Resilience and Ownership as a Leader with Adam Wray, Founder & CEO AstrumU

[00:00:00] I was waiting tables and my first job, the CEO of this small healthcare company, was sitting there talking to me and he come in early.

[00:00:08] One of my gigs I had was the breakfast place. And he's like, he finally looked at me like he talked to me a couple times.

[00:00:15] I'd waited on him. He's like, what the hell are you doing here, Adam?

[00:00:18] Like you were just like not like one of these things now like that.

[00:00:21] I'm like, well, you know, I had a couple of job offers and they were all crap and I didn't want to do them.

[00:00:26] And so he's like, look, come talk to me. So I went in there, they go off and be like 18 five or something.

[00:00:34] And I said, no, I didn't. So I negotiated for 25 with kind of this ramp up.

[00:00:38] And I come back and tell my dad and he's like, and I said, well, they wouldn't give me what I wanted.

[00:00:42] So I negotiate based on what you don't have any damn skills.

[00:00:46] Like, where were you? Where'd you get the balls to even think you can negotiate?

[00:00:50] I'm like, well, if you don't ask, you don't know.

[00:00:57] Brian Gray, you're listening and watching Inside the Seas Street.

[00:01:00] And we've had Adam Ray on today and we are going to learn his story, his journey.

[00:01:07] And Adam, how are you doing today?

[00:01:09] Doing great. Doing great, William. Ryan, it's good to be with you guys today.

[00:01:13] I like these wipe off boards that you have on the back because I once had an office.

[00:01:19] It didn't have any light. I didn't have any windows.

[00:01:21] It was inside of an inside deal.

[00:01:23] And it was total wipe off boards all the way around me.

[00:01:26] Was it boards or was it paint on the wall? So you can write all over the wall.

[00:01:30] It was boards. It was like what you've got.

[00:01:32] It was boards, but the entire surface.

[00:01:35] So like I could John Nash start in one place and just go all the way around my office.

[00:01:42] Beautiful minded all the way.

[00:01:44] Oh yeah. I like to just see what's on the board itself. See if I can get any information.

[00:01:51] I've had people before. I don't know if you've done this, but I've had people erase stuff before like we record.

[00:01:57] They're like, what is that? Is that the recipe to Coke?

[00:02:00] What are you doing? No one cares?

[00:02:03] No one's going to look at your board and know what that is.

[00:02:06] He strategically placed the weekend.

[00:02:10] Oh yeah. Trust me. There's nothing there just rambling thoughts on the back.

[00:02:13] Oh, by our software.

[00:02:17] I have a WWW link. I have some type of offer.

[00:02:21] Here's the number.

[00:02:23] Yeah, here's the demo link. Here's the demo. Just come and do a demo.

[00:02:27] It's awesome though to like collaborate.

[00:02:30] You think people think you need to engage every visual you can. I love these things.

[00:02:35] So tell us a little bit about yourself. What are you doing right now? What's the job?

[00:02:41] I'm CEO and founder of a company by the name of Vastromu based out of Bellevue, Washington.

[00:02:46] I've been on this journey for the last five or so years.

[00:02:51] The highlight is basically we're looking at the challenge of information asymmetry between education and industry

[00:02:59] and how it's not accountable to outcomes at an individual level.

[00:03:02] And so if you're going to have a skills-based economy, you're ultimately going to need skills measurement tools

[00:03:08] that can individually measure someone's skills at scale.

[00:03:12] And right now, whether it's skills-based student success, skills-based hiring, skills-based talent management,

[00:03:18] there's no way to do this at an individualized level.

[00:03:22] Everything is designed for aggregate trends like labor market analytics, aggregate AI,

[00:03:28] they use self-reported data to anonymize data to labor trends.

[00:03:32] Look, I think there's a way to do that. If you have enough unique data assets to train up your large language models,

[00:03:39] if you have enough insights from a longitudinal journey, you can do the skills extraction inference

[00:03:44] to build a verified skills profile. And so we're building that data services platform.

[00:03:48] It's a set of API-enabled services that integrate into existing workflows and use cases.

[00:03:53] And we're deploying it out through large strategic partners like National Student Clearinghouse

[00:04:00] who's doing their digital transformation, leveraging our platform so they can enable their data assets.

[00:04:05] We're doing a beta project with the Army who's doing using an app called Skill Set.

[00:04:11] This runs on top of our platform where soldiers can load their transcripts up

[00:04:15] and immediately have a baseline understanding of verified skills profile that says,

[00:04:19] here's my top three career options, here's my top three career ways to leverage education to a better option.

[00:04:25] And it's translated...

[00:04:27] Well, it's terrible.

[00:04:29] We have 2,000 soldiers right now on that and kind of ramping that up.

[00:04:33] And it's a beta in collaboration with Transition Assistance Program and several forts.

[00:04:40] Those are the type of things, but we see a lot of opportunity to enable

[00:04:44] and be kind of the intel inside to create the skills measurement tools

[00:04:50] to go tackle some of these use cases and problems and level the playing field through it.

[00:04:55] Right, for the organizations, how large does a dataset need to be for you to have some accuracy?

[00:05:02] Yeah, it's obviously...

[00:05:05] It depends on whether we're dealing with...

[00:05:07] We kind of think of the infrastructure, players like Clearinghouse obviously bring a lot of data to the table,

[00:05:12] but we bring a lot of data as well.

[00:05:14] We have 209 million learner worker profiles.

[00:05:17] We have millions of those that are verified.

[00:05:19] So for example, I've got a decade plus of transcription at the University of Washington.

[00:05:24] I've got half the HR records for one of the largest telcos in the country.

[00:05:30] That's just training data.

[00:05:33] We don't own that data, but it allows us to extract insights at a much higher fidelity

[00:05:38] than otherwise would be able to accomplish because you don't have the proper training data.

[00:05:42] But when we go into an auction, like we're dealing with universities,

[00:05:47] we'll say start with your SIS data student information system.

[00:05:51] We can expand the learning management systems, co-curricular data, which will all be siloed out.

[00:05:56] We'll say don't worry, it's dirty. We'll use it.

[00:05:59] Do you pull out career center data as well or any of that type of recruiting data?

[00:06:04] We will take it.

[00:06:05] We all feel we are designed to be able to ingest any type of structured done structured at scale.

[00:06:12] Yeah, and so it's a thorny problem.

[00:06:15] And that's why it's taken us 11 patents and multiple years to get the foundation in place

[00:06:21] to have enough data services to actually do this.

[00:06:25] But when you talk to the chief people officer of one of the largest banks in the country

[00:06:30] and they're like look, we've got tools that are kind of trying to tackle something.

[00:06:36] Is anybody doing it at scale?

[00:06:37] Anybody, but you even see the ability to do it scale with an aggregate AI tool or a labor market

[00:06:42] and I think tool like no.

[00:06:45] Well, guess what? Just dropping the degree is not going to change the equation.

[00:06:50] You know, like you're going to have to give somebody way to verify.

[00:06:54] The hiring managers don't want to get fired, right?

[00:06:57] Right, right.

[00:06:58] And skills, there's a there's a dimensionality to skills and you can fill those things in when

[00:07:04] and again for me when the skills wave kind of hit us a couple years ago,

[00:07:09] it reminded me a lot of competency models or 15 years ago.

[00:07:14] Yeah, that's 15 years.

[00:07:16] Right? So everyone's going to have a competency model.

[00:07:18] It's like, listen, if you don't hire, promote and fire to a competency model,

[00:07:24] you may as well not have one.

[00:07:27] So I feel the same way about skills on some level.

[00:07:30] You know, I think it's got a little bit more traction.

[00:07:32] I think it will be adopted a little bit more hopefully better than competency models were.

[00:07:38] But again, it's the same theory if you hire to it.

[00:07:42] Okay, that's great.

[00:07:43] But if you just stop there, so what?

[00:07:46] You know, then then then you have a retention issue because you're not you're not promoting people that are

[00:07:54] using it internally, right?

[00:07:57] You're not using it internally.

[00:07:58] If you don't even know what you have, right?

[00:08:01] Well, the problem with competency models is competency models are not granular enough.

[00:08:05] Right.

[00:08:06] They're generally buckets and so everybody kind of learned that night and to your point skills.

[00:08:10] And I think it's early like this skills based economy is very early in this game.

[00:08:15] And I think of it as attributes.

[00:08:17] We're really trying to get at, you know, durable skills or if you want to call them software universal,

[00:08:22] I don't care, but the bottom line is trying to get at things like leadership, persistence, you know, a willingness to resiliency,

[00:08:30] things that, you know, agility of mind critical thinking, along with, you know, a set of hard skills that are pertinent.

[00:08:37] Yeah, but it's your point in this is where we think like the problem right now is everything hierarchically is taxonomy is very static.

[00:08:46] They set their taxonomy up.

[00:08:48] They say this is the little box, but skills are evolving constantly.

[00:08:53] Shit.

[00:08:54] And people don't talk about the decay of skills.

[00:08:58] Oh, we talk about all the additive stuff.

[00:09:00] So here's how you can grow your skills tangential and otherwise, et cetera.

[00:09:04] But no one talks about skills also have a half life that you have the skill.

[00:09:11] And then if you don't do it for a long period of time or whatever the bid is that skills gone.

[00:09:16] That's no longer a skill that you have.

[00:09:18] You might have it on your resume or your LinkedIn profile.

[00:09:21] Not a skill.

[00:09:22] Yeah, I took a CCNA class and consultant for Capgeminar and I don't know why.

[00:09:29] But if you asked me to touch a router right now, I'd be like screw it.

[00:09:33] I can touch it, but I can't do anything to it.

[00:09:35] You know, I'm like, no way.

[00:09:36] I mean, come on, who you can?

[00:09:37] I mean, there's definitely half life.

[00:09:39] And the other thing is the correspondent durable skills have compounding on it.

[00:09:43] Right.

[00:09:44] And our engine is in our skills graph, which is designed to be dynamic and constantly vectoring a view of what the skill is and how another person will interpret that skill is constantly evolving and adapting to that.

[00:09:55] And we think that's the future.

[00:09:57] Right.

[00:09:58] Last question before you ask, because I'm just curious about this.

[00:10:01] Do you think we've shifted to a place like where we talked about resiliency and persistence?

[00:10:06] That doesn't seem like it's something that can be taught.

[00:10:11] It might be, it might be.

[00:10:13] I'm not, I don't have hard edges here.

[00:10:15] But like if I want you to learn how to program in Python, even even use in a modern context where you can use chat, GBT and other tools to program for you.

[00:10:26] Okay, fair enough.

[00:10:27] That can be learned.

[00:10:28] There's some of these other things that maybe it's harder to like resilience or persistence or, you know, those types of things.

[00:10:38] Do you feel like people will care more now about like these things and I'll teach them the rest?

[00:10:46] Or I can train them the rest now.

[00:10:48] Loaded question, right?

[00:10:50] Yeah, well, I mean, you're also talking to underpinning of that question is nature versus nurture.

[00:10:55] How much, how much, you know, or like, like if you if you had to be raised up hard, you know, but your children weren't guys will they be as strong and persistent?

[00:11:06] Yeah, yeah.

[00:11:07] Yeah, I look the end of day.

[00:11:09] I think, look, I don't know whether you can train persistence and things in nature.

[00:11:13] I do believe that there isn't a desire to restart to say, hey, look, give us a putty and we'll move with it.

[00:11:20] Here's the problem.

[00:11:21] There's a desire.

[00:11:23] There's no skills measurement tools to do it.

[00:11:27] Right.

[00:11:28] Except on small scale. And so like, look, doing it with 50 or 100 even 300 people doesn't change the equation.

[00:11:36] You've got to be able to do this in the thousands and the millions.

[00:11:40] And so we designed for scale, like we can't we're not designed to go solve a simple problem.

[00:11:46] We're designed to go solve complex and our backers and you know, and our partners like Thurnaus and ETS and JFF, you know, they're interested in these large scale challenges as well.

[00:11:57] And so, you know, it's kind of swing to the moon, you know, or either hit it and crash into the side of the wall.

[00:12:03] I don't know whatever.

[00:12:05] One or the other.

[00:12:06] Yeah, well that's just good transition into why we're here today. Right.

[00:12:12] To learn about your journey. Not necessarily just your crashes, but I'm sure we'll have a number of those two.

[00:12:20] So where do we start? How far back can we go? Can we go back into little Adam as a child and did you have this entrepreneurial spirits the whole way or where did it start?

[00:12:33] So I don't know if entrepreneurs are just DNA wired. I have a suspicion that people that are true entrepreneurs are wired to just be weird.

[00:12:45] I'll raise my hand on no doubt.

[00:12:50] There's a there's a side this book called Lean Analytics, which is about the lean startup movement.

[00:12:55] The first chapter is about how entrepreneurs are psychopaths.

[00:13:02] It's the greatest bit in the world because the office.

[00:13:06] I'm not sure if he just offended him or.

[00:13:08] No, no, no, no.

[00:13:09] It's a compliment.

[00:13:11] Because basically, and this was the bit, right?

[00:13:14] It's entrepreneurs have to live in the past, present and future, obviously.

[00:13:18] Right.

[00:13:19] And so do psychopaths.

[00:13:21] So when somebody, when a prospect asks you, Hey, Adam, is this feature done?

[00:13:29] Hell yeah.

[00:13:30] You know, it's not done yet.

[00:13:33] But but next Tuesday by the launch, it will be done.

[00:13:37] You say yes.

[00:13:39] Most entrepreneurs say yes, which is what psychopaths do.

[00:13:44] So their whole point was, Hey, get, get, get just get at peace with being a psychopath.

[00:13:50] It's okay.

[00:13:51] Just love yourself and understand that maybe people don't understand you.

[00:13:56] And maybe you might be caught in the past, present and future stuff occasionally, but it's okay.

[00:14:02] I just wanted to know if he was an entrepreneur as a kid.

[00:14:05] Yeah, yeah.

[00:14:07] So I don't think about the psychopaths component, but as a child, I'll give you stories where I knew this is my where my mind was going to go.

[00:14:16] One story is, you know, I we when I was six, we we in the fall, I grew up and raised up.

[00:14:24] I'm raising Kansas City, though live in Seattle now. And so I'm kind of Casey boy at the heart.

[00:14:28] And so we have beautiful falls and during the fall we had leaves all over the front yard and somehow I set up a stand to sell leaves to all my friends, which they bought candy.

[00:14:40] I got money and everything.

[00:14:42] My mom was a whore. She's like, like, you're scamming them like yourself and leave them and some leaves are buying it's great.

[00:14:49] And another mother comes up and my mom's like, I'm sorry that she's like what are you complaining about my kids the dumb ass to bought the leaves.

[00:15:00] You know, it's so, you know, it's like stuff like that, you know, it's like, I don't know.

[00:15:07] The other story which is kind of Kennedy is, and I honestly do not know how I came up with this but somewhere along the line, I heard that.

[00:15:19] And it probably tells you how screwed up portions of my childhood were that I even found this out because I'm like sub 10, but I found out that you have no had no air.

[00:15:28] So I got on my mind that I sent I wrote a letter to you have. I don't know what my mom did with it, but I wrote a letter to you ever say look if you need an air I'm willing to step in and be your air.

[00:15:40] And I'm like, I don't know where a seven or eight year old gets the idea of this. Anyway, that's my my start out of path.

[00:15:48] Let's talk about how you know man they had the perfect job.

[00:15:51] What pajamas.

[00:15:53] Dude woke up in pajamas.

[00:15:55] Stayed in pajamas. Yeah, not exactly akin to my lifestyle but you know for some reason I think all I saw is hey he's got a business he gets to do what he wants this sounds like a good thing.

[00:16:07] Exactly.

[00:16:09] Ryan you had a question. I'm sorry. Oh, I was just asking how he knew of Hugh Hefner at Oh, yeah, that's the part we can't talk about. That's the part where you just give us since my life was very screwed up as a child.

[00:16:21] Yeah, we were which means we were the American family if everything can go wrong we did go wrong from divorce craziness and you name it in the middle.

[00:16:30] A lot of national parks.

[00:16:33] A lot of camping.

[00:16:35] We didn't have any money so we didn't have to do anything nice. We were poor.

[00:16:40] Right. And that's the beauty of that actually but you just you enjoy whatever you got. You're going to go to the beach it doesn't have to be a fancy beach. It's just a beach.

[00:16:51] And as a kid you don't know any better. Yeah, I'm thinking about Pali or Fiji or Hawaii or anything like Kalveston Texas for me is like it's the worst beach in the world but when I was a kid is like man's beach is water.

[00:17:06] I can go play. I'm going to Kalveston Texas. I agree with you that beach is crappy. It is horrible but as a kid I mean growing up in Texas as a kid that was mecca that was awesome like it was great.

[00:17:19] I agree with you. I'd say you don't know what you don't know and that's part of the joy of childhood.

[00:17:24] Yep.

[00:17:25] So Ryan where do you want to go next? First job?

[00:17:29] Yeah on this journey where where does it begin so your your high school you move in the college or you kind of graduate in the college. What's in your mind right what do you know what you want to do.

[00:17:41] Yeah because college yeah college can be that I'd have no idea and I'll figure it out during the four or five years of them here or you can go in going I know exactly what I want to do.

[00:17:54] I've always been envious of those people. I like like people that just walked in like I'm like wow you're dialed in I'm slow I'm dumb I need time to dial.

[00:18:03] When people are in pre-bed or pre-law I'm like you're gonna change that. You're gonna change that. They never change it.

[00:18:09] I'm pretty I have no understanding of either of these two things. I've got one son that's that and one son that's not.

[00:18:17] So two boys four years apart one of them knew he wanted to be a weapons engineer at 12 11 years old.

[00:18:25] That's when the school started tracking him at that point just in case.

[00:18:32] Oh yeah FBICIA everybody's he's on your radar.

[00:18:36] But so he's going to college getting a degree in physics at Texas A&M going to be in the core and he's already got an army army ROT scholarship paid for everything.

[00:18:45] He's gonna go and be in the army.

[00:18:47] So this kid knew at a very early age the 14 year old.

[00:18:52] Yeah I the way I think I'm going to approach that with him is college is a great place to figure yourself out.

[00:18:58] You know what take some classes try some things figure it out join a fraternity.

[00:19:04] You have liberal arts you can learn a little bit of this little bit of that because I think that's what he'll respond to you know because he's seen his older brother be so laser focused.

[00:19:15] Yeah he's probably going to react against that.

[00:19:18] And so you know what hey listen college is a great place to figure it out go have some fun.

[00:19:23] The year older some will probably end up working for you younger someone day.

[00:19:27] 100% probably.

[00:19:29] Yeah exactly it'll be the scenario.

[00:19:34] So did think I graduated in high school in Kent City I was committed to not go to school as much as possible in high school.

[00:19:43] So I did work work work I had jobs since I was like 12 or 13 and and then through that process went to University of Kansas which is a great thing about KU.

[00:19:52] At this time is if you graduate from high school in Kansas they had to accept you and because so all I knew is I had a class of 635 I was 615 something like that.

[00:20:04] Why literally like you like I spent most of my senior year Saturday tensions and it wasn't because I was doing terrible things just I wouldn't show up.

[00:20:13] You weren't engaged you weren't engaged in the process.

[00:20:17] I was engaged in getting out of there.

[00:20:20] 100% fault for not engaging you.

[00:20:23] My graduate so I graduated with about 1000 students in my high school and I didn't know because I was selling drugs.

[00:20:31] I didn't know if I was going to graduate I'd failed English in the fall and in the spring I didn't even show up.

[00:20:38] So I showed up with my cat and capping down got in line fully knowing that they might not call my name.

[00:20:46] I did they gave me a piece of paper and like you can see like so my dad had a camcorder.

[00:20:52] You can see me opening up the roll of paper like is this just a piece of paper or is this actually a diploma.

[00:20:59] They actually sent one from here just moving along.

[00:21:02] Honestly, honestly, I thought you were going to say but then my principal came around the corner and bought a bag for me.

[00:21:09] No, no, no, no.

[00:21:15] Not in Kansas City.

[00:21:16] Can't city actually at St. Louis where that is the.

[00:21:19] That is a thing.

[00:21:20] Sorry, that is it's St. Louis and New Orleans.

[00:21:22] They they're great about it in St. Louis.

[00:21:24] I don't know about New Orleans but I'm crazy about it.

[00:21:27] The first thing they asked somebody said oh you're from New Orleans really where'd you go to high school?

[00:21:31] Yeah, yeah, that sets a path of questioning that goes on to this thing.

[00:21:35] It is St. Louis.

[00:21:36] Yeah, Jim Durbin with with with to high school there.

[00:21:40] It is totally not like so my chairman and our largest investors based at St. Louis and I like it was picking up this vibe.

[00:21:48] I've been going to St. Louis since the 80s but oh yeah, you don't really pay attention.

[00:21:52] Then when you're doing business there, you start to pick up the vibe.

[00:21:54] You're like why didn't everybody ask about high school?

[00:21:57] Yeah, yeah, high school more.

[00:22:01] Oh yeah, I don't know, but I didn't go to KU.

[00:22:04] Oh yeah, J.

[00:22:06] So were you there for some of the championships?

[00:22:09] I was so 88 was my first year so they won and then I came in.

[00:22:14] They went to two Final Four as well as there, you know, so but we've gone to, we have a family tradition.

[00:22:21] We go to Final Four just to go.

[00:22:23] It's family.

[00:22:24] Oh genius.

[00:22:25] We've probably been to about 18, 19 of them.

[00:22:27] So I've seen KU when it's 2008, I was there, 2008 I was there and they're 22, I was there as well.

[00:22:36] So I was there in Indianapolis at 97 when Arizona won because I was at the University of Arizona.

[00:22:43] Yeah, that was the year we were supposed to win.

[00:22:45] That is the year you all were supposed to win.

[00:22:47] We were a 7th seed or some crazy shit like that when we had a good team.

[00:22:52] You did, you did.

[00:22:53] We beat a lot of people that we weren't supposed to be.

[00:22:56] We were favored to win the last championship and you guys upset us on the way there.

[00:22:59] That is correct.

[00:23:00] No, no, I remember that was very because we have Paul Pierce on that dang team and Paul Pierce what had like a 20 year MBA career.

[00:23:09] Right.

[00:23:10] Now, thanks for reminding me.

[00:23:12] I just appreciate it.

[00:23:13] No worries.

[00:23:14] I'm at this is twice in one episode.

[00:23:17] This is a coach from and then you took him out of the tournament.

[00:23:21] No, no, the coach from coach K.

[00:23:24] I met coach K coming out of the rest or coming out of the restroom.

[00:23:28] He was coming in and I'm like, hey coach, and he gets no autographs.

[00:23:32] And I'm like, dude, we're in a restroom.

[00:23:35] I just said, hey, coach, my bad.

[00:23:38] Break some type of decorum that I'm unaware of.

[00:23:41] Not trying to shake your hand, coach.

[00:23:43] No, no, we're good.

[00:23:44] We're good.

[00:23:45] Okay.

[00:23:46] So we're doing one basketball thing.

[00:23:47] We'll go back.

[00:23:48] And so J bill us when he and her be the guy Herbert Davis who's now the head coach for

[00:23:55] UNC, right?

[00:23:56] Yep.

[00:23:57] Did we're sideline reporters in a way.

[00:23:59] And so they were doing the way national championship and they come and we happen to

[00:24:03] go stand in an elevator and it's just my wife and I and them.

[00:24:07] And they start chatting up and you know, and J's, you know, Duke guy, right.

[00:24:12] And it's and so we're just talking and he finds that.

[00:24:16] And he's like, do you want an autograph?

[00:24:17] He's a super cool guy.

[00:24:19] And I'm like, no, you're graduate from Duke.

[00:24:21] I don't want anybody's.

[00:24:22] He just starts laughing his ass off.

[00:24:26] That's genius.

[00:24:29] That's genius.

[00:24:30] I'm like, no, I can't give me a break.

[00:24:32] No way.

[00:24:33] No, we're good.

[00:24:34] Thank you.

[00:24:35] Do you want my.

[00:24:36] Yeah, exactly.

[00:24:37] But no, I had small college basketball.

[00:24:40] Great thing.

[00:24:41] Where did you study at KU?

[00:24:43] I was a liberal arts degree.

[00:24:45] I'm an English major with a minor in German and history.

[00:24:48] So liberal arts, everything you need for an AI company.

[00:24:52] Yeah.

[00:24:53] How do we transition into?

[00:24:54] You have to think anything in the humanities.

[00:24:57] It's like the people that are actually going to thrive in the future

[00:25:00] with prompt engine are all going to be humanities.

[00:25:03] They're all going to be liberal arts people.

[00:25:05] So here was the part of the thesis actually for asking you,

[00:25:08] I mean, there was many.

[00:25:09] Is it this, I saw trends and commodifying of cloud services

[00:25:14] that were a lot of data to be unlocked in ways that people

[00:25:16] didn't realize yet.

[00:25:17] Well, I kept looking at the amount of CEOs in tech.

[00:25:21] They're humanities majors.

[00:25:23] I mean, Buttersture field, you know, Slack, Dak Ma, Alibaba,

[00:25:27] you know, even Elon Musk, one of his degrees is philosophy.

[00:25:30] You know what I mean?

[00:25:31] You see this like consistently pattern and you're like,

[00:25:34] okay, guess what?

[00:25:35] Those people are coming from a totally different angle than

[00:25:38] what everybody says.

[00:25:40] And, you know, I'm living in instantiation, the same thing.

[00:25:43] So that's genius.

[00:25:47] But what was the first job out of college?

[00:25:52] Yeah, so I got the degree and a first job.

[00:25:56] I was just like everybody else because I worked two jobs through school.

[00:26:00] And so I got my first job offer to work in operations and standard insurance.

[00:26:06] I was making and I didn't take it by the way, but because I was making

[00:26:10] was I'm making $35,000 a year waiting tables, 10 of bars.

[00:26:15] And they offered me a job for 15,500 and I'd have to go buy a suit.

[00:26:22] And I didn't know a suit.

[00:26:24] So is it salary or the suit?

[00:26:27] What was the determining factor here?

[00:26:29] Well, well, well, well, so I turned it down.

[00:26:33] It's current man.

[00:26:34] I ain't doing that.

[00:26:35] And I was waiting tables and my first job, the CEO of this small healthcare

[00:26:40] company was sitting there talking to me and he come in early.

[00:26:43] I was like one of my gigs I had was the breakfast place.

[00:26:47] And he's like, he finally looked at me like he talked to me a couple times.

[00:26:50] I'd waited on him.

[00:26:51] He's like, what the hell are you doing here, Adam?

[00:26:53] Like you were just like not like one of these things is not like that.

[00:26:57] I'm like, well, you know, I had a couple of job offers and they were all

[00:27:00] crap and I didn't want to do them.

[00:27:02] So he's like, look, come, come talk to me.

[00:27:05] So I went in there and they've offered me like 18 five or something.

[00:27:09] And I said, no, I didn't.

[00:27:10] So I negotiated for 25 with kind of this ramp up.

[00:27:13] And I come back and tell my dad and he's like, and I said, well,

[00:27:17] they wouldn't give me what I wanted.

[00:27:18] So I negotiate based on what you don't have any damn skills.

[00:27:22] Like where were you?

[00:27:23] Where'd you get the balls to even think you can negotiate?

[00:27:26] I'm like, well, if you don't ask, you don't know.

[00:27:29] You were Gen Z before Gen Z.

[00:27:32] Yeah, that's I mean, that's how Gen Z operates right now.

[00:27:36] Yeah.

[00:27:37] Yeah, I don't have to work.

[00:27:38] I'm not going to do that.

[00:27:39] I'll just do Uber Eats, whatever.

[00:27:41] Well, the difference is, is they're living on mom and dad's dime

[00:27:44] whereas I was living on my own.

[00:27:46] Let's just give it let's just give it straight.

[00:27:48] Like if you're living on mom and dad's dime,

[00:27:50] you can say I don't care for as long as you want.

[00:27:52] He negotiated for a reason.

[00:27:54] Yeah.

[00:27:55] That sounds like you have some personal experience there.

[00:27:59] Well, you're that one alone.

[00:28:01] Sorry about that.

[00:28:02] Keep the waiter job and the bartending job alone.

[00:28:05] No, no, I actually did the healthcare thing for about a year

[00:28:08] and a half, but then I probably this is where my break came.

[00:28:11] I probably got lucky.

[00:28:13] And I to this day still can't quite figure out how to happen,

[00:28:16] but I ended up going to work for Capgeminar and some young

[00:28:19] as a senior consultant.

[00:28:20] And that's where I got my training because they they

[00:28:23] I would tell any person who doesn't know consulting is

[00:28:26] a wonderful place to go because they'll just throw you into

[00:28:29] the mix.

[00:28:30] They'll train you on a bunch of different things and you'll begin

[00:28:33] to understand where you see your strengths,

[00:28:35] whether it's consulting product, you know, integration

[00:28:38] operation sales doesn't matter technology being pure

[00:28:42] technologist.

[00:28:43] And so I did that for almost four years,

[00:28:44] three and a half, four years.

[00:28:45] And probably that then through a bunch of series of other

[00:28:48] things.

[00:28:49] Well, it's kept Jim and I at that time.

[00:28:51] They there's a period where they would lock off the bottom

[00:28:55] quarter.

[00:28:56] No, the we remember that.

[00:28:59] Yeah, that they did a little bit of Jack Welch.

[00:29:02] Yeah, yeah, no, they had just done so they weren't doing

[00:29:06] that at that time in the 90s.

[00:29:08] They were doing they had grabbed interesting young and

[00:29:13] spun off their assets consulting assets one of three

[00:29:16] times the NY sold their consulting assets building

[00:29:19] Capgeminar bottom.

[00:29:20] So it was Capgeminar said,

[00:29:22] I was working for the French and they had regional

[00:29:27] practices and national practices.

[00:29:29] And so I got lucky I was in a regional practice.

[00:29:32] So I didn't travel that much.

[00:29:33] Right.

[00:29:34] I was that was working on like my last reason I left

[00:29:36] consulting is the last job I was doing was Y2K.

[00:29:39] And I'm like, and I couldn't get away from the project.

[00:29:42] Like I had gotten so much institutional knowledge of

[00:29:45] trans America at the time to CTO.

[00:29:47] Literally, I was telling him like, look,

[00:29:49] I got 1015 hours work.

[00:29:51] I've already got all your exacts and all this stuff.

[00:29:53] And I don't really care.

[00:29:54] You know so much about us.

[00:29:56] We are not taking a chance.

[00:29:57] And I'm like, so you're going to pay for me to do what he's

[00:30:00] like, I don't give credit.

[00:30:01] Just stay there.

[00:30:03] Stay in that spot.

[00:30:04] And so this kid is like early, early ages, like 90s, you know,

[00:30:08] and so they had a T3 line, which like a T3 line at that

[00:30:12] time was like, so I was downloading wage files like Lucy

[00:30:17] and this guy with diamonds by William Shatner and stuff like

[00:30:20] that.

[00:30:21] And I was calling my wife who had a real job by the way.

[00:30:23] And I'm like, hey, you got to listen to she's like, I got work

[00:30:27] to do.

[00:30:28] I know you don't get out 20 hours a week.

[00:30:33] I was doing he was sending Instagram reels to his wife

[00:30:36] before they were into.

[00:30:38] Because he had the bandwidth.

[00:30:40] No one had all the bandwidth.

[00:30:42] Yeah, it was cool.

[00:30:44] I go home and get on my dial up and suck.

[00:30:46] You got the 56 K and you're like, oh, wow, this is awesome.

[00:30:50] Not this is what the internet shouldn't be.

[00:30:53] Great. Thanks.

[00:30:54] So but that parlayed and through a series of steps, I ended up

[00:30:57] at SBC data comm then really where my distributed data

[00:31:01] cloud services background came from this working CDN space

[00:31:04] first for Akamai and then for limelight networks and then

[00:31:08] Amazon in the middle.

[00:31:10] And that gave me appreciation for distributed data cloud

[00:31:13] services and ultimately artificial intelligence and some of the

[00:31:15] power of, you know, it could be done with machine learning

[00:31:18] natural language processing and ultimately large language models.

[00:31:21] Who was the most advanced of those at that time?

[00:31:24] That's a wall back but who is already kind of on the bleeding

[00:31:27] edge?

[00:31:28] Yeah, well, I mean Akamai in the day and I was there from 0

[00:31:31] to 4 which was right brutal period of first and then an

[00:31:35] awesome period at the end.

[00:31:37] Right.

[00:31:38] You know they were cutting it like they were they were

[00:31:40] doing some stuff people hadn't done before for for distributed

[00:31:43] services and content at the edge.

[00:31:45] I mean, but the office I was in in Seattle had when I started

[00:31:49] in 2000 had 176 people and then by 2000 begin 2002 and two

[00:31:55] which I was one and you know it's like and so this is

[00:32:01] like the dot com blow up and there was this after effect

[00:32:05] which you guys might remember like a lot had happened in

[00:32:09] like 9 11 was the last straw for a lot of employers because

[00:32:14] they're like because they kind of I mean I hate to say it this

[00:32:18] way but they really use it as the excuse to finish off

[00:32:20] everything we didn't want to do but now they could justify

[00:32:24] it.

[00:32:25] It's like COVID same thing.

[00:32:26] The beginning of COVID was an excuse to hey, we're

[00:32:30] bloated.

[00:32:31] We need to trim.

[00:32:32] Let's do a layoff.

[00:32:33] Let's do a riff and we'll blame it on COVID.

[00:32:36] What to do.

[00:32:38] Oh my God.

[00:32:39] Yeah, something like that.

[00:32:40] So and then and then it turns around for Akamai it turned

[00:32:44] way around after after that they kind of blew they blew

[00:32:49] up not in a bad way they just they they got big.

[00:32:52] They've been I mean they're massive.

[00:32:54] There's like a $20 15 $20 billion market cap company now

[00:32:57] the and I think you know it's funny when I left

[00:33:00] Akamai I left it no for to go to work for AWS when AWS

[00:33:04] was jasses org was like when I left AWS after three and a

[00:33:08] half years jasses org was still under 100 people.

[00:33:11] AWS enterprise funded what is easy to you as three and

[00:33:16] then ultimately the AWS machine and that was the

[00:33:19] outsourcing of Target the outsourcing of you know

[00:33:22] Victoria's Secret yada yada yada and so I did that

[00:33:25] for years but when I left Akamai at the time

[00:33:27] people were like I was doing product I was doing sale

[00:33:30] I was doing Corp dev I was you know a little bit

[00:33:33] of everything they're like move back to Boston

[00:33:35] I'm like I'd rather kill myself.

[00:33:38] I'm like that was the executive track like if you

[00:33:41] wanted to be a VP you got to be a boss and I'm

[00:33:43] like try I'll visit Cambridge buying live in there

[00:33:47] right so but good learning experiences especially

[00:33:50] for microservices and really thinking about

[00:33:52] like the future AWS and Akamai in those years

[00:33:55] in their early odds were so on the cutting edge

[00:33:58] so I mean you really got a chance to think about

[00:34:01] how architecture and cloud services like my first

[00:34:04] company we founded we bought the hardware still

[00:34:07] right but by my third company somebody told me

[00:34:11] I want to buy a box I'd slap them.

[00:34:13] You know that's a dumb idea when did you when

[00:34:18] did you make the transition from working for

[00:34:21] company into founding your own company?

[00:34:25] 2009.

[00:34:27] What drove that?

[00:34:29] You know like if I could talk to you know your

[00:34:32] younger self or if I and I tell this to kids that

[00:34:35] I you know ask for mentorship or help all the

[00:34:38] time I'm like you look you'll never be ready

[00:34:40] to be a founder and entrepreneur.

[00:34:43] Great.

[00:34:44] Don't think there's some point and trick at

[00:34:46] which here's where the snap just jump in

[00:34:49] and they go well I don't know this or I don't

[00:34:51] know cap tables or I don't know how to raise

[00:34:53] capital.

[00:34:54] Perfect data.

[00:34:55] He literally just asked the question that I

[00:34:58] asked to himself.

[00:35:00] Yeah like you figured out like I didn't you

[00:35:03] know and so in 2009 I was working for Limbite

[00:35:06] I was running about two thirds of the revenue

[00:35:09] directly or indirectly and I was sitting there

[00:35:11] watching the cloud services trends and I

[00:35:13] saw the enterprise was going to jump on

[00:35:15] this and they didn't know how to and I

[00:35:18] thought we could make some enterprise type

[00:35:20] environments and cloud services that would

[00:35:22] resonate for traditional applications

[00:35:23] specifically for the operations people

[00:35:25] who were being ignored everybody was

[00:35:27] looking to developers in late thoughts

[00:35:29] not thinking about the ops people who

[00:35:31] managed the real budget for applications

[00:35:34] and so was it managed services that

[00:35:38] you were attacking in particular?

[00:35:40] No it wasn't like an ASP or managed

[00:35:42] service component.

[00:35:43] We were trying to create what was

[00:35:44] the CEO left because you know the tech

[00:35:46] like we were creating a shared cloud

[00:35:49] environment which was going to be a

[00:35:51] public cloud experience in a private

[00:35:53] cloud format.

[00:35:55] So we would give you the all the

[00:35:58] confidence from SOC compliance component

[00:36:00] all this of like it's your own dedicated

[00:36:03] equipment but it's actually a shared

[00:36:04] environment.

[00:36:05] Right and so and then what we did is

[00:36:08] we made an interface that was

[00:36:10] incredible intuitive especially for

[00:36:13] operations people but could be used by

[00:36:15] developers as well and it got traction.

[00:36:18] We get we net app ended up outsourcing

[00:36:20] everything from traditional apps like

[00:36:22] mail to some of their apps that they

[00:36:24] just didn't want to keep in house.

[00:36:25] Heck we had soft outsource their legal

[00:36:28] stuff because legally they couldn't run on

[00:36:30] their own systems they had to show that

[00:36:31] they were running a third party but

[00:36:33] they didn't want to just put it in any

[00:36:35] place.

[00:36:36] Your cloud you had redundancy around

[00:36:38] the world so if something went down

[00:36:40] right well redundancy around the

[00:36:42] world is a relative statement but

[00:36:44] they for a 10 million.

[00:36:46] Yeah but we didn't have multiple

[00:36:49] pops and then we we ended up doing a deal

[00:36:52] with a hosting company that got us some

[00:36:55] international pops to service clients

[00:36:57] like one or music group but you know

[00:36:59] we like when I did it I didn't take any

[00:37:01] money for like the first year and a

[00:37:03] half two years.

[00:37:05] I found a I found a scrap kid who

[00:37:08] had done some stuff to kind of hold

[00:37:10] it all together and you know we

[00:37:12] figured it out because I was co-founded

[00:37:14] with it and ultimately you know that

[00:37:16] ended up rolling into a company that

[00:37:19] you know at about 12 13 million was

[00:37:22] sold to CenturyLink for just under

[00:37:24] 200 million.

[00:37:25] Wow.

[00:37:27] So and I think you know like if I

[00:37:29] think about the things I didn't have

[00:37:32] a clue how to raise capital.

[00:37:33] Right time.

[00:37:34] I had to go figure it all out from

[00:37:36] scratch and there was no way to

[00:37:37] get like now there's so much tools

[00:37:39] out there you can go out and search

[00:37:40] for like hey how do I do.

[00:37:42] There's so much advice from BC's

[00:37:43] because it saves them time too.

[00:37:45] Like a Sequoia is a really good

[00:37:47] resource for young entrepreneurs

[00:37:49] like you want to understand a

[00:37:50] Pitch-Pitch Deck they could give you

[00:37:51] a new content for Pitch-Pitch Deck

[00:37:52] every year.

[00:37:53] You know I didn't know have any

[00:37:55] network that was that fixated.

[00:37:58] My network was more traditional

[00:37:59] network when the industry is always

[00:38:01] in and I didn't even know the

[00:38:03] first thing like I knew how to

[00:38:05] run a P&L and stuff like that but

[00:38:07] I didn't know how I was going to

[00:38:08] apply it.

[00:38:09] You just figured it out OJT all the

[00:38:11] way.

[00:38:12] Throw yourself in the deep in the

[00:38:14] pool you'll figure out how to

[00:38:16] swim.

[00:38:17] Yeah and if you don't you drown.

[00:38:18] Turns out.

[00:38:19] There's a bit of natural selection

[00:38:21] that gets played out there.

[00:38:23] But I mean it's you know it's

[00:38:25] alright like I actually this is

[00:38:26] the thing I like it's fun

[00:38:29] as hack even when everything

[00:38:31] doesn't go the right way.

[00:38:33] Still better than working a job

[00:38:35] at a queue.

[00:38:37] I'm ruined.

[00:38:38] I mean I don't know I like you know

[00:38:40] you do it for a while.

[00:38:42] Well but the thing about this like

[00:38:44] it's true.

[00:38:45] It is true.

[00:38:46] The pits to your wife the pits

[00:38:48] to your wife right is a spouse if

[00:38:50] you're a female.

[00:38:51] Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah the pits

[00:38:52] to spouses they're going to be

[00:38:53] like okay let me get this straight

[00:38:55] you're going to leave a really

[00:38:57] good paying job.

[00:38:58] It's with insurance and everything

[00:39:00] and we're going to do this

[00:39:03] saying that literally you might

[00:39:05] make zilch hell we might even go

[00:39:07] into debt.

[00:39:08] Yeah that's the pitch yeah yeah

[00:39:11] that's the that's the deal.

[00:39:13] And so how I counter the pit

[00:39:15] where the counterpitch is here

[00:39:17] I'm going to be more valuable

[00:39:19] to companies.

[00:39:20] So even if I fail I'll get a

[00:39:22] better job because I was the

[00:39:25] guy that took those risks.

[00:39:27] That's pretty good.

[00:39:29] That's a pretty good pitch.

[00:39:31] And it paid off.

[00:39:33] It worked out.

[00:39:35] Ever have to go back and get a

[00:39:37] job?

[00:39:38] No.

[00:39:39] Oh no.

[00:39:40] I haven't had a real job since

[00:39:42] 2009.

[00:39:43] Yeah I was about to say.

[00:39:45] Once you go down this path

[00:39:47] you're ruined of

[00:39:49] again going into an office

[00:39:51] or even if you're not doing

[00:39:53] into an office working the way

[00:39:55] that you want to work with the

[00:39:57] people that you want to work

[00:39:59] you don't have to deal with

[00:40:01] things that happen in corporate

[00:40:03] America.

[00:40:04] And so the last question for me

[00:40:06] is what type of person thrives

[00:40:08] around you?

[00:40:09] You know like they like I have

[00:40:11] certain types of people that

[00:40:13] thrive around me that I thrive

[00:40:15] that help me thrive.

[00:40:16] So what are those types of

[00:40:18] people for you?

[00:40:19] Well there's an underpinning

[00:40:21] lesson in this particular

[00:40:23] question that I'm going to pull

[00:40:25] back because I think it's at

[00:40:27] the heart of your question

[00:40:29] is do you have that you can shore up?

[00:40:31] Right.

[00:40:32] And I had a boss back in the

[00:40:34] odds.

[00:40:35] Ryan do you notice how you

[00:40:37] brought it back to skills?

[00:40:39] Yeah.

[00:40:40] He's not successful.

[00:40:43] Like a ninja.

[00:40:45] I don't know what you guys

[00:40:47] talking about.

[00:40:49] I had a boss

[00:40:51] back in the odds

[00:40:53] who I hated by the way

[00:40:55] but he gave me

[00:40:57] one thing like I learned a couple

[00:40:59] of different things from him but one

[00:41:01] thing from him that really

[00:41:03] stuck with me is like look Adam

[00:41:05] you're really good at

[00:41:07] you know vision.

[00:41:09] Setting the stage for execution

[00:41:11] pulling the pieces together understanding

[00:41:13] how it's going to go and the other kid went

[00:41:15] through a couple other things.

[00:41:17] But he's like you hate

[00:41:19] minutiae.

[00:41:20] You hate the details.

[00:41:22] And he's like and you can't keep yourself

[00:41:24] in it forever.

[00:41:25] And so you better

[00:41:27] like partner up with people

[00:41:29] who love living in that shit.

[00:41:31] And so and I thought about it and I'm

[00:41:33] like damn he's right man.

[00:41:35] It's like I can do it but I really

[00:41:37] hate it.

[00:41:38] It sounds like work.

[00:41:40] Yeah.

[00:41:41] It's like it's like I'll do

[00:41:43] I'll do an execution just don't

[00:41:45] make me stay in that shit forever.

[00:41:47] Ryan's about to have a seizure.

[00:41:49] Sounds familiar.

[00:41:51] I know the relationship I understand

[00:41:53] why I'm here.

[00:41:55] Yeah.

[00:41:56] Thank you.

[00:41:57] Thanks for helping me with the download on Chrome.

[00:41:59] Yeah.

[00:42:00] Ryan did you do you wrap us up

[00:42:02] wrap us up with a question or whatever you want to

[00:42:04] I've got a lot of questions but we're going to wrap it up.

[00:42:06] I got it.

[00:42:07] We didn't get to talk about everything.

[00:42:09] We get to talk about everything but the thing

[00:42:11] that's a part two.

[00:42:12] That's a part two.

[00:42:13] Yeah.

[00:42:14] Yeah.

[00:42:15] So you kind of you kind of enter this

[00:42:17] in a way when you're talking about mentoring

[00:42:19] younger younger kids.

[00:42:21] What would older Adam Adam of today

[00:42:24] tell the seven year old Adam that was selling.

[00:42:27] Yeah.

[00:42:28] What would you tell yourself back then what's

[00:42:30] that what's the wisdom.

[00:42:32] Yeah I don't know about the seven year old Adam

[00:42:34] whether he could absorb it in let's say bought

[00:42:36] some candy from with me or something but

[00:42:38] I do think if I could amend the question a

[00:42:42] little bit just to the younger someone that's

[00:42:44] younger whether it's me or someone else

[00:42:46] skills again.

[00:42:47] Here we go.

[00:42:49] Well it's really about taking risks.

[00:42:52] There's a couple of things in the equation like

[00:42:55] I'm a I don't know if you guys have ever read

[00:42:57] Jocker Willings extreme accountability.

[00:43:00] Yes.

[00:43:01] Extreme and I mean like he hits it right like

[00:43:04] look you have to own it all.

[00:43:06] And so as a CEO the buck is just as a

[00:43:10] founder the buck always stops with you.

[00:43:13] Right.

[00:43:14] So you have to get really comfortable with

[00:43:16] that which means you have to get comfortable

[00:43:18] making decisions with 10 to 20 percent of the

[00:43:20] actual information you need.

[00:43:22] You have to get comfortable with pushing out

[00:43:24] risk and being accountable to take the fall

[00:43:26] and not pushing on to other people because

[00:43:29] ultimately you own it you know and so

[00:43:31] you'd have to people need to wrap their

[00:43:33] head around if I'm willing to push

[00:43:35] myself it doesn't matter if I'm the

[00:43:37] gregarious person or the really quiet

[00:43:39] person I think that's BS there's a

[00:43:41] lot of successful CEOs that are not

[00:43:43] gregarious who are very introverts who

[00:43:46] bring different talents to table.

[00:43:48] Right.

[00:43:49] So don't don't pigeonhole any of that I

[00:43:51] would tell people but if you're thinking

[00:43:52] about it don't wait like if I could do

[00:43:55] one thing over I would have started my

[00:43:58] CEO journey at 29 not 39.

[00:44:02] Right.

[00:44:03] Because I would be so much farther along

[00:44:05] and I've had three companies now one

[00:44:07] of them has had a great outcome one

[00:44:10] of them this one is on a massive to

[00:44:12] great growth great opportunity and

[00:44:14] then I had one failure in the middle

[00:44:16] where you know I got a PhD on how to

[00:44:18] do everything wrong so that I wouldn't

[00:44:20] do it again.

[00:44:22] But I learned and and so I mean I just

[00:44:25] think you know I feel like I tell I

[00:44:27] talk to these people and they're like

[00:44:29] well I'm kind of waiting for this

[00:44:30] way that screw it jump in the pool

[00:44:33] in fact I would argue right now the

[00:44:35] best time ever when the economy is

[00:44:37] down and things are kind of not going

[00:44:39] so great people pull back and that's

[00:44:42] when great companies are made.

[00:44:44] Oh yeah I just if my advice would be

[00:44:47] don't wait own it all take risks

[00:44:50] and be comfortable with failure because

[00:44:52] failure means you're learning and

[00:44:54] growing and pushing now don't accept

[00:44:56] it like when I'm a loser but you know

[00:44:58] like say hey what can I take from

[00:45:00] this and then apply it to the next

[00:45:02] thing so that you don't have to go

[00:45:04] relearn that whereas I tell my

[00:45:06] employees I'll underwrite 10 to 20

[00:45:08] percent of your failure every single

[00:45:10] day but I have two asks one is

[00:45:13] I just paid for your MBA in that

[00:45:15] experience so what did you learn

[00:45:17] so the what's the skills we can pull

[00:45:19] out of this one and to go share it

[00:45:21] with as many of your colleagues as

[00:45:23] possible so I don't have to write

[00:45:25] their MBA to right.

[00:45:26] All right so one more question I

[00:45:27] got to ask another question so you

[00:45:29] have a failure right and this

[00:45:31] happens this is going to happen a

[00:45:32] lot of us a lot of people are

[00:45:33] going to listen to this they're

[00:45:34] going to have failures how do you

[00:45:36] have a massive failure

[00:45:38] pick up and keep going how do you

[00:45:41] not get bogged down in that in that

[00:45:43] value the analysis for us as part of

[00:45:46] it yeah yeah how do you just forward

[00:45:48] and pick up.

[00:45:49] Yeah well I mean so you know

[00:45:52] we talked we started the show that

[00:45:54] there's probably some innate

[00:45:56] components that do happen to

[00:45:58] trickle into the DNA of people who

[00:46:00] really are going to be founders or

[00:46:02] entrepreneurs and by the way I

[00:46:05] I doesn't people that don't have

[00:46:07] those they just might have to

[00:46:08] recognize they need to quickly move

[00:46:10] out of the lead role after their

[00:46:12] ideas germinated because maybe they

[00:46:14] don't have enough but I think one of

[00:46:16] them is you know a prevent your

[00:46:18] willingness to push themselves take

[00:46:20] risk one but the other one which

[00:46:22] is an answer to your question is

[00:46:23] resiliency like I you have a

[00:46:25] choice on how you 90% of the

[00:46:27] world is how you choose to

[00:46:29] respond to it and so I could

[00:46:31] respond to the fact that I had

[00:46:34] yeah what I learned later on and to

[00:46:36] I've been in two lawsuits because of

[00:46:38] this that the investors suit each other

[00:46:40] because one of them was crooked I didn't

[00:46:42] know this at the time and they end up

[00:46:44] suing each other well your CEO you get

[00:46:46] sued too so I've been I was in two

[00:46:48] lawsuits so I'm like I got that

[00:46:49] checkbox for you no problem.

[00:46:51] You know I end up having to pay some

[00:46:53] of that big chunk out of my own pocket

[00:46:55] because the you know I was like

[00:46:57] guess what this is we're going to

[00:46:59] fight you on how much we have to

[00:47:01] fight and stuff like that but all

[00:47:03] that taught me so much and so I

[00:47:05] chose I could have said hey you know

[00:47:07] geez you know bad investors had to

[00:47:09] go through this all this crappy

[00:47:11] culture had to turn around instead I

[00:47:13] said what can I learn so what I'm

[00:47:15] like maniacal about culture now the

[00:47:17] lie because I inherited a company

[00:47:19] that was a rebuild which we took

[00:47:21] from a tear down after we laid off

[00:47:23] 100 people back from 2 million to

[00:47:25] almost 20 and then almost recap

[00:47:27] the whole thing went 40 million

[00:47:29] dollars and James C. I before the

[00:47:31] founders got in a fight and the

[00:47:33] whole thing fell apart are the

[00:47:35] investors and the more than

[00:47:37] original founder but through it I

[00:47:39] learned pay a lot of attention to

[00:47:41] your embed with for your investors

[00:47:43] and don't take any of that stuff

[00:47:45] for granted because you were

[00:47:47] marrying them even if you don't know

[00:47:49] it I learned that culture is

[00:47:51] everything in a drug or says

[00:47:53] culture eats strategy every day of

[00:47:55] the week but he really means

[00:47:57] culture and get people be cultural

[00:47:59] founders out of the gate they can

[00:48:01] help amplify your business in ways

[00:48:03] that you could never do on your own

[00:48:05] and so those those lessons are now

[00:48:07] imbued in me in a way that I think is

[00:48:09] key to some of the success we're seeing

[00:48:11] right now. Ryan I tend to

[00:48:13] look at failure like defensive

[00:48:15] backs in football that just got

[00:48:17] burned for a touchdown

[00:48:19] they don't have to

[00:48:21] think about being burned

[00:48:23] because they're going to be

[00:48:25] in the next set they can't

[00:48:27] think about what just happened

[00:48:29] they've got to be in that moment

[00:48:31] now after the game for the next week

[00:48:33] they could go back and learn some things

[00:48:35] with their coaches etc but in that

[00:48:37] moment they can't think about

[00:48:39] they don't have time to think about it

[00:48:41] because if they're thinking about it

[00:48:43] they're not going to be covering the wide receiver

[00:48:45] or the tight end or whatever. Sports is

[00:48:47] always a great analogy for business

[00:48:49] it's like Roger Federer

[00:48:51] does a bad shot next one

[00:48:53] didn't even realize it happened

[00:48:55] you have to forget it

[00:48:57] but I think the key is you've got to choose to learn

[00:48:59] and so to your point the D-Back will study that film later on

[00:49:01] but right now he's like screw it

[00:49:03] what can I take I've got to go to the next

[00:49:05] we'll study it on the sideline

[00:49:07] oh yeah yeah

[00:49:09] but it's learning

[00:49:11] it's taking that failure

[00:49:13] and not allowing yourself to go down the rabbit hole

[00:49:15] where you're blaming yourself

[00:49:17] and all that guilt and shame

[00:49:19] and all that stuff that gets piled on

[00:49:21] that was a failure

[00:49:23] but it taught me this

[00:49:25] so the best coaches

[00:49:27] and the best CEOs are the ones who say what did it teach you

[00:49:29] what did you learn?

[00:49:31] I love the fact that it forces a person

[00:49:33] I always tell people like look if you fail

[00:49:35] that means you pushed yourself to grow

[00:49:37] and you're going to fail

[00:49:39] because you don't know where the edge is

[00:49:41] that's alright let's take away from it

[00:49:43] I've done this and it offends a lot of people

[00:49:45] when I've said

[00:49:47] if you don't fail daily

[00:49:49] you're not pushing hard enough

[00:49:51] to the length to now

[00:49:53] for a lot of folks it's a little bit too much

[00:49:55] but the idea is like

[00:49:57] you're soft

[00:49:59] you're not pushing yourself hard enough

[00:50:01] so that you fail

[00:50:03] which ultimately causes the shuddering

[00:50:05] of the business anyhow

[00:50:07] I mean like at the end of the day

[00:50:09] fail fast learn fast

[00:50:11] move on

[00:50:13] we've taken way too much of your time

[00:50:15] yeah that's alright

[00:50:17] I would say the odds are stacked so massively

[00:50:19] against starting a business

[00:50:21] you might as well just throw everything you got at

[00:50:23] and see where it lands

[00:50:25] that's a great point

[00:50:27] with that we will wrap Adam

[00:50:29] thanks for coming on, thanks for educating the audience

[00:50:31] we appreciate your brother

[00:50:33] definitely well enjoyed as always my friend

[00:50:35] and Ryan it was great

[00:50:37] I know your role now completely understand everything

[00:50:39] completely understand your dynamics for you too

[00:50:41] I am where I sit

[00:50:43] yeah that's what it is

[00:50:45] that's alright

[00:50:47] I'm accepting my role

[00:50:49] and I'm moving forward

[00:50:51] you're crushing it my friend