Jocko Underground: Chat GPT VS. Jocko Willink

Chat GPT VS Jocko's principles. Having trouble speaking up in meetings. Red teaming and critical thinking. What path to take as a young man. NoFAP? How to be successful regardless of your residence. Getting on the program? Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Jocko Willink?

  This is the Jocko Underground Podcast, number 91, sitting here with Echo Charles. Chat GPT.

• 0:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:10Jocko Willink?

  It's coming. Matter of fact, you could say it's already here. So I've been playing around with Chat GPT to see what the deal is. You've used it for something?

• 0:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:18Jocko Willink?

  What have you used it for?

• 0:19Speaker 01

  Uh, plenty. So actually, I found a lot of stuff. I don't want to go off on too much of a thing, but Chat GPT turns out so far in my experience to be a like an assistant person who's down to do all the research you need them to do forever.

• 0:36Jocko Willink?

  What have you researched?

• 0:38Speaker 01

  Oh, the last thing I researched was actually you. I said, write a script about XYZ written by Jocko Willink.

• 0:49Jocko Willink?

  How'd it do?

• 0:49Speaker 01

  Bad, terrible.

• 0:52Jocko Willink?

  I've tried that too. It's not, it's off.

• 0:55Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 0:55Jocko Willink?

  It's, it ends up with a, you get over the caricature. That's what you get. You get a caricature of my writing or of me.

• 1:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:03Jocko Willink?

  My personality.

• 1:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, it was literally, here's the, the, put it this, then again, I know it's just a state of, of like how it is right now. I understand that, like literally like next week it could be better in theory.

• 1:17Jocko Willink?

  It actually is better right now.

• 1:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, but currently, given when I did it a few days ago, whatever, it was poor, it did a very poor job, very poor job. It was using words that I literally witnessed you say, I would never use that word. And it used that word.

• 1:34Jocko Willink?

  Do you know what word it is?

• 1:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:35Jocko Willink?

  What?

• 1:35Speaker 01

  Warrior.

• 1:36Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:39Jocko Willink?

  I mean, it's not that I would never use, but there's a, there's a very specific time for that.

• 1:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, and that's what I mean.

• 1:47Jocko Willink?

  And it's not an often used word.

• 1:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, like you, I forget the exact context you said it, but it was under certain circumstances, you would say, I would never use the word warrior.

• 1:56Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:57Speaker 01

  For like for that.

• 1:58Jocko Willink?

  For that thing.

• 1:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, you said, more than once, by the way.

• 2:01Jocko Willink?

  Well, I was playing with Chat GPT, so I asked it, I asked Chat GPT, what are some flaws from Jocko Willink's principles?

• 2:12Jocko Willink?

  Pretty straightforward. It does a pretty good job. It does like a 90% job. But here's the problem. The 10% is like real critical.

• 2:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:23Jocko Willink?

  It misses. It's like saying, hey, 90% of the ingredients for your steak were correct.

• 2:33Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:33Jocko Willink?

  You know, butter, salt, pepper steak, but the part that the ingredient misses is steak.

• 2:43Speaker 01

  It landed on me as a very generic result, like a very generic

• 2:50Speaker 01

  like response to your prompts.

• 2:52Jocko Willink?

  So, so I asked it this prompt, what are some flaws from Jocko Willink's principles? And it said this, Jocko Willink is a former Navy SEAL, author and motivational speaker known for his disciplined and no nonsense approach to leadership and personal development.

• 3:10Jocko Willink?

  While he has a large following and is respected by many, there are a few criticisms associated with him. Number one, it says, and it gives bullet, that chat GPT really likes bullet points and lists. It's the first one. It says aggressive and militaristic approach. Some critics argue that Willink's leadership philosophy and communication style can be overly aggressive or militaristic. His emphasis on extreme ownership and discipline may not resonate with everyone as it can be perceived as rigid or unyielding in certain contexts. So I actually agree with that, that, that perception, because what does it call it? It says

• 3:55Jocko Willink?

  critics. Well, actually, I guess this is what's my fault. It's my fault because that's kind of what I look like.

• 4:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:02Jocko Willink?

  You know what I mean? Like I look like that. I look like aggressive and militaristic. Anybody that spends any time actually going into the principles themselves will realize that it's the opposite of rigid. In fact, Open, keeping an open mind is one of the key components. Humility is one of the key components. Listening to what other people have to say. All these things are key components. You've been here. You've heard me talk about this stuff for years. So rigid and unyielding are actually the opposite of the way I have always led. So now I get where it comes from because I also wrote a book called Discipline Equals Freedom. So they take that one thing and extrapolate it out to be

• 4:46Jocko Willink?

  an unyielding form. I mean, anybody, well, I was gonna say anybody that's ever worked for me. I wouldn't, I don't know if you work for me, but you've definitely worked with me for how long? Seven years?

• 4:55Speaker 01

  Seven years, yeah.

• 4:57Jocko Willink?

  How, how, how rigid and unyielding would you say my leadership style is?

• 5:02Speaker 01

  Not rigid and not unyielding, I'll tell you.

• 5:04Jocko Willink?

  So there you go. So out of the gate, what would you give them for a grade on that? On that statement?

• 5:11Speaker 01

  Well, it's hard to determine what they actually mean because at face value, zero or, or what'd you say, one to 10?

• 5:17Jocko Willink?

  I give him a, I give him a one.

• 5:19Speaker 01

  I would say one. And this really just reflects of like what you guys talk about, um, where you're like default aggressive, right? That's literally saying you have a shirt about it. Default aggressive. So Chad GPT is gonna pick that up and be like, well, some people don't like that aggression. They don't like that, whatever. But then the little caveat, which is very important, by the way. It's actually bigger than a caveat. It's like kind of the key component is aggressive isn't towards people. It's a towards make, it's towards making things happen. And then you're like, oh, hold, there's only one person. You gotta hold your, uh, yourself accountable, not others. Kind of so like accountability, right? Big, I'm big on accountability, kind of a thing. But for myself, though, exactly right. So.

• 6:00Jocko Willink?

  All right. They get a 1.5. So, well, you give him a one. We'll just give him a one.

• 6:05Speaker 01

  One, sure.

• 6:06Jocko Willink?

  Okay. So they get a one on that one. Next one is lack of nuance. Willing's messages and advice often emphasize personal responsibility and discipline, which some critics argue can overlook systemic or external factors that influence outcomes. They argue that his approach, it's weird that there's the they, right? Some critics quote and they like, I've never seen this stuff before, but it captures it. They argue that his approach may not adequately address the complexities of certain situations or the impact of factors beyond an individual's control. Again, I think all this stuff is is my fault because the surface kind of image or the surface impression that you're gonna get from the title of the books, right? Extreme ownership.

• 6:51Jocko Willink?

  Discipline equals freedom. Leadership, strategy, and tactics. All those books kind of imply this sort of thing. So at a surface value, I can see where chat GPT is gonna gonna miss out here. Because

• 7:06Jocko Willink?

  look, I've been, we've been doing a podcast. We have hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of hours talking about the nuance of leadership and how it applies to all these different situations. So, and that's critical.

• 7:19Jocko Willink?

  So, lack of nuance.

• 7:22Jocko Willink?

  What do you give him for a grade on this one?

• 7:24Speaker 01

  Can we give zeros?

• 7:25Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, you can give a zero.

• 7:25Speaker 01

  Okay, I give zero. This is why, because literally, your second book is called The Dichotomy of Leadership. So it's like

• 7:34Jocko Willink?

  Good point. Hey, that's a good point.

• 7:36Speaker 01

  So, lack of nuance is literally like against. If someone's like, there's no nuance. That's literally the opposite of what you're saying.

• 7:42Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, that's interesting. I mean, I'm just, I just pulled out the book Dichotomy of Leadership and the inside flap says Dichotomy provides the crucial insight and awareness necessary for leaders to understand when to lead and when to follow, when to focus and when to detach, when to tighten the reins and when to let the team run, when to aggressively maneuver and when to be prudent. Like, it's literal nuance.

• 8:05Jocko Willink?

  The only, I can't, for me, giving them a zero would mean they, there's no basis in what they're saying.

• 8:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:12Jocko Willink?

  I have to give chat GPT at least the credit of understanding what exists in some way. I'll give him a one. Can we, can we round it up to a one?

• 8:25Speaker 01

  You make a good point with like zero basis. So like basically you got it. What is chat GPT hanging on to to result in this answer? Or what'd they latch on to? It latch on to. Um, maybe it is hundred percent.

• 8:40Speaker 01

  On you kind of a thing, right? Where it's like.

• 8:44Jocko Willink?

  Yes, which is what's interesting about that is when it talks about, they argue that his approach may not adequately address the complexities of certain situations or the impact of factors beyond an individual's control. So, one of the earliest questions I got asked about this topic was someone said, hey, you know, my daughter has terminal cancer. How do I take ownership of that? And I said, hey, you can't take ownership of that. What you can take ownership of is how you respond to it. And there you go. So, this is actually addressing what is in this and it's in, I've said that a thousand times, written it. So, I'll give them a one that

• 9:25Jocko Willink?

  they knew that it's a topic, but that's about it. Next up, simplistic solutions. Some detractors argue that willing solutions and strategies may oversimplify complex problems. That's the point, by the way. While his emphasis on taking ownership and developing discipline, it's obviously this thing is everything talks about responsibility and discipline and ownership, which is kind of like me, I guess. Also, it's kind of getting at least a one. Developing discipline can be valuable. Critics contend that they may not address the root causes of issues or consider the broader context in which they arise.

• 10:04Jocko Willink?

  So, oversimplifying, maybe you're just, okay, this is one of those things where, again, wrote a book called Leadership Strategy and Tactics. We talk all the time about the fact that you can't just win the tactical battle that's right in front of you. You need to find out the long-term solution. You need to find out where the problem is coming from.

• 10:28Jocko Willink?

  That's where you need to focus your efforts. I'm giving this a one.

• 10:32Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'm assuming I understand what ChatGPT is talking about, but I actually will give it a, what did you say, one to 10?

• 10:41Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, one to 10.

• 10:42Speaker 01

  I'll give it a five.

• 10:44Jocko Willink?

  Five? Okay, how come you're giving it a five?

• 10:46Speaker 01

  Because, and this is just hanging on to that idea of oversimplifying it, because sometimes, this is less about your philosophy, though, this is more about you as a human, like actual existing human being, where certain things I think you overlook as being. Like, normal things, you overlook it. Like, just because you're you, and you're like, oh dang. You probably never really thought about that, that certain things that much.

• 11:11Jocko Willink?

  I bet that you're just wrong.

• 11:16Speaker 01

  Maybe, maybe that's just my perception.

• 11:18Jocko Willink?

  Let me give you the example. The example is, how do I get out of bed in the morning? Right? This is what you're thinking. How do I get out of bed in the morning? Oh, you want to get out of bed in the morning? Set your alarm clock when it goes off, get out of bed. Period.

• 11:32Jocko Willink?

  That's the right answer, dude.

• 11:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, I know.

• 11:34Jocko Willink?

  And you can say that there's a bunch of little mitigating circumstances, but the fact of the matter is, if you want to get out of bed in the morning, set your alarm, get out of bed in the morning.

• 11:41Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well.

• 11:43Jocko Willink?

  Your, your five just went back down to a one.

• 11:46Speaker 01

  Nope.

• 11:46Jocko Willink?

  You're actually wrong.

• 11:48Speaker 01

  Still at five, in fact. You're pushing it to five point five right now.

• 11:52Speaker 01

  Because this is, this is why. So here's the analogy where like, it's like if, if two people were yelling in your ear, right? Yelling in your ear and you just said, yeah, just ignore them. Where it's like, cool, yes, in theory, you're in a vacuum, sure, someone could find it, you could probably ignore them, but the normal person, the norm, they can't ignore them. Like, it's, you can't ignore them. It's too loud, it's too close to your ear, you can feel the warmth of their breath. Like, there's so much, so many things that, that I think, anyway, I don't know, I can't read your mind. But there's certain things that affect certain people in certain ways that don't affect you in certain ways.

• 12:26Jocko Willink?

  And I feel like. So I'm not human now.

• 12:28Speaker 01

  I feel like, no, false dichotomy. I feel like you just assume a lot of the time, not all the time, but maybe more times than you realize that certain things are literally like normal. This is a normal thing for everybody.

• 12:42Jocko Willink?

  I think I got asked this on Twitter, maybe? I'm almost positive, I got asked this on Twitter and I responded. The question was like, hey, what do you do when you're, because you know how a lot of times when I'm doing Twitter, I'm traveling? And so someone wrote like, hey, what do you do when you're on a flight? And the person behind you, it keeps kicking your chair or the, there's a baby behind you screaming and hitting your chair while you're on the flight. What do you do? And I wrote, right, I wrote, I write three chapters for my next book. Like, this is no factor to me. Like, literally no factor. So when you talk about people screaming in your ears and what, there's some people that have some kind of a medical trigger that goes off when they get yelled at? No, it's not true. Like, you're not, you're not, that's not, that's not true.

• 13:26Jocko Willink?

  If if Captain Plum can be in a prison cell in Hanoi and and take ownership of being annoyed with his cellmates, I think you can take a little ownership if someone's annoying you by being loud.

• 13:40Speaker 01

  Right, yeah, and see now you're going like with these kind of absolutes where you take this extreme situation, like probably one of the most extreme situations ever, can you compare that to everyday person and be like, look, like, what the hell, you know?

• 13:54Jocko Willink?

  But but but isn't there some validity to that?

• 13:57Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 13:57Jocko Willink?

  Because if a human being can be locked in a prison cell in a prisoner of war camp and decide that he's going to take ownership of things that are really truly bothering him

• 14:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:09Jocko Willink?

  in an area where he's trapped.

• 14:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:12Jocko Willink?

  Then someone's talking on a plane or yelling on a plane and you're gonna let that drive you crazy?

• 14:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:17Jocko Willink?

  Will you want to lash out? Like, is that where we're at?

• 14:20Speaker 01

  Uh, well, in real life, yes, because that extreme situation does, that's a very extreme situation and in certain situations, yeah, a baby crying is, I'm probably not even hear that in certain situations, especially the more extreme the situation. So, again, like you, it's comes down to simplifying it like that, where it's like you're taking something like literally a million steps down the road and you're saying, that's the same as step number one and two, it's different, it's, there's more to it than that, is what I'm saying. And I'm not saying it's bad or good, and in fact, in theory, as far as

• 14:54Jocko Willink?

  You operate.

• 14:54Speaker 01

  It's, that's how everyone operates, that's the whole point.

• 14:57Jocko Willink?

  No, that's

• 14:57Speaker 01

  There's so much

• 14:58Jocko Willink?

  That's the mistake. The mistake is saying, instead of saying, ho, I want to write a book, people say, well, yeah, how do I write a book? I say, write a thousand words a day. It takes one hour. Find that one hour, write a thousand words a day. People act like that's the craziest thing they've ever heard. People want to get up in the morning, oh, you should set your alarm clock. Oh, people want to, you know, they're having trouble working out every day? Cool, you know what I do? Go work out every day.

• 15:18Speaker 01

  Yeah, and I'm not

• 15:19Jocko Willink?

  These are not, I think, I think you're actually, you actually could be wrong here. You're over complicating things because that's human nature. That's why simplicity is such a powerful tool.

• 15:30Speaker 01

  Yes, well, yes, and I agree with that.

• 15:33Jocko Willink?

  I mean, sure, could we sit here and say there's all these different mitigating circumstances? That'll unfold when someone the alarm clock goes off and they were up late last night and their circadian rhythms off and they're they want to wake up their wife and they actually were feeling a little bit sniffly in the when they their nose is a little bunged up as they slept and there's like a bunch of things, right? A bunch of reasons and probably you need more rest and

• 15:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 15:54Jocko Willink?

  You know, uh, uh, the, the podcast told me that sleep was the most important thing for longevity, like all these things, right? There's all these things.

• 16:02Speaker 01

  Sure. Yeah.

• 16:03Jocko Willink?

  They can all, you can all keep you in bed.

• 16:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 16:05Jocko Willink?

  Pillow feel pillow feels good.

• 16:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, I get it.

• 16:07Jocko Willink?

  Warm blanket feels good.

• 16:08Speaker 01

  Right. And it's less about any specific thing. What I'm saying is you as a human being, not your, the thing is you're right about the thing. Like I said, from being like your approach to it is correct, just a little oversimplified to a level of five out of 10. So I'm saying, so again, this is like you personally, so.

• 16:26Jocko Willink?

  You know what? For the sake of brevity, we're going to go with five. We're going to go with the, with your complete, we're going to give it full credit. We're getting at five. Look, because everything's super complex.

• 16:35Speaker 01

  No, no, no, no, no, no, no, that's not what I'm saying. That's not what I'm saying at all. See, see how you're oversimplifying the thing again?

• 16:43Speaker 01

  So you got, look, do you know what, you know what tolerance is, right? Do you believe or do you, do you know or believe, I don't know, maybe you don't believe this, that different people have different levels of tolerance, like actual tolerance?

• 16:53Jocko Willink?

  Tolerance for what?

• 16:54Speaker 01

  Anything, just anything.

• 16:56Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, different people have different levels of tolerance.

• 16:58Speaker 01

  Exactly right. So even just that alone would, would make things clear that it's not just like, hey, no, you just do it. Or A, no, just ignore them. We're like, just, just the individual nuance of tolerance. It in and of itself makes it not that simple. The approach is, the approach is the same.

• 17:18Jocko Willink?

  Okay.

• 17:18Speaker 01

  Like, hey, let's work towards this, let's work towards that. Here's, here's, I think where the, where the mistake kind of comes in real life. When people will be like, hey, everyone's different. Hey, it's easier for Jocko because he has high tolerance for this stuff or whatever. Therefore, it's okay for me to slack. It's like that when they, when they come, when someone comes to that conclusion, and I'm not excluding myself either. When they come to that conclusion and use it as like a crutch, there's where the problems.

• 17:42Jocko Willink?

  Well, that's definitely a problem.

• 17:43Speaker 01

  So I understand the usefulness of your simplistic approach.

• 17:46Jocko Willink?

  Okay. So that's a good point and we'll give it a five. And for those of you that want to believe the Echo Charles system of complexity and everything's a lot harder and it makes a lot more difference and everyone's different. There's always in Jocko's this, I'm some kind of a freaking robot cyborg. So that is a little excerpt of what we are doing on the Jocko Underground Podcast. So if you want to continue to listen,

• 18:11Jocko Willink?

  go to JacoUnderground.com and subscribe and we're doing this, we're doing this to mitigate our reliance on external platforms. So we are not subject to their control and we are doing this so that we can support the Jocko Podcast, which will remain as is free for all, as long as we can keep it that way. But we, but we are doing this so we don't have to be under the control of sponsors. And we're doing it so we can give you

• 18:43Jocko Willink?

  more control, more interaction, more direct connections, better communications with us.

• 18:49Jocko Willink?

  And to do that, we are, we're building a website right now where we'll be able to utilize to strengthen this legion of troopers that are in the game with us. So thank you. It's JacoUnderground.com. It costs $8.18 a month and if you can't afford to support us,

• 19:09Jocko Willink?

  we can still support you. Just email [email protected] and we'll get you taken care of. Until then, we will see you mobilized underground.