Beyond the Uniform

In this episode we talk about feelings at work, and how - if leveraged properly - they can provide enormous insight into a leader and team about where they need to focus their time and energy.

Why Listen:

Today's story is so different. Ranjeet has an incredible background of going from the Marine Corps as an Avionics Division Non-Commissioned Officer and then choosing to go down a path centered around food and operations, including roles like being a Plant Supervisor at Safeway, a Shipping Department Supervisor at Albertsons, an Operations Manager at Ralphs Grocery Company, and a Plant Manager at BakeMark. You probably recognize all of those names. You've definitely had one of his products from Aspire Bakeries, where his focus is on frozen baked goods. But so much to learn today about why he chose to focus on this industry. Today, he will talk about the advantages of being so focused in this way, what it's like to be a Bakery Director, and what his day-to-day life looks like.

About Ranjeet:

Ranjeet Singh is the Bakery Director at Aspire Bakeries, a North American baking company with a leadership position in specialty frozen baked goods. Some of their brands you may recognize are La Brea Bakery, Otis Spunkmeyer, and Oakrun Farm Bakery. Ranjeet served in the Marine Corps for nearly five years as an Avionics Division Non-Commissioned Officer. He worked as a Plant Supervisor at Safeway, a Shipping Department Supervisor at Albertsons, an Operations Manager at Ralphs Grocery Company, and a Plant Manager at BakeMark. He earned his BSBA in Management from Columbia College and an MBA from Syracuse University.

This is a new episode format where I focus on a mindset that I'm working on and that I believe will help our BTU audience in their career and life. Today, I'm talking about gratitude and three "pro tips" about building up a muscle of gratitude and apprecation.

Why Listen:

One thing that will come through in this interview is how much Trevor is constantly learning from others and books as a professional and an entrepreneur. I am ordering three different books based on the ones he recommended in this episode. We talked a lot about how the riches are in the niches and Trevor's own story of entrepreneurship of how he started to do things and had a realization and pursued that. And it led to what he's doing right now, which is selling software specifically-targeted at the cannabis dispensaries, which are booming here in Colorado and elsewhere.

As always at beyondtheuniform.org you'll find show notes with links to everything we discussed, as well as 415 other episodes just like this one.

About Trevor Shirk:

Trevor Shirk is the CEO and Co-Founder of Terrayn, where he has generated $28 million in revenue with over 160 dispensaries. He graduated from West Point in 2008. Trevor served in the Army for more than eight years, where he was a Ranger Qualified Combat Engineer, including combat ops in Afghanistan. When he left the Army, he did Stanford's Ignite Program and became CEO of Strattex Solutions, where he did SEO and digital marketing strategy work. After that, he co-founded Terrayn nearly two years ago.

Why Listen:

KC overlapped his time in the military with his time at NASA having over 20 years at each of those organizations. Although his childhood aspiration was to become an astronaut, and he got to the final stages of that process, he ended up starting a company called Athlete Foundary. I love their mission because it's aimed at helping children of any zip code and background fulfill their dream of becoming collegiate athletes. By leveling the playing field and making it clear what process people need to follow to become a collegiate athlete, he's helping hundreds of 1000s of people across the United States. This is a great episode for those of you interested in entrepreneurship. It's also great to see how someone is having a positive impact on the world after the military service, and also hearing about his experience at NASA.

About KC:

KC Chhipwadia is the CEO and Founder of Athlete Foundary. For the driven middle and high school student athlete, Athlete Foundary improves the odds of her achieving her dream to become a collegiate athlete, regardless of zip code, by providing a first-of-its-kind athletic and academic unified plan, integrated with qualities collegiate coaches actually value so they can track, build, and communicate a better journey to collegiate athletics. KC served for 20 years as a Senior Human Spaceflight Engineer at NASA Johnson Space Center, supporting over 50 Space Shuttle missions. He also served for over 20 years, both active and reserved in the Navy as a Surface Warfare Officer, including deployments to Iraq looking for our missing-in-action, and Afghanistan with Naval Special Warfare.

Next Friday (December 17th, 2021) at 9am Pacific / 12pm Eastern, we'll be trying a live, interactive episode.

We'll be using an app called Wisdom to record the show. If you download the app and follow @jnassiri, you'll be able to join us live.

Here's the direct link to follow me on Wisdom: https://joinwisdom.audio/jnassiri

If you'd like to participate, go to beyondtheuniform.org/live and complete the sort form there - you can ask a question or share your own knowledge with our audience.

See you there!

Why Listen:

Today's interview is a different story than I've heard before. Because Justin didn't found a company, he was working at a company called Intuit, getting a lot of experience in product innovation. He was contacted by a company right when he was starting his entrepreneurial journey about having the possibility of him taking over as CEO. It's a path that I haven't heard of a lot. He's done well at tripling the size of this company in those two years. Even though at that time the pandemic started and he lost a third of his revenue overnight. I love this conversation. Keep an ear out for when he talks about it. He took action while on active duty, earning his MBA and volunteering so that when he got out of the military, his resume had mostly non-military items, which was an impressive idea. I learned a lot from Justin; he seems like a natural coach, and I'm personally looking forward to keeping in contact with him and continuing to learn from his example of leadership.

About Justin:

Justin Wells is the CEO at Interlaced.io. It's a 50-person IT services company in San Diego. They provide premium IT managed services, essentially enterprise-grade IT programs and fractional IT departments with Apple Cloud and networking expertise. Justin started at the Naval Academy, after which he served in the Navy for ten years as a Naval Aviator. He earned his MBA from UC San Diego, focusing on innovation strategy, business development, and growth partnership. Interlaced.io was founded in 2009. Justin took over as CEO two years ago, tripling the company's size over that time through organic growth and a recent acquisition.

Why Listen:

I had intended to spend the bulk of my conversation with Devin talking about growth and marketing because he has some great ideas. But we ended up going down a different path. Devin runs a company called StraightHemp, where they sell different hemp-related products. In this interview, we talked about CBD and other things. And he also is an advocate for psychedelics. Devin is a rare breed of person. He's building a company and making money, but that's not what's driving him. Devin is very community-driven. He's very much about making the world a better place. I know that sounds trite. But it just really I found our interview touching in that sense. As an entrepreneur, it was helpful to see an example of someone who is so purpose-driven.

About Devin:

Devin Alvarez is the Founder and CEO of StraightHemp. Using a proprietary extraction method to power their leading Straight Hemp family of products, they are positioned to become a top seller in the natural products channel. He started at the Air Force Academy before switching over to Florida State University. He holds a Master's of Science from Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University in Environmental Science.

Why Listen:

Today's conversation is dense in terms of the amount of wisdom per square second. I've known Ken for a while now, and it was great hearing more about his story. I respect his vulnerability and authenticity in sharing how he navigated multiple times in his career in life. Things didn't work out the way that he thought they would. One example is his work in the ICU in Afghanistan and Iraq that changed his view about medicine and realizing that that path wasn't what he wanted to do. And he goes from there to consulting and then becomes a senior at a rapidly growing startup. It just shows that you can adapt and overcome. He talks about hiring, managing a remote workforce, and so many great things.

About Kit:

Kit Kieling is the President, COO, and Co-Founder of Orderly Health. Orderly Health is on a mission to make sure patients have access to the most up-to-date information about healthcare providers. Through proprietary algorithms of machine learning, Orderly Health improves the accuracy of provider directories and the overall interoperability of data for payers and providers. Kitt started at the Air Force Academy and earned his MD from the Oregon Health and Science University. He served as the Pediatric ICU Director in Iraq and Afghanistan. He has also worked as a Consultant at McKinsey & Company in addition to multiple medical positions before his time at Orderly Health.

Why Listen:

Erik is a man I tremendously respect. His background is unbelievably impressive. A few things that we talked about that stood out to me is, first of all, where we started the conversation, which is an alternate view on the veteran transition that I've never heard before; it puts veterans in a different light. And I think it's very thought-provoking. Second of all is Erik's work around Afghanistan, which he has done for the last ten years of helping people get out of Afghanistan and making sure that they're safe. Third of all, Erik has an amazing story of work in the food and agriculture space, and he talks about why that's so important to him. Fourth, it was remarkable to hear about the crazy journey that the quarantine put on his company, SafeTraces, and how they were able to pivot into something even bigger when most companies honestly would have gone out of business. Instead, they're thriving due to their adaptability. And he talks about how the military training was such an asset in that way.

About Erik:

Erik Malmstrom is the CEO of SafeTraces, a biotechnology company that is harnessing the power of DNA. SafeTraces has developed groundbreaking solutions for food and drug traceability, sanitation verification, and safe airflow verification that address the fundamental human need for safety. Erik started out at the University of Pennsylvania, after which he served for nearly seven years in the Army, where he graduated from Army Ranger School and Airborne School and earned the Bronze Star Medal for his service as a rifle platoon leader during deployments to eastern Afghanistan. After his military service, he earned degrees at Harvard Business School and Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government. His career has included time at Cargill, working on food, agriculture, nutrition, and risk management, time as a White House Fellow, and time as General Manager of the Farmer's Business Network, a company that has now raised over $250 million in capital.