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Beth Armknecht Miller with Executive Velocity

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Welcome to Daring To, a podcast that finds out how CEOs and entrepreneurs navigate today’s business world – the conventions they’re breaking, the challenges they’ve faced and the decisions that they’ve made, and lastly, just what makes them different.

In 2006, Beth Armknecht Miller founded Executive Velocity as an outlet for her trademark enthusiasm and energy for assisting clients with their most valuable asset – their people. Through her proven approaches, she provides expert advice on leadership capabilities and builds succession plans for organizational continuity.

Beth served as a Chair with Vistage, the most prestigious CEO and business owner peer advisory organization in the world for 13 years. As a Vistage Chair, Beth facilitated peer advisor meetings and coached business owners and executives to grow and develop in their roles and careers.

Connect with Beth on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Show Transcript

Rita Trehan: [00:00:02] Welcome to Dairy To, a podcast that finds out how CEOs and entrepreneurs navigate today’s business world, the conventions they’re breaking, the challenges they faced, and the decisions that they’ve made, and lastly, just what makes them different? Well, joining me today, what can I say, this is like, you know, being with my soulmate, right? Because we are both passionate about something that’s really important, which is leadership. So, I’m joined today by Beth Armknecht Miller, who is the CEO of the, Executive Velocity. I love the name, by the way, Executive Velocity. It almost says it all, really, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:00:42] Well, it does, yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:00:43] Yeah. But, you know, you have had an interesting career. So, here you are, sort of in this sort of leadership consulting, making companies better, but that’s not how you started your career. And I started my career in HR. And your career started in the profession, there’s often like jokes that go on about like HR and the profession that you started in.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:01:03] Finance.

Rita Trehan: [00:01:04] Yeah. So, tell me a little bit about that. So, how did you make that transition? Not many people made from finance to sort of leadership.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:01:11] Yeah. There were a number of steps. And at the time, when I was working in finance, I was working for DEC, which with Digital Equipment Corporation, lot of people listening probably never heard of it before, but the remains of it is Hewlett Packard. And I was in finance for seven years. About three years into it, I was like, you know, I’m good at this, but I’m not passionate about it. This is not where I should be. So, I was very fortunate. They were hiring people internally to develop them into salespeople. And the deal was, we’ll train you, Beth, but you have to move. We’re not going keep you up in New England. I was like, that’s fine, I’m done with winners. So, that’s how I got to Atlanta.

Rita Trehan: [00:02:06] Okay.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:02:06] And it was a great experience, great training. And when I got down here, one of the lessons I learned was that you leave managers, not companies, and I had just the worst manager down here.

Rita Trehan: [00:02:28] If he’s listening, he better takes some advice. That’s one way of saying.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:02:30] I have no idea where he is.

Rita Trehan: [00:02:33] We won’t mention his name, but we hope he’s listening because he might listen. Words of wisdom.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:02:39] Yeah. So, I made a decision to leave. Digital had been wonderful to me, but I made the decision to leave. And when I left, I met my husband. He had started an accounting temporary services firm. And so, I had left and went to Coopers & Lybrand. Again, another company that doesn’t exist anymore.

Rita Trehan: [00:03:02] I remember, though. Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:03:04] Now, PricewaterhouseCoopers. I was in sales in their technology practice and I was there for several years. But my husband convinced me to move, leave, and become an entrepreneur, which, that’s really not my comfort zone. He is much more of an entrepreneur than me.

Rita Trehan: [00:03:23] I think you’re being far too modest because the company grew to be one of like, you know, the fastest growing companies.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:03:29] Yes. Another thing that I learned about leadership doing that was my husband had certain skill sets and I had certain skill sets. They didn’t align. They were compatible. And he was able to fill certain things that I didn’t have and vice versa. So, it really made a great partnership. Believe me, there were times like it was really difficult.

Rita Trehan: [00:04:00] I was going to say, it’s like a marriage made in heaven, right? But like, you know-.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:04:04] There were times. Believe me, there were times. We always try to make sure that if we were disagreeing, it was over dinner and not in the workplace. And fast forward, we made Inc. 500, lot of fast-growing local awards as well. And then, we sold back in 2002. It was not the best time to sell, but it was the right time. My dad passed away. I was spending time going back and forth to help my mother up in the northeast. And so, I just didn’t have the energy. So, we took some time off. I was in my 40s at the time and I got bored really quickly. There was only so much volunteer work I could do.

Rita Trehan: [00:04:53] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:04:54] And so, I had gone through Leadership Atlanta, had met a lot of wonderful people there. And one of them was Dave Peterson, who had started North Highland Consulting here. A wonderful guy. And he he was the one that led me to Vistage. He had been a member for many years. And he basically said, “Beth, my Vistage group helped me through a lot of difficult times. And I got to the point where I could step away, and, you know, be on the board.” And he said, “I think you’d make a great Vistage chair.” So, that was back in ’05.

Rita Trehan: [00:05:43] And if people don’t know about Vistage, it’s actually a renowned sort of global group that offers like a huge amount of value to businesses of like small to medium sizes that people can be part of. And obviously, you know, we’re all involved in it and have been involved in it. And tell us a little bit about that, because often, like we don’t think we—you know, we focus a lot on leadership and like what corporate companies need, but actually, as a small- to medium-sized business, it’s so critical, isn’t it?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:06:11] Yes. And because I had been a business owner, I knew what I had kind of missed, and that was somebody from the outside or people from the outside that could advise you in a safe environment. And that’s what Vistage does. It brings business owners, presidents together on a monthly basis. It’s like an advisory board or a brain trust. And it allows you, in a safe place, to bring really significant issues and get advice from your peers. So, there’s no competitors. There was education involved as well. There were a lot of speakers that would come in and speak on various topics that were critical to small- to mid-sized companies. And then, there was coaching. So, each month, I would meet individually with one of the business owners in the group and coach both on leadership and business.

Rita Trehan: [00:07:16] Now, look, you strike me as somebody that’s quite humble, right? So, our listeners don’t know like you are not only an acclaimed author of a book called Talent Obsessed, you have been named a diva. I love that. I just like want to be. Like a diva in a good way, guys.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:07:28] I forgot about that.

Rita Trehan: [00:07:30] A diva in a good way. Sort of like, you know, 40 under 40 in Atlanta.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:07:34] Oh, you’ve done your research.

Rita Trehan: [00:07:36] Oh, yeah. So, I’m sort of like in awe because, you know, you come across and clearly, you are sort of a humble leader in terms of like what you have achieved over the years. But also, I’m sure that must give you so much credibility with the leadership that you go in and work with. And today, like, you know, we are both passionate about a topic that is close to our hearts, right? Which is the next generation of leaders. Every leader, you know, legacy maybe, we would like to believe that it’s developing great leadership talent.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:08:08] Exactly.

Rita Trehan: [00:08:08] The reality is we both know that, you know, sadly, that’s not always the case.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:08:13] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:08:14] It’s still the case that we can pick up a consulting report, a global report, and say like, what is it that keeps CEOs up at night, whether they’re like corporate companies or small companies? And they will say, oh, let me guess, I think like, you know—or probably, I would say the last at least 20 years that I can think of, maybe longer than that, but one of their top three issues is they’re concerned about talent.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:08:35] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:08:35] And about leadership talent. So, you know, I turn my hair out. That’s why it goes gray a lot. And I have conversations around that as sort of a strategic advisory capacity.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:08:46] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:08:46] But you’re going in and talking about that a lot. How do you get them to understand the importance of succession?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:08:53] Yeah. Oftentimes, they’ve lost somebody key. There’s pain involved. And so, that’s generally when they’re interested in succession planning. It’s not when things are going well, unfortunately. There is a company that I worked with years ago who the CEO had gotten some bad health, he had a heart problem, and he realized, you know, he was not going to live another 10 years. So, he was somebody who was proactive in succession planning.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:09:38] So, you know, he called me in to actually consult and coach his high potentials, one of them specifically who we identified as a potential president to take over. And during the three years that I was working with them, the CEO went from, you know, 80 hours a week of work down to eight hours. And he basically got the company to a point where he didn’t have to be there. And consequently, he was able to sell that company to ADP for cash. Cash. There was no earn out, which is phenomenal.

Rita Trehan: [00:10:27] It’s unusual, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:10:27] Yeah. And, you know, his key employees did very well in the sale as well.

Rita Trehan: [00:10:35] So, it is about like really developing that capability because it’s the people that have the value, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:10:40] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:10:40] What creates the value of a corporation. And I think like it seems like they almost missed out. You know, I’ve read some of your stuff where you go like, leaders that focus on sort of like the numbers kind of stuff, and that’s great, but actually, that’s not what makes the business go around.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:10:57] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:10:58] So, how have you helped them? And you’ve talked about it like you got this guy interested in succession, right? I often go in inside, like tear up the succession plan because, you know what’s going to happen. You’re going to look at it and like, you know, you’re going to put all these names to it, and then you’re going to have a problem, and you can go outside and recruit. So, what was the point in spending all that time doing it? So, how do you help guide them through a process that they—because there must be a process that you use to help them do that, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:11:19] Well, initially, I’ll go in and we’ll assess their readiness for a succession plan.

Rita Trehan: [00:11:26] Interesting. Talk about that a little bit.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:11:27] Yeah. So, you know, there are there are some key components to a succession plan that a lot of small to mid-sized companies don’t have. A lot of large companies do. But it’s things like understanding your core competencies, understanding leadership competencies. And so, that might be an entire project right there because they don’t have those. And that can also help for hiring purposes, not just for succession planning, hiring and performance. They might not have identified key positions for today and key positions that they need in three years. And when they do that exercise, they’ll often find out that there are positions that they need that they aren’t on the org chart right now.

Rita Trehan: [00:12:18] Right.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:12:18] Right. And then it’s, okay, we’ve identified the key positions, and sometimes, they’re not at the C-suite. They’re somewhere down farther. There might be some subject matter expert that holds the keys to the castle. And they have nobody that’s prepared to take that position. And there’s a risk. I often talk about succession planning being risk management.

Rita Trehan: [00:12:48] That’s a great way to describe it, yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:12:50] You know, you are creating a plan for success in the future and you never know when there might be somebody that, God forbid, dies, gets disabled, decides to go to a competitor, and you’ve got to have that that plan in place and have those people that you’ve identified that could potentially move into the position ready. And so then, there’s all about development and training.

Rita Trehan: [00:13:24] Yeah. And how hard is that, though, for a leader of a small to mid-sized company to go like, you know what, I’m going to like develop these people, and they’re actually going to be ready, I like didn’t do my job, well, I don’t know that I’m ready for that? How do you get them comfortable with that?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:13:41] Well then, that’s a discussion with the CEO about, okay, where is your identity? Is your identity in the organization? What are the things you are involved with? For instance, this gentleman who had a heart problem. Now, I don’t run into that situation a lot, fortunately. But in his situation, his identity for years had been that company. Well, what was he ignoring? It was his family, right? So, he started shifting. He started more travel with his wife, more family get-togethers. So, he shifted his identity. Too often, nine times out of ten, that’s the discussion that the business owner is fearful because the company has his or her identity.

Rita Trehan: [00:14:38] Yeah, that’s a really interesting point. And, you know, we’ve been through several weeks, you know, couple of months now of sort of lockdown. And that has had a massive effect, by form, like large companies, but even more so on those small and medium-sized companies.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:14:53] Yes.

Rita Trehan: [00:14:53] And, you know, I can’t help feeling that there’s going to have to be—and, you know, you read about it all the time that we’re seeing shift in what’s important from leaders today and what they need to be focusing on, which is, yes, get your business up and running, but, you know, you just talked about somebody that spent more time with family while some people are realizing that they’ve been missing out just by being at home.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:15:16] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:15:17] There’s leaders right now that are trying to think about how do I, you know, restart, new normal, whatever. Like what do you think their focus should be as leaders in trying to restart or reconnect their businesses?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:15:32] Yeah. Well, I think through this this challenging time, I’ve noticed that leaders, good leaders are really focused on employee well-being. And that’s not to say, they’re not focused on results, but pre-COVID, they were focused on results first, and then relationships. And I think that’s flipped. Now, as we move into that recovery phase and companies are already starting to go back to work and in a phased approach, client I was just talking to in Florida yesterday was talking about this, and you got to make sure that people feel safe.

Rita Trehan: [00:16:18] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:16:18] Right. If they don’t feel safe and they’re anxious, they’re not going to perform. So, why even ask them to come back if they feel that way? I was just writing a blog the other day about the fact that today is even more important for leaders to use their emotional intelligence and to really understand what individuals are going through, and then be really clear of, here are our plans, here are our backup plans if something should happen, right? This company in Florida happens to be in a county that they’ve just peaked.

Rita Trehan: [00:17:04] Right.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:17:05] Right. And they’ve got a lot of individuals who are stay-at-home moms, people that are taking care of the elderly. So, they’ve phased it where, okay, if you don’t have any kids, you know, you’re single, young, well, you’re the first phase that we’d like to come, but that’s not to say that that’s a blanket, right? Okay. Be aware when you’re having conversation, and of course, it’s going to be video. It’s going to be good old Zoom. Everybody is tired of hearing Zoom. But anyways, be really conscious of the tone of their voice, body language, and their-

Rita Trehan: [00:18:00] At least connecting to them, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:18:00] Right. Exactly.

Rita Trehan: [00:18:00] Like making that connection is quite hard virtually in some ways, right? It’s like we’ve kind of done it in the past a bit, but like not with a real focus on, actually, this is our only way, of communicating.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:18:13] Exactly.

Rita Trehan: [00:18:14] Normally, it’s been, well, I’m going to have this virtual teleconference, but I know I’m going to see this person in two days, so I can follow up with them in person. That’s a whole capability set that maybe leaders haven’t really honed.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:18:27] Right. Exactly.

Rita Trehan: [00:18:28] So, what kind of advice or tips do you have for them to kind of hone that capability?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:18:33] Yeah. I think there’s, first of all, get real with your self-awareness.

Rita Trehan: [00:18:43] I love that. Get real with your—I love that, yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:18:45] Yeah. And, you know, how are you showing up to the people that you’re leading? And, you know, if you’re fearful, they’re going to know that, right? So, you’re to have that courage to be out in front of it. And then, you know, there are people around you that you trust and respect, ask for their feedback. What can I be doing differently? And make sure that when you ask and you listen to their feedback that you do something with it.

Rita Trehan: [00:19:17] Yeah. That’s really great advice, I think, because it’s very actionable for leaders to be able to put in practice. And often, I think there is going to be like some massive thing that it’s like, my God, how am I going to be able to like do that? That’s like so out of my comfort zone. But actually, what you’re saying is like just be in touch with yourself in some ways.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:19:37] Exactly. Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:19:39] So, how do you help companies also, you know, you’ve talked about it, some people are going to be nervous, some people are going to be like, you know what, I’m ready to go back. That’s all good. It’s almost like we’re going to have this melting pot, I feel, of all these different like feelings and emotions.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:19:53] That’s right.

Rita Trehan: [00:19:54] And so, this whole thing about like diversity, for me, takes on a completely different meaning, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:20:01] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:20:01] What do you think about that? Like how can companies sort of address that in the longer term? Because I think it’s bringing to the full, in a good way maybe, how to think about diversity and strengths of that.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:20:14] Yeah. You know, I’m hopeful that, you know, we come out of this as leaders focused on a different set of priorities. You know, there’s been a lot of talk over the last 10, 15 years about culture, and values, and purpose, and I think that-

Rita Trehan: [00:20:37] A lot of talk, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:20:38] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:20:38] You and I both know there’s a lot of talk, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:20:40] Exactly.

Rita Trehan: [00:20:40] We want it to be different, but it’s a bit of talk.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:20:42] It is. It is. And I think there are some companies that do that very well, but not a lot. And I think the leaders that have gone through this, they’ve learned a lot. And they’ve learned a lot about their teams. They’ve learned a lot about themselves. And I would be hopeful that on the other side of this that they continue to focus on the people first, and then through that, they’re going to get the results.

Rita Trehan: [00:21:16] And in terms of like developing the next generation of leaders that think like that, right? Because I think, you know, through every crisis or every sort of, I guess, misfortune comes opportunity.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:21:29] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:21:29] And I think actually, COVID-19 is surfacing a massive amount of opportunity for businesses to actually step back, rethink, and reshape in a way that they’ve not been had that kind of burning platform to do. So, that that must help when you think about developing the next generation of leaders.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:21:50] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:21:51] How do you get companies to buy into that, and not get sucked into, we’re a month back in and the numbers are not looking good, and I just need to focus on that because that’s the most important thing.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:22:02] Yeah. Clearly, it’s more difficult with a small- to mid-sized companies because they don’t have the resources that a Coca-Cola has or UPS. So, really, it’s about, okay, what are the demands of those individuals coming back? Because I think that a lot of them are going to be looking at work differently and looking at the company differently. So, I would be working with those C-suite to determine, okay, kind of looking out in the future again, okay, we’ve gone through all of this, what have you really learned? And what are you going to put into practice that makes sense for your organization? And what do you need to stop doing?

Rita Trehan: [00:22:59] Yeah. It’s interesting, right? I wonder how many companies are thinking right now about all the things that they have like constantly done that actually, they haven’t missed, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:23:10] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:23:10] The reports that they had written, all the meetings that they’ve had that actually, we haven’t really missed it that much.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:23:18] Right. Exactly. Even for people going back to work, you know, they were managing it through these eight weeks or whatever, and do you really need to have these people coming back to work? Now, some of them want to go back to work because their kids are still at home, right? But there are others that, you know, have that fear. So, you’ve got to do that delicate balance to make sure that the people that are there at work really need to be there and want to be there.

Rita Trehan: [00:23:56] Yeah. So, I read in the newspaper yesterday coming from the UK that one of the most prestigious universities equivalent to like where you did your leadership, at Harvard, in the UK, that’s kind of Cambridge University, announced that for their next year, they are going to run all their courses virtually.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:24:16] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:24:16] Virtually.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:24:16] And I heard that here in the States, they’re talking about bringing the kids back to university in the fall through Thanksgiving. And then, once Thanksgiving hits, they’re going to go online, which is very interesting.

Rita Trehan: [00:24:35] Right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:24:36] Right. It’s a whole new dynamic.

Rita Trehan: [00:24:37] Yeah. So, like what does it mean for leaders?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:24:39] Right. So, you know, you’ve got to rethink how you operate. Now, there are some professional white-collar companies. This has been a series of changes constantly as you got information. And they’ve been able to run. And now, some of them had to—like health care, for instance, there have been a lot of layoffs there. In retail, can’t do it, right? But as it relates to those kinds of white-collar jobs, there are a lot of ways that you can be operating differently moving forward.

Rita Trehan: [00:25:21] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:25:21] You’ve got technology. It’s not like this happened—can you imagine if this happened 20 years ago?

Rita Trehan: [00:25:27] I cannot imagine like how we would have coped with like lack of information and just sort of, you know, it would have been, obviously, we would’ve found a way to cope, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:25:36] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:25:37] Because like human beings are, you know, like all kind of entrepreneurial, they find ways to cope.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:25:42] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:25:42] Whether we believe it or not, we have, in a sense, like of survival and like ability to deal with an uncertainty in why some people do it better than others, but we have an instinct that will help us get through it. But like you, I cannot imagine without the use of technology. If anything, it has probably sped it up, the use of technology.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:26:02] Right. Yes, I think so.

Rita Trehan: [00:26:04] But I can’t help but imagine that lots of leaders are really scared right now because this is like a new paradigm.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:26:11] Yes.

Rita Trehan: [00:26:11] And it’s almost like turning that page on that new paradigm is you’re not quite sure if you’re going to like what you see.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:26:17] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:26:18] Because you’ve got this comfort zone. So, you must have had to deal with that in the past, you know, in different sort scenarios of getting leaders to get comfortable of like not being in their comfort zone.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:26:29] Yeah. It’s kind of stretching them and being comfortable with failure. You know, failure is actually a friend because you learn from it. I mean, if everything was perfect-

Rita Trehan: [00:26:45] Boring.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:26:45] Boring, very boring. So, one of the things that I’ve been doing personally is, you know, everybody’s making bread.

Rita Trehan: [00:26:55] Oh, God.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:26:56] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:26:57] I have friends that like sending me pictures of them making bread. I’m like, okay, guys, what is this all about?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:27:01] Okay. Well, I was one of them.

Rita Trehan: [00:27:03] Okay. I want to know. I’m like curious.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:27:05] And I had heard that yeast, you couldn’t find yeast. So, I thought, well, I’m going to do sour dough, but you have to get a sour-dough starter. So, I went on in Google, found this recipe. And they said, “Five days, you’re going to have a starter.” It didn’t happen in five days. And so, I kept feeding it, and I finally grew impatient. I’m like, I’m just going to make this bread. Well, it turned into a block. It was of course-

Rita Trehan: [00:27:36] You can use it for other things, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:27:38] Yeah, bird food or something. So, I continued to feed it, and three or four days later, I thought, I’m going to try this again. Well, it was a little better, but it was by no means what it looked like in the pictures. So, you know, I realized that I was impatient and I needed to slow down. So, I named my starter, Dudley do right.

Rita Trehan: [00:28:08] Dudley Do Right. I’ll text that to my friends.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:28:09] So, he was Dudley for a long time.

Rita Trehan: [00:28:14] Right.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:28:14] I slowed down and he finally became, Do Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:28:18] Do Right. I love it. I got it.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:28:20] So, just the other day, you have to do this float test to make sure that the starter floats, and that means it’s active and ready to mix, and stuff like that. So, I did the whole process. You have to let it sit overnight. It’s a long process. Well, I opened the oven and I yelled. I was so excited. It really looked like bread and it tasted good. And that was all about failure. Two times, I didn’t give up, and I kept working at it, and I felt so proud.

Rita Trehan: [00:29:03] I can just see it in your face, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:29:04] I know.

Rita Trehan: [00:29:04] It’s like, wow.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:29:05] I was so excited. I was running. I brought it down to my mother, my mother took a picture of it because they had been living through this whole thing, too.

Rita Trehan: [00:29:13] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:29:13] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:29:13] But I mean, that’s a really good way to describe it, you know, that failure is a friend, and it’s about like understanding your own sort of, I guess, your preferences or your limitations in the sense like, look, you went like, I’m really just impatient, like I’m not used to having to like write something and not see it like work.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:29:30] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:29:30] It’s like, come on, I like followed the instructions, like what else is there to do, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:29:33] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:29:33] And so, it is a skill that we struggle with in society, that being able to accept failure as a friend is something that we find hard to do.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:29:48] Yes. Especially leaders, because they’re out in front and their mindset is, they should have all the answers, but they don’t. That’s why they have a team around them, right? One of the things that I work on often with leaders, especially new leaders, is they’re always trying to solve the problem versus coaching somebody through a problem so that, that person is actually solving the problem themselves. So, they’re basically enabling people to keep coming to them for problems. I like it to, you know, teach them to fish, don’t keep throwing them the fish.

Rita Trehan: [00:30:29] Yeah, I know that. I have to practice that so much because like, I want to help that, oh, yeah, I know how to solve that.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:30:34] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:30:34] And it takes a lot of like actually like self-reflection, like step back from it, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:30:40] But you also have to slow down because it’s really easy if you’ve got the solution to throw that fish. You have to slow down and ask the questions, get that person to self-reflect, and come to their own solution because they’ll own that solution.

Rita Trehan: [00:31:00] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:31:01] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:31:01] And so, like new leaders, I think that is such valuable advice because there is sort of like, I’m a new leader, look at me, like, you know, everyone’s eyes are on them, they want to be able to perform. But there’s a lot that’s going on right now, and people are talking about it more and more, which heartens me about leaders being humble, about humility being really, really important, that actually, vulnerability is a strength, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:31:26] Yes.

Rita Trehan: [00:31:27] It’s not what we have been brought up with. Like, you know, I can remember years ago working in a big corporate world where it was, you know, how many times she slapped your hands down on the table and swore was, like, you know, showed like how great a leader you were, you know. And I’m like, I was, you know, a young individual contributor, leader at the time as well, being like, in HR, going like, this is what we’re talking about leaders should look like?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:31:56] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:31:56] That’s not necessarily a great sort of role model. Now, we are hearing much more about the need for leaders to do to show vulnerability.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:32:08] Yeah, especially now, right? Because everybody, leaders and their employees are all dealing with this. And so, you know, nobody has the right solution.

Rita Trehan: [00:32:23] Yeah, that’s true actually. Nobody does, right? So, maybe, that’s what’s helping to encourage that humility that there isn’t like a single silver bullet or a single answer to know where to go forward.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:32:35] Yeah. But I hear a lot from leaders that, you know, we’re trying to be transparent. You know, we’re trying to communicate on a very regular basis. They do, you know, a lot of town halls where the CEO is out front versus having the managers deliver, and that makes employees feel a lot more comfortable and safe, that they’re hearing it directly from the person that either owns the company or is leading that company.

Rita Trehan: [00:33:11] Now, you’re a certified coach, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:33:12] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:33:12] So, you’ve spent a lot time sort of coaching leaders and high potentials, as to, you know, helping them sort of grow and develop.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:33:19] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:33:19] Over the years as you’ve coached people, what do you think of like the biggest areas where you see, like these are absolutely core skills that leaders will—you know, that I really focus on coaching leaders? And what are ones that you go like, these are just like you can spot these like capabilities a mile off and say, you know, you’re just not going to make it as a leader because one of the other things, I think, the companies struggles with is making that choice about a leader and whether they should be a leader in the first place or if they are a leader, making that call to say, actually, you know what, maybe there’s a different role somewhere else.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:33:57] Yeah. I actually just had this conversation recently on a podcast. And, you know, oftentimes, companies will have a subject matter expert who’s really great at what they’re doing and they make the decision that we’re going to put them into a leadership position. There is a big difference between performance and potential. Most high performers don’t have the potential to go into a leadership position.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:34:31] One of the things I encourage leaders to do is have a conversation with subject matter experts about what do they believe leadership is. If they hear them talk about management and not leadership, there is a problem. Leaders are really—great leaders develop future leaders. They are there to make their team shine. And it’s not—yeah, it’s about results, but it’s through the individuals.

Rita Trehan: [00:35:16] And have you sort of like—from your own experience, you grew a business, you, you know, grew it to be an amazing business that was then sold in value. I mean, is that something you put—like what are some of your personal sort of memories and stories around that? Because you have such a good grasp of what’s important in leadership, that how much of that has come from your own sort of experiences in growing and going through some of those situations?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:35:42] You know, I have to say that I wish I had a lot of the wisdom that I have today than I did 20 years ago. I made a lot of mistakes, a lot of mistakes. But they’re valuable now, right? I think about some of the leaders that I’ve worked with in the past couple of years, and what brings me joy is to see them grow. One comes to mind. I still work with her. She was two or three levels down in the organization from the CEO and she had kind of hit her peak, and it was because of her emotional intelligence. She had real trouble self-managing her emotions. She could get angry pretty quickly, especially with other departments.

Rita Trehan: [00:36:43] Right.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:36:43] So, their CEO called me, and I did an assessment, and I was pleased to see that she was highly goal-oriented and very competitive. So, I thought, well, you know, she’s got the profile where because she’s so goal-oriented inch and she knew, she was self-aware enough to know that this was holding her back that I agreed to work with her. And it was amazing. She now is two levels above. She reports directly with the CEO and she’s like, of course, my biggest fan, and she’s always calling me to coach other high potentials, but it’s about being self-aware and that whole emotional intelligence that is critical to leadership. That’s one of the things that I find. The other is communication.

Rita Trehan: [00:37:43] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:37:43] And being able to communicate the vision and connecting the employee to that vision. How do they fit? You know, what’s the customer service rep? How do they impact the long-term vision? How important is that?

Rita Trehan: [00:38:02] Yeah. Do you think that that’s become, people have been able to connect more to a company’s vision during this COVID crisis? Because of the focus on communities, and customers, and that, do you think that people are sort of connecting much more to their organizations if they are putting that time and attention into that area?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:38:18] Yes, I believe so. And I was actually on a webinar a couple weeks ago with DDI, and they had been doing some research on employee engagement. And it is actually gone up over this-

Rita Trehan: [00:38:31] Yeah. Someone mentioned that, yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:38:32] And yeah. And initially, it was kind of counter-intuitive. I was like, really? But then, when you started hearing about the time that, you know, CEOs and leaders were putting in to the relationships with their employees, it made sense.

Rita Trehan: [00:38:48] Yeah. Those will be the winning companies that come out of this, you know, small, medium, large are the ones that have actually put that investment in.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:38:55] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:38:55] But let’s talk a bit like you got a great story about like helping a female leader sort of rise up the ranks. Obviously, we are two women who run our own businesses, who offer that. And then, we have other women that do that. But, you know, it’s still a struggle for organizations today to have like sufficient representation of women leaders at various levels. I don’t care of the size of the company. It’s a problem wherever we look at it. And yes, there’s lots of efforts being put into that. How do we solve it?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:39:26] Oh, my gosh. If I knew how to solve it-

Rita Trehan: [00:39:30] Yeah. We’d all be like, yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:39:33] Right. Exactly.

Rita Trehan: [00:39:33] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:39:33] Exactly. Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:39:34] Okay. So, like look-

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:39:35] You know, it’s obviously a gradual thing. I think that, you know, we’ve got a generation coming up who are demanding it more, right? They have a different perspective than our generation. And so, I think we’re getting there. You know, you’ve got a whole baby boomer group that’s about ready to retire, right? So, you’ve got leaders coming in who are X’ers or millennials that will bring that to the table.

Rita Trehan: [00:40:16] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:40:16] So, you know, you can’t force it. You can’t mandate it, unfortunately.

Rita Trehan: [00:40:23] And that wouldn’t work, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:40:24] No.

Rita Trehan: [00:40:25] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:40:26] Exactly. So, I’m hopeful.

Rita Trehan: [00:40:28] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:40:28] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:40:29] And clearly, I guess people like the individuals that you’ve got are sort of spokespeople, and sponsors, and ambassadors for what is actually achievable that we don’t often think. And sometimes, as women in organizations, about our own capabilities and what we actually bring to the table and can deliver.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:40:46] And I think it also depends on, you know, the leaders in the organization today. Like for instance, the gentleman that is the CEO to this woman, he was always trying to promote diversity. It was a cornerstone of his. A big part of it was he had girls, daughters, right?

Rita Trehan: [00:41:14] It does make a difference like when you say that to the leaders, doesn’t it? When you say to them like, it’s your daughter, or your granddaughter, or your friend’s daughter, those are the people that are going to be around, what do you want them to-

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:41:28] Yeah. And I look at that. I look back on the leaders that I had, that I admired, and many of them had daughters.

Rita Trehan: [00:41:38] Yeah. Yeah. That’s an interesting insight.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:41:40] Yes.

Rita Trehan: [00:41:41] That makes a difference because they can connect to that.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:41:43] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:41:44] So, tell us what it’s like being—I mean, clearly, it’s passion that’s taking you to set up the organization and to move that forward. As you think about leaders that want to set up their own businesses or to think about, can I actually do this and how do you help, what would you say to them? What’s your advice to them around, here are some of the things to think about whether you’ve got what it takes to be able to do that?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:42:09] Yeah. I mean, there are a lot of skill sets that you need. If you’re going out on your own, you know, what’s your network like? You know, how is your sales skills? What’s your fear level, your anxiety? What’s your risk factor? There are individuals that I’ve met that think about it, but never quite do it. There’s also the personal situation. You’ve got, you know, three kids at home, are you willing to step away and try this on your own when you have mouths to feed, right? We never had kids.

Rita Trehan: [00:42:55] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:42:55] So, it was a much easier decision to go out on our own versus some other situation.

Rita Trehan: [00:43:05] Yeah. So, kind of like make that balance choice and just make sure you do the kind of pros and cons of what you’re doing and make sure you’ve got kind of what you have said that companies need to do today, is make sure you’ve got those backup plans in place that help support you as you go forward.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:43:22] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:43:22] And what’s your hope for the small or medium-sized companies coming out of COVID-19 would you say? And how leaders are—we’ve talked about like what some of the things that we want leaders to be doing in terms of well-being and that, but what’s your hope for things that will be different? What do you want organizations to look like, per se?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:43:38] You know, my hope is that leaders remain open-minded to what has occurred, the changes that have taken place, and self-reflect as to what are those things that we want to keep, what are the things that we stopped and we just need to keep stopped, if that’s a word.

Rita Trehan: [00:44:05] Don’t start them again, yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:44:06] Exactly.

Rita Trehan: [00:44:07] Don’t fall into bad habits, guys.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:44:08] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:44:09] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:44:09] And what do we need to do more of? And I’m hoping that it’s on that talent people side. And that will then drive the results.

Rita Trehan: [00:44:23] Do you have the view on how much time leaders should be spending on talent and people in terms of their—there’s lots of research or statistics that say like, you know, they spend 60% to 70%, and I say, “Really? Come on. Like, you know, you may think you do, but do you really?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:44:39] Yeah, especially small to mid-sized companies.

Rita Trehan: [00:44:43] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:44:43] You know, the smaller you get, the more that, that CEO is wearing a couple of hats, right? They don’t have an assistant. You know, they’re taking care of their calendar and travel arrangements if they travel. And so, it really depends. I would like to say that if you’re in that kind of 50 employees to 500 employees, which is where I generally work, that you’re spending at least 25% of your time.

Rita Trehan: [00:45:19] Yeah. Sounds about good. Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:45:20] Yeah. So, that’s like doing one-to-ones on a consistent basis, mentoring, all those things.

Rita Trehan: [00:45:29] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:45:29] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:45:30] I often have this view, and I’ve written about it a lot, I tend to have a lot of opinions about lots of things, and one of them is about sort of startup organizations and how typically, when a startup starts up, the first hire that they try to do is probably the finance role, and there’s a legal role, and then it’s sales, and yet, they don’t think about hiring like the talent leader that helps assist that CEO, who is spending so much time on it, that actually, what you need them to be doing is focusing on setting the culture, establishing the priorities.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:46:05] Right.

Rita Trehan: [00:46:05] It’s almost like it’s an afterthought.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:46:08] It is.

Rita Trehan: [00:46:08] Why?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:46:11] Well, I think that they’re so focused on generating profits, right? In order to get additional investments, et cetera, they need to see results. But one of the things that I also see when they’re hiring those individuals is oftentimes, they will hire their mirror.

Rita Trehan: [00:46:33] Oh, let’s talk about that. I love talking about that subject because we it a lot, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:46:37] Yeah. Then, you got, you know, three or four people sitting around the table that are just like you.

Rita Trehan: [00:46:44] It’s like that song, isn’t it? I want to walk like you, talk like you.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:46:46] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:46:46] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:46:47] Exactly. And that’s really not what you want because then, you got to group-

[00:46:51] think and it’s not as innovative or collaborative. Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:46:59] How do you help, from a selection standpoint, them to like look at that perspective and making sure, you know, you are not hiring a mirror image of yourself, and really testing the boundaries, it’s a diverse perspective that’s coming in.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:47:14] Right. Well, when we’re talking about small companies, I’ll use an assessment called Business DNA, which actually is a local firm here. The research came out at Georgia Tech. And it helps to identify those natural talents, those things that were formed between zero and three. That doesn’t mean that you show up like that all the time because as you get experience, you realize you need to shift. But what it does do is it shows your go-to talent when you’re under stress. Well, we’ve been under a lot of stress, right?

Rita Trehan: [00:47:48] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:47:50] I was doing some work with a staffing firm here in town, and we went in and assessed the team. And it was just like we talked about. There was five out of the six, all had a similar profile. And the sixth one, this poor woman, she felt like she was a duck out of water because she was really planned and scheduled, and here with this bunch of spontaneous folks.

Rita Trehan: [00:48:21] Yeah. It would be driving her crazy.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:48:22] Oh, it did. It did. But going through the assessment, it made her feel better, right? That okay, I’m not crazy, right? But what it did do was it then opened up the conversation of, okay, you have some positions you’re going to be hiring for, what do we need to be looking for to make this team more diverse so you don’t have that group-think and you’re not driving this poor woman crazy?

Rita Trehan: [00:48:51] Yeah. That’s a great insight. So, like teams actually reflecting on what capabilities they have today, and then saying, well, how can we like, you know, augment that in a way that makes us more rounded and grounded to be able to grow, right?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:49:04] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:49:04] When you say, great leaders growing great people, there was a quote that actually was in one of your blogs, which obviously came from somewhere, but it sort of, I think, personified for me something that I think would resonate with leaders a lot. I probably won’t get it exactly right, but it was about as open pencils. And we are, you know, like a pencil, we’re guided by the hand, the hand that the pencil holds, the hand that holds the pencil, and that every one of us always needs to sharpen up a pencil, right? So, it’s almost like you’re like sharpening your skills, constantly doing that.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:49:42] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:49:43] That’s hard, isn’t it, like to constantly do that?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:49:46] So, that is one of the things that I encourage leaders to understand about those individuals that they’re hiring. Are they learners? Because in today’s world, if you’re not hiring learners, you’re going to grow past them, and especially in small companies. You’re going to grow past them, and then you’re going to have to make a decision, does this person fit our organization now?

Rita Trehan: [00:50:19] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:50:19] I mean, we had that happen several times with our company in the early days. And it was hard. I mean, because these individuals had joined us early on, but they weren’t learners, they weren’t adjusting to change, and they they no longer fit.

Rita Trehan: [00:50:37] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:50:39] It’s really hard because we’ve felt a sense of loyalty, but we weren’t doing them a favor by having them stay.

Rita Trehan: [00:50:49] And actually, one of my previous guests, the CEO of, you know, tech companies, several tech companies, and, you know, spun them off, said exactly the same thing, which is, you know, from his own experience about how hard it was to transition from both to him, personally, but then also, for the team in terms of like knowing the skills that you need to do one thing may not be the skills you need in a different sort of, you know, time period in an organization. And that’s so hard to get people to think that, but I do think it’s really worth reinforcing. And, you know, again, I encourage listeners to always go back and like listen to a couple of bits of the podcast.

Rita Trehan: [00:51:23] This is one of them. It says, like, you know, go back, and reflect, and really think about the capabilities that your team has. And as you hire, think about what you are doing around that, and do listen to the story about like the bread because failure is your friend, like I mean, just get that first, right? Failure is a friend. I think it would be so important to sort of resonate. I ask everyone that comes on the podcast what their daring to moment is. I mean, I imagine that you must’ve had loads, right? Because like taking to businesses to success, maybe it has to do with being a diva, I don’t know, maybe it’s being 40 under 40, maybe it’s where you are now. What is it?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:51:57] You know, I am one of those people that looks to the future. I’m not looking in the past kind of girl. I’ve got a brother who is, so it’s a real challenge talking to him. But I think it’s today.

Rita Trehan: [00:52:12] Yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:52:12] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:52:13] That’s a great daring to, yeah.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:52:15] Yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:52:16] Fabulous. Beth, if people want to know more about what you do, how can they get in touch with you, the work that you do around leadership development, to selection, and just making companies perform better, what’s the best way for them to contact you?

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:52:29] Well, I think the two ways are LinkedIn, so Beth Armknecht Miller, it’s A-R-M-K-N-E-C-H-T, there’s only one of us, and then my website, executive-velocity.com. I have a lot of free resources out there on hiring leadership and succession planning.

Rita Trehan: [00:52:50] That’s great. And obviously, you’ve got book called Talent Obsessed.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:52:53] I’ve got my book, Are You Talent Obsessed, yeah.

Rita Trehan: [00:52:55] Yeah. I love the title.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:52:56] Which is now in hard copy. For years, I just had it as an e-book, so that’s available on Amazon.

Rita Trehan: [00:53:02] And everybody should be talent-obsessed.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:53:03] Yes.

Rita Trehan: [00:53:03] That’s what I believe. But I hope listeners, if you’ve enjoyed listening to this show, then please leave your review and let us know. It’s been great having you as a guest today. Thank you so much. My kindred spirit has been with me today. So, thank you very much.

Beth Armknecht Miller: [00:53:14] Well, thank you. It’s been a pleasure.

Rita Trehan: [00:53:17] Thanks for listening. Enjoyed the conversation? Make sure you subscribe so you don’t miss out on future episodes of Daring To. Also, check out our website, dareworldwide.com for some great resources around business in general, leadership, and how to bring about change. See you next time.

Daring to

Liam Hayes with Train My Athlete

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Welcome to Daring To, a podcast that finds out how CEOs and entrepreneurs navigate today’s business world – the conventions they’re breaking, the challenges they’ve faced and the decisions that they’ve made, and lastly, just what makes them different.

Liam Hayes is the developer of TrainMyAthlete. He wanted to give medical, coaching and sports science teams a platform that saved time, was more affordable and had a superior user experience when collecting wellbeing and performance data on athletes.

Connect with Liam on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Show Transcript

Intro: [00:00:02] Welcome to Daring To, a podcast that finds out how CEOs and entrepreneurs navigate today’s business world, the conventions they’re breaking, the challenges they faced, and the decisions that they’ve made. And lastly, just what makes them different?

Rita Trehan: [00:00:19] Well, welcome to Daring To. The podcast is all about people that are daring to be different. So, to bring together an idea, a passion, or a belief about something that’s really going to work. And today’s guest, I’ll tell you, the today’s guest is really interesting for a number of reasons. So, I’m delighted to welcome Liam Hayes. He’s the founder of Train My Athlete. Liam, welcome.

Liam Hayes: [00:00:42] Thanks, Rita. Thanks for having me.

Rita Trehan: [00:00:44] I’m delighted. So, listeners, just so you know, normally, when I get ready for a podcast, you know, I research the person who’s going to be on the show, I learn all about them, but Train My Athlete made me do something, which I haven’t done for a long time this morning. And I’m feeling a bit of pain right now, Liam. I just want you to know that, okay? Because I ended up going to do some exercise this morning. And after about like 10 minutes, I was like, that Liam, when I get him on the show today, I’m going to say to him, like, this is your fault I’m in this pain right now, right?

Rita Trehan: [00:01:16] So, if I had trained my athlete, maybe, the Train My Athlete app, maybe I would realize just what my levels of fitness were like, given that I haven’t done anything for a long time. So, we are going to talk about what Train My Athlete is, but I just wanted to share with my listeners today that I actually do feel a lot better for having done some exercise, but I have no doubt that this is all because of you, Liam.

Rita Trehan: [00:01:36] So, you are in the pain that I’m going to feel for the rest of the day. But more importantly, let’s start off, right? So, here you are, an entrepreneur, like who has started a fascinating app, which I think has so many applications, which we’ll talk about. But that’s not how your career started, was it? You didn’t start out to be a founder of an app, a technology app, did you?

Liam Hayes: [00:02:00] I didn’t, Rita. And thanks for the lovely introduction. And I’m really glad that you’ve been spending time really wisely, and going out, and getting some more exercise now that we’re in this enforced situation, so I’m really pleased to hear that. But it wasn’t a typical journey. No. Certainly, there was no sign of me becoming an entrepreneur in the early days. I was an above average student at school, absolutely was hardworking and driven.

Liam Hayes: [00:02:29] And I tried to become a successful professional footballer. It didn’t quite work out. I just didn’t quite make the grade. And so, I went into what I thought was the next best thing, and started a career in physiotherapy. And what a wonderful time I had. And I began working in physiotherapy within professional school, which I thoroughly enjoyed. And really, was prepping for just a career within physiotherapy, and to maintain that.

Liam Hayes: [00:02:58] It was only through some frustration in what we do in professional sport, is we create exercise plans. And we tell all these professional athletes when they go on holiday exactly what they need to do to keep their weight down, to make sure when they come back, they’re not too overweight, and they’re nice, and fit, and healthy. And I used to spend must have been 15 hours creating these lovely Excel spreadsheets only for the players.

Liam Hayes: [00:03:26] And I completely understand why, just to leave them in the changing rooms after the game because they were off on holiday, their hard season was done, and they needed some much-needed rest. So, there was some mild frustration at that. And I thought there must be a bit more of a professional way rather than keeping in touch over the holidays with WhatsApp. But nothing, the entrepreneur light still didn’t switch on, even though it was telling me to switch on at that stage.

Liam Hayes: [00:03:51] And it was only then after I moved into another area of physiotherapy that I was on holiday and all of a sudden then, when I was away on holiday, I thought, wouldn’t it be great just to know exactly what I should do in this gym? I don’t know why I was in the gym on holiday, but I thought, if only I just knew the exact things that I should be doing and working on. And it casted my mind back to all those athletes that were away on holiday and probably thinking the same thing. And suddenly, I thought, well, actually, simply having all of this content on the app would have been a really beneficial thing. And that’s what kick-started it.

Liam Hayes: [00:04:26] And then, from doing market research, I realized it wasn’t the most unique idea. And there were some products in the market. However, they didn’t particularly look great, those products, and they weren’t particularly functional, and they weren’t particularly used. And I still had some of those athletes that I worked with texting me and asking me how to cope with a certain injury, et cetera. So, that’s where my journey started. And it’s been a great journey since then, Rita. But certainly, no signs in the early days of that happening.

Rita Trehan: [00:04:56] Do you think it’s because like, you know, you kind of grown up, like you using apps, the connectivity that there must be a way of putting all of these disparate information, data sources together? Because it surprises me that in the elite athlete world that, that hadn’t been thought of before. If you think about just how much it cost to have somebody that’s injured on a team or even like just an individual professional athlete on their own, once they’re injured or not able to play for whatever reasons because they got sick or whatever, and that costs a lot of money.

Rita Trehan: [00:05:30] So, I’m really surprised that it hadn’t been thought of before. As you say, yes, it was. But yours is being touted as the fastest growing, most affordable solution that’s out there. So, like what was it that you did that enabled you to create something that’s actually not only affordable, but is clearly being seen as something that’s market leading? Is that because you’ve got an understanding of apps or just, was it because you were able to connect stuff? What was it?

Liam Hayes: [00:06:04] Well, no, actually. So, no understanding of how to code myself, although we’ve been brought up in a generation where we’re now, over the last decade, that’s ubiquitous, and everywhere, around us. But it’s an interesting one in professional sport because even the most elite, whether it be in football, in terms of Champions League winning sides, still using platforms at the time, like WhatsApp, some of the best athletes in the world. And I don’t know why that didn’t evolve.

Liam Hayes: [00:06:38] I guess sometimes, it’s to do with habit and being used to working with one successful way and not wanting to change that. But I think there’s subsequently been quite a shift where we are now able to give so much data. And data is really important in professional school, whether it be, which is part of what Train My Athlete does to analyze and predict risk of injury, for example. And that’s really important because you want your best players to be playing, and be fit, and healthy for a club to be successful.

Liam Hayes: [00:07:17] But I think mostly, it was the elite clubs who were able to afford this technology or embrace and have the extra money to put into that technology. So, the clubs that I was working with didn’t have that ability to collect that data. And it was then that I realized, well, actually, that’s where the need is, that’s where the demand is, is how do we take something that only the top 2% of sports institutions can afford and give that to other clubs? And with no knowledge of coding, I literally just went through all of any existing contacts, internet searches, Google searches, and I just had a whole host of conversations with app designers and creators.

Liam Hayes: [00:08:09] And it was just really important for me to ensure that the ones that I did choose completely understood the idea or my vision, and whether what people. And we were very fortunate, and that we built a very close relationship subsequently with that. But it was something that really was waiting to happen. And the name of your podcast is Daring To. And once the light bulb did go off, I just thought, you know what, I think that we can achieve this and we can dare to make something better, make something faster and disrupt the market in that front. And it’s been a wonderful journey since.

Liam Hayes: [00:08:53] But for anyone listening who’s just thinking that they’ve got that unique idea, I just would urge, I was someone who had no idea about coding, had no background in entrepreneurship, really had no savings, but I just felt so strongly about the idea that I just also, pilot took over, and I felt we would always—it was just have to be, and always going to break down every barrier that came in front of me or learn as much as I could to get to that end destination. So, it really was a surprise to me that I had that drive and ambition inside of me, but I think I was just so confident in the idea and confident in what the market needed. It brought me to this coming together, really.

Rita Trehan: [00:09:47] So, talk about some of those barriers, right? Because it must have been hard. There you were, you were a physiotherapist, a great job, like you knew what your income was coming from. You were well-respected. You got to work with some great athletes. You got to work with the people, you know, general people as well. And it was secure. It’s safe. And there you go, you’re passionate about an idea, some people will be listening like, oh, yeah, lucky dude, right? You know, just happened to have luck on his side and, you know, voila, it happened, but I’m sure it wasn’t all plain sailing. So, what were some of the hardest barriers that you had to overcome?

Liam Hayes: [00:10:21] Well, money was the number one barrier, is I didn’t have a network or any access to somebody who could invest on a whim and give me that ability just to put the idea into fruition. So, that was the biggest barrier at first that I came across. And my answer to that was to think that, well, actually, what I need to do is get a saving. So, I moved back in to my parents’ house. I’ve got a physiotherapy job that was two minutes away.

Liam Hayes: [00:10:58] So, I’ve cut down on commuting costs like actual et cetera. And I just saved. So, I didn’t have too much of a social life at that point because everything was going into this pot, which was eventually going to create the prototype. And it was a small pot, but it gave me what I needed to start because I just didn’t feel that in such a new and emerging market, I had the contacts to really go to and say, look, I’ve got this vision, back me with your finances.

Liam Hayes: [00:11:27] And I felt that actually, I was so confident in the idea that I was just going to invest my own money. If I could only just get the prototype, then I could show people this app and this product, and how amazing it would be. And then, I’ll be able to have conversations about funding and develop it further. So, that was my biggest one. And there was plenty of low moments. There were plenty of times where I really financially saw, this is very tricky now because it takes a lot to kick-start that process.

Liam Hayes: [00:11:59] But I think that’s where maybe a skill that I didn’t realize that I had in terms of that every entrepreneur should have. And it’s just that inner resilience, just to keep on going, and to keep confidence in your vision, and to make sure that you’re still planning for that vision. And then, once I developed the prototype, the next barrier was that I think I noted down, I think I got rejected, is the idea, I got told, no, it wasn’t a good idea, I think 24 four times. So, I’ve got myself in front of-.

Rita Trehan: [00:12:34] Twenty-four. Wow.

Liam Hayes: [00:12:35] Twenty-four. And I still remember. And it’s an incredible source of motivation. And I understood each of the 24 reasons why I was I was told no. Perhaps on reflection, looking back, I wasn’t a well-oiled machine that time. I was presenting in a very informal manner, I guess. And perhaps, I didn’t have that knowledge and the depth that I needed to, to be able to really sell that vision to an entrepreneur, and why should I invest in Liam?

Liam Hayes: [00:13:12] I felt very investible, but I could understand that with no previous kind of experience in the area of entrepreneurship and setting up businesses, I could understand. But it never deterred me, that resilience. I felt sad for a day after being told no. And then, it was a case. What’s the next plan? Where’s my next meeting? I’ve got another investor meeting to come. And also, the 24, there was one moment in me, which I did some serious reflection, where I thought, is this a good idea? Am I just completely believing my own ambition and my own vision too much? And do these guys have a point?

Liam Hayes: [00:13:56] And I subsequently believe, no, I do. And never any point sort of, you know what, this is it. And it was two weeks later because just to go back, I developed the prototype and I’d sent out some messages through LinkedIn, which is a great way to connect with professionals in your industry to professional clubs, would they like to try my app? And some of them, just really, out of kindness said, yes, sure. And then, within two or three weeks, there was orders coming in for my app from the Premier League right the way through the English League. And it was just the prototype at this stage.

Liam Hayes: [00:14:39] So, I got through that. And I’ve been kind of managing these clients from my bedroom effectively. Got the 24th rejection, had some serious, rough self-reflection, but still wanted to pursue it. And then, two weeks later, a professional footballer rang who had got in touch and had said, “I really like this app. What is your vision for it? What do you plan of doing it?” And I told them a little bit about my troubles and how I needed to get access to money to really develop my idea.

Liam Hayes: [00:15:15] And that’s how it came about. That’s how funding came about, which was crucial to go on to develop the data analytics platform that we have now. It was just that phone call which essentially changed the direction of everything. I feel like, looking back, that I hope that I created that luck, and that they liked me and the product enough to be able to do that. But it was a defining moment. And it just made me think that all of those low points from rejection to how am I going to scale up the business, let alone me with no experience. It was just all of those emotions culminated together to say, I was so right just to carry on and persevering through.

Liam Hayes: [00:15:58] So, that was that journey. And that was some of the barriers that I faced. And once I kind of got over that wall, still, every day, still learning and still mistakes, but I feel like I’ve gone past the point of return now, and that hard work, and that ambition, and that just courage to carry on really got me through it. And it’s not something I—before I started that journey, I would have told you that I would have had. It was just complete conviction in that idea at the time. So, anyone out there who does feel like that, they’ve come across those barriers and they don’t have that pot of cash to develop, keep going. Just keep going. Believe in your idea. And I do believe you’ll create that luck. Certainly, I did.

Rita Trehan: [00:16:57] And look, you know, Train My Athlete has worked with some of the top Premier League, you know, football teams, right? You’ve worked with like Chelsea. And, you know, I mean, I hate to say these names because like they’re not my team, I want to know where Arsenal are, like so awesome football club. If you are listening today, I suggest you contact Train My Athlete because we need help as a club, as a fan for a long time.

Rita Trehan: [00:17:22] But, you know, that in itself is, you know, affirmation really that there is real value to having to bring in all these data points together. Because what you’re actually doing is not just bringing in fitness, like talk a little bit about what it is, because, what do you mean by like a wearable GPS. Like I don’t even know where I’m going on a good day. Never mind about like, you know, using a GPS to get from like A to B. Like how do you use it to get data on like all kinds of things? Like explain to like a person like me.

Liam Hayes: [00:17:55] Essentially, we collect three types of data that’s really important for medical teams, sports science teams, and coaching teams to make a decision on an athlete, whether that’s, that they should train hard today, they should take it easy from training because they might be a little bit at risk of injury, or they’re ready to perform at their best of their ability. And those three facets are taken from GPS data.

Liam Hayes: [00:18:20] So, anyone who watches sports, when they score a goal, when they take off their shirt, you might see that they’ve got that sports bra-type vest on underneath and that contains a GPS tracking device, and that will give the club information on how much distance that player has covered during a game, how fast they’ve been running, how many sprints they’ve done. So, that’s one aspect. So, it takes all of that data in.

Rita Trehan: [00:18:48] So, if you’re in here right now, Liam, you’d see Stone, our producer here, he’s like shaking his head, going like, no way, like really? He’s like fascinated by what you just said. So, now, everybody, all the listeners are going to be like watching from now on of all the like different games, whether it’s American football, or like soccer, or whatever it might be, they’re going to be waiting to look and see, where is that GPS that, that person’s got on? Because like, you know, you just-

Liam Hayes: [00:19:09] Absolutely. Sometimes, it’s a telltale sign at the back of the shirt. Just a little what looks like a bit of a lump just coming out of their shirt. And there’s no hiding ground for athletes as well. It’s a little bit Big Brother, I guess, but it is really important, not only just to ensure that the clubs perform successfully, but also to ensure the health of the athlete, which is very important, to make sure they’re not doing too much.

Liam Hayes: [00:19:35] But that’s one component. The second component that our software collects in terms of the data is the wellness of that athlete. Now, that will be collecting data on how well they slept, what their general stress level is like, what their mood level is like, and any other things that are going on in terms of, do they just feel sore across their body? That’s a really important information, whether an athlete should be training that day, or playing, or whether any intervention is needed.

Liam Hayes: [00:20:05] And combining those data and statistics, we provide the visualizations to those medical teams, so they can see visually, whether they’ve covered too much distance or they haven’t slept well last night, let’s have a chat with them, what should we do? And by presenting that data to them, we just give them the confidence to be able to make decisions. So, it’s a clever, sophisticated system. And there’s a lot of algorithms and data that go into producing it.

Liam Hayes: [00:20:46] But it’s something that really, most professional sports teams will be using now or will be looking to invest in to use because if we look at the COVID-19, it has completely changed the landscape of professional sport. So, some of those things that we’re talking about, particularly the wellness side of the game, normally, what would happen is you turn up to training that day, and the sports scientist would come in face-to-face, close to you and ask you, how well did you sleep last night, how’s your mood levels, how’s your energy levels, et cetera.

Liam Hayes: [00:21:20] Now, people are working from home effectively. Athletes are working from home. So, there needs to be a way to collect that data. And we do that through, so with the players having access to the app, and being able to answer all their questions, and being able to keep in touch with their coaches and their managers through the app. So, even with the player at home and not on the training grounds, you can still get that quality care from all of the medical team and the sports scientists. You’re able to see all of the data coming in at the time.

Rita Trehan: [00:21:58] And there’s been a lot of talk about that recently. I mean, particularly here in the US now with a lot of sports, obviously, as around the world, that’s been stopped, you know, the NFL, and all the other sort of like baseball teams, et cetera, you know, those teams, those players are finding it really hard, I think, not to be in that sort of like face-to-face environment, and thinking about, how do you keep them motivated, how do you keep them focused on staying fit, looking after themselves, like mentally prepared during this time period. And it sounds like this is a great way to sort of connect them to keeping that contact in a way, albeit virtually.

Liam Hayes: [00:22:32] That’s right. Every morning, those athletes who are using Train My Athlete will wake up, and they’ll get a notification, and it will be, here’s what you need to do today, here’s what you need to eat today. And then, they’ll be all of those questions that we talked about, about how they’re feeling, and they cannot upload videos, they can tell those clubs, the backroom team of those clubs, how well they’re doing, how well they’re feeling.

Liam Hayes: [00:22:58] And it’s a very strange situation at the moment because clubs are so used to being able to see players face-to-face and just to know how they’re feeling. Now, all of those clubs are having to reorganize how they do that and how they do that effectively. So, it’s an interesting time and it will be fascinating now when players start to come back in to the training ground, how much they’ve been able to replicate what they would normally do on the training field from home.

Liam Hayes: [00:23:33] And you’ve got to remember that these athletes love structure and they’re used to being told what they need to be doing every day. And being away from that and the kind of the banter in the locker room or in the changing rooms is really hard. So, their stress levels and their anxiety levels being away from the game are likely to be higher. And that’s where Train My Athlete really comes into play because it can be a really powerful connecting tool.

Liam Hayes: [00:24:05] And initially, it was designed to make sure that they had that communication when they went off on holiday in the off-season. Now, in this unforeseen pandemic, it’s played a really important role in making sure that those players are okay, both physically and mentally through the software. So, that’s been really interesting how we didn’t realize what was going to happen because the first thing that you think when professional sport shuts down across the world is the budgets are frozen.

Liam Hayes: [00:24:38] So, that’s difficult for us when we try to sell a product into those clubs. We’ve then found this niche whereby actually, we are still very much needed because we are that powerful communication tool, that lifeline to keep that contact in a professional way that can be recorded and analyzed between athlete and coach or athlete and physiotherapist. So, it’s been fascinating how quickly we’ve adapted.

Liam Hayes: [00:25:08] And I know I’ve listened to some of your more recent podcasts since the pandemic has happened, and it’s been a wonderful time to give business that reflection, and what are we going to do after this? How are we going to change our business model? In a really good way, we’ve not had a great deal of time because we’ve seen a lot of organizations come to us to have this software to use. So, in some ways, we would never have predicted the kind of success we’ve had through this pandemic. So, it’s an unusual time, but we’ve been very fortunate, I think.

Rita Trehan: [00:25:48] So, I’ve got a question. I mean, a lot of this is around well-being, right? I mean, ultimately, whether it’s about their sort of nutrition, or their fitness levels, or, you know, how they are. Ultimately, it’s about well-being. Now, companies today, beyond the sort of the sports arena, companies at large have become much, much more focused on employee well-being, and mental health, and making sure that people are sleeping well, eating well, making sure that they’re taking care of themselves, doing physical exercise, yes, like myself this morning, realizing that that’s a positive thing to be doing. Do you see the benefits of like the Train My Athlete for that kind of thing? For like CEOs, and other leaders, and just employees in general. I’m curious as to see the application of what you guys have from a data standpoint. Could you see it in that sort of area?

Liam Hayes: [00:26:40] Absolutely, I could. It’s so transferable. And really, the management of your staff, whatever industry you’re in, isn’t too dissimilar to the management of athletes. You need to keep them—it’s in your interest to keep them happy, to keep them performing well. And by ensuring that is the keys to that, the key pillars of that is ensuring that they’ve got good mental health and good physical health. Now, our application, in my opinion, is easily transferable to that.

Liam Hayes: [00:27:20] And I think if you’re in a good place physically and mentally, then you’re going to perform well, whether you’re a professional athlete, or whether you’re a CEO of a company, or whether you’re a receptionist of that CEO’s company. So, I think in looking across the landscape, there are more things happening now on focus on employee well-being, as you said, than there ever has. And I think that will only continue. And I think it should just become the norm across industry, that there are things in place to allow those workers to be both mentally and physically fit.

Liam Hayes: [00:28:05] And yeah, in the next year or so, you may well see that we start to work into those markets, which is really exciting. And it’s not something that’s gone unnoticed by us. And I had a brief spell myself as a physiotherapist within occupational health. So, I know full well that the types of stresses and anxieties we can get through working and having a very quick-acting alert system to get the support and help you need, whatever, however big or little is really important. And yeah. So, I completely agree.

Rita Trehan: [00:28:44] So, I like this concept of this alert system that you talk about, which is obviously useful, highly useful for COVID-19 being able to like spot maybe when sports does restart, particularly those that involve bringing teams together, that this would be a way to sort of spot signs that, you know, somebody may be a potential risk, somebody may have actually be suffering from COVID-19 ,and being able to like nip that in the bud or at least be aware of it so that you can manage that going forward. So, this kind of alert system that’s in there, how are companies, you know, like the sort of the sports teams reacting to that? How are you seeing that being used by them right now? You’re seeing them applying that and how they’re doing that virtually right now?

Liam Hayes: [00:29:32] Absolutely. So, specific to our application, we’re seeing a lot of club doctors asking questions every day about how an athlete’s temperature, if they’ve got a dry cough, are they displaying any symptoms at all? And when they answer those questions, what will happen is if they reach a certain threshold where they are becoming symptomatic, then the doctors will be getting notification on their phone or an email to say that so-and-so is displaying some symptoms that could potentially be COVID-19.

Liam Hayes: [00:30:09] And then, what we’re seeing is that, allowing them to have that conversation, and if need be, doing drive-by testing or taking further action as necessary. It’s been engaged with very, very well. And I think not just in sport, but particularly, because the spotlight at the moment is on sport with the conversations happening to return to sport now, there is a great deal of anxiety within medical departments and sports clubs to ensure that they’re keeping their athletes safe and they’re stopping any spread within the group.

Liam Hayes: [00:30:46] And the only way that we can do that successfully is by testing them, but also, continuously screening for symptoms. So, clubs will be screening now symptoms every single day. So, every morning, those players will have to submit their forms on the app. And providing that doesn’t meet the threshold, then they’ll be able to come into training that day and still get a test. But if it does, then action can be taken to prevent both the welfare for that athlete, but also, the welfare of his teammates at the training ground.

Liam Hayes: [00:31:25] So, it’s something that’s being taken very seriously and a situation that’s never occurred before, but something that will change the way that sports medicine departments work for forever, really. It’s going to have that kind of profound effect. But these guys are the best in the business and they’re certainly taking this situation very seriously. And from my own personal perspective, it’s really lovely to see the technology that we’ve created just play a small part in helping that. And if that helps clubs get back to training and a little part in getting back to professional sport, then it’s a really lovely feeling.

Rita Trehan: [00:32:14] Yeah. Well, we talked a lot now about the sort of preventative side of how the app can help sort of prevent things or at least like the warning signals, if you like. Let’s flip it a little bit and talk about the performance side. So, a lot of these algorithms that you’ve got are obviously accumulating lots of data on individuals and on situations. And I watched a video about Gateshead football club and how the players were actually talking about enhancing their performance levels and making them strive for more. So, how much of it would you say helps individuals re-channel, if you like, what their possibilities could be in terms of, I guess, pushing them to be even better than they are? Are you finding that through some of the data that you’re gathering or the individuals are getting from the Train My Athlete app?

Liam Hayes: [00:33:08] Absolutely. And Gateshead, they’re a good example. They haven’t used a GPS technology before. And suddenly, the players were able to get all of this data on their own performance to their phone. And their performances post-pandemic really, really improved. And part of the reason why in speaking to the coaching team was there was this burst from the players to know how they did, what was the data for that game or that training, and the competitive nature of comparing to their colleagues.

Liam Hayes: [00:33:44] And I think professional athletes have that natural attribute of striving to be the best or better. And suddenly, now, in this day and age, they can have access, where a previous generation didn’t, to data, which then, fundamentally, they might not have been aware of, they might have not realized that they don’t cover as much distance as someone else during a game because their mind is on other things. So, they can then put that into practice in training. And coaches can identify that and almost improve their coaching style to get the best out of that player.

Liam Hayes: [00:34:26] So, I think it has played a huge role both for Gateshead, but just generally, GPS and wearable technology has changed the way athletes think about themselves. On one sense, there’s no hiding grounds, so it can seem a bit intrusive. And it’s not always a complete replication of a performance. You might have someone who runs 20 kilometers that can’t kick football all game; and you might have someone who’s running 10 kilometers, and scored three goals, and has had a huge impact on the game.

Liam Hayes: [00:34:59] But what it does is it identify things and trends. And that has had a massive take-up from both the backroom team, but also of the athletes. They’re a competitive bunch by nature. And what we’re planning to do in the next year or so is actually bring that out to the everyday Sunday-league-type footballer to both at consumer level, whereby, they can run around the field for their pub team, or they’re on the tennis team, or whatever it might be. And then, they can pick up the data and compare themselves to how does that compare with my favorite footballer in the Premier League?

Rita Trehan: [00:35:43] Oh, there’s going to be so many like moms, and dads, and kids, who are going to be like on that, right? Everyone’s going to have their favorite like player or team. I can see that being—yeah. I can almost see a fantasy league football thing being started there in itself. Yeah.

Liam Hayes: [00:35:59] You’ve got it. And it’s wonderful for two reasons. One is to see how good you are or where you maybe need to improve, where you need to go, but also, to get an admiration of just how good these athletes are and why they’ve got to where they are. And on the whole, they are, I mean this across professional sport, of all disciplines, the level of dedication to their chosen sport is something that is inspiring. And particularly, entrepreneurs can take from that because if you can get that level of dedication that those athletes show towards a sport and put that towards your chosen idea, well, it’s a win-win situation, but I look forward to seeing how that goes when we do eventually get that over the line. It will be really interesting and fun as well.

Rita Trehan: [00:36:55] So, let’s talk a little bit about the few comments that you just made. One, that we’re going to come back to. The one I want to pick up right now is this whole idea of like the level of dedication and the inspiration that these athletes have. What do you think is applicable to leadership today in any kind of facet or, you know, whether it’s in a sports environment, in a corporate environment, in a non-profit institutional environment? There must be some capabilities that you are seeing through the data that you’re gathering. You’ve talked about one of them, and things like this dedication. Are there others that you’d say, hey, these are things that like are real capabilities that make people successful?

Liam Hayes: [00:37:38] I think there’s really interesting link here because when we look at now inspiring leaders or managers within, let’s just say, the English Premier League, those type of managers were previously types like Sir Alex Ferguson would think straight away. And the type of character he was, which might be potentially, and I don’t know, but potentially, quite cold, wouldn’t be afraid to give you a good kick up the bum if you needed it.

Liam Hayes: [00:38:09] And it was almost that fear factor that they inspire players who wants to kind of impress for them. But this next generation of coaches, particularly, people talk about Jurgen Klopp at Liverpool, and this larger-than-life character, very charismatic. The type of manager that you would imagine would put their arm around the player and inspire them in a very different way. And I think that’s quite transferable to other industries, where I think CEOs, leaders should be somebody that people can approach and go to.

Liam Hayes: [00:38:52] They should have that approachability. They should have that want to build that person up and to inspire that person to be better. And I think the way we inspire is changing. I think a true leader now is somebody who can empathize, and show compassion, and talk through mistakes, why they might happen, and not come down so hard. I think as a generation, our personalities are changing as well, where we’re responding better to that time, almost like that TLC approach to build them up.

Liam Hayes: [00:39:32] And there are always times where difficult conversations need to be had, and you need that ability to have that difficult conversation. But truly understanding your employees is the most important. Knowing when they’re sad, that is not the time to have a really difficult discussion with them. I’m trying to build them up to work through these issues. And I think in my opinion and the type of leader that I am trying to be, I will try to be in the future, is one that inspires through showing them my own personal dedication, my own personal resilience, but also being able to have a conversation, put your arm around that person.

Liam Hayes: [00:40:20] If they’re not having a great time or they’ve made a mistake, and have not been successful, and working through with them, I think patience is key. I think we should—to inspire people, we need to be invested in them in the long term. And I think when you invest in someone in the long term, you will get lows, but you’ll also get incredible highs. And I know even as a physiotherapist, the people that I initially—when I came out of university, despite having a good degree in everything, I didn’t really know too much. I was suddenly thrust upon it.

Liam Hayes: [00:40:57] But I had leaders that inspired me, that were patient with me, and I think I’ve taken a lot from that. And when I look at now these charismatic people like Jugen Klopp, you know that every one of those players walks in and they want to play for them because they admire that person and they know that that person has their back when they need to be. And I think we should see a shift towards that rather than the kind of old archaic ruling by fear.

Liam Hayes: [00:41:31] I think people now rebelled against that. Certainly, I probably would have if I have ever experienced it. But I think that’s an interesting change. And I think it’s really clear in school, I think you can see that. And I think within different industries, I think those who are the most charismatic and understanding of their employees, and the demands, and the pressures that they’re under will be the most successful.

Rita Trehan: [00:41:56] You know what, I get more and more inspired when I do these podcasts of hearing from the leaders of the future because it’s people like yourself, the younger ones that are coming in that are actually re-articulating a vision for leadership of the future. And sort of like it blows me away because it makes me so hopeful for what leadership can and should be. And that’s not to discount the leaders that are in place today because there are many great leaders.

Rita Trehan: [00:42:24] But, you know, some of the things that you talk about, the empathy, the passion, the humbleness, the willingness to sort of like be invested, they are all so important in qualities of leaders today, that it humbles me to hear like talented people that are potentially the leaders of the future, well, you’re a leader now, but hopefully, doing it broader and better. So, for anybody that’s listening today that is a leader, is a CEO or is passionate about that, then, you know, let’s have little rewind moments on my podcast. And I think that was a rewind moment to listen to. And, you know, my only thing about Jugen is like he is with the wrong team. I would have liked him to be with Arsenal, but we’ll move swiftly on from that, okay?

Rita Trehan: [00:43:07] Two, let’s talk about, we kind of skirted around it a little bit, but this idea that, you know, wearable technology, how do you get people comfortable with the fact that it’s not a Big Brother, that it’s not intrusive. I mean, how do you sell that to people? Because there is that bit to it, right? Oh, please don’t watch what I’m eating every day or like how many hours I’m training, and I just want to have a day off, and I don’t want anyone to know what I’m doing. How do you address that challenge?

Liam Hayes: [00:43:38] There’s a really important point to start with, and that is the players actually need to consent to this. So, even though we’re selling a product to, I guess, the medical department who very much want this type of data, the players still need to consent to that data. And they should rightly understand where that data is going. And that data should be kept within the confines of that club, et cetera. So, that’s a really important point, that the players should be always kept informed of that data and on what type of data is collected.

Liam Hayes: [00:44:18] On the whole, it’s true that athletes are very onboard with it and it inevitably helps improve them, both their performance, but also can play a critical role in stopping them from getting injured. So, it’s within their interest to be completely engaged in it. But that being said, I think it’s really important. And as the CEO of Train My Athlete, kind of an analytic software company, I’m quite happy to say that data is not the be all and end all.

Liam Hayes: [00:44:56] And it has to be used to inform rather than to be the key reason to make a decision because data lacks that human element, right? And I think we can collate as much really cool data that looks really cool on spreadsheets, wonderful graphs, et cetera, but I always think until you’re looking that athlete in the eye, for example, it is very difficult to make a decision purely based on data. And I actually think it should always revert to the skill of the clinician, whether that’s the club doctor, the club physios, or scientists, the coach, they will know and a player will know whether they perform well or whether they’re doing too much or too little.

Liam Hayes: [00:45:49] It can be a key role in motivating someone. So, if someone is resistant to how well they’ve played, it can support in an argument of perhaps they haven’t done enough compared to their peers. And that in itself can be motivating to make sure that the athlete wants to be able to pull his weight compared to his colleagues. But I think as long as data is kept where it should be and is not used to make the final decision, that skill of the person making that decision, that human element has to be a factor.

Liam Hayes: [00:46:29] Otherwise, it won’t be successful. And we’ve seen many stories, and this just isn’t with the data that we collect, but kind of Moneyball was a film that I remember watching, where there was a success story, where they used kind of data analytics in baseball, I believe, for the Oakland Athletics to make them successful. And yes, they had a great run, but there are many stories where they have just looked at data to sign particular players or to play a particular way. There are many more unsuccessful stories than there are success stories.

Liam Hayes: [00:47:08] And that’s because you need to take your head out of the data. It’s a really important part. It’s there and it should be very accessible, but it should be taken with other elements, the human element, the expert knowledge of the person making the decision. And I think once you combine all of those, then there is the real chance of being successful. But I think data alone is just not enough. And we should never go down that route ever. And it should be a handrail, not a handcuff.

Rita Trehan: [00:47:44] That’s a great analogy to put for the use of data. Absolutely brilliant. Like, you know, it is— like Stone’s writing that down. So, like we always like to take it, like we always give credit when we hear something that we like. So, both of us are going like, that’s one we’re going to use in the future. And like there’s so many other things that I would ask you, you know, about how it’s—you know, in my head, I’m going like, wow, we can see like different people coming together and collaborating that wouldn’t have collaborated before, like sports scientists, coaches, players.

Rita Trehan: [00:48:16] I mean, it’s a whole different kind of thinking around collaboration, but we don’t have enough time to talk about those things. So, the last question, I’m afraid I’m going to ask you, well, right, to like close it out, really, but have to do so, is what’s your daring to moment do you think? Was it like starting the business? What is it? Like now that you look back couple of years on, I mean, taking this vision and made it happen, what’s your daring to moment?

Liam Hayes: [00:48:41] Honestly, what you just said, even the words was daring to, it just took me right back to the moment and the hairs on my arm standing up because my daring to moment was that light bulb moment. I was in the gym on a holiday and I thought, wouldn’t this be a good idea? And there was just that, almost within that same time, am I going to do this? Am I the person to do this? Is this a good enough idea? And very quickly in my head, I just thought, yes, I’m going to do it. And actually, even though I’ve got no background in setting up business, even though I’ve not got any money, which I didn’t at that time, I think I can make this work.

Liam Hayes: [00:49:30] And if I don’t go for this now, I will look back and think, I should have done it then. And if I do and it doesn’t work out, I’ll have absolutely no regrets and be really proud of myself for taking on that challenge. So, that was absolutely my dare to moment. I’m proud I did it. Even if it hadn’t have worked out, I would have been very proud. I left nothing, a stone unturned in my quest to develop Train My Athlete. So, for that, genuinely, I can say, I was proud of myself. And that was my dare to moment, I think.

Rita Trehan: [00:50:07] Brilliant. I’m speechless. Brilliant. It was a great way to end the show. Liam, if people want to know more about Train My Athlete, get in contact with you, find out more about it, what’s the best way?

Liam Hayes: [00:50:19] Email me or on LinkedIn. So, you can get me on email with liam@trainmyathlete.com or you can easily find me, Liam Hayes, on LinkedIn. I’m quite active on both, so feel free to reach out.

Rita Trehan: [00:50:32] Okay. And you’re going to hear more about where you can find out about Dare Worldwide, but you can also find me on Twitter at Rita_Trehan. It’s been great to have you, Liam.

Liam Hayes: [00:50:41] Thank you so much, Rita. I really enjoyed that.

Rita Trehan: [00:50:44] Thanks for listening. Enjoyed the conversation? Make sure you subscribe so you don’t miss out on future episodes of Daring To. Also, check out our website, dareworldwide.com for some great resources around business in general, leadership, and how to bring about change. See you next time.

Daring to

Entrepreneur and Author Bob Tinker

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Welcome to Daring To, a podcast that finds out how CEOs and entrepreneurs navigate today’s business world – the conventions they’re breaking, the challenges they’ve faced and the decisions that they’ve made, and lastly, just what makes them different.

Bob Tinker is a 3-time entrepreneur. Most recently, Bob was founding CEO of mobile security company, MobileIron, from 2008 to 2016. He led MobileIron from 3 people and initial idea to over 12,000 enterprise customers and $150M of revenue, and an IPO in 2014. During the five-year period from 2009-2013 MobileIron was named the fastest growing technology company in the world and ranked #1 in Deloitte’s Fast 500 Index.

Inspired by the question, “What do you wish you could tell yourself 15 years ago as a newbie entrepreneur?”, Bob recently co-authored the book series, Survival to Thrival: The Enterprise Startup Guide. The book is #1 on Google search for “Enterprise Startup Book”. Bob’s 2nd book — Change or Be Changed — was just released in late 2019.

[Personal trivia: Bob grew up in the midwest, and lived in Silicon Valley for over 20 yrs. He collects Onomatopoeias from different languages, is obsessed with fruit trees, and has an oddly good muppet voice.]

Connect with Bob on LinkedIn and follow Survival to Thrival on LinkedIn.

Show Transcript

Intro: [00:00:02] Welcome to Daring To, a podcast that finds out how CEOs and entrepreneurs navigate today’s business world, the conventions they’re breaking, the challenges they faced, and the decisions that they’ve made. And lastly, just what makes them different?

Rita Tehran: [00:00:19] Well, hi, listeners, and welcome to Daring To. And today, joining me on the podcast, I’ve got really interesting guests, I can’t wait to get started talking to Bob Tinker. He is a serial entrepreneur, three-time entrepreneur, had one of the fastest growing technology companies in the world, believe it or not, which was ranked number one by Deloitte in their Fast 500 index. It was a company that was focused on mobile security called MobileIron.

Rita Tehran: [00:00:45] That was the last of one of his ventures, which eventually was IPO, which started with like three people. Can you imagine, three people? And then, it became $150 million company revenue, right? So, I mean, that’s pretty amazing. But that’s not just the first venture that he’s had. He’s been very successful as an entrepreneur. So, we’re going to have lots of questions. He’s had written two books, both of which I have found riveting. One is called Survival to Thrival, and the other is Change or Be Changed. Now, Bob, welcome to the podcast.

Bob Tinker: [00:01:20] Thank you, Rita. Great to be here.

Rita Tehran: [00:01:22] So, listen, let’s dive into it, right? Because I did read-

Bob Tinker: [00:01:26] Yes.

Rita Tehran: [00:01:26] … the book, Changed or Be Changed. And I’m like, “Here’s a guy that is like a serial entrepreneur, a successful entrepreneur, but he describes the entrepreneurial journey in a really interesting way.” You talked about aging the soul that it’s like it can be lonely; that when you first start out, the first thing that you’re really focusing on is making sure that you don’t die as a business. But yet, within that, you also conjure up this amazing view of what it feels like when you grow a company to success and talk about just the amount of self-awareness and personal growth that you get as an entrepreneur.

Rita Tehran: [00:02:13] And that while the journey might be hard, it sounds absolutely exhilarating. So, I kind of juxtaposed all of those emotions and feelings and go, “Wow!” Tell me what it’s like that made you … I mean, it’s probably why you decided to write the book, right? But did you start out as a young kid going, “I’m going to be an entrepreneur. That’s what I’m going to be. I can tell that. Even I think it’s gonna be painful, I’m going to do it anyway.” How did you start?

Bob Tinker: [00:02:44] I love that you used the word juxtaposition because that’s exactly what it’s like to sort of try and get a company off the ground, and build it, and the highs and lows, things that go great, things that go terrible. I would even go as far as to say that sometimes, it feels actually a little more schizophrenic than that. It really does feel very split personality. And in many ways, like starting a company is kind of irrational.

Rita Tehran: [00:03:14] Tell me more. How could it be irrational? All these entrepreneurs that are listening right now going like, “You think? Bob is telling me I’m going to be irrational.”

Bob Tinker: [00:03:22] Usually, what happens is you’ve got a good job somewhere, you’ve been successful, and you’re like, “I’m going to quit that, go start a company that most likely will fail, and I’m going to work my tail off, and it’s going to be awesome and miserable at the same time.” It is kind of an irrational thing to go do. But when you have an idea or just believe that something needs to exist, and you want to go try and build it, you just got to take the leap and go do it.

Bob Tinker: [00:03:58] When Ajay and Suresh, my two co-founders of MobileIron, approached me to join them as CEO in 2007, I was at Cisco. My last company had been bought by Cisco. And I had a great job there, actually. But when I saw the idea that Suresh and Ajay were working on, I had this, “Oh, crap. I got to go do that,” reaction. And I left, vested stock on the table. My Midwestern father executive thought I was crazy leaving. But sometimes, you just gotta go do it. And it’s an irrational act in some ways, but like many great things in life, they often start with somewhat of an irrational act.

Rita Tehran: [00:04:46] What were you most scared about? I mean, obviously, you like leaving all the stock options and the security. So, moving into that role as CEO in a startup is different to being part of a big enterprise organization like Cisco. What was the thing that you’d say, “That kept me up at night”? If there was one thing that was really, “Yeah,” and then you’re like, “Oh, crap,” what was it?

Bob Tinker: [00:05:09] Yeah, the thing I was most scared, I was to rewind back to 2007 when I was jumping into the chair with Suresh and Ajay. The I was most scared of is failing as a first time CEO, failing Ajay and Suresh as my co-founders if I were not to be a good first-time CEO. I’d never been a CEO before. It’s sort of a big job, and it was a big compliment that they’re willing to bring me on board, but I was scared that my biggest fear was actually don’t do a good job as first-time CEO and actually screw up a perfectly good startup opportunity for these guys.

Bob Tinker: [00:05:47] And I actually spent some time trying to figure out how to answer that question. So, I’m actually not sure I’ve ever told this story before, but I’m like probably 40 or something like that. And-

Rita Tehran: [00:06:05] Young. I like that, young.

Bob Tinker: [00:06:07] Yeah, yeah.

Rita Tehran: [00:06:08] Yeah.

Bob Tinker: [00:06:08] I think, it depends on your point of view. Okay.

Rita Tehran: [00:06:09] It’s definitely young in my books.

Bob Tinker: [00:06:13] So, at 40, I’ve been an executive, never been a CEO. And I wanted to figure out, like, if I thought I could do a good job at this and not screw it up. And so, one of the questions I asked myself was, would I be able to actually hire people – more experienced, smarter, better at their jobs than I was? Because I couldn’t. Like then, I actually wouldn’t be a very good CEO, and I would actually be a roadblock for the team. So-

Rita Tehran: [00:06:47] Is that hard though, Bob? Isn’t that hard though, Bob? Don’t you think that people find that hard? As much as they want to, maybe that’s one of the things that leaders find difficult to be in that position where you actually trying to hire and have talent that is better than you, potentially? Do you think CEOs generally find that hard?

Bob Tinker: [00:07:08] Oh, yeah. And look, it’s actually one of the key criteria of the job, right? Because in the beginning, it’s just sort of you and a small team. But eventually, the job shifts to be more like you sort of do the analogy of like superhero analogy. The first CEO job is kind of like Captain America was put in the woods or Wonder Woman was put into the woods. It’s like you in a small team like back in a tree getting punched and getting dirty. But then, the CEO job turns into more like Captain America, The Avengers, where it’s like you and a band of superheroes. And you have to be able to hire grade A superheros who all have better superpowers than you. You need a marketing superhero, product superhero, engineering superhero, a finance superhero. And they better be better at their jobs than you are. Otherwise, you’re not hiring the right person.

Bob Tinker: [00:07:57] So, I think one of the most important criteria for an early and mid-stage CEO is, can they hire people better than them? And candidly, I was worried that I wasn’t far enough along my career that I’d be able to do that. So, I called one of my old colleagues. So, my previous company, he was one of my peer executives. He’s the CFO, and I was the VP of Business Development. His name is Jim Buckley. I called Jim, and I said, “Hey, Jim.” We didn’t talk in like a year. “I have an important question for you. And please be honest because it affects other people.”

Bob Tinker: [00:08:36] And the question was, “Here’s what I’m thinking about doing. I’m worried about not being able to hire strong executives at this point in my career. If I were to go do this, Jim, like, would you ever come work for me someday?” And Jim’s a super seasoned and super senior CFO. And Jim was like, “Yeah, I would.” I was like,”Seriously, Jim. Please tell me because, look, there are people whose careers are on the line here.” He said, “No, yeah. I would.” So, that was one of the ways I went, at least, to try and figure out whether I thought I could hire people with more experience than [inaudible].

Rita Tehran: [00:09:11] It’s a great litmus test, right? Because if people are willing-

Bob Tinker: [00:09:13] Yeah.

Rita Tehran: [00:09:13] … to follow you, then that says, “Hey, look, you’ve got something that they want to be part of,” or “You’ve got some type booty’s that they really believe in,” and all those and more, right? So, that’s a great fellowship litmus test for leaders to ask. It’s a great question to go and actually solicit. It’s asking-

Bob Tinker: [00:09:34] Here’s the fun anecdote there is that six months later, Jim joined as our consulting CFO, and then actually became our full-time CFO. And he and I worked together to build the company from zero to a hundred million.

Rita Tehran: [00:09:48] He made a good decision. There’s a CFO that read that right. And look, it’s interesting as you talk about it. I mean, in Changed or Be Changed. I love that phrase. I use it myself. And it’s the fact that you actually bring to reality what happens with startups, right? That’s sort of when you start out as the three-person company, maybe a two-person company, to then suddenly growing. And with that growth, not only is it company growth that happens, but there’s also growth within the company itself, right, whether it’s the company culture, whether it’s the people, whether it’s-.

Bob Tinker: [00:10:28] Exactly.

Rita Tehran: [00:10:28] … the CEO role. And so, tell us about that because I think that there are some really interesting … I kind of likened it to it’s a plant that’s starting to grow, and you start like, “Look at what I can do. I can grow all these great leaves. And now, I’m growing all these flowers and just flourishing.” But actually, you need a lot around it as well as it grows because things change. So, when do you think the first sort of aha moment comes in for a new CEO where they go, “Actually, it’s not the same as it was when I first took this on. I need to think differently. I need to be different”? And from your own experience, when’s that first sort of, I don’t know, transition if you like?

Bob Tinker: [00:11:13] The first time that hits is at about 50 people in my experience. And the book, Changed or Be Changed, like many things, sort of the inspiration for that was born from a frustration like many things. And what frustrated me, having been a first-time CEO and being in the fortunate position to be part of a company that we grew from zero to a thousand people, is that I don’t feel like I was very well prepared for how the CEO job was going to change as the company changed, right? As we grew from zero to 50, 50 to 150, 150 to 450, 450 to a thousand, the company changed. And as a result, my job as CEO changed. It’s not like I woke up one day with a different title or anything. It’s like I’m still a CEO, but my job’s different. And I didn’t feel like anybody kinda sat me down and said, “Hey, Bob, as your job changes…” I’m sorry, “As your company changes, your job changes. So, therefore, you have to change.” And-

Rita Tehran: [00:12:26] And why would you, right? You are successful. What you were doing was bringing success. Why would you need to change?

Bob Tinker: [00:12:32] Exactly. That’s the irony of it is that what I discovered the hard way is that the very things that actually helped make me successful in sort of the first CEO stage become the very things that sort of hold me back, get my way, and screw things up at the next. And so, to answer your question, like what made me start to realize, “Uh-oh, this is not working,” was I started to fail at things, things stopped working that used to work. Like, it’s kind of weird when all the sudden, you’re like the things that used to work suddenly stopped working. And it’s kind of maddening, actually.

Rita Tehran: [00:13:13] And you go like, “It must be somebody else. It can’t be me, can it? Because, like, look, I started the company. I got it going. So, what else is going on in this environment that is causing this?”

Bob Tinker: [00:13:23] Yes. Sometimes, that’s the reaction, “Okay. Maybe it’s the environment.” I think, one of the more important characteristics of a CEO that is particularly a first timer is a little bit of self-awareness because when something’s not going right, it’s sort of like a parent. Like if your kids are acting out,  you can blame it on the kids or, often, you got to kind of look in the mirror and be like, “What am I doing that’s contributing to the situation?” It gets kind of the same thing when you’re a CEO. Something’s not going right with the company. Sometimes, it’s the situation or the team of the company. Sometimes, it’s you. So, you got to look in the mirror and be like, “What am I doing to contribute to this situation?”

Bob Tinker: [00:14:01] And I’ll give you a really specific example. So, when MobileIron got to about 50 people, two things changed that, suddenly, what used to work stopped working. So, the first thing was when we grew from like 45 to 55 people, I felt like we got worse. You think when you add people, you get better, but there’s this weird organizational break point where like 50 people, the human brain loses its ability to track one-to-one connections. And all of a sudden, what used to work sort of organically just started failing. Like, I remember my customer success team and my QA team, it used to organically be able to stay in touch on customer issues. Now, we’re like dropping balls between.

Bob Tinker: [00:14:48] I’m like, “What happened? We actually hired more people. We should be getting better.” The irony was, as we got bigger, like the way we used to behave, and that applied to the team, it also applied to me that that was about when … like, look, and like a lot of founding CEOs in tech, like I was sort of a product customer person. Like I like spending time on product and customers. And I was good at it. And that was what was important in the very beginning of the company is you work with few people because you’re just trying to survive. You’re just trying to find some customers and sort of prove that you have a business that’s worth getting more capital.

Bob Tinker: [00:15:26] But then, once we started winning some early customers and started to grow that I kept spending my time on product and customer stuff, which is fine. But my team – and I give them huge credit for this – basically sat me down and was like, “Hey, Bob, we are not getting from you what we need. Like, we need you to be the CEO of the whole company, not just product stuff and customer stuff.” And that was kind of a wake-up call for me, right that the things that I was gravitating towards because that’s what the company needed and I was good at, I had to change my behavior to be the CEO of the whole company. Like, “What are we doing on go-to market? What are you doing on team? What are we doing on finance?” Like, I needed to be thinking across all the different swim lanes of the business, not just spending time in sort of my comfort zone that I had gotten good at over the last year and a half as we were sort of getting the company off the ground.

Rita Tehran: [00:16:22] So, let me just ask about that. That’s quite brave of your organization to actually confront you with that. There are often sort of-

Bob Tinker: [00:16:30] Yes, it was.

Rita Tehran: [00:16:30] …  situations that you wouldn’t find that, even in a small startup, even if they’ve known you for a long time. What do you think it was that-

Bob Tinker: [00:16:40] What enabled that?

Rita Tehran: [00:16:41] Yeah. What was your secret sauce that enabled people to sort of like stare you in the face and go, “Hey, take a look in the mirror. You might not like what you see, but you need to hear this”? What do you think it was?

Bob Tinker: [00:16:56] So, there are two things. One was culture that in the very beginning of getting MobileIron off the ground, we sat down as a team, which is actually the three core founders. The second meeting we had as a team was what type of culture do we want to have as a company? And one of the things that was important to us was a concept we called intellectual honesty, which is, “Hey, celebrate the good, but it’s okay to talk about the bad.” And we had sort of built that into the culture where it’s OK to sort of, you know, put a stinker on the table and say this isn’t working or something’s broken. This is not going well and it’s okay to do that. So, I think, culturally, the team was wired, and we had made it safe to sort of talk about the bad stuff.

Bob Tinker: [00:17:51] The second thing that enabled that conversation and that feedback from the team to me was that I regularly asked my team for feedback on me. I’d be like, “Hey, do you have any feedback for me? What can I be doing better than I’m not doing?” And at first, they’re like, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever. We’re not going to really tell you what we really think.”

Rita Tehran: [00:18:16] They said, “We love you, Bob.”

Bob Tinker: [00:18:16] But, eventually, if you sort of keep asking the question, and they give you feedback, the key is how you react as a CEO and leader, like if you get defensive or trying to…