Month: December 2022

Making Something From Nothing: CJ Looi Of PixCap On How To Go From Idea To Launch

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Talk to users often. Ideally daily. Do a lot of user discovery and validation before building.

As part of our series about the “5 Things You Need To Know To Create a Successful App or SaaS”, I had the pleasure of interviewing CJ Looi.

CJ Looi founded PixCap after a stint at Dorabot, a fast-growing robotics company where he was the head of computer vision and deep learning. His background in robotics and experience in building systems for 3D vision fueled his interest in 3D-based applications, which led him to found PixCap.

Thank you so much for joining us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you got started?

Before founding PixCap with Cyril Nie, I was in a robotics company working on deep learning and robotic vision. My job was to teach robots “how to see”. I was surrounded by highly ambitious and talented engineers, many of whom came from top robotics labs such as MIT, Carnegie Mellon and Stanford. Though I did well in my job and learned everything I could (I wouldn’t trade it for anything else), I did not feel that I was making a “real” contribution to the world. I suppose being surrounded by extremely bright people does that — you feel as though your contributions are never as impactful as those of your peers.

Then in late 2019, I was given an opportunity to join a well-known self-driving car company in Shenzhen, to help cars drive autonomously in challenging environments with deep learning and 3D vision. To an outsider, this perhaps sounded like an incredibly exciting job, and it most likely was. But my experience in robotics taught me that if I were to enter a highly competitive industry as self-driving, I would not be able to make as much of an impact as many of the talented engineers and researchers in the field.

I wanted to take my skills somewhere where I could contribute more to society and the wider ecosystem. Then I thought back to my childhood love for video games, and reflected back on the one question that had always eluded me since I was a kid — why is 3D content still so difficult, time-consuming and expensive to make? Perhaps I could do something about it, now that I have a much stronger grasp of programming and 3D.

From there, I had a lightbulb moment, and that’s when I started developing a 3D editor prototype for PixCap, which I used to eventually convince my best friend Cyril to quit his job in London and join me full-time at PixCap.

PixCap initially started as an AI motion capture solution, converting human motion from videos (e.g. dance videos) into 3D character animations. We built a 3D editor around the AI solution to help users edit and augment their animations, with the goal of simplifying the 3D content creation process in video games. Since then, we have shifted our focus towards the design market, focusing exclusively on an easy-to-use 3D editor with thousands of templates to democratize the 3D content creation process for designers, marketers and beyond.

Can you tell us a story about the hard times that you faced when you first started your journey? Did you ever consider giving up? Where did you get the drive to continue even though things were so hard?

We faced a lot of rejection and skepticism when we first started. Rejection from investors, corporate partners and potential hires were not uncommon. But the toughest rejections to handle were those from users whom we thought could have become great customers. I remember on several occasions meeting users that showed a lot of initial excitement, only for them to end up becoming disappointed and ‘ghosting’ us. One of them even told me never to call again.

We never really thought about giving up though. Being passionate about solving a hard problem certainly helps. But also the feeling of knowing we can take risks to build an amazing product from scratch is something that we are extremely grateful for, and something that we would not trade for anything else.

So, how are things going today? How did your grit and resilience lead to your eventual success?

Things are starting to ramp up — we’ve set up a strong foundation in our team and have major plans for 2023. I wouldn’t describe what we have as “success” yet, but our roadmap has never been clearer and we’re more excited than ever to launch PixCap in Jan 2023.

Grit played a huge role in getting us to this point. There were a number of moments where people doubted us, with a few saying that we’ll never make it. Internally, this made us question the usefulness of our product and cast doubt on whether we could achieve our mission of democratizing 3D content. But it seems that “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” has an element of truth. Having witnessed how far we’ve come, how much the team has grown and seeing what users have been able to create with our product has kept us going and instilled in us the resilience to face bigger challenges going forward.

It has been said that our mistakes are our greatest teachers. Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lessons or ‘take aways’ you learned from that?

The funniest mistake I made when I first started was showing a “broken” demo to an extremely well-established game company. What made it funny was that I didn’t think the demo was broken at the time; I naively assumed that the demo was good to go without any feedback or validation from target users. I sent follow up emails about the demo and kept wondering why they wouldn’t reply back. It was only after I showed the product to a different user that I was told how bad the demo actually was. Surely enough, that was the first and last time I made contact with that game company.

The takeaway? Always get users to proof check your demos, and don’t spend time targeting big companies at the early stage, as big companies often have long adoption cycles and have plenty of alternatives, especially when your product is far from ready!

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

We’re a fully remote team with employees across many countries (UK, France, Mexico, India, Vietnam, Malaysia, Nigeria, Argentina, Russia, Canada, Turkey, and lots more), ethnicities, time zones and cultures. Having a clear understanding in the organization about the company’s mission and values really makes a huge difference in impacting our culture and focus on where we should be heading. It still amazes me how we all came together and are united in our common mission of making 3D a lot more accessible to everyone.

Which tips would you recommend to your colleagues in your industry to help them to thrive and not “burn out”?

For fellow founders, be passionate about what you’re solving!

Startups are a marathon. I would advise them to think about this — Is your idea something that you truly believe in, and want to work on for the next 10 years?

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?

I’m grateful to my dad.

Growing up, my dad was very strict with me. He was a typical tiger dad. I did not always have the best grades and would be terrified just talking to him about school, or anything, for that matter. It was only until I left for college that I realized this was his way of setting me up for success, and that he has always been there to support me financially and mentally. He never told me what to study for university, which profession I should strive for, or had high expectations of who I should become. He encouraged me to forge my own path and has always been supportive of my decisions.

Ok, thank you for all that. Now let’s shift to the main focus of this interview. Approximately how many users or subscribers does your app or software currently have? Can you share with our readers three of the main steps you’ve taken to build such a large community?

We currently have close to 30,000 users from all over the world, including US, India, UK and Indonesia.

It took a lot of trial-and-error before we got to building a larger community. The three main steps are to know your ideal customer profile well, figure out their pain points and what the key messaging and unique selling proposition should be, then target the channels that they hang out in. This sounds straightforward but many early stage founders don’t always get the first step about customer profiling right. We certainly did not get this right in the beginning; it took us a couple of iterations and wake up calls before we started to figure things out.

What is your monetization model? How do you monetize your community of users? Have you considered other monetization options? Why did you not use those?

We offer a freemium subscription plan similar to Canva. Users can use the editor for free and access free templates, but have to pay a premium subscription for access to many more templates.

We used to monetize on AI credits back when we had an AI motion capture system, but have since shifted to a simpler freemium subscription model.

Thank you. Here is the main question of our discussion. Based on your experience and success, what are the five most important things one should know in order to create a very successful app or a SaaS? If you can, please share a story or an example for each.

Talk to users often. Ideally daily. Do a lot of user discovery and validation before building.
Build a community or close group of power users to get feedback and quickly iterate.
Launch and ship as quickly as possible. Launching does not have to mean a fully built product — it could be a simple design to validate hypotheses and assumptions.
Don’t scale before product market fit.
You should strive for your solution to be 10 times better. Solve a problem or pain point that users don’t have great solutions or alternatives to.

You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

I’m not a person of great influence (yet)!

To encourage people to build more and consume less. We live in an era of social media where content is highly entertaining and extremely easy to consume; the average daily social media usage for internet users is more than 2 hours! Imagine a world where people used social media less often and instead spent that time learning and building amazing things for themselves, their community or the world. 2 hours a day may not seem much, but over time it makes a tremendous difference. Albert Einstein once said “Compound interest/growth is the eighth wonder of the world. He who understands it, earns it; he who doesn’t, pays it”.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Check us out on pixcap.com and subscribe to our newsletter!

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

Thank you as well. I appreciate you reaching out for an interview.

Making Something From Nothing: CJ Looi Of PixCap On How To Go From Idea To Launch was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Makers of The Metaverse: Eric Alexander Of Soundscape VR On The Future Of The VR, AR & Mixed…

Makers of The Metaverse: Eric Alexander Of Soundscape VR On The Future Of The VR, AR & Mixed Reality Industries

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Passion — This industry is full of obsessed people who are either working on this stuff or dreaming about it while they sleep. If you don’t share that level of commitment, you are going to be beat by them.

The Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality & Mixed Reality Industries are so exciting. What is coming around the corner? How will these improve our lives? What are the concerns we should keep an eye out for? Aside from entertainment, how can VR or AR help work or other parts of life? To address this, we had the pleasure of interviewing Eric Alexander.

Eric Alexander is the metaverse innovator and creator of Soundscape VR, the world’s longest-running VR music destination. Alexander has been exploring the intersection of art and technology for over 25 years, and in 2014 his passion for audiovisual arts led to the inception of his most ambitious project yet.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit. Can you tell us a bit about your backstory and how you grew up?

I grew up in a midwest home that wasn’t very interested in computers. I saw huge potential in them, but my family saw them as a distraction, as a waste of time. I was constantly playing a game of cat and mouse to gain more access. My parents would remove the keyboard or mouse, I would replace them with my own hidden devices. My parents would install a physical lock on the computer, I would pick the lock and remove it. It wasn’t until I got to college that I would finally be able to dive fully into that world and satisfy my curiosity, but only as a hobby. I began my studies in microbiology rather than computer science, as I was too afraid that pursuing a degree and career related to computers would ruin my passion if I turned it into something I did for the money.

Is there a particular book, film, or podcast that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

Seeing the movie Avatar on a lot of edibles had an enormous impact on me in showing the power of technology and art operating at their highest levels, being teleported to a hyper-immersive 3D world that felt like magic. I immediately saw the demand for experiences of that quality level when it became the highest grossing piece of entertainment ever created.

Is there a particular story that inspired you to pursue a career in the X Reality industry? We’d love to hear it.

The inception of the Soundscape idea happened at a concert in Chicago when I was standing on the upper balcony in the front row and realized how much more enjoyable a concert is when you’re fully immersed with the artist, when there’s nothing and no one in your way blocking your view or breaking the immersion with distraction. There’s a massive chasm between the best seat in the house and the worst, and I realized VR had the potential to give everyone the ultimate concert experience from home, while being a new form of art to celebrate all music and sound.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began this fascinating career?

In my first years building Soundscape, I was viewed as a crazy person. I had this idea that I was so confident in and 100% certain that the future was leading to, but everyone I talked to was highly skeptical or dismissive of it. From 2014–2019 I built the foundations of Soundscape, pieces of virtual art that were enjoyed at places like Burning Man, but to the vast majority of the world this was a dumb idea and I was wasting my time on something that would never come to fruition. It was not until late 2020 that the tide suddenly shifted and overnight I went from being considered a crazy person to a genius for seeing the potential in the technology I started developing six years earlier. It made me realize that the best ideas are not celebrated, they are dismissed. So now I teach entrepreneurs that the best indicator that you are onto something powerful is when the majority tells you it will never work. If everyone is cheering you on, you’re probably too late.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

The funniest mistake I made when starting was believing I could do this all myself. For the first 4 years of operations, the company existed entirely as myself. I was the lead developer, creative consultant, CEO, marketing director, social media manager, video producer, sound engineer, tech support, hardware operator, as well as a dozen other roles. While it was great to get so much exposure to a variety of operations, I learned that to execute at the highest levels you need other people to get behind your vision and work together. At the same time, too many people and running by committee are just as challenging on the opposite end of the spectrum. I still wear many hats today as it improves the agility of the company and enables us to execute on ideas in a fraction of the time it takes a company 10x our size.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

The person who taught me how to think, question, and explore my reality was Carl Sagan. I was a scientist before I became interested in VR, and it was Sagan’s thought leadership that taught me to dream big and believe that anything was possible. When the media was polluting my mind and authority figures of the world were trying to teach me what they thought was right and wrong, I looked to the wisdom of the world’s greatest scientist to choose my path. There is so much noise in this world and people out there trying to influence or propagandize you into their vision of what the world should be, it’s more important than ever to find a voice of good with no ulterior motives. Sagan embodies reason, humanity, wonder, and the pure pursuit of knowledge; in a world of politicized science there is no left like him today.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

The next exciting project for Soundscape is going to be taking livestream concerts to the next level. We’ve seen an outpouring of creativity from artists during the early stages of COVID in performing from home, but that only goes so far when you have the limitations of fans experiencing that content on a phone or laptop in an isolated fashion. We can level up any stream so that friends & fans can join together in a shared experience, dancing side by side and experiencing that content in a highly immersive fashion that feels like a real life concert with a presentation that will satisfy even the most discerning audiophiles and videophiles.

Ok super. Thank you for all that. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview. The VR, AR and MR industries seem so exciting right now. What are the 3 things in particular that most excite you about the industry? Can you explain or give an example?

The first thing that excites me is the fact that this all is an enormous blank slate of untapped creativity for so many artists. Every other form of entertainment, be it books, film, or music, has a lot of history and many of the good ideas have already been taken. It’s very hard to make a music video that hasn’t been done before, you may set out to create something original only to find someone executed a similar idea decades ago. I love creating in VR knowing everything I produce is wholly original.

The second would be that these technologies are not only in the hands of the biggest companies, the real innovation is happening on a smaller scale with those that are driven by passion. Mark Zuckerberg may want you to think he invented the metaverse, but the reality is he is losing the race to many smaller companies. The last would be that these technologies have the potential to eliminate many of the problems of the real world and be a great equalizer. The music industry as a whole is designed to siphon value away from artists themselves and enrich other middlemen like ticketing companies or vendors selling 20 dollar drinks. We connect artists and fans directly which means the artist takes home more money than ever before, and the fans pay a lower price with a host of other benefits.

What are the 3 things that concern you about the VR, AR and MR industries? Can you explain? What can be done to address those concerns?

My concerns with VR mirror that of other advanced technologies like the internet, social media, or smartphones; that in time the powerful come to control them and warp their creative potential into a massive advertising and data mining tool. We see that already with Facebook/Meta where they buy their way into this industry and poison the well for everyone else, now there is a lot of justified fear around VR because Zuckerberg is in charge of the largest company. He sells his headsets at a loss so no one else can compete, and suddenly we’ve gone from new exciting fun technology to being on the fast track to dystopia and falling back into the same problems that have befallen other industries. As much as many are opposed to this, there are plenty out there that don’t value their data and will happily give away all their information to Zuckerberg to save $100 when they buy their next headset. We really need to see more conscious buying decisions from consumers on who they are choosing to support and recognize the effects of voting with their wallets. I can’t stop anyone from making those choices, all I can do is provide an alternative for people who value freedom and aren’t interested in enabling the Zuckerverse.

I think the entertainment aspects of VR, AR and MR are apparent. Can you share with our readers how these industries can help us at work?

It really depends on the industry, there will be areas where these technologies can make a larger impact than others. Training is a great example of the strength of VR, imagine you are a surgeon or an industrial worker or anyone where there is some level of risk in performing your day to day operations. Being able to lower the stakes and gain proficiency without putting anyone in harm’s way is an enormous benefit. Meetings, conferencing, and in person collaboration will also be huge, the ability to teleport across the world and be face to face with anyone in a real way has enormous benefits for productivity and the environment. And lastly remember, what is entertainment for one person is work for another, so the other side of the equation for musicians or entertainers offers less travel, more family time, and new creative tools.

Are there other ways that VR, AR and MR can improve our lives? Can you explain?

The unique thing about these technologies is that they will offer the greatest benefit to those in lower socioeconomic status. For someone who lives in a 100 sq ft apartment, the ability to teleport to a lakeside mansion is far more powerful than for someone who already lives in one. All of the metaverse technologies are great equalizers that remove the barriers that come with location, distance, and accessibility.

What are the “myths” that you would like to dispel about working in your industry? Can you explain what you mean?

The biggest myth that almost stopped me in my tracks was the idea that I had to go to school for this and pay for a piece of paper from an accredited university. I had been programmed to believe that without the validation of these educational businesses I couldn’t succeed, but the reality is the traditional education system is so far behind these new technologies they end up holding you back. With the power of the internet and the limitless information available, your mind and desire is the only limiting factor. All of my greatest successes in life have been areas in which I am self-taught and relied on my own mind for education rather than looking to validation from others.

What are your “5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In The VR, AR or MR Industries?”

1) Passion — This industry is full of obsessed people who are either working on this stuff or dreaming about it while they sleep. If you don’t share that level of commitment, you are going to be beat by them.

2) Financial Backing — The latest technologies cost a lot of money and the timeframes are long. 99% of businesses in this space are losing money today due to the heavy competition, you must have a plan to survive until the 2030s.

3) Creativity — The foundation of this industry is creativity and trying new things, just copying an existing product and bringing it to the metaverse isn’t enough to be successful, you must carve out your own niche.

4) Vision — You must understand the intersection of big ideas and what is actually possible today, as well as what future technologies will enable. You should have a 20 year vision for your product and how it will evolve during that time.

5) Dedication — It is going to take decades for these technologies to begin reach their potential, you must have a long time horizon and be willing to stick with it, rather than just try to capitalize on the latest buzzwords.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

My dream is for people to flex their critical thinking skills and use their own minds to determine their reality rather than looking to major media outlets and talking head “experts” for answers. Whether it is the New York Times, Fox News, or a tabloid at the grocery store checkout, the media has a 100+ year history of manipulation and lies to propagandize people and turn them against one another to distract from the real problems we all face. The world cannot improve in a meaningful way until these media establishments are recognized as the cancer they are and their influence is removed from society.

We are very blessed that very prominent leaders read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would like to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them 🙂

If it wasn’t for Elon I wouldn’t be here today. My investments in Tesla are what has provided the funding for Soundscape for 9 years and counting, and I’ve always looked to him in lessons for how I build my strategies and run my company.

Thank you so much for these excellent stories and insights. We wish you continued success in your great work!

Makers of The Metaverse: Eric Alexander Of Soundscape VR On The Future Of The VR, AR & Mixed… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Making Something From Nothing: Lance Zaal On How To Go From Idea To Launch

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Build a team, and a cadre of leaders. Your role will change rapidly, and you need to adjust both yourself and your organization to meet these changes as it grows.

As a part of our series called “Making Something From Nothing”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Lance Zaal.

Lance Zaal is an entrepreneur, investor, veteran, and business owner. Zaal owns and operates businesses in the tourism, hospitality, and software industries, including US Ghost Adventures, which includes the Lizzie Borden House and Brickhouse Inn Bed and Breakfast, and Junket.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your “childhood backstory”?

This can be found on my website at lancezaal.com

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

I don’t have a favorite quote.

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

Not really, but there were many books and a few films that I enjoyed and took something from.

Let’s now shift to the main part of our discussion. There is no shortage of good ideas out there. Many people have good ideas all the time. But people seem to struggle in taking a good idea and translating it into an actual business. Can you share a few ideas from your experience about how to overcome this challenge?

First, if it can’t be transformed into a sustainable enterprise, it’s probably not a great idea, and should be abandoned to pursue something that will work. The idea should be scalable, fairly inexpensive to get off the ground to gain some traction, and ideally covering its own expenses relatively quickly. All aspects of costs, risks, and revenues should be considered, while the business model and its assumptions should undergo heavy scrutiny. An experienced entrepreneur mentor is very important.

Often when people think of a new idea, they dismiss it saying someone else must have thought of it before. How would you recommend that someone go about researching whether or not their idea has already been created?

It’s not relevant. Who cares who else thought of an idea? This is fear at first thinking. What matters is creating a sustainable, strong business. Just because there are others in your market, doesn’t mean you can’t succeed in it, or even redefine it. What is important is ensuring you don’t break the law, whether that be a trademark, patent, or whatever.

For the benefit of our readers, can you outline the steps one has to go through, from when they think of the idea, until it finally lands in a customer’s hands? In particular, we’d love to hear about how to file a patent, how to source a good manufacturer, and how to find a retailer to distribute it.

Every journey, industry, and startup is different, so it’s not appropriate to make a generalization. Not every idea will be a physical product, and not every product or process may be patentable. But you need to have a solid business plan, understand your risks and costs, understand realistic opportunities to ensure sustainability, and execute your plan to achieve growth. Processes and people (your team) are the most important. You must understand your market: your competitors and the customers, and where and how things are changing. What value do you add? Why should people pay for your product or service instead of everything else they can do with their money? And how will you convince them?

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Started Leading My Company” and why?

GET A MENTOR
You’re on your own. You have no friends. The market is god.
Do things by the book, don’t cut corners. Payroll, legal.
Design is critical.
Focus and flexibility is the most important. Don’t waste your energy on things that don’t advance your vision and mission; be unrelenting and selfish with your time. Pivot quickly when it appears you’re spinning your wheels (and understand why).
Build a team, and a cadre of leaders. Your role will change rapidly, and you need to adjust both yourself and your organization to meet these changes as it grows.

Let’s imagine that a reader reading this interview has an idea for a product that they would like to invent. What are the first few steps that you would recommend that they take?

Speak to a patent attorney and an experienced entrepreneur who can help guide you.

What are your thoughts about bootstrapping vs looking for venture capital? What is the best way to decide if you should do either one?

I’m a big fan of bootstrapping first. Show it has potential, then go for the money. You’re doing this for you and your vision, not for VCs. So first make it work for you. If it’s sustainable and has scalability, then you can approach VCs- if you need to. Every situation will be different based on needed startup costs.

How have you used your success to make the world a better place?

I have hired many employees, and we touch many customers every year with our stories and experiences. Personally, this year I supported Ukraine during Russia’s invasion, which resulted in saving the lives of many Ukrainians, and helping to combat the Russian army. Read more on my website or here — https://www.linkedin.com/posts/imatveichenko_every-war-produces-heroes-as-they-say-light-activity-6995022295958220800–kSf?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop

You are an inspiration to a great many people. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.

Strengthening democracy, and humanitarian efforts to combat disease, and ensure access to clean water

We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US, with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them.

I would love to do this with anyone really. I don’t have a network and grew my business on my own and without external funding. I’d like to make new connections, maybe friends, and possibly explore other opportunities to expand my business in the travel, tourism, and hospitality space.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

Thank you as well. I appreciate you reaching out for an interview.

Making Something From Nothing: Lance Zaal On How To Go From Idea To Launch was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Making Something From Nothing: Bryan Smeltzer Of LiquidMind On How To Go From Idea To Launch

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

It will always take longer to build…before they come; You must plan for a long adoption cycle, increased cost, and lower ROI in the early years.

As a part of our series called “Making Something From Nothing”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Bryan Smeltzer.

Bryan Smeltzer is a successful consumer products business executive and entrepreneur. He has held executive-level roles in business development, product, and marketing with some of the world’s most prestigious brands, including; Oakley, TaylorMade, Adidas, K-Swiss, and Schutt Sports, among other international brands. He also founded a men’s apparel brand, successfully running a profitable business for ten years, eventually selling to a VC firm.

He also hosts a Podcast called The Visionary Chronicles. In addition, he released his first bestselling book this year, The Visionary Brand, The Success Formula Behind the World’s Most Visionary Brands. He recently received the prestigious Readers Favorite Award for BEST Non-fiction, Marketing Genre book.

He is also a member of the Board of Advisors at UCI’s BCIE along with their New Venture Program, an Innovation Advisor at the UCI’s Applied Innovation program at the Cove, a Mentor/Advisor to UCLA’s Price Center Venture Accelerator Program, and a Mentor/Advisor at the San Diego Sports Innovators Accelerator (SDSI) center.

Bryan currently oversees LiquidMind Inc., a global brand strategy firm that partners with start-ups and established mid to large-cap consumer brands to empower businesses to think differently, be different, drive a passionate culture, and execute relentlessly.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your “childhood backstory”?

Having grown up in a blue-collar family environment in North Dakota, we were taught early on how to be independent and find a way to always provide for ourselves. Having two hard-working parents who, month to month, were trying to make ends meet, it was a tough life for a family of five living in a small trailer through brutal winters.

I always knew I would leave at some point. I needed the moment to propel me into this new world outside North Dakota. This moment came during my last semester at the University of North Dakota, where I would move to California to finish my engineering degree, never looking back and with nothing in hand. I survived my first year, eventually finding a role with an aerospace company in Manhattan Beach.

After five years in the aerospace industry, I found my true calling was in consumer products. At this point, I started my apparel company, UTOPIA, an upper-tier men’s apparel collection. But, again, I started with nothing in an industry where I knew virtually nothing, eventually building over ten profitable years into a brand when I sold it to a VC firm.

After selling my apparel brand, I transitioned into consumer products, moving from my own company to working for some of the world’s most iconic brands. I started with Oakley, successfully building the Athletic Division, then I would move on to K-Swiss, where I would lead their global apparel/accessories and licensing. Eventually, I would end up at TaylorMade/Adidas Golf as their Vice President of Global Softgoods and Accessories product lines. Also, I would lead several international brands such as; SKINS performance apparel out of Australia, ARENA swim out of Italy, and ZAMST bracing/supports out of Japan.

Each was a unique experience, eventually leading me to LiquidMind, a global brand strategy firm out of Southern Cal. Having been with so many international brands, I found that this served me very well in founding LiquidMind, as I knew there was a significant void of brand services available to these companies.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

There is a portion of a scriptural verse from Ephesians 6:13, “Having done all…stand.” This verse is relevant to me, especially as I was going through the trials of being an entrepreneur and throughout life when barriers to success seemed to come out of nowhere.

Overcoming and conquering fear through faith and courage are foundational values everyone should have. Still, most do not, and this verse is a constant reminder to do as much as is humanly possible and leave the rest for divine intervention.

I have found in building my own company and eventually selling to a venture capital firm that you are only human, and all the worry in the world will not change your circumstances. So it is always best to do the best you can and stand firm, stand tall through the storms of life, both personal and professional.

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that significantly impacted you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

Yes, there have been many books I have read over the years, and each has provided a building block for my foundation to achieve success both in life and business.

These books are timeless. Each provides insight through situations you will face and offers practical knowledge for achieving your goals, the leadership to inspire teams, and knowledge to drive disruptive brands that move beyond the status quo.

My favorite biography so Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson. The book provided direct knowledge into Steve’s life, mission, and successes and failures, and it is the only book commissioned by Steve to be written by Walter.

For inspiration, I read a timeless book by Dr. Norman Vincent Peale called Bible Power for Successful Living. When you go through life, it is always good to have an anchor to hold to and to know you are not alone in your Journey. This book has been my anchor, the soul of what will lead you to a purposeful life and not lose sight of how to live your life, not just live.

For knowledge, I am an avid reader of Tom Peters. Between Steve Jobs and Tom Peters, through them, I created a foundation for my product, design, and marketing inspiration that served me well, along with a good dose of Oakley’s passion injected as well.

These are all inspirational books, but each has a specific purpose. I am an avid reader, and it is always challenging to come up with one, but this is a great start!

Ok super. Let’s now shift to the main part of our discussion. There is no shortage of good ideas out there. Many people have good ideas all the time. But people seem to struggle in taking a good idea and translating it into an actual business. Can you share a few ideas from your experience about how to overcome this challenge?

Ideas are the beginning of a long Journey. The Journey can be one where it is to aspire to become an entrepreneur or provide an idea to drive the brand forward.

Each has its challenges, but both are full of barriers and often lead to frustration and failure — those who understand that these are stepping stones to accomplishing the most in life. I often reference Thomas Edison, who is an excellent example of perseverance. He had 999 successful failures before inventing the light bulb. So it is, first and foremost, your ability to persevere through failure. It should not be your goal to succeed without failure. If you go in with this attitude, you are sure not to succeed, for no great idea has succeeded without first failing. Failure is a badge of honor and is what all great visionaries embrace.

In my new bestselling book, The Visionary Brand, The Success Formula Behind the World’s Most Visionary Brands, I discuss this process, the formula all Visionary brands embrace to succeed.

Some of the most successful brands embrace the following.

Failure | fail fast, fail often, for each failure leads you one step closer to success.
Risk | always take risks; unless you risk something, you will never accomplish anything meaningful.
Vision | define your Vision, set your foundation, and lead your brand. Never compromise for short-term gain.

When thinking of new products, define what you want to solve, define your customer, and determine the addressable market. Each of these is critical to ensure your idea is viable. There are so many variants of products in the marketplace that it is impossible to ensure no one else is doing the same product or process. The key to success is either to reinvent a current product or process, making it either easier or faster, or a revolutionary product, something new or different way to do something already established, a breakaway opportunity.

I am a big believer in “breakaway” products, which set you apart from the competition and allow for drawdown products. In building this platform, you are creating something that may not be your best seller but sets you apart from your competition and provides talking points to marketing and sales. For an idea to gain oxygen and live, you must first give a path to life, and this is done by setting a vision to provide a better way or an entirely new direction. Neither is easy, and why are so few brands, and millions of commodity imitators?

For the benefit of our readers, can you outline the steps one has to go through, from when they think of the idea until it finally lands in a customer’s hands? In particular, we’d love to hear about how to file a patent, how to source a good manufacturer, and how to find a retailer to distribute it.

I will provide a short answer to a highly complex question. I have written a book called The Visionary Brand, The Success Formula Behind the World’s Most Visionary Brands, and inside I have written extensively about this “formula” brands integrate into their foundation.

Their foundation, once established, does not change, it shifts with the times, but its character and original principles on which the company was built do not. The difference between a brand and a commodity. Brands innovate, are disruptive, and provide a lifestyle experience. Commodities do none of these.

I mention this because you must first have a defined brand or what you would like to be or provide. Then once this is established, you can build products around this positioning. This is mandatory for you to be considered authentic. With DTC becoming more critical and dominant, your ability to engage, provide value beyond product, and be consistently excellent will seal your success.

Your path to commercializing the idea is knowing who, what, when, where, how, and why. These essential questions must be answered before deciding to spend money on prototyping. So, first, concept, answer these questions, and third do a proof of concept (POC). Once you thoroughly vetted the idea through this process, you will need to build a detailed business plan and brand deck to solidify your investment and thought process.

Once these are completed, you will need to source your product for proto, ensuring you have defined all production parameters. Never go with a factory that does not have the core competencies or capacity to build your proto properly or fulfill your production as you move forward. There are many items on the checklist, too many to mention, but this provides a good start.

Having patented over 15 different products with Utility Patents, first, I would say do not bother with a design patent; always strive to get a Utility Patent, and be realistic with your chances of successfully getting a Patent. This is usually where other ideas come out of the woodwork, some in retail, but many are not. But remember, either way, the inventor has the rights to the product design or utility.

Finding a retailer starts with having a great idea, not after the fact. The retailer will be the culmination of commercializing your idea, one which you are passionate will succeed.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Started Leading My Company” and why?

The five things I wish someone would have told me before starting to lead my company;

It will always take longer to build…before they come; You must plan for a long adoption cycle, increased cost, and lower ROI in the early years.

You must be able to ride out these first initial years when the failure rate is the highest. Manage expectations for growth and always have a plan for alternate scenarios. Expect the best, but plan for the worst. This provides the confidence to have a dynamic strategy and adapt to market conditions quickly.

2. It will cost more than you planned or anticipated; always plan for higher investment, be honest with projections and realize why companies fail, with cash flow being near the top of the list.

Have a detailed Budget, track it religiously against actuals and adjust where necessary to ensure you are maintaining cash.

Also, a rapid understanding of growth can kill off a business as quickly as no growth. If you do not have time for a “cash flow breather,” it may be too late, and you will choke off your business.

3. Bootstrapping is necessary; since it will always cost more than anticipated, it should be a common practice.

However, it becomes a hindrance if you do not know how to prioritize investments. Yes, investments in your future, your livelihood as an ongoing company.

4. You will wear all hats at some point; you must understand all aspects of your company. But, unfortunately, you will not be able to hire this expertise, at least not initially.

If you do not know how to manage the financials, learn it before turning it over to someone else. The more you learn, the more prepared you are for managing the ups and downs that inevitably happen when starting and running a company.

5. It’s Lonely; when you build a true start-up with a high risk of failure, it will feel very lonely at the top.

You will not have others to lean on in a crisis, and you must be both a leader and a preacher. So you are leading the company through trying times, continually preaching that everything will work out and we will succeed, even when you may not be convinced.

It is a highly stressful feeling and one you can not necessarily share with others at work and do not want to bring home.

Let’s imagine that a reader reading this interview has an idea for a product that they would like to invent. What are the first few steps that you would recommend that they take?

First, define the who, what, why, how, when, and where? These are broad questions, but each has a specific purpose in ensuring you are thinking through what you want to achieve, how you will get there, and what it will take to realize your Vision.

There are many invention development consultants. Would you recommend that a person with a new idea hire such a consultant, or should they try to strike out independently?

If you have a good handle on developing a product or process, then my answer is an absolute no; however if you have an idea or a concept, but no idea how to create a prototype, then maybe. I do not say yes in either instance, as you will go through many steps before needing someone to support your product proto-build.

What are your thoughts about bootstrapping vs. looking for venture capital? What is the best way to decide if you should do either one?

You will be hard-pressed to get anyone interested in an idea. Therefore, it is best to first conceptualize your story with a “beauty deck” that will both impress and explain what you are looking to achieve by creating your product.

I recommend bootstrapping, finding a mentor with no ulterior motive, or an accelerator group. These two avenues for support will guide you to mentorship in areas where you need support with your weakness. Everyone has flaws; the sooner you strengthen these and improve your strengths, the better off you will be near and long term.

In deciding between the two, you must determine how comfortable you are with telling your story around the idea or if you have the current skillset to complete all aspects of the business planning process. If not, find mentors, complete these tasks, prepare through dry runs with mentors, and present to venture capitalists, but spend most of your time on DIY (do it yourself).

Ok. We are nearly done. Here are our final questions. How have you used your success to make the world a better place?

There is not enough support for the Entrepreneurs community, true Founders, starting with nothing and building something of value to others.

I know their struggles and the trials or barriers they have to overcome daily. This stress sets in and eventually bleeds into their professional and personal lives. They need support and may not always know where to turn or find a trustworthy resource with no ulterior motive.

This is why I started the Christian Entrepreneur Leadership Ministry at Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, CA. Yes, the same church was led by Pastor Rick Warren, author of Purpose Driven Life.

I hope this Ministry provides a valued service to those in need of support and a trusting environment for other Entrepreneurs with no ulterior motive other than to serve others.

I also give back time to young Entrepreneurs through voluntary mentorship. I am a Board Member at the University of California, Irvine, Beall Center for Innovation & Entrepreneurship, and UCLA’s Price Center for Innovation & Entrepreneurship, where we mentor young entrepreneurs throughout the year and provide funding to get them started in their Journey.

Find inspiration through Faith, the Faith to know that all things do work together for good. Stand tall through your trials, and know that you are not alone.

We are blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US, with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them.

#ElonMusk

#Guy Kawasaki

#TomPeters

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

Bryan can be followed through these sites;

The Visionary Chronicles: https://bryansmeltzer.podbean.com/

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Email: [email protected]

Facebook: @bryansmeltzer33

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LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/bryansmeltzer/

Making Something From Nothing: Bryan Smeltzer Of LiquidMind On How To Go From Idea To Launch was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Making Something From Nothing: Kay Giesecke On How To Go From Idea To Launch

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Learn patience. This helps with all of the above. If you expect that everything needs to be done or happen quickly, you will eventually drive yourself and everyone around you crazy.

As a part of our series called “Making Something From Nothing”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Kay Giesecke.

Kay Giesecke is Professor of Management Science & Engineering at Stanford University.

He is the Director of the Advanced Financial Technologies Laboratory and the Director of the Mathematical and Computational Finance Program. Kay is a member of the Institute for Computational and Mathematical Engineering. He serves on the Governing Board and Scientific Advisory Board of the Consortium for Data Analytics in Risk. He is a member of the Council of the Bachelier Finance Society.

Kay is the founder, Executive Chairman and Chief Scientist of Infima Technologies, a capital markets technology company building transformative prediction systems for fixed-income market participants.

Kay is a financial technologist and engineer. He develops stochastic financial models, designs statistical methods for analyzing financial data, examines simulation and other numerical algorithms for solving the associated computational problems, and performs empirical analyses. Much of Kay’s work is driven by important applications in areas such as credit risk management, investment management, and, most recently, housing finance. His research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, JP Morgan, State Street, Morgan Stanley, Swiss Re, American Express, Moody’s, and several other organizations.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your “childhood backstory”?

I grew up in East Germany behind the Iron Curtain. When I was fifteen years old, the walls came down, and the whole world opened up. It defined my childhood in an almost indescribable way. Not only was it unexpected and entirely different, but I was also old enough to experience and remember the communist systems as they were and didn’t know another way, so to speak. Communist systems were the opposite of what we are now. It was the complete opposite end of the spectrum compared to the world I had experienced before that moment in history. I was also at the right age to take advantage of the many new possibilities and explore them. And I was at the cusp of the time in life when I started thinking more seriously about my future and professional goals. The independence I gained at fifteen was inconceivable before that moment when the walls came down.

To think then, the concept of a startup was completely nonexistent. There was no such thing. When I look back to what shaped me as a founder and, more importantly, as a person, it was that defining moment in time. And I mean this two-fold. One was to experience the world in an entirely new way, but when we were under a communist regime, we had to be inventive and imaginative to get what we wanted. It was in that inventiveness that I learned to make more out of less and get creative. I’ll get into that more later in this interview.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

I don’t have a specific life lesson quote that I can point to, but I can point to life lessons I learned along the way.

When I was growing up in East Germany, you could not go out and purchase anything you wanted. There was a limited set of things you could buy, and if you wanted something — whether a toy, a game, or some sort of unavailable commodity — you had to be creative in order to make it. It forced us to be inventive and think differently and constructively. It was an unconventional upbringing. To be creative, inventive, and use our imaginations to make use of what we had available in order to have the things we ultimately wanted. This way of thinking has helped me tremendously in building a startup. In a sense, we were learning life hacks before that was an actual term.

With startups, you start out with fewer resources. Sometimes, we need to develop our own creative solutions — our hacks. How do we get to where we need to go without all the resources we’d hope to be available?

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

I don’t have one particular book or other media that significantly impacted me, but I can share that I make time to read books, primarily fiction. I recently read Pachinko by Min Jin Lee, a captivating four-generation saga of a Korean family facing constant uncertainty and misfortune. What deeply impressed me was the characters’ kindness, persistence, and determination against all the odds. (Not unlike the situation one faces building a company.)

I’m sure many say this, but it’s definitely more challenging than I thought it would be. I can understand why execution is everything — ideas are, in fact, cheap, and rather, it’s all in the execution. I now can see the wisdom in that sentiment. Everything took longer than expected, and it’s important to develop patience.

Because of my academic background, it wasn’t easy to put a meaningful timeline on development especially. It is one thing to develop a prototype in an academic setting but then taking it out to the commercial domain is another battle, a different skill set. My team and I learned new skills, techniques, and approaches to take the concept from the academic lab to a viable commercial business, which is now Infima. Infima is a fixed-income predictive analytics provider focused on the mortgage market.

After several years, I also made the decision to bring on an experienced CEO, Hendrik Bartel. I liked what he was doing at his former company, Truvalue Labs, applying AI systems to ESG problems. We talked over a series of six months or so, and it all happened very organically. It was with Hendrik and others that I sought out insights and held regular discussions as we looked to make decisions at Infima. Part of overcoming some of our challenges was to enlist the help of others, all with a varied set of experiences, skills and expertise. It made for informed decision-making.

To come up with an idea, it’s usually because someone already has experience and is fairly immersed in a space or topic rather than sitting in a vacuum. Many have a professional background or know someone who has experienced challenges doing something, and the solution to that problem leads to an aha moment. Hopefully, before deciding to take an idea to fruition, there is a lot of leg work done beforehand, as well as validation and insights from others. At least, in my experience, that’s how we came across an idea.

I’d also advise someone to do your due diligence and gather data points through independent research. Knowing the space is the number one priority, but you can never rule out that other people are working on similar ideas. They could be doing it in stealth, or it can be an idea incubated at a large company, and there is no record of it whatsoever. This reality shouldn’t stop you, but it does point back to my point of due diligence. And it goes back to what I mentioned before -ideas are cheap; it’s all in the execution.

For Infima, it wasn’t an aha moment. Instead, we developed the core technology in an academic research setting at Stanford. The idea to start a company came to fruition from the reception we received when presenting to financial industry people. That was the trigger point — not the typical way — but more of a set of circumstances coming together at the right time. We had something that was really resonating with the investment community, although we didn’t initially plan for it to become a commercial venture. It’s about doing the work, then figuring out the path to commercialization.

Filing for a patent is certainly something I can address. At Infima, we did go through the process of submitting patent applications. It’s an expensive, lengthy, and time-consuming process. I’d advise anyone looking to do so to think about the ROI. Is it necessary, and what’s the intended result? Those are some of the questions I’d ask.

We learned there are certain things that you cannot patent — such as mathematical algorithms. There’s something called “lack of patentability”. The US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), in a sense, wants to see something physical — software can be an entirely different ballgame. They changed some of their criteria several years ago. I’d go back to a business person or idea person asking why they need it before they invest in it. You may want to consider keeping the secret sauce confidential in the end if there’s no real gain from a patent.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Started Leading My Company” and why?

If someone had told me how hard it would be to build and manage the right team, raise funding, build out the technology stack, find the right partners, and do all those things a startup founder does while balancing family life and staying healthy, I probably would not have started the company in the first place! The truth is that you need to have a very generous amount of optimism to start a company. Ignorance was not bliss at first, but I’ve learned a lot along the way. I have a top four that I’d like to share:

Surround yourself with the right people. This is always important, but especially so when you’re first starting out. You have to be able to trust people who can collaborate with you, but who can also take an idea and run. It takes a special type of person to work in a startup, and it’s not just about having the smartest people. You also need people who care about deadlines and quality yet also have empathy amongst others when someone needs to pick up their kids from school.
Make time for family. Early on this is a tough one, because you’re trying to move your company forward, but if you don’t put boundaries in place. If your family isn’t happy with you, you won’t be your best at leading a company. When a founder makes his or her family’s importance known to the rest of the team, the team also feels safe to do so, too.
Take care of yourself. It’s easy to understand why so many founders crash and burn after months of not eating well, not sleeping enough, and not taking time to relax. Early on I saw that I wasn’t feeling as well and wasn’t as sharp as I could be, because I wasn’t taking care of myself. It’s really important that you create a plan and allocate time to take care of your basic human needs even when you’re in start-up mode.
Learn patience. This helps with all of the above. If you expect that everything needs to be done or happen quickly, you will eventually drive yourself and everyone around you crazy.

Let’s imagine that a reader reading this interview has an idea for a product that they would like to invent. What are the first few steps that you would recommend that they take?

As a first step, understand the industry at a very granular level and develop deep domain expertise. I’d also recommend speaking to people in the industry, gathering intel and insight. Validate the idea and your assumptions. Surround yourself with others to glean advice and build a diverse team with a set of skills that complement each other. Also, think more about the execution of the idea, not just the idea itself. How will you take it to market? Is there even a market? And so on.

There are many invention development consultants. Would you recommend that a person with a new idea hire such a consultant, or should they try to strike out on their own?

For me, I never worked with an invention consultant as this wasn’t really a “thing” or machine we were inventing; rather, it was about developing Deep Learning technologies for the mortgage and housing market.

What are your thoughts about bootstrapping vs looking for venture capital? What is the best way to decide if you should do either one?

In most cases, it isn’t easy to bootstrap a product that takes several years of research and development to get to the first version. But that’s my point of view and experience, it depends on your circumstances and the idea you are trying to bring to the market. Otherwise, you may struggle to finance that development time before there is a product to sell and any signs of product-market-fit. Fundraising is a time-consuming process that takes away time from development and running the business. So there are many factors to consider. We knew that raising external funding was the path for our success.

Ok. We are nearly done. Here are our final questions. How have you used your success to make the world a better place?

With the predictive tools for mortgage securities market participants that we’re building at Infima, our users get a more comprehensive outlook of the opportunities as well as the financial risk they are taking on. And especially the risk that they are taking in these markets and in their funds and being more aware. We all want to avoid another major financial crisis, and when we saw the crisis in 2007–2009, it was largely due to the housing market. Investors did not really understand risk, which had a catastrophic ripple effect. It’s clear they need better ways to understand risk. The more people understand risk, the more we can avoid these bad situations. The financial crisis and role mortgages was not only a national event. It was worldwide and pulled us all into a recession. It is not just about making money; there’s a larger societal issue at play. Transparency through data and more insight into risk-taking could benefit us in many ways.

Climate change is top of mind as it affects everyone in the world. Some might not see how a mortgage analytics company could make an impact, but we believe that we could indeed fight climate change by developing technology that addresses the climate impact on mortgage securities by helping investors to make more informed decisions towards more sustainable housing investments. We view this as meaningful now and see that it will become an increasingly important and exciting area in our industry in the future.

I would really like to meet Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. While he might not be everybody’s first choice since he’s not a flashy person, his decisions have such a massive impact on the US economy and, in fact, the entire world’s economy. Whenever he and the Federal Reserve Board make decisions, they have an enormous effect on Main Street and affect real people’s lives. His job is extremely difficult these days in the face of high inflation, COVID, and a looming recession in the US.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

Thank you as well. I appreciate you reaching out for an interview.

Making Something From Nothing: Kay Giesecke On How To Go From Idea To Launch was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Making Something From Nothing: Mike Lastrina & Myran Mahroo of Modern Gents On How To Go From Idea…

Making Something From Nothing: Mike Lastrina & Myran Mahroo of Modern Gents On How To Go From Idea To Launch

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Don’t be afraid to take risks — It’s a skill and you definitely have to weigh out the pros and cons, but for the most part, you’ll always land on your feet.

As a part of our series called “Making Something From Nothing”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Mike Lastrina & Myran Mahroo.

Based in Costa Mesa, CA, Mike Lastrina & Myran Mahroo, are the Owners & Co-Founders of Modern Gents, the high-quality, conflict-free jewelry brand disrupting the diamond industry.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your “childhood backstory”?

Hello, my name is Myran Mahroo and I was born and raised in Whittier, California. From an early age, I have always had the drive to be an entrepreneur, whether it was selling comic books or candy, I was always side-hustling and doing what I could to make a profit. I was raised by two immigrant parents and I inherited a hard work ethic from watching my father work long hours to provide for our family. When I was in high school, I was enrolled in a dual enrollment program, which allowed me to get my associate’s degree before I received my high school diploma. After graduating, I attended Cal Poly Pomona and was the first in my family to graduate from college. To this day, my parents have inspired me to always strive to do more and never settle for the status quo.

Hi, my name is Mike Lastrina, and similar to Myran’s story, my father was also an immigrant who constantly worked hard to build a life for our family. I grew up in Long Beach, California and from an early age, I have always had a desire to be an entrepreneur and start my own business so that I could be financially independent and push myself to do more than my parents and grandparents were able to.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

Mike — One of my favorite quotes that I live by says, “you can measure a man’s worth by how he loves.” This quote has always resonated with me because it’s a constant reminder to stay humble and it matters most about how you treat and love others.

Myran — Nike’s “just do it” slogan has always resonated with me in every facet of my life. Although brief, this tagline is a reminder to accomplish your goals and do whatever it takes to achieve them, even if it seems daunting.

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

Myran — When Mike and I started our business, Gary Vaynerchuk’s online content was very influential and transformed the way that we conduct our business. Gary’s no-excuse mentality, stood out to both of us and has always influenced our decisions and approaches as entrepreneurs.

Myran — Taking an idea and turning it into a business can be very overwhelming and discouraging to young entrepreneurs. Without passion, a great idea can only take you so far. I believe that one of the most important aspects of business is knowing when to pivot when ideas no longer work. Having a good idea and a market evaluation is good enough to see if the market wants or needs your service to begin with.

Myran — It would all depend on the type of market that your product would fall under. If you’re entering an overly saturated market, it would be easier to instead identify the gaps and holes where other brands have missed the mark. We would recommend researching brands within a saturated market to identify what these brands could be doing better and pinpoint what your differentiating factor would be. Research can allow you to know the strengths and weaknesses of your competitors and create messaging and branding that appeals to your target audience.

Myran: Each business is different but we live in the era of information having Google and Youtube. Essentially, any informational website can give you a ton of useful information depending on what you are doing. There are so many resources and how-to guides available that didn’t even exist a few years ago. These guides are extremely specific to the type of business you are going for, but they do require your time and research. You skip a lot of steps by having this information out there and readily available, so, these resources are major. I recommend starting with Alibaba or any other supplier search engine for manufacturing purposes. As for patents, the process can be quite lengthy so I suggest using a platform or service like PatentsKart so they can head that up for you.

Mike: Shopify is a great retailer not only to get you started but in the long run too. It’s direct to consumer and a trusted retailer amongst many businesses so that’d be my recommendation for distribution.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Started Leading My Company” and why?

Mike:

Avoid seeking/using any investment money — A lot of people think fundraising is a crucial step but I advise you to use your own capital and bootstrap. Investors will take ownership but if you use your own means it shows you are dedicated to your business and that you yourself believe in it.
Look at the bigger picture — Some entrepreneurs have become too narrow in how they view what the business should look like. I suggest focusing on the bigger picture including what the business can become and looking at how to scale and infrastructure the brand so it’s set up for success in the long run.
Reinvest all of the money back into the business — Avoid spending all the money and profit earned on personal items but rather invest all that money back into the business! Also, if you go the investor route, at all costs do not use any of the investment funds for personal use.
Try to think about what would be a recession-proof, pandemic-proof business — This advice will take you far. As recession-proof business owners, we’ve seen how true this advice has rung over the last three years.

Myran:

Don’t be afraid to take risks — It’s a skill and you definitely have to weigh out the pros and cons, but for the most part, you’ll always land on your feet.
Don’t focus too much on perfection during the beginning days — At first, a lot of brands spend tons of money on tiny details like branding concepts, logos, etc., and then they eventually launch, and their product unfortunately flops. Instead, utilize the resources that you have available and select an MVP (minimum viable product) to get your feet wet and worry about the more challenging tasks later.

Let’s imagine that a reader reading this interview has an idea for a product that they would like to invent. What are the first few steps that you would recommend that they take?

Myran: Do market research to figure out if your product is something that’s brand new or already out there. If it’s brand new, get a patent as soon as possible. If it’s already out there, figure out a way to position your product where it has a really strong competitor edge. Then, you can go on to produce small quantities of the product, even having friends and family test it out so you can hear their feedback. Next, if the feedback is positive, conduct a manufacturing round and crowdfund for the first few rounds of financing. Then, if all works out, you should develop your product fully and scale from there.

There are many invention development consultants. Would you recommend that a person with a new idea hire such a consultant, or should they try to strike out on their own?

Myran: From an invention standpoint, maybe? It all depends on the risk-to-reward ratio. I wouldn’t suggest pouring all of your funding into a consultant but if you are confident in your idea and are fairly confident that a consultant will help get it off the ground then I say go for it.

What are your thoughts about bootstrapping vs looking for venture capital? What is the best way to decide if you should do either one?

Myran: Bootstrap 100%. I think VC is for those who are only focused on growing quickly. If you bootstrap, not only is there less risk involved but you are putting your own skin into the game. What you are putting into the company is truly what you will get out of it.

Mike: You’ve got to bootstrap all the way. This is your concept and your idea, you have to stand by it and own that.

Ok. We are nearly done. Here are our final questions. How have you used your success to make the world a better place?

Myran: We would love to give back even more, but recently we threw a dream wedding for a disabled Marine Corp Veteran. We heard his touching story and had him and his wife come into the Modern Gents office so we could hear it from him firsthand. In the end, we were able to surprise both him and his wife by letting them know that we would be taking care of their entire wedding. We had a few local vendors hop in and support as well so it was a team effort. The least we could do to give back to the brave Veterans of this country. Looking ahead to 2023, we want to do more initiatives like this.

Mike: At Modern Gents, we sell love, attainable love. Engagement rings are a symbol of love that is typically expensive and helping others affordably unlock that next threshold of love is pure magic. Giving people the realistic opportunity to take this next step is like our version of giving back to the world.

Myran: It’d be awesome if we could have a product that’s cause-focused. Definitely, something we will be working towards in 2023.

Mryan + Mike: Gary Vaynerchuk — I want to let him know he helped inspire us to start Modern Gents and gave us the confidence and tools to help us see it through to its successful state now. Honestly, I don’t need a full lunch, I’d settle for a quick coffee with him.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

Website: modgents.com

Social: @themodgents

Making Something From Nothing: Mike Lastrina & Myran Mahroo of Modern Gents On How To Go From Idea… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Ron Hamlin Of Virtual Reload On 5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In eSports

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

One thing I wish I knew about before I started was toxicity in business. I was well aware of toxicity when it came to esports but I was unaware it also existed in other areas of business as well.

As a part of our series about “5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In eSports”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Ron Hamlin.

Ron Hamlin of Greenville, South Carolina, is a foster/adoptive dad, and owner of the esports and events company Virtual Reload. He teaches people about competitive video game play. Esports is seen as a form of sports with organized teams, professional coaches and world-class players. The industry provides a brand new experience for younger generations captivated with this new sport. Hamlin unpacks why everyone should take note.

<a href="https://medium.com/media/2322f88c2e101c78277fe2d8bed1a10a/href">https://medium.com/media/2322f88c2e101c78277fe2d8bed1a10a/href</a>

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?

Virtual Reload had the privilege of hosting one of the largest regional Smash Brothers tournaments in South Carolina state history. Nearly 200 players from the region participated. We have ingrained ourselves in the local South Carolina Smase scene, host weekly and monthly tournaments, and act as Tournament Organizers for others in the community.

Connecting with local South Carolina institutions, such as Charter Schools and Private schools, from an overall esports perspective has also been interesting and rewarding. There is a lot of potential within these organizations and we would like to assist them in realizing their potential.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

My favorite life lesson quote comes from Philippians chapter 4:6–7: Be at peace and let God know your wishes in everything through prayer, petition, and supplication with thankfulness. Through Christ Jesus, the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will keep watch over your hearts and minds. My name is in honor of a distant uncle who passed away at the age of 18 from leukemia. I was in my grandparents’ home after they passed away, browsing through some of the items that were distributed to various family members. And then someone handed me my uncle’s Bible, which was complete with his name inscribed on the cover. And after that, I was permitted to keep that Bible. After looking through it a few times, I saw that it was worn out, outdated, and difficult to read. When I read some of it, I noticed that he had underlined the same sentence.

I mentored a young man named Chris who was a senior in high school and in foster care. He was a talented esports player. I took him to meet the Erskine College esports coach. Chris was offered a substantial scholarship of approximately $20,000 a year to attend Erskine and play esports. Up until that point the idea of a student receiving an esports scholarship was hypothetical to me. This was life changing for the both of us and was the catalyst for bringing what I am doing with Virtual Reload to life.

Is there a particular book, film, or podcast that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

The book Play Dead had a significant impact on me and Virtual Reload. The synopsis of the story is that technology exists and humans might get engrossed in it. We strive to educate the moderation aspect of esports. We want people to place competitive games but in a structured way. There can be detrimental effects of competitive esports so we strive to make it a positive activity of the participants. The novel Play Dead was an example of how far the detriment can go and the dangers of taking things too far.

You are a successful business leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?

Perseverance is the first trait. We have been hosting weekly Smash Bros tournaments and have not always had a great turnout. However, there are times when we will have a great turnout and these efforts lead to hosting one of the largest Smash Regional tournaments in South Carolina state history, the Swamp Rabbit Summit.

Being considerate would be the second trait. We understand that the local Smash Brothers players are keeping an eye on each available event and we try to keep them in mind when hosting each event.

The third trait would be a combination of kindness and acceptance for all who would like to participate in esports.

How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?

Virtual Reload has offered many players the opportunity to grow and showcase their talents and create a community of like minded individuals to meet, form relationships and enjoy themselves playing esports. We also hope to utilize Virtual Reload to assist individuals with disabilities through the use of adaptive technology so they too can experience competition at a high level. This will also open doors for them not previously available. Everyone deserves a chance to follow their passions and esports is a great equalizer.

How do you think this might change the world of sports?

At the moment, adaptive technologies excite me the most. Adaptive technologies allow those who may not be able to compete in physical activities, but can compete in esports and open doors for them they would not have access to, such as scholarships for competitive sports.

Keeping “Black Mirror” in mind, can you see any potential drawbacks about this technology that people should think more deeply about?

One potential drawback would be becoming so engrossed in esports or virtual reality that you neglect the important things in life: family, your personal health, and work or your education. This is a pitfall that has been around for some time, and with esports becoming prevalent at younger ages, we have made it our mission to make sure that we can not only train and educate young people in esports but help them moderate the amount of time and attention they put into esports, so that it remains a healthy extracurricular activity that they can still benefit from.

What are the 3 things that concern you about the sports industry today? Can you explain? What can be done to address or correct those concerns?

My first concern is that esports do not consider the player first. My personal view is that esports companies are too concerned with their bottom line to take the health and well being of the players who play for them or represent them as one of their first priorities.

There is a lot of pressure on players at the highest level of esports to perform, however, they do not have the same level of protection or representation as players in other professional sports leagues. Long term contracts, for example, are few and far between.

Burnout amongst professional esports players is the third concern. Professional esports careers last an average of two years. There should be a way to avoid such churn in the industry. At this point, professional esports players are putting in a substantial amount of work for much less reward than we believe they are owed. We hope to correct this in the future through our efforts with Virtual Reload.

Fantastic. Here is the main question of our interview. What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why?

One thing I wish I knew about before I started was toxicity in business. I was well aware of toxicity when it came to esports but I was unaware it also existed in other areas of business as well.

I would inspire a movement to get as many people involved in esports as possible. We started Virtual Reload to help those who unfortunately are unable to achieve scholarships or other opportunities that are currently offered to the athletically gifted. Our focus is on individuals who have other gifts, and should be rewarded for those gifts, in the same manner, but do not have the same opportunity. Our movement would consist of helping create those opportunities and helping those individuals achieve their goals.

Gary Vaynerchuk, also known as Gary Vee, inspires me. I appreciate where he came from, what his goals are, and what he has accomplished. He also owns the Minnesota Rokker, a professional esports team, so it appears he has a basic understanding of esports, and we have something in common. It would be amazing to have the opportunity to meet with him and discuss our work. We could collaborate on improving esports as a whole. His advice would be invaluable.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Website: http://virtualreload.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thevirtualreload

Twitter: https://twitter.com/VirtualReload

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/VirtualReload/

Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/thevirtualreload

Discord: https://discord.gg/PkEVQYbN

Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.

Ron Hamlin Of Virtual Reload On 5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In eSports was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Meet The Disruptors: Matt Ovenden of Borrow a Boat On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your…

Meet The Disruptors: Matt Ovenden of Borrow a Boat On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

“Be Bold” — from a former boss who was wishing me on my way as I left a role in his team for a promotion somewhere else. It’s so simple — but is such great advice for both career and life.

As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Matt Ovenden Founder of Borrow A Boat Group.

Borrow A Boat Group is an international business in the boat rental and yacht charter sector, with multiple brands and a presence in more than 65 countries, operating on a global scale, including in popular sailing destinations such as the UK, the Mediterranean, the Caribbean, North America and southeast Asia. A variety of boats are available for rental, which include sailboats, motorboats, riverboats, RIBs, catamarans, gulets, superyachts and luxury yacht charters.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?

Absolutely! Having been involved in various tech businesses in the past the focus was to launch a user-friendly platform which offered peer- to -peer charter offering boat owners the security in offsetting the costs of owning a boat or yacht coupled with a marketplace that enabled those wishing to rent a boat or charter a yacht an easy hassle-free booking system. I had considered buying a boat, then thought how about renting a boat that was sitting in the marina, resulting in a peer — peer charter economy. As a tech entrepreneur I had identified a missing part of the market where one could browse for a boat in a user-friendly way. Boating has always been a traditional marketplace, so my view was to digitise it enabling a accessibility that had not been seen before

And of which resulted in the launch of Borrow A Boat in 2017.

Borrow A Boat is my 4th business as a tech entrepreneur, previous businesses have included a cleantech consultancy, a wind farm development business, and a specialist eco-island business in the Caribbean. I once worked with Richard Branson on a project to make Necker Island as sustainable and energy efficient as possible, and then worked with him to promote clantech across the Caribbean.

We have since built the UK’s leading boat charter marketplace, now one of the largest in the world, listing over 45,000 boats in more than 65 countries for charter — with everything from a RIB up to a superyacht.

Our purpose is to digitise the boat rental and yacht charter industry worldwide, harnessing technology to make the booking process simpler and easier than ever. Using digital technology to scale the business and become the leading boat charter group in boating worldwide.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

The focus for us was to launch a user-friendly platform which offered peer- to -peer charter giving boat owners the security in offsetting the costs of owning a boat or yacht coupled with a marketplace that enabled those wishing to rent a boat or charter a yacht an easy hassle-free booking system. In a traditional space such as boating the access to such was always via individuals, Now you can go online and search thoroughly in just a few clicks.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

I think this one was rather a lesson moreso than funny, however at the very start of Borrow A Boat — we had focused on a peer-to-peer charter platform only (hence the nickname which stuck at the time “the Airbnb of boats”!) we realised that we wanted to enter the market in a fresh capacity and communication was very important in making sure that clients knew exactly what we offered. Our plan wasn’t based on professional charter fleets at the very beginning. But when fleets such as Sunsail and Dream Yacht wanted to list hundreds of their vessels from their commercial charter fleets in one go, we thought — why not!? So, we opened the channel to commercial fleets and have been growing the number of listings ever since, with the number currently running at around 45,000+ in more than 65 countries!

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

I met Richard Branson when working in one of my previous businesses as I was specifying renewable energy and other cleantech solutions for his home on Necker Island. I had dinner with him there and he was full of support to keep going as an entrepreneur and ignore anyone who tells you that you can’t do it, or it won’t work! I worked on a number of events and summits with Virgin Unite and Carbon War Room subsequently.

In today’s parlance, being disruptive is usually a positive adjective. But is disrupting always good? When do we say the converse, that a system or structure has ‘withstood the test of time’? Can you articulate to our readers when disrupting an industry is positive, and when disrupting an industry is ‘not so positive’? Can you share some examples of what you mean?

I think new companies perceived as “Disruptors” can often be positive for industry sectors. Often, they are just a bit different or operate in a different way to the norm, but this can often bring added benefits to the customer for example, or help the sector overall e.g., a business that moves a traditionally offline business more online — to increase the reach of it and ease of access, which may in turn help it grow. Disrupting can of course go too far — we’ve seen some competitors attempt things such as cutting all middlemen out and removing and up-ending the normal way an industry operates — only to find themselves blacklisted and barred from trading with large chunks of the sector!

Can you share five of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

“Be Bold” — from a former boss who was wishing me on my way as I left a role in his team for a promotion somewhere else. It’s so simple — but is such great advice for both career and life.

“Your time is limited so don’t waste it living someone else’s life” — Steve Jobs. It was around the time of the iPhone and iPad before Steve died that I was starting my first business — and he was an inspiration to me. He was big on innovation and ideas, which was particularly encouraging when I was thinking about whether to leave the comfort of a safe, salaried position to go it alone on a new idea and business.

“When you’re going through hell — keep going” — Winston Churchill. Perseverance and resilience are absolutely key for some things in life, and certainly there are moments when one has to really take the plunge. Steve Jobs said it as “I’m convinced that about half of what separates the successful entrepreneurs from the unsuccessful ones is perseverance”

“Life is not a dress rehearsal” — by my Dad! I grew up with boating, travelling a lot and spending time in Spain, and the UK boating. My Dad was a self-made businessman who was living life to the full, and he always used to say as we drove down to the river for late summer evening water skiing together, or early Sunday morning catamaran racing — Life is not a dress rehearsal, it’s happening to you now — you need to live it now!

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

Borrow A Boat is certainly not done and won’t be done until we are the biggest and best boating marketplace in the world! Boating should be accessible to all worldwide. Booking a boat for hire should be as easy as booking a rental car, apartment, or train ticket, easily browsable and bookable for anyone online, anywhere — and we are making that happen.

Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?

The Lean Startup was a great read — I found the writer’s story fascinating and very helpful from starting with an MVP and what to focus on and what matters the most in the early days of a business.

Also, Tribes by Seth Godin — and the mantra to “build your tribe”, I believe in making your customers your investors, and your investors your customers… we’ve done that a lot over the years with the abundance of crowdfunding and we’ve engaged boaters to help grow Borrow A Boat. The company has more than 2000 shareholders at the moment — and mostly all boating enthusiasts — our “tribe”!

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“Get out of your own way” — we are defined by the decisions we make, and that is the case for everything from where we live, who we choose to live with, the clothes we wear, to the job we do. We are in control of all of it — we make our own future by our own choices. Some people seem to think they don’t control these things — but we do, look back and a decision you made somewhere leads to where you are now. It’s empowering to remember we’re fully in control — and that means you’re free to build the life you want — set up the business you want, change the industry sector you want, create the work / life balance you want — it’s all within our power, just start making the decisions and taking the steps, one by one, and see what happens.

I would love to see more people embrace the outdoors and the benefits of an outdoor lifestyle — embrace the planet at the same time — embrace healthy living — for the mental health benefits, the physical health benefits — and the planet’s benefits, including raising awareness of how good it is for you to be in the outdoors, and both how amazing nature and our planet are, and that we need to build sustainability into our thinking both now and in the future.

How can our readers follow you online?

Website: https://www.borrowaboat.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/borrowaboat

Instagram: @borrowaboat

Twitter: @borrowaboat1

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Meet The Disruptors: Matt Ovenden of Borrow a Boat On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Meet The Disruptors: Raanan Naftalovich Of Shamir On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your…

Meet The Disruptors: Raanan Naftalovich Of Shamir On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Don’t be proud — let people give you the advice you need to grow.

As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Raanan Naftalovich.

Raanan Naftalovich has been President of Shamir North America since January 2015. Throughout his tenure, Raanan has been responsible for advancing Shamir’s cutting-edge designs and service capabilities, while investing in developing the North American region’s distribution network. He has played an integral role in the company since its inception, guiding the company’s manufacturing processes, marketing efforts and research & development departments.

I began at Shamir at the age of 18 and have had a passion for the optical industry ever since. I’ve worked at various positions in Shamir, including product manager, marketing director, international regional export manager, and now, president. Throughout my career, I’ve seen two main factors as essential to our success: delivering truly personal service to our customers, and a dedication towards finding cutting-edge technological solutions that move our industry forward.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

At Shamir, we’ve always been at the forefront of design innovation in the lens production industry. We utilize the latest advancements in Visual Artificial Intelligence and Big Data processing to develop lenses and coatings that improve the lives of our end consumer. We’ve also answered the call to develop products suited to the modern customer, who spends many hours watching digital screens.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

My first boss once told me that your right palm is different from your left, in the same way that one person is completely different from the next, and different business approaches are unique to each other.

When I met with a customer, they asked me tough questions about the competition. I tried to make a point that customers are different, using my palms as an example. The customer had no idea what I was talking about. I was a bit lost at that point, too. So I just put my palms together and said we’re stronger together.

Sometimes when you try to make a point it’s hard to put into words. The lesson I learned is to be honest and be human — and it’s ok to not know everything.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

I have had a mentor for many years named Hillel, who is now 83 years old and lives in Israel. He has been instrumental to my success, and I believe everybody needs to have a mentor. These are people who guide you, support you, and help you when you’re lost — in business, personally and on every level.

Hillel once told me this old saying, that “sacred cows make the best steaks.” This rather blunt philosophy meant that no approach in business should ever be put upon a pedestal; that once common wisdom can disappear with modern ideas in an instant. So you should never hold one truth to be unchangeable — as every business is adapting to new challenges every year.

I feel that a disruption is positive in an industry, when it encourages all competitors to quickly adapt and compete, for the betterment of the end consumer. When a disruption is not positive is when a development occurs that decimates many of the competing companies in the industry, thereby limiting the natural competition.

Can you share five of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

Sacred cows make the best steaks.
Be curious, and study every day.
Be as human as you can, honest as you can. And admit mistakes as soon as they happen.
Don’t be proud — let people give you the advice you need to grow.
Hire people better than yourself, that’s how you improve.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

Looking for what’s new, and what people need so we can be their solution.

We are on the lookout for the next big thing. With any luck — we’ll be the cause of it. At Shamir, we’re in the business of creating innovative solutions that modern customers actually need, to not only improve their vision, but their lives. An example of this is when business moved to video calls and conferencing, we knew instantly that we had to change our focus to developing more effective and supportive computer lenses. Another example of this is the fact that we implement AI technology to determine different needs for customers of different age groups — and with these algorithms, we can do it in a fraction of the time.

Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?

I listen to a number of media, including the New York Times Daily Podcast, the Smart List, CNET, Ted Talks Daily, and the Dropout. I feel that paying attention to the political dynamic in the United States is key to understanding the business environment here. I listen to what’s happening on the ground, for insight into what’s coming next, even in business.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

I’d say that I look at life, as I would a jar. When you’re filling your jar, there’s only so much you can take. When I feel overwhelmed, it’s important to revisit my values and my mentors, who help me unload the burden and release some of the pressure, giving me more room in my jar.

I would love to inspire a movement towards a healthy soul, mind and body. Combining physical, intellectual and personal activities is key to staying as healthy and happy as you can be.

How can our readers follow you online?

I’m most active on LinkedIn, where I also share frequent updates on new technologies and products Shamir is working on.

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Meet The Disruptors: Raanan Naftalovich Of Shamir On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

ShiftKey: Tom Ellis ’s Big Idea That Might Change The World

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

A less fun one, but get your paperwork in order because it really matters. Big ideas are great, and they are what we specialize in as entrepreneurs, but documentation and paperwork are key to making that idea a sustainable, long-term reality.

As a part of my series about “Big Ideas That Might Change The World In The Next Few Years” I had the pleasure of interviewing Tom Ellis.

Tom Ellis is the founder and CEO of ShiftKey, a marketplace technology platform transforming the future of work by empowering licensed professionals to choose their pay rate, define when and where to work, and connect directly with facilities looking to fill open workforce needs. After spending more than a decade in healthcare staffing, Ellis recognized the limitations of the traditional agency approach and was inspired to create a solution that wouldn’t just create business efficiencies, but would transform the future of work and empower licensed professionals to embrace independence and flexibility. In 2016, Ellis founded ShiftKey, headquartered in Dallas, Texas. Since then, facilities have posted more than 50 million hours of open shifts on the platform, and Hundreds of thousands of licensed professionals have engaged on the platform. In 2022, Ellis was named #1 on the Dallas 100 Fastest-Growing Companies in DFW list and was also a winner for EY’s Central Plains Regional Entrepreneur of the Year Awards.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit. Can you please tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?

ShiftKey was created to solve America’s workforce shortages by empowering licensed professionals to choose their pay rate, define when and where to work, and connect directly with facilities looking to fill open workforce needs.

ShiftKey was officially launched in 2016 and has made a significant positive and ongoing impact across the healthcare industry. The platform was built such that the facilities themselves are the ones posting available shifts — creating the first healthcare marketplace for licensed healthcare professionals, rather than simply another tech-enabled staffing company.

Over the years, I continued to add talent to the in-house development team, which worked to streamline and automate the verification process. With the need for manual recruiters and the inefficiencies of paperwork/faxing eliminated, ShiftKey 2.0 came online in 2019. Thanks to these efforts and continued investment in the platform, nurses and CNAs now have access to the ShiftKey App and can view open shifts directly on their phones. The entire ShiftKey experience, from signing up and getting their licenses and credentials verified, to browsing, bidding on, and scheduling shifts (and much more), can all be done within the ShiftKey App. 2.0 happened in 2019 but was a re-write of the entire system to a new development framework along with a ton of new features. We released the self-registration process in 2018 that eliminated the need for emailed & faxed paperwork. We have always been “mobile friendly” but the actual native applications were released in 2020.

Prior to 2020, ShiftKey achieved product-market fit with features such as an intuitive interface and powerful reporting tools that enable facilities to better manage their operations while empowering healthcare professionals with more control regarding where and when they work.

At present, ShiftKey helps managers at top-tier healthcare facilities schedule, manage costs, and maintain compliance within their facility, and ultimately improve patient care with a full schedule of nurses and professionals. Even today, I work tirelessly with the team to continue to find ways to improve and increase the value of the ShiftKey platform as a scalable tool for licensed professionals across many different industries.

Which principles or philosophies have guided your life? Your career?

When you see a gap, step in and fill it. In past jobs, whether it was a healthcare staffing agency or a sales job, my brain would immediately jump to the questions: How can we make this more efficient? How can we make this work for more people?

With ShiftKey, that is what I did and continue to do. ShiftKey’s technology platform is driving the future of work, considering all key stakeholders to create business efficiencies, solve major workforce challenges, break down workforce barriers, maximize ROI and ultimately put the focus on patient care.

And at the end of it all, it’s all about people — surround yourself with the right people. The best people will motivate you, drive you and move your business forward — those you work alongside and those you want to help empower. The ShiftKey team works collaboratively and tirelessly to offer the freedom and flexibility that licensed professionals need to allow them to effectively balance their personal priorities and values.

Ok thank you for that. Let’s now move to the main focus of our interview. Can you tell us about your “Big Idea That Might Change The World”?

Simply put, we are leading the way in transforming and expanding the future of work through tech to build a more sustainable, profitable economy. ShiftKey’s marketplace platform enables independent licensed professionals to choose their pay rate, set their availability, and connect directly with healthcare facilities with workforce needs. This approach creates a relief valve for facilities, addresses workforce shortages, and allows facilities and licensed professionals to focus on expanding access to quality patient care.

Every day, we see the headlines — healthcare workers are burning out and leaving the workforce, while workforce gaps persist and patient demand increases. If “traditional employment” was working, we would not currently be in a workforce crisis. ShiftKey addresses a persistent, increasingly relevant challenge — how to offer freedom to licensed healthcare professionals, while balancing 24/7 on-site patient needs — through a highly accessible, user-friendly platform. We are creating and providing a supportive economic environment for independent licensed professionals who value a flexible work schedule so they can prioritize their personal needs and well-being.

How do you think this will change the world?

ShiftKey is transforming the future of work, leveraging technology to empower licensed professionals to define their value, embrace independence, and prioritize their personal health, family and lifestyle needs. We are expanding access to work for licensed professionals who have been shut out of the workforce or forced to make unreasonable decisions about family, finances and well-being to conform to traditional work models.

Most importantly, we are addressing persistent barriers for both the facilities and licensed professionals, and putting the focus back on patient care, driving positive impact for communities and creating a more sustainable, equitable health system. Our technology streamlines facilities’ processes by providing easy access to synthesized, relevant workforce data, including credentials and licensing, budget analyses, and the tools to make strategic scheduling decisions.

As ShiftKey grows, our technology-driven approach provides a scalable solution to address workforce shortages in a number of other industries while empowering licensed professionals to seek the work they want, when they want. ShiftKey’s scalability transcends healthcare and is poised to revolutionize the entire licensed professional workforce. We are embracing and expanding the future of work, empowering people to work on their own terms and reinvesting in the community.

Keeping “Black Mirror” and the “Law of Unintended Consequences” in mind, can you see any potential drawbacks about this idea that people should think more deeply about?

Up until this point, I think technology has largely been used to help people work remotely, but the innovation has stopped there — and that leaves out a significant portion of our workforce. The main issue I see is what could happen if we don’t move forward and embrace truly unique and different ways of approaching work that address these barriers that have persisted for decades.

We certainly hear the fear from people “What if everyone moves to a platform like ShiftKey and facilities have no full-time staff?”, but that’s just not going to happen. In fact, we’ve seen the opposite happen with facilities that we partner with — because ShiftKey acts as a relief valve for facilities experiencing workforce needs, facilities can avoid overscheduling and burning out their existing teams, alleviating pressures and improving retention. We’re providing a solution to long-existing workforce challenges in order to focus on the things that really matter like licensed professionals’ mental and physical well-being, and a focus on patient care. We believe that licensed professionals should have a choice about how to work — whether that’s traditional employment or a more flexible model.

Was there a “tipping point” that led you to this idea? Can you tell us that story?

In 2012, while running a healthcare staffing company, I realized that the traditional agency model was broken and in desperate need of change. The legacy method of making phone calls to find licensed professionals to work was time-consuming, inefficient and ineffective for both the professional and facility. Even more modernized, tech-enabled staffing agencies presented many of these same challenges, introducing third parties and limiting visibility into potential opportunities. I even approached an independent software platform about posting available shifts online. I waited to see if nurses would be willing to log in to pick them up, and they did. However, the third-party platform had limitations — there was no feasible way to ensure each nurse had proper credentials.

Dreaming of a solution that would eliminate the endless games of “phone tag,” while also slashing costs associated with traditional agencies, I set out to create a true marketplace platform, one that would connect healthcare facilities directly with independent, verifiably licensed healthcare professionals. The idea for ShiftKey was born.

What do you need to lead this idea to widespread adoption?

We need people to buy into the vision for a very different workforce strategy in the future. We’re literally working against decades of traditional hiring and corporate structure.

The future of work is independence, freedom and choice, affirming the value of the individual and addressing systemic workforce barriers. If “traditional employment” was working, we would not currently be in a workforce crisis. ShiftKey is a solution to workforce shortages, and is addressing the needs and wants of licensed professionals and facilities to help people and advance the future of work.

We must recognize that the solution is forward-looking and based in technology, and in order for us to move towards the next phase of work, we must embrace that. The future of work is now and ShiftKey is meeting the market’s need while innovating and evolving to ensure licensed professionals are prioritized and facilities are able to care for patients. As we continue to grow, supportive, proactive, and progressive policies are needed to support independence for licensed professionals and build a more sustainable workforce for the future.

And if we get the continued support and adoption of our workforce solution, we will be able to scale our technology and solve workforce gaps across industries.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why.

Too much business

Something no one tells you as a start-up is that’s actually possible to have too much business. It’s really important to have a realistic, data-based assessment of your bandwidth, resources and the business you can take on — that way, instead of setting yourself up for failure, you set yourself up for strategic growth.

Paperwork!

A less fun one, but get your paperwork in order because it really matters. Big ideas are great, and they are what we specialize in as entrepreneurs, but documentation and paperwork are key to making that idea a sustainable, long-term reality.

People

It’s all about people — surround yourself with the right people. Ultimately, they are what will motivate you, drive you and move your business forward.

Top-Down Team Build

There’s a lot of debate about how to hire and who to hire first. What I’ve learned is, when you’re starting out, hire the best leader you can and let them build their team in alignment with their vision and priorities.

Bank evaluation

Interview your bank and other partners to make sure they truly understand your vision for your business and what you’re trying to do — otherwise, you could get taken to market with inaccurate positioning, which can not only hurt prospects in the short term, but can disrupt your positioning strategy in the long term.

Can you share with our readers what you think are the most important “success habits” or “success mindsets”?

Intentional growth mindset: Something no one tells you as a start-up is that’s actually possible to have too much business. It’s really important to have a realistic, data-based assessment of your bandwidth, resources and the business you can take on — that way, instead of setting yourself up for failure, you set yourself up for strategic growth.
Get used to paperwork: A less fun one, but get your paperwork in order because it really matters. Big ideas are great and they are what we specialize in as entrepreneurs, but documentation and paperwork are key to making that idea a sustainable, long-term reality.
Find your people: It’s all about people — surround yourself with the right people. Ultimate, they are what will motivate you, drive you and move your business forward.

Some very well known VCs read this column. If you had 60 seconds to make a pitch to a VC, what would you say? He or she might just see this if we tag them 🙂

ShiftKey is positioned to be the leader driving workforce solutions and economic empowerment through technology, impacting industries and communities across the globe.

By investing in ShiftKey’s marketplace platform, you can be part of transforming the future of work and creating more equitable access to critical services. Addressing persistent barriers for both the facilities and licensed professionals, ShiftKey’s marketplace platform is putting the focus back on patient care, driving positive impact for communities and creating a more sustainable, equitable health system.

ShiftKey’s scalability transcends healthcare and is poised to revolutionize the entire licensed professional workforce. We are embracing and expanding the future of work, empowering people to work on their own terms and reinvesting in the community.

How can our readers follow you on social media?

They can follow my personal profile Tom Ellis on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tom-ellis-27117539/

They can also follow along with ShiftKey’s most recent business updates on LinkedIn, Twitter & Instagram:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/myshiftkey/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MyShiftKey
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/myshiftkey/

Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.

ShiftKey: Tom Ellis ’s Big Idea That Might Change The World was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Makers of The Metaverse: Gianfranco Lopane On The Future Of The VR, AR & Mixed Reality Industries

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Strong communication and collaboration skills: The VR, AR, and MR industries are highly collaborative, so being able to communicate effectively and work well with others is essential. This may involve working with team members from various disciplines, such as designers, developers, and artists, to bring a project to life.

The Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality & Mixed Reality Industries are so exciting. What is coming around the corner? How will these improve our lives? What are the concerns we should keep an eye out for? Aside from entertainment, how can VR or AR help work for other parts of life? To address this, we had the pleasure of interviewing Gianfranco Lopane.

Gianfranco Lopane is the President of Smarterver, Inc., and serves as Head of Business Development in charge of the team responsible for revenue growth enablement within DatChat’s Social Network+, Metaverse, NFT, and blockchain initiatives. In his 20 years of experience, he has worked with startups as well as Fortune-500 companies like Nestle, Hertz, and XPO Logistics in different senior-level positions.

Back in 2017 he started his career in the blockchain space and co-founded an advertising network company for the metaverse and by 2018 he founded Generiqo, the company that is currently helping dozens of companies to migrate to the blockchain space. In 2014 Gianfranco obtained his Master’s degree in Commerce and Marketing (MCom) from EUDE Business School in Madrid, Spain.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Has a particular book, film, or podcast significantly impacted you?

I have read many books, but the critical three are Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson, Ready Player One by Ernest Cline, and Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan. All three novels feature complex, multi-layered plots that involve action, adventure, and philosophical explorations of the nature of virtual worlds and the human experience.

Is there a particular story that inspired you to pursue a career in the X Reality industry? We’d love to hear it.

Back in 2017 was the boom of the ICOs in the crypto industry, and I was an investor in many of these technologies, and one day talking with one of my friends, we thought, “How about with run ads in AR, VR, and MR for big companies?” He and I, both marketers, wanted to combine our knowledge with our passion. The continuation of the story is in the following questions.

Can you share a story about your funniest mistake when you first started? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

My friend and I created a company, actually one of the first companies created in Wyoming under the new crypto law, to be able to raise money to start building the technology to launch it in an ICO. We worked countless hours, and we spent money on our project. We couldn’t even raise a penny just because I was pitching the company like I was talking with developers instead of regular people who didn’t know the “Metaverse” back in the day. I learned to be plain and simple in my speech and, most importantly, to educate before moving forward in communication.

We need some help to achieve success along the way. Is there a particular person you are grateful to who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

Darin Myman, without knowing each other, we shared the same idea to make a significant impact in the Metaverse, and when we met, it was a perfect match. With his help and support along this Metaverse journey, we have gone so far together, and this is just the beginning.

Can you share the most exciting story that happened to you since you began this fascinating career?

I could interoperate between all the decentralized metaverses running ads across all the Metaverse with just a click of a button, our proprietary Dynamic NFT DRM technology. Because of this achievement, we noticed that there is almost no one there, and we decided to create our Metaverse called Habytat Smarterverse, making it simple, fun, and accessible for everyone in a near photorealistic world where everybody is part of it, owning land and a house for free.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

Habytat Smarterverse is making the Metaverse simple, fun, and accessible to all, providing a near-photorealistic world where you will own an essential part. Habytat will be full of shops, galleries, entertainment, games, pets, and other resources that will improve and change how we interact, socialize, and communicate, connecting our real lives with virtual ones. As a founder member of Habytat, you will receive premium NFT-deeded land and a house to call your own for free. For more information, visit http://smarterverse.com.

Ok super. Thank you for all that. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview. The VR, AR, and MR industries seem so exciting right now. What are the three things that excite you about the industry? Can you explain or give an example?

Some of the key benefits of these technologies include their ability to provide immersive experiences, enhance our perception of the world around us, and facilitate remote communication and collaboration.

For example, VR headsets can allow users to experience fully immersive virtual environments, allowing them to “visit” places and engage in activities that would be impossible in the real world. This can be especially useful for training, simulation, education, and entertainment. AR technology can enhance the real world by overlaying digital information and visuals onto our view of the world, providing helpful information and enhancing our ability to interact with our environment. This can be useful in various gaming, retail, and industrial applications. MR combines the best of both VR and AR, allowing users to interact with virtual objects in the real world and enhance their perception of the world around them. This can be particularly useful for tasks requiring a high spatial awareness, such as manufacturing and design. Overall, the VR, AR, and MR industries offer many potential benefits and will continue to evolve and develop in the coming years.

What three things concern you about the VR, AR, and MR industries? Can you explain? What can be done to address those concerns?

There are several potential concerns associated with the virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and mixed reality (MR) industries. Some key issues to consider include the potential for addiction and adverse effects on mental health, the potential for misuse and abuse of the technology, and the potential for privacy and security breaches.

For example, VR, AR, and MR technologies can be highly immersive and engaging, which can be a double-edged sword. While this immersion can be beneficial for specific applications, such as training and education, it can also lead to addiction and adverse effects on mental health if not used responsibly. Additionally, the ability of these technologies to enhance and alter our perception of the world raises concerns about their potential misuse and abuse. For example, VR, AR, and MR technologies could be used to create false or misleading experiences, which could have negative consequences.

Some potential solutions include implementing responsible design practices, promoting education and awareness about these technologies’ potential risks and benefits, and establishing regulations and standards to ensure their safe and ethical use.

For example, the designers and developers of VR, AR, and MR technologies can prioritize the health and well-being of users in their design decisions. This can include features that encourage responsible use, such as setting limits on usage time, providing warnings about potential health effects, and allowing users to customize their experiences to reduce the potential for adverse effects. Additionally, promoting education and awareness about these technologies’ potential risks and benefits can help users make informed decisions about their use and seek help if needed.

The entertainment aspects of VR, AR, and MR are apparent. Can you share with our readers how these industries can help us at work?

These technologies can enhance training and simulation, improve collaboration and communication, and provide new ways of engaging with customers and clients.

For example, VR headsets can create immersive training simulations that allow workers to practice and hone their skills in a realistic but safe environment. This can be particularly useful for jobs that require complex tasks or dangerous situations, such as surgery or firefighting. AR technology can provide workers with real-time information and instructions, allowing them to access information quickly and easily without switching between multiple screens or devices. This can be useful for tasks requiring a high spatial awareness, such as manufacturing and assembly. MR technology can create mixed-reality environments where workers can collaborate and interact with virtual objects and information in the real world. This can be useful for tasks that require a high level of collaboration, such as design and engineering. Overall, the entertainment potential of VR, AR, and MR technologies can be harnessed to improve efficiency and productivity at work.

Are there other ways VR, AR, and MR can improve our lives? Can you explain?

Some potential ways in which VR, AR, and MR could improve our lives include:
It provides new and immersive ways to learn and experience new things. VR, AR, and MR technologies can create interactive and engaging educational experiences that allow users to learn in a hands-on and immersive way. This can be especially useful for subjects that are difficult to teach in a traditional classroom setting, such as history, science, and art.
We are enhancing our ability to communicate and collaborate with others. VR, AR, and MR technologies can provide new ways of interacting with others, allowing us to communicate and collaborate in real time, even when physically distant. This can be useful for remote work, education, and social interactions.
They are improving accessibility and independence for people with disabilities. VR, AR, and MR technologies can provide new ways for people with disabilities to engage with the world around them. For example, VR headsets can provide people with visual impairments with audio-based navigation and orientation. In contrast, AR technology can provide real-time text-to-speech translation for people with hearing impairments.
We are improving our ability to access and interact with information. VR, AR, and MR technologies can provide new ways of accessing and interacting with data, allowing us to quickly and easily find and use the information we need. For example, AR technology can provide helpful information and context in real-time, allowing us to quickly and easily understand our surroundings and make decisions.

Overall, the potential benefits of VR, AR, and MR technologies are vast and varied. As these technologies continue to evolve and develop, they have the potential to improve our lives in many different ways significantly.

What “ myths “ would you like to dispel about working in your industry? Can you explain what you mean?

VR is only for gaming: While VR is undoubtedly a popular platform for gaming, it has many other applications, such as education, training, therapy, and even journalism.
AR is just a gimmick: While AR may have started as a novelty, it has many practical applications in fields such as medicine, manufacturing, and retail.
MR is the same as VR: While MR shares some similarities with VR, it is a different technology that combines elements of the natural and virtual worlds.
VR is unrealistic: Despite the improvements in VR technology, it may not always feel fully realistic, but it is still a natural experience. However, many VR experiences are designed to be highly immersive and can provide a sense of presence in the virtual world.
AR and MR require special equipment: While some AR and MR experiences may require specialized hardware, such as headsets or smart glasses, many can be experienced using a smartphone or tablet.

What are your “5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In The VR, AR or MR Industries?”

A strong understanding of the technologies; to create a successful career in the VR, AR, or MR industries, it is essential to have a deep understanding of the technologies and how they work. This may involve studying computer science, engineering, or a related field and staying up-to-date on the latest developments in the industry.
Creativity and problem-solving skills: The VR, AR, and MR industries are all about creating new and innovative solutions, so being able to think creatively and solve problems is essential. This may involve developing novel ideas for applications or experiences or finding creative solutions to technical challenges.
Strong communication and collaboration skills: The VR, AR, and MR industries are highly collaborative, so being able to communicate effectively and work well with others is essential. This may involve working with team members from various disciplines, such as designers, developers, and artists, to bring a project to life.
A portfolio of work: To be successful in the VR, AR, or MR industries, it is essential to have a portfolio of work to show potential employers or clients. This can include examples of projects you have worked on, demos of applications or experiences you have created, or any other relevant work that showcases your skills and abilities.
A willingness to learn and adapt: The VR, AR, and MR industries are constantly evolving, so being willing to learn and adapt to new technologies and techniques is crucial. This may involve staying up-to-date on the latest trends and developments in the industry and being open to new ideas and approaches.

I will call it quality education for all.

Access to quality education is essential for individuals’ and communities’ overall development and well-being. It provides individuals with the skills and knowledge they need to succeed in life and helps to create a more just and equitable society.

One way technology, specifically virtual reality (VR), can enhance the education experience is by providing immersive and interactive learning opportunities. VR can transport students to different locations and periods, allowing them to experience and learn about new concepts more engagingly and interactively.

In addition to enhancing the learning experience, VR technology can also make education more accessible to all. For students who may not have the resources or opportunity to visit specific locations or experience certain events physically, VR can provide an alternative way to learn and engage with the world.

We are very blessed that very prominent leaders read this column. Is there a person in the world or the US with whom you would like to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might see this if we tag them 🙂

Elon Musk, he’s a guy that thinks outside the box, and he seems funny.

Thank you so much for these excellent stories and insights. We wish you continued success on your great work!

Makers of The Metaverse: Gianfranco Lopane On The Future Of The VR, AR & Mixed Reality Industries was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Tammy Ramos Of LatinaVida On How Diversity Can Increase a Company’s Bottom Line

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Increased employee retention and promotion of diverse talent.

As a part of our series about “How Diversity Can Increase a Company’s Bottom Line”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Tammy Ramos, J.D.

Tammy Ramos, J.D. is the Executive Director of LatinaVIDA, a nonprofit who partners with organizations to support DEI goals to equip the next generation of diverse leaders to rise to the top in their careers. Tammy is also a well sought after speaker who is known for her ability to connect, engage and inspire a broad range of audiences. Her passion is to empower women of color by building community and unity while celebrating diversity.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive into the main part of our interview, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit more. Can you share a bit of your “backstory” with us?

I am a first generation Latina in my family to not only graduate from college and law school, but I’m also the first to graduate from high school. I’m also the first non-teen mom. My mother was a 16 years old girl who had run away from home and came back pregnant with me. My father was an illegal immigrant from Mexico who left her out of fear he’d be deported. I often say that I grew up on the other side of the tracks into a life of poverty, homelessness, abuse, neglect and great sadness. Today, I have the privilege to live on this side of the tracks. I’m eternally grateful for all those along the way in my journey to success who believed in me, inspired me, opened doors for me and basically — took a chance on me. I find myself in this career because my high calling has always been to make my life count for something — to do good in a broken world, and as the last sentence of my essay for law school admittance says, “… to be the voice, power and strength of the unheard, weak and helpless.”

Can you share the funniest or most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career? Can you tell us the lesson or take away, you took out of that story?

The funniest — I can’t think of anything, but the most interesting may be the fact that I went to law school with Amy Coney Barrett who now sits in the U.S. Supreme Court. Unlike Amy, I entered the legal profession with no privilege, connections, resources, etc. I entered a law firm of 35 attorneys — 33 were middle aged white men and one white woman; I was the only person of color. I did not feel like I belonged. I saw my diversity, my cultural identity, and my gender as liabilities. I did everything I could to assimilate, to fit, to belong. It was painful, lonely and exhausting. Back in 1996, we didn’t talk about DEI. Women of color like me were simply trying to survive in a world never created for us and often hostile to us.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you tell us a story about how that was relevant in your own life?

“I can do all things through Christ, who strengthens me.” Philippians 4:13 As a girl born into poverty, abuse, addiction, neglect and great trauma, I came to know the Lord in an orphanage at the age of 11 years old. Through the deepest, darkest traumatic and painful moments, I would repeat, “I can do all things through Christ, who strengthens me.” Although I was helpless, I found comfort in knowing that there was someone else I could count on to give me strength.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are?

The most important piece of advice I share often is that we need people along the way to support us in life and career. Some may be mentors, others sponsors, coaches, counselors, colleagues, friends, family, professors, bosses, allies, etc. What all these people have in common is — your best interest. They want to see you happy and successful. I have been blessed to have had many lifelong believers in Tammy Ramos. One story is of my foster mom, Mary Pena. She was the leader of the Mecha Club at my high school. She saw that I had no home, no family, no hope. So, she took me in and gave me a home, family and hope. She changed the course of my life and helped me to see that there was so much more I could do and become. She inspired me and helped me apply for college where I would meet Dr. Maria Hernandez who took a chance on me and gave me a seat in the High Potential Program at Saint Mary’s College. Dr. Hernandez has been a lifelong friend who has opened doors for me where I didn’t even know doors existed. These two women continue to build me up to continue to dream big dreams and see them come to fruition.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

LatinaVIDA was originally founded by my dearest and longest mentor of over 30 years, Dr. Maria Hernandez. While sitting around a kitchen table one day with the other two co-founders, Santalynda Marrero, EdD and Julia Arellano-Sullivan, MBA were reflecting on the challenges they faced as first-generation Latinas trying to navigate corporate America. They realized that many Latinas, who are first in their families to have advanced degrees and professional careers, often do not have the skills or knowledge to navigate their careers in a world dominated by white men. LatinaVIDA was birthed to empower and equip the next generation of Latinas to rise to the top in their careers. Today, LatinaVIDA has expanded its mission to partner with organizations who want to support all first generation professionals of color to advance in their careers.

Are you working on any new or exciting projects now? How do you think that might help people?

Personally, I’m always working on exciting projects. Currently, I’m preparing myself to get on a corporate board, write a book on Latina leadership and do a TedTalk. Professionally, I’m working to broaden LatinaVIDA’s reach into Fortune 500 companies through the support of our developing Corporate Advisory Board. My goal is to see a minimum of 1,000 professionals of color to have gone through our PODER Leadership Academy by the end of 2023 with it resulting in their increased promotions, self-confidence, pay equity, sponsorship and joy in the work they do.

How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?

Absolutely! As I mentioned earlier, at the young age of 21, I knew the calling on my life was to be “the voice, power and strength of the unheard, weak and helpless.” I am privileged to get to earn a living doing what I am passionate about which is creating inclusion and equity for women and people of color through my DEI work in coaching leaders on how to create cultures of inclusion and through my partnerships with organizations who invest in the leadership development of their diverse talent.

Ok. Thank you for that. Let’s now jump to the main part of our interview. This may be obvious to you, but it is not intuitive to many people. Can you articulate to our readers five ways that increased diversity can help a company’s bottom line.

Increased employee engagement and productivity.
Increased employee retention and promotion of diverse talent.
Increased employee innovation and creativity.
Increased employee morale.
Increased profits for the organization.

Where there is diversity, there is greater innovation because there is a broader and deeper knowledge base to pull from. This leads to profitability and success for organizations and individuals. I will use an example of a time when an organization failed to do this. Chevy came out with the Nova back in the 1960s. They came to realize the reason they couldn’t sell it to the Hispanic community was because “no va” means “it doesn’t run.” This is a prime example of what happens when you have homogeneous voices at the table. Organizations who invite ALL voices to participate in the decision making process reap the rewards of the diversity of thought, lived experiences and knowledge which results in the bottom line success for the organization with all stakeholders — employees, customers, clients, vendors, suppliers, etc.

What advice would you give to other business leaders to help their employees to thrive?

If the goal is to support employees’ success, organizations must recognize that employees are first human beings. As humans, we all have a deep need to belong and to believe our lives matter. Today we live in a much more diverse, complex and multifaceted world. The workplace is made up of a global, multigenerational, multiethnic, multilingual, multidimensional community which is beautifully rich in knowledge, culture and lived experiences. Organizations that invest in this diverse talent pool will be the ones who are able to successfully attract, retain and promote this talent and reap the benefits.

What advice would you give to other business leaders about how to manage a large team?

Lead with humility, curiosity and empathy and your teams will manage themselves.

We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this 🙂

Melinda Gates and Oprah because both women have a long history of demonstrating love, commitment and resources to underprivileged minority groups. I believe they both would value and be moved by my personal story and passion to inspire and empower the least of us — especially women of color who continue to face the greatest discrimination, bias, lack of access and equity. For those who stand on the side of justice, fairness and righteousness — will naturally see the need to support a nonprofit like LatinaVIDA who is changing and shaping the world for the next generation of diverse professionals.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

https://www.linkedin.com/in/tammy-ramosjd/

Thank you for these excellent insights. We wish you continued success in your great work.

Tammy Ramos Of LatinaVida On How Diversity Can Increase a Company’s Bottom Line was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

The Future Is Now: Jack Jia of Musely On How Their Technological Innovation Will Shake Up The Tech…

The Future Is Now: Jack Jia of Musely On How Their Technological Innovation Will Shake Up The Tech Scene

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Never stop experimenting. Even if you build a winning team, you will still fail exponentially more times than you succeed. Accept that failures will happen, but be prepared to fail fast and iterate faster. Never stop running experiments, measuring the outcomes, and repeating.

As a part of our series about cutting-edge technological breakthroughs, I had the pleasure of interviewing Jack Jia.

Jack Jia is an American entrepreneur. He is known for founding and leading Musely, an online platform to provide skincare medical treatments through technology, as its chief executive officer since its launch in November 2017.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit about you. Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?

Having been a serial entrepreneur in internet technology for many years, I can tell you that skincare was definitely not my planned career path, but the result of a series of steps and an “aha!” moment. Believe it or not — the story of my 4th company, Musely, starts with my own personal passion for DIY and home improvement tips. Years ago, we created an app called Trusper Tips (short for Trusted Helper’s Tips) to empower women to create and share lifestyle tips. Within a year or two, 8 million women flocked to the app and created over a million tips! Can you guess the #1 most popular tip category? Beauty and skincare!

By late 2017, we had created a marketplace allowing 900+ skincare brands to promote and sell their skincare products to this community we had created of dedicated skincare junkies. This was a particularly hopeful moment for my wife, Cherry, who had been fighting her own decades-long battle against melasma. At this point, I thought our community (Cherry, included!) would be thrilled to see and experience the endless options of skincare products we added to the app. Boy, was I wrong!

After doing a little digging, here’s what I learned about these 900+ brands and the $300B skincare industry:

Most of them shared the same contract manufacturers — just with different packaging and marketing stories. They may spin a different narrative to reach different audience segments, but at the end of the day — it is still the same generic formula and nothing is truly effective.
Over-the-counter creams have no proven impact whatsoever except being a fragranced moisturizer. While moisturizer does, of course, serve a purpose in our skincare routine, surely it should never warrant a $300 price tag.

When I discussed my revelation with industry experts, I learned two more shocking facts that revealed the “smoke and mirrors” behind the cosmeceutical industry.

Fact #1: OTC skincare cannot have a real impact.

My friend and renowned Board-Certified dermatologist, Dr. Marie Jhin, told me that OTC skincare creams were actually not allowed to have a real impact on your skin except for being a moisturizer. By legal definition, over-the-counter products cannot directly interact with our skin cells.

Fact #2: The skincare industry promotes scent over science.

Next, I connected with Lori Bush, founding CEO of Rodan + Fields, and Kimber Maderazzo, former top executive at Proactiv. Both of these experts confirmed that the cosmeceuticals industry is more focused on spending money on supermodel spokespeople than any research & development behind their products. But — both Rodan & Fields and Proactiv had no choice, since prescription medicated skincare products were out of the question for their business models.

Aha! Now, I finally understood why my wife, Cherry, continued to struggle with melasma even after spending tens of thousands of dollars over the years on expensive creams (and even IPL and Fraxel laser treatments), while her dark spots only got worse.

Dr. Jhin invited Cherry and I to visit her practice in the Bay Area, and with some convincing, Cherry very reluctantly agreed to make one last ditch effort to treat her melasma. Using Dr. Jhin’s prescription treatment, Cherry’s stubborn dark spots had been erased in less than two months,, and even her wrinkles started to fade. Just like that, Cherry became “Patient Zero”, and Musely FaceRx was born!

Can you share an interesting story that has happened to you since you began your career?

In my early conversations with Dr. Jhin, who is now the Chief Medical Officer at Musely, she told me a story I’ll never forget. The story was of a patient who came into her office with a tote back literally filled to the brim with dozens of OTC skincare products. The patient dumped the tote bag out on the counter in front of Dr. Jhin and asked, “Which one of these products will work for my melasma?”. Dr. Jhin, knowing the truth about OTC skincare, had no choice but to tell the patient, “None of them”. After painting this picture, Dr. Jhin revealed she actually encounters multiple “tote bag ladies” each month — all with the same saga of failed attempts with OTC skincare.

This was when I realized that the cosmeceutical industry was born as a compromise. One example that illustrates this perfectly is that of retinol versus tretinoin. We all know that the skincare industry loves retinol. But the little-known secret is that retinol is simply riding on the coattails of its more powerful distant cousin, tretinoin. In reality, tretinoin is a derivative of Vitamin A (as is retinol), but tretinoin is at least 20x stronger than retinol! In fact, it’s the only ingredient that is FDA-approved to reverse signs of aging. But, of course, since tretinoin is only available with a prescription, the OTC skincare industry doesn’t want you to know this! Instead, they market retinol as having the same anti-aging benefits. And this is just one example of many similar OTC versus Rx comparisons!

My goal with Musely is to debunk the misinformation put forth by the skincare industry by offering medications that are scientifically proven to slow down and even reverse our biological clock.

Can you tell us about the cutting-edge technological breakthroughs that you have created? How do you think that will help people?

With Musely, we’ve successfully disrupted the skincare industry not only from a technological standpoint, but an efficacy and affordability standpoint, as well. Let me explain:

On the technology front, we have custom-built a streamlined telemedicine platform that connects patients with board-certified dermatologists and pharmacies in a way that is at least 100x faster, easier, cheaper, and more accessible than any in-person or online alternatives.

In addition, with our custom eNurse app, patients have 24/7 access to the highest accredited skincare experts in the country, all from the comfort of their home, with just a few taps on their smartphone. With each treatment purchase, Musely patients also receive 60 days of unlimited access to their prescribing dermatologist — truly a “first” for the skincare industry.

Not only have we applied cutting-edge technology to medical science, but we also developed clinical and pharmacy processes to continually test and improve efficacy. We have commissioned advanced research & development initiatives and built state-of-the-art compounding facilities so that we have the ability to constantly develop, test and produce new formulas. This is something that dermatologists have only ever dreamed of providing to their patients before.

Since Musely FaceRx launched in 2019, we have also created several of the world’s first and only skincare medications such as:

The Body Cream: The first and only prescription-strength body cream specifically formulated to treat dark spots and signs of aging on the body. This was a tough nut to crack, since the body skin is too thick for normal base molecules to penetrate. Therefore, body conditions like dark spots or signs of aging were considered untreatable by the derms. So, we developed a custom Musely Micro Base to effectively penetrate the thicker body skin.

The Private Cream: The first and only affordable and easily accessible prescription-strength dark spot treatment formulated for intimate areas like the groin, genitals, underarms, inner thigh area and anus.
The Spot Peel: The world’s first affordable fast-acting peel formula designed to reduce dark spots in just days instead of weeks.
And most recently, The Eye Serum, the world’s first ever prescription-strength eye serum formulated by dermatologists to treat fine lines and crow’s feet around the eyes. This is a dream treatment for dermatologists and patients who didn’t have access to anything similar until just weeks ago.

Lastly, we have successfully disrupted the inefficient and highly outdated chemical and packaging industries, allowing us to pass major savings along to our patients. By removing the middlemen in the supply chain of doctors, pharmacists, and suppliers, Musely has made skincare and medical services 10x cheaper, 10x faster, and 10x more efficacious!

These advances in technology, efficacy, and affordability have allowed us to completely turn the skincare industry upside down, and allow people across the country (and eventually, the world!) access to skincare that actually works.

How do you think this might change the world?

By flipping the script, we will revolutionize the way consumers think about skincare! From the outside looking in, it seems like truly effective skincare is reserved for the rich & famous. The rest of us, on the other hand, pour billions of dollars into brands that aren’t at all concerned with the efficacy behind their products (so long as they have the top A-list celebrities to promote them!).

By now, you understand why this is not fair. So, why don’t more people know about it? Throughout many conversations with Dr. Jhin and our medical board, I asked about the pain points that prevent most Americans from seeing a dermatologist. Their answer? Cost, accessibility, and availability.

Because there are so few board-certified dermatologists in the country, appointments can require weeks or even months to secure. And then, you’re required to sacrifice time out of your busy schedule to accommodate trips to the doctor and pharmacy, and pay out of pocket if your health insurance doesn’t cover it. If you’re one of the lucky few that do get to see a dermatologist, you will likely be prescribed a generic medication that ranges from $200 to $1000 per treatment. These treatments are often a “one size fits all” formula that does not take into account your unique skin concerns — a concept that we wholeheartedly reject. Instead, we’ve created over 100 formulations that you and your dermatologist can customize into a treatment plan (all within minutes, from your phone!)

We’re on a mission to expand knowledge, affordability, and access to the only effective skincare solutions by completely obliterating those three barriers to entry. So far, in the three years since launch, Musely has allowed hundreds of thousands of patients access to prescription skin and treatments, turning long-time skeptics into believers. It’s this social cause and real-life impact on our patients that makes Musely not just a business but a social movement. And we’re only just getting started!

Was there a “tipping point” that led you to this breakthrough? Can you tell us that story?

Yes, there were several tipping points!

The first tipping point was the realization that effective skincare medications have existed for years (for many of the most prominent skin conditions). However, 99% of women (and men) are not aware of their existence, and the skincare industry wants to keep it that way! Because how else would they sell you their $300 scented moisturizer?

The second tipping point is that compounded ingredients make the original medications 5–10x more effective and 10x cheaper at the same time. Compounding is the process of combining, mixing, or altering ingredients to create a medication tailored to the needs of an individual patient. It is the oldest and most widespread form of medicine — dating back centuries before the modern pharmaceutical drug manufacturing. In the last century, compounding pharmacies lost the battle to big pharma factories, who claimed to automate the process and lower costs. But there is a catch! It all comes down to efficacy.

Many don’t realize that even prescription skincare has a shelf life, sometimes as short as 2–4 months. With extremely volatile skincare ingredients that can oxidize in the air, the medication can lose potency very quickly, making the treatment far less effective. This puts over-the-counter skincare products, and even other prescription products, at a severe disadvantage because of the lengthy manufacturing, storage & distribution process before it gets into your hands. A product from a brick-and-mortar store could have been sitting on the shelf for months before you pick it up and purchase it!

Knowing this, I knew it was essential that Musely be able to freshly compound our medications, just days before our patients receive them in the mail. We pride ourselves in compounding the freshest medications, which is really the key to seeing any results. By compounding and shipping directly from our pharmacy, we’re able to deliver the medication in its freshest, most powerful state, which will allow you to actually reap the benefits of the ingredients.

Ironically, this “pharm to table”, customized approach is up to 10 times cheaper than pharmaceutical medication (because of monopoly power and insane margins). Yet another way we’re able to pass savings onto our patients.

The third tipping point is that software and internet technology are the key components that allow patients, dermatologists, pharmacists, and chemists to work together simultaneously. Each of these different players can be working over the internet, on the same platform to carry the patient from point A to point Z, all within minutes!

What do you need to lead this technology to widespread adoption?

Lack of awareness is the glass ceiling to widespread adoption. People don’t know that teledermatology exists, and that better treatment exists outside of the skincare products found at your local department, beauty, and drug stores. We’re up against a $300B industry that leverages the platforms and recognition of global celebrities to continue pushing the false narrative of efficacy.

In order to disrupt the status quo, we must lead with education and foster our own community of brand advocates, who, together, can be even more powerful than celebrities! Having seen my wife, Cherry, go through her own decades-long struggle with melasma, I understand that celebrities are not the way to relate to women who are truly suffering with seemingly “untreatable” skin concerns. Our patients are not “aspirational” or driven by the latest skincare trends. Instead, they are very skeptical, defeated, and they aren’t convinced by gimmicky marketing ploys. For our 500,000+ patients, the glimmer of hope is seeing the transformations and reading the heartfelt stories of other women who have been in that same dark place.

Our ticket to widespread adoption is our patients themselves. Word-of-mouth and real patients testimonials are what drives our business and will ultimately promote widespread awareness and access to efficacious skincare. In fact, as we speak, we are building new technology to help our patients spread awareness digitally. Stay tuned for that launch!

Many mentors have helped me along the way, including my NYU professors who allowed me to graduate early, and several angel investors who offered me more than money, but their collective wisdom on how their companies succeeded. I am also extremely grateful to our current investors who have displayed infinite patience as we pivoted three times in three years before we took off.

But, if I had to choose one person in particular who guided me to where I am the most, it would be my late mother. She was an accomplished professor of geophysics who was willing to try anything and everything. When I was 10 years old and living in China, she taught me (along with herself) to use punch cards for computer programming. This was in the 1970’s when “computer” was barely even a word! Then, in the 1980’s, she visited NYC and managed to convince professors at Columbia University and NYU that I would be a great computer science PhD student for them, all with very poor & broken English! She never gave up regardless of how nascent or naive a field was to her, and her mentorship and tenacity have been the fuel for my never-ending entrepreneurial journey. I miss her and am forever indebted to her!

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why?

Your team is everything. Without co-founders that are passionate, talented and somewhat (just somewhat) experienced in the area of your business, you will absolutely not be able to reach your true potential.
Find an ocean to play in, not a pond. More often than not, successful entrepreneurs are the ones who discover unique and ground-breaking business opportunities in a large market rather than a small one.
Never stop experimenting. Even if you build a winning team, you will still fail exponentially more times than you succeed. Accept that failures will happen, but be prepared to fail fast and iterate faster. Never stop running experiments, measuring the outcomes, and repeating.
Accept that moments of feeling lost and in despair are just part of the entrepreneurial journey. These moments can break you, but without them, you cannot break through.
If you are passionate and talented, you already have a great foundation for being an entrepreneur. While it’s not a linear or stress-free journey, I have never heard of an entrepreneur regretting their choice in starting a business. Enjoy the journey and you’ll be grateful for what you learn along the way.

How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?

As an entrepreneur, the single greatest reward (in my opinion, at least!) is seeing the real life impact that your brand, product or service has made. Seeing the transformations and hearing the stories from our 500K+ patients as they have regained their confidence and restored their love of life. These heart-wrenching, inspiring stories and profound emotions have created momentum that fuels the entire Musely team. It’s this shared passion and sense of a bigger purpose that allows us to be so much more than merely a skincare brand.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

First time entrepreneurs may be drawn to the motto “fortune favors the bold”. But at this point in my career, I cherish the message “1% inspiration & 99% perspiration” far more.

Building a successful business (or a happy life for that matter) is never a straight line. There will be many zig-zags and back-and-forths — so many that you’ll lose count. You’ll face dead ends and impasses along the way that will make your initial idea feel like the easiest part (as soon as you get far enough to look back!) This is why you’ll hear many experienced entrepreneurs, executives or investors often say: “Ideas are cheap, but execution is everything!”

Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.

The Future Is Now: Jack Jia of Musely On How Their Technological Innovation Will Shake Up The Tech… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Erik McKinney of Impact XM: Five Things You Need To Build A Trusted And Beloved Brand

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Building Community. Jeep is an excellent example. I drive my wife’s Jeep Wrangler on occasion, and I still haven’t gotten used to everyone else in a Wrangler waving at me when they pass by. Jeep continues to grow and foster this community through loyalty events, social media, and celebrating their drives. And then there’s the whole rubber duck thing. Just Google it.

As a part of our series about how to create a trusted, believable, and beloved brand, I had the pleasure to Interview Erik McKinney.

Erik McKinney has over two decades of experience in the industry leading award-winning, needle moving experiential work across a long list of Fortune 500 clients. He is a B2C-B2B creative hybrid with demonstrated ability in crafting compelling stories that drive engagement across the live and digital world.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?

The crux of my job now is creating live events and experiences between brands and people. Growing up as an only child in rural Pennsylvania, I found myself playing alone quite often. To keep myself entertained, I was constantly imagining new games, new worlds, and new experiences. In many ways, I’m doing the same thing now for brands except I’m crafting the experiences for specific audiences, not just myself.

Can you share a story about the funniest marketing mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

I didn’t start my career as a creative, but I wanted to be one. I started as an Assistant Account Executive at an old school New York ad agency. I specifically remember working on a brand and I thought I had this great creative idea for a new campaign. Fueled by my youthful ignorance, I went to the head of the creative team to share my “brilliant” idea that I had sketched out. I don’t remember the exact idea, all I remember is that it was horrible. There was no strategy, no understanding of the brand and no consideration for the audience we were trying to reach. The only person that this idea was relevant to was me.

He could very easily have laughed me out of his office, and he would have been completely justified in doing so. Instead, he actually sat down and took the time to explain why the idea wouldn’t work and how I should have approached it differently. He taught me the best ideas require you to truly understand what the brand means, what the audience wants and the context within the two will meet. It’s a lesson that I carry with me to this day.

The bigger lesson it taught me was the importance of being a mentor. My dreams of being a creative could have been crushed that day and my career path forever altered. Instead, I was met with kindness, wisdom, and encouragement that kept my dreams alive.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

I feel there are a lot of things that make Impact XM special to our people and our clients. However, given the chaos of the world over the last couple of years, I think our ability to adapt quickly and intelligently to our clients’ needs and realities of the world stands out to me the most.

During the pandemic, our business got crushed. We are in an industry built on creating live experiences that bring people together, and all of the sudden we couldn’t do that. So, we very quickly pivoted to doing it in the virtual world. We went from doing a handful of virtual events a year to several hundred. This was accomplished through a combination of necessity, innovation, collaboration, and the humility to know what we didn’t know, and then figure it out. The fact that we were able to do all of this so successfully is a testament to who we are and what we’re made of.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

The most exciting project I’m working on currently is a confidential one. All I can say is it will be a one-of-a-kind event that celebrates a diverse range of cultures and creativity coming together in one place.

Ok let’s now jump to the core part of our interview. In a nutshell, how would you define the difference between brand marketing (branding) and product marketing (advertising)? Can you explain?

The simplest answer is one is rational, and one is emotional. The best marketing finds the intersection between both. Product marketing is typically very rational; what is the product? How does it fit into my life? How does it make my life better? Brand marketing on the other hand is more emotional. You’re telling a story that connects with people and aligns with their values that define who they are and the aspirations of who they hope to become.

Can you explain to our readers why it is important to invest resources and energy into building a brand, in addition to the general marketing and advertising efforts?

The brand and its purpose should be the north star for all marketing efforts. The products, the audience, the world around us and the challenges we face are ever-changing. An enduring brand adapts to the change, but always stays true to what it is and, by doing so, builds its credibility in the eyes of the audience. This credibility makes it easier to introduce new products and ideas into the world.

Can you share 5 strategies that a company should be doing to build a trusted and believable brand? Please tell us a story or example for each.

Consistency is key. The idea “Red Bull gives you wings” has been a constant across Red Bull’s advertising, extreme sports sponsorships, and proprietary events (like Flugtag) for decades. They’re so committed to it that they dropped a dude from space. However, no matter how crazy the idea may manifest itself, it always reinforces the brand’s commitment to empowering people to do the incredible.
Being able to innovate while remaining true to who you are. Lego is a great example of this. Legos are constantly innovating with new products, films, licensing partnerships, and even theme parks. However, every innovation ties back to their brand mission to inspire and develop the builders of tomorrow.
Building Community. Jeep is an excellent example. I drive my wife’s Jeep Wrangler on occasion, and I still haven’t gotten used to everyone else in a Wrangler waving at me when they pass by. Jeep continues to grow and foster this community through loyalty events, social media, and celebrating their drives. And then there’s the whole rubber duck thing. Just Google it.
Demonstrating through action. It is easy to talk about what you can do, but doing it is what matters. An example is the United States Postal Service who live and breathe their slogan — it doesn’t matter how bad the weather is, the USPS always delivers. They were also frontline workers during the pandemic, demonstrating through their commitment that they are a brand people can trust.
Authenticity. You can say all you want about your brand and brand story, but it’s important to practice what you preach. A great example of this is Patagonia who literally put their money where their mouth is when the founder made headlines for giving away the company to fight climate change. This proved to customers that from the top down they remain true to the values that they promote.

What role does social media play in your branding efforts?

The role social media plays in branding efforts depends on your objectives, but the things that popped to mind are the ability to connect in real time, generate conversation and discussion through a two-way dialogue versus a brand speaking their message into the world. Through that dialogue you build community and loyalty. Also, I think it’s this amplification of your efforts. When working in live events we can take the stories we are creating and amplify them on a broader scale through the use of social media.

I don’t know how you would do this, but the combination of advancements we are making with the Metaverse, VR technology and artificial intelligence to allow people to walk in someone else’s shoes (as cliche as that sounds). Simply put, the ability to see the world through others’ perspectives and understand how they process information and how it impacts them. In our country there’s so much divisiveness due to the fact that we do not have the ability to see things through someone else’s perspective and we become blinded by our own thoughts and beliefs. So, if we could use all this wonderful technology to actually provide that opportunity to see other perspectives it can probably go a long way and help bridge the gaps.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“Creativity is intelligence having fun.” — Albert Einstein

We are blessed that very prominent leaders in business and entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world with whom you would like to have lunch or breakfast with? He or she might just see this, especially if we tag them. 🙂

George R.R. Martin. I’m fascinated by storytellers that create immersive, complex worlds.

How can our readers follow you on social media?

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/erikmckinney

Impact XM social media:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/impactxm/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/impactxm/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/impactxm
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdG2SN326Vzbobb0EFykZfA
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/impactxm

Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.

Erik McKinney of Impact XM: Five Things You Need To Build A Trusted And Beloved Brand was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

XPO’s Diana Brown On 5 Ways To Create a Wow! Customer Experience

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Make it easy for customers to do business with you. A great example of that at XPO is our customer onboarding process. We have a dedicated project manager who oversees the entire process, so we know everything’s in sync from the very beginning. That’s a big piece of simplifying the engagement with customers.

As part of our series about the five things a business should do to create a Wow! customer experience,I had the pleasure of interviewing Diana Brown.

Diana Brown has more than two decades of leadership experience with customer-centric sales and service organizations. She currently serves as senior vice president of sales operations and customer experience at XPO, a leading provider of less-than-truckload freight transportation services.

In that capacity, Diana leads the company’s customer experience team and is responsible for onboarding new accounts and ensuring high customer satisfaction across multiple customer service channels. She joined the company from Amazon Business, where she was head of customer success.

Diana holds an MBA from Anderson Graduate School of Management at UCLA, and a bachelor’s degree in mathematics and economics from Indiana University.

Thank you so much for joining us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you got started?

I initially wanted to be an actuary but realized pretty quickly in college that it wasn’t the right path for me. When I graduated from Indiana University, I started building custom supply chain software as a consultant. I loved my experience working with customers and helping them solve their problems through technology. I’ve been passionate about working with customers ever since. Over the course of my career, I’ve built multiple customer support teams. I like to look ahead and build solutions that delight customers. I’m at my best when I’m at the crossroads of leading teams, working directly with customers and thinking big to drive change.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lessons or ‘take aways’ you learned from that?

Early in my career, I was selected to lead a project during a three-month consulting boot camp. It was a great moment for me because I was super competitive and wanted to win. I had one hour to set up the team structure and kick off the project. I quickly assembled the team and led a discussion for 45 minutes and then assigned responsibilities based on everyone’s interest. Within the first few days, I learned that delegation was going to be a problem in this group. We were a bunch of Type-A successful students, and everyone had their own ideas they were passionate about. It became clear that the way we had assigned responsibilities wasn’t going to work. I needed to ensure everyone had a voice and felt they were part of the solution. I also needed to appreciate the different ideas but know when it was time to stop exploring and get everyone rowing in the same direction. This experience taught me the value of being authentic and apologizing for mistakes. Being humble and listening to others remains foundational to how I lead my team and approach my work with customers.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?

In my first job as a consultant, I worked for a Partner who was great about providing visibility to newer employees. He’d often take one or two of us to senior-level meetings and ask us to “act like furniture,” meaning to be an active listener without speaking so we could absorb and learn. Following each of these opportunities to gain exposure to senior-level discussions and negotiations, this leader would take the time to debrief with us. It was such a great learning tool, and super motivational for me. He was an amazing team leader who fostered a culture of curiosity and excellence. About three years ago, I reconnected with him and thanked him for his mentorship. I try to replicate that experience with my team as often as I can.

This might be intuitive, but I think it’s helpful to specifically articulate it. In your words, can you share a few reasons why great customer service and a great customer experience is essential for success in business?

A great customer experience is critical for brand loyalty and growth. People have choices and will exercise them if they’re unhappy. It’s easier to retain customers than cultivate new customer relationships, although both are important.

At XPO, growing our business demands best-in-class customer service, and we take it seriously. From our drivers, dockworkers and customer service representatives to our CEO, everyone sees providing quality service as our number one job.

We have all had times either in a store, or online, when we’ve had a very poor experience as a customer or user. If the importance of a good customer experience is so intuitive, and apparent, where is the disconnect? How is it that so many companies do not make this a priority?

I think a lot of it is about humility. Many companies can get a false sense of security that they’re the best, or that there are no other options for customers, or that people won’t have an appetite to deal with switching providers because of the cost. Staying humble and grounded, and focusing on your customers’ needs, has to be as natural as breathing every day.

Do you think that more competition helps force companies to improve the customer experience they offer? Are there other external pressures that can force a company to improve the customer experience?

Absolutely. If you’re in a monopolistic market, customers don’t have a choice. They have to accept the experience provided by that organization if they need that product or service.

On the flipside, when there is significant choice, people will make decisions based on the customer experience — the full customer journey. Think about buying a car. There are so many different approaches to the customer experience. There are dealers that are more receptive than others to haggling. Some offer nice touches, like a great place to wait while your car’s being serviced or free car washes. Others tout the convenience of their internet buying process. There are so many ways to differentiate yourself as a dealer, even at similar price points.

I learned in Economics 101 that competition is good because organizations are forced to differentiate, and that drives loyalty and brand evangelism. There’s little that’s more powerful than having brand loyalists advocate on behalf of your business.

Can you share with us a story from your experience about a customer who was “Wowed” by the experience you provided?

Sure. I typically get involved in customer escalations, so by the time someone gets to me they’re usually frustrated. A recent example involved one of our large service centers that had been impacted by weather. We were late getting a shipment delivered because of the weather and then having a truck break down. The customer reached out to me and asked that I expedite the delivery. I contacted our service center manager and found that delivery had already been scheduled for the next day. Within two hours of getting this customer’s email, I was able to inform him that our team had a full plan in place for expedited delivery. I followed up the next day and confirmed the delivery had been made as promised. Freight transportation isn’t a problem-free business, but when you show customers that you genuinely care when they have an issue, you create those “wow” moments that enable you to retain and grow business.

Did that Wow! experience have any long-term ripple effects? Can you share the story?

Absolutely. In this case, the customer was extremely appreciative and sent thank-you notes to me and our operational leadership. And their shipping volumes haven’t just been sustained — they’ve even grown a bit. These small moments are very important to preserving and growing business with customers.

Based on your experience and success, what are the five most important things a business leader should know in order to create a Wow! Customer Experience. Please share a story or an example for each.

There are five things we always make sure to think about at XPO:

First is to walk in the customer’s shoes — you need to thoroughly understand their requirements and deliver more than they expect.

Second is to go above and beyond to deliver extraordinary value. At XPO, it’s really our technology that makes that possible. Our piece-level-tracking, for example, allows us to track every pallet in a load independently. The nature of LTL shipments is that one truck carries freight for multiple customers, and this technology allows us to give each customer the individualized attention they deserve.

Third is to make it easy for customers to do business with you. A great example of that at XPO is our customer onboarding process. We have a dedicated project manager who oversees the entire process, so we know everything’s in sync from the very beginning. That’s a big piece of simplifying the engagement with customers.

Fourth is to respond quickly and effectively when things go wrong. To do that, you have to provide thorough, ongoing training for customer service representatives, and have a well-oiled escalation machine in place to ensure no issue is left unresolved.

Finally, it’s essential to recognize and reward customer service employees. A culture of recognition and accountability fosters a sense of pride that incentivizes employees to do their very best to deliver an exceptional customer experience. At XPO, that means supporting every employee in a way that makes them feel a personal connection to our tagline, “Your Freight First.” We have similar quality programs for our operations team, who handle our customers’ freight, and also tie incentive compensation to quality for all XPO leaders.

Are there a few things that can be done so that when a customer or client has a Wow! experience, they inspire others to reach out to you as well?

Absolutely — that’s been an added benefit of the “wow” effect. Given the extensive interconnectivity that exists between shippers, vendors and carriers as freight moves through the supply chain, it’s unsurprising that customer service experiences are routinely shared. We have relationships with several national customers who make their vendors aware that they endorse us as a preferred carrier. In many cases, these national relationships have helped us secure contracted pricing agreements with new customers.

If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?

What comes to mind for me is the phrase, “better together.” We all win when we focus on how we work together to take care of each other, our communities and our customers. This past holiday season, many of our service centers and administrative offices joined together to adopt families in need of support through local schools and shelters in nearby communities. Pooling our resources for a worthy cause was a great way to get to know each other better, to lift each other up through volunteering and to make an impact in our local communities. We truly have a service-oriented spirit at XPO, and it’s a spirit that resonates with me very much outside of work, as well.

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

XPO’s Diana Brown On 5 Ways To Create a Wow! Customer Experience was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Meet The Disruptors: David Fenton Of ECM Technologies On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your…

Meet The Disruptors: David Fenton Of ECM Technologies On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Look a person in their eyes when you are speaking so they know you can be trusted.

As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing David Fenton.

David Fenton, managing director at ECM Technologies, is a creative, analytical and responsive entrepreneur and business executive with a proven history of success and leadership. A former residential and commercial real estate developer and founder and CEO of Twin Oaks Construction Company, Fenton is a persistent problem solver with a passion for green building and sustainable solutions that contribute to reducing a building’s carbon footprint.

Over the course of my development and construction career, and not by my choosing, I became much more entrenched in understanding HVAC equipment due to it causing the biggest ongoing headaches along with customer complaints. Most of the issues were around thermal degradation due to oil-foiling which attributed to lost cooling capacity. So, when I became aware there was a recent technology that cured this issue and the opportunity to bring it to market, I jumped in with both feet.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

Like I mentioned above, oil-fouling is something that occurs with almost all HVAC systems, and it can leave units operating at 70% or less of their original capacity. It creates excessive work for compressors in delivering called for BTUs, leading to substantial energy loss, higher electricity bills and a shortened system or component life.

Our technology at ECMT is remedy for this issue, making HVAC equipment more efficient therefore extending its operating life. A single treatment of our ThermaClear solution lasts the life of the equipment, improves HVAC efficiency by 10–15% and has a payback period of 24 to 36 months.

In turn, equipment manufacturers do not sell new replacement units and component parts as fast.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

I am not sure if this is the funniest story, but certainly one of the best eventual outcomes. Early in my career, I arrived at a co-working space for a meeting with people I had never met. I was a bit early, as I like to always be prepared. I walked into the reserved conference room to find two people already sitting down. I introduced myself and we began talking. After about 10-minutes, they realized they were in the wrong room and not who I was supposed to be meeting. Impressed with the start of our conversation, they asked if we could schedule a time for an actual meeting. I ended up forming great relationships with both and they later helped me in my business. This situation showed me how a quick unintentional conversation could lead to something great. You never know who you are speaking with — always be polite and professional.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

There is a big difference between a “hand up” and a “hand out.” Having been a recipient over my business career of a “hand up” had a tremendous impact on where I am today. All of us, when having the ability to do so, should always be willing to extend a hand up to those that deserve it and just need that little break. I have had the privilege of having some remarkable mentors in my life that not only gave me a hand up but also gave me some of their best wisdom that did not fall on deaf ears. No question, I would not be where I am at today if not for all of them. (Out of respect for the individuals, I cannot disclose names, but let’s just say they are well-known leaders in their respective areas.)

I am not sure if it is never good to be disruptive within an industry. A big part of disruption is changing, and change is good. It’s one of the main ingredients that build capitalism. “Withstanding the test of time” can have many interpretations; to me, it simply means that nothing new or better has been developed yet. Just because something has withstood the test of time does not equate that it is the best and only way. Take our technology — We will always look for better ways to improve what we have now and not just rest on what it is today.

Can you share five of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey?

1. Show up early before anyone else and make sure you get noticed.

2. Only pay the same tax once.

3. Invest in yourself as much as possible.

4. Always start your day with a complete breakfast.

5. Look a person in their eyes when you are speaking so they know you can be trusted.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

At this time, I am not really focusing on what’s next to shake up. But when I do, it will be big because at this stage in my life, I do not need any more practice.

Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?

One book, “Tuesdays with Morrie,” changed my life when I was 30 years old. If you have not read–do so and you will understand why it had a profound effect on me then and still does today.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“Don’t confuse efforts with results.”

This taught me grit, determination and how to focus on what matters.

Having physical conditioning and nutrition coaching be part of every employee’s workday. I encourage employers to include this for everyone in their dedicated work week schedule.

How can our readers follow you online?

https://ecm-technologies.net

https://twitter.com/ThermaClear

https://www.linkedin.com/company/thermaclear

https://www.instagram.com/thermaclear

https://www.facebook.com/ThermaClear1

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Meet The Disruptors: David Fenton Of ECM Technologies On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Meet The Disruptors: Mike Mabin of MABU Agency On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your…

Meet The Disruptors: Mike Mabin of MABU Agency On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

“Keep it simple, slow it down, and pause,” are the words of advice I received from my dad. In life, and in business, things get complicated and fast-paced. It’s easy to get swept away by the whirlwind of activity. When this begins to happen, my dad’s advice helps me stop the madness, pause to organize my thoughts, and chart a course that makes sense for myself and others.

As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Mike Mabin.

Mike Mabin, a North Dakota-based entrepreneur, is carrying on a family tradition started by his grandfathers — one who owned a company that delivered automotive products to rural gas stations throughout the Dakotas, and the other who ran a boat rental and bait shop on the Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation. Mike started his first company, Agency MABU, 21 years ago and currently co-owns several others — Shutter Pilots, Innovatar, Pemmican Patty Food Company, and JamesLee Properties. He has also invested his time, talents, and resources to support dozens of other entrepreneurs in starting and running their own businesses.

My first passion was filmmaking and photography. My dad used an 8mm camera to film his buddies while on fishing trips to Canada. I loved watching him edit the footage and show his homemade movies to family and friends. The joy I experienced when my parents bought me my first camera — a Nikon 35mm with telephoto lens — is unforgettable. It was my constant companion, and I became an obsessed “shutterbug.”

After high school, I planned to attend the local college to study business and start my own photo studio. However, life had other plans. In my last year of high school, my parent’s business failed. This harsh event caused me to rethink my plans to start my own business. So, instead of going to the local college to study business, I set my sights on attending art college to study photography.

In hindsight, this was a great decision. After four years of study at the Minneapolis College of Art & Design, I was hired as the Audio-Visual Coordinator for a large hospital in North Dakota, where I worked for over 20 years, becoming a top executive reporting directly to the CEO and overseeing dozens of departments and hundreds of staff.

While nurturing my career in healthcare management, I continued to hone my business skills, earning a master’s degree and developing a business plan for an ad agency. When I hesitated to give up my career and start a business for fear of failure, my wife assured me I could always get another job if it didn’t work out. Within a month, I was implementing my business plan and opened Agency MABU.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

I’ve never considered myself to be a disruptive sort of guy. Instead, I journey down paths that attract my interests and curiosities. One such path involved starting a company named Shutter Pilots. Its claim to fame is being the first firm in America to receive approval from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to combine unmanned drones with 3D geo-mapping technology for creating aerial images. Equally amazing is that our first client was National Geographic. I wasn’t trying to change the world. I was just having fun combining some interests I have in the fields of photography, 3D animation, and remote-controlled aircraft.

Another example of exploring my interests involves changing the way society views the first inhabitants of the Americas. As an enrolled citizen of the Little Shell Band of Chippewa Indians of Montana, I have focused the efforts of Agency MABU on serving clients and causes representing Indian Country. My co-workers and I create and share stories from a vast array of Native American perspectives. The stories challenge deep-rooted stereotypes that often depict American Indians as noble warriors of the past or poverty-stricken communities of the present.

At Agency MABU, we’ve worked with renowned clients such as the U.S. Capitol, the Smithsonian Museum, Discovery Education, and the National Indian Education Association to uplift Native American voices and new narratives surrounding topics such as the Thanksgiving holiday and the discovery of America. We’re using modern day communication methods including 360° virtual tours, 2D/3D animation, and augmented reality to show the world that the first Americans are “still here.” We’re also working with leading non-profit organizations such as The Nature Conservancy, Red Star International, and the Swift Foundation to incorporate traditional Indigenous practices and values into healing our planet and our people through stewardship, sustainability, and spirituality.

We are being disruptive by collaborating with our clients to shine light on the first Americans living in today’s world as artists, teachers, scientists, spiritual leaders, business owners and so much more.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

Most of my work involves using words in one form or another. That said, every letter matters, especially if a critical one is missing. Early in my career, I was the editor of a health & wellness publication produced by my employer (a Catholic hospital) and distributed to area residents through the local newspaper. In one memorable issue, the cover story featured an invitation to attend an open house for a new clinic. The headline featured the words “Public Open House;” however, the letter “L” was conspicuously missing from the word “public.” This embarrassing fact was first brought to my attention by a nun who handed me a copy of the publication with this request: “Please be more diligent when proofing our magazine.” Needless to say, I immediately put stringent practices in place to minimize the potential for repeating such errors. On the upside, I am pleased to report that the clinic open house attracted a record number of attendees.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors?

It would take a book rivaling the page count of War & Peace to acknowledge the myriad of people who’ve inspired, molded, and mentored me along the way. Beyond my wife, sons, parents, sisters, grandparents, and other immediate family members, I’d say the first person who comes to mind as a mentor was the owner of the lawn care and snow removal company where I worked while in college. Despite being in his late 50’s, he outworked everyone. From sunup to sundown, he operated a large, walk-behind mower called a Gravely, as well as a large snow blower. He also maintained and repaired all of the equipment long after his crew was gone each day. Beyond this, I was impressed that he invented and patented a number of contraptions that he affixed to the mowers, blowers, and other equipment.

At the time I worked for him, there were three other employees — me, his oldest son, and a long-time friend. I truly felt part of the owner’s family. One day, while having lunch together, I asked him if he ever wanted to grow his business and have more employees. “Not anymore,” he answered. He went on to say that at one time, he had five separate crews with over 25 employees who mowed over 400 lawns weekly. He said the work consumed every moment of his time and attention.

It wasn’t until one Sunday morning while doing the books that he realized his company was making less money with two dozen employees than it made when he first started it with four employees. At that moment, he made the decision to downsize. By wintertime, he was back to his original size of operations. He said, “I was once again free to attend Church on Sunday, and also have time to spend with family and friends.” This story has helped me keep my priorities in mind, thus allowing me to run my businesses instead of my business running me.

By its very nature, disruption ignites change, which enables our world to continually evolve and adapt to the future. However, whenever change occurs, some things are lost, while other things are gained. Consequently, the “not so positive” side of disruption involves that which is being left behind. To minimize these downsides, we should acknowledge that the old ways of thinking or doing aren’t always bad. It’s just time to change.

Such is the case as it relates to my passion for telling stories from a “first person” view of history. Telling stories through the eyes and voices of American Indians doesn’t need to destroy or dimmish other stories of U.S. history. There’s no need to tear down something in order to build up something else. We can simply add new voices and shine light on people who’ve been in the shadows.

Far too much of what we see in the media these days in politicized and polarized. It causes people to take sides and not see others with differing views as being fully human. That’s when being disruptive to the systems that have “withstood the test of time” can turn negative. To take a more positive approach to disrupting a prevailing narrative about Native people, we’re simply adding their voices to the equation. We can more effectively disrupt the hearts and minds of people through addition rather than subtraction of history.

Can you share five of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey?

“Let’s name our newest baby MABU.” These words of advice came from my wife when we started our first business. MABU was a nickname of mine in college. She nixed naming our first child MABU. However, several years later, when discussing a name for our business, she said “Marketing & Advertising Business. Those are the first three letters of your nickname. All we need is a word for the U — Unlimited!” So, our incorporated name became “Marketing & Advertising Business Unlimited,” but we simply go by my favorite nickname — MABU.

“Keep it simple, slow it down, and pause,” are the words of advice I received from my dad. In life, and in business, things get complicated and fast-paced. It’s easy to get swept away by the whirlwind of activity. When this begins to happen, my dad’s advice helps me stop the madness, pause to organize my thoughts, and chart a course that makes sense for myself and others.

“Creativity is the ability to flip and redefine.” These are the words of advice I received from one of my fine arts college professors. Although I initially didn’t have a clue as to what this meant, the professor went on to reveal the secret behind being “creative.” He said it’s based on the premise that “there’s nothing new under the sun.” Thus, we need not waste our time trying to create something altogether new. Instead, we should simply flip and redefine what already exists. He advised his students to “take something old and change it into something new. Then, tweak it until it becomes creative and a part of you.”

“Don’t forget to bill your clients,” are the words of advice I received from a colleague of mine when I started my first business. I thought she was joking, but she was dead serious. She had been running her own consulting company for several years and said she got so busy that she failed to set up the proper bookkeeping systems to track her time on projects and issue invoices. She ended up doing a lot of work which wasn’t documented, and therefore couldn’t be billed. So, one of the first things I did upon going into business was to set up QuickBooks.

“Do what you think is right and ask forgiveness later, if necessary.” These are the words of advice I received from a nun and board member at the Catholic hospital where I worked. She shared this advice with me shortly after I was promoted into an administrative position, explaining that the hospital is a big organization with lots of people and processes that could impede progress. She encouraged me not to let divergent voices or red tape get in my way. This advice gave me the courage and confidence to get lots of things done.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

I’m excited about the cutting edge work we’re doing at InnovatAR (www.innovatar.io) — a mixed reality company started a few years ago with my older son Alex and a few co-workers. Last year, we launched Yondar, a web-based wayfinding app that uses augmented reality to make finding people and places fun. It operates somewhat like Google Maps, except it’s designed for unmapped, walkable locations. Our first clients have included a national park, a city center, a university, and a music festival. Our most recent client is the Rose Bowl Parade in Pasadena, California.

InnovatAR also recently launched a product called Seekers (www.seekersnft.io). It features non-fungible tokens (NFTs), gamification and cryptocurrency technologies to create meaningful experiences in the metaverse. We call it the Betterverse.

I’m also focusing attention on helping my older sister and younger son start a company called Pemmican Patty Food Company (www.pemmicanpatty.com). We’re working to bring pemmican back as a modern-day snack food. Pemmican is a mixture of dried meat, rendered fat and dried berries which originated with the Metis and other Indigenous people of the Great Plains and Great Lakes regions. The company is dedicated to our Grandma Ida who made pemmican while raising my mom and her siblings on the Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation in North Dakota.

Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?

One book that has impacted me deeply is titled “Neither Wolf Nor Dog” by Kent Nerburn. The author chronicles the life and times of an American Indian elder named Dan. Readers are exposed to the harsh truths about the Lakota people’s experience in America. I relate to many of the stories in this book since they all occurred in and around my home state of North Dakota.

Dan speaks eloquently on topics such as the power of silence, the commercialization on Indigenous culture, and the indoctrination of Native children, something my own mother experienced when she was taken to an Indian boarding school in South Dakota at the tender age of six.

This book also resonates with me because of the story behind the title. “Neither wolf nor dog” refers to the way in which many of the Native warriors were viewed after being captured and imprisoned by the U.S. government in the late 1800’s. They had been stripped of their identities and were no longer free like wolves, nor were they tame like dogs. Having been raised by a mother of Native American descent and a father of European descent, I understand the confusion that can result from living in two different worlds.

This is a great read for anyone who has an interest in learning more about Native American history and culture. The following review from the Yoga Journal sums up my thoughts about the book “It is a sobering, humbling, cleansing, loving book, one that every American should read.”

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

My favorite life lesson quote is “It’s not about you.” This is the first line in The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren. By shifting our focus away from ourselves and toward others, I believe we find greater peace, joy, and purpose in life. Don Clifton, a renowned psychologist, educator, author, researcher, and entrepreneur called it the “Bucket & Dipper” theory. It purports that if we go through life focusing on ourselves, we use our “dipper” to pull whatever we need out of other people’s “buckets.” However, if we use our dipper to fill other people’s buckets, not only are they filled, but so are we. Miraculously, our buckets become overflowing, thus creating an even greater capacity to fill others. Living outwardly feeds us inwardly, not the other way around.

I’d start a global smile movement. It could become the fastest, largest, and most impactful movement in history. Within a matter of moments, it could have billions of followers spreading their goodness worldwide. By simply smiling, they would join the movement. Instantly, they would feel better, as would the people around them. Their smiles would become contagious and infect others. Before we know it, the world would forever be changed for good. We’ll know the movement is alive and well every time someone smiles.

How can our readers follow you online?

I joined LinkedIn nearly 20 years ago when I was just getting started in business. It has been my “go to” social media community ever since. Folks can follow me at www.linkedin.com/in/mikemabin/

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Meet The Disruptors: Mike Mabin of MABU Agency On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Meet The Disruptors: Thomas McLeod On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Be curious- curiosity keeps your mind active vs. passive. It allows you to imagine the impossible and drives you into the unknown, which is where discoveries happen.

As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Thomas McLeod.

Tom McLeod is a 5x founder. Most recently, he was the CEO and Founder of Omni (exited to Coinbase in 2019). Currently, he is building Arkive, unlocking the value of Smithsonian-like museum treasuries by letting members curate a distributed collection of offline valuable cultural artifacts. Prior to Omni, he founded Pagelime (acquired by SurrealCMS in 2015), LolConnect (acquired by Tencent in 2012), and Imaginary Feet, which developed 15+ profitable iPhone apps enjoyed by over 10 million users. Along with a passion for tech and the arts, Tom has a dedicated interest in service and supporting diverse communities. He sits on the board of Camelback Ventures and advises numerous founders and startups. Originally from Plainfield, NJ, he and his family recently relocated from San Francisco to Santa Monica, where you can find him in search of his new favorite mall and movie theater.

My story begins when my parents were school teachers. They worked an exorbitant amount to put me in a fancy school, but by the second grade, they realized the quality of education was not particularly better than less prestigious ones. Instead, they enrolled me in a creativity-focused school that specialized in the arts and sciences. It opened my eyes to the world of computing and the possibilities of what the internet could become.

In college, I majored in audio engineering and started a recording studio and small record label that I ran until 2008. At this time, the music industry was changing significantly, and Web 2 was really taking off. I started to shift my focus from album creation to platform creation for artists. I realized that building out custom MySpace pages was a surprisingly lucrative business. A few years in, the business evolved into a SaaS content management company to help small business owners make changes and update their websites.

When the iPhone AppStore emerged, we expanded into app development, launching 17 apps in 3 years. Simultaneously, my wife and I moved from DC to SF, significantly downsizing our life and putting a large majority of my belongings in storage. Five years later, I realized I had been paying to store these items I had never been back to enjoy. That’s when it hit me; if I could have seen all of these items in storage, I would have been able to use them more, sell them off, or just simply do more than have them collect dust.

That’s when Omni was born, the DropBox for urban living. This platform created a way for users to see what they were storing. What surprised me most, however, was that people found value in simply having a secure location. While I originally envisioned this as a place to store utilities you would only need on occasion (think camping gear for the urban dweller), it grew into a curated and vaulted museum right before my eyes. Everything from original sealed Nintendo units to rare sneaker collections were coming in. These were the things that people cared most about and paid money to store. This always stuck with me — the items they were storing were the things they loved and were passionate about, things they were experts in, but things they weren’t necessarily scaling. These little rooms in Omni, where people were storing pieces of amazing memorabilia, culture and art, inspired the genesis of what would become Arkive.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

Arkive is rethinking the way the world interacts with the art and artifacts that define human culture. We’ve created a platform that lets everyday people curate and create culture while providing access to the most exclusive asset class ever created — art.

Since the first museum opened in 1693, curated spaces have remained the arbiters of culture worldwide. From the Louvre in Paris to the National Palace Museum in Taipei and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, museums have become some of the most iconic symbols of contemporary culture. Yet, despite representing the history and taste of entire populations, none have completely opened their doors to decentralization. Traditionally, museums use curators to decide which artifacts are important and worthy of display. As a result, the artifacts we see that are meant to represent the culture of the many are largely still determined by the few.

Arkive is the first entirely decentralized physical museum redefining what it means to be part of defining the narrative of culture. It’s allowing our community to vote and ultimately build world-class collections. We’re answering the simple question: what if the Smithsonian was owned and curated by the internet?

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

Aaron Batalion was there as a sounding board and mentor at the beginning of both Omni and Arkive. He was one of the founders of Living Social and has had a similarly unique professional experience as me. Never sticking to one lane and always evolving his work alongside his personal interests. He’s helped me think through setting long visions and some of the early technical hurdles I would encounter. Also, when I first moved to SF, he and Micah Baldwin (another mentor) used to throw donut meetups down in the peninsula on weekend mornings. It was nice to have a small network of friends one generation ahead of me when I was 25 and basically winging entrepreneurship every day.

In today’s parlance, being disruptive is usually a positive adjective. But is disrupting always good? When do we say the converse that a system or structure has ‘withstood the test of time’? Can you articulate to our readers when disrupting an industry is positive and when disrupting an industry is ‘not so positive’? Can you share some examples of what you mean?

Art is meant to be disruptive, challenge conformity, and provide alternative perspectives. However, as it currently stands, the majority of the art world is defined and curated by a small group of individuals. This homogeneity leads to a lack of diversity in not just selection but in what it means to define cultural relevance and the history of art.

While the art world — and the art within it — has withstood the test of time, I think that way of thinking about collecting art fundamentally limits our ability to see advancements. Who is to say Beethoven is more important than Drake? Who is to opine that the patent for the first computer is more worthy of display than the first Burton snowboard prototype? The answer is the community.

Can you share five of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

Be curious- curiosity keeps your mind active vs. passive. It allows you to imagine the impossible and drives you into the unknown, which is where discoveries happen.
Be fearless- be fearless in your pursuit of success. Don’t allow others to dictate your path. It can be lonely at times, but when you know you’re on to something groundbreaking, don’t give up.
Be disruptive- challenge the status quo, be destructive. Sometimes we have to completely rethink normalcy to create magic.
Be intentional- don’t disrupt for the sake of disruption. Disrupt for the sake of change. Disrupt for the purpose of a mission. Disrupt to build a path others didn’t have but have yearned for.
Lead with passion- my career has taken me to a lot of different places in life. However, the best outcomes have been when I am most passionate about what I’m solving for.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

Just a few months after launching out of stealth, Arkive is well on its way to finalizing its first member-curated collection and we’ve debuted at Art Basel Miami Beach — one of the most defining art events of the year. Simultaneously, we are exploring ways to further democratize access to the appreciating asset class of art with more physical and digital experiences.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

A friend’s father passed away a little over a decade or so ago, and he updated his Facebook status to simply say, “Keep Punching — [Dad’s Name].” I have no idea why it’s always stuck with me. So many times, I’ve felt like there have been obstacles and stumbling blocks on the path to accomplishing anything, and this idea of just simply taking another swing has managed to get me back in the fight more times than I can count.

We are all artists, and art comes in so many different forms. We see it often in traditional forms like music, painting, literature, and cinema, but today we have so much more access to digital art, creators and curators. My movement would be to inspire people to never stop creating art. And, importantly, never stop sharing it.

How can our readers follow you online?

TWITTER: @tmcleod3

LINKEDIN: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tmcleod3

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Meet The Disruptors: Thomas McLeod On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

The Future Is Now: Jon Hu Of Pepper Bio On How Their Technological Innovation Will Shake Up The…

The Future Is Now: Jon Hu Of Pepper Bio On How Their Technological Innovation Will Shake Up The Tech Scene

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Don’t think about how others want you to act. You don’t have to be that typical entrepreneur who is prim and proper, like a caricature of corporate America. Like-minded people will gravitate towards you when you show up as yourself, leading you to a stronger team.

As a part of our series about cutting-edge technological breakthroughs, I had the pleasure of interviewing Jon Hu.

As co-founder and CEO of Pepper Bio, Jon’s vision to end untreatable diseases starts with building the world’s first transomics drug discovery solution. The many stops he’s made along his journey have given him a unique perspective on the drug development process and R&D.

At Shire, he gained valuable insights into bridging the gap between unmet patient needs, science (e.g., biology, technology), and business (e.g., finance, strategy). As an R&D analyst, Jon saw promising therapeutic programs shut down in early stages, due to perceived inadequate return on investment, despite potential drug effectiveness.

Having personally experienced the relief of life-changing medicine for chronic debilitating migraines, he knew first-hand how much life improves when effective treatments exists. After watching his grandmother’s neurological condition deteriorate from Alzheimer’s without access to disease-modifying therapies, Jon wanted to pursue cures for untreated diseases by mitigating scientific risk and better managing the pharma development process. He spent the next few years trying to find the right set of technologies to achieve these goals.

After work and on weekends, he spent time speaking with researchers to understand why, despite so much technological progress over the last few decades, there were still so many diseases, that don’t have effective treatments.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit about you. Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?

My journey to the world of drug discovery began when my grandmother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. The diagnosis was devastating for my family, and I felt compelled to take matters into my own hands and create hope for the millions of people and families affected by untreatable diseases.

My search for answers led me to partner with my co-founder Samantha Dale Strasser, whom I had known since college at Northwestern. She was developing innovative technology to shed light on highly complex biology, which could be used to probe diseases and drug effects. Today, Pepper Bio uses proprietary technology to find new targets, select the best treatments, and identify the optimal candidates for treatments to optimize the drug discovery process. Our mission is to end the era of untreatable diseases by gaining a comprehensive understanding in the early stages of drug development.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?

Earlier in my career, I worked at Shire Pharmaceuticals to prioritize its R&D portfolio. I saw the decision-making process behind either progressing or killing a drug program. Programs that could significantly impact patients’ lives could be considered ‘low priority’ if they had low financial returns, even if they had strong credentials in every other dimension. I’d heard stories like this before, but I never thought I’d be the one making these calls and being an obstacle in other patients’ journey to recovery. To be the person saying, “We recommend killing this project because it’s not going to be profitable,” was something I never imagined I’d have to do.

These experiences fueled my passion for entering the pharmaceutical space and forced me to question how I could change the economics of cutting-edge research.

Can you tell us about the cutting-edge technological breakthroughs that you are working on? How do you think that will help people?

We designed Pepper Bio to be the Google Maps of drug discovery. Our technology unlocks a new layer of sophistication to significantly reduce the cost and time required to develop drugs — specifically for neurology, oncology, and inflammatory diseases. Using a computational platform that integrates genomic, transcriptomic, proteomic, and phosphoproteomic data, we’re building the world’s first transomics database, which provides researchers with a complete, real-time map of disease mechanisms and interactions between therapies and surrounding cells. Leveraging our technology, other developers can engineer and select drugs with less toxicity, higher efficacy, and higher response rates, ensuring that patients can get rid of their disease symptoms with limited side effects.

Historically researchers focused solely on the “big data.” They’d collect as much data as possible because there was no downside to having more data. Over time, the industry learned that this approach was hindering the development process, and we pivoted toward collecting the right data. AI algorithms are only as effective as the data they are deployed on, which is why the use and integration of phosphoproteomic data into biological analyses is a complex but vital component of treating disease. Pepper Bio’s ability to stack protein phosphorylation information on top of more common data types, such as genomics, allows researchers to find effective therapies more easily. Minimizing time spent creating a drug while increasing its probability of success ensures therapeutic research into “riskier” diseases is less challenging.

Our ability to help researchers pre-vet drug targets and avoid costly mistakes during the trial phase is enabling a future of faster, safer, and more cost-effective drug discovery — bringing the same miraculous speed of Moderna and Pfizer’s mRNA vaccine innovations to neurodegenerative disease, cancer, and inflammatory disease.

How do you think this might change the world?

Pepper Bio has the potential to change the drug discovery industry and provide hope for millions of people and families across the world impacted by currently untreatable diseases.

Today’s drug discovery process is expensive and time-consuming. The combined cost of successful and failed attempts at developing a single successful therapy is upwards of $2.6 billion, and it can take 10+ years to bring a new drug to market. For pharma companies, risky and complex diseases are a bad financial bet, leaving patients who suffer from these ailments without hope.

Any individual drug has a 3% probability of success in drug discovery. These odds are so low because we still don’t have a comprehensive understanding of disease or the effects drugs have on disease and patients. Instead, drug developers conduct targeted analysis with limited data types, which only look at one or two specific pathways for the drug. As a result, developers miss other pathways that could interfere further down the road or miss potential side effects deemed intolerable by the FDA.

Our transomics technology addresses issues starting at the earliest stages of drug development. By bringing a new layer of understanding to drug discovery, we can make causal inferences about disease mechanisms and provide partners with functional insights into biological occurrences in real time.

Keeping “Black Mirror” in mind, can you see any potential drawbacks of this technology that people should think more deeply about?

I think all revolutionary ideas, concepts, and technology that can save the world carry some potential risks. Our technology can be used to map out what can potentially save a patient from pain or long-term decline. The platform can be used for so much good because it finds the best way to help people based on a new approach to transomics, but on the other hand, it could be used for the exact opposite. Hypothetically, a person with ill intentions for the world could utilize our technology to find the most effective way to hurt people. This is something we are always aware of and careful to consider as we do this research. Ultimately, the guiding question we ask ourselves is whether the direction we are heading in is serving the patients and caregivers we want to help.

Was there a “tipping point” that led you to this breakthrough? Can you tell us that story?

My grandma’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis was the tipping point for me. At the time, I knew anything I could do would be too late for her because there were no current treatments on the market. But I wanted to work hard to make sure no other families had to go through this feeling of hopelessness in the future.

What do you need to lead this technology to widespread adoption?

We need the adoption of our technology through educational institutions and drug research facilities. We plan to do this through new and existing partnerships to continue the expansion of validated targets and get drug candidates into the clinic. Early adopters will be important to test it out and champion the idea to those around them.

Additionally, the drug discovery industry needs a new spark, a sense of wonder. It needs imaginative, adventurous people to take calculated risks and leaps forward by adopting new technologies. More potential to develop curative medicines can’t come from doing the same things year after year, we need people who can think both inside and outside the box.

What have you been doing to publicize this idea? Have you been using any innovative marketing strategies?

We’ve presented at various conferences, panel discussions, and award ceremonies and have done media interviews and case presentations at Harvard Business School. We also have various partnerships in the works right now that will play an important role in presenting our mission to the pharma industry and beyond. We’re looking forward to when we can provide more details on the collaborations we have behind the scenes!

I’ve met so many people throughout my journey that have helped me immensely, but my biggest supporter and motivator has always been my grandfather. When I was growing up, China was very different from today, it was much less developed and recovering from the aftermath of the cultural revolution. My grandfather was self-taught in so many different areas like chemistry, agriculture, and even in building day-to-day items like kitchen pots and pans out of survival and necessity. Though it was a cultural shift, the revolution brought starvation and poverty to families, and there were nights when he had to eat stew made from tree bark and leather belts… but this didn’t stop him. He became one of the most cited successful chemists in China and President of Lanzhou University.

He’d take me around the rural areas in China and show me that so many people who don’t have the financial means or opportunities still have incredible skills and innovative ideas, but they don’t always get the chance to show the world. These areas sometimes had no running water or electricity, and his goal was to show me how much help the world needs and encourage me to be one of those people helping others.

My grandfather nourished my curiosity for the world by showing me the interesting part about problem-solving. It’s about using your unique set of skills and experience to make a lasting impact on the world.

How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?

I use every opportunity I can to mentor the upcoming generation of leaders just like people have done for me. Through Pepper’s technology, the team and I are putting in a lot of hard work to make this company the gold standard for the future of drug discovery. This means continuing our mission of finding new cures for untreatable diseases.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why?

It’s all about the people — Don’t hire for skillset only.

Motivated people with high drive will be phenomenal in any work environment. Our head of business development, Caitlin, came to us with a banking background. She had no sales experience but was highly motivated and took ownership of her work. She ended up building a massive network of relationships. Because of this, we’re on track to sign multiple partnerships before the end of the year, well ahead of our initial plans. Had we been hung up on the fact that she didn’t have the sales experience, we would’ve missed out on a great teammate and leader.

2. Pitching highly innovative ideas is about finding the right partners and not changing people’s minds.

Building on each other’s ideas is essential and creates a lot of value by opening new ways of thinking about growth. Arguing with folks very rarely gets you anywhere.

3. Be yourself.

Don’t think about how others want you to act. You don’t have to be that typical entrepreneur who is prim and proper, like a caricature of corporate America. Like-minded people will gravitate towards you when you show up as yourself, leading you to a stronger team.

4. Listen broadly, but make your own decisions.

Everyone has opinions, and they’ll likely contradict each other at times. Get as many perspectives as possible and make decisions based on what’s best for your mission and vision.

5. Know why you’re starting a company.

Inevitably, you’ll have bad days. Remind yourself of why you started the journey, get out of bed, and keep moving forward.

I’d try to get people to be more curious. Curiosity is the foundation for human progress, whether we’re talking about innovation in science or social science. We need curiosity to understand how things work and why others think the way they do.

In solving physics problems, we learned that simply changing your point of view can make an intractable problem solvable. That goes for most things in life. New perspectives can make challenges easier to overcome.

Unfortunately, our society’s infrastructure is built to dampen curiosity, and we frequently read and subscribe to things that reinforce our pre-held beliefs. For instance, our social media and purchasing patterns get analyzed, and we’re sent ideas that we already agree with, which doesn’t inspire curiosity or creativity.

Whenever possible, I’d encourage everyone to consider new ideas and perspectives, get out of your comfort zone and bring the right people into the room to challenge you along the way. There’s no doubt it will benefit you in the long run.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

I live by hundreds of quotes, but my favorite would have to be the following by Eddy Zhong: “No one has ever changed the world by doing what the world has told them to do.”

This quote is very relevant to my life goals and Pepper Bio. What we’re doing isn’t traditional; we’ve created this technology to find solutions that may be applicable in other areas of medicine and drug development. In life, people will tell you to follow a traditional path and emphasize how hard it is to do something different than those before you, but early on, I noticed something. If you look at the history of the world, things have generally been changed by the outliers. The nontraditional, nonsensical approaches, the people who dared to be different and build upon a traditional foundation made significant, notable progress toward their end goals for the greater good of humanity. Trying to affect change can’t be done the exact same way each time if those methods aren’t working and moving us forward. That quote has resonated with me since the first time I heard it.

Some very well-known VCs read this column. If you had 60 seconds to make a pitch to a VC, what would you say? He or she might just see this if we tag them 🙂

Pepper Bio is solving a multi-billion dollar problem in today’s drug discovery industry; the time and costs it takes to bring drugs to market. Our technology, dubbed the Google Maps for Drug Discovery, maps out the best treatments for diseases, whether that be discovering the new use of an old drug or the development of a new drug. Our methods cut costs and accelerate timelines, all while using reliable and repeatable methods.

How can our readers follow you on social media?

Twitter: @Pepper_bio

Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.

The Future Is Now: Jon Hu Of Pepper Bio On How Their Technological Innovation Will Shake Up The… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Meet The Disruptors: Greg Parker Of Parker’s On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Value opportunity and flexibility. As you achieve success in your career, it’s o.k. to give yourself permission to take a vacation, spend more time with family and live a life beyond work. Having the freedom to do what you enjoy is one of the richest rewards of professional success.

As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Greg Parker, founder and CEO of Parker’s convenience store company.

Greg Parker, the founder and CEO of Parker’s and Parker’s Kitchen, stands apart as one of America’s leading business innovators and disruptors. He has earned acclaim for his uncompromising commitment to high-quality foodservice, dedication to operating the cleanest convenience stores in the industry and passion for cutting-edge technology.

Inducted into the Convenience Store News Hall of Fame, Parker has been recognized as the Convenience Foodservice Leader of the Year, Tech Executive of the Year, Frank Callen Boys and Girls Club Citizen of the Year, Savannah Morning News Entrepreneur of the Year and Savannah Area Chamber of Commerce Entrepreneur of the Year.

Under his leadership, Parker’s has been honored as the Convenience Store Decisions Chain of the Year, included on the Inc. 5000 list of fastest-growing companies in America for six years, voted one of the America’s Top 10 Gas Brands by USA TODAY readers and named one of America’s Best Convenience Stores by Food and Wine. The company also specializes in preparing and serving Southern-inspired food and has earned a Tripadvisor Travelers’ Choice Award, which recognizes the top 10% of restaurants around the world.

I’m originally from Collins, Georgia, and I opened my first convenience store in 1976, right after I graduated from the University of Georgia. I considered going to law school, but opened my first convenience store right off I-95 in Midway, Georgia at the age of 21. In those days, I-95 had just opened and my father worked as an Amoco distributor. His territory included one exit that touched the new interstate, so this was a great opportunity.

After the store opened, I was the main employee and literally did everything. I wore a change belt, and would go out and pump the gas, clean the windshield, check the oil, check the air in the tires, cook food, make deposits and do the books. In fact, I never took a day off for three and a half years. I would get up before sunrise and work until I had to go home. I worked Christmas, I worked every day and have never regretted working hard to achieve my goals. When you’re starting your career and creating a foundation for success, you have to be willing to make sacrifices. I wasn’t a believer in work-life balance when I was younger. I just worked hard and kept my head down.

Creating a foundation of success affords you the luxury of work-life balance later in your career. It provides you the luxury of flexibility, once you have laid that foundation. Now, I pursue other interests and enjoy working hard and playing hard. I think it’s important to have balance as you progress in your career. My family, my friends and my health are all very important to me now.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

At Parker’s, we have a culture of innovation that’s focused on excellence at every level. We’re doing a number of things that are disruptive and have recognized the fact that the three main profit centers that historically drove the convenience store industry — which are known as “gas, Cokes and smokes” — are diminishing. There’s going to be a seismic shift in the consumption of fossil fuels in the coming years, which means that we have to look for alternative ways to supply our customer needs and to make money.

As the consumption of cigarettes and carbonated beverage have been going down, we’ve realized that we needed to transition from a convenience store company that sells food service into a food service company that sells convenience. We want to continue to have the best products to satisfy the needs states of the consumer. Another thing we’ve done is develop technology for people to order food, turn the gas pump on and make payments from their phone. We have a loyalty program that allows the customer to get additional tiered discounts on gasoline for every 25 dollars they spend. We’ve found that the customers who use your mobile apps are much more loyal than other consumers.

We’re continuing to improve how we do food service. Using machine learning, we know in real time what the consumer demand is going before they place an order, which helps make sure our food is as fresh as possible. We also use “smart kitchens” in our stores, which use machine learning to predict how many chicken tenders or other items we’re going to sell in the next 30 minutes. We want to ensure that our hot food is freshly prepared, but we don’t want customers to have to wait on us to prepare it.

At Parker’s, we’ve created a scorecard for success, incorporating key metrics. I truly believe that in order to make success achievable, you have to make it measurable. We’ve enjoyed 20 to 24 percent growth over the past 24 years and have been included on the Inc. 500 list of the fastest growing private companies in America for six years, which is truly an incredible achievement.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

Warren Buffett says that you need to know exactly what you’re investing in and you also need to know more about it than anybody else. I got the lamebrained idea that I needed to have a tow truck when I was first in business because I opened a convenience store on I-95. I borrowed $5,000 from the bank to purchase a wrecker and didn’t really think it through.

The only time that I actually used the wrecker was when somebody from the Sheriff’s Department called to tell me that a vehicle had broken down on I-95. I was the only game in town, and there was nothing else around. However, in order to go get the person whose car had broken down, I had to lock the store up and close everything down. Also, there weren’t any mechanics around to fix anything, so it just made no sense and was a big waste of time and money. I should have played to my strengths. Lesson learned.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors?

Absolutely. I’m a big believer in the power of mentors. My key mentors over the years include Bill Martin, a dairy farmer in Midway, Georgia who taught me the nuances of real estate, which includes understanding the nuisance value of property. John Cay, a Savannah business leader, was another mentor who dared me to think big and inspired me to create a board of advisors. I’ve also learned so much from former BP Amoco Marketers Association Executive Director John Kleine, who took me under his wing and taught me about the importance of relationships, in business and in life.

With disruption, as with most challenges in life, there’s often a silver lining. I think that disruption often allows for greater growth and a fresh way of thinking. I’ve certainly experienced a lot of challenges and things that seemed like insurmountable hurdles at the time. Then, as time progresses, I’ve realized that those things actually gave me a competitive advantage.

I think the successful companies are the ones that are most adaptable to change and to disruption. In our company, we’re quick to respond, and we’re quick to think about what’s over the horizon. How are we going to best deal with it? How do we apply the capital? We take the human resources and the financial resources and then create a scorecard around it, so we can measure the efficacy of our efforts over time.

In our industry, there was a great disruption that occurred when everybody was scared of the hypermarkets selling gas very cheap. What ultimately happened is that convenience store owners learned that they need to build stores that are going to be able to compete with the hypermarkets, so it’s sort of forced everybody to up their game.

Can you share five of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

First, remember that the first decade out of school is the most important time to build a foundation for future success. That is the time when you will develop the core habits that will help you succeed over the years. It’s the perfect time to be “all in” on your career and to be laser focused on achieving your goals.

Second, embrace curiosity and lifelong learning. Be a reader, explorer and adventurer. Keep an open mind. As I get older, I see more grey in my life and less black and white. Remember that curious people are happier and live fuller lives. There’s so much to learn in life and so many incredible resources to explore. Take a deep dive into the subjects that interest you most and find others who share those same interests.

Third, value opportunity and flexibility. As you achieve success in your career, it’s o.k. to give yourself permission to take a vacation, spend more time with family and live a life beyond work. Having the freedom to do what you enjoy is one of the richest rewards of professional success.

Fourth, remember that you only have one body and you need to take care of it. Eat right, exercise, do yoga and cardio, meditate and sleep. All of these elements are critical for physical, mental and psychological growth and to stay as healthy as possible over time. If you choose to neglect your body now, you will pay the price in the future.

And, finally, create your own personal and business board of directors to help you achieve your goals and hold you accountable. In business and in life, surround yourself with people who lift you up, challenge you and are loyal. Choose to spend time with people who embody the characteristics you aspire to have. In many ways, we are a reflection of the sum total of the people we associate with. Surround yourself with high-quality people who help you become a better person.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

I love growth and trying to figure out how to grow in smart, strategic ways. I’m a futurist by nature and am intensely curious. I think the future is always evolving. As an industry, convenience stores are going to have to expand the definition of fuel as our nation moves away from petroleum-based gasoline. We need to become a gathering place for commerce and a hub of innovation.

At Parker’s, we’re going to shake things up by offering a better experience for our customers, which means nicer stores, better landscaping, better architecture, cleaner stores, better service and a faster way to get in and out of the store by using technology and other means to be able to have a frictionless experience. We want to make sure that when our food is served, it’s hot, delicious and freshly prepared.

We’re also really focused on loyalty and having the technology that allows us to mine data to find out how to best satisfy our consumers. We are very focused on trip generators and the profits that they bring into our store. A major trip generator for us is gas, so we’re not going to be undersold on gas. We want to harvest the data from various transactions to find out what the other ancillary sales are that come with those trip generators, and then making it compelling for the consumer to come to you to get those things. So, we’re not looking at just the profit on a single item. We’re looking at the profit on the basket of what that item facilitates.

We want to continue to expand the technology on our phones. Now, when you come to our stores, you can turn on the pump and pay directly from your phone. We want to make the process as frictionless as possible so that it takes fewer steps to get what you want. There’s also a lot that’s happening with technology to help us better operate stores to mitigate expenses and to make sure that we have the right number of personnel on site for the demand of the transactions that we know that are going to occur. We have the business intelligence that can predict how many transactions will happen at each store for a particular period, so when we’re doing labor and budgeting, we will make sure that we have the right number of team members taking care of customers at each store.

Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?

Books I’ve read recently that I’ve loved include Sapiens, The Psychology of Money and The Almanack of Naval Ravikant. Those are all great reads, with lessons that apply to life as well as business. I also enjoy listening to podcasts by Joe Rogan and Tim Ferriss. They have great messages about how to live life and how to make smart decisions.

I especially like Ravikant’s perspective on short-term pain for a long-term gain. I’ve naturally always done that and have never been a procrastinator. I watch other people and marvel at the fact that they don’t want to make the tough decisions today to live their best life long-term.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

I love Naval Ravikant’s quote where he says, “All the benefits in life come from compound interest — relationship, money, habits — anything of importance.” I definitely agree that one of the greatest lessons of life is understanding the importance of compounding. It’s true in relationships, financial investments, how we run our business and how we treat people. Everything truly adds up and compounds over time.

I think one movement that is taking place now is the importance of meditation. I listened to a Tony Robbins podcast recently where he said that every successful person he knows does some form of meditation. Entrepreneur, writer and innovator Naval Ravikant says the two most important things he does in his life are exercising and meditating daily. Billionaire Ray Dalio trains all his top-level executives in Transcendental Meditation, which I find fascinating.

I think another great movement would be a shift toward trying to understand other people’s point of view. We’ve become so polarized as a country, but we can’t just be a fragmented nation of single-issue voters. We need to recognize that the world is changing. Ultimately, allowing ourselves to be more accepting and more adaptive to change will make us stronger as a country and will help us create a better world.

How can our readers follow you online?

Follow Parker’s at @TheParkersKitchen on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram.

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

My pleasure!

Meet The Disruptors: Greg Parker Of Parker’s On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Making Something From Nothing: Jim OMeara Of NetBandz On How To Go From Idea To Launch

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

You’re going to make mistakes through trial and error! Whenever you start something new and forge out into the great unknown, there are going to be bumps in the road. You’re going to make mistakes, it’s a given! Just try and do your best to minimize your downside risk.

As a part of our series called “Making Something From Nothing”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Jim OMeara.

Jim was Raised in New Rochelle, NY and was always into sports. He graduated from Fairfield University in 1988 with a degree in Marketing and is married to a fellow Fairfield Alum, Alice Giff. They have two daughters, Patti (24) and Jillian (18) and live in Fairfield, CT.

Jim also has a Master’s degree in counseling from Manhattan College. He has been a Career Counselor/Executive Recruiter for the past 23 years and owns his own executive recruiting agency in Westport, CT. He enjoys spending time with family, watching crime shows, reading self-help books, golf, fantasy football and playing with his two dogs (St Bernard Nory and golden retriever Lily)

Jim loves the game of basketball and always hated to see rims without nets in public parks. He thought that every kid wants to shoot on a hoop with a net! So in 2019, he set out to find a way to brand basketball nets so that companies could advertise their brands on the net which would incentivize a movement to put nets up in all public parks across America.

The idea for NetBandz finally came to him by chance in the bookstore of the college where his daughter was a student, William & Mary in Williamsburg, VA. He saw a tube-top apparel item on display in the store and a light bulb went off! This could be a potential way to brand the net. All that was needed was to have 12 openings around the top circumference of the band/tube which would allow the top loops of the net to go through allowing for the band to hang on the outside of the net where it would never interfere with the ball going through it.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your “childhood backstory”?

I was raised in Westchester County in a fairly-well to do neighborhood. My father was an accountant and my mother was a stay-at-home mom.

I’m the youngest of six kids. I have a twin sister as well. We’re all very close in age (six kids, five years apart) so it was never a dull moment in our house.

I think growing up with all these people around me helped to shape my personality to one who gets along with people, adapts quickly and who is unselfish. Looking over my life, I’ve always been good around people and can easily engage with anyone and fit in quickly, so I can thank my upbringing for that!

I wasn’t the best student growing up but managed to squeak by somehow. When I got to high school, I only played basketball and was a three-year starter on the varsity team and did well.

I went on to play my freshman year in college at Fairfield University in CT. However, I found the adjustment to college and mixing academics and basketball to be challenging. Although basketball was such a large part of my life, I was forced to focus on academics and stopped playing after my freshman year. That was a big inflection point in my life where my identity shifted from being this basketball player “sports jock” to just being a regular everyday college student. I went on to graduate from Fairfield U in 1988 with a degree in marketing.

I stopped playing basketball many years ago, but I still follow some of the NBA teams and colleges. It’s ironic that the sport of basketball that I loved so much in my childhood would be where I have my invention.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

I’m a self-help person and read all the books (James Allen, Og Mandino, Napoleon Hill, Tony Robbins etc.). I also have a Master’s in Counseling Psychology from Manhattan College so this question is right up my alley.

There is one quote that sticks out above the rest and is easily remembered and it’s from Tony Robbins.

“RAISE YOUR STANDARDS”

Don’t settle for the status quo. Always try and get better and do more. This quote serves as a constant reminder for me to convert my “want to haves” in my life to “must haves”. It keeps me committed and determined.

As an inventor, there are a lot of times when things don’t go your way and there are set- backs. However, set the bar high and keep grinding and pushing through. I also use this quote to help guide me across all areas of my life including my health (exercise and what I choose to eat), business and relationships.

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

As A Man Thinketh by James Allen.

I read this in my early self-help reading days and it opened the door to me learning that human beings have control over their thoughts and as a result they themselves can control their destiny and happiness. People are not on “autopilot” when it comes to their thoughts.

I picked this book out because of the profound impact it had on my life. It turned me into a life-long curious person and really opened up my mind. It changed me.

Moving from idea to an actual business is very hard. I have other inventions/patents that have gone nowhere. It’s a combination of things and many things have to line up in order to get there. I think a lot.

My advice to inventors about moving from idea phase to a real business phase is two things and they flow into one another:

Action — just thinking and talking/brainstorming about your invention and how great it will be won’t get you where you want to go. You must take action. People come to me for advice with an idea they have and I’ll say “That sounds great where are you with it?” and they’ll say something like “Oh I’m too busy with my job” or “I’m looking into getting a patent” or some other weak reason that tells me they’re not really serious and passionate about taking the idea to the next level. If you’re serious and passionate about your idea and believe in it, you have to take action to enhance it and bring it forward and shouldn’t let it just sit on a shelf in your mind.
Incrementalism — Focus on the next task only.

With the mindset of incrementalism and action, you’re constantly asking yourself “What task do I have to perform next to move this forward?” and do that task as soon as possible. You should always be in task, never idle.

It’s a one step at a time thought process, each task building on the next, but it’s constant. Once a task is done, you ask yourself again right away “What task do I have to do next?” and just keep going.

There’s a vision an inventor has when thinking of their product of many people buying and using it and it’s a big hit and they are rich. Of course, this is a great vision to have and hold and should be the primary driver, but along with that in parallel the inventor has to come back down to earth and put in the daily grunt work to move the invention along so it can evolve and expand.

For example, when developing NetBandz, I was personally in the back of a dry cleaner every week making samples of my bands with a seamstress for over a year until we got the right prototype. I remember having two weeks of phone calls at 11PM with manufacturers in Asia just to get the care tag that goes on the inner hem of the band that tells the customer how to wash it. It’s just things you have to do as an entrepreneur, and you do these things because you believe in where it will go eventually.

The first thing I do is Google it. See if it’s out there in the public domain. After that, get curious and educate yourself on the patent process. Learning the patent process is valuable by itself because you may invent other things and it’s just good to know. The website is uspto.gov which is the USA patent website.

3. First my advice is the inventor should never be paranoid that someone will steal their invention. This fear leads to stagnation and procrastination. Move fast! Be cautious and cover your bases with NDAs with manufacturers and people you don’t know but don’t let this slow you down!

4. Make a prototype and have people use it and get feedback. You must ensure that people who use it like it and it solves a need.

5. Cost: What would someone pay for it? Can it be manufactured at a cost that will make the business worthwhile? There are tons of good products where the economics/margins just don’t line up!

3. “How to file a patent” — Once the above is done and satisfied, find a patent attorney. The first thing the attorney will do is run an official patent search with the USPTO to see if there is anything like your product already in existence. After their patent search, they will make a recommendation based on their experience if they think your product has a chance of being granted a patent. (Note: Even if your lawyer says you have a good chance of getting a patent after the search and recommends you apply for one, the USPTO Examiner can still reject it based on prior patents issued. It’s a very subjective process based on the “opinion” of the examiner).

After the patent search, the attorney will ask you for drawings (referred to by the patent office as ART) or they may have an artist on staff to create the drawings for submittal. The lawyer will then carefully write out a list of “Claims” which explains in detail the invention in written form. The lawyer will then submit your invention to the patent office for “provisional” patent status. This is a “place holder” patent certification for your invention, it is not a patent itself. Once the attorney files the provisional patent, it will get assigned a certification number. Your invention is now “in the que” and you have protection from others submitting your idea so you’re free to show it to anyone. If asked if you have a patent, you say “I’m patent pending”. If someone else invents a similar item to yours and files a provisional patent after you, your patent would take precedence over there’s because yours was filed first.

Once in Provisional status, you now wait until you hear back from the lawyer on if it’s officially granted or not and the lawyer will tell you how long it will take. I think our patent was granted 8 months after we got the provisional patent but could be up to a year or more depending on how busy the patent office is.

4. While submitting patent, you should be sourcing manufacturers for the product. We used Alibaba for NetBandz, as ours is an apparel item but they have all types of different manufacturers on Alibaba, so I would start there. You can select manufacturers and contact them through the site. We called about ten different manufacturers in Asia we got through Alibaba and selected two (You should always have more than one just in case your primary can’t produce for whatever reason). Always have a backup!

Find out total costs and minimum quantities and get a contract with manufacturer as well as time to deliver which is critical in this market with slow supply chains etc.

We started selling retail ecommerce online with an Amazon account. There’s a monthly fee of $39.99. Once you have inventory on hand, photos created, you create your pages on Amazon yourself which is straightforward. You set your inventory and pricing levels for the product and then go live. I recommend keeping inventory of your product yourself and ship everything yourself at first just to see how it goes before engaging with a fulfillment center (a warehouse that ships your products for you). Fulfillment centers can be expensive and a little slow with delivery plus you don’t get to see the quality control. At least when you ship yourself, you can oversee quality control and know exactly how it’s packaged and delivered and when it’s shipped out.

5. How will you ship the item? In a box or a mailer envelope? If you ship yourself, you’ll have to have the shipping materials on hand as well. You’ll also have to get a printer label machine for postage which is easy to set up. Shipping material can be expensive and should be factored into the cost of goods.

6. In addition to Amazon, we also built our website and sell our products through there using Shopify. Shopify is also easy to set up for online orders. You’ll have to create all the product pages again just like on Amazon.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Started Leading My Company” and why?

I wish someone told me:

That you must be patient. Things take a long time to develop! There’s a lot of little things that pop up that slows things down. For example, it took over a year just to develop a prototype to get it where we wanted it to be. Another area is manufacturing turnaround. It could take up to five weeks to get product and time seems to drag on, so you have to be patient with everything.
Things get harder and more time consuming as you go along. I always thought things would get easier as time went on. They don’t, they get harder. It seems that once you get over one hurdle, there’s two more in front of you! For example, I thought once we got on Amazon that was it. We could sit back and crank out the sales and enjoy. That was not the case at all. Once you’re selling on ecommerce, now you must develop advertising, social media, your website, new product development, SEO optimization, get designers for new products, deal with manufacturing issues and maintaining inventory levels, dealing with licensing agreements — the list goes on and on.
The costs of running the business are more than expected and really eat into profits such as costs of goods rising and advertising etc. Over the past year, our cost per unit from manufacturers has doubled. Cost of advertising was a higher than we thought too. Pay per click advertising is expensive on Amazon.
You must be prepared to make final decisions on your own because in the end, it’s your call. It can be difficult sometimes because you may have partners that want to do one thing and you think it’s best to do another. I was always part of a team and now with NetBandz, I make the final decisions on what direction to go in and how to allocate resources, which is new to me. Inventors should be ready to make the final call, be decisive and live with their decisions.
You’re going to make mistakes through trial and error! Whenever you start something new and forge out into the great unknown, there are going to be bumps in the road. You’re going to make mistakes, it’s a given! Just try and do your best to minimize your downside risk.

At NetBandz, we made a few mistakes ordering too much inventory of certain items that we ended up not even putting up for sale. It was costly, but we take it as a learning experience.

Let’s imagine that a reader reading this interview has an idea for a product that they would like to invent. What are the first few steps that you would recommend that they take? Find out if it’s already on the market. Google it and do a patent search.

There are many invention development consultants. Would you recommend that a person with a new idea hire such a consultant, or should they try to strike out on their own? I have nothing against idea consultants. For me, it’s always best to go out and learn everything on your own. You’ll learn a ton and be better for it! I have learned so much over the past two years that I wouldn’t take that back for the world. Plus, now when I invent my next thing, I’ll know what to do and can hit the ground running. Never pass up an opportunity to learn!

What are your thoughts about bootstrapping vs looking for venture capital? What is the best way to decide if you should do either one?

I would recommend exploring both avenues and gathering as much information as possible and see where it takes you. It all depends on personal preference and risk tolerance and what structure you want to work out of etc. I do think having a VC who specializes in your market could accelerate things a lot quicker and create greater enterprise value and would be potentially good for optics. Of course, it comes with a price, and you have to give up equity and control.

Ok. We are nearly done. Here are our final questions. How have you used your success to make the world a better place?

Interesting question! In addition to being an inventor, I’m also a career counselor who spends a lot of time coaching people, giving them guidance with their careers and other personal matters. My hope is that what I’ve learned over the years both as an entrepreneur/inventor and as a counselor/coach comes through and impacts the people I come in contact with in a positive way and makes the world a better place.

I would inspire a movement to cure ALS (Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis) Disease. I personally have two friends with the disease and seeing what these people and their families are going through just makes me want to help them and give them hope. I envision a future where there’s a cure, but it needs more attention and resources behind it. 5,000 people in the US get diagnosed with ALS each year. It’s a terminal disease and we MUST find a cure!

Mark Cuban!! Mark is someone we would love to connect with as he’s a basketball guy and invests in cool ideas.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

Making Something From Nothing: Jim OMeara Of NetBandz On How To Go From Idea To Launch was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Non-Fungible Tokens: Elsa Jean Of The Elsa Jean NFT Community On The 5 Things You Need To Know To…

Non-Fungible Tokens: Elsa Jean Of The Elsa Jean NFT Community On The 5 Things You Need To Know To Create a Highly Successful Career In The NFT Industry

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Do your own research by looking into the creators, founders and engaging in the community.

Many have observed that we are at the cusp of an NFT boom. The thing is, it’s so cutting edge, that many people don’t know what it is. What exactly is an NFT and how can one create a lucrative career out of selling them? To address this, as a part of our interview series called “5 Things You Need To Know To Create a Highly Successful Career In The NFT Industry”, we had the pleasure of interviewing Elsa Jean.

Elsa Jean, known as the “sexiest woman in Web3,” is using blockchain technology to revolutionize the way women can monetize their brands. At 26, the former adult film actress has built a multi-million dollar brand, The Elsa Jean Community, and established herself as a leader in the Web3 space. Her Elsa Jean NFTs launched in November 2022, giving her fans lifetime ownership of a limited number of digital keys that unlock access to her exclusive Web3 community. Elsa is flipping the traditional subscription-based payment and distribution model on its head.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit. Can you tell us a bit about your backstory and how you grew up?

I am a small town girl from Minnesota. I had to provide for my family at only 16 when my mother, who battled mental illness, left me and my sisters. After working multiple jobs, I joined the adult film industry and built a brand that established me as one of the top adult film actresses in the world. After leaving the industry over a year ago, I am now pioneering Web3 business models and helping to onboard users into the space.

Is there a particular book, film, or podcast that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

Legally blonde : it sounds like a cliche that I would say this , but this movie teaches women that brains and beauty are not mutually exclusive in the realest way to me. I love it!

Is there a particular story that inspired you to pursue a career in this new industry? We’d love to hear it.

I heard of a former adult performer who had promised fans a safe place to invest in their community and then they did not follow through, really losing trust in their community and tarnishing a new and promising way to do business. I couldn’t sit by and leave the space tainted for fans and not see the light for millions of other creators in web3 to flourish and utilize all the incredible tools blockchain technology offers.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began this fascinating career?

The outpouring of love and support from women. Coming from the industry I do, I’m not used to such beautiful support and feeling so welcomed into a new space by other women. It’s a wonderful feeling and a testament to how inclusive the web3 space is slowly becoming.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

Someone sent me 10M fake Shiba tokens. I told everyone some guy had taken a liking to me and quickly came to the realization when I transferred them that they disappeared into thin air. Let’s hope they weren’t real anyway!

I had a mother-like influence with my first agent: Sandra from ATMLA. I was very lucky to have such a nurturing space to start my career and be kept on the right track.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

I recently launched my Elsa Jean Community NFTs, which give my community the most exclusive access to me, my content, IRL events and so much more to come that we are currently building out. I think NFT technology is revolutionizing the traditional subscription-based web2 model for creators, and I certainly want to be at the forefront of that. I’m using this new technology to give my audience long-term value, a worthwhile investment, and as a business owner it allows me to have full ownership of my community and freedom over my content. I love onboarding other women into the web3 space and teaching them how valuable this technology is for their community and their business.

I’m launching my brand new podcast, “Heartbreakers with Elsa Jean & James” very soon, which will give a unique take on relationships, sex and dating that I hope will be helpful for people in a really compassionate way. I’ll also be releasing a line of merchandise in February with a portion of the proceeds going to charity, and my NFT holders will get first access.

Ok super. Thank you for all that. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview. I’m sure you get this question all the time. But for the benefit of our readers, can you explain in your own words what an NFT is, and why people are spending so much money on them?

An NFT is a digital collectible that is totally unique and non-fungible, meaning there is only one of that NFT that exists and it can’t be interchanged. In the case of my Elsa Jean NFTs, the NFT acts as a membership pass to the Elsa Jean Community. There are only 1,000 Elsa Jean NFTs in total, so by owning one of my NFTs, holders get unique long-term access to the infrastructure we’re building in web3 and beyond.

The NFT industry seems so exciting right now. What are the 3 things in particular that most excite you about the industry? If you can, please share a story or example for each.

I’m excited about so many things in this space. First of all, the fact that I’m able to give my fans something back that has the potential to increase in value while they enjoy perks and can trade at a later date. Building a new fan base that integrates nicely with my existing fan base, and learning all together as we go. Seeing web3’s integration onto social platforms and real world products excites me. The fact that buyers are able to use credit cards to purchase NFTs now and they don’t need crypto was such a foreign concept not long ago. I love seeing web3 agencies and divisions being implemented in top financial institutions such as Goldman Sachs, talent agencies like CAA and WME and studios like Warner Bro’s. It’s really exciting to see the leaders in finance and entertainment making room for web3 — it means we aren’t batting into thin air!

What are the 3 things that concern you about the industry? Can you explain? What can be done to address those concerns?

Celebrity endorsement and gifting. Specific rules and guidelines need to be established for anyone endorsing a product. If something has been gifted, it will have a cash value and that needs to be disclosed like any other paid endorsement.

I’m also worried that an over-course-correction from the initial ‘Wild Wild West’ approach people took in web3 could get in the way of what we’re trying to build and give freedom to. There needs to be a happy medium without overregulation. And there must always be very clear messaging about not investing what you don’t have.

The safety and protection of web3 assets. It’s so important for anyone onboarding into the space to learn first and foremost how to protect their assets. And also to do their research before investing in any project.

What are the “myths” that you would like to dispel about NFTs? Can you explain what you mean?

“NFT’s are a scam. NFT’s don’t hold value. NFT’s are difficult to comprehend or participate in.”

The web3 community is so inclusive and wants to succeed and help others do too. And the only way they are able to do so is to reach mass adoption and be able to cross over into the mainstream for them to make a ROI and grow what they came to build. Millions of people in web3 are on Twitter, Discord and other social media platforms ready and waiting to educate and help people onboard. And to learn web3 is actually a lot easier than people think. It can feel over-complicated by some of the content that’s out there, but that’s not the truth.

What are the most common mistakes you have seen people make when they enter the NFT industry? What can be done to avoid that?

Starting too big!!! Start small and grow with your community. Educate them and go every step of the way hand in hand and you will succeed. You can always level up but it will be a lot harder to come back from a massive influx you are not able to control and deliver in a real way to each individual.

How do you think NFTs have the potential to help society in the future?

NFTs give creators ways to have their work seen and made come to life in ways they wouldn’t have had in traditional mediums. The window used to be small and the bar was set very high by a select few. Whereas now, creators have been given a safe space to play in the sandbox . No pun intended.

Ok, fantastic. Here is the main question of our interview. What are your “5 Things You Need To Know To Create a Highly Successful Career In The NFT Industry?”

Do your own research by looking into the creators, founders and engaging in the community.

Create allies with other creators. Collaboration is KEY.

Host Twitter Spaces to have transparent conversations with your community and other web3 creators.

Create touch points with your NFT to keep your community engaged. An example of this could be delayed reveals, real world interaction, perks tied to your existing materials like brand deals.

To create a successful NFT project, my best advice is to start small but think big. Grow meaningfully and intentionally every step of the way.

I was severely bullied my whole life right up to present day. If I could change the mindset of bullies and shine a light on people’s reactions to their own trauma, that would be my chosen movement. I would have people post their experiences of regret from saying something nasty to someone. Perhaps share a story from when they were in high school and go back to a moment to re-experience where they were at that time mentally and emotionally through a new lens and see how they’ve grown. Hindsight is a beautiful thing.

Julia Haart. She’s a success in every facet of her life in my eyes, and the fact she was able to get to the place she is today from where she came from and the suppression women face in her original community makes her legendary in my eyes. Bad Boss Lady!!! And a great mother.

Thank you so much for these excellent stories and insights. We wish you continued success on your great work!

Non-Fungible Tokens: Elsa Jean Of The Elsa Jean NFT Community On The 5 Things You Need To Know To… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Tara Miskelly Of M&C Saatchi One-to-One On How to Effectively Leverage The Power of Digital…

Tara Miskelly Of M&C Saatchi One-to-One On How to Effectively Leverage The Power of Digital Marketing, PPC, & Email to Dramatically Increase Sales

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Have Passion: Passion is contagious and as a digital marketer and as a manager you need to be passionate about what you’re doing. If you aren’t, it can be very hard to motivate yourself to want to run the best campaigns or be the best manager you can be. A lack of passion may manifest in to failed campaigns, unhappy clients or unhappy employees.

Marketing a product or service today is easier than ever before in history. Using platforms like Facebook ads or Google ads, a company can market their product directly to people who perfectly fit the ideal client demographic, at a very low cost. Digital Marketing tools, Pay per Click ads, and email marketing can help a company dramatically increase sales. At the same time, many companies that just start exploring with digital marketing tools often see disappointing results.

In this interview series called “How to Effectively Leverage The Power of Digital Marketing, PPC, & Email to Dramatically Increase Sales”, we are talking to marketers, advertisers, brand consultants, & digital marketing gurus who can share practical ideas from their experience about how to effectively leverage the power of digital marketing, PPC, & email.

As a part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Tara Miskelly.

Tara Miskelly is an Account Manager at M&C Saatchi One-to-One — a CRM agency who have a portfolio of high-profile clients including Moët Hennessy, Brightpearl by Sage, Christie’s and more. Her main responsibilities here include leading and optimizing Moët Hennessy’s CRM activities and practices across their brands to increase brand awareness, loyalty and drive sales.

Tara has over seven years experience delivering successful digital marketing, PPC, and email campaigns across many industries from retail to real estate for clients including Moët Hennessy, CBRE, Spear Street Capital, and Dulux. Her speciality lies in her in-depth knowledge of the digital marketing landscape and her ability to create campaigns that drive conversions and turn online channels such as Social, Search, or Email into a company’s key source of revenue. Tara loves how digital marketing allows her to utilize both her creative and analytical skills.

In her spare time, she enjoys putting her Masters degree in UX Design to good use by working on her portfolio and building mobile apps (she’s currently working on building a mobile app to help better educate people about sustainable fashion). She also loves going to art museums, exploring New York City or FaceTiming with her family in Ireland.

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive in, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you got started?

I’ve always been a creative and analytical person so when it came time to choose my major in college I decided to pick Marketing as I felt it was the best of both worlds. At the time, digital marketing wasn’t known at the scale it is today. It wasn’t until my final year in college that I actually had a class that focused on digital marketing but after the first class I was hooked! I thought it was incredible how much data you could glean from platforms like Google Analytics and how this data could be used or presented to inform a marketing strategy. I wanted to gain real-world experience in this field so I got an internship during my final year of college. This internship involved me implementing the full digital marketing life cycle to successfully launch a mobile savings app into the UK market.

Once I graduated, I started running digital marketing for a popular retail store in Dublin, Ireland. By harnessing strategic campaigns across social media (paid and organic), Google Ads and SEO, I was able to turn the store’s online channels, specifically its social media, into its number one channel for sales, far surpassing in-store sales which had been its bread and butter. After this role, I spent several years in digital marketing and creative agencies leading successful social media, PPC and email marketing campaigns for clients including CBRE, Dulux, Hibernia Reit, Spear Street Capital, and Travelport. Leading so many digital projects sparked my curiosity in UX Design so I decided to pursue a Master’s Degree in UX Design whilst working full-time.

After my Master’s, I moved to New York where I was really exposed to the importance and best practices of email marketing and CRM. Currently, I am an Account Manager at M&C Saatchi One-to-One and I’m responsible for optimizing Moët Hennessy’s CRM activities and practices.

Can you share a story about the funniest marketing mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lessons or ‘takeaways’ you learned from that?

This might be a classic intern mistake but in one of my earlier marketing internships, I misspelled a few words in an email and sent the email on the wrong day! At the time, I thought this would mark the end of my career and I’d be fired immediately but thankfully my boss wasn’t too annoyed. It’s funny to look back on that now as I’ve since seen big brands fall victim to similar mistakes.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?

I’ve been very lucky in that people took a chance on me at the start of my career when I didn’t have much experience.

In particular, Louise Stokes, who owns the retail store I worked with, really nurtured my creative side but also taught me how to present the data I found in a concise, compelling and easy-to-understand manner. Additionally, Ian Blake and Brona Donlon at Squaredot took me under their wings and introduced me to the best practices around the client-facing side of the business and how to be a better Account Manager. They also educated me on the more technical background of SEO — the information and principles I learned from this is still something I use today.

Lastly, all of my colleagues at M&C Saatchi One-to-One who truly embody what it means to be collaborative and a team. Their support has not only helped me grow in my career but in my personal life too.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

We’re not your typical agency in that we don’t label ourselves as a branding agency or a marketing agency per se. Instead, we really focus on creating impactful, human connections between brands and their consumers at a one-to-one level and hone in on what the best platform to achieve that connection is.

Our focus on creating impactful, human connections is also deeply embedded in our company culture. The Leadership team genuinely cares about their employees which can sometimes be difficult to find in the agency world. Every employee can also set up an initiative dedicated to a topic that they each care about. I choose to focus on mental health and have started to implement ways to create a positive mental health environment in the workplace which has been well received so far.

You are a successful business leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?

Be Emotionally Intelligent: The difference between a leader who is emotionally intelligent versus those who aren’t is night and day. Being emotionally intelligent creates a positive, productive and collaborative work environment and gives space for people to be open with each other.
Stay Humble & Be a Team Player: No matter how senior you are, no task should be ‘beneath you.’ You should always be willing to offer a helping hand to your team when they need one.
Be Organized & Focused: It can be easy to get overwhelmed with the number of tasks you have to do which is why it’s important to be organized and stay focused. Every week I write out my top 5–7 goals/priorities for the week and I have a daily to-do list to keep on top of my deadlines. If possible, it’s better to plan your day the night before so that you’re clear on what needs to be done when you wake up.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

Yes! I’m currently leading a rebranding project for our pro-bono client — the Carlton Locksley Bennett Foundation. This is an incredible charity which educates people about the effects of gun violence and supports the at-risk youth in their local community. Through our rebranding efforts, we’re hoping to give the charity more of a presence online and in the community to help them reach more people not just in their community but across the US. I hope, in turn, this will let young people at risk of homelessness, mental health issues and gun violence know there is somewhere they can turn to for help.

Ok super. Now let’s jump to the main questions of our interview. As we mentioned in the beginning, sometimes companies that just start exploring with digital marketing tools like PPC campaigns often see disappointing results. In your opinion, what are a few of the biggest mistakes companies make when they first start out with digital marketing? If you can, please share an example for each.

Ignoring campaign & conversion set up: In my experience, a lot of companies tend to skip one of the most crucial steps — setting up their campaign and conversions correctly. I’ve seen it many times where companies push a campaign live without connecting platforms like Google Tag Manager or Facebook Conversions to their campaign. In doing so, they risk garnering the most accurate results from their campaigns and may not have a true picture of which online channel brings them the most conversions and has the highest conversion rate.
Jack of all trades, master of none: Companies can get super excited about digital marketing when they first start out and may want to try every platform. This can translate into a lack of focus or leave consumers confused. Of course, it’s important to have a presence online across different platforms but it’s also important to focus on channels where your customers are and being a ‘master’ of these channels.
Optimizing: Digital marketing, especially PPC, is an ever-changing, competitive industry so it is important to keep on top of campaign performance and optimize campaigns accordingly. With real-estate clients, I’ve actually found the market can change quite quickly so you’re always having to review keywords to make sure they’re as relevant as possible.

If you could break down a very successful digital marketing campaign into a “blueprint”, what would that blueprint look like? Please share some stories or examples of your ideas.

A “blueprint” of a successful digital campaign would look like the following.

Research: Get an understanding of the industry and the client to better inform your strategy and plan (see step two). This includes conducting a competitor analysis to see what platforms their competitors are on, what the industry average spend on search and social ads is, carrying out keyword research and more. This phase also involves reviewing the client’s existing social media, PPC, and email campaigns and assets to determine what performs well for them and what doesn’t.
Strategy & Plan: The next step is to build a strategy and plan. This can include;

Campaign Objective

Time and Duration

KPIs to measure the success of the campaign

Platforms to be included in the campaign (if it’s multi-channel) and a breakdown of these channels e.g. ad budget and the estimated reach with this budget (if relevant), number of assets, the audience to be targeted or the audience the comms should be sent to

Campaign Timelines

3. Set Up: Ensure all conversions you want to track are successfully set up and tracking accurately. This stage also includes setting up or creating assets.

4. Execute: Roll out of the campaign.

5. Managing, Analyzing & Optimizing: Continue to monitor the performance of the campaign to determine when you might need to step in and tweak it to enhance performance or to check that all is running smoothly.

6. Results & Learnings: Post the campaign, put together a review of the results and learnings to determine what worked and where you should continue to lean into or what didn’t perform well and how you can learn from this.

Let’s talk about Pay Per Click Marketing (PPC) for a bit. In your opinion which PPC platform produces the best results to increase sales?

In my opinion, Google Ads. There are so many different ad formats for different types of campaigns. It also works with you to give campaign optimization suggestions and allows you to quickly remove keywords that aren’t performing well.

Can you please share 3 things that you need to know to run a highly successful PPC campaign?

Keyword research: Conducting keyword research to ensure you’re bidding on the best, most relevant keywords or phrases that your target audience is searching for is crucial. You can use free tools like Google Ads keyword planner or paid tools like Moz to conduct keyword research.
Understanding the platform: Getting to know a new platform can be daunting, especially if you’re not super digital savvy, but it’s so important to know what a platform has to offer to make sure you’re fully utilizing it.
Determining Your Strategy & Goals: Knowing why you’re running a PPC campaign and your goals for the said campaign will not only determine the type of ad you run but will also inform the messaging of your ads. Messaging is important as Google has a word count cap so you need to make sure you’re getting your message across and enticing consumers to click your ad, eventually turning them into customers.

Let’s now talk about email marketing for a bit. In your opinion, what are the 3 things that you need to know to run a highly successful email marketing campaign that increases sales?

Segmentation of your database is so important with sales as it allows you to better understand customers in the database and send relevant, targeted communications to them.
Testing & analyzing subject lines, CTA copy, creative, etc. is crucial as it will help you understand what messaging your database is engaging with during what time of the day or year and can inform your strategy moving forward.
Air traffic control and the cadence at which you send email communications are crucial. The last thing you want is for your sender score to go down or your email address to be reported as spam or blacklisted!

What are the other digital marketing tools that you are passionate about? If you can, can you share with our readers what they are and how to best leverage them?

I’m a big fan of Moz and Semrush for keyword research, competitor analysis, page scores and more! Both tools are incredibly intuitive and insightful.

Google Tag Manager is a tool I’ve been using a lot over the last few years. It integrates so seamlessly with your website, other Google products, social media and more to make tracking (and your life as a digital marketing manager) a lot easier.

Here is the main question of our series. Can you please tell us the 5 things you need to create a highly successful career as a digital marketer? Can you please share a story or example for each?

Stay Curious: As I mentioned earlier, digital marketing is an ever-changing industry and you need to stay curious to be on top of new tools, platforms or trends.
Be Open: This ties into my first point, I believe you need to be open when it comes to being a digital marketer. Just because you’ve found a way that works doesn’t mean it always will. Even after years in the industry, you might be surprised as to how content you once thought wouldn’t work on a platform now does. I know this has definitely happened to me.
Embrace Your Creativity: A big part of being a digital marketer is being able to be analytical. However, I believe embracing your creativity can often be overlooked. Digital marketing is a saturated industry, you need to add an extra flair to your campaigns to break through the noise.
Have Passion: Passion is contagious and as a digital marketer and as a manager you need to be passionate about what you’re doing. If you aren’t, it can be very hard to motivate yourself to want to run the best campaigns or be the best manager you can be. A lack of passion may manifest in to failed campaigns, unhappy clients or unhappy employees.
The Ability to be Concise: When a campaign performs well or content is highly engaged with, it can be hard to not want to list off all the amazing analytics that showcase this. However, it’s important to be able to shift through this data to create compelling and concise findings that others can understand or that indicate success at a high level to key stakeholders.

What books, podcasts, videos or other resources do you use to sharpen your marketing skills?

I really enjoy reading Neil Patel’s blog posts on his website neilpatel.com as well as content on sites such as Digiday and AdWeek.

A book I come back to time and time again when I need a little push is “Little Black Book” by Otegha Uwagba.

Thank you for all of that. We are nearly done. Here is our final ‘meaty’ question. You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

Even more open and honest conversations around mental health and access to affordable mental health care.

How can our readers further follow your work?

You can connect with me on LinkedIn!

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for the time you spent with this!

Tara Miskelly Of M&C Saatchi One-to-One On How to Effectively Leverage The Power of Digital… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Meet The Disruptors: Justin Schwaiger Of Manufacton by ViZZ Technologies On The Five Things You…

Meet The Disruptors: Justin Schwaiger Of Manufacton by ViZZ Technologies On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

“Do your best so doors will open.” They told me they didn’t know what those doors would be, but they were confident that the set of available opportunities would be more favorable if I tried my best.

As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Justin Schwaiger.

Justin Schwaiger, PE, LSSBB, is an accomplished, results-driven leader with expertise in business operations, SaaS, digital transformation, consulting engineering, and data science. He currently serves as the Director of Customer Success for ViZZ and Manufacton, DSi-Digital-owned AEC software providers. In this role, Justin leads customer success initiatives and continues the development of a scalable implementation program for customers.

Throughout his career, Justin has been a transformational leader in the broader real estate development industry. This includes his prior experience at Katerra, Thornton Tomasetti, and more. In addition, he currently serves as an Executive Leader of the Urban Land Institute Partnership Forum program that connects leaders in commercial real estate and technology through year-long programs built around common professional interests.

Justin holds a Master of Science in Structural Engineering from Stanford University and a Bachelor of Architectural Engineering from California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo. In addition, he holds a certificate in Commercial Real Estate Analysis and Investment from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a certificate in Data Science from Harvard University. He is also a licensed Professional Civil Engineer and has a Lean Six Sigma Black Belt from the International Association of Six Sigma Certification.

His expertise and leadership are recognized through his continued thought leadership efforts, including his position as an industry mentor for Stanford University’s graduate-level AEC Global Teamwork project-based learning course. In addition, he participates in frequent speaking opportunities at Urban Land Institute’s Construction Technology Seminar, the Structural Engineers Association and Stanford University.

I got into the real estate industry because as a kid I experienced the Northridge earthquake in the LA area. Bridges and buildings collapsed, and I wanted to be a part of making the world a safer place, especially in earthquake-prone areas. I went to graduate school to develop the skillset to design and build high-rise towers in high-seismic areas. I then went on to design and build tall buildings all over the world as an engineering consultant.

But as someone motivated to produce efficient and optimized processes, I struggled with traditional real estate development projects since they remain one-off, boutique projects with new teams solving and resolving the same kinds of problems on each new project. So, I left consulting engineering to pursue construction technology and develop ways to build efficiently and with more economies of scale.

New technology and construction methods can generate a step change in the way we design and build.

In the construction technology space, I’ve worn many hats: technology user (as an engineer), business operations, sales operations, customer success, product strategy, strategic partnerships. Really, I’m all about doing whatever it takes to build a successful product and team and then the harness the energy and ambiguity of the startup environment to make real progress toward operational innovation and scalability.

I’ve lived the status quo in real estate development and construction and I’m dead set on changing it. We have a severe housing shortage, for example, and construction technology that allows for more efficient construction practices is a market-driven solution to the affordable housing problem we’re facing.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

I’m currently at a construction technology software company called Manufacton where we have developed a software platform that enables the “industrialization of construction”. This trend of taking construction work off of the jobsite and moving it into prefabrication factories is picking up steam and we are working with the innovators in that space to define the standard processes and platform by which the construction industry can innovate. The real goal here is to deliver higher-quality buildings faster through factory production.

For example, volumetric modular builders like Factory_OS, 3D printing companies like Mighty Buildings, and mass timber producers like Timberlab are using Manufacton to run their factories as they accelerate change in the construction industry. We’re building the software platform to allow them to do this work efficiently and to supply the data necessary for them to improve their processes to help usher in this new era for the construction industry.

My role is to drive new technologies into the industry and to understand where the next big opportunity is so we can build the right technology to continually innovate.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

I was a fresh graduate engineer, and my boss couldn’t attend a meeting we were supposed to attend together. There was a room full of real estate developers, architects, and builders who were meeting to determine which material the building that was starting to be planned should be made out of. I ended up taking the floor and describing all of the possible options in far too much detail. They really weren’t looking for an engineering lesson, they were looking for an answer. I had a whole room of blank faces staring back at me.

I learned that day that my job as a consultant is to know all sorts of stuff that never gets said; instead, a lot of thinking goes into what to say so the answer sounds simple to others who have different priorities… that’s why they hired me as a consultant.

So, reading the audience, understanding expectations, and delivering concise responses was the lesson learned that awkward day.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

There have been so many who have mentored me along the way. I make an effort to pursue relationships with a few mentors at each point in my career. These relationships tend to evolve over time. This includes:

There were a couple of engineering “principals” (essentially, my bosses. Think partner at a law firm) who gave me the freedom to pursue new challenges and trusted my judgement, even as a young engineer. I spent hours in their offices working out problems that I didn’t know how to solve, and they would share their experience with me to help me solve them. This allowed me to grow in my skillset quickly and learn to think for myself and develop my own “engineering intuition” that I could leverage in the next meeting or on the next project.
One particular mentor of mine took a huge chance on me as I was pivoting from a consulting engineering role to business operations at a construction tech company. He brought me on his team and then gave me freedom to grow/take as much responsibility that I wanted. He also challenged me. One time I was asked to speak on a panel about the work we were doing at the company; I deflected and asked him who at the company would be the best to do the panel. He said I should just do it, knowing that I needed to grow in confidence in this way even if I didn’t think I had enough expertise to do so. That speaking engagement (and the extensive preparation that was required) has given me the confidence to do the same many times since. This mentor believed in me, challenged me, and helped me to grow beyond my own expectations for myself.

In today’s parlance, being disruptive is usually a positive adjective. But is disrupting always good? When do we say the converse, that a system or structure has withstood the test of time? Can you articulate to our readers when disrupting an industry is positive, and when disrupting an industry is not so positive? Can you share some examples of what you mean?

No disruption isn’t always good. There are a couple angles to look at this:

What’s best for people? Disrupting (historically typical) in-person human community/communication with digital platforms that separate people physically and emotionally are not positive disruption. Especially when these platforms are built to attract eyeballs through algorithms that foster outrage, oversupply information that aligns with someone’s already-held beliefs, and drive people into information silos. Sure, there’s money here, but disruption like this isn’t a good thing for people.
Disruption is good especially when it’s necessary. For example, in the construction space, approximately 40% of the skilled workforce is expected to leave the construction industry by 2030. Simultaneously, we have a housing shortage of millions of units. So, the question is: without disruption to current operating models, who will build these buildings? Disruption in this case means finding novel solutions to problems in order to increase productivity. It’s the techno optimist view that technology combined with human ingenuity will provide solutions to unlock a better world. Even better when the solution can unlock value for investors.
In the industrialized construction space that means technology-enabled process improvement (design, procurement, factory production, jobsite installation). It also means expanding the workforce: in a factory a worker doesn’t need to do nearly the amount of heavy lifting, safety training, or specialty skill certifications. So it can pull in a whole new workforce to help address the chronic labor shortage, provide job skills to new populations, and keep people safer. These are the kinds of positive disruption that I can get behind.

Can you share five of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey?

Parents: “do your best so doors will open.” They told me they didn’t know what those doors would be, but they were confident that the set of available opportunities would be more favorable if I tried my best.

Wife (while dating): Choose a harder college major! Saw potential in me and challenged me to explore a larger set of opportunities. I changed my major to engineering after this.

Older mentor advising me on how to complete a career pivot: Go get an MBA, write articles on topics you want to be perceived as an expert in, and leverage my network’s contacts to make new important connections. He offered to connect me with his best contacts as I was exploring a career pivot so I could explore more opportunities. I followed his advice! Conference presentations, articles, constant networking, and I just wrapped up an Executive MBA program. These have become foundational building blocks that I’m standing on now.

Engineering mentor: Communicate clearly. For engineering, this meant building up to a coherent argument to clearly articulate a simple message to describe something complex. To clearly describe facts. Similar to my earlier funny mistake, this mentor taught me to take all of the complexity out of my explanations and only articulate what was critical for an audience to know. They don’t need to know the details of how an earthquake will affect a 1,000 ft tall high-rise tower, they only need to know enough to effectively solve the problem at hand.

During a job interview for a Biz Ops role: Communicate clearly. But in business, and for problems with uncertain solutions, this means leading with a high-level hypothesis and then developing a fact base that will prove or disprove the hypothesis. It’s the top-down approach to uncertain problems as opposed to the bottom-up method of starting with first principles to build up to a proof that I’d learned as an engineer. This relates back to reading an audience and providing information in a way that’s useful to them.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

There’s so much to be done! Construction is a $10 trillion a year industry. Think about it, if we make a 1% improvement to that number it’s a $100 billion/year opportunity.

The world of industrialized construction and more broadly in construction technology is just starting to emerge. Today, I’m focused on driving construction work into factories. Next will be to drive the “productization” of construction components. Just like the automotive industry digitized and productized over the course of about 40 years, from hand-made, custom automobiles into mass-produced automotive products, construction is following that same path today. In the coming decade, we’ll see the emergence of standardized prefabricated and modular building components that can be easily ordered and easily installed on construction jobsites. The foundations for this revolution are being built now, but there is a lot more to come. I’ll be in the thick of it, driving things forward toward the goal of higher quality, efficiently produced buildings that can address both our current labor shortages as well as the high cost of housing.

Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?

I love epic novels and historical accounts that look at many eras of history in one volume: anything by James Michener, Sarum by Edward Rutherford, the Old Testament in the Bible. My mind tends toward the present; these stories and accounts help draw me outside of the present and to see my place in the arc of history. To see myself as a part of a much larger narrative provides clarity for the present (who am I and where do I fit?) and purpose for the future (what am I here for?). For example, fostering positive traits in my three kids will have an exponentially increasing impact through time as they pass these traits on to future generations. I have to step out of my myopic, daily grind to see that kind of purpose.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“Do your best so doors will open” has been my operating principle to-date and has helped me navigate life thus far. It may be reaching the end of its usefulness though. I’m doing lots of thinking at this point around what success means going forward.

If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?

Professionally, it’d be to leverage technology to build better buildings and to reduce the cost of housing.

For the world at large, it’d be to get people’s eyeballs off of screens and get together in shared community. Living in overly personalized digital bubbles isn’t good for people.

How can our readers follow you online?

LinkedIn mostly, for professional connections. I stopped using social media a long time ago. Or give me a call and we’ll get together in-person over a beer.

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Meet The Disruptors: Justin Schwaiger Of Manufacton by ViZZ Technologies On The Five Things You… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Marcus Leonardo Boyd On The 5 Things You Need To Be A Highly Effective Public Speaker

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

You need to have confidence and determination I mean you first get started depending on the topic you are speaking on you may or may not book a lot of gigs at first I don’t know how many doors get slammed in your face it’s not about the doors that slamming its about your wellness to never give up I can’t tell you how many doors closed in my face or how many opportunities I messed up on but I had to learn is what’s for me will be for me so I don’t take it as a lost I take it as a learning lesson.

At some point in our lives, many of us will have to give a talk to a large group of people. What does it take to be a highly effective public speaker? How can you improve your public speaking skills? How can you overcome a fear of speaking in public? What does it take to give a very interesting and engaging public talk? In this interview series called “5 Things You Need To Be A Highly Effective Public Speaker” we are talking to successful and effective public speakers to share insights and stories from their experience. As a part of this series, we had the pleasure of interviewing 7x award winning autism activist Marcus Leonardo Boyd.

Marcus Leonardo Boyd is a global figure he is known in so many countries and he uses his platform to help bring change and new opportunities for the Autism communities , Marcus himself has autism so he understands from a personal level the trails and tribulations you can face with having autism, Marcus is the first African American to have 7 awards as a autism activist also he is the first person with Autism to win a Distinguished Person Humanitarian Award and a Lifetime Presidential Achievement Award, Marcus has spoken in 10 different countries about autism places like Asia, Australia, South Africa, Dubai, London UK, Scotland UK, Philippines, China, Pakistan, South America, Marcus has a clothing line and a shoe line he is a book author with coloring books and a comic book and so much more he has been a international public speaker for over 5 years now he has 13 music awards as a music Producer and Composer so sit back and learn more about 7x award winning autism activist Marcus Boyd.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Our readers would love to get to know you a bit better. Can you tell us the story of how you grew up?

I come from a place where roaches and rats walked the hall ways I come from a place where you smelled piss and vomit in the air I come from a place where Jr’s hard to make it out I’m from the projects the ghetto the hood or poverty just to name a few I was born in Atlanta ga and raised between Atlanta ga and Brooklyn ny I got separated from my family at a early age due to horrific abuse from my birth father I don’t think he was truly ready to be a father plus he had generational demons he was fighting so I got moved to foster care and I was in 16 different homes 16 different group homes and I was in a emergency children shelter and I was in 16 different mental hospitals 4 impatient centers and I dealt with electrical shock therapy in the hospital when I didn’t want to take my medications I was in therapy for years and years I had different doctors I was on so many different medications by me having Autism I was non verbal until I was 13 or 13 ½ then I started to speak at a 2 year old level I didn’t start speaking like j do now until I was almost 18 years old so my life was pretty difficult but I praise God for it

Can you share a story with us about what brought you to this specific career path?

5 years ago I was in Atlanta ga and I needed to go to Walmart so a friend of mine that I grew up with offered to take me to the store so she picked me up it was rainy really hard that day and I got in her car and we started to talk and she asked me a question she said when are you going to let others hear your story about your journey with Autism and I said that’s not happening all of my life I just wanted to be looked at as normal so I am not telling strangers my story and then she got mad and said really you know I got a son who has autism and God allowed you to talk and you refuse to help someone else out who may be going through what you went through or may have some questions that you can help with again I said no I am not a doctor nor do I feel like having people in my personal business, so again it was rainy really hard outside so she said I tell you what and she pulled over her car on the highway and said for me to get out she said since I want to be selfish and not spread how God blessed me to be able to talk and function then I need to get out and walk to wal mart so at this point I was looking out the window and I see it’s coming down real hard and I didn’t see a wal mart in sight so I told her if I agree to tell my story at her church will she be happy and still take me to wal mart she said yes she would so I agreed and she took me to wal mart and back home safely and then that Sunday she came early to pick me up she had her son with her and she drove me to the church and when we got inside it was like a concert in their like kirk Franklin was preforming I mean people really had the holy ghost in there I loved the music and dancing so things calmed down and the pastor said do we have any visitors today and she pushed me to stand up I said my name and the pastor said o yeah I heard about you do you want to tell us your story and how God worked in your life so I began to tell my story and when I was done a lot of people came up to me to ask me questions about my story and autism and from their I realized it’s not about me at all its about the millions of families and individuals who has autism and they don’t get to have their stories told or their voices heard so right then I knew what I had to do was become a voice for Autism

Can you tell us the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?

Well about 3 years ago I was doing some spelling gigs around Atlanta ga and then j got a Facebook message by a Facebook friend asking me what’s my schedule for the next week and I replied back with I’m free why you asking and then they told me that they wanted me to be a guest speaker at a event they are having for autism by this point I been speaking a lot about autism so I’m comfortable you know feeling myself a little bit so I said sure where is the event located at how long will I have on stage and what is the budget so my Facebook friend told me that the event was in London uk and I will have 60 mins to speak you know in the speaking world that’s like a whole day of speaking and I was going to get paid but it’s more about the exposure value of it and I will be speaking via video to the national society of Autism in london uk I mean at this point I was blown away I was so excited I was crying because I couldn’t believe God would bless someone like me with this life changing opportunity so I got myself prepared and ready I practiced my speech harder then ever before and then when the time came to give my speech via zoom I know I delivered a powerful heart felt speech about autism in America and my story with having autism I truly believed that it touched some people’s lives and after that I was asked to come back to speak in London again

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

About 5 years ago when I was first starting to do my speaking engagements I was always nervous and scared and not really sure of myself at that time so I got a chance to speak in front of like 100 to 150 people at a fundraiser event for autism awareness so I got my suit on my three piece suit at that my Stacy Adam’s on with the tip I mean j thought I was super Sharpe so they told me I had 12 mins to speak and I was one of the featured speakers for the eevents I was back stage practicing my speech and my voice on how I was going to deliver the speech I was sweating alittle bit but I was cool so then I had to go to the bathroom so mind you I was in a 3 piece suit so I went to the bathroom washed my hands and after that I left the bathroom so now I hear the woman giving me a introduction on stage so I’m saying to myself this is it you got this Marcus I was giving myself a pep talk so the woman said let welcome autism activist Marcus Boyd so I begin to walk on the stage and as I got to the middle of the stage and I said hello all of a sudden my pants fall right on the floor I mean you have to image how embarrassed I was all I hear was laughing people in shock my draws was showing and my legs so I tried to pick up my pants up real quick and I ran off stage the lesson I learned is to finish what you start regardless if you make a mistake and Too to always make sure my pants are zipped and fixed before I leave the restroom lol

Everybody has someone who comes in their life and helps it in some type of way for me I was blessed to have more then one person, I truly believe in giving people their flowers while they are here to smell them so I have to start with God who is thr head of my life and without God guiding me through my hard times then I don’t know where I would be I mean I know a lot of people says that but I really mean it I was so messed up without having direction that it was hard for me to focus on the mission in front of me, next has to be my grandma Mary Boyd what she taught me and did for me is do priceless and I learned so much from her the things to do and the things not to do but she taught me the art of hustling and grinding and the real meaning of never quitting, then I have to show some love to my best friend Gary Sinatra thank you for supporting me and helping me out so many times in my journey, to My super supporter Queen carter thank you so much you are a amazing friend that has helped me mode and build my autism brand thank you for everything you have done for me and to my mentors John McClung Jr, Tracy bumpers, Manisha Holiday, jacquetta Quashie, Mary Mitchell, Dorothy Carr, Bob ordner, Anna Gibbs, thank you for being a light when my life was dark thank you for showing me what a true Legend and Leader looks like thank you for loving me when I couldn’t love myself.

You have been blessed with great success in a career path that can be challenging and intimidating. Do you have any words of advice for others who may want to embark on this career path, but seem daunted by the prospect of failure?

Well first off where you are reading this I want you to stop reading this and say out loud I am somebody I matter I am important and I won’t stop until I achieve my dreams, now that you have done that continue reading this answer what I know is that you can’t go into anything scared or afraid yes you are going to have challenges and you are going to mess up and fall but that’s OK pick yourself back up dust yourself off and you keep on the road to your dreams and goals we all fall short but God still loves and pushes us anyways so you have to see past you never done this before or it’s your first time or the fact that you might not have the money or resources to do it I mean trust me when I first started I didn’t have the money or resources either but what I had to learn is when you take a step God will take five it’s the faith in your dreams and goals and the faith in him that he wants you to have, then I would say to not listen to anyone that is not supporting you or giving you positive advice because there are some people that smile in your face but pray for your down fall you need real support around you and for people to speak life into you so pray to God and ask him who should you have around you and who should you make a team with because you can’t do anything alone, next you need to make sure you are making the right connections and resources if this is the field you want to do then you need to know what organizations you need to talk to how to get involved with speaking agencies and how to set up a paid speaking engagements please understand nothing comes over night it took me 5 years before I got my first real payment now it make take you a way shorter or longer time but the message that you keep going regardless of payment or not I do what I do because I have a passion and this is my purpose it’s way bigger then fame or money but you have to know your worth as well, and I would say make a strong team of believers and workers around you that will be on the mission to push your dreams and goals just like its there’s and will honor you with the work they put in to help elevate the dream and goal and finally just have belief in yourself a lot of times we get into things without having that full belief in ourselves trust me I know I have done it before so as long as you have that confidence in yourself then you are prepared to move mountains.

What drives you to get up everyday and give your talks? What is the main empowering message that you aim to share with the world?

I get up every morning feeling blessed and honored that God has given me another day when he didn’t have too, so I know I have a family To take care of and they need me like I need them so I strive to make my today better then yesterday and I know my why and when see a lot of us don’t know our why’s so it can be a little bury when you wake up every morning because you still trying to see pass your own reality but for me I see my vision and I know my purpose so it makes it easier for me to get up now my message I want to leave with thr world is that don’t look at the word autism as a death sentence because it’s not you have so many important and famous people who has autism so many lawyers and doctors and nurses and singers rappers actors actresses judges basketball players and Nascar drivers we all have to understand that autism is a diagnosis but you can still do anything you out your mind too I have autism so as a person who had Autism I fight everyday to prove the stereo type wrong when it comes too what we can’t do with having Autism what we don’t understand or will never read or get a education or do for ourselves I am not saying that there are not individuals that have situations like these because there are but every person with Autism is different I was non verbal for many years and on medication and had ieps and was in special Ed class rooms and went to hospitals the whole nine but God still will make a way with Autism you just have to continue to have that fighting spirit that never giving up spirit regardless the trail or tribulations we face with Autism we can still get to the other side, I want to encourage the world who has autism that having autism is a super power and we are the lucky ones because not everyone gets to ha e these powers and you are not different or less than and its ok for you to move at your time and speed and all we truly need is love patience understanding acceptance inclusion and support so my mission on this earth is to make people see autism differently and I will continue to raise my voice for Autism

You have such impressive work. What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now? Where do you see yourself heading from here?

My team tells me all the time marcus you are doing to much you have to stay focused on one thing lol for me that’s hard because I want to touch the world in so many ways so currently right now I am working on a 30 page comic book called super marcus and the autism squad it’s a comic book for the Autism and special needs communities worldwide and in this book you will see super marcus and the autism squad who are the protectors for autism and special needs kids all around the world they come against the hate corps who hate anyone or anything that has to do with Autism or special needs and their sole mission is to wipe them off the face of the planet but we will just have to see what will happen, next I have a clothing line that I am working on it’s called the A collection clothing and it’s a urban/Casual line for men woman and children it will be in all sizes and have different designs and what I wanted to do was have a stylish designer clothing company and the autism and special needs communities can wear and be proud of but this line is for everyone next I have a shoe line called G soles with G Soles being the first ever spiritual tennis shoe ever created and what I wanted to do was bring positive messages and change the style for the shoe game putting God where he needs to ne first then I have my autobiography book I am working on called the boy with no voice it will be telling my true story with having autism and growing up in foster homes and group homes and being homeless and the things I went through up until this point then I have a tv series that will happen with the boy with no voice and then I have a coloring book called the Wayne’s which is the very first sitcom coloring book where you follow the story of a Christian family called the Wayne’s and see how life situations happen and how they come together as a family and who knows what I will do next you just have to wait and stay tuned

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

History has shown us that courage can be contagious, and hope can take on a life of its own. –Michelle Obama
“The cost of liberty is less than the price of repression.” –W.E.B. Du Bois
“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” –Nelson Mandela
“You can’t separate peace from freedom because no one can be at peace unless he has his freedom.” –Malcolm X
“If there is no struggle, there is no progress.” –Frederick Douglass
“Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.” –Barack Obama

Ok, thank you for all that. Here is the main question of our interview. What are your “5 Things You Need To Be A Highly Effective Public Speaker?”

To me I know for sure the first thing is your belief and faith in God I mean we can’t build the ark by ourselves so we have to have help with our dreams and goals and the things we want to do so with having God on your side you can achieve all of your dreams plus more so I will tell anyone if you want to be a public speaker make sure you have a strong relationship with God so when you ask him for help you won’t be ignored. 2nd you need to have confidence and determination I mean you first get started depending on the topic you are speaking on you may or may not book a lot of gigs at first I don’t know how many doors get slammed in your face it’s not about the doors that slamming its about your wellness to never give up I can’t tell you how many doors closed in my face or how many opportunities I messed up on but I had to learn is what’s for me will be for me so I don’t take it as a lost I take it as a learning lesson, 3rd you need the right connections and contacts in this world you can’t do anything if you don’t know the right people to talk too yes you can do it on your own with nothing but that is so much harder so when you start on the public speaker journey you need to find other successful public speakers get their pr information o booking agent information and reach out to them learn from find out how they got into the door and take pieces of that and create your own yes when you book your gigs you need to know the locations or venues to go to how much you need to charge to speak and how your team needs to promote the event 4th you need to have a good talking topic I don’t know what your topic will be about but this is not to preach to people or tell them what they need to do or don’t need to do this is to give wisdom knowledge and encouragement with your story and your knowledge of the topic you are talking about make sure you are not boring you interact with the crowd make them feel like they can talk too and not just listen ask questions while you talking tell jokes make them laugh because as a public speaker you are only good from your last event so every event you have to prove yourself that you are on top and better then the rest so make them want more of your topic and you that’s your job is to give the audience something that will continue to talk about with you as the speaker and 5th and final thing is preparation and attack you have to put in your mind that you are about to play in the biggest game of your life when yiu step on that stage and you began to talk on the topic you speaking of you have to see it like your in a football game and the crowd is trying to tackle you and stop you so you have to fo plays that out wit and amaze the crowd you have to shake them and don’t let them tackle you one way to do that is make sure you are prepared before you do your speech go over your speech a lot of times do it in the mirror or in front of people become comfortable with the words so when you talk you are free handed and you can really deliver a incredible performance being a public speaker is no different from being a musician instead of singing or rapping you are delivering word with power and your words is the music so bring it ro them in a qay that they will never forget.

As you know, many people are terrified of speaking in public. Can you give some of your advice about how to overcome this fear?

We all want to achieve our dreams and goals and get things we want but a lot of times what stands in our way is ourselves so I will say that you can’t be afraid or scared or fearful of anything if you try and don’t succeed guess what you csn do it again don’t get mad and say oh I quit no just go back and do it find out ways to make it better so you can succeed and I know this interview I been saying God a lot but honestly God never gave us a spirit of fear us as man made that to be reality we have to get pads our on self’s and allow God to take full control see that’s one of the problems we try to complete a dream when God is in the background saying please let me help your not alone but we would swear up and down that we have to do this by ourselves because we don’t have help and it’s OK to be nervous but you can’t stay in the nervousness you are a genius a inspiration a warrior and most importantly you are God’s child so we can do anything through Christ who strengthen us so I honestly think the devil uses our fear against us and have us to believe that we are no good nobody will give us a chance and we need to stop chasing a Dream and to me the devil is a lieee so my advice to you is to stand with God and stand on your dreams and goals and go get them don’t allow the devil to stop you I believe in you

You are a person of huge influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?

I would start called Autism Hearts where people would wear the Autism hearts on them and that would be a representation of the love and support they have for people with Autism like the shirt would say my name is Marcus boyd and I love with my Autism heart or it would say Jenny uses her autism heart to show love like I would do t shirts hats jackets bracelets chains sweat suits hoodies to continue to spread more acceptance inclusion and awareness for autism.

Is there a person in the world whom you would love to have lunch with, and why? Maybe we can tag them and see what happens!

Well a lot of my hero’s are gone people like biggie smalls j dilla proof from D-12 Luther Vandross but I would love to do lunch with les brown Eric Thompson 9th wonder dwele gucci mane Deb Anthony I mean honestly I would lobe to have lunch with anyone that is positive and who is influencing the culture I want to learn I want to be a student so that’s my people I would love to eat lunch with.

Are you on social media? How can our readers follow you online?

Autismactivistmarcusb.com

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid0PqM69FX5C37thJ19G8d9Y2tdeT1ueAu8pJju1Q1bN5pqgiAesXaxsKiJXVoAvpEGl&id=100009450426523&mibextid=Nif5oz

https://www.instagram.com/reel/CmFAYi9tA4A/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=

https://twitter.com/ActivistBoyd/status/1600149683371851776?t=wLMgmrXHkIgAv5KQ5vp1bw&s=19

This was so informative, thank you so much! We wish you continued success!

Marcus Leonardo Boyd On The 5 Things You Need To Be A Highly Effective Public Speaker was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Jeff Whitten Of ROKFORM On How To Create A Fantastic Retail Experience That Keeps Bringing…

Jeff Whitten Of ROKFORM On How To Create A Fantastic Retail Experience That Keeps Bringing Customers Back For More

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Ship as quickly as you can. Customers love to get their products as fast as possible; you should be sending out their product that day or the next one after an order is placed after your pickup time.

As part of my series about “How to Create a Fantastic Retail Experience That Keeps Bringing Customers Back for More”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Jeff Whitten.

Jeff Whitten is the Founder and CEO at ROKFORM, the maker of premium handheld innovations for those who take action seriously. Through ROKFORM’s small but dedicated team, the company has bootstrapped their way to become a leader in the design and manufacturing of innovative consumer electronics products, including their patented twist lock and magnetic phone cases, mounts, and accessories. Prior to ROKFORM, Jeff was co-owner of a leading exhaust manufacturer in the powersports industry until he exited that business in 2016 to dedicate full time to ROKFORM. With more than 30 years of product design and manufacturing experience and more than 10 patents and co-patents across two industries, you can say that Jeff knows a thing or two about product development and entrepreneurship.

My entrepreneurial journey started young. When I was just eight years old, I ran a paper route, washed cars, sold candy out of my backpack, and in high school I built and sold furniture. When I finished high school, I worked in construction and then as a mechanic for a road race team which later led me to owning half of the company. We designed and manufactured motorcycle exhaust systems, everything from bending, welding, fabrication, and assembly. I enjoyed this for almost 25 years and learned a lot along the way. We grew that business from a simple garage operation to one of the largest powersports exhaust manufacturers in the country. I ended up selling my ownership stake in 2016 to focus on ROKFORM.

During this time, I was playing golf as much as I could but my phone was constantly getting damaged on the golf course and I lost a couple phones out there, too. It would also get scratched or left behind in the glove box on my cart, or I would break a screen with the golf ball in my pocket. I had the idea to make a phone case that could easily stick to a golf cart, by testing with some off the shelf magnets and sticking my phone to the cart over an 18 hole round, the idea was born. We also felt the need to kill the giant claws that were holding phones in cars, we wanted a small simple solution that did not take up a lot of space and was not an eyesore. We solved that problem with the invention of the ROKLOCK Twist-Lock system. From there we just kept innovating on those features to create bike mounts, motorcycle mounts, golf accessories, and an entire suite of magnetic and or twist lock mounts. Our customers are cyclists, motorcyclists, golfers, outdoorsmen, first responders, military, police, and professionals who want more than just a basic cover for their phone.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lessons or ‘takeaways’ you learned from that?

One of the biggest mistakes we made was trying to grow too big, too fast. For example, we were selling our phone cases at a big box store along with two mounts, a bicycle mount, and a stroller mount. We were talked into putting the stroller mount in the phone case section, which didn’t sell because people who are looking for stroller accessories are looking in the stroller section, not the phone case section. They also talked us into selling an iPhone 5 case a month before the iPhone 6 came out. We had a lot of returns and lost a lot of money. It ended up being a tough lesson but a good one. We no longer sell at big box stores as we’ve learned that we really like to have a connection with our customers and if something is going on, we can fix it quickly before it’s too late.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?

There are a couple people that have been a fundamental part of my success. My dad is one of them, he really taught me the value of hard work, doing more than what you’re asked of, always leaving something better than you found it, and if you want something, you had better go out and find a way to earn the money.

Tony Robbins was another big influence on my life. He helped the most with goal setting. I’ve always been a goal setter, but he made me learn how to put it into an actual framework and be able to tie an emotional piece to it. So, in other words, why do you want that goal and why is it important and what’s stopping you?

Also, Keith Cunningham who I met at a Tony Robbins event. He’s one of the best business leaders I’ve ever come across. And the reason is he knows it so well and can explain it in a way that everybody can understand. I’ve run across many people who can’t do that. The biggest lesson he taught me is to remember that it’s not what you make, it’s what you keep, and that accounting is the language of business.

Lastly, our business coach Lee Froschheiser. He helped our team align ourselves in our business. Because of him, every team member is working in the same direction and knows what they’re responsible for and what they own. This has been huge for ROKFORM’s growth and success.

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

One of my favorite films is Rocky because here’s a guy who had nothing but grit, determination, and a realistic goal. He had the mindset that he couldn’t beat his opponent but wanted to go the distance. Where that translates into business is you’re not going to beat everybody, but you can stay in business and make your customers happy. I mean that’s the goal, right? Make customers happy.

Some of my favorite books include The Road Less Stupid by Keith Cunningham, think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill, and 60 Minute CFO by David A. Duryee, in which I had the entire ROKFORM team read. I truly believe that your team should at least know the basics of accounting and why it’s important to the business.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

What makes ROKFORM stand out is our products are not only unique but incredibly useful. Our latest iPhone 14 Case has a 4–5x stronger hold on all MagSafe® compatible accessories and any magnetic surfaces, and our G-ROK Wireless Golf Speaker is a portable Bluetooth golf speaker that instantly sticks to a golf cart and other metal surfaces.

We have some of the best customer service where we listen and care about our customers. Most of the time if I run into somebody and we start discussing work, they share a story with me about their interaction with our customer service team and how good of an experience it was. Customer service quality has been fundamental to our success.

Which tips would you recommend to your colleagues in your industry to help them to thrive and not “burn out”?

I believe that burn out can come from boredom and it’s usually when your business isn’t doing well. You don’t find many people who have a growing business with a great culture that is accomplishing great things who are burnt out. Burn out can also come when you’re trying to grow too fast. If you grow at a steady manageable pace and you have a good team in place where you’re really focused and aligned, you’re probably not going to get burnt out. It’s normally not the ones who grow the fastest, it’s the ones who grow a solid, sustainable, profitable business that takes care of their customers that win the long game.

I have been burnt out before and this is exactly what happened, the business wasn’t doing well, and it was because I was spending too much time being busy and not working on being strategic and seeing the larger picture. I had to slow down and stop doing a lot of things so I could focus on just the most important things that would move the needle for the company. My advice is to slow down and do less of the easy busy stuff and more of the high level, strategic work, and that’s the most difficult. There is no prize for the person who stays up the latest or works the most hours.

Ok super. Now let’s jump to the main questions of our interview. The so-called “Retail Apocalypse” has been going on for about a decade. The Pandemic only made things much worse for retailers in general. While many retailers are struggling, some retailers, like Lululemon, Kroger, and Costco are quite profitable. Can you share a few lessons that other retailers can learn from the success of profitable retailers?

A lesson to be learned for other retailers is to watch your service and your numbers. To be profitable is completely different than having a big top line. Don’t worry about the top line, worry about how much cash you have in the bank, what your margins are, and how customer service is operating.

The reason you started your business is to solve a problem for your customer, whether it’s a customer service problem or whether it’s a problem that they don’t know they have that your product or service is answering. Make the customer your focus and you increase your chance for success.

Amazon is going to exert pressure on all of retail for the foreseeable future. New Direct-To-Consumer companies based in China are emerging that offer prices that are much cheaper than US and European brands. What would you advise retail companies and eCommerce companies, for them to be successful in the face of such strong competition?

My advice to other smaller retail and eCommerce companies is to not worry about your competition and focus on your own business, product, and customer. Stand out by having a great customer service team, and a great product. Your product should be priced accordingly and fit into your margin requirements and not priced to compete with a low-priced generic item. You can differentiate yourself through great service and a great product without the need to worry about playing the low-price game. Very few ever win at that over time.

What are the most common mistakes you have seen CEOs & founders make when they start a retail business? What can be done to avoid those errors?

The most common mistake I see CEOs and founders make is they don’t value accounting, or know their numbers before they try and expand their business. Most people don’t know how much money they’re making and don’t have accurate financials. I have friends who did very well with their eCommerce business and decided to open a retail location without really thinking about the costs involved. If you plan to open a retail business, you better make sure that you know exactly how much you need to sell to break even and how much it’s going to cost to get those sales before opening. Second locations usually decline the fastest and take the longest to return.

My advice is to watch your numbers and talk to both your accountant and your team to find out as much as you can about what it’s going to do to your business if you open a storefront.

One of my recent customer service stories is when I moved houses. I hired movers and I like to help them with the moving process so it’s faster for everybody. So, I put everything on a pallet for them in a staging area but recommended unloading everything off the pallets since it wouldn’t have fit in the truck otherwise. They wanted to leave some stuff on pallets and so we did, consequently not everything they charged me to move fit. Once we were finished moving, I asked them to take the pallets and they could use them for their own warehouse, as they were too big to fit in my truck. They let me know they couldn’t take anything back without an extra charge. I ended up speaking to their boss letting him know I helped his movers by putting everything on pallets and used my forklift to make the process easier and faster. They didn’t care about that and stood firm in charging me extra for making their job easier and faster! They just didn’t get it. For something that would have cost him nothing, he lost referrals and a repeat customer. It’s normally quite easy to make a customer happy, but surprisingly few even try.

A good customer experience comes from the top leadership of the business. If the leader doesn’t enforce the importance of great service, and it’s not part of the company culture, it won’t happen. You need to train employees exactly how they’re supposed to treat your customers in exactly the way you want them treated. Employees won’t make customer service a priority if it isn’t a priority for the leader.

It’s not about telling your team “Treat every customer how you would like to be treated”, it’s about training the team to treat every customer how you as the leader would treat the customer. For example, a customer’s expectation at a Four Seasons is going to be a lot different than a Motel 6. If your employee had only ever stayed at a Motel 6 and then got a job at a Four Seasons and treated those customers like the Motel 6, you would likely have some unhappy customers paying $1,000+ per night at the Four Seasons. It is the job of the leader to create the framework of how customers should be treated and not the employee. This is called customer service training, very few know this, I know that my movers don’t.

Can you share with us a story from your experience about a customer who was wowed by the experience you provided? Can you share with us a story from your experience about a customer who was “Wowed” by the experience you provided? Did that “Wow! Experience” have any long-term ripple effects? Can you share the story?

Recently, we had a customer who bought an item through our Amazon store who was having an issue with the installation and was obviously frustrated. These types of alerts come through on my phone and it popped up on a Sunday. Issues like this are typically handled quickly by our customer service team but this one, I could feel his frustration as I’ve been there before. So, I immediately called him directly where we talked through his troubles, he ended up having the wrong item. I offered to either give him a full refund or send him the correct item free of charge that I would personally send for him. He asked who I was, and I told him I was the owner and CEO of the company, and he was pretty blown away.

Just by reaching out to a customer and making a call can instantly diffuse a situation when you listen and hear them. Always listen to your customers, anytime you can go above and beyond for a customer or just talk to them, you should.

A fantastic retail experience isn’t just one specific thing. It can be a composite of many different subtle elements fused together. Can you help us break down and identify the different ingredients that come together to create a “fantastic retail experience”?

When creating a fantastic retail experience, the most important step is when a customer heads to your website, make sure they fully understand what you’re selling and how your product will impact their life. Secondly, be able to answer all their questions and have enough visual elements that showcase the product in action. You can do this through photos, videos, or an FAQ format.

When you’re lucky enough to get their order, make sure you ship it as quickly as possible. Customers should have all their order information and an easy-to-find tracking number, which really should be automated. If a customer has a question, a customer service team should be standing by and be able to answer their questions through a chat function on the website, through email, and via phone. It’s important for a customer to know that there is a real person they can speak with.

Then, when they receive their order, the packaging should reflect the experience they’ve had so far. The box that it comes in should be nicely presented and packaged with care with detailed instructions included for the product if necessary.

Ok super. Here is the main question of our interview. Based on your experience and success, what are the five most important things one should know in order to create a fantastic retail experience that keeps bringing customers back for more?

A great website. If a customer comes to a website that doesn’t look good and the photos aren’t inspiring, you’re not going to win that customer.
Product pages need to answer all potential questions. Don’t leave the customer with any questions on how they might use the product. You can answer their questions through a written FAQ section, great copy, images and video.
Ship as quickly as you can. Customers love to get their products as fast as possible; you should be sending out their product that day or the next one after an order is placed after your pickup time.
Customer service. If a customer is going to call the company, then someone needs to answer and be prepared to answer product, company, or other relevant questions.
A terrific box opening experience. From start to finish, the customer should love their experience with you, and that includes great packaging.

I have a few:

If everybody did just a little more than what they are expected to do, people around them would do the same.
Take responsibility for your own actions, don’t blame others and be a part of the solutions not the problems. We have a core value at ROKFORM and its being a “Problem Solver.” There are millions of “problem identifiers”, but it is the problem solvers that are always the highest paid and the most valuable to an enterprise, family, or friendship. If there were more problem solvers than problem identifiers, the world would be a better place.
Smile more and make someone feel better than they did before they ran into you. It was Maya Angelou who said, “People will forget what you said. People will forget what you did. But people will never forget how you made them feel.” Make someone feel good, be a problem solver and do a little more than people expect, these are things we can all be better at, and it will make the world a better place.

How can our readers further follow your work?

Readers can follow my work on LinkedIn and visit rokform.com to view our full range of products.

This was truly meaningful! Thank you so much for your time and for sharing your expertise!

Jeff Whitten Of ROKFORM On How To Create A Fantastic Retail Experience That Keeps Bringing… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Deepak Ohri On 5 Ways To Create a Wow! Customer Experience

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Every leader who wants to create a WOW customer experience needs to know himself first.

As part of our series about the five things a business should do to create a Wow! customer experience,I had the pleasure of interviewing Deepak Ohri.

Deepak Ohri, founder and CEO of lebua Hotels and Resorts is well-known worldwide as an award-winning entrepreneur who has transformed the luxury hospitality landscape in Asia and elevated experiential luxury hospitality. He was the first to create the world’s highest rooftop restaurant that earned two 2 Michelin stars and the first to develop the concept of a vertical destination. Under his leadership, Iebua has been named the World’s Leading All-Suite Hotel by World Travel Award and is rated within the top 1 percent of companies globally for customer satisfaction. International Hospitality Institute selected Deepak Ohri as one of the Global Top Most Inspirational Executives in Travel and Hospitality. Ohri is also the author of “A Bridge Not Too Far — Where Creativity Meets Innovation.” The key to his success is his ability to create incredible customer experiences.

Thank you so much for joining us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you got started?

My backstory is very simple. I grew up in India in a very modest neighborhood. I believe my biggest advantage was that I was always a very curious child. There was a road that separated our modest neighborhood from the wealthier one. We were not supposed to cross the road, but I never understood why. I crossed the road and discovered that there were other types of houses. These houses were much nicer than the one I lived in. They had bathrooms and a fridge with a fascinating drink, Coca-Cola. This is the first time that I tasted such a cold refreshing drink. This is my backstory, to learn how to discover. I learned that curiosity and inquisitiveness opens our eyes to see things that we would not have otherwise. Our mind is exposed to possibilities. We start dreaming and once we start dreaming these dreams can become reality. Therefore, the art of discovery is my backstory.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lessons or ‘take aways’ you learned from that?

There are many funny mistakes that I have made in life. They seem really funny now. When I was 21 years old, I took my first flight. I was going from Mumbai to Goa which is approximately a 45-minute flight. Since it was the first time I had ever travelled, I wanted to make sure that I was the first one on the plane so that I could observe from the other passengers what to do; especially how to fasten the seatbelt. I was so determined to be the first on the plane that I pushed through all of the passengers and skipped the line. That would be really hard to do these days. When I was on the plane, in my seat, the passengers coming in were looking at me. The lesson that I learned is simple, if you do not know something be brave enough to admit it. We are not supposed to know everything in this world.

None of us can achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?

It is very true that I would not have been able to achieve the success I’ve had without any help. When it comes to help, we always look outside of our comfort zone. Many people helped me through my journey, but the biggest help I received was not outside of my comfort zone, but in my house, my late father. I am eternally grateful to him. He did not help me develop my career, but he helped me to be better person, a strong person who understands that power corrupts people, and who understands that one’s roots are the most essential in life. He made me understand that humility is the key to success, mistakes will happen, and it is important to learn how to admit it. He is no longer with us but his story, his wisdom and his lessons are always with me. I want to share a story. When I was a young child, I went with my father to the store. He needed to buy a new shirt for work. The price of the shirt was $0.50. While in the store, I wanted a toy; a milk van — toy car. I wanted to have it so much. My father decided to buy me the toy instead of his shirt. It was the most precious gift. When we got back home, my father informed my mother that he would buy his shirt in two months. This is when I understood what unconditional love is. The price of $0.50 might not seem to be a high price now, but it is still a lot in some parts of the world, especially for the family that cannot afford it. My father taught me to love people and not to hide the love. Today, I do not hide my love for education, helping people and being in front of people sharing my wisdom and my mistakes.

Thank you for that. Let’s now pivot to the main focus of our interview. This might be intuitive, but I think it’s helpful to specifically articulate it. In your words, can you share a few reasons why great customer service and a great customer experience is essential for success in business?

Every customer is a human being. Great customer experience can be explained in one word that I learned from my late father, RESPECT. When respect is given, it is then returned and that is the key to understanding great customer service. We cannot forget that until we pay respect to others, we will not get respect in return.

In today’s world of globalization, the simplest things are the most difficult things to do. The reason is that many times organizations look at what they believe are high level things instead of looking at a basic simple principle, such as respect. There are two types of organizations — principle based, and rule based. The organizations that create the best customer service are the ones that are a hybrid of both. These two need to be connected for the best customer experience and it is not easy to achieve. My message to every organization is that no matter how small or how big, start with respect first.

Competition and external pressure always force a company to improve the customer experience. However, in reality, the customer experience can be only improved if the person at the top truly wants to improve it.

Did that Wow! experience have any long-term ripple effects? Can you share the story?

I am going to respond to both questions with one answer. We all “WOW” our customers. I want to tell you how to wow a customer after a failure and how that customer can then become your best ambassador. One of our VIP guests from Japan was involved in a car accident. It was our car and our driver, the accident was just a small scratch, but because of the rules and regulations, the police had to be called to file a report. It was not our driver’s fault, but he could not drive away. This unfortunately, made our guest loose some time and be late for a very important meeting. His time was priceless. He called his credit card company Centurion, and the credit card company informed us. Our hotel manager was upset. How was it possible that we found out about the car accident from the credit card company. The customer arrived angry at the hotel because he lost time. We knew we could not compensate his time, but we decided to compensate his loss for the future. We awarded him a seven-day stay at our VIP suite and two first-class airline tickets. Not only he was surprised, but he liked this gesture, and this story became so viral that he became our best ambassador. Today, we welcome many prominent guests from Japan.

Ok, here is the main question of our discussion. Based on your experience and success, what are the five most important things a business leader should know in order to create a Wow! Customer Experience. Please share a story or an example for each.

Five of the most important things for every business leader in my opinion are:

Every leader who wants to create a WOW customer experience needs to know himself first.
There must be certain principles created in the organization that should never be changed.
It is essential to spend time with the team to make them understand.
The leader must have a measuring tool to understand where the gaps are in the customer experience.
Every time there is a customer complaint a leader should empower the team but also give personal final touches to the customers so that they understand it is top — down.

In one of the organizations, I worked at in the past, I presented my boss with a customer service report. He asked me how much time I spent on this project. I told him three days. He said that these are three days that we lost. He said that if I would have spent the three days on the floor talking to the customers, we would have created a real report. He took the report I created and threw it in the garbage bin. He knew very well how important customer service was and wanted to know about hits where we “WOWed” the customer and misses where we lost an opportunity.

In order to create a WOW customer experience, a leader needs to know himself first. Knowing yourself first means that leaders should know and create a customer journey and experience before the customer even arrives. Creating this customer experience is both the easiest and the most difficult task because it requires a lot of discipline. It is important to spend time creating a customer journey. The customer will follow us on how this journey should take place and we should be able to allow the customer to follow us through his/her subconscious mind. We must create a service process that matters, just like a GPS. Customers want us to show them the journey.

There must also be certain principles created in the organization that should never be changed.

I want to share an example how principles need to be followed. In one organization, the company decided to give laptop to each executive. One of them lost the laptop. So, the next day the mandate was to have all of the laptops fixed to the desks. We should never change because of one mistake. Yes, there will be always people who will take advantage or make mistakes, but the principle should remain the same.

In my organization, we trust our employees. We spend around $100,000 on customer experience reports. We have an option of a mystery audit, but we do not do that because why would we tell our employees that we trust them and then, check on them.

It is also important to have a tool to measure and understand gaps in a customer’s experience. We use artificial intelligence, technology, and qualitative and quantitative assessments to measure the gap in the customer experience. In one of the restaurants where I worked, the outcome of the measurement was that the quality and variety of food was not impressive. The menu had 300 items so how that could be possible? We decided to investigate further. We spent three days in the restaurant to find out. We discovered that our staff only knew five items on the menu well and so that was what they recommended and what our chef prepared. If there was anything else ordered, it was not fresh. Since the recommendations were always the same, the customers ended up eating the same things repeatedly. Once we discovered the issue, we spent time with the team so that they understood their roles in the customer experience. By doing this we were able to not only able to discover the gap between what we thought and what was actually happening, but also were able to improve customer experiences. Once again, the example given always has to be from the top — down.

Are there a few things that can be done so that when a customer or client has a Wow! experience, they inspire others to reach out to you as well?

Nothing, you need to leave the customer alone and they will do that on their own. Privacy is much bigger than the experience. We do not intervene in privacy.

I want to only start one thing and that is a new definition of happiness. Happiness is an expression of management. It is not well-being, mindfulness, or meditation. It is an agreement with yourself based on your own acceptance, understanding and willingness to build a better tomorrow.

How can our readers follow you on social media?

Find me on LinkedIn, follow and connect with me. You can also follow my website: www.deepakohri.com

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Deepak Ohri On 5 Ways To Create a Wow! Customer Experience was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Aaron Hensley Of Rise Executive Consulting On 5 Things You Need To Know To Successfully Scale Your…

Aaron Hensley Of Rise Executive Consulting On 5 Things You Need To Know To Successfully Scale Your Business

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Be self-aware. You can’t rely on people telling you about yourself. You must lead with a high sense of who you are in every moment. If you are mastering this, you will be entuned to the culture you are building and will be able to pivot when needed. Many people can’t adapt or grow past their sense of themselves. They trap themselves. You cannot grow people past your own lid!

Startups usually start with a small cohort of close colleagues. But what happens when you add a bunch of new people into this close cohort? How do you maintain the company culture? In addition, what is needed to successfully scale a business to increase market share or to increase offerings? How can a small startup grow successfully to a midsize and then large company? To address these questions, we are talking to successful business leaders who can share stories and insights from their experiences about the “5 Things You Need To Know To Successfully Scale Your Business”. As a part of this series, we had the distinct pleasure of interviewing Aaron Hensley.

Aaron Hensley, President and CEO of RISE — an executive coaching consultancy spent 30 years leading and mentoring employees and business owners in one of the largest martial arts franchises in the United States; during which he owned and operated 12 of his own locations. As an owner/operator himself, he quickly learned his true passion was helping others discover and cultivate their own personal and professional vision — achieving their personal BEST!

Thank you for joining us in this interview series. Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’?

I am a 7th degree black belt and began my martial arts journey long ago training with martial arts legend Chuck Norris. As a martial arts practitioner of 39 years, I have met some amazing and inspiring people; created lifelong, lasting memories; and learned some of the best life lessons. For most of my adulthood, martial arts was not only my personal passion but also my career. I started my career with 1 martial arts school with 60 students and quickly grew from 1 school to 12; servicing 1200 families across Georgia, Tennessee, and South Carolina. This is where the real growth occurred, where I cut my teeth so to speak, learning how to grow and scale a company.

You’ve had a remarkable career journey. Can you highlight a key decision in your career that helped you get to where you are today?

A few years ago, with having success in the industry I was in; I looked around and asked myself if I was really living up to my potential or was it someone else’s version of success? In my gut I knew I could push further so I dug in and decided to get serious about my future. It was as if all my experiences and education finally matured in both my personal and professional life.

What’s the most impactful initiative you’ve led that you’re particularly proud of?

Over my career I’ve lead hundreds of students through the rank of Black Belt every year. That is an experience they will use to launch themselves into all levels in life. Playing a small part in that journey gives me so much joy.

The journey to black belt is typically a family financial and time commitment, therefore the accomplishment of receiving one’s black belt is often felt by the whole family. Becoming a black belt is an accomplishment intended only for those willing to demonstrate and live by the code of black belt: Modesty, Curtsey, Integrity, Perseverance, Self-Control, and Indominable Sprit. Each of these tenants are not only part of the BB code but are also character-building traits that support my overall strategic mission in everything I do.

Sometimes our mistakes can be our greatest teachers. Can you share a mistake you’ve made and the lesson you took away from it?

At one point, I scaled my martial arts business from 1 location to 3. I wasn’t ready. I was making the same amount of money for 3 times the stress and work. I questioned if I was cut out for entrepreneurship, and I had to swallow some pride and start the process over. With a lot of honesty (to myself) and hard work I was able to turn it around.

How has mentorship played a role in your career, whether receiving mentorship or offering it to others?

Mentorship has been a Game Changer! I have learned, through mentorship, self-made success stories are filled with guidance from someone that was there before you. This is a pivotal part in reaching a successful point in your business. My recommendation, lean on your mentors — they have already learned the pain points and can help you avoid them.

Developing your leadership style takes time and practice. Who do you model your leadership style after? What are some key character traits you try to emulate?

As a leader, I aspire to be transparent, real, approachable, with a high level of intensity. Age and experience have given me confidence and allows me the ability to be more open — which is a great feeling.

One of my long-time mentors is business and finance mogul, Grant Cardone. His best leadership trait is being transparent and real! He stays current about where he is in his growth and makes you understand the journey and how to lead truly by example!

Thank you for sharing that with us. Let’s talk about scaling a business from a small startup to a midsize and then large company. Based on your experience, can you share with our readers the “5 Things You Need To Know To Successfully Scale Your Business”?

Passion. Hold fast to the passion you feel for your journey. Passion will keep you from questioning if it is the right journey for you. If you don’t have passion for what you are doing you will falter and give up on it, it will become a job. Scaling your business can come with risk; if you believe in your core, it is the right choice you will jump headfirst into its success.

Be self-aware. You can’t rely on people telling you about yourself. You must lead with a high sense of who you are in every moment. If you are mastering this, you will be entuned to the culture you are building and will be able to pivot when needed. Many people can’t adapt or grow past their sense of themselves. They trap themselves. You cannot grow people past your own lid!

Master the People Game. This is the hardest part of scaling your business because you can’t do any if this alone. You need people, more and more, and your ability to grow your people will grow your company. Learn to be a servant leader!

Take responsibility. Seems ever so simple. The reality is there will be plenty that you don’t know but will need to learn enough to be accountable in that area. Attract and hire great people, but don’t punt the responsibility of knowing about every function in your organization.

Vision — Lead from Inspiration. People want to work for companies and people that have a remarkable future. Are you telling the story about where you are going not where you are?

Can you share a few of the mistakes that companies make when they try to scale a business? What would you suggest to address those errors?

Putting profits over the people. How? They cut the “expense” of people to appear more profitable. This quickly stalls growth, innovation, and productivity. Better to make sure you have alignment and people engaged and in right opportunities as the only way to scale is to have people working towards a common goal.

Scaling includes bringing new people into the organization. How can a company preserve its company culture and ethos when new people are brought in?

One is having a process in the hiring phase that seeks out those with similar core values. Next is having a strong culture intact, your own people will help remove anyone with ulterior motives. This goes totally with knowing your people and having alignment.

Many times, a key aspect of scaling your business is scaling your team’s knowledge and internal procedures. What tools or techniques have helped your teams be successful at scaling internally?

We have used online training for continue education mixed with traveling and attending in person workshops. If people aren’t willing to grow, they have to go! That is our mantra. We encourage and help facilitate it.

Daily personal growth intention is required on our team.

What software or tools do you recommend to help onboard new hires?

Plenty of options out there and it can be confusing to decide if software is needed. For a small start-up, don’t overthink or get fancy, good ole spreadsheet with a timeline tracking works for on boarding.

Because of your role, you are a person of significant influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most people, what would that be? You never know what your ideas can trigger.

In the ideal sense, martial arts has the benefits of fitness and self-defense but its real purpose is self-enlightenment. I would love to help people find their vehicle for similar in their life. To know oneself!

How can our readers further follow your work online?
www.aaronhensley.com

@team_hensley

This was truly meaningful! Thank you so much for your time and for sharing your expertise!

Aaron Hensley Of Rise Executive Consulting On 5 Things You Need To Know To Successfully Scale Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Rav Panesar Of Rymindr: 5 Things You Need To Know To Create a Successful App or SaaS

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Plan before but be reactive and flexible to which way your business is heading.

As part of our series about the “5 Things You Need To Know To Create a Successful App or SaaS”,I had the pleasure of interviewing Rav Panesar.

Rav Panesar is the founder and CEO of social-tech company Rymindr, a service which works through an app that automates and alerts users about important dates and events such as doctor’s appointments and deadlines for bills and payments, with the aim of helping people and businesses save money and time. He founded the company five years ago after researching how damaging forgetting dates can be financially. It has since gained hundreds of thousands of users.

Thank you so much for joining us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you got started?

I developed a big interest in tech from a young age. This led me to study computer science at the University of Greenwich, and since then I haven’t looked back, working in the computer industry for 21 years now. In my early years working in digital technology, I founded Web Genies, a company that builds websites and web applications for businesses, which I later sold. I’ve worked for various corporate, bank and financial institutions, including the Financial Times and Thompson Reuters, on the design and implementation of apps and web technology, as well as specialising in blockchain. I also gained a certified scrum master qualification along the way, a methodology which I believe in and I continue to use with my team today.

In June 2016, I was involved in a car accident, suffering a spinal fracture and slipped discs that left me in excruciating pain. The recovery process was slow. For the first six months I saw osteopaths, chiropractors and physios but I could find no long-term relief. I was in constant pain, I struggled to even walk. It was eventually decided that I should have surgery on my spine, with the risk it could leave me paralysed. Thankfully I came out ok, but it took me about a year in total to recover, and my back still isn’t as strong as it used to be. This was such a challenging period for me but I was determined to turn it into something positive, to use the time I spent recovering productively, to use it to make a difference. And I did. It was during this time that the idea for Rymindr was formed and took shape.

So, how are things going today? How did your grit and resilience lead to your eventual success?

Running and building a business is hard, you will fall and fail, many times! Building up Rymindr to where it is now has not been plain sailing, but two things have really pushed me forward and empowered me not to give up. The first is validation from people, including our users, about how Rymindr helps them and what they get out of it. The second is the amazing feedback we get from people about the vision behind Rymindr.

Let’s call this one, ‘right place, right time, maybe God’s listening?’ This is going back to when I first started. The vision behind Rymindr was to remind people, however at the start I wasn’t using Rymindr for myself as I really should have. One day, I was attending and helping at an event at our local Gurudwara (temple), but it turned out I had a meeting with a client on that same day. They called me on my mobile ‘reminding’ me of our meeting at the precise time I was helping to cook some food to serve people. Thankfully, the client saw the irony and funny side of it and was very understanding. I had my handsfree on and continued with the meeting while frying samosas.

This was when the automation of Rymindr started. I questioned myself, why did I not have a ‘Rymindr’ setup? Turns out people have too many things to keep track of in their lives and data entry or keeping diaries up to date and accurate can be tricky, time consuming and sometimes annoying. What was my takeaway? Lightbulb moments can manifest in the strangest ways, the trick is to spot them and realise this could be something special.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

We define ourselves as a social technology business with a heart. I always wanted to create a business that would give back to society, and our aim is to develop services using the latest technology which benefit people. ‘Tech for good.’ The vision behind Rymindr is to create a win-win ecosystem that benefits anyone who uses it and make positive impacts on people’s lives.

Rymindr is used by people every day to keep track of important dates and events, and to save money. It offers services to help households save thousands of pounds every year. We work for our members to maximize those benefits and continue to grow to offer more useful services to help save more time and money.

My original idea when I started Rymindr was also to allocate a percentage of its revenue to good causes. The cause I have homed in on is school meals. I’m passionate about this. Hundreds and thousands of children in the UK are going hungry because they do not qualify for free school meals under government rules. Through my work with schools, I’ve heard too many stories of children being unable to pay for food. I’ve witnessed parents counting change on head teachers’ desks to ensure their child got a school meal. No child should go hungry. Without sounding too cliche, children are the future and while the government is doing what it can, I know through Rymindr we can have amazing impacts using innovative ways to create long term sustainable support. With each member of Rymindr Rewards we can fund two meals and we have plans to extend this to four soon. As more and more people use Rymindr every year, our mission to end child hunger gets closer and closer to being achieved.

We are helping schools in two ways. Most schools in this country are really struggling and underfunded. They lack adequate facilities and opportunities, and it’s a significant problem. To help, each Rymindr user can nominate a school. Once a certain threshold of nominations is reached, we fund services for that school and for staff members in addition to helping fund school meals.

Which tips would you recommend to your colleagues in your industry to help them to thrive and not “burn out”?

Having breathing space away from the business is just as important as working on the business. As the saying goes, time is one commodity which is not replaceable. Once it’s gone, it’s gone. It’s something I learned a little later into my business life and although I do not regret working hard, I now realise I have missed out on some very important things in my life, including spending time with the kids or meeting friends and family at events. Work hard, but use your time wisely, it’s not coming back.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?

Absolutely! For me, support has come from close family and friends. There’s a saying which I read that has really stuck in my mind: ‘show me some of your closest family and friends and I’ll show you your future’. It’s so important to have the right people around you. In the early days of Rymindr, at the pre-concept stages, two people really got behind me. One is my amazing wife and the other is my friend Banty Singh. When I was at the stage where I still was 50/50 about progressing with Rymindr, it was Banty who gave me the push to get on the road, so to speak. In fact, his exact words were: ‘so what you waiting for, get going.’ I also draw inspiration from other people who have life and business experience. I’m constantly learning, and I thrive from listening and taking on board information from successful people who are humble and down to earth.

We have hundreds of thousands of people using Rymindr every day, sharing and receiving millions of Rymindrs. Three steps,

Listen to your users.
Implement change that will benefit them or solve a problem for them.
Create moments where your users can’t help but tell other people about how they have benefitted.

What is your monetization model? How do you monetize your community of users? Have you considered other monetization options? Why did you not use those?

Our revenue comes from our subscription model, Rymindr Rewards. It’s a £60 annual subscription that has the benefit of pulling in the cheapest options and discounts for everything from MOTs to retail and services. The objective is to save our users hundreds if not thousands of pounds per year, especially beneficial given the cost-of-living crisis.

Know your audience.
Listen to your users.
Know your product or service
Plan before but be reactive and flexible to which way your business is heading.
Know your tech or get expert advice from someone who does. It’s too easy and expensive to fall into a trap where you limit yourself with how your business can scale or develop.

Rymindr! Simple, that’s who we are and that’s what we’re doing.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Follow me on Twitter @RymindrRav

Follow facebook on www.facebook.com/rymindr

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Rav Panesar Of Rymindr: 5 Things You Need To Know To Create a Successful App or SaaS was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Making Something From Nothing: Woody Mawhinney Of Pawlicy Advisor On How To Go From Idea To Launch

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Don’t go it alone: Starting a business is hard, and anyone who has started one will tell you this. If you are motivated enough to start a business, it’s easy to have the self-belief you can launch it alone — and some people can. But even the solo founders have a strong network of supporters they can lean on when the going gets tough.

As a part of our series called “Making Something From Nothing”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Woody Mawhinney, Co-founder and CEO of Pawlicy Advisor.

Woody Mawhinney is the CEO & Co-founder of Pawlicy Advisor, the leading pet insurance marketplace offering personalized product comparisons based on breed-specific attributes and total cost predictions for the lifetime of the pet. Having served over three million pet parents across the U.S., Pawlicy Advisor is recommended by the American Animal Hospital Association and has raised $20M in venture capital. Woody launched the company in 2018 out of Columbia Business School, where he received his MBA.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your “childhood backstory”?

I grew up in an apple orchard in Maine, atop a local ski hill. It was the perfect ecosystem to foster curiosity and exploration: there was never a limit to hiking, running, biking, and nature walks. My mother was a teacher, and home-schooled my siblings and me until public high school. My education was largely hands-on and interactive. Instead of reading about renewable energy, we built model solar cars and boats; rather than hearing in a classroom about how the government operates, we visited the State House to speak with representatives. My upbringing fostered a sense of curiosity about why things operate as they do and how one can make a tangible impact on the world, and I’m thankful I had a supportive and smart educator in my mother who encouraged taking the less-traveled path.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

Ultra swimmer Petter Attia was interviewed by Joe Rogan and asked, “Why do you do this?” Petter’s response is ingrained in my head: “Velocity means very little and acceleration means everything.” What Petter meant is you only feel when speed changes and he believes that emotionally, this is also true. He provides the example of how the feeling of crawling on the shore after swimming for 10–14 hours is amazing, but what makes it especially amazing is how six hours earlier, he felt like he was going to die. By challenging oneself and persevering through difficulty, the beauty of everyday life reveals itself more vibrantly. I’ve found this concept especially helpful to think about when I’ve wanted to procrastinate, when I’ve faced stress, or when I’ve felt complacent.

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

In high school, I was gifted a book called “Why Not? How to Use Everyday Ingenuity to Solve Problems Big and Small.” Two decades later, I still keep this book close and routinely ask the question “why” and “why not?” It’s had a profound impact on my life. The premise is that some people have the notion that coming up with solutions for real-world problems is somehow reserved for the experts–that innovation is somehow beyond the capacity of a typical person. In fact, it taught me that looking for new and better ways of doing something is a skill to develop–a way of life. I frequently find and identify problems by tuning into moments of frustration or friction: my zipper caught on my jacket–sure, I could have pulled the jacket fabric tighter when zipping, but what if I didn’t have to in the first place? When I came up with the idea for Pawlicy Advisor, I found finding the right insurance coverage for my dog harder than my day job as a risk analyst supporting Homeland Security. So, I paused and asked myself, “Why can’t I compare my dog’s unique breed-related health risks to the insurance coverage options on the market?” “Why can’t I easily understand which insurance policy is the best price?” “Why does my veterinarian care about pet insurance but not know much about it?” “Why isn’t there a tool to help pet owners like me and a platform to help veterinarians like my vet?” “If I had unlimited resources, what would a solution look like?” You get the picture.

Ok super. Let’s now shift to the main part of our discussion. There is no shortage of good ideas out there. Many people have good ideas all the time. But people seem to struggle to take a good idea and translating it into an actual business. Can you share a few ideas from your experience about how to overcome this challenge?

To transition from idea to launch of Pawlicy Advisor, I spent a long time developing a business model canvas (an approach that is widely taught) and testing my assumptions with customer-driven research and by pitching prospective customers as early as possible. The business model canvas is helpful in structuring your idea within nine company building blocks: (1) key partners; (2) key activities; (3) key resources; (4) value propositions; (5) customer relationships; (6) customer segments; (7) channels; (8) cost structure; and (9) revenue streams. Yet a business model is only as good as it is rooted in customer demand, and I am a big believer in speaking directly with prospective customers as early as possible. For example, I learned there was a need for a pet insurance marketplace because I walked from the length of Manhattan speaking with every pet owner I could find. They told me (1) if they had pet insurance, they didn’t know if they got a good deal or not; and (2) if they didn’t have pet insurance, it was because they didn’t know if it was worth the money. I then found that most of these individuals would take me up on my offer and trust me to compare options and find them the right pet insurance plan. Ultimately, a lot of entrepreneurs fall in love with building at the risk of not selling early or frequently enough. Engaging with customers at the outset increases the chance you are efficiently driving toward a productive and sustainable business.

I would argue most ideas are not really original, and that’s okay. Sometimes fantastic solutions are derived from asking, “where else would this concept work?” Sometimes, the time when entering the market matters most and a failed idea in the past could be a successful idea moving forward. Obviously, risk can and should be reduced when intellectual property is involved. It’s always a good idea to search internet domains, trademarks, and patents to see what’s out there.

If you’re going to run a business, you should have the passion and discipline to become a leading expert on the topics most relevant to your business. I wasn’t a pet insurance expert before starting Pawlicy Advisor, but I became a licensed insurance producer in every state, joined the North American Pet Health Insurance Association, and participated in the National Association of Insurance Commissioners Working Group on Pet Insurance. You need that inherent hunger to learn and grow that will drive you during challenging moments in your entrepreneurial journey and allow you to think comprehensively when researching your idea.

I named Pawlicy Advisor only after I had vetted the business idea thoroughly. I reviewed internet domains, trademarks, and conducted user surveys. When I felt like there was alignment on all three (available domain, no similar trademarks, and broad customer support), I incorporated the business. The advice I received early on was, “use a startup lawyer to incorporate the business and file IP,” rather than an internet legal service. Maybe things have changed somewhat from five years ago, but some startup founders I know have run into issues with the defensibility of their IP and the ease of scaling their startup because of user-generated mistakes that could have been avoided when filing their legal paperwork. In a similar vein, I used a registered agent to help me with major state filings.

As a marketplace, Pawlicy Advisor needed to solve for not only demand, but supply. We needed insurance partnerships to be able to sell insurance. I’m a huge believer in picking up the phone and communicating directly with decision-makers in key business relationships–I’ve found nothing more effective in business development. Early on, I used a free email domain research service to identify potential email addresses of pet insurance carrier CEOs, and I reached out to them directly, going straight to the top of my ideal partner organizations. I’m not necessarily recommending others take that approach, but I can say 100% of my emails received responses leading to scheduled calls with either the CEOs themselves or the individuals to whom they delegated. Those conversations were extremely valuable and productive because any action after the calls were supported by the organization’s leader.

I take a similar approach with key vendors and manufacturers. I rely on other leaders I trust and know or other leaders I don’t know yet, but I respect them to guide me to the right suppliers. For example, we needed to create boxes of marketing materials we could send to veterinarians, so I got an intro to a paper and packaging VP I respected who shared who their favorite vendor was. We have used this vendor for three years and greatly value that relationship.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Started Leading My Company” and why?

Understand and truly love the “why”: As an entrepreneur, you need to be resilient–resilient to hearing “no,” resilient to things moving slower than expected, resilient to something going wrong. Internalizing the “why” builds not only your resolve, but also your enthusiasm for your work, which can be a vibrant and powerful energy for yourself, your employees, external partners, and the public. Whenever I wake up, two of the first faces I see are Wilma and Wrigley, my two dogs. A simple hug to the two of them reminds me why I am in the business of helping other pet owners.
Don’t go it alone: Starting a business is hard, and anyone who has started one will tell you this. If you are motivated enough to start a business, it’s easy to have the self-belief you can launch it alone — and some people can. But even the solo founders have a strong network of supporters they can lean on when the going gets tough. Some of my most challenging days at Pawlicy Advisor occurred before I met Travis Bloom, my Co-founder, and Pawlicy Advisor’s CTO. In Travis, I found an expert in business areas where I fell short. I also found in him a confidant and leader I could lean on to drive the business forward.
Receive buy-in from your spouse and/or core support systems: There is a reason why actors, athletes, politicians, and awardees thank their families–often first–during receptions acknowledging their work. Even if you work up the courage to start a business and are prepared for the challenges ahead, your key supporters may not have internalized the journey the same way as you. My wife likes to joke she’s another “co-founder” of Pawlicy Advisor because of the stress I feel, she feels; the wins I recognize, she participates in; and the puzzles I solve, she often contributes. I overlooked how my wife married not only me, but my business. I can’t thank her enough for the support she has provided and the sacrifices she has made to support my dreams.
It’s a rollercoaster: Entrepreneurship offers some of the highest highs and lowest lows. One day you can be closing an incredible business partnership, and the next day you can be trying to get your business back online. I think some of the most even-keeled leaders are not only calm because they are skilled but because they have experienced the volatility of running a business, leading to reservedness during the highs and optimism during the lows.
Deals aren’t done until they’re in writing: Running a business is full of potential distractions, and it’s a leader’s job to keep the operations of the company pointed at true North, solving its most important needs and steering toward its most impactful opportunities. I’ve encountered countless distribution and investment opportunities that fell apart at the one-yard line. We have a saying at Pawlicy Advisor, which is don’t commit resources or revisit the roadmap until the ink is dry.

Let’s imagine that a reader reading this interview has an idea for a product that they would like to invent. What are the first few steps that you would recommend that they take?

Make a minimum viable product and put it in front of a potential customer or user as quickly as possible. Nothing beats testing your idea “in the wild,” and if you aren’t embarrassed by the quality of the minimum viable product that you shared with the world, you probably waited too long to put it in front of people. Put any ego aside, and prioritize testing with the end-user at the risk of looking silly.

There are many invention development consultants. Would you recommend that a person with a new idea hire such a consultant, or should they try to strike out on their own?

It may depend on how technical or scientific the invention is. If the consultant has a stellar reputation, the price is right, and you need an expert to help you go to market, it may be worth it. At the earliest stage, more often than not, it’s cheaper and more valuable to go directly to prospective users and customers for their opinions than it is to go to a consultant. It can also be valuable to lean on your network and people you trust to recommend the right resources for you. Consultants sometimes do not have incentives that are aligned with your direct interests. Ruthlessly prioritize what you are focused on accomplishing and think of a consultant as only one resource to help you get there, not as the core strategy itself.

What are your thoughts about bootstrapping vs looking for venture capital? What is the best way to decide if you should do either one?

At the end of the day, no money is free money. If you accept outside capital, venture or otherwise, you are adding key partners in the business who may impact strategy, operations, and outcome. It’s your responsibility as a fiduciary to treat shareholders’ interests equally. Venture capital is a fantastic accelerant: you can fuel exceptionally quick growth, which can help you shoot for the moon. VCs are also exceptionally skilled at pattern recognition, which helps founders avoid tunnel vision and optimize their approaches. If you go the VC route, you need to be honest with yourself about VC economics. VCs aren’t in business for a 2x or 3x return. They are stewards of capital who invest because they believe you could be the next 50x, 100x, or 200x return. You should be aligned with that vision if you accept venture backing.

What’s most important is to have a clear vision of where you want to steer the business and what resources you need to get you there. Fundraising isn’t the milestone that particularly matters: progress toward achieving your core objectives matters more. What a bootstrapped business may not receive in terms of expertise, network, and larger balance sheet, it may receive in flexibility (including in an exit), ownership, and even possibly ROI. The truth of the matter is running a business is hard — many fail. ROI for the founders of a bootstrapped business and a business that has raised $50M in venture funding can look surprisingly similar when dilution is taken into account. I am amazed at how many venture-backed founders are jealous of bootstrapped founders and how many bootstrapped founders are jealous of venture-backed founders.

Ok. We are nearly done. Here are our final questions. How have you used your success to make the world a better place?

As we have grown, we have stayed true to our mission of making it easy for pet parents to do the right thing. We believe personalized advice from trustworthy experts ensures pets get the best care possible. Navigating pet care is hard: medical care is expensive and because pets are treated as equal family members these days, conversations pertaining to affording their care are naturally personal and emotional. I’m exceptionally proud of how our team has prioritized providing both pet owners and veterinarians with resources that allow them to care for the pets they and we all love. From a pet parent perspective, we’re saving them up to thousands of dollars over their pets’ lives and providing them peace of mind. From a veterinary perspective, we’re supporting some of their most delicate and impactful conversations that take place in a clinic (financial ones). As a pet parent myself, it’s a marvelous privilege to hear from veterinarians and pet owners about the positive impact we’re making on their clinics and furry families.

My alma mater, Bowdoin College, instilled in me a philosophy that no matter what fields we pursue, we can make them more accessible and ethical by making space for empathy, understanding, and context–committing to and seeking out the Common Good. While broad, the concepts of civil discourse, active listening, the promotion of mutual understanding, free and respectful discussion, and honesty are key values that deserve protection. The intersection of tech and public discourse is a topic that’s currently buzzing in the news, and the discussion that’s occurring about the intersection of tech and free speech is valuable. My hope is it starts a public movement to better understand and address the ways technologies impact public discourse and opinion formation.

Jon Stewart. I admire his contributions to the veteran and first responder communities. As a vegan and pet care founder, I admire his animal sanctuary work. And I’m a fan of his writing, comedy, and shows.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

Making Something From Nothing: Woody Mawhinney Of Pawlicy Advisor On How To Go From Idea To Launch was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Jonathan Kroll Of Leadership Trainer On The 5 Things You Need To Be A Highly Effective Public…

Jonathan Kroll Of Leadership Trainer On The 5 Things You Need To Be A Highly Effective Public Speaker

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Get To Know The Audience: Exceptional speakers, trainers, and facilitators never just show up and, poof, they are ready to go. We have work to do well before the clock strikes and it’s go time. Long before any training begins, we need to go on a reconnaissance mission. We collect data on the participants’ interests and desires so we can craft the experience to meets their needs and can be translated from the speaking and training engagement to their real-life leadership practice.

Jonathan Kroll is a leadership educator and entrepreneur.

Jonathan began his career as a university administrator by focusing on leadership development, community engagement, and reflection initiatives. He has co-founded two leadership training businesses in addition to Leadership Trainer, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that focuses on trainer/facilitator preparation. Over the last decade, Jonathan has facilitated hundreds of leadership workshops, retreats, trainings, conference presentations, and classes to 1,000s of participants across 4 continents. In addition to serving as the Executive Director and a Master Trainer with Leadership Trainer, Jonathan is an Assistant Teaching Professor and Program Director for the Professional Leadership Studies program at the University of Rhode Island. Jonathan has earned a PhD from Fielding Graduate University in Leadership with a focus in Group Mentoring. He coaches, consults, writes, teaches, and trains about leadership, mentoring, and training/facilitation. Contact Jonathan at: [email protected]

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Our readers would love to get to know you a bit better. Can you tell us the story of how you grew up?

I grew up in central New Jersey close to Princeton. I spent my entire childhood in that community before going to Quinnipiac University in Connecticut. It was through my involvement in clubs and organizations in both high school and college that I gained the confidence and cultivated the skills to serve as a public speaker and leadership trainer.

Can you share a story with us about what brought you to this specific career path?

In 2005, after earning my master’s degree, I volunteered in Nicaragua for six months. During this stint, I expected the experience to be light and breezy with plenty of time at the beach, exploring a new and different place, reading interesting nonacademic literature, and teaching a little bit of English. It ended up being heavy on the teaching and light on the ‘light and breezy’. I also started facilitating leadership trainings. I had an interest and, albeit limited skill set that matched the desire of people in that local community. Through this experience, I fell in the with the opportunity to facilitate the leadership training and development of others which led me down this career path.

Can you tell us the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?

The story I share is when I believe I embraced my identity as a public speaker and leadership educator.

It was a Monday. October 1st, 2012, to be exact. Not an ordinary start to the week in the slightest. On this particular Monday, I was serving as a Resident Director on an around-the-Atlantic Semester at Sea voyage. The shipboard community of students, faculty, and staff didn’t operate in the traditional five days of schooling and two days of weekend rejuvenation. Rather, courses were only held at sea on an A/B schedule. Classes were offered on either ‘A’ Days or ‘B’ Days. When we were in port, aside from some academic course-related excursions, we were invited to explore these ports and cities and countries at our leisure.

The context surrounding this Monday was far from ordinary. Per the original itinerary, on this particular Monday, we were supposed to be in Casablanca, Morocco. Weeks prior, though, two American diplomats — Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and Information Management Officer Sean Smith were killed at the US Embassy in Benghazi, Libya. Shortly thereafter, the United States of America issued travel warnings to many Muslim countries in North Africa and the Middle East. Morocco was on the list. Semester at Sea decided to heed these US State Department warnings and, while in scramble-mode, shift our itinerary. On short notice, we extended our time in Cadiz, Spain and added Las Islas Canarias (The Canary Islands) to our voyage.

For every port-of-call, Semester at Sea offered extensive, albeit optional, in-country excursion opportunities. These were designed through Semester at Sea’s HQ and facilitated by our on-board Field Office during the voyage. These excursions were contracted well in advance through a significant vetting process of in-country vendors and tour agencies. Tenerife, the largest and most populated of the Canary Islands, served as our two-day docking station. Due to the circumstances, official Semester at Sea-sponsored excursion options were limited.

On this particular Monday, I would organize and facilitate a last-minute, half-day leadership retreat. I, and the Dean of Students of our voyage, Lisa Slavid, another incredible and wise leadership educator-mentor, collaborated to design and host a compelling and reflective morning experience. This leadership training was proposed to fill a gap. We wanted to offer something structured and leadership-developmental for the students of our voyage as an alternative to walking the city streets or visiting a nearby beach.

It was a solid program, especially under those circumstances. We prepared and arranged the four-hour experience in less than two days without having a physical location or pre-planned experiential activity training materials. We didn’t know how many students would actually be interested in participating nor did we provide any incentives like meals or course credits, but in the end it was a remarkable success. We are able to craft a meaningful, intentional opportunity to reflect on leadership and strengthen our capacities to serve as effective leaders.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

When I was just starting out, I was coordinating a training engagement for a team. There were four of us and it was the first time we were all together. The planning went quite smoothly. Yet, when we got together for the training experience, I recognized we weren’t clear on clothing expectations. Most of us were wearing khakis and a polo. One team member thought it was appropriate to wear one of his ‘trademark’ jumpsuits. He was totally out of context and looked out his element. In the moment, I was incredibly frustrated by how we was representing the training team and our organization. Looking back, we often laugh about it and emphasize the importance of having a great pair of khakis just in case!

Peter Magolda. Peter was a faculty member and mentor who was the first person to dedicate serious energy and attention to my writing and how I might sharpen my messaging. It is because of his guidance and support that I was able to strengthen my writing and gain confidence in my abilities to share a message. His encouragement has been instrumental in getting my first book published (Preparing Leadership Educators: A Comprehensive Guide to Theories, Practices, and Facilitation Skills) as well as how I perform as a speaker and leadership trainer.

We will all face obstacles and failures. It is not a question of “if”, but “when” — and “how” we can effectively navigate those challenges. Most important is for speakers, trainers, facilitators, and educators to cultivate a growth mindset and see these failures as learning opportunities. The famed US Women’s Soccer Coach, Tony DiCicco, suggested we utilize failure as fertilizer — it can be fuel for tremendous growth, development, and improvement.

What drives you to get up everyday and give your talks? What is the main empowering message that you aim to share with the world?

I’m called to do this work. The guiding question that guides my work and frames my message is this: How can the next generations of leaders (i.e., the young people of today) effectively navigate the challenges we will all inevitably face if those responsible for their leadership training and development are ill-prepared? In short, they won’t. I believe that trainer/facilitator/speaker preparation is imperative because if we do not effectively develop the leadership skills and capacities of our future leaders, we won’t be able to navigate the leadership challenges we will all inevitably face. Trainer/facilitator/speaker preparation is about both the immediate skills development and enhancement of trainers as well as long-term generational change for their participants.

If we critically review our current leadership development programs, training opportunities, and speaking opportunities we’ll notice their severe inadequacies. They are not producing the leadership learning outcomes they espouse. Collectively, we are thirsty for leadership development experiences that actualize what they claim — to prepare us to be effective, just, and resonant leaders. The type of leaders who can nurture our own and others’ brilliance, illuminate human potential, and deeply connect with others in nourishing relationships so we can collaboratively do good in our organizations, communities, and the world. We keep pursuing leadership development and enhancement opportunities because nothing seems to quench this thirst to become the leaders we dream of being.

You have such impressive work. What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now? Where do you see yourself heading from here?

I am most excited about Leadership Trainer’s Certification Program — my nonprofit organization’s flagship experience. Leadership Trainer’s Certification Program is a one-of-a-kind, immersive, engaging, hands-on, trainer preparation experience that is guided by four objectives:

Prepare participants to facilitate amazing and impactful trainings rooted in dynamic, culturally relevant, and learning-oriented facilitation techniques — specifically experiential activities and reflective dialogue;
Engage participants in purposeful critical self-reflection and identity exploration;
Utilize leadership scholarship to advance participants own understanding and practice of leadership;
Cultivate a community of other trainers and facilitators.

My focus, now, is better prepare speakers, trainers, and facilitators with the knowledge base and skills to be effective in their work.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“Those of us seeking to be inspirited by the call to make a difference in the world have no choice but to take the journey of self-discovery” (Dennis Roberts, Deeper Learning in Leadership, p. 129).

For those of us who are professional speakers, trainers, and facilitators, we are often moved to make a difference in the world. Yet, many us have yet to sincerely engage in the ever-important practice of purposeful self-reflection and discovery. For me, when I started to engage in this work, I was able to show up more authentically and powerfully in my speaking and training engagements.

Ok, thank you for all that. Here is the main question of our interview. What are your “5 Things You Need To Be A Highly Effective Public Speaker?”

Get To Know The Audience: Exceptional speakers, trainers, and facilitators never just show up and, poof, they are ready to go. We have work to do well before the clock strikes and it’s go time. Long before any training begins, we need to go on a reconnaissance mission. We collect data on the participants’ interests and desires so we can craft the experience to meets their needs and can be translated from the speaking and training engagement to their real-life leadership practice.
Engage In Personal Preparation: In addition to our content preparations, we need to focus inwardly so we can be our best selves when it comes time for the speaking engagement or training experience. We set our intention. We can ask a series of overarching questions to focus our attention: How do I want to show up to this experience? How do I want to engage and interact with the participants? How can I best serve these participants? What do I hope to accomplish through this experience? Once our intention is set, our personal preparation happens in multiple domains: emotionally, mentally, physically, and tactically. Emotionally, we ensure that we are fully present and focused on this particular experience and these particular participants. Mentally, we have a deep knowledge of the theme, learning outcomes, and material. Physically, we are well fed and hydrated and dressed appropriately for the audience and experience. Tactically, we have confidence in the flow of the speaking engagement and training opportunity.
Pay Special Attention to Energy & Pace: Our energy and pace are essentially our presence. We know, from our own experiences, that our participants more easily integrate our message into their practice when they feel a healthy, positive emotional connection. Our presence is the combination of our energy and pace. When our energy is low and pace is slow, it is a clear indication of boredom and lack of interest. Rather, we can leverage our positive attitudes and an engaging pace to show excitement, care, and dedication to this experience, these participants, and the topic being addressed. Timothy Koegle (2007), a presentation consultant and author of The Exceptional Presenter, suggests we find a healthy rhythm of speaking, pausing, breathing, and speaking. Speak. Pause. Breathe. Speak. Essentially, we want to deliver a message, offer an instruction, ask a question, or provide a response statement. Then we take a moment to pause and attend to the energy in the space
Be Sharp & Edgy: When delivering our message, we want it to be sharp and edgy. (As I like to quip, if we are not living on the edge, we’re taking up too much space!) Often, our speaking topics and themes can be generic. Communication, for example, is, well, highly communicated as a leadership training topic. It is so broad and popular. We want to differentiate our experience from others by providing a message that is novel and exciting for our participants. The topic isn’t going to change. Our message and delivery of it is what makes it edgy. We offer a new way to explore the topic, ask provocative questions about the theme, and share data that are sexy and intriguing. This is how we get our participants engaged — rather than participating in just another communication training. For some examples, depending on the audience and context, I might use a song for the group to listen to or a movie clip to watch as an entry point as we explore the topic, rather than the traditional approach of just me offering my reflections about healthy communication habits. Alternatively, I might share a personal story — or better yet, ask participants to think back on a time when they were poor communicators. By inviting a selection of participants to share their stories, both serious and comical ones — before asking the whole participant body to offer reflections on what they heard about poor communication behaviors — we center the training experience in the lives, wisdom, and insight of our participants while preparing them for immersive, participatory engagement with the material in the soon-to-be facilitated experiential learning activity. We can also use data to make a bland or overdone topic both sexy and intriguing. To continue with this communication example, I might use data from Project Worldwide’s 2019 study of 471 survey respondents. They found that 74% of people have stopped dealing with a company and moved to a competitor due to feeling the company was disorganized, 92% have had to repeat a piece of information to two or more people within an organization, 85% find it annoying to have to repeat information when working with other organizations, 96% think the organizations they deal with could improve when it comes to communication, and even though 89% believe that effective communication is extremely important, 80% of the respondents rate their own organizations’ communication as either average or poor (Project Worldwide, 2020). These data highlight intriguing information about communication that can be packaged and offered to our participants to spur dialogue and spice up our training experiences.
End On Time: Finally, a personal plea — conclude the speaking engagement or training experience at the designated and labeled time. When serving in this capacity, we make a commitment to offer a robust, dynamic learning experience in the time allotted. We always end on time. Even if participants are late and we begin 30 minutes behind schedule, we end at the scheduled time. This is a matter of respect and respecting the commitment we’ve made to ourselves and our participants.

As you know, many people are terrified of speaking in public. Can you give some of your advice about how to overcome this fear?

We need to focus on our own breath and presence. Conquering our fear of speaking begins with focusing on deep full breaths.

You are a person of huge influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?

We need to focus much more intentionally on trainer and facilitator preparation. If we do not effectively develop the leadership skills and capacities of our future leaders, we won’t be able to navigate the leadership challenges we will all inevitably face. Trainer/facilitator/speaker preparation is about both the immediate skills development and enhancement of trainers as well as long-term generational change for their participants.

Is there a person in the world whom you would love to have lunch with, and why? Maybe we can tag them and see what happens!

Shaq! I’d love to have lunch with Shaquille O’Neal. He has earned his doctorate in leadership — I would love to explore his reflections on leadership. I also appreciate how eclectic his professional pursuits have been following his elite basketball career.

Are you on social media? How can our readers follow you online?

LinkedIn:

Instagram: JonathanKroll_PhD

This was so informative, thank you so much! We wish you continued success!

Jonathan Kroll Of Leadership Trainer On The 5 Things You Need To Be A Highly Effective Public… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Ilgar Tali Of Smartist: 5 Things You Need To Know To Create a Successful App or SaaS

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Know what your passion is, and you’ll be able to pick an industry that fits you. Once you’ve found something you’re passionate about, you’ll be able to stick with it for a long time.

As part of our series about the “5 Things You Need To Know To Create a Successful App or SaaS”,I had the pleasure of interviewing Ilgar Tali.

Ilgar Tali is the Founder & CEO of Smartist, the ultimate tech app for artists. Smartist was launched in 2021 and based in Miami, FL.

Smartist is the first app designed by artists, for artists as the next big leap in relationship between the art and tech worlds. Downloaded over 400,000 times in over 170 countries, Smartist makes it faster and easier than ever to digitally showcase artwork by using real dimensions and scaling onto pre-uploaded pictures of interiors. Its seamless design is easy to navigate. The app’s ability to stage artwork quickly and efficiently can do more than just drive sales — it can enhance social media content, boost engagement, set the stage for an artist’s online shop or help create a robust professional portfolio for any audience.

Thank you so much for joining us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you got started?

I was born and raised in Baku, Azerbaijan. Since I was five years old, I’ve been drawing and painting, but graphic design is what I followed as an occupation. In 2014, I came to Missouri, USA, to learn English as a Second Language. While there, I started painting again after a break from my design career. I created an Instagram account and shared my new paintings with the world. It was then that I first thought about presenting my art in space so that people could understand the accurate proportions of each piece. Even though I’m a graphic designer by trade, it took me time to find a relevant image on the internet — usually an interior photograph — open it up in Photoshop®, add your artwork on top of it and make it look realistic. This process proved to be time-consuming.

I was offered an opportunity to exhibit my art in New York City. I visited NYC for my show and fell in love with the city, so I decided to stay there and explore creative opportunities. I had the chance to work for many different creative agencies, allowing me to improve my branding and UX/UI design skills. In addition, working with talented people has given me more confidence in my abilities.

Even though I was focused on my design career, I participated in a few group art shows that made me realize many artists struggle to market their art. Artists spend more time selling art than creating it. In addition, the majority of them have part-time jobs to make a living. I have a profound desire to help artists, which led me to start a contemporary art agency called Kontempo, representing talented emerging local artists and creating new opportunities for them in 2019. After curating two group shows in Manhattan and Brooklyn with hundreds of visitors, it became one of my most enjoyable activities. Unfortunately, due to Covid-19, we had to discontinue.

By the end of 2019, my passions and past experiences helped me connect the dots and inspired me to work on a new adventure that will have a more significant impact. I wanted to solve a problem in 2014, make visualizing art easier, and help artists sell art online faster. Studies show that when you display art using realistic visualizations, you are more likely to sell your art. As a result, Smartist was born at the intersection of a love for art, design, tech, and support artists.

In early 2020, I started assembling a remote team to help me research, design, and develop the app. During the lockdown, I decided to move to Miami, and after many months of hard work, we launched our first version on April 7, 2021. Since it was my first tech product, learning the ropes took me some time.

Today, we are proud that Smartist has made thousands of artists’ lives easier by saving their creative time and helping them market and sell art faster.

It’s hard for startup founders to get people to believe in them and their vision, not to mention the challenges they face when they don’t have any external funding. For me, it was most challenging when I got investor rejections while we were still in beta testing — it affected my motivation and self-confidence. So then, I’ve decided not to spend time raising capital but focus on the product and find other ways to fund the business and keep my inspiration high.

So, how are things going today? How did your grit and resilience lead to your eventual success?

I am grateful for all of the things in my life and the way they are going. Resilience and grit are two essential traits that can lead to success in many areas of life. Those with these traits persevere, maintain their determination in the face of challenges and adapt when situations get complicated.

When we make mistakes, it’s more often because we rush and lack knowledge, focus, or patience. For example, we worked on the app’s first version for over a year before releasing it to the App Store. Unfortunately, I made a mistake when I accidentally clicked the ‘Release’ button without final testing. As a result, the app had significant bugs and incorrect pricing plans.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

According to thousands of 5-star reviews, Smartist is the market’s most powerful art visualization app. What makes us unique is that we update the app every two weeks with new additions to our content library, features, and bug fixes. We also listen to every user’s feedback and frequently implement their suggestions.

We believe that, together with our community of users, we can continually improve Smartist for all our users. We love our Smartist community, and we feel their love, too. That said, this is just the beginning for Smartist. We plan to continue developing innovative tools that empower artists and other creatives in every aspect of their lives and careers.

Which tips would you recommend to your colleagues in your industry to help them to thrive and not “burn out”?

Burnout happens when we try to do everything at once and forget the importance of priority. There are plenty of opportunities in every industry, but only some prospects have the same priority. So make the right choices by focusing on what’s essential today and remembering that FOCUS means following one course until successful. That’s the key not only to business but also to the life you want to create.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?

First, I’d like to thank my mom for believing in me regardless of distance and events. Next, I’d like to acknowledge my small but fantastic team members — I couldn’t do it without them. Lastly, I want to thank the Universe for allowing me to manage my thoughts and doubts while keeping a positive attitude.

Smartist has been downloaded over 400k times by 175 countries. We are proud to have built a product that people love and share with their friends. To create word-of-mouth marketing, first, build something hard to ignore; second, make it affordable and focus on one marketing channel with the best ROI.

What is your monetization model? How do you monetize your community of users? Have you considered other monetization options? Why did you not use those?

Our business model is freemium. Users can use our app for free with limited features or purchase a premium subscription to unlock everything. Smartist is essential for artists who want to market their work effectively. Based on our survey, Smartists reported increased sales, connected with more potential buyers, received positive client feedback, and upgraded their art portfolios or websites after using our app.

Know what your passion is, and you’ll be able to pick an industry that fits you. Once you’ve found something you’re passionate about, you’ll be able to stick with it for a long time.
Define why your app should be built. You need to identify a need or problem that your app can solve. Is the problem worth solving? Is it a common problem? If not, you’ll have to think carefully about getting people to adopt and use your app regularly.
Create a solution for your users’ needs. Research your app’s competition and target audience to create a product that meets their preferences.
Design and develop a minimum viable product (MVP) that is easy to understand and allows you to test the app effectively.
Test your app with a small group of users before you release it to a broader audience. Make changes to the app based on their feedback, then test it again thoroughly to ensure that it is stable, reliable, and free of bugs and other issues.

Since childhood, society and our family have encouraged us to study different subjects and sciences. When we want to learn more about any topic, we research, analyze, find insights, and understand the case from the core. But why don’t we do the same about ourselves? The place we live in — our mind, body, and soul — should be explored just as thoroughly as any topic of interest. Knowing yourself well is essential to make choices that bring you happiness.

We tend to spend too much time worrying about things we cannot control. Instead, we should focus on transforming ourselves for the better. It is not only good for us but for everybody around us and the entire society.

I would start a movement for the most significant science — The Science of Self. The world would be better if we all tried to understand ourselves better.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Instagram

https://www.instagram.com/smartistapp/

Twitter

https://twitter.com/smartist_app

TikTok

https://www.tiktok.com/@smartistapp

Website

https://smartist.app/

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Ilgar Tali Of Smartist: 5 Things You Need To Know To Create a Successful App or SaaS was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

The Future Is Now: Anthony Capone Of DocGo On How Their Technological Innovation Will Shake Up The…

The Future Is Now: Anthony Capone Of DocGo On How Their Technological Innovation Will Shake Up The Tech Scene

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

The reality is that what is best for other people is also in your best interest. That’s the connection that most people don’t take the leap on. They just are focused on right now, “I can benefit by cheating, by lying, by stealing, by not caring about others — that’s what’s beneficial for me now.” But that lacks foresight and an understanding of the interdependence of the world. After even one interaction, you may very quickly become interdependent on the person you could have helped. It’s a very shortsighted approach. What is good is good for you.

As a part of our series about cutting-edge technological breakthroughs, I had the pleasure of interviewing Anthony Capone.

Anthony Capone has served DocGo’s (Nasdaq: DCGO) executive team since 2017; previously as CTO and CPO, currently as president, and as of 1/1/23, DocGo’s CEO. His sterling record of entrepreneurial excellence includes leading three companies from start to successful exit. In addition to his roles at DocGo, Mr. Capone is a member of the Forbes Tech Council, writing on topics at the intersection of healthcare and AI.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit about you. Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?

Six or seven years ago, I’d just received a job offer from a multinational technology company and had only 24 hours to accept or reject the offer. At that time, there were two components I was searching for in the next part of my career. First was that I was able to help some portion of society in some way. And the second was that I would be intellectually stimulated the entire time. You’re lucky to have one of the two, but it’s very rare to have both.

I ran into Stan Vashovsky, DocGo’s CEO, and we struck up a conversation. He shared this idea he had to revolutionize the ambulance industry. I was fascinated. He told me if I was really interested in the company, I should fly to Los Angeles and see what was going on firsthand. So, only hours after meeting Stan, I was on a flight to LA.

When I got into that dispatch center, it was a wild scene. I sat down and I was like, “Yup, this is for me.” The benefits to society were obvious. The intellectual part — you’re solving a computer science problem, commonly referred to as the travelling salesman problem, which is one of the most elemental challenges you learn in computer science. It’s a resource allocation challenge. Every day, I’d get to solve one of the hardest problems in computer science to efficiently allocate resources.

I think I was in LA for less than 60 minutes before I called the other company and told them I didn’t want the offer. It was probably the best decision I’ve made in my entire life.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?

In the second year of the company, we switched nearly every single employee to a large bonus program. They were getting compensated not only for an hourly rate, but they were also receiving a very significant amount of compensation on a per-transport basis. Because of that, we had individuals that went from making minimum wage to making $60-$70+ thousand a year. And I remember one of them coming to speak with me.

He came in and said, “I’ve done it. I finally moved out of my parents’ house. I have my wife and my two kids, and we couldn’t afford our own place, so we had to live with my parents.” And he told me, “I didn’t feel like I could be a breadwinner, like I could support my family. Now I do. You gave me the ability to feel like I was valuable enough to warrant having a family.” He had tears in his eyes, tears of appreciation, it was a massively impactful event in my history here.

I’ve had that many times, and again, actually, just a week ago. I was riding the elevator and making conversation with a clinician, “Hey, how are you, what project are you working on, what are you up to?” And she goes, “Are you Anthony? Anthony Capone?” When I said yeah, and she asked if she could hug me.

She said, “I want to tell you thank you. This is the best job I’ve ever had in my entire life. I make more money than I ever have, plus I have a company that cares about me.” That was worth the world to me.

Can you tell us about the cutting-edge technological breakthroughs that you are working on? How do you think that will help people?

Remote patient monitoring (RPM), paired with DocGo On-Demand, truly reinvents the way that healthcare is thought about and delivered in America. We move from reactive situations being dealt with in expensive institutions to proactive situations within the comfort of the patient’s own home.

Everybody who is diabetic monitors their glucose, right? But having your glucose monitored and transmitted to a clinician who is looking at it in real-time can allow you to understand that maybe you have contraindications with some of your other medications and that those medications may need to be titrated relative to the trending analysis of your glucose levels. There’s a tremendous difference between monitoring your glucose and having a trained clinician look at it.

Today, we offer both ER readmission avoidance and RPM with a non-profit partner in Southern California. Because of our RPM and Treat On-Scene solutions, we reduced their year-over-year hospital readmissions rate by 20%.

How do you think this might change the world?

The largest portion of cost, and the area in which it is the most impactful to quality of life, is unnecessary hospitalizations. If we can only utilize hospitals when they’re needed and avoid them when they’re not, we can dramatically lower the cost of healthcare in the United States while also significantly improving health outcomes.

Keeping “Black Mirror” in mind, can you see any potential drawbacks of this technology that people should think more deeply about?

You cannot underestimate the importance of cyber security. Thankfully, I come from a computer science background and have a specialized view on the impact of technology and data. Information about the real-time vitals and real-time health of an individual has potential to be used for nefarious practices in the wrong hands.

Companies should be investing a considerable percentage of the income generated from these services into its cyber security practices. That’s why DocGo invests a significant sum into general cyber security practices and routine penetration testing. We also spent years obtaining our ISO 27001 certification to ensure that we’re held to the highest international security standards.

Was there a “tipping point” that led you to this breakthrough? Can you tell us that story?

DocGo is extraordinarily data-driven. After years of looking at our ambulance transportation data, it became obvious that a majority of the patients being transported could have been treated in their homes if there were better mechanisms to diagnose issues and provide on-site care. That motivated us to develop a solution that could safely and reliably keep people from escalating care due to acute decompensation.

RPM can help move people from a reactive health practice to a more proactive one. Part of the importance of integrating technology into the status quo of healthcare delivery is how significant these types of preventive measures can improve quality of life for patients.

What do you need to lead this technology to widespread adoption?

We need to educate the providers who are responsible for managing the patient population so that they understand this technology and its efficacy. Ideally, all patients will be enrolled and onboarded to these solutions through a trusted provider’s recommendation.

RPM technology can only be successful if a patient is also engaged in their own health strategy. We need to educate patients about the efficacy of RPM and giving both patient and provider real-time access to the data received by these devices. Education is the only path to widespread adoption.

What have you been doing to publicize this idea? Have you been using any innovative marketing strategies?

We partner with some of the largest sub-specialty organizations that manage polychronic patients. When someone can offer a solution that genuinely works for their patients, like the synergy we’ve found with our RPM and DocGo On-Demand mobile care, word spreads. Regarding innovative marketing, we’re focused on delivering a high quality, consistent care experience across all consumer touchpoints and producing positive results over and over and over again.

Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

Yes, Stan Vashovsky. I cannot overstate the importance of Stan in my life and the adventure I’ve been on with him in the last six or seven years. I’ve had the fortune of shadowing him, partnering with him and learning from him. I owe an enormous amount, all of my success, to Stan.

How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?

The two most important things at DocGo are to provide is high-quality healthcare for the underserved and to ensure that our employees are compensated relative to their enormous contribution to society. Every day, I try to use my skills and knowledge to further those two goals.

What is your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“What is good is good for you.”

That’s something that took me a long time to believe. It took me about five years to get out of my Ayn Rand phase in life and move towards realizing that actually what she said is true, you should always be selfish.

The reality is that what is best for other people is also in your best interest. That’s the connection that most people don’t take the leap on. They just are focused on right now, “I can benefit by cheating, by lying, by stealing, by not caring about others — that’s what’s beneficial for me now.” But that lacks foresight and an understanding of the interdependence of the world. After even one interaction, you may very quickly become interdependent on the person you could have helped. It’s a very shortsighted approach. What is good is good for you.

Understanding not only that we are truly nothing but products of our own circumstance, but that we have free will to control that circumstance, is a critical part of building habits that are beneficial to your life.

How can our readers follow you on social media?

I am active on LinkedIn and always happy to connect with new people.

Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.

The Future Is Now: Anthony Capone Of DocGo On How Their Technological Innovation Will Shake Up The… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Making Something From Nothing: Leigh Phillips On How To Go From Idea To Launch

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Get references and call them for all your vendors and employees. Our first manufacturer didn’t have the capabilities needed to ensure consistency and excellence in our first run. Our new co-packer came with so many recommendations we were confident when we updated our product and that’s certainly been the case.

As a part of our series called “Making Something From Nothing”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Leigh Phillips.

After careers spent in computer programming, math, law, and then management consulting, Leigh set out to build something of his own. He started NextDay, a company that believes life is for living, and creates easy-to-trust, easy-to-ingest products to help people feel great. Launched a month before the start of the pandemic, Leigh faced unique challenges on top of starting a business. Now, Leigh worked to make NextDay available anywhere in the US and in hundreds of locations around the country, as well as the UK, South Korea, and Dubai.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your “childhood backstory”?

I grew in Raleigh, NC where my family encouraged business and entrepreneurship. Although we lacked connections to the corporate world, I started my first business selling candy on the bus in 1st grade. I’d give a few free pieces to the 5th graders so no one would mess with me and made a profit reselling after buying in bulk from Sam’s Club. My parents pushed me to get my first job at age 8, when I started making custom cabinets. In high school, I thought I wanted to follow in my dad’s footsteps and do computer programming, so I worked at a company writing apps for the government in Java while my friends worked at grocery stores and ice cream shops. I stayed local for college at the University of North Carolina.

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

Le Petit Prince. While a children’s book, it doubles as a deep, meaningful book for adults that emphasizes the importance of friends and enjoying the time you have together. I always cherish the opportunity to connect with friends.

Surround yourself with great people. Doing it alone is really tough, you need mentors, advisors, and most importantly colleagues you can count on.

Find an idea that motivates you beyond money. Someone has likely thought about your idea before and maybe even tried it. Sometimes 100s of times. If success is mission driven it’s easier to win — for NextDay, I want to help people feel great so they can connect with friends (or however they choose to live their life).

Get feedback and adapt. No matter how many people tell you it’s a great idea, once you build it, you will need to change it.

Often when people think of a new idea, they dismiss it saying someone else must have thought of it before. How would you recommend that someone go about researching whether their idea has already been created?

No matter the idea, someone has probably already thought about it. When starting a company, you want to determine if there is room for your company in the market. You can be Pepsi to someone’s Coke even.

Try and assess whether you have the right market, the right product, and the right team. You really need two, and ideally three of these things.

For the market, I’d start by determining the size of the total addressable market and how fast it is growing. Is it attractive? Who are the key players (who make up 75%+ of the market)? Are they are consolidated (3–5 players) or fragmented)?

For product, does it solve the market need? Do you have the ability to “build a moat” around it? The moat doesn’t have to be patents or an invention, it could be great branding. Liquid Death didn’t invent the can or certainly water, but they are crushing the market with fantastic branding.

For team, do you have the right experience? Can you bring someone in that would add to your experience?

For the benefit of our readers, can you outline the steps one has to go through from when they think of the idea, until it finally lands in a customer’s hands? We’d love to hear about how to file a patent, how to source a good manufacturer, and how to find a retailer to distribute it.

Our product started with an idea — feel great after a night out in a simple, easy-to-drink format. We first researched what ingredients had scientific support for their efficacy. Then it required working with food scientists, identifying suppliers, ordering ingredients and cans, and having them delivered to a co-packer (manufacturer in our industry). Each step along the way, you need to talk to people and assess whether you think they have the experience you lack and are committed to delivering excellence. You may not get it right the first time, but it’s important to evaluate each partner along the way so you know if you need to replace them.

Once your product is created, finding retailers (and distributors to fill at the retailers) requires a lot of cold emails and phone calls. We had less of an opportunity to go in person because of the pandemic, but that’s become an option again, and one that we use. We lay out why our product solves a need their customers have, why it’s an attractive product for them to carry, and how our distribution partners can fill them.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Started Leading My Company” and why?

All co-founders need to be full time. When we started, I was full-time, but my co-founder still had a day job. There are not enough hours in the day to make that work, and we realized he was really more of an investor and advisor, and when he had the time to commit full time again, he is playing a co-founder role.
Test your product at the smallest possible size. We manufactured 20,000 cans to start because that was the first economically viable option. In hindsight we should’ve down 1,000 cans and gotten feedback. Even though selling the 1,000 cans wouldn’t have made money, we would’ve learned about some of the issues with our first product that we now have corrected.
Get references and call them for all your vendors and employees. Our first manufacturer didn’t have the capabilities needed to ensure consistency and excellence in our first run. Our new co-packer came with so many recommendations we were confident when we updated our product and that’s certainly been the case.
Distribution matters! When talking to stores, the first question we get is who distributes our product. By working with great distributors, we can get retail space.
The highs will be higher and the lows lower than you expect. When you are working for someone else, you can leave the work at the door (or maybe a bring some home) but you can stop it. When you are working on your own company, it never stops. Ever.

Let’s imagine that a reader reading this interview has an idea for a product that they would like to invent. What are the first few steps that you would recommend that they take?

Try and make the lowest cost prototype possible and get some people who are willing to give you honest feedback to try it.

There are many invention development consultants. Would you recommend that a person with a new idea hire such a consultant, or should they try to strike out on their own?

I’m biased towards striking out on your own. I’m sure they can help, and they probably have contacts that may help you (like distributors), but you are the person who will be most passionate and care about your invention. Find a cofounder that’s as passionate as you are instead.

What are your thoughts about bootstrapping vs looking for venture capital? What is the best way to decide if you should do either one?

If you can build a low-cost prototype, delaying as much as possible your raise is beneficial. When you have nothing and your valuation is low, money is most expensive. As your valuation grows, you can give away less to get more.

Ok. We are nearly done. Here are our final questions. How have you used your success to make the world a better place?

Through NextDay I want to help people feel great. I get texts all the time (often from distributors) about how the drink made them feel so much better. That makes me happy and want to keep pushing forward with growing the company and letting people know there is a way to feel great after a night out.

Spent an extra 5 minutes talking with friends and making new ones every single day.

Seth Goldman, the founder of Honest Tea and executive chairman of Beyond Meat. I think he’s done a really great job of creating products that are better for you / the environment and getting them into people’s hands to make their lives better.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

Making Something From Nothing: Leigh Phillips On How To Go From Idea To Launch was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Making Something From Nothing: Nevena Rousseva Of Ladies of Leisure On How To Go From Idea To…

Making Something From Nothing: Nevena Rousseva Of Ladies of Leisure On How To Go From Idea To Launch

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

I wish someone told me that selling wine online has so many fragmented regulations. I quickly found out that each state has their own rules and regulations and we had to find a compliance company to help us manage them.

As a part of our series called “Making Something From Nothing”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Nevena Rousseva.

Nevena is the founder of Ladies of Leisure, a direct-to-consumer lifestyle brand transforming wine into a form of emotional expression while delivering great tasting, high-quality wine in fun, vibrant packaging. It’s wine that looks good and tastes good. Nevena’s career started at a fast-growing fashion start-up where she managed operations and learned the ins and outs of starting and running a cult fashion brand. She then moved to a corporate setting where she managed accounts for national retailers. After getting her master’s degree in Sustainability Management from Columbia University, she worked for a digital platform focused on sustainable fashion lifestyle where she focused on branding, marketing and translating complex sustainability issues into customer friendly marketing and educational assets.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your “childhood backstory”?

I was born in Bulgaria and moved to the U.S. at the age of nine. Growing up my grandparents on both sides of my family had small vineyards in their backyards. Everyone back then made their own wine. Grape picking and wine-making was always a fun activity my parents, cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents would do as a family. We, the kids, would pick grapes and run around playing. We got to stomp grapes and later hear the adults congratulate themselves on a good harvest. It was always fun. When we came to the U.S., we moved to the East End of Long Island, which is one of New York’s wine making regions. The vineyards there are densely packed and make for a charming drive through the region. I grew up across the street from a vineyard.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“The only constant in life is change”. I try to always remember this and remind myself of it when a change that feels uncomfortable comes along. You either adapt or you waste time and energy trying to deny change, which never works and ends up holding you back. Things are always moving forward, even if it’s in ways you may not like. The key is learning to adapt and finding ways to thrive. In the end, that is a reflection of you. There was a big change that happened at my first job out of college that I was not prepared for. I thought things would never change and then they did. I wasn’t ready for it and struggled. It took some time but I adapted and from then on, when I feel a change coming, I go into adapt mode instead of deny mode.

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

I know this book can be somewhat controversial, but I loved and could not put down Atlas Shrugged. The breadth, depth and scope of the book took me by surprise as did the sexy and scandalous story between Dagny Taggard, Hank Rearden and John Galt. I loved the determination, the will and the focus the characters had. That book showed me that you can think really big. I also loved The Fountainhead, which I read after Atlas Shrugged. I loved Roark’s belief in his innovative architectural style and unwillingness to compromise and conform.

I think the way you bring an idea to life is through research and persistence. You have to research your idea to see if it’s viable, if it exists and if there is a place for it. Then, you have to research the market, who is out there, who you need to reach and who you need to contact to get your idea off the ground. Persistence is key, because all this takes time and effort to do. Developing the idea, the prototypes, the graphics, the pitch decks, the sketches, then contacting the people you believe would be interested, support you, help you — it all comes down to how persistent you are in doing these things to bring your idea to life.

It really depends on what the idea is, but the easiest way is by searching the internet and searching for different key terms and words that describe your idea. Search social media and search forums. If you have a revolutionary idea, you will want to search if it has been patented already. You can do that through the patent office’s website.

Once you have the idea, you have to present it to people. You have to create a minimal viable product to show what it can look like. You will have to do a marketing plan and a financial plan to figure out your costs and how much money you will need to bring the idea to life. If you don’t have the money, you will need to find someone to fund you, whether that’s friends and family, a bank, or an investor. You need to create a pitch deck that outlines the idea, the market, the customer, competition, financial forecasts and how much money you need. Once you secure the money, you have to find someone to make it for you.

If you want to patent your idea, then that’s a longer and more involved process. You have to find a good patent lawyer who will first do indepth research on whether your idea has been previously patented. You have to decide if you want a design patent or a utility patent. A design patent is just a patent on the design. A utility patent is a patent on the use of the product. A utility patent is better to get, but it’s also more costly and a longer process. Once the patent process starts, it can take months to years. You have to decide if you want to file nationally or internationally. I think it’s best to start nationally. The patent lawyer will write out the patent with your input. You have to also create drawings for the idea to include in your patent application. You will need to hire someone to do them if you can’t do them yourself. Once the patent is filed, you wait to hear from the patent office. They may challenge parts of your patent and you will have to explain and defend them. This can be a long back and forth process. While you are in the process of obtaining the patent, you can start to manufacture and sell your product with the label, “patent pending”.

Finding a good manufacturer can be tricky and you need to spend time researching them, talking to them, seeing what they have done and who they have worked with. You should have them make samples for you to see what their quality is like. Finding a retailer can be a similar process. You need to spend time researching the retailers you want to carry your product to understand how they select new products to carry. There is no set way of getting into a retailer. You really have to take time and research them to understand what their process is and even then, there is no guarantee they will choose to carry your products. There is always, of course, Amazon, but that comes with a whole set of different rules.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Started Leading My Company” and why?

I wish someone told me that it takes longer than you might think. When I started Ladies of Leisure I thought I would secure the legal documents needed faster than I actually did.
I wish someone told me that selling wine online has so many fragmented regulations. I quickly found out that each state has their own rules and regulations and we had to find a compliance company to help us manage them.
I wish someone told me that building a brand is not easy and takes time. Even though I kind of knew that, I didn’t know it until I started doing it from scratch. It takes a lot of time to get your brand in front of people.
I wish someone told me you have to work at your business everyday. It’s not easy coming home tired from your day job and having to work on your company, but it is necessary.
I wish someone told me that digital marketing can be frustrating. We did a campaign that we thought would work, but it didn’t. It felt disheartening not seeing the results you thought you would or feeling like you “don’t get the customer”, but we used it as a learning lesson.

Let’s imagine that a reader reading this interview has an idea for a product that they would like to invent. What are the first few steps that you would recommend that they take?

The main one is research. Research if the product is already out there and if it’s not, research if there is a need for it and if it would be a viable business. Then, try to make a prototype or a minimum viable product.

There are many invention development consultants. Would you recommend that a person with a new idea hire such a consultant, or should they try to strike out on their own?

I don’t think consultants are worth it. I think it’s better to do your own research. All the information is out there. I think it’s better to spend the money on creating a prototype.

What are your thoughts about bootstrapping vs looking for venture capital? What is the best way to decide if you should do either one?

I think bootstrapping is easier than finding a VC and depending on your idea, VCs may or may not be interested. Again, I think you need to research if there are VCs that invest in what you are trying to create. If there are, you need to pitch them and there are no guarantees. If you can bootstrap and create something that gains some traction, you then have a much better pitch for VCs or other sources of money.

Ok. We are nearly done. Here are our final questions. How have you used your success to make the world a better place?

At Ladies of Leisure, we donate a portion of each purchase to nonprofits. We have pre-selected three organizations across women’s rights, the environment and education. We let the customers choose where to send a portion of their purchase.

Well, there are three. Equality for women, education for everyone and protecting our planet and the environment which we need for our survival. That’s why at Ladies of Leisure, we donate to nonprofits in these three areas.

Sarah Blakely. I love how she took her idea for Spanks and built it into a billion dollar empire. It was an idea that people didn’t get at first.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.

Making Something From Nothing: Nevena Rousseva Of Ladies of Leisure On How To Go From Idea To… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Dave Bennett Of pCare On How To Use Digital Transformation To Take Your Company To The Next Level

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Select Use Cases to Start — When it comes to new digital solutions, it’s important to uncover quick wins that will generate revenue right away and provide a stronger ROI. Look for ways you can optimize your current financial models and consider where the strongest need is first.

As part of our series about “How To Use Digital Transformation To Take Your Company To The Next Level”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Dave Bennett, CEO of pCare.

Dave Bennett’s visionary approach to patient engagement, digital and mobile technologies, and IT integration ensures continuous innovation of the #1-KLAS ranked pCare platform and a company culture dedicated to delighting customers. Prior to joining pCare, Dave served in a variety of executive roles at ViiMed, GetWellNetwork and StayWell. Dave holds a CISM certificate from ISACA and is an active member of the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS), The American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA), Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA), and the American College of Healthcare Executives (ACHE).

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series. Before we dive in, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you got started?

My involvement in the business side of healthcare stems from witnessing my parents’ passion for their careers. My father was a businessman and operated various supermarkets in our area. My mother was a nurse, which immersed me in the world of healthcare from an early age.

After attending the Citidel and a few years in the army, I attended the Medical University of South Carolina and earned a master’s degree in Health Sciences. That was the true springboard to my career. I started out in molecular biology research and then transitioned into computer coding. A few years down the road, I turned toward the business side of healthcare. First, I worked in sales and marketing and then eventually became a chief technology officer, and now the chief executive officer of a healthcare technology company.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lessons or ‘take aways’ you learned from that?

Back in the early 1980s, I was just starting out on the business side of healthcare and was a sales representative for a biotech company. My job was selling to the research lab at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). I was excited about the opportunity, but I mistakenly made it all about me and the company. Instead of listening to a researcher’s needs, I was overly confident that I could explain to the researcher the wisdom of doing business with me. The truth? I was terrible. I didn’t sell a thing with this approach.

Luckily, I connected with a more experienced sales representative from another company, and he took me under his wing. At lunch one day he asked how everything was going, and I spilled my guts. I told him that I felt like I had to be the worst salesperson ever, to which he simply gave me the best advice. He told me to flip the script and make it about the prospective client instead of myself. He advised me to become well-versed in what these organizations were engaged in and how my company could help them reach their goals. It sounds so basic, but I really needed to hear it. Following his advice, I got the biggest sale of my career by reviewing a poster presentation on tumor necrosis. The researcher saw me and asked me what I thought. I don’t remember exactly what I said but it was enough to get me invited to his lab and introduced to his team, which led to a lot of new business.

At pCare, we’ve built our business by being patient-centric for over 70 years. This lesson I learned in the 80s was really the same thing — the importance of listening, of empathy, and putting the other person first.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?

That’s a great question as well as a difficult one for me to answer. There isn’t one person to attribute this to — it’s not a story of one particular person but a lifetime of chances from others. Over the course of my career, I’ve been blessed to be surrounded by various people who saw promise in me and decided to help, give advice, or mentor. What I’ve taken from each person is the need to pay it forward. I recognize and appreciate that others helped me, so I look for others who show promise and see how I can share advice or provide mentorship. Now, as a leader, I make it my mission to surround myself with diverse people, people who are smarter than me, and those who have the drive to succeed.

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

The Medic: The Miracle on Hacksaw Ridge. This qualifies as a book and also a film. It’s the story of Desmond Doss — a 7th Day Adventist who wanted to serve in the army despite being a conscientious objector and refusing to carry a gun. The military tried to transition him out of the service due to his conscientious objector status and he experienced little support in the platoon. He persevered though, because he felt he could still serve his country and fellow man as a medic. While at the bloody battle of Okinawa on Hacksaw Ridge, the U.S. troops were in retreat, yet Doss decided to stay behind. His choice to stay saved 78 men, for which he won the Medal of Honor. After the war, he went home, married his high school sweetheart, and lived a relatively quiet life.

What I take from this is the need to never give up in the face of adversity; to stick to your guns and do what you know to be the right thing no matter what. And do it humbly. I believe that doing the right thing is its own reward.

Extensive research suggests that “purpose-driven businesses” are more successful in many areas. When your company started, what was its vision, what was its purpose?

In today’s rapidly evolving healthcare landscape, our team at pCare seeks to lessen the daily challenges faced by healthcare professionals. Throughout hospitals and healthcare facilities, teams must deliver excellent care, provide top-tier patient experiences, ensure the latest technology, and keep staff safe, productive, and satisfied — all while maintaining profitability.

That’s why we listen to the needs of the industry and design our solutions to hardwire the quadruple aim: provide cost effective solutions while meeting the ever-changing demands of today’s healthcare consumers and recognize the operational realities managed daily. From the beginning, we’ve simply sought to improve patient outcomes and make the work of healthcare teams safer and more efficient. This has become even more of our focus throughout the pandemic. As teams and facilities are experiencing staff shortages and resource constraints, we continue to enhance our end-to-end stress-free Patient Engagement Ecosystem to further benefit the patient, staff, and facility.

Are you working on any new, exciting projects now? How do you think that might help people?

pCare is uniquely positioned to help our clients on both ends of the spectrum — on the hardware and software sides. While our Interactive Patient Care System, or IPS, has won the Best in KLAS award — for best software solution in the IPS category — we also provide a full-service solution. More and more, architectural firms are contacting us on the front-end and having pCare create Computer-Aided Design (CAD) plans to help design what the future hospital will include from the comprehensive audiovisual (AV) perspective.

Over the last few years, we’ve increased our efforts with architectural firms to develop hospitals of the future. Among others, these efforts have led to the innovative designs of the new MetroHealth Glick Center in Cleveland, OH and Hackensack University Medical Center’s Helena Theurer Pavilion in Hackensack, NJ. At the new Helena Theurer Pavilion, which is anticipated to open by year end 2022, each room is equipped with a 65” Smart TV running pCare’s Interactive Patient System, including a Digital Whiteboard displaying key patient and provider information, TV entertainment, Real Time Feedback, and Dietary Integration for Meal Ordering.

The patient engagement integration also includes a bedside tablet to navigate the system, Room Connect, the powerful smart display that shows key patient information at the entrance of their room, and VideoConnect, allowing for family video visits, consultations with doctors, and language interpretation. The Helena Theurer Pavilion additionally features pCare’s extended audiovisual services, including Physiological Boards to display vitals, Status Boards at the nurses station, and Full Conferencing and AV for the auditorium.

The new designs at the Helena Theurer Pavilion and the Glick Center are meant to enhance the patient experience in its smart technological design and support innovative and compassionate care to benefit their communities.

Thank you for all that. Let’s now turn to the main focus of our discussion about Digital Transformation. For the benefit of our readers, can you help explain what exactly Digital Transformation means? On a practical level what does it look like to engage in a Digital Transformation?

That’s a great question. The term digital transformation has turned into a bit of a buzzword, with a variety of different meanings ascribed to it. At the basic level, digital transformation means the process of implementing emerging digital technologies in order to modify a company’s essential operations, processes, and services.

When I think about the digital hospital of the future, I’m referring to digital transformation. It’s more than just using technology. It’s about new ways of delivering value, and that’s true of all digital transformations in any industry. For pCare, it’s about leveraging technology to streamline and improve care for all stakeholders. It extends from the ability to self-schedule appointments on the front end to using advanced analytics and Robotic Process Automation (RPA) to settle claims on the back end. In all industries, it’s not about removing the human component, but using technology at every step to optimize the experience for all parties. So, for example, a patient in a bed can use the TV remote control to manage the room lighting or temperature without requiring assistance from a nurse. Another example is when a nurse enters a patient room, the door sign surfaces critical patient information that will help staffers deliver better care to the patient. Again, it’s about new ways of providing value. It’s more than just using technology.

Which companies can most benefit from a Digital Transformation?

Digital transformation is something that all organizations and industries can benefit from. When companies consider undertaking this type of transformation, the primary drivers or considerations are cost and customer experience/expectations, both of which are only growing.

Despite inflation and the threat of a potential recession, companies are still experiencing the impact from the great resignation. While labor costs are ballooning, millions of jobs are still unfilled. Digital transformation holds the promise to re-engineer processes to automate jobs that are increasingly difficult for staff or non-value-added tasks. When compared, these are typically tasks that can be done cheaper, better, faster, i.e., with fewer errors through automation. This enables optimal deployment of a shrinking yet higher skilled labor force, digital natives with expectations that existing technologies will be utilized at their jobs. In most industries, the customer (or patient) is a significant part of the equation. We know that within the healthcare environment, one of the top priorities of the C-suite is addressing rising healthcare consumerism. Again, the demand is for the experience integrated with the latest/most remarkable technologies.

We’d love to hear about your experiences helping others with Digital Transformation. In your experience, how has Digital Transformation helped improve operations, processes and customer experiences? We’d love to hear some stories if possible.

From the start of the company, we’ve believed in the four Is: innovate, interact, integrate, and inclusive. This has led our team to work with a wide variety of healthcare organizations to help navigate their digital transformation. Our pCare Engagement Platform is comprised of a suite of applications designed to help healthcare teams seamlessly collaborate with patients and families across the care continuum. Built on an open architecture, we implement a scalable solution to fit into the healthcare environment. It’s designed to increase staff efficiency and benefit operations while improving patient outcomes and experience.

As we’ve worked with facilities to implement this technology, we’ve witnessed firsthand the value the system and overall transformation bring to the full care continuum. Our API integrates with the electronic health records (EHR), so the system can dispense educational videos to patients based on the reason they were admitted into the hospital. By gaining answers to learning verification questions, the nursing staff understand how best to educate patients on their care management. That’s one value aspect brought by the transformation: focused education. Of course, in terms of entertainment, there is TV programming. We also offer a package of on-demand, theatrical movie releases, relaxation videos, music and spiritual content, audiobooks, photo share, and host video calls with friends and families using the TV. Throughout these use cases, the patient has multiple options to decompress, relax, and learn during their stay to get them in a healing state of mind.

As it pertains to empowerment, a suite of integrations with Health Information Technology (HIT), such as facilities, communications, dietary, pharmacy, etc., allow the patient to manage non-clinical aspects of their admission. For example, the patient can change the room’s temperature, lower the lights, order a meal, and place a service request without needing facetime with a nurse. It gives the patient a sense of control in an unfamiliar environment and relieves the nursing staff from doing non-clinical tasks. To further benefit the nursing staff, we also offer a digital patient room whiteboard and digital door signs, which conveniently convey critical information to family and staff — such as daily schedules, precautions, patient repositioning, and the current care team. It also automatically updates the hospital IT systems without manual inputs from staff. It’s a great time saver for staff and gives peace of mind to patients and their loved ones.

Has integrating Digital Transformation been a challenging process for some companies? What are the challenges? How do you help resolve them?

Our technology allows an easy, cost-effective implementation process, but there can still be challenges around evaluating what technology is necessary (it can vary at every healthcare facility). To ensure the best success ahead of a digital transformation, evaluate who your patient or customer is, what they’re seeking, and how the available technology can best assist their care and experience as well as the overall impact on facility operations. Following those considerations, I advise any company considering a digital transformation to ensure that they have the right team in place to handle the transformation process. Your success will be that much more certain when you bring together clinicians, patient engagement and experience specialists, data analysts, technical developers, administrators, and representatives from the relevant departments to share their input. Each of these viewpoints are crucial and offer a different perspective.

Ok. Thank you. Here is the primary question of our discussion. Based on your experience and success, what are “Five Ways a Company Can Use Digital Transformation To Take It To The Next Level”? Please share a story or an example for each.

Understand Your Customers — This sounds obvious, but the key is to really focus on your customers. Get a better understanding of their demographics, why/what they’re seeking from your organization, their comfort level with different technologies, etc. Do you have a firm grasp of the customer journey and an understanding of what would best fit in or enhance the experience? For a healthcare organization, we recommend surveying patients or reaching out to a Patient and Family Advisory Council to get their input on what your patient community may be seeking. The information you collect can help you decide on the customer experience you want to initially implement.
Evaluate the Total Cost of Ownership — As with any significant venture, you want to conduct your due diligence. When looking to enhance the customer experience and implement a digital transformation, consider the software costs including implementation, monthly SaaS charges, and any integration fees. In hospitals, there are also technology costs to consider including telecommunication upgrades and new hardware such as webcams or tablets. Finally, there are the staffing impacts including the clinical staff that you will want to interact with patients on the new platform and the support staff needed to ensure the system is available when you need it. It’s important to consider each aspect in your decision.
Select Use Cases to Start — When it comes to new digital solutions, it’s important to uncover quick wins that will generate revenue right away and provide a stronger ROI. Look for ways you can optimize your current financial models and consider where the strongest need is first.
Get the Right Team in Place — Collaboration drives the optimal experience for all stakeholders. Your success will be that much more certain when you bring together the right team. For healthcare facilities, that can be clinicians, patient engagement and experience specialists, data analysts, various department heads, and technical developers to share their input on what they need for success. Furthermore, a strong project manager to drive the initiative forward can ensure all parties continue to work toward the shared goal of improved customer/patient journey and engagement.
Choose a Technology Partner that Adapts to Your Needs — Being trapped in a one-size-fits-all solution will only frustrate your IT and clinical staff and hurt engagement. Don’t waste time trying to adjust your workflows to technology — choose a technical solution that adjusts with you. Look for a strategic partner that can support multiple modalities so you can engage customers where they are and how they want to be involved. You want to be sure the technology is flexible so you can adapt your model and scale from simple to complex. A good rule of thumb is to ask about their open APIs to ensure you will be able to embed care and support across all customer touchpoints. And finally, make sure you are not opening the door to a future competitor who may try to drive customers to their own providers.
As a bonus: Plan to Measure the Results — Plan to measure the results of your digital solution to determine where you can adjust to better meet the needs of your staff and customers/patients. In the healthcare industry, decide what provider utilization metrics you need to monitor to evaluate if you have the right mix of clinicians and support staff available and whether they are using their time efficiently.

Started before the pandemic and validated over the past 2.5 years, the six steps outlined above provide a solid framework for implementing new digital solutions that deliver the optimal experience to customers while supporting efficiency and satisfaction. Additionally, when done right, you are also future-proofing your solution by allowing it to both scale and flex to emerging technologies.

In your opinion, how can companies best create a “culture of innovation” in order to create new competitive advantages?

The best way to create a culture of innovation is to first create a culture of collaboration. It’s important to remember that no one has all the answers, and it’s helpful to bring in various points of view and perspectives. Then, listen. This leads to new ideas.

As a vendor in healthcare, the only way to succeed is to tap your customers and hear their perspectives and needs — and then leverage the knowledge to benefit them. If you want to know what is happening on the front lines with clinicians and patients, you have to let the people you want to serve help you define their needs and opportunities. By identifying the problems, you can create and validate your solutions. You cannot innovate without collaboration.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“Everything is possible.” If you work hard and focus, success is out there for anybody. This is the lesson I took from Desmond Doss in Hacksaw Ridge. It’s why I’ve been able to do a variety of things from molecular biology to sales, from coder to marketing to CEO. If you put in the time and effort and truly focus on your passion, you really can achieve so much — almost anything — from a personal goal like running a marathon to profession goals like running a company. If you are open to learn and open to the effort; willing to try, willing to work, willing to fail, and willing to persevere, you can do anything.

How can our readers further follow your work?

Yes, readers can learn more about our work at pcare.com. They can also follow along with our technology on Twitter (@pCarebyTVRC) and LinkedIn.

Thank you so much for sharing these important insights. We wish you continued success and good health!

Dave Bennett Of pCare On How To Use Digital Transformation To Take Your Company To The Next Level was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Thomas Taylor Of E-Sign On How To Use Digital Transformation To Take Your Company To The Next Level

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Business survival — digital transformation can future proof your business. During COVID and beyond, strikes and postal services have been affected. By helping numerous healthcare providers provide contactless prescriptions and consultations, our technology has allowed vulnerable people to access the medicine they need.

As part of our series about “How To Use Digital Transformation To Take Your Company To The Next Level”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Thomas Taylor.

Thomas Taylor, Founder & Managing Director of electronic signature company E-Sign. He is an expert in digital identities, digital transformation, sustainability, security, eID and citizen services via government access. Thomas had led many digital transformation projects, including, most recently for the Palestinian Ministry of Telecommunications and IT to play a key role in the project to shape the Palestinian digital economy.

I took my Bachelors of Mechanical Engineering and Manufacturing at Liverpool John Moores University, before designing and creating electronic submersible pumps for oil reservoirs, so my background is in engineering. Most of my jobs have been about problem solving and making something better. Whilst I was in the fire service working as a firefighter, I saw the inefficiencies with paper-based document processes and came up with the idea for my business and developed it from there. E-Sign is now 10 years old.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lessons or ‘take aways’ you learned from that?

When we first pushed the platform live in the early days, I was doing some maintenance in the background on the SQL database, the raw brain, heart and soul of any platform. Usually there is a management interface over it so you can’t break the SQL, but in my enthusiasm to make changes, I overrode it and went straight into the database. I made a slip of the finger and I highlighted and hit the spacebar in a filename, which created a white space — an invisible character — in the code. The whole system went down. The developers worked around the clock for three days to try and find the error and an invisible character is hard to find! The valuable lesson I learned from this is patience — do not rush into doing things, especially where large data sets are involved when you’re not aware of the ramifications. Doing things quickly can easily lead to making mistakes. I’m aware of the huge responsibility now that our customers place in us to handle their data with the highest levels of security. And indeed, as the business has grown, we cannot afford to make any mistakes or have any downtime — our clients — who range from hospitals, universities and public sector organisations — don’t have downtime. We can’t be offline.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?

When I started E-Sign, I didn’t have a lot of confidence in business. Rich Dad (entrepreneur Robert Kiyosaki) explains how, depending on how you make your living, you belong to one four quadrants labeled with a letter: E, S, B and I. On the left-hand side of the plus sign are the E and S quadrants. The E stands for “employee” and the S for “small business or self-employed.” All my life I was an employee and never felt like a Director or a decision maker. I was very inexperienced, but I was lucky to be living in a city where there were incubators and places to help. One day, I

googled “help with starting up a business in Liverpool” and two people — Pacific Stream and Ray Haigh and Roy Jones came up. I contacted them and, to this day, I believe they were instrumental in helping me start this business. Ray did my financials and told me how to conduct myself and Roy helped me to write a business plan and guided me through everything and gave me a place to work. We started at Elevator Studios then moved on to Basecamp in Baltic Creative. They had a network of MSIF finance connections and other people in other universities that were helping nurture startups at that time. E-Sign is a product of all that. This has reaffirmed my desire to base the business in Liverpool and give back as much as we can to the local community. With that in mind, all our staff members commit two days / year of voluntary service to charities, we sponsor community rugby and football teams and we donated iPads during Lockdown to local schools.

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

I can recommend lots of really good books! I’m a really big fan of the For Dummies range, for example Marketing for Dummies. When you’re starting out, those books are brilliant as references. Our product was ahead of its time in terms of QR code technology, but one book that really helped me to understand the market and the requirement for what we were building was called Consumption Economics by J.B. Wood. Trailblazers by Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce (whose dad ran a business out of the back of a Volvo estate car) helped us develop our Business Value Map process which is the framework for the whole business infrastructure. We often work with customers who ask us for one thing or think they need a certain solution — but they need something else. Our process helps us (and the customer) to understand what is really going on and spec out the requirements. My favourite book that really helped develop our product is Don’t make me think by Steve Krug and Rocket Surgery Made Easy by the same author is pretty good as well.

Extensive research suggests that “purpose-driven businesses” are more successful in many areas. When your company started, what was its vision, what was its purpose?

The business was inspired by the idea that there had to be a better solution for securely signing documents that was easier than paper flying around or waiting for a letter or important document to come to you in the postal service.

I’d had things go missing in the past, like finance documents or contracts that were time sensitive and critical. I thought to myself “there’s got to be a simpler way”. The idea was a digital solution that would replace what was a centuries old process — the postal service.

Watching Liverpool’s redevelopment and improvement over the years and its improvement influenced me — I thought “we can make things better”. When I was a kid, my dad worked for Royal Mail and I saw the struggles with that. I probably picked up on the frustrations. I worked for many years in the fire service and public sector, so I had a deep understanding of the challenges with inefficiencies of paper-based processes. The fire service also instilled a great sense of discipline — we always had to leave everything in a better condition than we found it — even after the worst fires we would clean the station so much you could eat your dinner off it — everything would also be pristine and perfect!

I have three sons and I always tell them to leave things in a better state than they find it. This is becoming increasingly important as the effects of Climate Change show, and I’m proud that E-Sign gives businesses a demonstrably sustainable solution.

Are you working on any new, exciting projects now? How do you think that might help people?

We are working on digital transformation and citizen services for international governments in places like Ireland, the Middle East and the UK. A lot of governments and large enterprises have reached a similar point in their digital transformation journey where they need a higher assurance level on security and accountability.

An example of this is a project that we are delivering in Palestine for the Palestinian Ministry of Telecommunications and IT to play a key role in the Digital West Bank project to shape the Palestinian digital economy. Funded by the World Bank, it will give Palestinian citizens sound digital infrastructure and access to digital services; as well as address education, health, agriculture and governmental services. Ultimately, this will enable the creation of a strong digital economy, contribute to reduction of poverty and the improvement of everyday life for Palestinians.

The other side of this is citizen empowerment; we’re empowering people to have direct control over their digital identity and use only select identifying data to access their services. We are creating the secure infrastructure to do that in many places across the world.

We’re also working on some high security projects in the UK that protect national infrastructure, as well as helping organisations to expand their digital journey and put more accountability on employees so that any documents can be traced and tracked.

We often hear the words ‘digital transformation’ and think of this massive journey or organizational change. This isn’t the case. In its simplest form, digital transformation means taking a process in your business and using technology (often in the form of software, or complemented with a software) to improve that process with increased efficiency.

With E-Sign for example, we use our software to implement digital document management and esignatures. This can be a small process where a private landlord sends out tenancy agreements electronically and only needs to do this once or twice a year, or it can be for a global organisation that is digitising its document management processes at multiple locations, spanning thousands of documents. But the outcomes (both large or small) are the same… Improved customer experience, reduced costs and almost instantaneous transaction completion.

We have in-house digital transformation experts that map out client requirements and accompany them through the entire journey to ensure its success.

Which companies can most benefit from a Digital Transformation?

We benefit every business and industry that is typing or writing or using documents or transactions that need accountability and security — which is every company and every industry! We help to digitise this approach and then we enable customers to build an ecosystem that will complement and work alongside their other digital services.

Additionally, since legal frameworks have changed, nearly every government recognised that they need to accommodate digital transformation and write it into their digital frameworks

We have so many stories, but here are a select few that we’re proud of:

We helped a nationwide pharmacy digitise prescriptions for clinically vulnerable people who can’t leave their houses, enabling them to access their medications.

We helped a global engineering brand with their long-term UK infrastructure for sustainable energy — giving them full control over their supply chain, due diligence and maintaining security and audit trail.

We helped the National Clinical Homecare Association (NCHA) adopt a digital approach to prescription processing, giving operational advantages, regulatory compliance, and improvements to patient safety. Prescription process time was reduced from two days to two hours (80% reduction) as well as:

9,172kg CO2 equivalent reduction over 12 months (inclusive of paper, envelopes).
£95,324.44 annual savings from kWh reduction (based on mailing).
510 trees can work on reducing carbon dioxide emissions from other sources.
Qualitatively, staff reported an improved audit log and reduction in delays due to multiple staff being assigned to prescriptions in case of absence.

One of the UK’s top universities now uses us to globally deliver documentation and the infrastructure platform to provide e-service and eConsent for clinical trials online for diseases such as covid-19 and Monkeypox.

Has integrating Digital Transformation been a challenging process for some companies? What are the challenges? How do you help resolve them?

The biggest blocker is if a company has grumblings and resistance to digital transformation internally, as well as interdepartmental communication issues / the presence of silos. We go in and break down the barriers, hand holding through the process to make sure that all departments are on the same page.

The other one is a lack of understanding of regulations within their industries — we have to educate them. This means having to be on the ball about every aspect of our industry and constantly researching changing regulatory requirements. I sit on eIDAS platforms and work with decision makers in legal frameworks to keep up to date with them — they change as quickly as software develops.

Ok. Thank you. Here is the primary question of our discussion. Based on your experience and success, what are “Five Ways a Company Can Use Digital Transformation To Take It To The Next Level”?

It will always reduce your costs — if you invest the time (mostly time, even more so than money) and implement a digital service properly and effectively then you’re automatically going to win on costs. Recent research we have conducted with Liverpool John Moores University, shows that medium-sized law firms would save approximately £400,000 annually by reduced printing costs, completing administrative tasks quicker and minimising storage costs for paper documents.
Instantly improves your customer experience — a customer only needs to click something as opposed to print and scan and send back. People don’t have much patience these days — they want the path of least resistance. Keeping your customers happy means retention. A client of ours who provides security locks for high end apartments in London gave us feedback that their end customers were much happier with their service once digitisation of documentation was adopted.
Business survival — digital transformation can future proof your business. During COVID and beyond, strikes and postal services have been affected. By helping numerous healthcare providers provide contactless prescriptions and consultations, our technology has allowed vulnerable people to access the medicine they need.
Verification — our secure technology can instantly verify someone and ensure there are no safeguarding issues, for example for candidate vetting selection during an HR process.
Industry compliance — when GDPR hit, we were inundated because businesses realised that you had to comply with data processing standards and stay on the right side of it. Our secure software enables our clients to be compliant and accredited with standards such as ISO9001, often a requirement of tenders and procurement.

I’ll give you a bonus number 6! Sustainability. By adopting digital signatures, each day less and less trees are getting cut down for paper and there are less wagons on the road. We have a carbon counter that enables our clients to see how much carbon they are saving by adopting E-Sign. Sustainability is key for all companies now — whether in making net zero targets, or attracting younger staff members, or winning new business.

In your opinion, how can companies best create a “culture of innovation” in order to create new competitive advantages?

Not being afraid to embrace change. We have weekly roundtables with both our teams in Liverpool and the Isle of Man, where we all proactively come up with ideas to take the business forward.

Surround yourself by people who are brighter than you. Have respect and neutrality in your workspace that allows people to communicate and speak up when they think about a good idea. We give people responsibility, we allow everyone to take part.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

One of my favourite sayings is by the TV presenter Jake Humphrey, who said “never sit in the comfy chair” — try and push yourself to do different things. Don’t be lazy. I’m always telling my sons not to get complacent.

How can our readers further follow your work?

By following:

https://www.e-sign.co.uk/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/e-sign/

https://twitter.com/eSignHQ

https://www.instagram.com/esign_uk/

Thank you so much for sharing these important insights. We wish you continued success and good health!

Thomas Taylor Of E-Sign On How To Use Digital Transformation To Take Your Company To The Next Level was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Andrew Marotta Of SmartBear On 5 Ways To Create a Wow! Customer Experience

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Fail fast and iterate faster: Not every idea is a winner, and that’s OK. More often than not, I learn more from my failures than my successes. As cliche as it may sound, brushing off failures and rising up to try again is the hallmark of a great marketer. It’s okay to fail as long as you brush off your shoulder and spring back into action to iterate, iterate, and iterate again until you land on a winning solution. It is equally important that on your climb to the top of the mountain, you celebrate the small wins and give yourself the recognition and self-praise needed to persevere forward.

As part of our series about the five things a business should do to create a Wow! customer experience, I had the pleasure of interviewing Andrew Marotta.

Andrew Marotta is Growth Marketing Manager at SmartBear, a leading provider of software development and visibility tools. Since joining the company in 2020, Andrew has changed the game for SmartBear’s self-service go-to-market motion, implementing best-in-class marketing strategies using complex tools and programs to grow various e-commerce businesses. Andrew has also made improvements to his products’ lead flow that has led to an improvement in sales qualified leads by 7% YoY. Based on his accomplishments, he was recently nominated for a BostInno Under 25 Award. Previously, Andrew held marketing operations roles at Sovos and Bullhorn. He has a bachelor’s degree in big data and business analytics and master’s degree in management and organizational leadership from Suffolk University.

Thank you so much for joining us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you got started?

I fell into the world of marketing entirely by accident, but I sure am glad I did. If you asked me five years ago what I thought I would be doing today, I probably would have said, “I want to be a financial analyst at a mutual fund company,” and described myself with any adjective other than creative. At that time, I saw the idea of work in true black and white and thought of that as my only roadmap. Boy, was I wrong, and thank goodness for that. I was first exposed to marketing in a marketing operations role, which entirely changed my outlook for the better and quickly debunked the false narrative that marketing is only for the creatives in advertising.

In my senior year of college, I realized the days of sitting in class would be coming to an end, and I needed to start planning what I wanted to do next. With little sense of direction for what I felt my calling would be, I made a list of things I know I like to do and my strengths, and I realized I thrive in situations that rely on data analysis, deductive reasoning, and strategic problem-solving. Hours of scrolling through LinkedIn and Indeed later, I arrived on a listing for a marketing operations role, a business function I had never heard of before. Fate struck when I decided to review the role, the only marketing role I had even considered in the swatch of what I believed would be my calling as a financial analyst, and I was instantly lured in with the job description. My naive assumption that all marketing roles were straight out of a scene of “Mad Men” had been disproved. For the first time, I realized there is an entire world of marketing where I can flex my analytical muscles and grow in the greenspace of opportunity far beyond the bounds of work as a financial analyst. I found myself quickly re-wiring, observing the gray space that is “Marketing” as I started my first role at Bullhorn in Boston and instantly knew I had landed in a career where I was meant to be. The everchanging terrain of the marketing world is what fills me with excitement every day and challenges me to seek out new and innovative ways to deliver value to our customers.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lessons or ‘take aways’ you learned from that?

If there is one thing SmartBear loves, it’s webinars. Putting together webinars is no slight task and becomes a rather grandiose production from generating titles and abstracts, to putting promotional content and graphics live to orchestrating the involvement of product marketing and solution engineers as keynote speakers. Rarely, if ever, do things go according to plan or 100% perfect every time, but the audience never knows and the show always carries on. However, I found myself in quite a tricky situation in my early days at SmartBear where in my haste to get a webinar program promoted and live, I forgot to ensure my product marketing counterpart was available to join the session and kick off the presentation. Showtime crept in, and I realized it was too late to draft my colleague and that I would have to run the introduction as best I could before handing the reigns over to the solution engineer running the product demo. Fortunately, the content I would be delivering was very high level, introducing who SmartBear is and how we meet the needs of developers across the software development lifecycle. In hindsight, the five minutes of improv I had thrown myself into were indistinguishable for the usual routine my counterpart would have done, but I have never let go of that mistake and have learned from it to double and triple check before every campaign that all contributors are accounted for and aligned on expectations so I never resort to that last minute panic again.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?

Arielle Daigle, my boss and Senior Director of Growth Marketing at SmartBear, has been my biggest, unwavering supporter, and I would not be where I am without her. Her guidance, compassion, and support have built the foundation of my career, and I cannot thank her enough or express enough gratitude. She embodies what it truly means to be a leader, a coach, a mentor, and a friend. Arielle is the most ideal role model for how to command respect, lead with confidence, and build team comradery. I am so fortunate to have been a student to her incredible tutelage and relentless support on my quest to become an expert in customer experience and product led-growth. From day one, she has worked tirelessly to move mountains to challenge my growth and ensure I am given visibility. As I progress in my career, I aspire to become even a fraction of the incredible leader and person that she is.

I would be remiss to not also praise Ariel Harrington, Director of Product Marketing at SmartBear, who has been my right-hand woman every step of the way. Ariel has never failed to prioritize my growth by including me in a wide array of projects that few people early in their career would have the opportunity to take part in otherwise. From launching new products to crafting dynamic, persona-based messaging, Ariel has been one of the best teachers that I have the privilege to work with. Ariel’s commitment to delivering timely and effective go-to-market programs has imprinted on me and inspires me to go deeper and be more strategic in every initiative.

Customer experience is everything! If nothing else, a business exists to enrich the lives of its customers, so why wouldn’t an incredible customer experience be the cornerstone of its values? When I think of a great customer experience, I think of empathy and how I can best put myself in the shoes of our end-users. I ask myself questions like, “Does this program make sense for where the user is in their journey?” and “Does my message convey excitement or provide enrichment?” Failing to employ empathy at every step of the journey is a risk marketers cannot afford. In my experience, meeting users where they are has led to the greatest success in scaling our user base, creating brand-advocate power-users, and promoting a supporting onboarding to adoption journey.

It is very unfortunate that customer experience is often the first line item to be cut when organizations are focused on hyper-growth. Where many organizations fail to insulate themselves from vulnerability is the inattention to storyboarding an ideal customer journey that focuses on the creation, delivery, and protection of value. When organizations become too obsessed with growth without acknowledgment of what is required to excite, educate, and empower users, customers will inevitably churn out of frustration or inability to grasp the full value of the product. Organizations that fail to prioritize customer experience are caught in a recurring loop of new user acquisition and failed retention. By focusing on what is required to deliver excellent onboarding guides, nurture programs, and adoption support, organizations are chartering a path toward true hyper-growth by building brand advocates and power users who are likely to evangelize the product and be cross-sold into the rest of the company’s portfolio of offering.

Absolutely! I have learned more from our competitors than I have ever expected to. I think the cliche of, “competitors are out to get you,” could not be any more untrue. I have been extremely fortunate in building working relationships with many of my counterparts at competitor companies where we have been able to exchange ideas and share our own approaches to the same challenges. At the end of the day, we are all chasing the same target but with a different set of tools. Why not learn from each other? It is my colleagues working for competitors who inspire me to bring my A-game each day and to never stop tinkering with new innovative ways to delight customers.

Can you share with us a story from your experience about a customer who was “Wowed” by the experience you provided?

The best anecdotes of successful customer experience have been shared with me directly from our solutions engineering team who spend extensive time with new customers onboarding tools into their tech stack. A large part of this past year has been dedicated to ramping up the use and deployment of in-app messaging to create bespoken paths of feature adoption and onboarding support for both new and existing customers. The primary goal of this program was to help shore up time for our solution engineers by empowering users with self-service learning where they experience gradual onboarding as they navigate through the product layer by layer. The hallmark success of this program proved itself in the feedback from our solution engineers stating that the quality and level of onboarding support required in their weekly sessions had elevated beyond the introductory, “How to set up X,” and “Where to view Y,” which had grown to be tiresome, and other rudimentary topics. With a plethora of new in-app onboarding guides, the volume of human-to-human onboarding sessions decreased dramatically as more users were enabled with independent in-product learning resources. Additionally, our solution engineers provided incredible feedback that the human-to-human onboarding sessions that remained have elevated to higher level discussions inquiring guidance for more advanced features that users previously rarely discovered.

Did that Wow! experience have any long-term ripple effects? Can you share the story?

Our in-app messaging strategy is one that I am constantly refining, tweaking, and optimizing to ensure we are delivering the right message to the right user at the right time in the right area of the product to maximize their consumption. As such, the most impactful measure of success I rely on is measuring the rolling time-to-value of the 10 core features our product team has defined as flagship features that indicate a sticky user. Through ample trials and tribulations of short copy versus long copy, video pop-ups, in-app knowledge centers, retargeting guides, tool tip highlights, and training certification courses, we have successfully moved the needle to a 20% increase in time-to-value for new customers adopting core features in their first 90 days of product onboarding.

Trust the data: Data is your best friend whether you are starting from scratch building onboarding guides and adoption programs, or looking to identify areas of optimization to accelerate customer experiences. Trust the data to validate your assumptions and avoid shooting in the dark when it comes to understanding what your customers need. Understanding where customers are gravitating in the product and where they are falling off is crucial information to understanding where you can add value via in-app messaging, email nurtures, or other engagement programs.
Inquire users for feedback: The best marketers are those who lead with curiosity, empathy, and a desire to be effective stewards to users. When possible, engage your users for anecdotal feedback or what they are enjoying in the product and where they would like to see improvement to better uncover the full value of your offerings. No matter how amazing, innovative, or shiny a new idea may be, it is only as valuable as its reception and impact on the user-base. Marketers who are stewards with profound understanding of the wants and needs of their users are best equipped for delivering long-lasting customer experiences that delight.
Foster cross-functional relationships: Marketing can lead the charge in customer experience, but at the end of the day, the initiative involves much more than Marketing and requires active participation from Sales, Product, Engineering, and many others. Establishing dialogue with each cross-functional team is so important to setting yourself up for success. No matter how well-versed you are with your product offering or how many years of experience you have in Marketing, establishing collaborative relationships with your cross-functional counterparts is necessary. Without a doubt, your peers likely have their own lens on how to deliver excellent customer experiences; leverage them for insights into how you can bring their ideas to life.
Take the risk and experiment: The job of a customer experience architect is never over. Now, that may sound daunting to some, however, that elates me beyond words. The challenge is never over and no solution is viable forever. Being comfortable with the uncomfortable is so important to being a successful marketer. A willingness to take on risk and appetite for ambiguity is the best way to grow and uncover new ways to accelerate customer onboarding and retention. The approach I default to is, “Yes, this is great, but how can I make this better for tomorrow, for next week, for next month….” Push yourself to your limits; you will be surprised where you end up and proud of the work preceding you.
Fail fast and iterate faster: Not every idea is a winner, and that’s OK. More often than not, I learn more from my failures than my successes. As cliche as it may sound, brushing off failures and rising up to try again is the hallmark of a great marketer. It’s okay to fail as long as you brush off your shoulder and spring back into action to iterate, iterate, and iterate again until you land on a winning solution. It is equally important that on your climb to the top of the mountain, you celebrate the small wins and give yourself the recognition and self-praise needed to persevere forward.

Are there a few things that can be done so that when a customer or client has a Wow! experience, they inspire others to reach out to you as well?

Transcribing customer success stories into “customer spotlight” stories has been an incredibly successful and impact program that SmartBear runs on a quarterly basis where we highlight the triumphs of various customers through webinars. During these segments, our customers own the conversation where they share how they were introduced to the product, how their onboarding journey faired, and how they knew they found a match with SmartBear. The customer spotlights have been by far one of the most effective ways for my team to broadcast not only the success of our customer experience-driven marketing but the very real value we are bringing to market. After each quarter’s customer spotlight, like clockwork, we get unsolicited requests from other customers eager to share their incredible journey which truly validates how solid our customer experiences are that our customers are eager to share, unprompted, their stories with other customers and prospective buyers.

As a career-learner who spends most week nights and weekends taking any and every course and certification I can find, I am a huge advocate of academic growth. I strongly believe in the democratization of learning and ensuring knowledge bases are within reach to anyone seeking resources. Fostering shared learning and providing a platform for other career-learners to teach-back, exchange ideas, and find psychological safety in their environment are incredibly valuable characteristics of successful organizations. My late-stage career goal is to become an adjunct professor to continue my love of learning as well as helping others to reach their highest level of performance. If I can impart any wisdom: never stop being curious and inquisitive, the best ideas come from a mind that never rests, and the lessons you will uncover along the way will shape your career in ways you would never expect. I would love to start a movement where many others have access to life-long learning.

How can our readers follow you on social media?

https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-marotta/

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Andrew Marotta Of SmartBear On 5 Ways To Create a Wow! Customer Experience was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Venk Korla Of HGS On 5 Ways To Create a Wow! Customer Experience

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Fine-tune customer experiences based on segmented customer needs: Improve loyalty and brand relationships via personalized customer journeys based on segmentation and prediction models. Lead from a place of empathy. Truly understand your customers and the moments that they are in. If I book an airline ticket, I don’t want to open the app and see a generic ad to buy another plane ticket, I want to see an ad for a hotel in the place I am flying to.

As part of our series about the Five things a business should do to create a Wow! customer experience, I had the pleasure of interviewing Venk Korla.

Venk Korla is President & CEO of HGS, a global leader in the customer experience (CX) lifecycle, digital transformation, and business process management. A visionary entrepreneur and technologist, Venk has a proven record of delivering outstanding shareholder returns through innovative growth strategies and strong execution. Before joining HGS, Venk was Founder & CEO of Element Solutions and also served as Director of Software Engineering for Rush University Medical Center in Chicago.

Thank you so much for joining us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you got started?

I went to engineering school in India and started my first company in the technology space doing electronics work when I was 19 years old. I built that up and sold it, then started another company selling computer parts. After school, I transitioned to the U.S. in the early 2000s and started consulting for an e-commerce company. After a couple of different entrepreneurial ventures, I realized that online digital experiences were calling my name. Focusing on the online experience was relatively new, so I really leaned into the solutions and offerings that would shape a better experience for retailers and even the healthcare space. My consulting company was ultimately sold to HGS and that’s what brought me here today.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lessons or ‘take aways’ you learned from that?

Back in the day when projectors were still a thing, I showed up to a presentation, ready to give it my all. We wanted to essentially hold a live whiteboarding session at a small Chicago hospital, so to better control the light from the projector, I taped a small journal to the light not knowing that it would begin to smoke within twenty minutes. Luckily, no fire broke out and I can say that we got the deal as a result of our quick thinking. Or maybe it was because we didn’t let our mistakes define us and we kept rolling under pressure. This helped me learn two foundational things that are pertinent to technology: always be agile, and always be ready to adapt. In the technology space, this is particularly helpful.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?

There are multiple people that have helped shaped my career, but early on in my career, when I first came to the U.S., there was a man that helped me through a particularly rough patch in which I was contemplating quitting because I was feeling so overwhelmed and not getting enough recognition. He told me to take the responsibility as a challenge and that the rewards will indeed come later.

Exceptional customer service and a great customer experience are essential for business success as customers increasingly demand greater speed, service, and convenience and have a wider array of options to choose from in today’s competitive marketplace. Companies should focus their efforts on providing better, more personalized CX at every phase of the customer journey — from attraction to retention and even attrition — to differentiate themselves from competitors.

A positive customer experience creates a vital relationship between the customer and the brand that ultimately boosts brand loyalty and trust, reduces customer attrition, creates happy customers who advocate for the brand, and increases overall revenue.

The disconnect between understanding the importance of a good customer experience and effectively making it a priority often lies in activation and how to employ the necessary steps to provide a positive experience from awareness to purchase and beyond. Technology plays a key role in creating a great customer experience each time a customer interacts with a brand. This can include simple tools such as the use of dedicated landing pages and customized emails, as well as more complex CX technologies like intelligent chatbots and AI-based algorithms that can help companies understand customer preferences.

As companies work to improve their customer care and experience solutions, it’s more important than ever that they respect and value their customers’ time. In the world of CX, every second counts. As organizations work to make their customer service more efficient, many have deployed AI-driven chatbots and are working to strike the right machine-human balance. Not only can chatbots dramatically shorten wait times and expediently route customers where they need to go, they can reduce the time and workload burden for human employees and free them up to handle more complex interactions.

Companies need to further understand that customer experience impacts the way they make buying decisions, creating a greater need for companies to focus on providing more than just a high-quality product or service, and consider the customer experience at every touchpoint with their brand.

Yes, more competition forces companies to improve the customer experiences they offer because the best experiences consumers have with one brand quickly become the de facto new expectation for customer experiences with every brand. For example, each time Netflix personalizes the selection of content and makes the experience a little easier, or Amazon personalizes product recommendations to make shopping a little quicker, the bar on customer expectations across the board rises.

General advancements in technology create another external pressure for companies to improve the customer experience. As customer expectations increase around personalization and providing a tailored customer experience, business marketing strategies seek to keep up with technological advancements to accomplish this.

Can you share with us a story from your experience about a customer who was “Wowed” by the experience you provided?

HGS manages billions of customer interactions every year, so I have many memorable “wow” moments to draw on. A couple that stand out include:

We worked with a Fortune 10 retailer that was struggling with a social strategy that would resonate with the digital needs of today’s new-age customers. Faced with a lot of negative sentiment about their customer service which adversely affected their bottom line, the retailer sought to revamp its social strategy. HGS Digital offered a level of hyper-personalization and in-channel conflict resolution, along with highly trained agents doubling as brand ambassadors. Combined with efficient crisis management and smart routing of queries, this engagement helped resolve more than 35,000 customer queries within 24 hours, for a savings of $200k annually.

We also helped a client that is one of the largest, private multinational players in the pet wellness and Rx space to optimize the digital CX by refreshing its website with more relevant and engaging content, streamlining the patient portal, and providing the option to start the purchase cycle and schedule appointments online. By evangelizing a customer-focused approach to website design and development, supplementing the marketing and analytics team with strategy and dashboarding support, and developing a personalization strategy to optimize both the .com and e-commerce experience, HGS was able to help our client wow customers, resulting in 32% increase in e-commerce revenue, 9% increase in orders, and 27% increase in appointment bookings.

Did that Wow! experience have any long-term ripple effects? Can you share the story?

Our Fortune 10 retail client is a retail industry leader that operates a chain of hypermarkets and grocery stores. With a massive worldwide presence, the client needed a social media partner that could support its growing business needs and address the demands of today’s digital customer. With hyper-personalized conversations being the key to new-age customer experiences, it was imperative to not just have a solid social media presence, but a brand voice that transcended communication channels.

The client received more than 10 million social media mentions a year. With such a large volume, the business challenge focused on filtering the noise to find actionable posts that provide the most ROI. HGS Digital set out to provide an end-to-end social engagement solution, bringing together the right people, processes, automation, and analytics to address these obstacles. The success of the project ultimately lies in the synergy between customer experience and marketing — better resolution means better customer sentiment, which also means that every dollar spent on social is amplified, not diminished by poor customer experience.

After the first two years working with HGS, the retail client was able to filter the number of non-actionable social mentions via enhanced automation, which enabled them to increase the average response rate by 35% and decrease the average response time from 12 hours to just 30 minutes. This has resulted in a cost avoidance of $12M+ and more than 400,000 customer mentions addressed annually through social channels, bringing long-term value to the client’s social media customer experiences.

The growing imperative of providing an amazing CX remains top of mind for many businesses. Successfully implementing an effective, autonomous CX initiative that wows customers requires some of the following strategies:

Design the right CX journey: Utilizing technology that can learn, refine processes, and integrate human intervention to add value. The key here is to understand the audience fully and how they will help define the overall journey. Everyone is familiar with needing to essentially fast before a surgery, but what if the healthcare space created a journey that would send you in context reminders/texts about your specific healthcare situation. If you need to fast 8–10 hours before your 8 am surgery, imagine getting a text at 6pm the night before reminding you that you should eat/drink something because you’re coming up on your deadline before you need to fast. It’s a game changer!
Strike the right balance of technology and people: Build businesses that have the flexibility to scale, agility to adapt, continuously learn using AI, and secure for the future. As previously noted, you need to be agile, but adaptable. We live in a world where technology is always changing and if you aren’t educating yourself, you’ll get left behind. How can you move forward if you’re stuck in the past?
Leverage data to create personalized and targeted offers: Build algorithms around purchase propensities and recommend unique products for each customer. Using data is in the best interest of any company because it’s about understanding the customer so innately that they know exactly what the customer wants before the customer knows what they want. Like most, I’ve bought a washer and dryer and then I get a flyer in the box that says register your product. But what value do I get by registering? You need all this information and then what? What if instead of a flyer, there was QR code that would allow me to scan, register and then I get specific text reminders on when to service/change filters etc.? It’s a more personalized approach that gives me the opportunity to get things I didn’t know I needed. We focus so much on marketing, and not enough on providing an experience that truly matters to that specific customer.
Fine-tune customer experiences based on segmented customer needs: Improve loyalty and brand relationships via personalized customer journeys based on segmentation and prediction models. Lead from a place of empathy. Truly understand your customers and the moments that they are in. If I book an airline ticket, I don’t want to open the app and see a generic ad to buy another plane ticket, I want to see an ad for a hotel in the place I am flying to.
Deliver a human-centered chatbot experience: Automate customer communication to provide greater control over their resolution journey via shortened experience times and greater satisfaction in resolution outcomes, which can lead to longer-term brand loyalty. Customers in general would rather be self-sufficient than call for help. We have mobile apps, texts, websites etc. that have made it easy for customers, and chatbots are a part of that experience. Chatbots are extremely useful for private requests/tasks. They can help with private information that you can’t necessarily get from a self-service perspective like requesting a lost credit card be replaced. They are most useful in places where there’s no need for empathy, places where there is a clear resolution — it’s a simple transactional journey.

Are there a few things that can be done so that when a customer or client has a Wow! experience, they inspire others to reach out to you as well?

When a customer or client has a Wow! experience, the primary thing companies can encourage to inspire others is to provide a positive review or endorsement. Customers are more likely to recommend something if they have had a good experience with the brand and, in turn, a majority of consumers today are influenced by reviews and endorsements, which play a big role in purchasing decisions.

Another method to inspire continued brand engagement is through an active presence on social media. If a company can effectively interact with and respond to reviews of their products and services through social media, it can create more brand awareness and goodwill that can motivate others to reach out and foster brand loyalty.

My particular expertise is in retail, so I’d like to ask a question about that. Amazon is going to exert pressure on all of retail for the foreseeable future. New Direct-To-Consumer companies based in China are emerging that offer prices that are much cheaper than US and European brands. What would you advise retail companies and eCommerce companies, for them to be successful?

Amazon is exceptional at strengthening the bond between customers and its brand, along with curating bundles of product content based on customer behavior. For retail and e-commerce companies to be successful today, they must leverage the benefits of hyper-personalization and keep the customer as their focal point, and that means creating personalized experiences in all channels, including email, SMS, push, and in-app mobile experiences. An omnichannel approach provides shoppers with an integrated customer experience, whether they are shopping online from a desktop or mobile device, calling in via phone, or physically browsing in a brick-and-mortar store.

The majority of today’s consumers purchase products and services using mobile devices. Mobile commerce now accounts for nearly two-thirds of all online shopping, so it’s critical to create ‘commerce anywhere’ experiences that allow for on-the-go, real-time interactions in order to remain competitive and drive success.

Increasingly, successful customer experience depends on how well retailers are digitally connecting to their consumers. Understanding how technology can act as a tool for retailers to create innovative and unique experiences will be the key to adjusting to shifting customer expectations.

How can our readers follow you on social media?

Readers can follow HGS online at hgsdigital.com and teamhgs.com (@teamhgs). I can be found on LinkedIn at linkedin.com/in/venk-korla-844924 or on Twitter @venk_korla.

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Venk Korla Of HGS On 5 Ways To Create a Wow! Customer Experience was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Richard J Kramer: 5 Things You Should Do To Optimize Your Wellness After Retirement

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Exercising — Staying active by exercising is a fantastic way to maintain your health after retirement. It not only gives your well-being a boost but also allows you to live independently as you age. Now that you have more time, it’s simple to develop an exercise plan that works for your schedule.

As a part of my series about the “5 Things You Should Do to Optimize Your Wellness After Retirement” I had the pleasure of interviewing Richard J. Kramer, M.D.

A retired gastroenterologist from San Jose, California, Dr. Richard J. Kramer received his medical degree from the University of California, Irvine, School of Medicine. He practiced GI in private practice for 25 years in the San Jose/Los Gatos area before joining the GI faculty at Santa Clara Valley Medical Center in 2003. Shortly after retiring in 2015, Dr. Kramer and his wife moved to Mirabella at ASU in 2021 where he discovered a mutually beneficial opportunity to both fill the retirement void he faced and help prepare students for life after graduation. Dr. Kramer is the founder and director of ASU’s fast-growing pre-med mentoring program designed to provide students with meaningful, real-life experiences.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you share with us the backstory about what brought you to your specific career path?

When I was 6 years old, I had Rheumatic Fever, which in those days (about 1953) was treated primarily with Penicillin (to which I became allergic) and bed rest. I was hospitalized right before the Christmas and New Year’s holidays and was not able to see my parents for more than two hours each day. I remember Dr. Morris Dirdack, a good friend of my parents and the physician that delivered me, took great care of me. He and the nurses became incredible role models for me and after nine months of complete bedrest, I decided that I was going to return the wonderful ability to help people by becoming a physician.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career?

Being a gastroenterologist, I saw incredible patients and situations. One of the most interesting stories is from when I was an attending physician at a teaching hospital associated with Stanford University. My students and I were asked to see a consultation for abnormal liver tests after repeated admissions without a diagnosis. When seeing the patient, I noticed a rash on the palms of his hands. I only had 10 days of dermatology training in medical school, which was normal, but one of the only things I remembered, was that any rash located on the palms and across the creases on your palms was Syphilis! The students had missed this completely, not having examined his skin and palms. They learned their lesson that day when the tests came back, and we cured him with a shot of Bicillin. The one thing I remembered from school helped save the patient’s life and taught the students two things: (1) to do a thorough exam and (2) nothing you learn is worthless and can be tucked in the back of your mind for later use!

Can you share a story with us about the most humorous mistake you made when you were first starting? What lesson or take-away did you learn from that?

I don’t want this to sound egocentric, but I did not, thankfully, make any mistakes at all that I know of, except for agreeing to see one patient that I regret seeing to this day. She caused me no end of grief!

The person that made the biggest impact on my career was my very first attending physician when I became an internal medicine resident, Dr. Michael Knauer. On the very first night of my residency, I ended up being on call and aside from not knowing anything about the hospital, my fellow residents were all reporting to me about their patients, so they could go home. I was the one responsible for covering all the patients on the internal medicine service for the next 24 hours! During that shift, I cared for 17 admissions and consulted on several ER patients, many of them quite sick with most of the patients in the ICU who were bleeding acutely from their GI tract. The next morning, 24 hours after starting my residency and my first on-call in the hospital, I had successfully written (in those days, handwritten) a resident’s admission note on every patient that I had admitted, except the last one. In addition, I saved and stopped the bleeding on all the ICU GI patients under my care. I also completed consulting on all ER patients that were requested. At 9 a.m., Dr. Knauer, my attending physician for that month, came in to make rounds with me and my two interns. After that horrible night on call for the first time, and being more than exhausted, he criticized me in front of everyone for not having written a note yet on the 17th patient that I admitted — even though I had seen the patient, stabilized them, and had written orders. He was hardnosed but taught me an incredible amount of medicine and ultimately, we became friends. It was he, who was a gastroenterologist, who convinced me to follow that career path instead of general medicine or surgery, which I was contemplating. And that led to the rest of my professional career!

What advice would you suggest to your colleagues in your industry to thrive and avoid burnout?

Balance your life. Manage your practice so you have quality time off with your family and can be there for all the important life events. Most importantly, make sure you enjoy your field and the way you are practicing your medicine! Unless a patient was so critical, I couldn’t leave, I always went home to be with my wife and kids and attended all their sports, activities, etc. Once they were in bed, I would go back and finish hospital consults, if needed. I made sure I was there for everything. You need to make time to relax, enjoy your life and escape the daily routine.

What advice would you give to other leaders about how to create a fantastic work culture?

Enjoy what you are doing. There is nothing worse than waking up every morning and not loving what you do! Understand that your coworkers also have a story and on a bad day, understand that there are two sides to every story! Treat everyone like you would like to be treated!

Ok thank you for all that. Now let’s move to the main focus of our interview. From your point of view or experience, what are a few of the reasons that retirement can reduce one’s health?

Retirement can affect your psychological and physical health if you don’t exercise and keep yourself physically fit. You also need to keep your mind active by doing new things, not the same old stuff you do every day, like classes, learning new hobbies, volunteering and helping others. Those that live the longest, are usually the people involved in their community, revered for their accumulated wisdom, and adhere to a healthy diet.

Can you share with our readers 5 things that one should do to optimize mental or physical wellness after retirement? Please share a story or an example for each.

Optimize Lifelong Learning — Be involved with education and mentor students, it’s a two-way street. I currently reside at a senior community on the ASU campus in Tempe, Arizona called Mirabella at ASU. An intergenerational community fueled by lifelong learning and collegiate energy, residents have access to an extensive variety of unique educational offerings including classes, activities, art and music programs and so much more. Shortly after moving in, I initiated a pre-med student mentorship program that has grown extensively over the last couple of years. They give me as much, if not more than I give in our relationship.
Exercising — Staying active by exercising is a fantastic way to maintain your health after retirement. It not only gives your well-being a boost but also allows you to live independently as you age. Now that you have more time, it’s simple to develop an exercise plan that works for your schedule.
Mindfulness — Retirement is supposed to bring some of the happiest years of our lives. We no longer must work every day or deal with stressful demands from our job. We can just relax and enjoy life. However, a recent study found that there is a growing trend of retirees who are unhappy in their retirement. We need to keep this unhappiness in check. This is the time of our lives we have looked forward to. Mindfulness in the form of meditation, whether that’s daily, weekly or even monthly, can help retirees achieve a relaxed state of mind and increase overall happiness.
Hobbies — Having a passion — whether it’s making or collecting something, volunteering or traveling, or whatever it may be — can enhance a retiree’s mental and physical health. I have done sleight of hand and magic since I was 6 years old. Since retirement, I have taken up more of my magic and am working out a way to continue doing some of the sleight of hand, even after developing difficulty with fine movement of my fingers. I still love doing this. We also really enjoy music (I take electric vibraphone lessons; my wife, Leslie, takes piano and guitar lessons and sings in a chorus), traveling and reading. It is so important to have hobbies even while working over the years. Being able to fall back on those when retiring will bring much pleasure.
Diet — While healthy eating is important at any age, as a senior, a healthy, balanced diet is more important than ever. It helps you stay active, independent and helps avoid malnutrition, which unfortunately seniors are more susceptible to. Transition to retirement is a major event followed by significant alterations at psychological and physical levels in a person’s life and it profoundly affects health. Specifically, obesity accelerates aging by shortening telomere length, compromises the immune system, and speeds up the early onset of age-related conditions, e.g. diabetes, heart disease, stroke, etc.

In your experience, what are 3 or 4 things that people wish someone told them before they retired?

How much I would enjoy life. Mentoring pre-med students has given me more pleasure than one can imagine!
I wish they had warned me that I would start waking up so early in the morning. I always looked forward to retirement, so I could get up when I wanted to, be able to turn over and go back to sleep if I wanted.
In retirement, I have more doctor’s appointments than imaginable. This can become your social life if you aren’t careful. I wish I was more prepared for this, so I wouldn’t have fought it for so long and just accepted it as a fact of my new life!

Is there a particular book that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story?

Not really. I’ve read a lot, but I think the book “The Power of One” by Bryce Courtenay made an impact on me. The ability to succeed is in everyone and not a matter of luck or life circumstance. You can put yourself in the right places at the right time and create your own luck.

You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

I would try to move people to respect each other more and learn to compromise. I’d love to bring people that are so far apart in opinions today together and guide them to a place where they are able to talk to each other civilly. I think we did a little better in years past.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Do you have a story about how that was relevant in your life?

My favorite Life Lesson is: “The best job in the world is the one that you would love to wake up and do every day, even if you don’t get paid for it!” I have the ability to live this lesson today with our move to Mirabella at ASU. I have been given the opportunity to continue working with passion without concern for my income! Retirement gives you the time and chance to explore new opportunities that provide an exciting way to retire with meaning and the ability to provide all that wisdom, experience and passion we retirees can contribute to the world.

I actually have two people that I admire and would love to meet:

President Barack Obama, I think is one of the most brilliant, sincere, and educated people in the world. He is someone who really wants to make a difference!
The second person I would love to spend time with is Comedian Billy Crystal. He is a remarkably intelligent, capable, funny entertainer in the world today, besides being an incredibly nice human being and family man! Oh, but to spend time eating and talking to him!

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We wish you only continued success in your great work!

Richard J Kramer: 5 Things You Should Do To Optimize Your Wellness After Retirement was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Makers of The Metaverse: John Marx Of AIA, Form4 Architecture On The Future Of The VR, AR & Mixed…

Makers of The Metaverse: John Marx Of AIA, Form4 Architecture On The Future Of The VR, AR & Mixed Reality Industries

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

A sense of creating community through activation strategies that fully engage people in virtual environments.

The Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality & Mixed Reality Industries are so exciting. What is coming around the corner? How will these improve our lives? What are the concerns we should keep an eye out for? Aside from entertainment, how can VR or AR help work for other parts of life? To address this, we had the pleasure of interviewing John Marx, AIA.

John Marx, AIA, is the founding design principal and Chief Artistic Officer of Form4 Architecture, a San Francisco firm that creates prominent buildings, campuses, and interiors for Bay Area tech companies such as Google and Facebook, laboratories for life-science clients, and workplaces for numerous other companies. Marx and Form4 are the recipients of 215 design awards. Named a Laureate of the American Prize for Architecture in 2017, Marx lectures and writes internationally on the topics of design, placemaking, and emotional meaning in architecture. He is the author of Wandering the Garden of Technology and Passion and Études: The Poetry of Dream + Other Fragments.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit. Can you tell us a bit about your backstory and how you grew up?

I have always had a multi-disciplinary focus, striving to be an architect, artist, and poet. My first love was drawing, then painting, both media for the creation of imaginary worlds. In the Midwest, where I grew up, these were not considered suitable for making a living. When I was seven years old, after an illuminating career day in grade school, architecture became my chosen focus as it promised to be a creative profession.

After graduating from the University of Illinois, I worked for a variety of firms. In 1998, I joined two colleagues in founding Form4 Architecture in San Francisco. There is a certain freedom that comes from owning a small office that permits one to explore design in more creative and adventurous ways, and ultimately to advocate for change through design and writing. Throughout my career I have tried to maintain a balance of architecture, art, and poetry in the way I approach design, perhaps evidenced by my corporate title of Chief Artistic Officer at Form4 Architecture.

This comes from taking a deeply philosophical point of view about the connection between architecture and humanity. As we take a step out each morning, we are confronted by a balance dynamic with the world. There is a moment, in the lives of most artists, where we realize we exist in relationship to a complex world, a world of paradox — of abundance and scarcity, of pleasure and pain, of epic beauty and inexplicable tragedy. For me, this means adopting a reflective approach to marshal what abundance life gives you in order to create positive change in the physical world.

While architecture has been my primary focus, this creative dynamic has come full circle with the 2020 publication of Études: The Poetry of Dream + Other Fragments, a book of my watercolors and poetry, which won the 2021 James Gates Percival International Prize for Literature.

Is there a particular book, film, or podcast that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

Snow Crash by Neal Stevenson, published in 1992, is a science-fiction novel that coined the word Metaverse. The book’s powerful main character, Hiro, had an ordinary pizza-delivery job in the physical world but was one of the most powerful people in the Metaverse. I found that notion very compelling.

Is there a particular story that inspired you to pursue a career in the X Reality industry? We’d love to hear it.

I co-taught a class at UC Berkeley with Yehuda Kalay beginning in 2000 called “Placemaking in Cyberspace.” We included Snow Crash as part of the curriculum. We assigned it to the class because the book explores the parallel natures of existence: physicality, virtuality, and their intersection.

As background, I’m interested in placemaking as a way to define the role of the physical 3D-experience environment in the virtual world and the idea of creating activation. This goes to place theory, which relates to the Metaverse.

Place theory is based on three things, a triumvirate necessary to create “place”: people, physical context, and physical activities. Those three things, when they come together in the right mix, produce place. Place is an enduring, significant, enjoyable, and emotionally engaging relationship with a particular environment that has the three qualities (people, context, activities). Those qualities can vary.

For example, Venice, Italy, is a very strong place. It’s strong on physical context with historical culture and the beauty of the canals. But in terms of activity, the activity is tourism — eating, visiting ancient things. Venice in some ways is a dying city. It’s been criticized as being an authentic version of Disneyland, but Venice is in essence a museum. Very little new culture is produced there; Venice currently struggles to find its voice. While the mass numbers of tourists create a certain kind of vibrancy, it’s a city based on consumption of historic culture rather than the production of new culture. All great cities in their golden moments produce more culture than they consume.

People, context, and activities don’t have to take sides, but you have to have sufficient quality and sometimes quantity of these three aspects. You might be at a café in an Italian piazza that lacks activation; 200 years ago it was full of people, now it’s a parking lot. There’s no place there anymore. Even though the physical context still has some charm, there’s no activity and no people.

Now, how do you apply all this to the virtual environment? That’s what my Berkeley class was about, modeled on the idea of Snow Crash. But there is a dynamic: the richest activation in the physical world normally involves food and drink. The challenge is how to create activation and engagement without having food or drink. When your primary thing in the physical world is gone, you’ve got to try to make up for it with other activities. Shooting games are popular; their first-person environments are very compelling. In the Berkeley class, we created environments that were non-violent. But games can be a form of activation — for that reason we excluded shooting games. However, game-based learning where you use your mind and memory is very engaging. People have applied game theory to almost anything: education, shopping, entertainment, and even world-building.

We haven’t even scratched the surface of the Metaverse yet. If you exclude games, shopping is another activator. Amazon made shopping easy. Amazon has not made shopping fun. If you can make online shopping fun, people are going to go because it’s engaging. My contention is that we’ll solve this in the third dimension. The technology is almost there. We need a 3D environment where you go to a place, see other people, feel like you can pick up the object, you can try on clothing, or you can virtually test the car or whatever you’re interested in buying. It needs to be tactile.

To make it fun, you need to have other things going on beyond what you’re looking for. That experience of discovery is an activator.

So the first stage of a virtual-experience portal might focus on shopping, because economics motivate change. The reason this will be compelling is we’re trying to get people to buy things online. The intention is to create a balance of experience where you can also buy things. It’s that balance of those things together that will make the Metaverse compelling.

The second part is community. Imagine you go to an online, 3D place that’s full of your friends. Online 2D communities, including Facebook, Instagram, and Slack, are very compelling (Twitter, not so much). But these 2D spaces are very limiting in the immersive quality of the experiences. It’s like the difference between reading a travel book about Paris versus actually going to Paris. So what if these social communities offered compelling virtual environments? You can meet your friends and go shopping together in both a virtual and physical Paris, even though most of you might be in other cities across the world.

Whoever adds how people can engage with their social community while shopping, learning, and entertaining will take over the world. The Metaverse is like a tidal wave that will crash over all of us. The analogy: We’re on a surfboard, we’re looking toward the shore, we’re on a nice wave that’s just the right size. But while we’re focusing on the shore, we don’t see that the wave rolling in behind us has grown to 500-feet tall. All we notice is that the sun is suddenly gone, but we think it’s from a cloud. We just have to catch the big wave and hope we don’t drown.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began this fascinating career?

I’m a veteran “Burner” and have designed several installations for Burning Man. I draw inspiration from how people interact with each other and the built environments at Burning Man, then use those observations to add as much humanity to physical architecture as possible. The same approaches apply to placemaking in virtual environments.

My most recent project for the festival is called The Museum of No Spectators (MoNS), originally designed for Burning Man 2020. The premise is that everyone in the museum becomes an active participant, creating art that is then displayed to inspire other visitors. When COVID caused the festival to be delayed, I collaborated with digital artist Tomek Miksa to re-imagine MoNS as a virtual experience. It was online for more than a year, literally in the Metaverse.

MoNS was also included in Black Rock City VR’s Virtual Worlds in 2020. With my artistic co-lead Absinthia Vermut, we activated MoNS with poetry readings, storytelling, art on the wall, and even a 2021 New Year’s Eve dance party. You could experience it with or without Oculus goggles, using the Altspace VR engine.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

In retrospect, it might have made more sense to conceive MoNS as a virtual experience instead of intending it to be the latest in a series of Burning Man experiences I designed to be built at Black Rock Desert. When Burning Man 2020 was delayed for COVID, we pivoted instead of mothballing the project. Since we already had multiple 2D renderings of the project, we took what we had and, in the true spirit of Burning Man, collaborated with other artists to re-imagine the museum in the Metaverse. We came full-circle this August at Burning Man 2022 and were able to compare the actual experience to the born-from-necessity virtual one. Never intending MoNS to be anything other than a Burning Man installation, the funniest part of the process is that the project was named one of Designboom’s Top 10 digital and virtual experiences of 2020 in the entire world, alongside Bjarke Ingels’ Vancouver House and virtual tours of leading museums.

None of us is able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful toward who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

The person who had the greatest influence on my career was architect Charles Warren Callister, whom I worked for in the 1980s. Warren integrated poetry into his architecture, and largely focused on high-end residential and large community developments. He taught me how his practice was based on the concept that architects were artists, and architecture is an art form — a commitment he followed throughout his long career.

Warren’s interest in art and emotional meaning applies to the Metaverse, which is an idea platform for self-expression. The Metaverse has the opportunity to create a great deal of resonance within the context of emotional meaning and human engagement. The hope is that we can create lovable environments, which was Warren’s goal as an architect. That’s the link to all future environments — lovability.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

We were invited to participate in a paid competition to design environments in the Metaverse as part of an international team of about 60 people from various parts of the creative community. That project is under NDA, but it’s basically a large research project based on experience design in both physical and virtual forms about various ways environments can benefit people.

Relative to Warren Callister, Form4 Architecture collaborated with his office on the design of the Episcopal Church of St. John the Baptist in Aptos, CA. It marked Callister’s final project before his death in 2008. Because of our existing relationship with the church’s board and clergy, Form4 was asked to design a columbarium, which we call “Intertwined Eternities,” to occupy a 4,000-square-foot garden of decomposed granite located behind the existing church. Form4’s approach was to contribute a poetic and meaningful addition to honor Callister’s legacy and complete the next phase of the church campus. The architects sought to create a design that is lyrical, poetic, rigorously modern, and emotionally engaging.

1. Seeing how the technology will progress to the point of opening up all of the possibilities for the Metaverse. Visual, aural, and tactile elements are emerging, and there’s more to come. Every month reveals something new. For example, Lensa portrait imagery in an AI context lets you become a better version of the person you are, in essence raising your self-image. Midjourney creates worlds that don’t exist but are very compelling, places you aspire to dwell in. The ability of AI to almost instantaneously create alternative universes will be very powerful in an experience-based Metaverse. There is still a long way to go in order to achieve the environmental quality needed to be compelling, but the rate of change is astounding and should get here very soon.

2. The potential for shared experiences and discovery is exciting. Attending virtual concerts with both actual and online friends is one intriguing example. In addition, the Metaverse offers an opportunity to powerfully extend a sense of community across the entire globe in a fundamentally safe environment.

3. Although entertainment and associated e-commerce will likely be the Metaverse’s foundation, the educational ramifications are enormous. Lecture-based pedagogy could be totally replaced by experiential learning in the Metaverse.

What are the 3 things that concern you about the VR, AR and MR industries? Can you explain? What can be done to address those concerns?

1. The industry doesn’t have mass appeal yet, although COVID helped build momentum very quickly. People aren’t racing from work to put on their VR goggles; AR is a more comfortable technology, with Pokémon Go being a prominent example of overlaid experiences in the physical world. But just as social media mushroomed from kids on MySpace into what’s now the primary communication and commercial platform for many people, the Metaverse should experience massive growth in the near future. Enthusiasm for the blockchain/crypto/NFTs is also helping build momentum. MR might accelerate the transition, with people wearing goggles and blending physical and digital activity.

2. Hardware cost is a barrier to entry, although economies of scale will likely bring prices down as more goggle options enter the market. Some people are building VR rooms where you don’t need goggles but are in a purely immersive virtual space.

3. Interaction seems to be the Metaverse’s largest hurdle. Fundamentally, there’s potential to make it highly engaging and participatory. How do you physically engage with an environment versus experiencing it purely as a spectator who has influence over what you’re seeing?

4. AI and the Metaverse both ask us to question what it means to be human on a deeply fundamental level. This is a critical challenge to world cultures that we have historically not been good at resolving. There are issue of ownership of the fundamental OS, and social media has shown us the ease at which societies can be manipulated. We will need to address these issues collectively, and it may require some thoughtful consideration of poets, philosophers, and artists to navigate what it means to be human.

I think the entertainment aspects of VR, AR and MR are apparent. Can you share with our readers how these industries can help us at work?

Architects have used digital design tools for more than a generation. Drafting with pencils gave way to CAD, which evolved into BIM (Building Information Modeling), where we can simulate design’s effects on performance. Applying VR, we now take our traditional building renderings and animate them to create virtual walk-throughs.

Another example is how newer technologies even allow architects to actually hear how different interior materials and their arrangement absorb noise. We can demonstrate to the client the difference between a 45-dB design and a 65-dB one, with BIM providing the cost analysis for both scenarios.

I don’t know that we’ll be able to virtually test office furniture for comfort and ergonomics in the foreseeable future, but the VR technology will definitely evolve architecture. Also, virtual real estate is creating a demand for architecture in the Metaverse. We’re interested in those conversations — but aren’t quite ready to accept crypto for our fee!

Are there other ways that VR, AR and MR can improve our lives? Can you explain?

One of the problems with remote working is the lack of a sense of shared experiences. You’re talking on Zoom but you don’t feel together. VR, AR, and MR can give us that sense of being in the same place at the same time, sharing the same environment. I spent a fair amount of time meeting people virtually in MoNS through Black Rock City VR. Everyone had an avatar. It was a much deeper and personal experience than a Zoom call. VR/MR is close second to physically being together compared to other tech-based forms of remote communication.

What are the “myths” that you would like to dispel about working in your industry? Can you explain what you mean?

We’d like to dispel the myth that architects will be replaced by AI. To put it in context, tract homes and gray-block industrial parks have possibly downgraded architects’ importance in the general public’s perception. The Metaverse could reverse that. At our best, architects are trained to design spaces that elevate people’s work and private lives through a uniquely human passion and vibrancy, while integrating required features for useability, health, and life-safety. Virtual buildings allow us to take what we’ve learned about how people interact with their physical environments and design beyond the envelope. In the Metaverse, the architect’s role is going to increase multi-fold to create experience-rich and texturally engaging environments where people want to be. We don’t have to worry about gravity, building codes, green materials, and other physical realities in order to design virtual cities. The primary question for architects, from a cultural perspective, is are we capable or interested in designing “lovable” enough environments to engage the Metaverses users. This is a very different type of client/user group from what we are used to in the physical world.

We feel that architects are uniquely suited to designing “built” spaces in the virtual world. At my firm, Form4 in San Francisco, we have designed what we feel are lovable buildings and spaces since 1998 — many for the Silicon Valley tech companies that are leaders in Web 3.0. There aren’t a lot of architects who can say that they started working in and teaching about the Metaverse 23 years ago: I co-wrote papers with UC Berkeley professor Yehuda Kalay on “The Role of Place in Cyberspace” (2001) and “Architecture and the Internet: Designing Places in Cyberspace” (2005). They describe the criteria for making cyber places different: hyper-reality spaces, abstracted reality, hybrid virtual spaces, and hyper virtuality.

What are your “5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In The VR, AR or MR Industries?”

These are all discussed in more detail above:

1. An understanding of the theory of place (people, context, activities).

2. A sense of creating community through activation strategies that fully engage people in virtual environments.

3. Combining social networks and e-commerce.

4. The realization that you’re still in a physical place that someone designed when you’re experiencing a virtual reality. The triumvirate of people, activity, and context is critical, even in a virtual environment. You need to be somewhere.

5. A desire to create lovable places — environments people look forward to experiencing.

The most powerful force for change is technology. Innovation, through technology, has created undeniable changes in the world by its very existence. These are foundational changes; they affect everyone in some way over time. As much as technology changes the way we do things, it does not always affect the fundamental core of the human condition. The change created by technology is not truly effective unless people care about each other.

If I could inspire a movement that would change the world, it would be one that encourages you to embrace community and kindness through participatory art. This is a profoundly powerful spark, that, in turn, will inspire you go out and change the world in myriad unimaginable ways. The Metaverse expands this beyond physical communities to a global scale. The Metaverse has limitless potential to facilitate the balance of self-expression and a sense of belonging to various groups.

Because Google is such a visionary company, I’d like to sit down with Sergey Brin. I’m particularly interested in the concept of creating a physical portal into the Metaverse, possibly at an aircraft hangar Google owns in Mountain View. The sheer size and scale of this hangar could provide a profoundly compelling place to create a major portal to the Metaverse. This is how the physical and virtual worlds can overlap in a symbiotic relationship.

Thank you so much for these excellent stories and insights. We wish you continued success on your great work!

Makers of The Metaverse: John Marx Of AIA, Form4 Architecture On The Future Of The VR, AR & Mixed… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Alexander Falatovich Of Identity Digital On Five Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful…

Alexander Falatovich Of Identity Digital On Five Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In The Cybersecurity Industry

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Don’t be afraid to fail. A career in cybersecurity is about constantly encountering new and challenging problems, which almost inevitably results in some failures. If you are not willing to make and learn from mistakes, a career in cybersecurity may be a struggle. We learn so much from failure. At the start of my career, I had never written corporate policies nor used the NIST CyberSecurity Framework. Still, I took on the challenge, making some mistakes along the way, and ultimately succeeded.

The cybersecurity industry has become so essential and exciting. What is coming around the corner? What are the concerns we should keep an eye out for? How does one succeed in the cybersecurity industry? As a part of this interview series called “Five Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In The Cybersecurity Industry”, we had the pleasure of interviewing Alexander Falatovich.

Alexander Falatovich (Fal-uh-toh-vich) of Identity Digital brings over a decade of experience from the domain name space, having led large legacy generic top-level domain (TLD) anti-abuse programs as well as facilitated the successful launch of dozens of descriptive TLD anti-abuse programs. He is a member of multiple industry groups and collaboratives, such as the Anti-Phishing Working Group and InfraGard. He has earned his Certified Ethical Hacker, Certified Incident Handler, and Certified Cyber Security Architect certifications to accompany his bachelor’s degree in intelligence analysis from Mercyhurst University with a minor in Asian studies and a graduate certificate in Homeland Security & Defense from Pennsylvania State University.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit. Can you tell us a bit about your backstory and how you grew up?

I’m from a small town in Northeast Pennsylvania, about as far from anything associated with cyberspace or information technology. My parents were teachers. They gave me many opportunities to try activities I enjoyed, like basketball, while ensuring I put forth the effort in school. I did well in math and science but really enjoyed the social sciences. I eventually went to college at Mercyhurst University, at the time Mercyhurst College, to study Intelligence Studies because I wanted to work in the US Intelligence Community. While I spent four years enjoying all the natural wonders of Erie, Pennsylvania (Spoiler: snow and cold), I added an Asia Studies minor that allowed me to mix the logical-centric elements of intelligence analysis with the more spiritual components of many Asian cultures. The job market wasn’t great when I graduated, so I did some temp work before eventually getting my first job, not in government as planned, but in cybersecurity near Philadelphia. Since then, I bounced to Baltimore for a little while before ending up where I am now.

Is there a particular book, film, or podcast that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

A book called ‘How to Cook Your Life: From the Zen Kitchen to Enlightenment ‘offered many valuable ideas. Even more so in an industry like cybersecurity, where many days are long and stressful. It’s a manual about cooking in a monastery and the spiritual training involved, but it can apply to so much of life. The concept of moving meditations resonates with me. Many of us do this without realizing it. People tend to think of meditation as sitting in silence, but it is about being conscious of your being and being present. I find it calming, whether while washing dishes or something more work-related, such as diving through a spreadsheet full of domain registration details. Be present in those small moments, and the world opens up.

Is there a particular story or incident that inspired you to pursue a career in cybersecurity? We’d love to hear it.

So funny enough, I never intended to pursue cybersecurity growing up or even in undergrad. I got into it out of necessity. But there was something that struck me that made me stay. About two years into my career, talking to friends and former classmates (some who filled positions I had wanted) I realized how much of a difference working in cybersecurity and the impact some of the anti-cybercrime work I was doing had and could make. I grew up with some technology, but the way society was moving, even back in 2013, if I wanted to help the public, staying in cybersecurity was right for me.

It has been said that our mistakes can be our greatest teachers. Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

There was one instance when I was responding to a report by a member of the public concerning material on a domain in one of our top-level domains (TLDs). They believed the domain was involved in supporting terrorism. As an enthusiastic cybersecurity greenling, I gathered information and submitted it to the FBI portal since that seemed the right thing to do. I had forgotten about it until two FBI special agents showed up two days later with my CEO, wanting to speak with me about a report filed. I had made the unglamorous mistake of not informing key leadership. Understandably, the leadership team was very surprised and not in an “oh, that’s so thoughtful” way. After the agents left, I got a friendly but stern lecture stating I wasn’t wrong to report the case but to notify our legal team next time. Lesson learned. Communicate with your legal team when you are engaged in any activities with serious legal implications. This protects you so you don’t put yourself or the company in an undesirable position.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

Without getting into the details, exciting projects are in the works to take advantage of some technical registry and DNS data we have access to; data that nobody else has in such volume and as comprehensive in scope. It involves the ability to more rapidly and accurately identify domain names registered for cybercrimes, such as phishing, and learning where legitimate domains may be compromised to be used in similar abusive behavior. This will help people by reducing the uptime of malicious content. Studies repeatedly show that most of the damage in cyber attacks happens within the first few hours of a domain being deployed. Faster, accurate detection can lead to faster mitigation and, by extension, fewer victims of cybercrime.

Ok super. Thank you for all that. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview. The Cybersecurity industry seems so exciting right now. What are the 3 things in particular that most excite you about the industry? Can you explain or give an example?

It’s an exciting time for the cybersecurity industry and the implications beyond. What excites me most is how accessible it is despite some negative elements in some communities. It is also increasingly diverse as one of the few areas where someone with no experience in technology can become a practitioner using free, open-source materials. This allows people from all kinds of backgrounds with different perspectives to join. I see the community adding needed voices via initiatives on social media like #sharethemicincyber and organizations of women in cybersecurity. Those voices profoundly impact creating a more fair and unbiased technological future.

The second thing that excites me is the growth potential in cybersecurity. You don’t need to look far to see the constant demand for more cybersecurity professionals, including in companies and spaces that you wouldn’t have just a few years ago. A report in CyberSeek underscores this, stating that nine of the ten top months for cybersecurity demand for the last decade came in the previous year. There’s a tremendous opportunity to find your niche and make an impact.

And finally, the third thing I’d single out is how amazing it is to be part of an industry when there is so much potential revolutionary technology starting to hit the mainstream that needs securing and protecting. Whether looking at one of the many text-to-image AI generators or visiting a website using a descriptive domain with a top-level domain I don’t commonly see, we’re constantly presented with new cybersecurity challenges. To me, that’s a gratifying part of cybersecurity work.

What are the 3 things that concern you about the Cybersecurity industry? Can you explain? What can be done to address those concerns?

You can’t have light without dark, and there are certainly concerns about the industry. Many are related to topics I just highlighted as positives. One area of concern involves gatekeeping in the community. Hiring can be overly focused on who is “qualified” or actually “doing cyber.” This can take many forms. For instance, considering anyone without a particular certification as not serious or a fit for cybersecurity if they don’t come from a network engineering background. Sometimes companies block aspiring new professionals by requiring certifications or experience far beyond what the job posting would require. We can call out these types of behaviors. However, it’s a culture change, and that takes time. I believe this will diminish as we continue to grow as an industry and some old guards retire or phase out.

My second concern is that so much new technology needs to be secured. Still, standards and regulations are lagging. While there is progress in many frameworks and industry bodies maintaining those, legal gaps strain the community and the public. For example, Internet of Things products can be challenging to secure. When you have lawmakers who are not comfortable with technology, it is a receipt for disaster. We need the community to support technology-aware politicians and engage in the process. Many elected officials didn’t grow up with the cyber resources that are so present these days. They can’t legislate properly without industry engagement to secure those technologies.

Lastly, I worry about the number of questionable, overpromising buzzwords companies use that sound great to an executive but fail to provide the protection they claim against the constantly shifting threat of cyber threat actors. Many new startups and security consulting firms are popping up doing great work. Others take advantage of the growth and demand for cybersecurity skills prioritizing profit over security. I’m not saying anyone needs to work for free. Still, when data breaches and compromises at one entity have such strong ripple effects on other organizations, they weaken the wider community. Beyond possibly advocating for standards and regulation, we can address this by being open and honest with our colleagues in the community. If you experience objective underperformance or questionable behavior by a vendor or provider, share that with your peers. Collective understanding and demanding better from providers allows us to strengthen the industry and produce better products and services.

Looking ahead to the near future, are there critical threats on the horizon that you think companies need to start preparing for? Can you explain?

Even though many threats are on the horizon, a couple stand out to me. First, hyper-realistic misinformation and disinformation campaigns target organizations, investors, and customers. With advances in machine learning and AI-generated content, particularly videos involving synthetic media, hostile actors can spread damaging stories about an organization that can lead to financial pressure. This could take the form of consumer boycotts or even violence from lone wolves of fringe ideologies. If an organization doesn’t have the means to identify and respond to this risk scenario, it will struggle to react if the threat becomes real.

Another current and growing threat involves attacks on multi-factor authentication. The “Oktapus” phishing attacks are an example. This large-scale campaign targeted Twilio, Okta, and other companies to receive text messages containing links to phishing sites that mimicked the Okta authentication page of their organization, which harvested Okta credentials and two-factor authentication (2-FA) codes. Many companies and vendors are using less secure second factors like SMS OTP or have likely not educated their users about hackers targeting their traditional credentials, such as username and password, and their second-factor authentication. Even though these security measures are better than nothing, companies must move away from these weaker second factors and adopt social engineering-resistant solutions such as hardware tokens and WebAuthn. Many companies, even major organizations that likely know better, still use these less secure mechanisms. Most companies are just lucky because there are still plenty of non-MFA-enabled accounts. Because of that, attackers haven’t had to switch to targeting MFA-enabled accounts for many attacks.

Can you share a story from your experience about a cybersecurity breach that you helped fix or stop? What were the main takeaways from that story?

I haven’t explicitly been part of responding to a cybersecurity breach, but I can speak to having potentially prevented some. My primary role involves mitigating domains used by cybercriminals and cyber attackers to victimize individuals and organizations. As part of that role, I am frequently in contact with the private sector, law enforcement, and national security colleagues. In some instances, I’ve received direct, timely intelligence regarding domain names registered specifically to target employees of organizations of interest to particular nation-states. I evaluate and neutralize the domains so they can’t be used in spear phishing attacks. My main takeaway from this story, which is true for so much of cybersecurity, is that networking with peers and colleagues across the space is essential. We only have visibility into a slice of what is happening online. Identity Digital has a robust domain abuse mitigation program. Yet, our partners often bring items we don’t see to our attention. This is because of their specialized focus on a particular threat actor. Collaboration is key to a more robust defense; no organization is an island.

As you know, breaches or hacks can occur even for those who are best prepared, and no one will be aware of it for a while. Are there 3 or 4 signs that a layperson can see or look for that might indicate that something might be amiss?

This is so true; IBM released a finding that in 2022 it is taking almost nine months to identify and contain a breach, so there’s an excellent chance someone other than the company may notice first. For the layperson, a breach identification can be challenging because they need to determine whether it is isolated (i.e., the user’s account was compromised) or organization-wide. However, it is doable if you’re attentive to details. One way is to use available services that check for compromised assets in data dumps. Many identity protection services offer some form of monitoring. But other free options, such as ‘Have I Been Pwned,’ can give individuals some insight into whether their credentials were posted following a breach. An average user may also discover a violation if they notice strange account activity. This can include more serious actions like unauthorized purchases or more subtle things like outgoing messages you didn’t send. Alternatively, if the individual is getting spammed with account notifications, particularly if they have MFA enabled, there is likely something amiss. It might be just that their account was compromised, but if they use a long, strong, unique passphrase, that may be unlikely, short of a data breach.

After a company is made aware of a data or security breach, what are the most important things they should do to protect themselves further, as well as protect their customers?

Companies aware of a breach should initiate their incident-response playbooks, which should include plans for involving legal and public relations personnel. The organization should try to understand what they are dealing with and avoid making incomplete assessments or downplaying the incidents. This could muddy the waters as customers and observers follow the event. If appropriate, working with law enforcement can bring additional support and resources and should be considered for critical infrastructure. One key element that helps protect customers is being clear about what is happening and what steps have been taken to secure their data. When you leave your customers in the dark or provide unclear updates about what has been done, you leave them more susceptible to scams and attackers looking to exploit your already painful situation. An example of this was the Equifax breach, and their eventual site to allow users to check if they were impacted spawned multiple phishing campaigns and scams because the messaging wasn’t unified.

What are the most common data security and cybersecurity mistakes you have seen companies make? What are the essential steps that companies should take to avoid or correct those errors?

One of the most common mistakes is for companies to have a false sense of security with only one security tool or feature deployed. There’s a lot of “fire and forget” regarding cybersecurity efforts, and the reality couldn’t be further from the truth. The DMARC Record a company implemented doesn’t stop criminals from spoofing its domain to customers if it has the policy configuration set to “none.” And that fancy threat-intelligence platform purchased isn’t automatically “Mission Accomplished” once deployed; it requires ongoing maintenance and tweaking. Threat actors are constantly updating their approaches, poking and prodding our defenses. This means companies need to actively maintain their defenses. One way to avoid this mistake is to ask a few questions about anything you’re doing for cybersecurity:

What are we seeking to protect against with this?
Is that happening with how we are currently using it?
What is it *not* providing us with?

By asking these questions, a company can at least understand current cybersecurity maturity to determine wether that’s acceptable to its risk appetite or if it may need to invest in additional measures.

What are the “myths” that you would like to dispel about working in the cybersecurity industry? Can you explain what you mean?

The biggest myth is having to be super technical to get into cybersecurity. If you want to eventually get a technical cybersecurity role, there are plenty of resources to skill up for it. But many non-technical roles are also offered. Training is available in cybersecurity policy, standards and auditing, security awareness, and more. Understanding the technical elements to some degree is a boon, but you don’t necessarily need to understand how to exploit vulnerabilities or reverse malware to get into cybersecurity. If you look at all the options on CISA’s NICCS career pathway tool, you see how diverse the options are.

Thank you for all of this. Here is the main question of our discussion. What are your “Five Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In The Cybersecurity Industry?

First, there’s no one way to have a successful career in the cybersecurity industry because everyone’s journey is different. With that in mind, these five things helped drive my success as well as others in the community:

Don’t be afraid to fail. A career in cybersecurity is about constantly encountering new and challenging problems, which almost inevitably results in some failures. If you are not willing to make and learn from mistakes, a career in cybersecurity may be a struggle. We learn so much from failure. At the start of my career, I had never written corporate policies nor used the NIST CyberSecurity Framework. Still, I took on the challenge, making some mistakes along the way, and ultimately succeeded.
Next, make time to give back to the community. Even if you feel you don’t have anything to contribute, someone can always benefit. Many people who have risen in the community are willing to take that chance and share what they know to help others. This contribution can come in many ways. For example, mentoring those new to the space, giving a talk, participating in a panel discussion, or reviewing résumés. These roles present an opportunity to grow and strengthen your knowledge. I’ve been fortunate enough to talk about my career and experience in cybersecurity with colleagues and youth groups. The benefits always outweigh the work put in.
Find your passion in the industry and master it. There are so many paths in cybersecurity it is impossible to master everything. Every job has a less enjoyable aspect. Still, strive to find a cybersecurity area that satisfies you. Once you find that, learn everything you can and moderate levels of understanding on related topics. Going to one extreme or the other, deep specialization or shallow jack-of-all-trades, can place obstacles in your growth trajectory. For many years, I wore all hats, but as the team grew, I could find what I really enjoyed, cybercrime investigations, and focus on investigating and disrupting those operations.
Find your tribe and your mentors. Cybersecurity is a team sport in every operation. Whether you are part of a team with dozens of teammates or a single staffer in a small startup, your success depends on working with others. Having peers that support and guide you can be invaluable, particularly if they have more experience. I am so thankful to the friends I’ve made by participating in industry groups like the Anti-Phishing Working Group and public-private partnerships like the NCFTA; it’s produced some amazing opportunities that led to unexpected discussions and collaboration.
Build a reputation of transparency, reliability, and integrity. The cybersecurity industry is one giant community with some subgroups, but there’s so much intermixing you can’t pretend to be someone you are not and expect nobody to find out. Be transparent in your intentions in interactions. Demonstrate being reliable and recognize when you won’t be able to deliver. Operate with integrity even when nobody seems to be watching. Someone almost always is. A former professor told our class the worst thing someone could do to risk a peer’s chances of getting into the intelligence community was to portray them as untrustworthy. I know of vendors passed over and collaborations that never materialized because one party had ethical, integrity-related concerns about a member of the other party. People talk up those who represent the best of our industry and share warnings about those who tarnish it.

And I can only pick one? That’s an exclusive brunch when there are so many people doing fantastic work I’d love to meet. But if the rules say I can only pick one, I will go with Jen Easterly, the current Director of CISA. She’s been amazing since she stepped into the role, continuing a lot of the great work Chris Krebs had begun and strengthening our critical infrastructure. Looking at her background and how she handles incredibly important and challenging tasks, I believe it would be an insightful conversation. Plus, she seems very genuine, which makes talking over a meal more enjoyable. It’d be particularly appealing because, being in the domain name space, we play such a critical role in the operation of the internet; I find myself feeling an affinity with CISA and many of the more “traditional” critical infrastructure sectors that people think about.

Thank you so much for these excellent stories and insights. We wish you continued success in your great work!

Alexander Falatovich Of Identity Digital On Five Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Miranda Jiggins Of Total Boss Wealth & Wellness On 5 Things You Need To Know To Successfully Scale…

Miranda Jiggins Of Total Boss Wealth & Wellness On 5 Things You Need To Know To Successfully Scale Your Business

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Boundaries! Very necessary. In the past, I had no idea what a boundary even was. Lol. They are your “rules”that everyone in your circle must follow. No time disrespect, no negative energy and no dumping are great examples of boundaries — especially the no time disrespect boundary. Just being aware is a great place to start with the boundaries!

Miranda Jiggins is a very high energy and passionate business owner, coach, bestselling author and event host. She has been fully running her business since 2019, and absolutely loves helping others embrace their true, deepest desires, and make those desires become a reality, plus so much more! Miranda and her cat, Mr. Whiskers, live in Ohio and will be relocating to Texas in January.

Thank you for joining us in this interview series. Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’?

Hi! Thank you so much for having me — I am so excited to be here! Hmmm .. where to begin! Well, I started my business in 2018, and became fully self employed in 2019. My very first mentor, Betsy McNally, helped me get started in the fitness industry with my first business — my fitness business! I started taking a few clients on the side, and it eventually grew where I was able to leave my car sales job, and run my biz full time.

January of 2021 I had my rock bottom moment. I have had a few “significant” moments in my life, however, January 2021 was THE one that changed everything. After hiring my current coach, Stacy Raske, doing a bunch of inner work, completely re inventing myself as a person and pivoting my business, I came out of that difficult situation stronger than ever! I launched a business coaching side to my business, my Total Boss Wealth & Wellness brand, and I launched four total boss events for high performers — three yearly national events and one international.

have scaled my business twice in one and a half years, and am preparing for a 3rd scale first quarter of 2023. If I can come out of a very mentally challenging situation stronger than ever, anyone can! You just have to REALLY dig deep, be your authentic self, be brave, and the rest will fall into place. I also love all animals, reading and bodybuilding!

You’ve had a remarkable career journey. Can you highlight a key decision in your career that helped you get to where you are today?

Yes! My rock bottom moment — January of 2021. During that time, I thought my entire world was collapsing. I seriously thought I was going to be stuck forever and there was no way out. That is the most scary, frustrating, annoying and undesirable feeling. However, now that I am on the other side, with the help of my coach, Stacy, and my business owner mastermind group, Apex, I am extremely grateful for that moment, as I truly would not be where I am today without it. Everything happens for a reason, even if we aren’t seeing it at the moment — I fully believe that with all of my heart.

What’s the most impactful initiative you’ve led that you’re particularly proud of?

My line of Total Boss Wealth & Wellness events! I launched these events on a whim, because I ran all of my bank accounts to $0 (that happens in the entrepreneur world), and needed to do something in order to make a payment. Lol.

I never dreamed that due to the above circumstance, my events would be where they are today, AND the impact they are making. I am so privileged to provide so many people with the opportunity to speak on stage and make their dreams come true, plus, the responses I get from event attendees — they tell me that they go home so inspired, and have made massive personal and professional shifts afterwards. The most rewarding feedback on the planet — I am just so grateful!

Sometimes our mistakes can be our greatest teachers. Can you share a mistake you’ve made and the lesson you took away from it?

The biggest mistake I have made — keeping people in my life (could be a team member, client, friend or family) who are no longer aligned. This has been the hardest thing for me. I want to help everyone succeed, and one of my gifts is seeing the potential in others. However, sometimes if a person isn’t a positive influence in your life, or isn’t progressing, it may be time to gently part ways. I have been told this by my coaches for years, but, truly did not start living this practice until one year ago. My biz and others around me have elevated significantly faster without people who may no longer be aligned. Extremely difficult, but necessary.

How has mentorship played a role in your career, whether receiving mentorship or offering it to others?

YES, 100%! I believe mentorship is extremely necessary. I have invested thousands of dollars into my coaching, plus I am a coach to others — it is very needed in order to grow personally and professionally. The most rewarding is definitely being a mentor to others. Generally, we mentor people who are just like our “old selves”. It is so fulfilling for me to help someone out of their shell, embrace their true selves, and get to work on their deepest desires that they have had for so long — and watch those desires come to life! I am smiling as I am typing that — it is the best. It also helps me reflect and grow, which allows myself to serve others at my highest self!

Developing your leadership style takes time and practice. Who do you model your leadership style after? What are some key character traits you try to emulate?

Leadership styles definitely take time — my current leadership style is very different from my past leadership style. I feel as if my leadership style is a mix between my coach’s plus my own. I have learned things from my coach, and have put my own twist on them! You also learn and develop as you go!

I try to emulate a “balance” between “masculine” energy and “feminine” energy. I feel as a female entrepreneur, there is a time and place for everything. I am HUGE for fairness between EVERYONE — clients, team members, event attendees, etc. Additionally, boundaries are huge — they are the necessary foundation / secret sauce to both leadership and growth.

Absolutely!

In my opinion, in order to successfully scale:

Leveling up personally. I really had to work on myself, before my business grew. It sounds backwards (the “generic” way is to “work harder” — that is false. You MUST grow personally in order for your business to grow. For example, having a routine, breaking bad habits, working on a scarcity vs abundance mentality, boundaries, etc.
“On” the business time vs “In” the business. This was huge for me — I used to work 80–100 hours per week “in” the biz, and I didn’t take a day off for 4.5 years. That is crazy! It took one year, but I decreased that to 12–15 hours per week “in” the biz time, the rest “on”, and my business instantly scaled — we will hit 6 figures this year. On vs in is key!
Your network is your net worth. I have made a point to be around / invest into being in rooms with very established business owners / founders / entrepreneurs. There is a mindset shift that is needed when you are scaling, and being around others who have done the same thing has made a huge difference.
Delegating or eliminating / automating $10 / hour tasks. How you spend your TIME is critical — money is a renewable resource, time is not. In order to scale, I had to take a look at how I was spending my time and make some major shifts.
Boundaries! Very necessary. In the past, I had no idea what a boundary even was. Lol. They are your “rules”that everyone in your circle must follow. No time disrespect, no negative energy and no dumping are great examples of boundaries — especially the no time disrespect boundary. Just being aware is a great place to start with the boundaries!

Can you share a few of the mistakes that companies make when they try to scale a business? What would you suggest to address those errors?

The top mistake I see when companies try to scale is not being flexible with the path / direction in order to reach the end goal. It has been my goal to reach 6 figures for my business, however, it took way more than just fitness coaching in order to do that. If I never listened to my intuition / decided to launch other things, I never would have reached my goal. I always say — keep the goal the same, however, be flexible and open with the path it takes to get there!

In order to work on flexibility in your path (I feel as if this is very difficult for most), you have to fully trust yourself. It also helps to create a “fears map”, and create an action plan if a fear while on this new path comes to life. It REALLY helps with confidence while taking new steps into new territory! Most of the time, your new path turns out way better than you could have imagined. You just have to trust yourself and the process!

Scaling includes bringing new people into the organization. How can a company preserve its company culture and ethos when new people are brought in?

Culture is everything!! Formulating your hiring questions off of your culture. For example, if team bonding night outs are a part of your culture, asking your applicant if that type of idea lights them up! Also, having your mission statement and core values posted everywhere. Whenever a new person comes into our ecosystem, whether they are a client or team member, I immediately send them the core values and mission statement sheet! Most importantly, as a leader, it is our job to lead / be an example of our culture at all times.

Many times, a key aspect of scaling your business is scaling your team’s knowledge and internal procedures. What tools or techniques have helped your teams be successful at scaling internally?

Communication and making sure your team is comfortable, and understands why you are doing things is key with internal scale! For some people, growth / change can be scary. However, if everyone is on the same page and understands why some things are in a pivot, then the team success rates should be much higher! Group huddles, weekly team “kick off” meetings, and team member appreciation gifts / prizes are all amazing tools!

What software or tools do you recommend to help onboard new hires?

SOPs! SOPs are the #1 tool — they stand for systems, operations and processes. Whenever I implement something new, and assign it to my VA, I ask him to create an SOP for the task while he is doing it. Then, the SOP is created and stored, so, the steps are written out for the next person. A lifesaver!

Love this! I believe a movement of “celebrating your wins and growth” would be amazing. In my opinion and my experience, people are so hard on themselves — especially us high performers, we are our own worst critics, by far. When we take time and give ourselves permission to celebrate our wins, even if they are “smaller”, it makes us feel accomplished, in a great mood, and therefore are able to be creative and get more tasks done! Most importantly, the more light we see in ourselves, the more light we see in others — that is the best part.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Find me on Facebook or LinkedIn! Miranda Jiggins

This was truly meaningful! Thank you so much for your time and for sharing your expertise!

Miranda Jiggins Of Total Boss Wealth & Wellness On 5 Things You Need To Know To Successfully Scale… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Makers of The Metaverse: Omar Gull Of Race Kingdom On The Future Of The VR, AR & Mixed Reality…

Makers of The Metaverse: Omar Gull Of Race Kingdom On The Future Of The VR, AR & Mixed Reality Industries

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Since the industry is new and technology is disruptive, it is crucial to surround yourself with people who share the same passion for the field. Whether you are an entrepreneur or work for a company or startup, there are constant obstacles that you have to overcome. Hence it is crucial to have a clear goal and unshakable vision to keep building daily.

Omar Gull is a blockchain entrepreneur and award-winning marketing professional. Omar is the founder and CEO of Metaverse game Race Kingdom (https://racekingdom.io). He is an engineer and entrepreneur specializing in blockchain, cryptocurrency, real estate and marketing.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit. Can you tell us a bit about your backstory and how you grew up?

I was born and raised in Jammu & Kashmir, India. My father is an Engineer and that inspired me to pursue an education and career in that field. My engineering degree has helped me in developing strong analytical ability and, at the same time, a deeper understanding of other business verticals. However, working miles away from civilization and people was not for me. So I pursued a Masters in Communication, launched my career as a marketing professional and entered consulting followed by real estate. Post an exciting real estate stint in India, I moved to Dubai and led the sales for Emaar and Damac properties — the largest developers in the Middle East. I had the opportunity to lead sales & marketing for a USD 1.5 billion international business vertical spread across 8 countries. I have always been an advocate of the use of technology and spearheaded many transformational initiatives that led to millions in sales. I recently started my journey as a blockchain entrepreneur in the GameFi space.

Is there a particular book, film, or podcast that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

I have taken a film-making course where I learnt to detach from the movies and books emotionally. So I don’t spend much time watching movies or reading books. However, I do enjoy reading biographies. Recent favourite is Shoe Dog by Phil Knight.

Is there a particular story that inspired you to pursue a career in the X Reality industry? We’d love to hear it.

Everyone building and scaling a million-dollar company in the metaverse is inspiring. That is the appeal and advantage of startups in general, they are scalable as they are technology-based. I am also fascinated by the merger of the virtual and real worlds. Whether in fashion, gaming, real estate, education or even medicine.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began this fascinating career?

If you have ever played any Web3 game, you know how complicated it is to start playing it as you have to go through several platforms, get NFTs separately in a marketplace, connect wallets, etc. On the one hand, most Web3 games have complex concepts, even the simplest ones. On the other hand, there is a vast camel racing market which is untapped. So the idea of Race Kingdom came to me — a metaverse camel racing game with a simplified concept and onboarding process. Our team is working on building the Netflix of Web3 gaming.

We have already launched our token $ATOZ which is performing strongly despite the bear market. Our latest development is camel NFTs. As we are the first camel racing game in the metaverse, you check them for yourself: https://racekingdom.io/nfts/. We also won the Best Utility NFT 2022 Award by Gulf News.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

Not sure if it is the funniest, but the biggest lesson I learnt was to understand the game mechanics. Gaming devices have the data loaded on the disk, so you cannot create heavy graphics. Technology is behind the vision. Hence, we must match current devices’ capabilities while developing metaverse-based games.

It is Jeetu Kataria, the co-founder and CEO of DIFX — Digital Financial Exchange. DIFX is our strategic partner supporting us tremendously and sharing its resources generously. We wouldn’t be where we are without DIFX’s support. Recent events show that an exchange must be safe and not lend the customers’ money to third parties. That’s why I trust DIFX, a fully insured cross-asset platform that uses FireBlocks as a custodian. Sharing values, ethics and business approach helps build sustainable Web3 projects.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

We are working on the mental health supporting metaverse game. There are 14 negative emotions, and the game helps to cope with them in a seamless and fun way. Of course, it is not a substitute for medical treatment but definitely a tool to prevent people from going into the rabbit hole of negative emotions.

Metaverse-based games coming on Apple store and Google play. That will increase the customer reach exponentially and ensure mass adoption.
Metaverse use for education. This technology can make learning a next-level, immersive experience.
Conventional game developers like Esports and PSP going into the metaverse. That would make the industry grow faster. It could even escalate the development of soft and hardware for the metaverse.

What are the 3 things that concern you about the VR, AR and MR industries? Can you explain? What can be done to address those concerns?

I would highlight one, but the most important one, in my opinion. The gaming engine is not advanced. Hence, most games are boring unless they are in arcades. People have beautiful game concepts that cannot be executed, which causes trust damage. The lack of experienced resources makes scaling up very difficult and expensive.

I think the entertainment aspects of VR, AR and MR are apparent. Can you share with our readers how these industries can help us at work?

Technology has yet to be as advanced to help us at work. Good use of VR could be providing an immersive environment for remote work, collaboration, training, as well as efficient product development. Also, testing or building new products can be done in various physical scenarios without wasting actual physical resources. For example, one of the pillars of the Dubai Metaverse Strategy unveiled recently by Sheikh Hamdan aims to create digital twins, a virtual representation of an object or system. It is applicable in real estate; you can design and model in the metaverse before bringing the vision into reality.

Are there other ways that VR, AR and MR can improve our lives? Can you explain?

Definitely healthcare and education. Once technology is advanced, it will cause a revolution. Some benefits of telemedicine include better access to care and lower travel expenses, especially in rural areas.

What are the “myths” that you would like to dispel about working in your industry? Can you explain what you mean?

I would dispel the most crucial “myth” of P2E being unsustainable.

Sustainability depends on how tokenomics and gameplay are designed. For us [Race Kingdom] it was the primary goal to build a feasible business model. Moreover, the DAO system will allow active players and community members to initiate, discuss and vote on different segments of game development. Compared to some competitors, our tokenomics is independent of the vicious cycle of continuously enticing new players. Our game is self-sustaining through community members earning and spending through in-game revenue channels.

Also, when online games first emerged, people were sceptical too. Then it was the same with free-to-play, which drew scepticism. People thought it was not sustainable. People also thought mobile games were low-grade. But look where mobile gaming is now.

That’s the trajectory we see with metaverse games. At the beginning of any innovation, people always complain and don’t understand the benefits, but slowly with more success and better games proving the concept, there’s an inevitable transition.

What are your “5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career In The VR, AR or MR Industries?”

For most people, AR & VR were probably introduced to them through games & products like Pokemon Go and the Oculus headsets. This technology is still in its early stages, with new developments coming out regularly. Thus, learning at this initial stage of development will be crucial in developing a successful career in this field. Here are my outtakes:

Knowledge is key

With so many innovations and developments coming out, it’s essential to stay up to date with the latest technologies and software that are the building blocks of VR, AR and the Metaverse. Even as simple as following the topic on social media, attending webinars and conferences will help you understand the latest trends within the industry.

2. Know your software

The software side will require experience with 3D modelling and design software, integrated development environments, and programming languages such as .NET and C#. Furthermore, graphics programming and even game development are valuable skills to have.

Even if you are only interested in the business side of things, you still need to grasp the basics of this software to explain to your audience and potential investors the utility and process of development.

3. Develop Experience

It’s important to stay curious and open-minded. Immersive tools and techniques are no longer confined to game studios. These skills can now be applied to numerous industries, including real-estate, automotive, events, marketing, and film. So don’t hesitate to build your experience in various fields to get a broader understanding of how this technology is used in a practical setting.

4. Join the larger online community

The industry is still small and pretty contained, so don’t hesitate to contact companies or individuals whose work you admire. If they can’t offer a job, perhaps they can provide advice. Joining groups on professional social networks can also be beneficial as you can network and meet colleagues or even future employers.

5. Build your own circle

Since the industry is new and technology is disruptive, it is crucial to surround yourself with people who share the same passion for the field. Whether you are an entrepreneur or work for a company or startup, there are constant obstacles that you have to overcome. Hence it is crucial to have a clear goal and unshakable vision to keep building daily.

I strongly believe in the power of education and that it is the best way to get out of most troubles. So, if I could inspire a movement it would be around education.

It is Donald Trump, one of the most successful businessmen. He defied the odds to beat Hilary Clinton. His campaign’s cost-per-vote acquisition was much lower than Hilary Clinton’s. Also, during his era, there were no wars…

Thank you so much for these excellent stories and insights. We wish you continued success in your great work!

Makers of The Metaverse: Omar Gull Of Race Kingdom On The Future Of The VR, AR & Mixed Reality… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Meet The Disruptors: Adam McMullin of AvaSure On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Innovation is invention at scale. To accomplish things at scale, your organization needs to be aligned and have everyone rowing in the same direction.

As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Adam McMullin.

Adam McMullin is the CEO of AvaSure, a pioneer and market leader in acute virtual care and patient safety monitoring, helping a thousand hospitals and health systems large and small create safer environments for patients, families and caregivers. A proven leader in healthcare technology for more than 15 years, McMullin most recently served as CEO at FDS, Inc., a leading provider of pharmacy software solutions. Prior to that, he was CEO at Voalte, a provider of clinical communications technology for healthcare systems. McMullin was also a senior executive at Hillrom, where he delivered innovative solutions to support clinical workflows and improve patient safety. He began his career at IBM, working in consulting, strategy, marketing and sales.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

Staffing shortages, financial pressures and something called the experience-complexity gap — which is when experienced nurses who retire are replaced by new and relatively inexperienced nurses — are motivating hospitals to explore technologies that enable more efficient and better care.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, providers and patients became accustomed to the convenience and flexibility of virtual care. As a result, interest in virtual care for health systems has never been higher. For the first time, health systems are seriously looking at how many jobs can be redesigned to be more efficient and effective by integrating virtual and in-person resources.

AvaSure provides scalable virtual care solutions with deep analytics combined with deep clinical change management and support so our customers can improve patient care while controlling costs more efficiently.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

When I was younger and in my first leadership role, I was so focused on trying to do things correctly that I was viewed as sort of mechanical. During town hall meetings, the sales leader would honor anyone who helped with anything customer related. He’d write their name on all these footballs and then throw them out into the audience.

At the very end of one sales meeting, he announced, “We have a special award for our CEO, who I know is passionate about the business, but always a little tight. So, I got him a can of WD-40 with his name on it to help remind him to stay loose.” That message has always stayed with me.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

When I first got into healthcare, a couple of mentors that were pretty impactful for me were Melissa Fitzpatrick and Mike Gallup.

Melissa is the former chief nurse officer for Duke. She took me under her wing and made it her job to help me understand how clinical care is delivered and the importance of bridging the gap between the IT world and the clinical world. She really helped me understand what it was like to walk in the shoes of the nurses we serve every day.

From Mike I learned about not accepting the status quo and executing with speed. Mike is the kind of person that if you have a problem and you’re choosing between option A and option B, he always looks for option C. He steps back from problems versus simply accepting the status quo and comes up with newer and better options. Do not be constrained by the resources you think you have, find the right answer, and then find the resources. That’s what I learned from Mike.

One of the things that’s so important about humanity is that we’re always striving to get better. If we become complacent because something has stood the test of time, then we’d miss opportunities to find new solutions and keep improving.

Take nursing, for example. They’ve had a bedside model that’s worked reasonably well for decades until the nursing shortage happened. While that shortage undeniably has created challenges, it also spurred innovative efforts to ensure nurses are working at the top of their license to avoid burnout. And now we have found a way to address the nursing shortage using our TeleSitter® and TeleNurse™ solutions. I just don’t see the negative side of disruption.

Can you share five of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

The five best words are: alignment, communication, transparency, humility and execution.

Innovation is invention at scale. To accomplish things at scale, your organization needs to be aligned and have everyone rowing in the same direction.

That won’t happen, however, unless an organization’s leaders are able to clearly articulate a vision and strategy. Being able to succinctly communicate a long-term vision is critical for sustainable success.

A big part of communication is transparency around what’s working and what’s not working. Employees respect and appreciate honesty. Transparency breeds trust, which in turn engenders loyalty. In organizations where workers respect and trust leaders and buy into the collective mission, “quiet quitting” isn’t a problem.

People also respect humility and the ability of leaders to admit mistakes. This self-awareness and willingness to acknowledge when something isn’t working is essential to making sound decisions. Conversely, hubris inevitably leads to miscalculation and disaster.

Finally, urgent execution is critical to success in healthcare. You have to be evolving and moving the ball forward constantly to meet the needs of patients while operating the business side efficiently. A huge part of execution is scalability and flexibility. We saw during the pandemic how many provider organizations were able to leverage virtual care technology almost overnight to continue treating patients, while those providers who couldn’t saw a sharp drop in revenue.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

We plan to use machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) in a practical way to automate more things in the care environment, to have a second set of computer eyes on the room, and to improve the delivery of care. Do we know if a patient is about to get out of bed and they’re a falls risk? Do we know if an IV bag needs to be replaced? Has the patient been visited recently? There are some practical things we can do with AI that will allow better care to be delivered more efficiently.

Is there a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?

My mother was born in London during World War II and my grandfather served, so the leadership during WWII has always fascinated me. I have read many books about Winston Churchill, most recently “The Splendid and the Vile.”

What I found most interesting is that you realize even though Churchill was projecting confidence to the public and his aides, he was just like everyone else during the war who was feeling the stress and depression. Everyone had to get out of bed each morning and put on their pants the same way. When we lionize people, it makes them seem different from us. This book really kind of humanized Churchill for me.

No matter how hard something seems in my life, I always reflect on the fact that others have had to lead through much more difficult times. Thus, we owe it to our teams, customers and stakeholders to step up and bring our A-game.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

I’m not really a quote person, but I do try to make sure I pull out the best from every situation, whether positive or negative, to see how I can be a better person and a better leader for those around me.

If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

Our technology solution is currently in the top 10 health systems in the U.S. and in 1,000+ hospitals in United States and Canada. We want to bring more virtual care and AI care to more people across the globe. We need to make virtual nursing a global practice so that nurses can practice at the top of their license.

How can our readers follow you online?

Follow me on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adampmcmullin/

and https://www.linkedin.com/company/avasurellc/posts/?feedView=all

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Meet The Disruptors: Adam McMullin of AvaSure On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

The Future Is Now: Miles Parry On How Their Technological Innovation Will Shake Up The Tech Scene

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Always remember that everyone is just as important as one another. We just have different roles and responsibilities. Everyone on the team has the same objective to succeed, no one is too senior to roll up their sleeves and get their hands dirty.

As a part of our series about cutting-edge technological breakthroughs, I had the pleasure of interviewing Miles Parry.

Miles Parry, Co-Founder and CEO of MPCH Labs, has extensive experience building highly secure solutions to protect sensitive data and assets. Miles has worked as a trusted consultant for a variety of government organizations, such as the Ministry of Defense, the Financial Conduct Authority, and the Foreign Commonwealth Officer. Before MPCH, Miles founded and built Vo1t (now Genesis), a high-security service that safeguards valuable digital assets trusted by some of the world’s largest companies. At MPCH, Miles is focused on delivering military-grade security infrastructure and cryptographically approved business process management across economic sectors.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit about you. Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?

My background began in consulting for governments specializing in physical and cyber intelligence and security. I have an affinity for new technologies and I like to think outside of the box. When I discovered Bitcoin in 2011, I began mining Bitcoin in my mother’s basement- which is an electricity bill I still haven’t paid her back for. I entered the space very early and since then have been an angel investor and advisor for layer 1s and 2s. From 2015–2020 I founded and ran Vo1t, a secure cold storage custodian that was acquired by DCG. It eventually became Genesis Custody, which is one of the largest crypto custodians in the world. I became the global Managing Director of Custody at Genesis.

All accounted for, I have gone from shaking the tin for change for a small start-up, to be a well-regarded start-up company, to one of the most dominant crypto custodians in the world. During this process, I witnessed the maturity of our industry and developed an understanding of new-world technological advancements. I saw a lot of start-ups devoting energy and resources to fixing individual bits and pieces of the industry, but there was a problem: they weren’t thinking outside the box to address the underlying problem of how to actually harness the benefits of MPC. And this is the origin of MPCH Labs. MPC is not actually a technology, it’s a concept. People have taken this concept and made their own iterations of technology. Essentially, I witnessed other companies shoe-horn MPC tech into crypto wallets, cutting corners to enable speed to market, to subsequently capitalise on market hype. This application is cryptographically centered around a private key which means these developers have to change iterations to support new assets, which results in a continuous change of their production environment. This creates massive problems at scale. MPCH Labs applies a singular method of authentication on wallet approval which enables the largest institutions to utilize our service at scale. The MPC6 engine enables authentication and authorization capabilities cryptographically bound by 6 layers, allowing us to be adopted by multiple industries with different use cases. Our first product is Fraction, a secure wallet not just for crypto, but all digital assets as a whole. We listened to the market and digested all the lessons learned. We know what the traditional markets want, we know what the new age markets want, and we have built functionalities for both. We are using recognised and certified technologies and hardware such as HSMs to ensure the likes of governments, financial institutions, military, etc. can utilise the MPC6 engine for multiple applications.

We also recognise the importance of compliance and are therefore in process of being properly audited so that the MPC6 engine can scale and support institutional adoption.

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?

Technically you want these moments to be rooted in success stories, but this one meeting was a bit of a disaster. There was one event where I was sitting with a top-tier bank in front of their senior department heads. Despite how intimidating the environment was, I found it really enjoyable because this particular meeting came with a eureka moment. My co-founder and I were going back and forth explaining variable tools and answering questions when the meeting turned a little sideways. Everyone we were presenting to started speaking over each other and arguing with one another. You had a security manager interrupting an operations manager who had just cut off someone from the innovations team. They were each insisting how our technology could resolve problems they had for years. They were so busy describing how our technology could help their business, my co-founder and I ended up leaving that meeting without achieving the goal of educating the attendees of our product. This was a breakthrough moment for us because it made us realise that the problem space exceeds the financial services industry and expands into multiple problems that can be solved by our engine, hence where MPC6 engine became modular to access multiple industries.

Can you tell us about the cutting-edge technological breakthroughs that you are working on? How do you think that will help people?

We have built our company to be considerate of the product and issues in front of us to ensure we build our solution correctly. The MPC6 engine has 6 layers all built to be modular and cryptographically work together agnostic to an industry. As such, the breakthroughs we experience occur on a weekly basis, and it’s not just one; it’s multiple. We are witnessing new functionalities and capabilities we didn’t even expect where possible. Our eyes continue to be opened to new problems we can resolve across different industries.

How do you think this might change the world?

Did you know the common denominator of all cyber hacks in the world is a breach/failure of the authentication layer? This breach/failure has led to a loss of client data, sensitive information, personal funds, you name it. It’s imperative we have this conversation because authentication is occurring on encrypted calls, logging on to a computer, swiping your pass at the office, and even unlocking a phone; it’s in just about everything in our everyday life. MPC technology can empower governments to have fair processes in voting, it can secure corporate operations, and it can even assist in the adoption of digital money. MPC technology can aid distressed countries that are in need of financial support, prevent large-scale data loss, reinforce cyber defense, and the list goes on. Authentication may be boring, but it’s relevant and important. At MPCH Labs, we seek to support multiple businesses across a variety of industries strategically with better systems.

Keeping “Black Mirror” in mind, can you see any potential drawbacks of this technology that people should think more deeply about?

The common thread in each Black Mirror episode I’ve seen was about technologies governed, monopolized, and controlled by an authority responsible for these devices. We are trying to reinforce the control of the people. We want to mitigate situations where certain corporations, for example, may try to centralize their control. All entrepreneurs in the tech space should be asking themselves how they can steward their technology to the right hands in the right way.

Was there a “tipping point” that led you to this breakthrough? Can you tell us that story?

Through the rigorous process of being an early entrepreneur learning how to raise funds and finding the right tool sets, there were multiple points where I saw different issues within the industry. I’ve seen a lot of companies seek to monopolize and lose touch with their objective. I watched them use their community to increase their position while forgetting where they came from. My journey is replete with learning from the flaws in our industry and we listened to those stories where companies didn’t quite have the pulse on what their customers were looking for. In just having these discussions and explaining the thesis behind MPC6 and Fraction, we’ve had a large number of institutions wishing to become design partners to help us test our initial product. Despite a bear market and the recession, we’ve been fortunate to get endorsed with our most recent raise. Between the outsized interest in companies wanting to be design partners and our Series A raise, these are good indicators we are on the right track. MPCH Labs not only enables us to service other industries, but it also allows us to build out a community of champions that can churn out specialists to adopt our technology and fix flaws in other industries themselves.

What do you need to lead this technology to widespread adoption?

I’m a strong believer in practicing what you preach. We often offer our technology to potential clients and let them see for themselves if our tech can do what we say it can. We are fortunate to have a large pipeline who want to adopt our tech from a variety of disciplines, especially on the blockchain-based asset side. Our prerogative, above a marketing plan, is to show industry players the questions they should be asking themselves and the problems they will face. This all goes back to the foundation of the blockchain community: it’s about a community that looks after one another. We seek to empower other companies with more than just our capabilities. We want to primarily educate them. This is the cycle that leads to adoption.

What have you been doing to publicize this idea? Have you been using any innovative marketing strategies?

We want to be publicized by recommendations; we want to be known for our reputation. We seek to make our marketing not simply about selling others on our tech, but by education. From there we can build and improve. We also try to practice what we preach by testing and utilising decentralized solutions, such as mastodon and mirror.xyz.

First, my wife. Without her, I wouldn’t be able to fly around the world, work late, work early hours, go to data centers, drive across countries and multiple states, or any of it. I wouldn’t be able to achieve anything if I didn’t have my support network at home. She has done and sacrificed so much to enable me to do what I’m doing. She is the most important person in my life. Second, my co-founder Cat Le-Huy. We are yin and yang. He allows me to be like a mad scientist who can think outside the box and use my dyslexia to build these technologies and solutions. He is the one with the enterprise at scale mind. He’s able to bring to life my crazy experience into something that can be accepted and understood. Being a founder is very hard and very lonely, so having that person to keep you level-set when you are pulling your hair out is crucial. The next two are my investors, Emil Woods and Murtaza Akbar who saw promise in myself and Cat. So much more than the financing, they mentored us and shared their wealth of experience in building companies of their own. They supported us through very difficult times and ultimately were invaluable to how we built the structure of our business. I personally see them as my mentors. Without any of these four people/pillars, I wouldn’t be where I am today.

How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?

I am lucky to be the representative of a very strong company of 70 talented individuals. Ultimately, I measure our success by the team’s success. With that being said, what I’m most proud of is the ability to offer these people opportunities. I was not an academically savvy student, given my severe dyslexia. I was told I wasn’t smart throughout the entirety of my schooling. It only took one person to see my promise, Harpreet Johal at the FCA. Harpreet offered me an opportunity to display what I knew and as I did, it changed my life. He nurtured and guided me through my early years, and I’m keen to pay that forward. The best people in our business have been those who just needed one shot to prove how capable they were. These people have changed their own lives; all I did was give them the opportunity to do so. Degrees and certifications are valuable, but it’s a person’s mentality and drive that’s most important.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why?

First is to look past the problem you are trying to solve and find the root issue to solve. The second is to choose your investors carefully. Money is important, but smart money is more valuable. Make your investors work for their next allocation. Third is to surround yourself with people better than you, not just “yes people”. Fourth is to build a strong culture and look after your people. You may be the captain of the ship, but a ship without a crew will inevitably crashes. Finally the fifth, always remember that everyone is just as important as one another. We just have different roles and responsibilities. Everyone on the team has the same objective to succeed, no one is too senior to roll up their sleeves and get their hands dirty. Though these five phrases appear simple, they are quite difficult to practice/maintain, but will pay dividends in the long term.

I would love to tell people that it doesn’t matter if you’ve been kicked out/haven’t done great at school. If you have a great idea and surround yourself with the right people, anything is possible. But be aware, if it were easy, everyone would do it. If you are given an opportunity, you are going to have to be persistent. Only then can you succeed. Lots of people are given opportunities and they shy away because they say they don’t have enough money, don’t know investors, or don’t have a team. I would tell that person to surround themselves with good people who can change that perspective. There’s no such thing as being too late or too early in this process, if you have the right idea and drive to make it happen, it will happen.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

My quote is this: “Why the hell not?” A lot of people have great ideas and they ask themselves why they should follow through on them. I say, why the hell not? If there’s an opportunity, go for it. What if you shake the tree and apples fall? I tell my team this everyday and it’s enabled the mentality that we are the sum of all our parts, not just the Miles and Cat show. If someone has a great idea, why the hell not? Let’s do it.

Some very well-known VCs read this column. If you had 60 seconds to make a pitch to a VC, what would you say? He or she might just see this if we tag them 🙂

MPCH Labs is an industry agnostic, game-changing cryptographic authentication infrastructure that has already revolutionized government, military, and now entering the financial services space. We are aware and have proven this technology has the ability to change all industries. The challenge we face is prioritizing which industry we want to change next. We don’t just want VCs with money, we want VCs who have access to different industries we can enter and resolve issues for. As said before, we like smart money.

How can our readers follow you on social media?

https://twitter.com/mpch_lab

Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.

The Future Is Now: Miles Parry On How Their Technological Innovation Will Shake Up The Tech Scene was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Métier Creative: Nicole Birman, Michelle Varkonyl, Natalie Mathers and Jasmine Motala: Five Things…

Métier Creative: Nicole Birman, Michelle Varkonyl, Natalie Mathers and Jasmine Motala: Five Things You Need To Build A Trusted And Beloved Brand

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Stay true to who you are and what you believe in, and stand for it at every opportunity.

As part of our series about how to create a trusted, believable, and beloved brand, I had the pleasure to Interview Nicole Birman, Michelle Varkonyl, Natalie Mathers and Jasmine Motala.

Nicole Birman, Managing Director at Métier Creative, Michelle Varkonyi Director, Client Services at Métier Creative, Natalie Mathers, Head Of Art at Métier Creative and Jasmine Motala, Associate Director, Strategy.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?

NB: Interestingly, Métier is made up of women that come from different corners of the industry. Our CEO, Erin, is a serial entrepreneur and her experience building Coveteur — telling brands’ stories through the publication’s lens, led her to start Métier — so we could help brands tell stories through their lenses. My background is rooted in fashion and luxury advertising having started my career at a top NY-based fashion agency going on to cut my teeth in-house at Ralph Lauren. Members of Métier bring with them experience from the event & production world, e-comm and digital advertising, architecture and industrial design as well as more traditional advertising agency work.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

NB: There are so many agencies out there and we actually spend quite a bit of time in self-reflection and strategy-mode — especially as we near the end of the year — thinking, planning and plotting for the one to come. When we talk about what makes us different a few key themes come to mind: First and foremost, we are the consumer. We work with brands and take on projects that are relevant and interesting to us; we are the target audience… who better to answer a consumer problem than the people you’re trying to target? Second, we lead with gut and intuition. It can almost feel taboo to say that, amidst the pressure to become more data-centric, but it’s something we take a lot of pride in. Taste isn’t something that can be measured and that ‘skill’ — if you can even call it that — is inherent to how we build our team. Last but certainly not least, we take a ‘Four Seasons’ approach when it comes to our client relationships. We view each relationship as a marriage — with that comes open & candid communication, trust and honesty, and some late night FaceTimes every now and again!

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

MV: Earlier this quarter, we wrapped a project with Maybelline titled Brave Together. It’s their global mental health platform that brings attention and awareness to people’s daily struggle with anxiety and depression. Métier worked with Maybelline’s Global Content team to not only create social-first assets for their platforms to educate people on what to do when faced with anxiety and depression, and specific resources but also to connect with creators all over the world to help them share their stories and experiences in a meaningful way.

Ok let’s now jump to the core part of our interview. In a nutshell, how would you define the difference between brand marketing (branding) and product marketing (advertising)? Can you explain?

JM: Branding is long-term thinking that focuses on building your brand’s world (identity and reputation). Advertising is shorter-term creative that focuses on getting your products/services noticed through culturally relevant stories.

NM: To me, branding is the true, overarching story and identity of the brand. Whereas advertising is all the iterations of that story. If branding is the north star then advertising is all the little stars that surround it.

Can you explain to our readers why it is important to invest resources and energy into building a brand, in addition to the general marketing and advertising efforts?

JM: A brand’s value lives in the perception and power of its consumers. The most successful brands will claim their message in the minds of its audience, and those that resonate will choose you over the rest. You can then bridge perception and reputation to profit and loyalty, which is why investing in brand building is so important for overall, long-term success.

NM: Consumers are (rightfully) full of skepticism. They’ve been bamboozled by flash in the pan advertising before and now they know better. So they question everything. When you invest time into building a rock solid, clear minded brand story you make your brand more believable. The longer and more consistently you live your brand’s truths, the less doubt consumers will have about you.

Can you share 5 strategies that a company should be doing to build a trusted and believable brand? Please tell us a story or example for each.

JM:

Solve real problems and needs of your target audience.
Build against goals promises you can actually deliver on.
Be as clear and concise as possible.
Stay true to who you are and what you believe in, and stand for it at every opportunity.
Create a strong identity that can become instantly recognizable.

In your opinion, what is an example of a company that has done a fantastic job building a believable and beloved brand. What specifically impresses you? What can one do to replicate that?

JM: I’m impressed by brands like Nike, Hermès and Goop because they never stop pushing the boundaries and surprising. They know who they are, what they stand for and what their superpower is — and they consistently prove that every chance they get. Never fearful of upsetting someone and just doing what feels right.

In advertising, one generally measures success by the number of sales. How does one measure the success of a brand building campaign? Is it similar, is it different?

JM: Brand building campaigns are usually measured on community sentiment. I.e. your hero brand message getting across/adopted clearly, shifting mindsets/behaviors, positive word of mouth, social media shares & buzz, or resonating with diverse communities beyond a singular group.

What role does social media play in your branding efforts?

JM: Humanizing your brand and socializing your positioning into stories that resonate with the masses. Social media is one of the best ways to build, understand and get closer with your community and customers on a more personal level.

NM: Social opens up the floor for your brand’s community to speak back to you. It fosters the type of two way conversation that only social can. These conversations can go on to inform how future content and campaigns come to life, grounding them in what the brand’s community really wants from or thinks about them.

NB: Mentorship has always been a central fixture for us. It’s something that Erin has always instilled — we joke that her office is basically a revolving door of youngins who are eager to embark on their own career journeys. We decided that we want to make this ‘open door policy’ — public. We’ll be launching Maison Mentors in early 2023 — a new program unlocking the wide-world of brand building within the spaces of fashion, beauty and lifestyle. As a united house, uplifting new and diverse voices has long been a part of our DNA. Now, we’re bringing together some of the industry’s best to create opportunities for participants to discover their path, build relationships and have impactful conversations that lead to new ways of thinking, dreaming and doing. Stay tuned for launch 👀👀👀

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

NB: “Harmony is the pleasing arrangement of different tones, voices or instruments, not the combination of identical sounds. Creative tension makes beautiful music.” — Adam Grant. Adam is a brilliant organizational psychologist and I follow him for daily nuggets like this one. It’s so highly relevant to what we do at Métier, both internally within our teams and externally with our clients. Some of our best work stems from healthy debate and productive disagreements. When the team or the brand is pushed to reach outside of what’s comfortable, that’s where the magic lies!

We are blessed that very prominent leaders in business and entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world with whom you would like to have a lunch or breakfast with? He or she might just see this, especially if we tag them. 🙂

NB: ADAM GRANT! ^^^

How can our readers follow you on social media?

@metiercreative on Instagram

Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational.

Métier Creative: Nicole Birman, Michelle Varkonyl, Natalie Mathers and Jasmine Motala: Five Things… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Meet The Disruptors: Eldad Postan-Koren Of Winn AI On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your…

Meet The Disruptors: Eldad Postan-Koren Of Winn AI On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

It is all persistence. Holding your emotional situation, keeping on a positive mindset, and keep pushing. Grit is the best tool for entrepreneurs. We got the first yes from investors after 40 told us no. Each No is a knockout you need to raise from- faster, stronger, better.

As a part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Eldad Posten-Korn.

Eldad Posten-Korn, Founder and CEO of Winn.AI, considers entrepreneurship in all fields as part of his DNA.

He was the first COO of DreaMed Diabetes where he built it from the ground up and was responsible for the company’s initial commercialization efforts (Sales, Marketing, Customer service, and CSM). Before helping launch DreaMed, he focused on Value Creation at OurCrowd — a company that enables accredited investors to join top VCs, Angel Investors, and Strategic Partners in accessing fully vetted deals. In addition, he founded two NGOs (Shavot and The Sky is the Limit); served as the Hebrew University Student Union’s Chairman, and is a proud veteran Naval Officer.

Hi, I’m Eldad Posten-Korn, 37, the founder and CEO of Winn.AI, a startup that builds an artificial intelligence-based personal assistant for salespeople. The company has been operating for about a year, raised $17 million as an initial investment, and has 25 employees. For the past decade, I’ve also been an active entrepreneur, and in recent years, together with my heart surgeon wife Roni, we co-founded ‘Shavot’, a non-profit organization for girls’ leadership.

The idea behind Winn.AI came after leading sales at DreaMed Diabetes, where I also started as the first field salesman. The professional pain I experienced firsthand at DreaMed, is the same one we’re solving with Winn.AI today.

Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?

The modern sales workflow is broken. As a leader you’re crafting a ‘sales playbook’, a collection of processes and content to support the ideal sales process, but then your actual salespeople aren’t embracing it. Why should they? The individual salesperson is already investing about a third of their time in following tedious administrative protocols, which they feel are counterproductive on many occasions. Winn.AI’s solution is all about bridging that gap. Our product join’s the sales person in their day-to-day sales meetings, and automatically tracks & captures the meeting minutes, thus enabling the salespeople to focus on their customers and not their keyboards.

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

During the ideation phase, I also “dated” potential co-founders. I remember one of those dates, an hour and a half where I took maybe 10 minutes of talking. I wanted to run away. He generously came with me to the car. I got in a drive as fast as I can out of there.

We all need a little help along the journey. Who has been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?

We were lucky enough to gather some great people around us, and we have some very inspiring advisors and investors. One of our VP Sales angels visited Israel and we were discussing the company name which was Liger back then. He said your bottom line value should be to improve the win rate. This was the moment we decided to change the name to Winn.AI.

Interfering with salespersons in our daily conduct is not good. Adding another system for them to enter, and changing the way they are used to working is a negative type of interference. This is the main reason I built Winn.AI as an augmentation of other existing systems. This will effectively disrupt the sales force where disruption is needed and welcomed.

Can you share five of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.

It is all persistence. Holding your emotional situation, keeping on a positive mindset, and keep pushing. Grit is the best tool for entrepreneurs. We got the first yes from investors after 40 told us no. Each No is a knockout you need to raise from- faster, stronger, better.

We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?

It feels like we’re just getting started. In the coming months, we’re going to add more ecosystems where we see high demand, and next year we’re going to officially launch our free product so that every salesperson on earth could immediately try our product. Our mission is to provide our users with an experience that they’ve never had before, and we feel the huge appetite in the sales market for such a product.

Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you? [Meitar]

Gandhi’s books are all great inspirations for me. I admire his crystal clear view of the world but more than this I appreciate the fact he 100% believed in leading by example. This was his force power.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“Don’t offer help — give help” that’s what my parents taught me at a young age Since then, it has been etched in my mind.

At around the age of seven, a water pipe burst in our house and I just took a mop and started raking. They said, “leave everything is fine”. And I told them, “you taught me that help should be given and not offered.” That is the greatest gift that my mother and father gave me — to have a sense of responsibility, for myself and my environment.

Bridging the gender gap. Actually, I founded this movement called Shavot. Shavot lets girls strengthen their sense of self-worth and provides them with tools that will enable them to fulfill their aspirations.

The nonprofit runs several nationwide programs that encourage girls to develop positive self-esteem and to believe in themselves in the long run. Through meaningful experiences, combining elements of goal-setting, self-feedback, and learning about inspirational women.

With Shavot, participants discover new strengths, aspire to reach higher goals, and achieve them.

How can our readers follow you online?

https://www.linkedin.com/in/eldad-postan/

https://www.facebook.com/eldad.postan

https://twitter.com/EldadPostan

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!

Meet The Disruptors: Eldad Postan-Koren Of Winn AI On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Alison Martin Of Engage Mentoring On How Diversity Can Increase a Company’s Bottom Line

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Companies with a strong diversity program attract the very best talent. Building a diverse workforce will ultimately make your business more appealing to job seekers and existing employees alike, making it easier to attract top talent.

As a part of our series about “How Diversity Can Increase a Company’s Bottom Line”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Alison Martin.

Alison Martin is the Founder and Managing Director of Engage Mentoring, whose mission is to transform workplace cultures by leveraging software that provides access to meaningful relationships.

Sure! I currently run a technology company that created a mentoring software and training program, but my background was actually in nonprofit work and I have a heart for impact. In fact, I had started a nonprofit to provide mentorship opportunities for women and was looking for software to support it. When I didn’t find what we were looking for, I contracted a developer to create a mentoring software and that is how Engage Mentoring was born just over 10 years ago.

Can you share the funniest or most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career? Can you tell us the lesson or take away, you took out of that story?

I exited the traditional workplace more than 10 years ago to start my own company at the age of 34 at what was really the beginning of a promising career as a nonprofit Executive Director for a large voluntary health organization. I don’t know if that is funny or interesting, but for me it required so much courage and the encouragement of a trusted mentor. I am so glad I made the leap.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you tell us a story about how that was relevant in your own life?

Things don’t happen to you, they happen for you. I believe things happen for a reason and you can learn powerful lessons when things don’t go the way as planned. This has been the case many times in my life and my career as I reflect back on it. Growth and learning always happened as a result of things not going according to plan AND those situations were usually shuffling in even greater opportunities. I try to remind myself to look for the lesson in everything.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are?

So many people! I was so fortunate to have met so many incredible people along my journey who saw my leadership potential and poured into me from a mentoring perspective, but I think the first boss who really took me under her wing and gave me the feedback I needed to grow was a woman by the name of Pat. Pat was the type of woman who never pulled any punches and you knew exactly where you stood with her, which wasn’t always a good thing. I learned so much from her about executive presence, speaking confidently, and navigating workplace politics from her and I am so grateful to have had her as a mentor early in my career.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

We stand out in our company values, which are we are smart, adaptable, fun, determined, and passionate about people. This has helped us create a culture of employees with whom those values resonate and I see them carried out every day.

Are you working on any new or exciting projects now? How do you think that might help people?

We are launching a new leadership mentoring program for HR and Diversity professionals. These individuals are so critical to the success of any company and we are thrilled to offer a unique program designed to grow their leadership capacity, meet new people, and build lasting relationships.

How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?

Mentoring programs, by nature, bring goodness to the world by allowing participants a safe space to learn while building a relationship between mentor and mentee, but I am proud to share we give back too. We have developed partnerships with universities and nonprofits which allow us to sponsor college students into our corporate mentoring programs at no cost to the student. It is our way of giving back by impacting the next generation of talent.

1 — Companies far outperform their competition when they are more diverse. In fact, according to McKinsey & Company, the most diverse companies outperform their less diverse peers by 36% in profitability.

2 — Diverse teams are more productive. One study by Gartner revealed that a highly diverse environment can improve team performance by up to 30%.

3 — Having a diverse workforce helps attract a diverse pool of customers. Building a more diverse business, including by improving hiring practices to be more inclusive, as well as by working with diverse suppliers, can help improve a company’s reputation among customers. If businesses want to appeal to a broader customer base, that likely means they will have diverse customers, and it can help to be known as a company that accurately reflects the diversity of those they serve.

4 — Companies with a strong diversity program attract the very best talent. Building a diverse workforce will ultimately make your business more appealing to job seekers and existing employees alike, making it easier to attract top talent.

5 — The more diverse a company is, the more likely they are to retain their talent too. A vital part of the diversity retention requires company leaders to mentor diverse talent. At Engage Mentoring, we believe access to relationships in the form of mentoring is not a “nice to have”, but a critical strategy when looked at through the lens of diversity.

What advice would you give to other business leaders to help their employees to thrive?

Pour into them as a mentor. Get to know them, make time for them, and be willing to share your perspective. Mentoring is a powerful way to shortcut learning and help employees achieve their greatest potential.

What advice would you give to other business leaders about how to manage a large team?

One critical strategy in managing a large team is leveraging peer mentorship. Peer mentorship is an often overlooked strategy, but by aligning members of your team with your top performers in a mentorship capacity, it alleviates the pressure for the leader and helps develop the leadership capacity of your top performers and ensures your team has a mentoring culture — that is, they know how to pour into one another and know how to access the resources they need in order to succeed.

Sara Blakely for sure! I am a huge fan of hers.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

They can connect with me on LinkedIn or visit our website at Engagementoring.com

Thank you for these excellent insights. We wish you continued success in your great work.

Alison Martin Of Engage Mentoring On How Diversity Can Increase a Company’s Bottom Line was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

JT Giri Of nOps On Five Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Startup

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

A Strong Vision and Mission — Startups need to have a clear vision that guides their business decisions and is something that stakeholders can easily understand.

An experienced technologist and serial entrepreneur, JT Giri’s passion is building and managing modern infrastructure solutions that help companies innovate faster. His experience with cloud started with Amazon EC2 in beta in 2006 where he worked with cloud-first, early adopters. He has been doing DevOps for more than 10 years, hands-on as a DevOps consultant, network engineer, systems architect, and sysadmin, helping solve complex operations challenges for Silicon Valley-based startups and enterprises.

He started nClouds in 2012 with a singular focus: empowering customers to deliver innovation faster. Now, nClouds is an award-winning AWS Premier Consulting Partner with deep skills, a long list of credentials , and lots of successful, innovative clients.

He founded nOps to productize the cool cloud management IP they initially created at nClouds to help fast-moving, cloud-native DevOps teams that need instant visibility to changes in their cloud environments.

When I first got into IT, I got a job as a network engineer in a data center. The best part of the job was configuring servers so they could talk to each other; the worst part was cabling and racking servers.

One of my friends told me about Cloud. Amazon had launched a very early version of Cloud. I started learning how to run workloads on Cloud. After a few months, I posted on Craigslist; the post’s title was Cloud Ninja. After that, I started getting Cloud migration gigs, I began migrating companies to the cloud. I was at the right place at the right time when cloud computing became a big thing.

What was the “Aha Moment” that led to the idea for your current company? Can you share that story with us?

My “Aha Moment” came when I noticed how quickly cloud spending continues to grow. It’s easy to provision resources on the cloud, but it can be incredibly difficult to optimize resources. All of the time engineers spend on learning AWS pricing plans is time away from building and developing features to delivering value to the end customers. I wanted to build a product to reduce cloud costs on autopilot so companies can focus on innovation.

Was there somebody in your life who inspired or helped you to start your journey with your business? Can you share a story with us?

My inspiration for starting my business journey began with my first job in IT, where I worked as a network engineer in a data center. While I enjoyed the challenge of configuring servers and routers and working with Linux systems, I hated all the cabling and racking of servers that came with it. When AWS launched its cloud offering, I suddenly had the opportunity to work with resources without having to worry about hardware, allowing me to focus on what I’m good at. Without this shift in technology, I may have never been able to pursue my entrepreneurial dreams. This story is a testament to the power of innovation and how it can create opportunities for new businesses.

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

Our company stands out from the competition because of our focus on innovation. We are dedicated to developing groundbreaking technologies and experience to optimize our customers’ AWS spending. We measure our success by the amount of money we are able to save our customers. Instead of operating like a “cloud tax” where vendors get paid regardless of the results we strive to create products that consistently provide value to our customers. By focusing on innovation and cost-efficiency, we can help our customers achieve success even in the most competitive markets.

How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?

Our success allowed us to create jobs and new opportunities. I strive to give people a chance to pursue their dreams and shape their own futures. In addition, by creating tools and technologies that help automate mundane tasks, I’ve been able to free engineers to focus their efforts on more important, innovative tasks. I believe in empowering people with the tools they need to make an impact in the world.

You are a successful business leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?

I can share four character traits that I believe have been most instrumental to my success: curiosity, willingness to take on uncomfortable tasks, investing in personal health, and surrounding myself with people who are smarter than me. My curiosity has helped me develop new ideas and think outside the box when it came to solving problems. I have also pushed myself out of my comfort zone by taking on difficult tasks that I was initially scared of. Additionally, I have invested in personal health with regular meditation and exercise, which enables me to stay focused and productive. Finally, I have surrounded myself with people who are more experienced and skilled than me, and who can help guide and mentor me.

Often leaders are asked to share the best advice they received. But let’s reverse the question. Can you share a story about advice you’ve received that you now wish you never followed?

The advice I received often that I misunderstood is to delegate all of my tasks as CEO. On the surface, it sounded like a great idea, but I soon realized that it’s important for CEOs to stay hands-on and connected to all of the teams. You can only effectively connect the dots and make decisions when you stay involved in every aspect of the business. In startups, it’s better to delegate tasks that are not essential or core to the business than to completely hands-off your responsibilities.

Can you tell us a story about the hard times that you faced when you first started your journey?

When I first started my journey, I faced many challenges. The most difficult obstacle was finding the right resources and support to help me move forward. I had no experience, mentors, or advisors to turn to, so I had to learn everything on my own and make informed decisions based on the limited information available to me. Not only that, but I also had to figure out how to balance my day-to-day responsibilities with the demands of starting a new business. Through persistence and dedication, I eventually overcome these obstacles and was able to launch my company and begin my journey as an entrepreneur.

Where did you get the drive to continue even though things were so hard? What strategies or techniques did you use to help overcome those challenges?

The drive to continue despite hard times came from my belief that showing up every day is key to success. No matter what happened yesterday, or what will happen tomorrow, we can only focus our energy on the present moment. I used this mindset as a strategy to keep myself motivated and focused on the tasks at hand. I also worked hard to create a support system of mentors and advisors who could provide guidance and feedback. Through resilience and resourcefulness, I was eventually able to overcome my obstacles and find success

The journey of an entrepreneur is never easy and is filled with challenges, failures, setbacks, as well as joys, thrills and celebrations. Can you share a few ideas or stories from your experience about how to successfully ride the emotional highs & lows of being a founder”?

The journey of an entrepreneur is never easy and is filled with challenges, failures, and setbacks, as well as joys, thrills, and celebrations. To successfully ride the emotional highs and lows, it is important to focus on the present moment. Showing up each day and focusing your energy on the task at hand is key to staying motivated during difficult times. It also helps to create a support system of mentors, advisors, and friends who can provide guidance and advice. Finally, leveraging techniques such as mindfulness and self-care can help you manage your emotions and keep you in control of the situation. By harnessing these strategies, I was able to find success despite all the ups and downs.

Let’s imagine that a young founder comes to you and asks for your advice about whether venture capital or bootstrapping is best for them? What would you advise them? Can you kindly share a few things a founder should look at to determine if fundraising or bootstrapping is the right choice?

It really depends on the individual situation and goals of the founder, but there are a few key factors to consider when deciding between venture capital or bootstrapping.

First, the founder should think about their timeline and how quickly they need to grow their business. Bootstrapping offers more flexibility but often takes longer. Venture capital can help speed up growth but usually comes with increased pressure in terms of expectations and timelines.

Second, the founder should consider what resources they can access. A startup may need more than just capital to succeed, and a venture capital firm may be able to provide access to valuable networks, mentors, and other resources.

Third, the founder should evaluate the potential returns from different sources of capital.

Ok super. Here is the main question of our interview. Many startups are not successful, and some are very successful. From your experience or perspective, what are the main factors that distinguish successful startups from unsuccessful ones? What are your “Five Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Startup”? If you can, please share a story or an example for each.

Successful startups typically have the following five factors in common:

1. A Strong Vision and Mission — Startups need to have a clear vision that guides their business decisions and is something that stakeholders can easily understand.

2. Leadership: You need strong, passionate, and experienced leaders in order to make sure that your startup succeeds. A successful leader is one who knows how to motivate their team, can make tough decisions, and take risks when needed. Elon Musk is a great example, as he has been able to motivate his team, take big risks and stick to his long-term vision.

3. A Solid Business Model. At the end of the day, businesses must be able to generate value in the market to stay competitive. And as Peter Thiel puts it, you need to be able to capture some of the value you create. That’s the only way to build a sustainable business.

4. Passion and Enthusiasm — A successful startup needs to have passionate and enthusiastic founders and employees who believe in and dedicate themselves to achieving the company’s goals.

5. Focus and Execution — Startups need to be able to focus on the tasks at hand and execute them quickly and efficiently in order.

What are the most common mistakes you have seen CEOs & founders make when they start a business? What can be done to avoid those errors?

One of the most common mistakes that CEOs and founders make when starting a business is not getting started early enough. Too often, entrepreneurs become overwhelmed with all the details of starting a business and thus spend too much time “planning” and not enough time “doing”. This can lead to missed opportunities, or even worse, failure to launch. To avoid this mistake, it is important for entrepreneurs to take action quickly and be prepared to pivot their strategy if necessary. Finally, it is important to surround yourself with experienced individuals who can provide advice and guidance along the way. When I started I used to go to meetups to meet people who were a lot more experienced than me.

Startup founders often work extremely long hours and it’s easy to burn the candle at both ends. What would you recommend to founders about how to best take care of their physical and mental wellness when starting a company?

Building a company is a marathon, not a sprint, and it’s important to take care of yourself. Working out and meditating can be great ways to take a break and recharge, and often it is during these times when some of your best ideas come to light. Additionally, it is important to make sure to develop strong relationships with your team and colleagues in order to have a supportive network that you can rely on.

If I could start a movement that would bring the most good to the most people, it would be focused on developing sustainable and impactful solutions to the global garbage problem. I believe that in the next ten years, AI and robots will improve recycling and waste management processes. Therefore, I would strive to encourage startups to innovate and create environmentally-friendly solutions to fundamentally change how we recycle. By investing in these technologies, we can make the world cleaner, safer, and healthier for everyone.

We are blessed that some very prominent names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them.

If I could have a private breakfast or lunch with anyone in the world, it would undoubtedly be Elon Musk. His impact on this world is absolutely amazing, and I believe that spending some time with him would be an incredible opportunity to hear his unique perspective and gain insight into his thought process.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Follow me on Twitter or Linkedin.

This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for the time you spent on this. We wish you continued success and good health!

JT Giri Of nOps On Five Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Startup was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.