Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Speaker A: Welcome to following the Gone, a podcast for Schreyer Scholars featuring scholar alumni bringing you mentoring on demand. My guest today, joining us here in our studio, powered by the Peter Weiler family endowment, is Matt gartland, class of 2005, one of our early IST grads. And we'll get into that. Matt, thank you so much for joining us right here in Atherton Hall.
[00:00:26] Speaker B: This is special and it's awesome and your studio is fantastic. So thanks for having me in.
[00:00:30] Speaker A: Well, in the words of Andy Samberg on snl, that's high praise coming from you given what we're going to talk about with your career today. So I appreciate that and I love the Penn State gear. Love when folks listen.
[00:00:41] Speaker B: Yeah, trying to do my best. Represent.
[00:00:43] Speaker A: Awesome. We're recording this in the tail end of football season. By the time you're watching this, football season will have wrapped up, hopefully with some trophies. But you'll know better than us based on when you're watching this.
So, Matt, I always like to start off with some really relatable piece. How did you come to Penn State as a student when you were a high school senior looking at colleges not.
[00:01:05] Speaker B: In the most direct path. So sometimes that's the happy path.
[00:01:08] Speaker C: Right.
[00:01:09] Speaker B: Is the unexpected one. So was just really interested in the dawn of the Internet and computers and all of that, sort of in the, you know, because I'm old, you know, like the.com era.
[00:01:19] Speaker C: Right.
[00:01:20] Speaker B: I graduated from high school in 01, so began to just explore, of course, like, okay, what is a career? How could I really channel those interests? And the prevailing option then was computer engineering or computer science, like that sort of idea.
[00:01:33] Speaker C: Right.
[00:01:34] Speaker B: And I did really well academically, so I was privileged to have like a lot of options.
I did actually get in and seriously consider Michigan. I gotta confess, my dad and his side of the family are from Michigan. I actually grew up a Wolverine fan. Holy cow. So, but yeah, I had opportunities on the East Coast.
So anyway, the story is that we did a big road trip, me and my family, to look at some of the universities. I'd gotten into an east coast trip. And I'd gotten into Penn State because I'm from Pittsburgh and most kids in my high school are like, you applied to Penn State, you get in hopefully.
[00:02:08] Speaker C: Right.
[00:02:08] Speaker B: And it's sort of like a good backup option.
[00:02:10] Speaker A: Pretty common. Penn State, Pitt, probably.
[00:02:12] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. So, long story short, though, like, we're on the return leg of that trip and I've started to whittle down the choices but hadn't yet seen campus.
So My parents were like, yeah, we're gonna stop, right? We're gonna stop, we're gonna see the campus, right? You're gonna get a feel for it. I'm like, nah, like, probably not. There's some other good schools, like the East coast, specifically D.C.
so that was likely kind of where I was leaning. But they forced me to stop and my God, I'm glad they did. Just instantly fell in love with campus, walked around, spent hours and hours and hours here, longer than we thought, got home late sort of story.
So that was it. And I was like, okay, we're going to do Penn State, and never looked back.
[00:02:50] Speaker A: Well, I'm glad that you stopped that day. You wouldn't be sitting here otherwise. So we've got a great conversation all about the web and marketing and startup culture. So we're going to dive into that. But first, at the time, the College of IST was brand new. You're one of the early grads of that. And Schreier was still pretty young at the time too. How did you end up in both of those colleges?
[00:03:13] Speaker B: Two different stories. So on the IST story, another sort of happy accident, serendipitous thing where so I had chosen Penn State, went college of Engineering, you know, computer science, thrilled to be here, got on campus for freshman orientation and promptly like lost my shit that day.
Because I just started to really realize, I think what maybe I had instinctively known, which was I wasn't going to be an engineer. I could do it.
I have that maybe ability. But in terms of what I was really going to get the most joy out of was not that just going through that day of, okay, this is what you're going to learn. This is what the next four years looks like. Meeting some of the faculty, great people, it's like, yeah, but that's maybe not me. So at the end of that day, the person we sat down with, a guidance counselor of sorts, to his immense credit, I wish I remembered his name to this day to give him credit, was like, look, you're probably not built here. You should go talk to this other program. They're brand new. They're so, so new that they don't even have a location on campus. And they're so small that they're not even the college of Blank.
[00:04:20] Speaker C: Right?
[00:04:20] Speaker B: They're the school of. And that was ist. So this is like close to 5 o'.
[00:04:24] Speaker C: Clock.
[00:04:24] Speaker B: So like he's like, run downtown, see if they're still there and you should talk to them. So we booked it down there, head into whatever off campus building it was at the time, hello, Hello? Hello? Crickets. No one's answering. And then eventually someone walks out of the back, and it turns out to be the assistant dean at the time.
So we sit down with him. Gregarious, awesome guy. Convinces me on the spot that this is where, you know, I want to be, you know, at the emerging space of, you know, where tech and, you know, Internet culture and all these other things that we now think of as, like, E commerce and the web and all that.
So that was it. So switched my major on the spot. So. So that's how I got into the third class of ist. And four years later, I was graduating number one in that class.
[00:05:04] Speaker A: And obviously you graduated with honors. So how did you come to find Schreyer?
[00:05:08] Speaker B: Schreyer came along, I'd say, late freshman year. I think I was sort of exposed to it. And that actually intersected with yet another storyline, which is residence life. I wanted to get involved in campus. I've always been motivated to take on, like, leadership positions in some way or just basically what that means is just you take responsibility for things.
[00:05:26] Speaker A: Typical Shrier scholar.
[00:05:27] Speaker B: Yeah. So natural born leader. That sort of language stuff. But, yeah, was. You know, I had a great R.A. my freshman year. Really helped with my freshman experience in north halls. So it's like, you know what this feels like. Me also, my father was in residence life through his collegiate career, so maybe it's in my blood, too. So it's kind of like through those two things, like the pursuit and interest of residence life. I was aware of them, like, honors dorms and, like, okay, that could be a thing if, you know, know if I become an ra, got a little more interested in the leadership kind of qualities and opportunities that the Schreier, you know, program facilitates and provides students. And I'm a nerd, so it's just like, well, more to learn, more to do.
[00:06:06] Speaker C: Right?
[00:06:07] Speaker B: And this is super cool. It's like, you know, up leveling my game.
So was thrilled and privileged that, you know, get accepted in, I think, end of freshman year into sophomore year sort of thing. And then found my way after a tour of duty, as I say in east halls, as a. As an ra Then made my way to Simmons and got in and was an RA in Simmons for the rest of my tenure here for undergrad.
[00:06:30] Speaker A: Excellent. So right across the street, obviously, we're sitting in Atherton. You were an RA in Simmons. You said, I like your phrase tour of duty. And I did want to ask about that because that's a common thing that students Seek out is to be an ra, right? There's a lot of benefits, a lot of work, a lot of opportunities. So what advice would you give to either aspiring or to current RAs?
[00:06:54] Speaker B: Well, that you are managing a culture, and in many ways, sort of almost a culture unto yourself. Like, you're part of a supergroup. I don't know if that term is still used, but that's what we call it ourselves. Like, all the RAs and Simmons we were. That was our supergroup, right. So you have that culture, right, which is really special and important, but when it comes down to, like, your floor, right. Or your wing of students, right. You have this amazing opportunity to cultivate that culture with you.
[00:07:23] Speaker C: Right.
[00:07:23] Speaker B: And not in a way that you know is all about you.
[00:07:26] Speaker C: Right.
[00:07:26] Speaker B: But that's the nature of, like, servant leadership, is being able to have real deep relationships with those students, find their commonalities as well as their differences.
[00:07:34] Speaker C: Right.
[00:07:34] Speaker B: And be sort of a steward of that at all levels of the collegiate experience. I think that's important, you know, if you're an RA for freshmen. Not that one is maybe more important than the other. There's different highs and lows or challenges to it. But, like, for me, and this was also just a really cool thing, being an honors kid and being in Simmons is. We saw the gamut of that, right? Like, we had freshman through senior there. So, like, my. My kids sort of, again, were all over the place. And it was cool to kind of be responsible, but to have that opportunity to influence, you know, ways of relationship building among the students, to elevate learning opportunities, even extracurriculars. My senior year in Simmons, some of the kids there, I want to say, were also ist kids, or at least they were really interested in the web. They went on to create a tech startup company that they grew and sold for a couple hundred million dollars.
That was weebly, which was a kind of website builder platform.
And I was there already. It was super cool, but just like. And not that I had any bearing on that success. I didn't. But just like, again, being a cultivator and a facilitator of that at such, like, at least for me, like, an impressionable age, like, those years are invaluable. Um, was, yeah, one of the best things that I think, hopefully, other RAs can just, hopefully take more away to know that you will leave an indelible imprint if you really lean into those opportunities, if you do really thoughtful programming with your students, if you're there as a resource to listen, you know, during hard times, and there's always hard times. If you build that trust with them, those skills for you will be invaluable for your career and your life. And you're going to make an impact on them too.
[00:09:08] Speaker A: So Matt, you mentioned about your career and I'm curious whether, you know, a lot of our students, they lead student organizations. You out there, you might be on a THON committee or in a fraternity or one of the other thousand student organizations we have. You're an ra.
We talked about this in this interview. But thinking back when you were applying for internships or jobs early in your career, what did you talk about?
Using those on campus experiences to help you get paid employment out in the world?
[00:09:36] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, I'll start with again the RA story. I, I think it is a little bit unique, especially at a campus this size. You know, the, the ratio is sort of in your favor almost in a way.
[00:09:46] Speaker C: Right.
[00:09:46] Speaker B: If you're an RA and being then an honors ra, that was just a unique thing. It was a way to add to sort of my, my differentiation, you know, I guess as a potential candidate for a job.
[00:09:57] Speaker C: Right.
[00:09:57] Speaker B: So I played into that and again like the leadership side and that's what was particularly interesting for me in terms of what I was considering and pursuing were leadership opportunities. So what I fell into, not fell into like I pursued it, but what I, what I ultimately was able to secure was access to a leadership development program in corporate America. So at the intersection of very much it given my IST education but also like business.
[00:10:24] Speaker C: Right.
[00:10:24] Speaker B: And sort of like that fusion point of like what can it Data science, systems, innovative product engineering, web engineering, I should say specifically software, et cetera meets business demands and business needs in moving business forward is what I really found fascinating. And I wanted to not just have an entry level job. I was really hopeful to have a more elevated experience.
And back then, and I think still to this day, the top five Fortune 100, Fortune 50 companies to really recruit top talent coming out of universities, they have these cultivated leadership programs that are structured, they invest a lot into them with you know, really sought after consultants and coaches and all of these things go into these programs that are oftentimes rotational as well through different business units. And sometimes like befell me which was wonderful opportunities to move around the country. So I actually moved around the country for two years as a part of Jane J's Johnson and Johnson's two year program. That's the one I got into.
So yeah, telling of the story through RA was again sort of unique element there. But Shrier's at Large was also awesome. Hey, I'm, I'm an honors kid. A really awesome memory that I have was going to Annapolis as a part of one of the trips that was, you know, able to be put on by, you know, the college here.
And it was a leadership trip. There was, you know, there was, you know, all of these different kind of talks and panels and things by admirals and whatnot.
[00:11:47] Speaker C: Right.
[00:11:48] Speaker B: My one and only time to still do that program.
[00:11:50] Speaker A: Do you really? Yep.
[00:11:51] Speaker B: Oh, that's awesome.
That was vivid. Like I still viscerally remember it. It was fantastic. So those sorts of things I can talk to and like, hey, you know what I took away from that and my just my appetite and my initiative to be a part of this culture here. Which you know, again I guess I'm being slightly repetitive, but it's about like the future leaders is how I think about what Shrier's is kind of built to do. Yep. Not just in business or in technology, but in every sort of facet of life or culture or society.
You know, politics, government, nonprofit kind of everything.
So that was very helpful for me in telling of like my genuine story and passion and the sort of difference I wanted to make and you know, being an applicant for some of these higher end leadership programs.
[00:12:37] Speaker A: Awesome. It almost feels like your brand, like the brain guide has come to life in our conversation.
I love it.
So Matt, you mentioned you had just full time gig, but I want to focus on something that's really pressing for a lot of students, which is internships. And you had the opportunity to intern at Lockheed Martin, which is obviously a name brand company. Can you talk about that experience and what you would tell current scholars to make sure that they have the most successful opportunity in whatever internship they have, whether that's here in State College or on the other side of the world.
[00:13:12] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, for starters is look for internships basics.
[00:13:16] Speaker A: Matt Isler can help you with that. Go check that out. Make sure you book an appointment with him. If you're watching this, the sort of.
[00:13:23] Speaker B: Intersection or even the fusion right of like the academic opportunities on campus with being able to even at that stage of life and development like begin to apply some of it like in the real world is. I mean you're delivering value, you're getting value back by way of like just learning how it does work out there in the real world. You start to build professional networks. To the extent that you're lining up hopefully intentional internship opportunities that might be in a general path forward for you in terms of what career looks like after Penn State.
And this was very. Also useful for me is you can potentially learn what you don't like, sort of testing certain theses.
So Lockheed, I love aviation. Both my grandfathers served in the military. So did my father, My father flew.
So I have a great respect and admiration for servicemen and women.
So in general, sort of the defense sector is I guess interesting to me or at least, you know, it wasn't even still remains, but for a career, you know, it's sort of a different thing. Do I want to like devote a lot of my lived reality, you know, to that? I thought I did and genuinely had an awful awesome experience, you know, with Lockheed. Very gregarious and generous people, you know, obviously a fantastic institution.
Very welcoming and generous to me as a student with scholarships and things in addition to just the internship program, actually. So I have a lot to be thankful for, you know, from Lockheed.
What it taught me in part was also that wasn't to be in my path.
I learned that, you know, it was likely to become a more technical path for me in terms of career outside of just the internships, which going back to even my entry story to Penn State was like sort of a parallel.
[00:15:09] Speaker C: Right.
[00:15:10] Speaker B: And also I kind of just had, at least for me personally and no bias or judgment upon anyone else, just like, do I really want to again commit potentially a significant amount of my career in life to the defense industry?
And for me, I just reached the conclusion, actually, no, I'd prefer not to do that. But because of those experiences and whatnot else, I became that much more confident and able, I think, to tell the story of my interest again around leadership programs. What I wanted to get into, the sort of impact I wanted to make, to build teams, lead teams, you know, really drive innovation for business results. But using technologies and data science to, you know, to do that and then be able to leverage the real stories and value that I had through these internship experiences to again, sort of elevate me probably, you know, above the pack, you know, among others when that time came. So this, that's how I would stitch it together in terms of how genuinely valuable and multifaceted internship opportunities can be for you. And you probably don't see those opportunities immediately. You just have to kind of commit to it and the value comes down the road.
[00:16:11] Speaker A: Absolutely. Sometimes you can find your full time gig out of it, or you can also say, hey, I don't want to do this and that's really valuable opportunity, right?
[00:16:18] Speaker B: Absolutely. So maybe tie the knot on the Lockheed story is I actually was given an Offer. I went into my senior year when I with an offer a full time.
[00:16:27] Speaker A: The dream, right? Yeah, it's like cool.
[00:16:29] Speaker B: Like I'm not going to coast in my senior year. That's not how I'm wired. But like, just like the pressure that kind of takes off.
[00:16:36] Speaker C: Right.
[00:16:36] Speaker B: I'm walking in or I'm walking back onto campus as a senior. And I love senior, you know, senior year I have this really fantastic job in the bag.
[00:16:47] Speaker C: Right.
[00:16:48] Speaker B: That is itself a leadership program. It's what I thought I wanted and largely was what I wanted.
[00:16:53] Speaker C: Right.
[00:16:53] Speaker B: And sort of had the like defense sector kumbaya sort of like or, or you know, internal reckoning myself that year. And it worked out. But again like I wouldn't have had, I think the awareness to other opportunities out there, been able to pursue other opportunities to have had the confidence to pursue those opportunities if I didn't have that history, you know, the reps of those internships, the stories and again even like the confidence of like I have that offer.
[00:17:22] Speaker C: Right.
[00:17:23] Speaker B: So it was just. Yeah, it was a big boost for me.
[00:17:25] Speaker A: Absolutely.
And in the previous answer you talked about teams and that really teed you.
[00:17:32] Speaker B: Up for your thesis, right?
Yeah.
[00:17:35] Speaker A: And so I wanted to ask, tell us about your topic because I think it was a little bit of ahead of its time before COVID Right. And everything. A little bit. A little bit. A little bit. Well ahead of its time. Right. And now it's something we take for granted almost.
But you can still do it well or not do it well. And then more importantly, how have you used the findings particularly as well as the experience of completing the project in your career?
[00:17:58] Speaker B: What we're talking about is remote work. Yep.
I wrote my honors thesis on the future of virtual teaming.
Something to that effect. That's not verbatim, but virtual teaming was sort of the term back then. I'm sure I'd probably cringe if I read it, you know, kind of like cover to cover these days.
But the general curiosity was, you know, what is happening with Internet based communications? You know, in that era where again, because I'm old, you know, this is when Mark Zuckerberg was sending out, you know, Facebook invites only to edue email addresses. Right. So I was in that era.
[00:18:31] Speaker A: It was like 2004, 2005, right?
[00:18:33] Speaker B: Yep, yep. So I graduated 05.
So like I was in that, that era where we went from AOL im, which probably no one listening to is like, what the frick is that?
That was AOL Instant messenger, which was ahead of its time, really. One of the, you know, almost one of the original like you know, instantaneous chat based communication platforms. It's like this is so fascinating, like we can start to have, you know, instantaneous communications globally instantaneous communications. You know this was before iPhone, you know even rolled out. IPhone was 2007 I think.
So yeah, I was just curious to like okay then what could this do to how fast we can work, right? To sharing of information, to completing projects. And again as an ist kid, one of the big mantras back then and is maybe still true today is problem based learning. PBL was sort of like this big idea.
So so much of the curriculum was you're working in clusters, you're working with teams. And I gravitated into sort of the leadership quality. I ended up leading those groups which was fascinating and fun and just like okay, so we're working on these things together.
We're doing that in a co located manner. But like all this global ish, this fast instantaneous Internet based communication, what is this going to do?
[00:19:49] Speaker C: Right?
[00:19:49] Speaker B: So that was my kind of curiosity and I tried to do as much like actual research.
I remember being very little at the time so I tried to formulate some thoughts through my thesis. So it was a fun project honestly.
And then yeah, lo and behold, you know what happens and not just you know, due to the, the circumstances of COVID is it was already moving in this direction and I think Covid accelerated it more than that accelerated or just kind of like dunked it. It was like okay, this is the future smack right sort of thing. Because even before COVID you know, I had, I'd left my corporate career to get into startups which is maybe a conversation track, come back to.
[00:20:23] Speaker A: Got several questions on that.
[00:20:25] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:20:26] Speaker B: But then you know, in that era there's all these new collaboration online collaboration platforms. The big one today is Slack. This was out there before even Covid happened. Microsoft has Microsoft Teams that came around after Slack as Slack got out, got big Salesforce acquired Slack several years ago. So I mean this is literally like the future now everyone knows that now is some version of virtual teaming which we call remote work.
It's fascinating. So I'm a part of several different startups, I don't like the term but serial entrepreneur.
They're all Internet based. I have staff, whether they be employees full time or they're you know, fractional contractors or vendors or things all over the country.
No one's really like in my office, I don't, I have a like a co working office, you know, back home.
So I can get out of the house and not go crazy.
But yeah, like my business partners don't live in Columbus, my staff doesn't live in Columbus. We're across the country in all time zones.
[00:21:21] Speaker C: Right.
[00:21:22] Speaker B: And the only way that that works is now due to these technologies, which is again I just think endlessly interesting. And you know, there's no shortage, like what's next there. So we'll see what happens.
[00:21:33] Speaker A: Awesome. And yes, thank you for joining us. All the way from Columbus, which is where you live. You grew up a Wolverine fan, but you ultimately chose Penn State. So kudos there.
[00:21:42] Speaker C: Right.
[00:21:42] Speaker A: So the whole mishmash there. And it's so funny because most of these I end up recording virtually with a lot of the technology that you're talking about in your thesis. But then you were able to join us. I'm here in person, co locate.
[00:21:53] Speaker B: Yeah, well, it all worked out so to kind of step out of the frame for a second. Big shout out to Elizabeth Hay, who runs LaunchBox, the innovation hub. Kind enough to invite me to that program. So spoke with a lot of great entrepreneurs today. Tomorrow I'm in Omar EZ's management class on the entrepreneurial mindset.
So yeah, it just all worked out. I'm on campus. Hey, let's do a lot of cool stuff. So grateful, you know, Sean Chia for having me in. Yep.
[00:22:17] Speaker A: And if you are a student who's interested in the entrepreneurial space, our friends over at Invent Penn State downtown at the Innovation Hub have tremendous different programs that you should engage with and you know, go, go do those things. If anything Matt talks about is resonating with you in entrepreneurial space.
But before you got into entrepreneurial things, you know, you were a student marshal for, for the College of ist. And this is something that in December and in May and in August every year we have Schreyer scholars that are departmental college marshals.
And I'm curious, did you ever talk about that in job interviews? Like I was the third college marshal for IST at Penn State.
[00:22:59] Speaker B: I remember doing that. I mean, back then. Yes, absolutely. It was an honor. It was a privilege to be recognized in that way, truthfully. So, yeah, absolutely. You know, highlighted that it was, you know, a celebration. Not just like me, that's weird. But just this institution.
[00:23:17] Speaker C: Right.
[00:23:17] Speaker B: You know, at all levels of it, you know, so Shrier, Penn State ist, like all of it together as a cohesive whole was, yeah, tremendously special to me and I very much sincerely played that up. You know, talking about, we're talking about like a Career prospect.
[00:23:33] Speaker C: Right.
[00:23:33] Speaker B: You know, with the companies I was pursuing.
[00:23:36] Speaker A: And so you. We're going to circle back now finally to something you were talking about a little bit ago, which is that leadership development program at J and J and obviously. But Lockheed, JJ are both massively distributed organizations with a global presence.
What was that experience like for you in, you know, you're 22, 23, coming out of college.
What was that like being able to do a program like that?
[00:24:02] Speaker B: It was challenging, but in the way that, like, I like climbing mountains, right. I mean, I've never done any serious mountains. I mean, maybe my wife will let me down the road later, but I. I like that challenge. You know, one of my core motivations, I have two is high achievement.
The other is service and being like a servant leader. Those through a number of personality assessments and all those fun nerdy things, like triangulated those. Those are the two.
So, yeah, a leadership development program in a high pace, almost high stakes. I mean, yeah, these are serious corporations with, you know, massive reach and potential. They're doing serious work. You know, Lockheed and Defense and J and J in all facets of health. You have med device, you have consumer products, maybe a little bit less serious, but, you know, med device and then pharmaceuticals, right? Being the. Those are the three. So you feel that you going in, and I know that from my other friends because you, you are cohorted in that way. Like, we had a class, I think we had about 50 kids in that leadership development program at J and J. When I, when I joined that class, most were domestic, several were international.
So.
[00:25:09] Speaker C: But.
[00:25:09] Speaker B: But you want that, right? And that's sort of like what I wanted, right? I wanted, you know, that elevated sort of opportunity to see what I could do and deliver bigger results. Hopefully, you know, for it. And a lot of that is you learn. And I learned it here as an ra. I learned it through the honor school, you know, is that you just can't always do it yourself. You have to build, you know, some version of partnerships, whether that's, you know, with colleagues or you build a team, right. You know, being able to be collaborative and collaborative around problem solving and get out of your own head, you know, is essential.
Builds trust in you and your ability to hopefully positively motivate and persuade others as well, and not just peers, but seniors and being able to manage up.
So that's another cool thing through these leadership development programs was an ability to have some level of access, right, to really senior leaders, like executives at these, like, holy crap companies, right?
Not all the time. But like, you know, I was able to be privileged to put on some really marquee assignments and then I'm like reporting out results or giving major updates, you know, to the CIO. It's like, well, that might be my job in six years or 10 years or something. And that's the sort of fast track program, you know, that these, that these things are really cultivated to do, right? Yep. So yeah, this wasn't again, just sort of like, cool, you're in a cubicle farm and that's your day job and like that's it. I mean there were cubicle farms to be clear.
But yeah, I wanted that sort of like I am pushing myself and hopefully leading others upward as well.
[00:26:39] Speaker A: Awesome. So you had a pretty good gig there, jj, like you said, they're hopefully cultivating you to fast track up into senior management. And if you want a good conversation about jj, go back and watch our episode when you're done with this one with Kristen Harkins, who's a senior leader at jj.
But you decided to step out, obviously. We've talked, you know, we're going to get into the startup part of the conversation here.
Walk us through the origin story for the first company that you started and how you knew when it was time to go full in on that and leave behind the core corporate life that you had at jj.
[00:27:16] Speaker B: Sure.
The story would start actually a little before, you know, the first company and leaving, which was because I actually didn't know, but it was just again, the recognition and the long held recognition that I'm an entrepreneur. You know, I was the kid with the lemonade stand, you know, trying to like do those things right, you're being creative. And that was me.
And I was able to apply that to reasonably good effect with both academics. And then eventually, you know, the JJ career, which I think all told was, oh gosh, six to seven years long, two year structured rotational program in the country. And then stayed for an additional, I think like four to five years there before I left to get into startups.
And then like even let's just recognize life itself happens.
[00:28:01] Speaker C: Right.
[00:28:02] Speaker B: So, you know, by that point, you know, I'm mid-20s, you know, some of my friends are definitely married by then and even certain ones having kids. So I'm kind of at that interesting, you know, just life moment, which is like, okay, I'm doing really well in this corporate career. Like, it's great, you know, comp is great, future comp is excellent. You know, I could be here and so long as things don't Make. I know some external factor happens, like this is probably going to, you know, ride itself out and it's going to be awesome, right? But is that what I want?
Is that going to make me feel fulfilled at the end of the day in terms of, I don't know how I assess myself in terms of, I know, satisfaction, fulfillment, not just in career, but the intersection of that, you know, with life.
So for me it was like, I, if I'm going to really give this a shot, if I'm really going to give this a try, then I'd better do this now before I get married, before I have kids, before I make some other longer term commitment to this company, you know, JJ or the particular operating company I was at in Cincinnati by then.
So it's like kind of now or never.
And I'd been having these conversations with several of my mentors.
One stood out, Matt Brodbeck.
And a window of opportunity presented itself. So create your own luck. This is real. And I would like to think almost anything. Sometimes he went with a divestiture of a business unit away from our J and J operating company.
Basically it's like major league startups. So. So it was divested away.
An insane amount of venture capital dollars came into the divested business unit. A whole new brand and model was built around that stuff and that it was going to go off and doing something.
So my mentor went with that project and he'd been my mentor, so he was like, hey, why don't I give you like a 9 to 12 month consulting gig here? You'll crush it. We need you. We'll pay you what we deserve to pay you. Which is to say, well, but that's your ramp, so that's your out. If you really are serious about these startup interests. And then you have on the side 9 to 12 months to figure out your own thing. That was on a Friday. I remember it was very vividly when he told me that this deal was going through the divestiture, he was going to go with it. He wants me on his team over there for nine months or so. I walked in on Monday and I resigned and kind of blew everyone's head apart because I was on that like cio, fast track sort of thing.
So that's the story that led into the exit.
I of course was interested in the Internet, right? That's the through line through a lot of my decisions, academically ist and everything.
So my interest was not to like, I want to run a coffee shop, right? Or I want to do something brick and mortar it was an Internet based company. Is that software? Is that, you know, some sort of a service based model? Is that, you know, what is that? But you know, being out gave me just that much more, honestly, like mental liberty to be like, okay, now this is real.
I was already studying and you know, the emergence of software as a service saf was quite appealing at software products.
So yeah, just doubled down, triple down on that after I made that decision.
And again, happy accident. Sometimes like again, you need to put yourself in the right moments to have really powerful things happen to you.
This was the, the era of the blogosphere. Everything exploded when a couple things happened in rapid succession. Matt Mullenweg builds and launches and, and unleashes WordPress upon the world, right? Which now powers like close to half of the Internet. It's like some crazy statistic in the 40%. I want to say someone could fact check me on that.
But like of all the websites in the entire world, like WordPress as the content management system, power is like 40 something percent. I want to say it's insane. And that launched in that era, you had Amazon unleash Kindle Direct publishing. So then anyone in the world, you and your brother or whomever, right, can now be an author. You can write a book, you can package it up, you can put it on kdp, you can sell it, and now you're an author, right? So this democratization of content, of storytelling, of the ability to create a brand, right? The ability to educate, solve people's problems through education online, right? To then be able to sell some version of that, products, services, et cetera, right? That is commerce, that is entrepreneurialism occurring in the cloud. So that interesting fusion of all of that was happening at the exact same time, more or less, you know, within a two, three year period it was all happening. I was like, that's it, that's. This is kind of what I've been waiting for. My interests in tech that weren't like engineering or hardware, it was communications, it was virtual teaming, right? It was my interest. And this hasn't popped up yet in Honestly Content. Like all my IST friends were crazy back in school because I was electively, in addition to all the IST classes and the business classes, I was electively taking composition, literature classes. I was reading and writing a ton. And all my friends thought like I was on drugs. It's like, why are you choosing to do this much work?
But it was fascinating, right? New media. I took an entire semester here on like vaudeville in the advent of like, you know, early film Just the whole, the whole history of, you know, media.
Fascinating. I studied the Greeks, the Romans, the Egyptians, you know, their societies, their cultures. And so much of that is storytelling and how they tell their fables.
[00:33:26] Speaker C: Right.
[00:33:26] Speaker B: And their, you know, mythologies and all these sorts of things. Took an entire semester on the Arthurian legend, which permeates like an ungodly number of cultures that most people won't recognize it even through lines all the way back to the Japanese, which is bizarre maybe to most folks. So it's just fascinating with storytelling.
And then of course, what we now know and is overly almost celebrated these days is the hero's journey. The monomyth was Joseph Campbell created, really got idolized with George Lucas when he did Star wars in the 70s. Really kind of resurrected that motif. And now it's obviously been everywhere. But I was like studying that stuff because I liked it.
You know, that was a twist in the story, but bringing it back, it's like storytelling and content. Oh, so now we have social media going like crazy and now we have content management systems like WordPress and KDP and a whole bunch of others. And it's all tech and it's all online.
So this is it, like some something there. So that was the first, that was the start. And again, long journey or long wind up to it. But I started the thing and I would even even say this as advice, quite frankly.
A great way to start as an entrepreneur is to do a service first. Even if you want product, if you want software, if you want to build a widget of some kind, or if you want to get into, you know, cpg, you know, you know, direct to consumer CPG or something like that, consumer packaged goods.
Do something in service first. Cut your teeth, deal with people, talk to potential customers, talk to actual customers.
I think that's an invaluable opportunity to just feel the tactileness of a certain market or who you want to serve in a certain way and learn from that and evolve. So yeah, my first venture became what we would now today call a creator studio. So the creator economy, that term did not exist back in 2012.
[00:35:11] Speaker C: Right.
[00:35:12] Speaker B: You know, blogger was the bigger term back then. That term is kind of seeing its time in the spotlight.
So we were working with, because I built that firm, eventually sold it.
First and foremost authors, you know, traditionally published authors that in that heyday were like, hey, I have a book. Traditionally published, got a book deal. But I want now more creative latitude, control and freedom to self publish. And then from there I want to be able to Expand my business and sell other forms of content. You know, workshops, courses, programs, downloadables, et cetera.
[00:35:44] Speaker C: Right.
[00:35:45] Speaker B: So I helped figure that out. You know, I networked my way into those channels and did everything really other than video production back then, which was great.
[00:35:55] Speaker C: Right?
[00:35:55] Speaker B: It was at the intersection of a lot of these things. Along the way, got pulled into another startup that was purely focused on direct to consumer E Com. This is like on Shopify for example. Another right time, right moment, right background, right person was Shopify was forking its technology to create an upmarket part of its platform called Shopify plus. Working with higher end merchants and brands more sophisticated challenges.
So agency service based business grew that sold that with the partners there along the way co created software with one of our DTC brands, Chubby Shorts. Weird but awesome brand in the returns and exchanges space. Because if you buy something online, at least back in the day, fricking sucked to like, you know, oh, my shorts don't fit, I need to return it to get a different like that whole.
[00:36:44] Speaker A: Process was last trial and returns.
[00:36:46] Speaker B: Yeah, right.
[00:36:46] Speaker A: It's part of a supply chain. Right.
[00:36:48] Speaker B: These days it's a little bit cute to talk about it because so much of this is improved. But reverse logistics and all this sort of lingo wasn't easy back then.
So we pioneered software that made a lot of the returns and exchanges process more fluid, reduced friction, empowered the consumer more.
We spun that software out of our agency into a new venture in partnership with Chubby's as our like kind of founding merchant partner that went on to raise a stupid amount of venture capital money.
So it's like cool. So I have a finger in SaaS software as a service. Right.
So yeah, so I've just been then like that's been my thing. It's like again, I don't like the term because it makes me sound much more important than I am and I'm not. But you know, a serial entrepreneur kind of operating online at this intersection of like where content and content, commerce and tech all mean.
[00:37:44] Speaker A: Absolutely.
So I want to read this one verbatim just because I want to get this right.
So you go on your LinkedIn. Matt, there's a whole slew of startups, but they're all different roles and titles that you've been involved. Some of you're a founder, an advisor, an investor. And maybe this is straightforward and maybe I'm just clueless here. But for those of us who aren't in that space, can you define your different roles in these different ventures, what makes them different and what kind of person or personality or skill set is best suited to each one of those?
[00:38:19] Speaker B: That's a remarkably good question. Thank you.
[00:38:21] Speaker A: I want to read it.
[00:38:22] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, there you go.
So yeah, if you go to my LinkedIn, it probably looks like I have like 12 jobs at the same time. Yep.
So I'm like active in 12 companies.
Most of those are advisor at the day to day, like hours per week or something level rather minimal.
[00:38:41] Speaker C: Right.
[00:38:41] Speaker B: These are strategic relationships where I am supporting the founders or the founding team of these tech startups. They're all tech startups and I'm giving advice right. In select structured ways where it's relevant and potent to them. They really drive the agenda. So that myself and I actually do a lot of this work with my friend Pat Flynn.
We are again surgical to like where they are in their own growth patterns and like where are their growth challenges or blocks or and we try to help with strategy, tactical feedback, strategic introductions in the market, etc.
[00:39:17] Speaker C: Right.
[00:39:17] Speaker B: So that's what advising means.
[00:39:19] Speaker A: Now is that out of the goodness of your heart or is that like an equity stake or how does that work?
[00:39:24] Speaker B: Yeah. So compensation wise it's not cash almost ever.
It is some version of an equity play either as an RSU or restricted stock unit or as options.
[00:39:37] Speaker C: Right.
[00:39:37] Speaker B: That vest over time so that really these are chips, right. They don't pay out short term. And in the world of startups, right, you probably like write off most of your bets right to zero because startups are hard and most don't survive.
[00:39:50] Speaker A: But if you had the right lottery.
[00:39:51] Speaker B: Ticket, if you had the right lottery ticket, it's going to be worth a good bit.
I'm privileged to be an advisor to a company called Circle Circle. So I've known those guys from the very beginning. Remarkably talented and generous founders have built an amazing product and company, very culture oriented, you know, with their staff. It is a community product first and foremost to build digital community that you can monetize with memberships you have, can do a lot of internal programming. It has gone gangbusters. You know, Oprah uses it like they have some major league hitters using their software. So that is the big bet.
That's probably the biggest in my little portfolio of companies, I advise. But some haven't worked out already, some have already kind of gone by the wayside again. That's the world of startups. So that's what advising means.
Others where I am founder or co founder, that means that I was there at the beginning and that means that I was operational in that company, at least at that time, or maybe still am, if I still sort of have an executive role at that company.
So that's true right now of CPG Fast Track, which is a new venture that's a community based accelerator program for early stage but not beginner, so more intermediate CPG companies that are somewhere in the neighborhood of 200k to a million and you're annual revenue and largely, at least right now, the companies that we are, we're serving in, in this sort of program are in food and beverage with a good for you product. Right? So more wholesome, more natural, you know, sort of ingredients, minimal ingredients, you know, that, that sort of vibe.
[00:41:32] Speaker C: Right.
[00:41:33] Speaker B: So co founder in that venture, very operational. It's early stage, you know, we're growing it. So yeah, in I guess in general that's kind of like what it means to be a founder. It's like you're helping to take an idea, you give it shape, birth the thing, get it moving.
[00:41:46] Speaker C: Right.
[00:41:47] Speaker B: Find market fit and traction, right. Really dial in who your ICP is, your ideal customer Persona, really improve upon that through cycles with copywriting. Get that message tight, tighter, tighter, more differentiated. All these good things, that's how you win. You just tighten that up over time and have more focus on, on the right, the right person and then get your offer, your pricing, all of that.
[00:42:09] Speaker C: Right.
[00:42:09] Speaker B: You know, over time I across all of that sort of stuff on the founder scale, use the term founder operator, which is, you know, it's leader. But it's not just like oh hi, I'm the idea guy, right. It's like, no, like I'm actually like running the thing, right. So not that this all came from say Penn State and my, my academics a little bit, but then I would say like the applied academics and then it all kind of starts to fold. On top of itself is operations, you know, workflow, communications, virtual teaming, building teams, you know, it is finance, which I was good at, that I didn't like, you know, major in finance, but like I can do very well small business finance and extrapolated pro formas and all that. That's kind of required to understand the unit economics and you know, patterns of a business and extrapolate cash flow and all that sort of stuff. So like, so that's some of the specifics around how I use the term like founder operator. And then at a certain size or stage then at least in my view, which is, you know, I guess my view a little bit bias and other people have a different sort of spin on it. But like, okay, are you the CEO? Are you something else? Like these other more like, you know, more formal terms should be used at some point. But if it's like just you or you and a partner and you're pretty early on, like, are you a CEO? Maybe, maybe not.
[00:43:33] Speaker C: Right.
[00:43:34] Speaker B: So I just am a little careful at least myself to like when do I introduce that sort of a label? Am I CEO, Am I coo? Well, I probably should have a team underneath me that should be a little more of a solidification of the business. Should be a little bit bigger once.
[00:43:49] Speaker A: You'Re no longer like a one person shop.
[00:43:51] Speaker B: Yeah, precisely. Right, yeah. And I'm all in on like one person shops, like the whole notion of. And there's different terms for this, you know, company of one, which is actually the title of a great book. Company of One by Paul Jarvis.
Solopreneurship as a broader idea. One of my really good friends, Justin Welsh, sort of like almost kind of cornered that term. He's massive on LinkedIn, really smart guy, helping other others become solopreneurs.
[00:44:18] Speaker C: Right.
[00:44:18] Speaker B: With their skill, their profession largely business. So they're know, former Deloitte, something in consulting, whatever. Now they want to write a book, they want a private coaching or consulting practice. They maybe want to write a really authoritative industry newsletter that's free, that attracts audience. Right. And then they monetize in different ways. Maybe they want to do keynotes and other things as well, blah, blah, blah. So different ways to shape up like a solopreneur business.
But yeah, I'm all for that.
[00:44:44] Speaker A: Awesome.
And speaking of titles like CEO right now, according to your LinkedIn, as of two days ago, when I looked at it, you are the president of Smart Passive Income.
[00:44:58] Speaker B: Got that right.
[00:44:59] Speaker A: You were previously the CEO and CEO according to your LinkedIn.
[00:45:03] Speaker B: Yes, that's right.
[00:45:04] Speaker A: So you mentioned this name before, but how did you get connected with your co founder, Pat Flynn? Because in certain circles that's a pretty notable name. He's a big deal to certain people. Yeah, you get connected with him.
[00:45:15] Speaker B: He was a client first and foremost. So yeah, this rewinds back to that creator studio firm that I founded myself. I didn't have a partner in that one way, way, way back at the dawn of all of this content proliferation democratization stuff.
[00:45:32] Speaker C: Right.
[00:45:33] Speaker B: In the 2012, 2013 era.
So he had, in Pat's story, which is by itself remarkable and I, I don't think I can probably do it justice myself here, but he was an architect, he had a traditional job and loved it and was really good at it, but lost a job in a great recession like so many people did, had a lot of adversity.
He had inadvertently though, during the last, I want to say like year or so of his tenure, created a niche website.
What does it mean to be a niche website? It's a very hyper specific topic solving of a very addressable pain point acutely.
[00:46:07] Speaker C: Right.
[00:46:07] Speaker B: And that's usually a good thing because it's very, very clear and people are searching maybe for that thing.
And what that thing was for him was there was a very difficult exam, industry exam that he was studying for to take to pass that certification to advance his career.
He did that. He organized all of his study notes for this very difficult exam on a WordPress blog.
Hence niche website. So when tying it all together. Yeah, when adversity hit him and he found himself without a job and he had a Runway, I believe he had several months notice. Like he was told this is going to happen, but you have three or so months, I forget the exact number. So trying to figure out, oh my gosh, what am I going to do? I just proposed to my girlfriend. True story for him.
So you know, there's a lot of stress, anxiety, what am I going to do?
And he then stumbled into learning about, hey, like this Internet business online thing can be a real thing.
Building up a website, trying to monetize a website is kind of how you do that. Blah, blah. He's like, huh, I have this thing I built. Wonder if that's like getting any traffic.
He hadn't thought about it. So he goes and puts a Google Analytics script on it to see how much traffic he's getting. And I don't remember the exact numbers, but it's like a lot like overnight because he created this thing and had cross linked all of his blog posts because they're all his study notes. And that's at least back then. SEO is a very different world right now. I don't think we're going to probably time to drift into that space, especially.
[00:47:33] Speaker A: Now with AI and everything.
[00:47:34] Speaker B: Well yeah, that's the drift point.
But anyway, so it was like, well holy crap, here it is.
So he takes a lot of his study notes that are free on the blog, packages them up into a PDF, basically the same stuff. But people will pay for convenience, like a takeaway point in almost any industry.
[00:47:57] Speaker A: I mean, look at Pennsylvania. We have how many discussions about sheets and wawa, right?
[00:48:01] Speaker B: Yes, right, right. So convenience is something that you can sell.
So he makes it a little bit prettier, packages up Into a single thing that people can read, puts it behind a little payment gateway, puts a button to buy it for $19 or whatever it was for him and like instantly has like a multi hundred thousand dollar a year business. Like overnight quote unquote of course, like overnight success. Not a thing. Right, Exactly. That's the shtick with that whole phrase.
So that's pat.
He was so profoundly grateful for what Internet business and entrepreneurship had done for him that to his immense credit, he wanted to give back.
So he created smart passive income. Because the word passive income was in its heyday back then, maybe hasn't aged so well, but that's why he created that brand and that website was to teach others everything that he had learned and just it was a feel good project. It didn't, wasn't a business.
[00:49:02] Speaker C: Right.
[00:49:02] Speaker B: He was making his money from that niche website and then he replicated that model in other niches.
[00:49:08] Speaker C: Right.
[00:49:08] Speaker B: So he got, he started to do really, really well. He used that playbook himself. And then SPI was a give back engine. Well, over time SPI became, oh, this could be more than that.
So then along the way he needed help on a lot of levels. Strategy, production, management, et cetera. So introduced to me, became a client. I started helping with spi.
First was a book project because that was sort of our inroad. We did a self published book for him.
I helped edit and produce and publish the book.
My team was growing, SPI was growing.
And then to wrap up this part of the story, it's a big one. So sorry, got stuck on it. But we became fast friends. I became Uncle Matt to his kids. I became basically a pseudo business partner. Was privileged to do that. He just trusted me a lot. And then all the way to my gosh, when was it? 2018. This was after my other partners and I had already sold the direct to consumer E Comm agency.
I was like, hey, my business is doing well, so is yours. We could do better, better together, different opportunities if we just go and basically make a baby company, which is what we did. So I took my company, he took SPI and we merged it together, created a new company, kept the same name, brand equity.
But this is then the beginnings of our big pivot into not just education, free content, paid content in the form of course courses and things, but real community and almost real academy. Like a real ecosystem, a private ecosystem that you have to pay for. It's a membership, right, but it's interactive. You're meeting other students, right? We're running live programming. It's a very different thing than just like, hey, Sean, here's. Here's your access to our on demand course for $300. And like, good luck on you. And you have to stay personally motivated and hold yourself accountable to get it done. And hey, guess what? Most people don't.
So we care about outcomes. We care about the journey, you know, because we've been on these entrepreneurial journeys ourselves. So that's Pat. And that's how I came to meet Pat and become partners with Pat.
[00:51:19] Speaker A: Awesome. It was funny because when I was doing the research for this episode, I had some real flashbacks to watching one of his videos on YouTube when I was first researching how to do a podcast. He's like one of the first videos that pops up on YouTube. I was like, hey, Ivern, I know that name. Yeah, full circle here.
[00:51:36] Speaker B: Yeah. And I realized I didn't actually maybe hit the real punchline. So the titles that you brought up.
[00:51:39] Speaker C: Right.
[00:51:41] Speaker B: It's a good maybe teaching point. So like, when we merged, you know, new company, I was initially the, you know, co founder of that new company. Yes, it had the same name, but like a very different, like, market thesis, you know, and this was me even before we pulled the trigger on that deal, like seeing certain patterns in again, again, what we would now call the creator economy.
And a primary pattern was declining demand for one time purchase courses, information, products, which had become at that point for spi, the revenue stream, the part of the business.
So it was like, hey, we can do this different. We have to change the business model. We have to do different things internally. Different cost structures on the OPEX operational expense side of things also, blah, blah, blah.
Here's my vision, here's how we can do this. I'll run ops, put this thing together. You can say the visionary guy, you can say keep in the CEO chair, at least initially. So that's why that happened, how that happened in the title. I then took on the CEO role to keep driving that big transformation.
I forget exactly when that started, but I'm proud to say that that sort of point in time has ended. I've led through that very significant change curve for us.
Being the person that I am, you know, want to be able to continue to serve in expanded ways in the market with Pat and with other partners. So it was right to do a proper succession planning process, which we started in January.
Takes a long time to do these things well.
So, yeah, then at the start of Q4, October officially passed the torch to my successor, who's now running the show. I'm still known, still in the business.
I'm taking on the president role, which basically means I just help expand possibility. So I try to grow the pie through new forms of strategic relationships, new forms of business deals and partnerships. But I'm not leading and running the company in that way. Gotcha.
[00:53:36] Speaker A: So imagine you've had a lot of meetings, a lot of zooms, but sometimes you want to get with folks and be co located, to use your word.
[00:53:43] Speaker C: Right.
[00:53:43] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:53:43] Speaker A: In person meetings like we have today.
And sometimes those can yield unexpected wins, which is all fancy way of setting up the question. Tell us how you met your wife.
[00:53:55] Speaker B: Where is this going? No, that's great. TM met my wife on an airplane.
So the story there is I just moved to Columbus.
[00:54:04] Speaker C: Right.
[00:54:05] Speaker B: Had taken the leap, so to speak, out of.
[00:54:08] Speaker A: With your Penn State flag to fly out.
[00:54:10] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:54:11] Speaker A: In Buckeye country.
[00:54:12] Speaker B: Yeah. And I do, I do, I don't shy away from it. So anyway, had just moved up to Columbus, starting to get more tapped into and networking in the entrepreneurial scene, you know, just really kind of throwing myself at it. And I think that maybe that moment in time just made me more open to almost like anything. So I was on my way out west coast, Portland, specifically Portland, Oregon for an entrepreneurial, you know, conference, meeting people in person. Very important then, very important now. Post Covid.
Yeah, saw just a lovely girl in the boarding area. It's sort of like an honest rom com story. And it was like yeah, like cute sort of thing. But like no way does like life like put me next to her on the plane.
That happened. I was the last one on the board. I was like doing some entrepreneurial thing. I'm a computer, I've traveled a lot. So I'm like, I'm not phased, like get on early or whatever. I have my seat, whatever, I'll get there. So I take my time, I wrap up the thing, shut down, get on the plane and I'm of course like, I wonder where, where she's going to be. And sure enough, she has the window, I have the aisle.
So I sit down, no one else comes on behind me, basically the last one on. So the middle seat stays open.
But she immediately puts in her AirPod or the corded version back then I'm like, oh, okay, you know, I get it. But the, you know, drink cart comes around, she takes it out to get the drink, I help broker the drink, and that's my end. So I immediately, I don't say something right, to spark a conversation.
It worked. We talked for the next two hours, we were flying to. I was connecting through Dallas. That was her final destination.
I came to learn much later that she actually kept the other ear pod in the whole time listening to music and never, never acknowledged it or took it out.
But yeah, that's how we met.
[00:56:01] Speaker A: Very nice.
So possibilities. Sometimes all you got to do is just strike up a conversation, whether it could be the love of your life or a mentor.
[00:56:08] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, I think the, the practical takeaway in different levels is like, take your shot. Yep.
[00:56:15] Speaker C: Right.
[00:56:15] Speaker B: And honestly, probably take more than one shot. You know, if my entrepreneurial story is anything, you know, and you know, I don't swing for the fences, I'm going to talk about this in a more class tomorrow a little bit, and it's totally cool. Like, if that's the game you want to play, play that game.
But in my personal lived experience, and I think there's even resonance even just with my tenure here at Penn State is I swing for singles and doubles, to use the baseball metaphor, small ball. Well, you get more reps, you learn so much faster. My ability to be tapped into res life.
[00:56:51] Speaker C: Right.
[00:56:52] Speaker B: And the programs and things that we were doing and learning rapidly.
[00:56:55] Speaker C: Right.
[00:56:55] Speaker B: Getting real time feedback.
[00:56:57] Speaker C: Right.
[00:56:57] Speaker B: Not committing too much energy or too much resources to one thing. You're learning to manage your resources.
That's how I like to play the game.
I'm not saying it has to be everyone's version.
[00:57:08] Speaker A: Play your strengths, right.
[00:57:09] Speaker B: Well, play to your strengths and then be able to over time compound your strengths. And I just think that faster feedback loops and shorter cycles. So, you know, the web is still the best place to, I think do that. And to hearken back to another point that I think I made, which is to possibly index on services first, at least in business, Right.
Especially entrepreneurial interests, is to cut your teeth on something, you know, put yourself out there as, you know, perform a service in some way.
And with that, you know, that's been able for me to not have like a hit on everything. I've had startup projects that, that quickly came up and okay, that didn't work.
[00:57:47] Speaker C: Right.
[00:57:47] Speaker B: But it's like, okay, cool. Like learned that didn't work, hopefully. Yeah. Could extrapolate some valuable learning as a takeaway, move on to the next. Like, SPI has been a hit, you know, the DTC ECOM Agency was hard, but we grew that, you know, and was able to sell that.
The software venture that spun out of that, like, hasn't finally, at least for me, like delivered anything. But that's A long term bet. The advisory stuff, same thing, right. Have a couple of those that are really going to deliver someday and a bunch of others that won't, right?
[00:58:14] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:58:14] Speaker B: But that's how I think about, you know, managing interests and really having a fulfillment, a joy to the work and meeting a lot of amazing people and a lot of diverse interests and a lot of diverse problems they're trying to solve in different ways.
It's brought me back to campus honestly, you know, today and tomorrow, similar themes. Anyway, so to me and what really has elevated, I think where I'm at at least in my career these days because I'm old, you know, again, graduated in 05, but yeah, that's kind of my through line too.
A lot of this you talked about.
[00:58:48] Speaker A: Finding fulfillment and whether you're a Shrier Scholar or an entrepreneur or both, you're kind of always on. So how do you turn off, how do you find work, life balance? How do you encourage our scholars to do it?
[00:59:00] Speaker B: I mean it was, it was probably or if not certainly easier as a student than even the entrepreneurial life. The entrepreneurial life even maybe I'm painting it to be very rosy and it's a lot of fun and very rewarding, fulfilling. Like it's.
[00:59:14] Speaker A: The highs are high.
[00:59:15] Speaker B: It is always this. It's never just like a curve like this. That is false. That is a myth these days. Working backwards, I guess. Like my kids, I have two little girls, five and two, five and a half and two and a half. So they're gorgeous and amazing and brilliant and just the love of our lives. My, my wife and me. So as much time as the four of us can spend together, we particularly like getting away from the city.
There's a region of Columbus outside of the metro area called Hocking Hills. It's nothing like say Colorado, but you know, it's mountainous. You can do hikes, you can get a cabin in the woods. So we love that. That's a great way to unplug and be away from town.
[00:59:55] Speaker C: Tech.
[00:59:55] Speaker B: I try my best not to either bring tech or if I do bring it okay, leave it in the bag, you know, sort of thing. So that's, that's a big way in general travel for me. I do travel a decent bit for business, but that's nice because it's getting back in person, meeting my business partners in person, expanding on partnership opportunities. Just strategic ones. Yes. Again, that's not fully like decompressing or being outside the business work, so to speak. But for me there just is a like rejuvenating quality to getting back out there and moving around internationally as well. I was fortunate to get to England earlier this year.
Business trip. But you know, just that sort of stuff is awesome.
So travel is a big thing for me.
And then I need to do a better job of this. It's harder again with kids, but you know, I'm a voracious learner that has waned in terms of books and other things.
But I'm sort of getting to a point, at least the girls are older now where it's like, okay, we're reclaiming more of our personal time again, which is good.
So trying to invest myself back into that. One last thing I failed to mention is just health. You know, I've been able to maintain.
You know, I did a lot of this going over to. Is it White Building? Why am I forgetting this? Yep.
[01:01:10] Speaker A: Right next door to Atherton, across from.
[01:01:12] Speaker B: Yeah, over here from Atherton and across from White Building. Yep. Yeah. Lived there, you know, during especially junior and senior year.
So yeah, I've been a devotee to just health and wellness practices and working out has kept me going.
[01:01:26] Speaker A: Awesome.
Now Matt, if it wasn't obvious, I dabble in content creation, but I'm definitely not a entrepreneur. I've never started a business. So there's probably things that I should have thought to ask, but just from what I do on a daily, I. I didn't think to ask. So what kind of questions do you often get from your mentees or interns or your colleagues or even your family and friends who may not understand what you do for a living that we can talk about that would be helpful for students to hear at the tail end of our chat.
[01:01:58] Speaker B: Yeah, I'll bring up maybe just one because I do think it's a big one and maybe the centerpiece of extended thinking is it's not about the idea.
So many folks that want to get into startups of any type, software, e commerce, you know, even something physical like a brick and mortar business, like, oh, I need to have like the perfect idea and I need to spend a lot of time iterating on the idea that's less true. You know, you need to get something out there actually a lot, lot, lot faster than you think.
And if it is, especially an online based startup or venture, there are so many ways now where you can test and validate or invalidate the beginnings of that idea with not a lot of resources, time, dollars, energy, longer term commitments.
[01:02:46] Speaker C: Right.
[01:02:46] Speaker B: So my encouragement is to, yeah, have an idea, give it some initial shape, keep it A lot smaller than you probably think. Maybe, maybe this can be the baby idea that grows into something much larger. Yes. Like have vision.
[01:02:59] Speaker C: Right.
[01:02:59] Speaker B: But don't get trapped by the possibility of all of this to come and over engineer the idea. And then now you're six months down the road of this idea and you're still in the idea phase.
[01:03:10] Speaker C: Right.
[01:03:10] Speaker B: And then you get overprotective of your idea because you think the idea is everything. I mean, there's so many people I've come across where it's like, oh, do I need to get like a trademark on my idea or do I, like, when do I get lawyers involved?
[01:03:20] Speaker C: Right.
[01:03:20] Speaker B: It's like, you don't have anything yet, man.
[01:03:23] Speaker C: Right.
[01:03:23] Speaker A: Yep.
[01:03:24] Speaker B: It's like, test this.
[01:03:26] Speaker A: Ideas are definitely. Don't act on them.
[01:03:28] Speaker C: Right.
[01:03:28] Speaker B: Start talking about it.
[01:03:29] Speaker C: Right.
[01:03:30] Speaker B: And depending on again, what it is that you're thinking about, product or service, who that product or service is for. Not that I'm like a social media maven, because I am not.
But that can be a good way to test the idea, is to just start talking about what you think and why it matters and how it can solve something in hopefully a unique way.
[01:03:50] Speaker C: Right.
[01:03:52] Speaker B: There's ways you can pre sell things, which is a great testing mechanism and not again, true for every sort of product or service out there. But if you're like, hey, I'm going to launch a new group coaching program, at least I'm thinking about it.
[01:04:06] Speaker C: Right.
[01:04:07] Speaker B: So put up a sales page. You don't have to have everything figured out. You don't have to have your brand name figured out. I mean, you have to have something to be able to communicate value. Value.
[01:04:17] Speaker C: Right.
[01:04:17] Speaker B: And then we'll. And then, hey, like, here's a deposit. Like, will you take the deposit in a way that's even like a Kickstarter campaign?
[01:04:23] Speaker A: Yep.
[01:04:24] Speaker C: Right.
[01:04:24] Speaker B: Keep that thinking in mind, which is like, cool. Here's the thing, right? Like, and how many people can you get to back the thing that. The idea of the thing?
[01:04:31] Speaker C: Right.
[01:04:32] Speaker B: So can you almost do that to yourself?
So I'm elongating the point, but move a lot faster than you might think that you can or need to keep the idea smaller and more executable. Because it's the execution in the repetition of the execution cycles that's going to fuel the momentum, the learning that fuels the momentum. Okay, I positioned it wrong. That didn't land in terms of the messaging or. This is taking way too long to build this first version of the product. That's a learning in and of itself.
[01:05:03] Speaker C: Right.
[01:05:04] Speaker B: So proceed with that sort of an orientation towards small scale idea.
Index more on execution, get it out there and move faster.
[01:05:12] Speaker A: I mean, we didn't start with this.
[01:05:14] Speaker B: No.
But I mean that's a pretty relevant and awesome even sort of corollary, which.
[01:05:20] Speaker A: Is hundred dollar Mike.
[01:05:21] Speaker B: I mean, what if you had, you're like, okay, my gosh, I have this vision for this podcast and here's what its potential could be.
[01:05:27] Speaker C: Right.
[01:05:28] Speaker B: And its meaningfulness to, you know, the college and a whole university, blah, blah, blah, and like to be good at podcasting. And I'm indexing and, and benchmarking on pad and all these other, you know, notable, you know, and they're recommending cool now. Yeah. You're six months, eight months down the road and you're building a budget of how I won't ask you to say, but like not small, you know, for all the amazing gear in here, it's like cool, man. You've just wasted like you, you've taken maybe upwards of a year to get there. Maybe. Yep.
[01:06:00] Speaker C: Right.
[01:06:00] Speaker B: Because. Or maybe not.
[01:06:02] Speaker C: Right?
[01:06:02] Speaker B: Because if you had gone to who, whomever the powers at B are over here anymore to like approve said budget with no results because you haven't done anything. Yep.
[01:06:12] Speaker C: Right.
[01:06:12] Speaker B: It's like, well, good luck.
[01:06:14] Speaker C: Right.
[01:06:14] Speaker B: You're. This is another part of the talking Omar's class. It all weaves together, at least in my brain, which is entrepreneurs, when they don't operate that way, when they don't have the mindset for that, and therefore their habits and their actions are not born from that mindset, they artificially reduce their, their odds of success.
You increase the opposite. You increase your odds of success by a different mindset and then the habits and actions that are born from that different mindset, not about the idea. Go smaller, move faster.
You know, don't inherit someone else's version of success. Figure out your own.
This is the track talk for tomorrow.
But that, that like keep the idea small pieces kind of essential. You've done this.
You've done this. You did something small. You had a hundred dollar mic, you got some reps, got some great people on the pod, got it published, got good feedback. You can showcase the quality of your work to other people on campus. That builds trust. Trust is a good asset to have. Play that forward, keep laddering up reasonably. So now look what you have.
[01:07:13] Speaker A: Yep. Took 60 some episodes before I put in for a grant. This was all donor paid for, by the way. No tuition dollars went.
[01:07:20] Speaker B: There you go. I, I would bet money though. I really would that you would not have secured that grant if you started with that bigger vision.
[01:07:28] Speaker A: Yep, I don't think so either. So if that conversation last five minutes or so really resonated two things you should check out. One, go back and find our episode with Connor Satley from our audio only days. Some great points about kind of that iteration process that I think would really complement what Matt, you were saying. And then an author we love here from Harvard in the college is Amy Edmondson. Check out her books Teaming and the Right Kind of Wrong. Really good stuff on this idea of failure. Fail fast but in a productive way and working with virtual teams. So some good resources for you to check out. Talking about books and learning.
[01:08:03] Speaker C: Right.
[01:08:04] Speaker A: So now Matt, we're going to move into just kind of our lightning round here at the end with some fast hitting questions hopefully.
What would you say is your biggest success to date?
Personally, professionally, your pick?
[01:08:17] Speaker B: I'd say my family, like the combination of my marriage and my kids and I, I mean they are separate things but it's like hey, we're a union unit. So my family is the most important thing and the most empowering thing that I have in my life right now. And I think that just just comes from like how I was raised and my parents and the fortune or the fortuitous opportunities I've had as a part of different communities and different mentors and you know, role models. You know, in my life that's the big success. It has an overlay with career which is can you be a role model to others in your career? You don't have to be capital L leader to be a role model.
That's something that's always been motivating to me though is to be a role model for peers and for a team and for everyone else.
[01:09:00] Speaker A: So on the flip side though, Matt, obviously we talked about these lottery tickets and not every startup is going to be a Facebook or an SPI and lucrative. So what is a failure or a mistake or a learning moment that you've had in your career? And most importantly you alluded to this earlier, what you took from that because even if a startup doesn't work out, you can still learn something from it.
[01:09:25] Speaker B: Yeah, this is an interesting one because it's tied into a success but at the same time I'd say a failure which was the sale of my direct to consumer ecommerce agency. We did sell it. That's a win.
Had a lot of learnings through that. But an unfortunate failure and tragedy of that was my business partner and I had a complete falling out at the end and too many layers to get into. At least at the end of the show here for a lightning round especially.
There's a lot there.
Remarkably difficult moment. Honestly.
The takeaway from that in general, it's.
Yeah, actually I struggle to maybe in a lightning round way, like distilled down to go for it. No, down to one thing.
Yeah. Just if you do work with people intimately as a partner in a startup venture of any shape or size for a long enough period of time, there's absolutely the possibility that you two will evolve in different ways.
[01:10:30] Speaker A: It's almost like a marriage in some ways.
[01:10:31] Speaker B: It very much is. I mean the term business marriage is like used a lot and there's a reason for that.
Without again enough time and space to unpack relevant details, I would just say that like that happened and there was, I think an imbalanced reckoning or recognition awareness to it happening to the scale it was happening and it created a lot of conflict.
And then how.
When significant conflict then ultimately presents. How do you handle that and how do you handle it with. At least in my case, he was my best friend, not just my business partner, but that also he was my best man in my wedding and that relationship didn't survive so very hard. So we had this success. We were able to get it out, you know, before, you know, something even maybe more significant transpired that would have ruined the company.
[01:11:25] Speaker C: Right.
[01:11:26] Speaker B: But it's just learning that, you know, you will yourself as an entrepreneur, as a business person, and then just as a person person, you'll learn about yourself and you'll go through phases and seasons and the people closest to you will also. And just be mindful just of what you're giving and what you're taking. In relationships, it should always be an equal exchange of value to some degree. And if those things ever start to get added touch and drift, be aware of that and address and this is maybe the learning built into it. So thanks for your space.
Resolve emerging issues earlier than you think.
I think there was looking back at it, there was clarity to things happening that maybe at least I'll say on my side. I can't represent my. My former partner that like I could see or feel it. I maybe didn't want to believe it was happening, so didn't.
[01:12:19] Speaker C: Right.
[01:12:19] Speaker B: Or tried to, but not in all ways that worked. And we let that sort of continue for too long.
[01:12:27] Speaker C: Right.
[01:12:28] Speaker B: So I guess I would sum that up by saying talk a lot, be open a lot, be vulnerable a lot. Especially if you're again in business with someone or again, marriage or other marquee significant relationships. You know, find shared language. You know, how are you sharing of that? Is there safety in space to share that stuff as necessary? And then how do you solve conflict and conflict constructively where it's not zero sum?
[01:12:57] Speaker C: Right.
[01:12:57] Speaker B: These are really hard things to summarize in a sound bite.
There are really good books out there if you want more book recommendations.
Oh, gosh, it's totally running out of my head. Kim Scott is the author. What's her book name?
Radical Candor. Bingo is a great place to maybe start. There's crucial conversations. Bingo. That's the second good book.
[01:13:20] Speaker A: I know that's a popular one here at the college.
[01:13:22] Speaker B: Yeah. So big learning for me there.
[01:13:25] Speaker A: Absolutely. And I think that's really good advice, Matt, for not just business partners, but for romantic partners, close friends, even. Supervisor Supervisee, if you're an officer in a student organization for our current scholars, like you're a THON captain and your committee members, like, that's really good advice.
[01:13:42] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. Especially with that stuff. I never got.
I was involved with thon, but not as like a captain or anything. I had friends that did that, but I was there. Yeah. But yeah, if you're taking any of those roles for me, like, like res life. Oh my God, like so much conflict, right?
[01:13:56] Speaker A: Oh, yes.
[01:13:56] Speaker B: So. And it was amazing to have developed some of those skills there. So I did have some.
I just think that that's a body of work, I might say, that is never complete. Just you go through again, different stages in your own life and own career. And then when you take on different roles and you are a different role model in different stages, how you approach conflict can evolve. I mean, there's still core tenets and core skills, but it can take on different permutations.
[01:14:24] Speaker A: I do have an entrepreneurial question that kind of came out of that last discussion about selling.
If I imagine if you're a first time entrepreneur, you're getting into something because there's a problem that you want to solve, you feel passionate about whatever that thing is, that product, that niche.
And at some point, you know, somebody comes along and says, hey, I want to buy your company, merge, acquisition, all those fun terms.
[01:14:50] Speaker C: Right.
[01:14:51] Speaker A: How do you go about deciding like, I do want to sell or no, I want to stick with this because once you sell once, I'm sure maybe it gets easier, I don't know. But I would say your first baby, basically, like as a startup founder.
[01:15:06] Speaker B: Yeah. If I may, I'd almost like Separate those into two different questions.
[01:15:09] Speaker A: Please do. Yeah, they relate to say we've gone in a productively off the rails.
[01:15:14] Speaker B: Yeah, right, right, right, right, right. You'll have to bring it back here so that we don't end up like at midnight doing the show.
[01:15:21] Speaker C: Almost there.
[01:15:23] Speaker B: But the, the front end of that question I would say is actually a lot harder because it's just so very personal. You know, the question of do you want to sell and how do you evaluate, you know, if there is an offer? You know, how you would consider that almost from an emotional standpoint.
The second is like if you have made the decision to sell, how does that work?
That is easier because there is more of a script to it.
[01:15:49] Speaker C: Right.
[01:15:49] Speaker B: And maybe you're past certain emotional considerations and now logically it's like, okay, I'm going to do this. How do I do this?
[01:15:56] Speaker C: Right?
[01:15:57] Speaker B: There's different economic models. A common one doesn't apply in all cases is SDE sellers discretionary earnings. So you're looking at your trailing 24, 24 months of earnings. So not revenue, but profit.
EBITDA earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, amortization.
And then the seller's discretionary earnings is an interesting sort of, I guess carve out where the seller can like say like, okay, but I'm going to add back the term add back, like, oh, I spent this money, but it's not actually an expense because this was more like maybe an investment or something. Now it has to pass mustard. It has to be like justifiable. But you know, you take your earnings, then you can, you know, as seller like add back things to try to get earnings to a certain state, look at earnings across a certain period of time because patterns matter.
And then probably a question of a multiple. So it's like, okay, here's my trailing 24 EBITDA, certain add backs. Here's then what sort of my computation of discretionary earnings is. And I'm asking for, you know, x2x.
You know, it depends on what market you're in. You know, you're selling a service firm going to be very different than selling a software company versus, you know, selling a CPG company. You know, so it's what is the thing you're selling? Different industries, different models. But that's at least a decent place to start if anyone says interested.
[01:17:27] Speaker A: Awesome.
[01:17:27] Speaker C: Yeah.
[01:17:28] Speaker A: And that kind of tees up. You know, I'm sure there was a lot of mentors that have helped you understand that because you were a novice at some point. Now you're the Expert.
How do you go about finding mentors? And also, you're still really young. You know, you keep saying you're old, but you're only in your 30s.
[01:17:46] Speaker B: How do you know I'm 40? Well, I'm 41.
[01:17:50] Speaker A: Nobody ever claimed I was great at math.
[01:17:53] Speaker B: You're kind. Thank you. I'll take it as a.
[01:17:56] Speaker A: So how do you advise students to approach mentorship?
[01:18:00] Speaker C: Both.
[01:18:01] Speaker A: Both as a mentor to those younger than them and behind them in their career, and mentees who they're just starting.
[01:18:08] Speaker B: Out their career, having as much clarity on what you want to get out of that relationship as well as even what you want to give it. It is a relationship. It should be bidirectional.
What you're going to get out of it, though, aren't answers the best mentorship relationships that I have had?
You know, they're not. They're not giving me the answers or the secret or the shortcut, right? They're challenging me. They're asking me. They're asking me the right questions that I'm maybe not answering or that I'm not asking myself, right? Have you thought about this differently? Have you reframed this problem this way?
These are different things, but they overlap. Mentoring and coaching, not the same thing. Very, very similar, often used interchangeably as terms.
Google it, look it up, figure out where the overlaps are. There is a lot of overlap. So a really good mentor, again, won't advise you, give you answers. That's advising. That's consulting. That's saying, like, okay, said problem. You know, like, you know, hammer, meat, nail, right? Sort of thing.
[01:19:13] Speaker A: That's I'm paying you to tell me.
[01:19:15] Speaker C: What to do, right?
[01:19:16] Speaker B: That's not mentoring. A mentor is someone that is okay. In this version of the story, you are the hero in most cases in business, you should not be the hero.
You know, especially with like, outward marketing and copywriting and these things. Your hero is your customer. You are not the hero. Don't make that mistake. But in a mentoring, you are Excalibur, but in a mentoring relationship, you're more the hero. And we can use a literal nerdy reference. Like, you are Frodo, right? And your mentor is, you know, the sage, right? He's been there, done that, been all through hell and back, right? Or, you know, through Mordor and back sort of thing from Lord of the Rings. So they will guide you. But the guidance, the mentorship, the wisdom is how you think in developing new modes, models, frames on how to enable yourself to solve your own problems.
That's what A good mentoring relationship looks like to be the mentee.
So finding someone who has really walked that path before, which is different than saying, like, oh, I need to go hire the most prestigious executive coach to be my coach mentor, because this person is a billionaire.
It's like, have they walked the path that you want to walk?
[01:20:41] Speaker C: Right.
[01:20:43] Speaker B: And you're never going to find, obviously, one to one. But the closer you can get to that is going to matter tremendously, because they know where the pitfalls are. They know the emotional journey you're about to go on. They know how good it's going to feel when you hit this moment in this sort of a business.
[01:21:02] Speaker C: Right.
[01:21:02] Speaker B: They know.
So they can be with you and ask you the right questions and be there for you to celebrate. Lately, that's the thing.
So look for that sort of a person, and if you don't have access or you aren't aware of that sort of a person, just start networking your face off.
[01:21:20] Speaker C: Really?
[01:21:21] Speaker B: Yep.
[01:21:21] Speaker A: And hopefully you'll find several of them.
[01:21:22] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:21:23] Speaker C: Right.
[01:21:24] Speaker A: So speaking of those kind of folks, Matt, are there any professors or friends or both from your days here at University Park?
Perhaps some folks from Simmons hall that you want to give a shout out to?
[01:21:37] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh. I mean, Stan Stupon comes to mind from. From ist tremendously meaningful in my career there, so he definitely deserves a shout out.
Oh, gosh, this is you putting me on the spot with names, and that's sometimes dangerous because I might flub it.
My resident director, Vanessa. I'm just forgetting her last name all of a sudden in Simmons. You know, I remember the interview I had, you know, to get into Simmons as an ra.
I mean, that. That tenure there was remarkable, you know, on a lot of the levels that we've hit on today. So a big shout out to her, say, like, everyone in my RA super group, which. Forget. If that's still a term that's. That's used.
[01:22:20] Speaker A: Could be.
[01:22:21] Speaker B: Yeah, could be. I think that was, like, a ubiquitous term.
[01:22:23] Speaker A: Let us know in the comments if. If that is still a term.
[01:22:25] Speaker B: I don't think we, like, invented it.
Yeah, and it was all Simmons. And then, like, Atherton had their super group of RAs, all the RAs in the building, and then we had, like, a super, super group.
[01:22:35] Speaker C: Right.
[01:22:36] Speaker B: It was like Atherton and Simmons together, and we had fun rivalries, of course. You know, the two honors dorms. But, yeah, Vanessa and, like. And then all of my friends over there, you know, Danny or Dan, Todd, for sure.
Gosh. See, I knew this was gonna happen if I'M trying to go too fast, Kristen.
Yeah, that group is just seared into my memory in very affectionate ways.
[01:23:02] Speaker A: Awesome.
Now, Matt, we're all at the very tail end of our chat here. This is your chance for a good sound bite. For perhaps an Instagram reel. You can be a little social media savvy.
[01:23:12] Speaker B: Goodness here.
[01:23:13] Speaker A: What's the last piece of advice that you want to leave scholars with on any topic we've touched on, or maybe not.
[01:23:20] Speaker B: Oh, gosh, that sound bite. Social media worthy. You're asking the wrong person to be like pithy.
My gosh, 50s overrated.
It tends to be a little bit like, it's so ephemeral. It's there and it's gone right on social.
Like just like effing do it.
Honestly, just like whether it's something on campus and taking an attitude of just I can do it. I'm going to take an action that's at least half the game, if not more.
Just effing do it. Which has got a little bit spice obviously here at the end, but, well, it's clean enough.
[01:23:54] Speaker A: I don't get the E on the episode.
[01:23:56] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I hope not ending on like a low note with that. But yeah, like, we just need more. Whether it's again, entrepreneurs or people serving in the resident life community or in any, you know, capacity, you know, on campus, like, take an action, just do it. Don't overthink, don't over engineer the idea, don't. Again, all of these things or a lot of the things that we've kind of hit on today, just freaking do it.
[01:24:22] Speaker A: All right, Matt, two very hard hitting questions here at the end. If a scholar is like enthralled with this conversation, they want to pick your brain more. How can they reach out to you?
[01:24:31] Speaker B: LinkedIn is the short answer.
I'm not like prolific on LinkedIn. I'm a little more honestly like the lurker type. But, but, but I engage there. It's my, my channel.
Matthew or Matt. I forget what my handle is, but search for Matt Gartland. You'll find me.
[01:24:47] Speaker C: Perfect.
[01:24:49] Speaker A: And finally, I hope you had a chance to look at the menu while per. Or maybe you'll be going up there after our chat here is over.
If you were a flavor of Berkey Creamery ice cream, which would you be? And as a scholar la Matt, why would you be that flavor?
[01:25:05] Speaker B: I didn't look, you're gonna hate me. And I know they have changed so much since I was here. I was here even before the new creamery was opened. I had OG Creamery during my days.
So I am honored to have had the OG Creamery experience. Personally, I just.
[01:25:20] Speaker A: Young enough to miss that.
[01:25:21] Speaker B: Yeah, the one that I remember, forget the full name. It was like. It was the Paterno.
[01:25:25] Speaker A: Something peachy Paterno.
[01:25:26] Speaker B: Preachy Paterno. Yep.
[01:25:27] Speaker A: All right. Why are you. That one.
[01:25:29] Speaker B: Oh, just like, it's smooth, like with a little bit of sweetness, but not overpowering. Like, it really delivers on sort of like, you know, almost like this. This is awesome. It's not too milky. It's not too sweet. It's not. Then also like too savory, like a deep chocolate or something. It kind of just like hits the right note for me.
[01:25:47] Speaker A: Says I'm peach ice cream. And that's exactly what you're getting.
[01:25:50] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. There's a clarity to it. There's a. Like, it delivers for me.
[01:25:55] Speaker A: Beats the value proposal.
[01:25:56] Speaker B: Yeah. And like, you can kind of eat it year round too. Yeah, like, definitely works in the summer.
[01:26:00] Speaker A: Oh, yes.
[01:26:01] Speaker B: I've always felt it was like, good in the winter. I think others are a little more seasonal specific.
[01:26:05] Speaker A: Yep. So versatile all year.
[01:26:08] Speaker B: Versatility. There we go. Let's end there.
[01:26:10] Speaker A: Excellent. Well, Matt, I really want to say thank you for joining us here and sharing all of your insights. You watching? If you haven't already, make sure you, like, subscribe, comment, you know, all the deal from every YouTuber you've ever seen. If you're listening on an audio app, Apple podcast, Spotify, make sure you follow or subscribe whatever verb they're using these days on that app of choice. And with that, Matt, I'm going to let you have the final word before we hit stop. On the record.
[01:26:36] Speaker C: Oh, we are Penny.
