet's the same . In fact , I was sitting in a Kentucky Fried Chicken . Would you believe I had this thing . I like to try KFC in every country that I go to and , for the record , I'm happy to say that South Korea not surprisingly , frankly , has the best KFC in the world . They do chicken and beer like nobody else , but anyway , I was sitting in the KFC there in Beijing , watching people as I do and it could have been any major city . To my left there was a group of teenagers gossiping and laughing like teenagers do , and in front of me a family of four mum , dad , two kids just enjoying their family , outing just like that would be if it was in Sydney or in Los Angeles or in London or anywhere else in the world that I've been .

JD 9:02

It looks very much the same , and so you know , for decades we've been subjected to a paradigm of life in China that's extremely different from what I've experienced firsthand as a regular visitor . Sure , their government's very different from what we are comfortable with in the West and they apply significantly higher levels of control over local businesses and trade , and there are obvious differences in the way of life . But in my experience , for the average person in China , quality of life is generally high , infrastructure is good and I feel like they might actually be a little bit happier , to be honest , than than I see in other countries that we think are more progressive . I'm looking at real data online . I was doing some research before this podcast and you know when I look at things like poverty rates and infant mortality rates and so forth . Frankly , china and the USA are in very similar positions , and Australia and countries like Singapore and New Zealand are slightly better off , but the numbers aren't vastly different by any stretch of the imagination , which I think is quite contrary to what we're led to believe .

JD 10:07

So you know , if we live in a world where our leaders and the press focused on what unites us as humans instead of creating division by drawing our attention negatively to the differences that we have , I can tell you that , you know , I've worked with and socialized with people from more races , cultures , religions and the many attributes that we have , and , with almost zero exceptions , I've enjoyed every engagement opportunity . Anyway , I digress . The point is that I will forever cherish my time as a world traveler and the many special people in my life that I've gained as a result of that . So , beyond the effects of getting older and my resilience in coping with the regular travel diminishing , a turning point in my mindset was a great book called the Five Types of Wealth

Five Types of Wealth and Life Priorities

JD 10:54

by Sahil Bloom . It's a book that I listened to quite recently and the timing of getting into this on Audible was quite appropriate , I guess , for what was going on right now .

JD 11:04

But in the book , bloom does a tremendous job of really challenging our definition of wealth , which is often really boiled down to a financial or a measure of the things that we own , and instead he explores wealth under dimensions of time , where he thinks about time as a luxury and encourages the reader to think about the allocation of time as a luxury . A luxury , and encourages the reader to think about the allocation of time as a luxury . Social wealth , so our connection with the people around us , and he talks about the connections or the ties that we have , being a great predictor for happiness and longevity . He looks at mental wealth your mindset , your emotional resilience and the sense of purpose that you have . He talks about physical wealth how you look after your vitality and your general you know , movement and nutrition and the way that you manage your space . And then , finally , he talks about financial wealth . And I think you know , as I went through this book , it was really interesting to see the different dimensions that Bloom looks at in terms of what we value as a people .

JD 12:09

But the analogy from the book that had the most marked impact on myself was the realization that he had had that living a long distance from his parents in the US , so still in the same country , but looking at the distance and the frequency that he had a chance to visit his parents , he calculated based on his age and his expected life expectancy was that he would probably see his parents 15 more times in their life , and that really was a was a stark realization for him in terms like just counting , like I'm only going to see my parents 15 more times now . In my case , my parents both passed away a long , long time ago . But I guess my manifestation of what he was talking about in this was how often am I going to see my children and my grandchildren between now and the end of my life ? And to me , the consumption of my life in my work and the travel and so forth I was really challenged in terms of thinking about am I focusing on the right priorities or giving myself the right space to do that ? And so this triggered in me some consideration about how do I give myself more free time and so forth . And so it wasn't the only catalyst for the decision that I made , but it certainly was a big part of how I was thinking about my life and the rest of my life and where I want to spend my life . So where do we go from here ?

JD 13:26

Well , initially I'm taking some time to reset . It actually feels like a bit of a detox process to me to some degree , the process of unlearning the habits that I've been so embedded in from a life in operations and security . You know , for example , I compulsively can't leave the room without carrying my phone with me , just in case something happens . Guess what Nothing's happening . Phone with me , just in case something happens , guess what Nothing's happening . I find myself opening email literally every 10 minutes to see if something new has come in that needs my attention . Well , guess what Nothing needs my attention . With that level of urgency . I still wake up at stupid o'clock in the morning . I wake up often before the sun rises so that I can review what has occurred overnight and what my priorities need to be first thing in the day . Well , guess what Nothing significant has occurred overnight that needs my immediate action . So I will know that I've made this adjustment when I

New Habits and Future Plans

JD 14:18

can actually leave my phone behind and not care about it .

JD 14:21

From a fitness perspective , I've spent far too long , too many hours over the years sitting staring at screens , so now I'm walking pretty much every day , at least five kilometers or three miles for my Imperial friends , and most days with a six kilogram or 13 pound backpack . I had the very good fortune to live here in the beautiful Blue Mountains of Sydney , and that means that I can walk out my front door and be almost immediately in the Aussie bushlands with spectacular views of the canyons around us . Walking alone in this environment is like meditation it's therapy for the mind , while providing a reasonable level of cardio and physical movement and hopefully some of the fat burning that I need to reduce the belly that I've developed over the last couple of decades . I find that I generally need some form of a goal to motivate me to develop new habits or re-establish old ones , and so I've signed up for a 28 kilometer or 17 mile walk called the Seven Bridges Walk in October . I know that I'm not ready to walk 28 kilometers in one day right now , so I've got some motivation to get ready . This walk is to raise money for the Australian Cancer Council and , given the number of my family members and friends that have either been lost or negatively impacted by cancer , I'm excited to do my little bit to support this very important cause and , given the multiple times in some cases that they've gone through this process . I know some of this can be attributed to the important research and the treatments prevention . The reason why people are surviving today is the good work that's being done by organizations like the Cancer Council . As a bonus , the route for this walk is across seven bridges , as I said , and it provides some spectacular views , and I'll be sure to share some snaps from the day on my socials in case you want to check them out and follow me along the way .

JD 16:18

This podcast has been terribly neglected , which is shameful given the volume of content and guests that I have in the pipeline , so this will be another one of my short-term priorities . When I launched the podcast back in February of 2024 , I had no idea whether anybody would be interested , whether anybody would listen , and it was purely an experiment to see whether I could do it , would I enjoy it and so forth . And frankly , I did enjoy it and I've been quite pleasantly surprised at the number of people that I didn't even know were listening to it that have reached out to me asking for new episodes . I do have to recognize one person in particular , a data center security manager in Japan , who not only reminded me that she listens , but also took the time to write reviews on two of the episodes with her observations and how she's applying them in her life . I won't name her here , but just suffice to say I was humbled by her feedback . I felt both guilty that I had let her down and also compelled to get off my backside and bring it back to life . So thank you to that person in Japan for giving me the hard kick in the backside that I needed . I'm dedicating this episode to you .

Next Episode Preview and Closing

JD 17:30

Looking further in the future , my wife and I do have a plan of sorts . I don't expect to retire fully . I'm not ready for that and , frankly , there are things that we want to do now that need to be funded . So not earning some form of income isn't really an option for us , but I have no intention of resuming the lifestyle that I just left . So our plans revolve around a more rational , sustainable vocation and , as I hinted in a recent video that I posted on my socials , I'm hopefully going to find a vocation that allows me to be spending more time in the outdoors in the Aussie bush or that's forests for you non-Aussies . I'm not going to share too much about this topic yet , not until things have developed , but I will share more as it comes together . That pretty much wraps up this somewhat self-indulgent episode , and I thank you for listening if you've made it this far .

JD 18:23

My next episode somewhat ironically in fact addresses the topic of career coaching , both in the context of mentoring and coaching others that you might be working with , but also as self-coaching . On this topic , I've been an active , enthusiastic mentor in the corporate world for decades now , and career progression is the most common theme of these engagements . In fact , it's the most common reason that , statistically , we're seeing people leaving the organizations that we work for . Today . It's a big deal . So in this episode , I'm going to be sharing some perspectives and some resources that will help you both in terms of mentoring others , but hopefully will be tools for you to use as you think about your own career and your next steps . In the meantime , I really want to thank you again for following JD's Journal . Thank you for your kind words and your support , and until next time I encourage you to live your best life and be good to each other . Bye for now , thank you .