I know you know this, but I'm going to say it any way - As CMOs we don't have long. CMO tenure is 44 months. My spider senses say it is less in Silicon Valley / The Tech World.

We come into companies with much enthusiasm and tons of CEO and board support. Within 2 years or so, our IQs drop to our shoe sizes and they are starting to think about firing us. So we have to work fast! ;-)

In the 1st 90 days tactically, find three things that increase revenue. Could be:

In most companies there is low hanging fruit that will make a noticeable improvement in revenue quickly. CEOs, CFOs and CROs want results now. Give it to them. Don't be confused, revenue is the CMO's job - even if you have a VP of Sales/CRO/CSO.

Driving revenue is the CMO's job.

In the 1st 90 days tactically, find three things that decrease cost. Could be:

The CEOs and CFO love costs reductions and improving productivity. Just like on the revenue side, in most companies there is low hanging fruit that will make a noticeable improvement in cost. Cut some costs. Make it happen. Cost reduction is our job.

In the 1st 90 days strategically partner with the CEO & exec team to design a category strategy by addressing:

Legendary CMOs are category designers. They don't just do marketing within markets - they create the markets. Who would you rather be, Steve Jobs or Steve Ballmer. (one guy design categories, the other guy competed).

Legends do not position their brand against existing companies in existing categories with a "we are better than them" strategy. They design new categories with their rules, so they can win with a "we are different from them" strategy.

For the love of God, Please don't fall into the re-branding trap. Many CMOs think branding fixes everything. NO. Categories make brands,

The two biggest problems our world is facing is education and healthcare. How can we better leverage advancing technology to improve them? What is the future of healthcare and biotech? What can make healthcare more efficient and personalized? On this episode, we talk to Venrock’s Bryan Roberts, who shares his insights on these important issues.

Getting to the simplicity on the other side of complexity is an art form. - Bryan Roberts

It takes a decade to build a decent product

Some products get lucky and are able to make it within the 5-6 year mark, but for most products, a lot more time is required to achieve robustness, test it effectively and then prepare the market for it. For a product to reach simplification, time and effort is required. It’s fair to say that a minimum of 10 years is needed, and in the event of a screw up, more time is required.

Building a healthcare product requires more time

In healthcare product creation, the penalties for screw ups are a lot higher, the sales cycle is slower, and there are more regulations at play. Additionally, the margins are pretty low because there are just so many people to serve. However the industry offers unique opportunities because of the slow adoption of technology and the need for resources.

The future of healthcare is speed, efficiency and personalization

In the current state of healthcare, companies are throwing people at the problem instead of leveraging the best technology that’s available. In the future, we’ll see a better application of tech and progress spurred on by more economic incentives. Additionally, things like x-rays will be done outside of the big healthcare system making things a lot easier for patients.

Technology will enable a more personalized way of treating patients, and that will also increase advocacy for each patient. In the future, we will see a dramatic increase in the use of data and technology to help patients get the most effective,and efficient care. Patient care will be done in lower acuity locations with a higher frequency. This is the kind of care that will improve quality of life, and bring healthcare into the 21st century.

Guest Bio

Bryan joined Venrock as a Kauffman Fellow in 1997. He is based in Palo Alto and invests broadly across the healthcare industry. Bryan is currently Chairman of the Board of Directors of Castlight Health (NYSE: CSLT) and Achaogen (NASDAQ: AKAO). He also serves on the Board of several private companies, including 10X Genomics, Doctor on Demand, Grand Rounds, Hua Medicine, Intarcia and Lyra Health and is a Board observer at CloudFlare. Bryan was named a Henry Crown Fellow by the Aspen Institute in 2006 and has ranked on Forbes’ Midas List nine times, 2008 – 2017. Go to Venrock.com for more information.

First responders have the highest incidence of cancer of any occupation in the country. How does Jeff Denholm’s company, ATIRA Systems solve these and many other problems? What was it like to go through a serious injury and make the way back to health and adventure? Why is humility important when you have tremendous abilities? On this episode, we are joined by legendary adventurer and entrepreneur Jeff Denholm.

If an athlete’s humility doesn’t exceed their ability, I don’t want anything to do with them. - Jeff Denholm

The number one cost associated with fire damage is water damage, and the number one killer of firefighters is flashover.

First responders are exposed to a great many risks as they do the honorable work of saving lives. They are prone to flashover, which takes place when heated air ignites from behind them, trapping them and burning them. They also deal with the risks of structural loading. The work ATIRA Systems does is helping these brave people do their work more safely. Additionally their systems, knock out fires with a 10th of the water needed.

If you want to deliver a giant vision for a profound change you’re committed to, you have to deliver that vision.

When the people in a company who are the originators leave, very often the ability to execute on the category potential diminishes, and the company fails. Most people think associating with big companies will make them stronger, but it can actually have the opposite effect. If you want to deliver against a giant vision for a profound change that you’re committed to, you have to deliver that vision.  

Painkillers weaken the body, the immune system and the mind.  

Jeff’s experience with a serious injury that resulted in the amputation of his hand taught him a great deal about resilience. Without painkillers he found he was able to find and use the strength to fight through his injury. In fact, he believes painkillers dull our senses and take away from the mental, physical and emotional strength we need to get us through something.

Jeff has a great deal of tenacity, which he believes comes from being drawn to things that are hard to do. With an amazing life as an adventurer, overcoming an injury and pushing his business for 6 years, it’s clear that he is a breath of fresh air. Visualizing his own success has brought him this far, but he also really values humility above any ability or amount of genius. The key to making it through the rough times is to keep executing.

Guest Bio

Jeff wears many hats in life, including entrepreneur, professional athlete, inspirational speaker and environmental steward. ATIRA Systems® is the professional nexus of Jeff's entrepreneurial spirit and passion for the environment. While seeking a fire retardant for his Wildfire Equipment Company, Jeff was struck by disturbing statistics about the toxicity of current offerings and asked himself, "What if we could come up with a non-toxic product that is more effective at fighting fires of all types without doing unnecessary harm?" Jeff discovered that annually there are millions of ga...

First responders have the highest incidence of cancer of any occupation in the country. How does Jeff Denholm’s company, ATIRA Systems solve these and many other problems? What was it like to go through a serious injury and make the way back to health and adventure? Why is humility important when you have tremendous abilities? On this episode, we are joined by legendary adventurer and entrepreneur Jeff Denholm.

If an athlete’s humility doesn’t exceed their ability, I don’t want anything to do with them. - Jeff Denholm

The number one cost associated with fire damage is water damage, and the number one killer of firefighters is flashover.

First responders are exposed to a great many risks as they do the honorable work of saving lives. They are prone to flashover, which takes place when heated air ignites from behind them, trapping them and burning them. They also deal with the risks of structural loading. The work ATIRA Systems does is helping these brave people do their work more safely. Additionally their systems, knock out fires with a 10th of the water needed.

If you want to deliver a giant vision for a profound change you’re committed to, you have to deliver that vision.

When the people in a company who are the originators leave, very often the ability to execute on the category potential diminishes, and the company fails. Most people think associating with big companies will make them stronger, but it can actually have the opposite effect. If you want to deliver against a giant vision for a profound change that you’re committed to, you have to deliver that vision.  

Painkillers weaken the body, the immune system and the mind.  

Jeff’s experience with a serious injury that resulted in the amputation of his hand taught him a great deal about resilience. Without painkillers he found he was able to find and use the strength to fight through his injury. In fact, he believes painkillers dull our senses and take away from the mental, physical and emotional strength we need to get us through something.

Jeff has a great deal of tenacity, which he believes comes from being drawn to things that are hard to do. With an amazing life as an adventurer, overcoming an injury and pushing his business for 6 years, it’s clear that he is a breath of fresh air. Visualizing his own success has brought him this far, but he also really values humility above any ability or amount of genius. The key to making it through the rough times is to keep executing.

Guest Bio

Jeff wears many hats in life, including entrepreneur, professional athlete, inspirational speaker and environmental steward. ATIRA Systems® is the professional nexus of Jeff's entrepreneurial spirit and passion for the environment. While seeking a fire retardant for his Wildfire Equipment Company, Jeff was struck by disturbing statistics about the toxicity of current offerings and asked himself, "What if we could come up with a non-toxic product that is more effective at fighting fires of all types without doing unnecessary harm?" Jeff discovered that annually there are millions of ga...

Most artisan businesses require the artiste to be there every single moment. How can this kind of business scale up to become dominant force in the market? What does it take to train people on the right values? How has coffee culture evolved over the years? On this episode we are joined by legendary entrepreneurs and Verve Coffee founders Ryan O’Donovan and Colby Barr who tell the story of their journey to become Silicon Valley’s artisan coffee of choice.  

We want the right people to feel confident that they are good at their job. - Colby Barr

Takeaways

1. Coming off as pretentious is usually from a lack of confidence, not from too much.

At the start of the show, Ryan and Colby shared on their beginnings as musicians and how they were inspired by coffee culture, and the different waves of coffee the market has seen. They also shared how they built a business that can scale and expand. Ryan and Colby also shared on giving up the CEO role and how that gave them so much more freedom. Towards the end of the show, we talked about building from the ground up, starting their business during a downturn and making their partnership work, “we’ve seen what the other side could look like and we don’t want that in our company.”

We also spoke about;

• Barista culture and latte art

If you want to build your category and brand, it’s all about who you associate with from the start, but having an excellent product is still highly critical. What makes Verve stand out is that it’s founders are still in the trenches for their brand, they’ve built an institution that builds communities and they staff encourage autonomy and empowerment. It’s an artisan business that puts a high-end customer service at the center of everything. Everyone in the business is confident in their training, the value of customer service and being a truth seeker over a wealth seeker.

Guest Bio

Ryan O’Donovan and Colby Barr are the co-founders of Verve Coffee, a third-wave coffee company. In 2007, Ryan and Colby built and opened the first Verve cafe on 41st Ave in Santa Cruz, California. Today, Verve has locations in cities from Los Angeles to San Francisco to Tokyo, but our roots remain planted in Santa Cruz, where we roast our coffee on vintage roasters and enjoy the endless surf of the rugged California coast. Go to VerveCoffee.com to learn more.

Most artisan businesses require the artiste to be there every single moment. How can this kind of business scale up to become dominant force in the market? What does it take to train people on the right values? How has coffee culture evolved over the years? On this episode we are joined by legendary entrepreneurs and Verve Coffee founders Ryan O’Donovan and Colby Barr who tell the story of their journey to become Silicon Valley’s artisan coffee of choice.  

We want the right people to feel confident that they are good at their job. - Colby Barr

Takeaways

At the start of the show, Ryan and Colby shared on their beginnings as musicians and how they were inspired by coffee culture, and the different waves of coffee the market has seen. They also shared how they built a business that can scale and expand. Ryan and Colby also shared on giving up the CEO role and how that gave them so much more freedom. Towards the end of the show, we talked about building from the ground up, starting their business during a downturn and making their partnership work, “we’ve seen what the other side could look like and we don’t want that in our company.”

We also spoke about;

If you want to build your category and brand, it’s all about who you associate with from the start, but having an excellent product is still highly critical. What makes Verve stand out is that it’s founders are still in the trenches for their brand, they’ve built an institution that builds communities and they staff encourage autonomy and empowerment. It’s an artisan business that puts a high-end customer service at the center of everything. Everyone in the business is confident in their training, the value of customer service and being a truth seeker over a wealth seeker.

Guest Bio

Ryan O’Donovan and Colby Barr are the co-founders of Verve Coffee, a third-wave coffee company. In 2007, Ryan and Colby built and opened the first Verve cafe on 41st Ave in Santa Cruz, California. Today, Verve has locations in cities from Los Angeles to San Francisco to Tokyo, but our roots remain planted in Santa Cruz, where we roast our coffee on vintage roasters and enjoy the endless surf of the rugged California coast. Go to VerveCoffee.com to learn more.

Failure and setbacks can discourage any entrepreneur from keeping up with their ultimate goal. How do we recover from failure and how do we make it work in our favor? What's the increasing role of automation in our contemporary business context? And is the concept of the work-life balance accurate? In this episode, Vaughan O'Connor discusses his theory on recovery, challenging marketing, and much more.

You should always keep moving forward and you should keep thinking there needs to be another revolution moving forward. - Vaughan O'Connor.

Takeaways

We started off with talking about Vaughan's background and how helping out with his father's business gave him the very basis of entrepreneurship. Vaughan then told the story of breaking his pelvis and his hard-fought way to recovery. Vaughan also mentioned and thanked all professionals who have helped him recover from his injury. We then moved on to talk about how resistance and accepting the reality of your situation helps you overcome self-pity and rediscover the joy in life. Afterwards, we also discussed how the development of technology has changed the essence of business communication between different parts of the world. Then we discussed the role of kindness and empathy as well as their use as part of category design. Vaughan then explained the connection between creative marketing and information technology. He confirmed that focusing on just digital marketing is can be detrimental. We also summarized how an open-door policy towards clients can be category design in itself. Vaughan then pointed out that digitalization can be a benefit of any future-oriented entrepreneur. Vaughan pointed out what really benefits a company's staff - the overall success of the company. Finally, we talked about the symbiosis between personal and business life and how they're ultimately one and the same.

We also discussed;

Born and raised in Compton, Judge Kelvin Filer is an inspiring man who comes from a family of activists and social advocates. What are his biggest life lessons? Why is his father such a big inspiration in his life? What was it like swearing his own daughter to the Bar? On this episode, Judge Kelvin Filer joins us to share his legendary life story.

So long as you’re doing the right thing or doing your best to do the right thing, that’s really all anyone can ask. - Judge Kelvin Filer

His Father Took the Bar 48 Times

Judge Filer’s biggest inspiration is his father, a man who was very active in Compton society. Maxcy Filer was so determined to be a lawyer that it took him 48 times to pass the Bar. When he did pass in 1991, people across the world celebrated, and his story is the greatest lesson on perseverance. Even his gravestone has the words “never give up”.

Judge Filer knew Richard Williams (Serena and Venus’ Dad)

Judge Filer has been an advocate for Compton, and in the 1990s he founded the Compton Athletic Foundation, and Richard Williams came for assistance and support. Back then, Richard said his daughters would be the greatest tennis players in the world.

The toughest part of being a judge on a criminal law case is the sentencing.

When it comes to crimes like murder, so many people are affected in the process. The victim’s family suffered a loss, the defendant’s family also suffer from a crime they didn’t commit. For judges, sentencing has to be fair to the victim’s family, and take their loss into account.

Doing the right thing is something that will always work out well for you, and no matter what you do, always persevere if you have a dream. As we learned from Judge Filer and his father, don’t give up on something you believe in, even when it’s hard. At a time where so many people question our justice system, it’s a comfort to know that someone as honorable, humble and dedicated sits on that bench.

Guest Bio

Kelvin D. Filer is a judge for the Superior Court of Los Angeles County in California. He was appointed by Governor Gray Davis on August 8, 2002. He received a bachelor's degree from University of California at Santa Cruz in 1977 and a J.D. from University of California, Berkeley Boalt Hall School of Law in 1980.

Self-awareness is a vital skill to have, especially in competitive fields and categories. Can you foster self-awareness and perception? Does mindfulness really work? How is practicing mindfulness similar to surfing and skiing? All these questions and a lot more are answered in this week's episode with special guest Jon Vroman, host of The Front Row Factor podcast. Jon will explain what differentiates him from other motivational speakers and how the Front Row mentality relates to category design.

It's about mindsets, relationships and environment. Those are the three factors and we need to have a hard look at those and say, what are those creating and do we like it? - Jon Vroman

Takeaways

We started off with Jon talking about his new book and his goal with moment-making. Jon shared his philosophy about fleeting moments and seizing the day. After a few examples, we also discussed staying focused on our own goals and identity, as well as practicing mindfulness. Jon pointed out that mindfulness can easily be integrated in your everyday life, and that relies on redefining your understanding of ''critical''. We then touched upon letting things pass and realizing that it's not your job to educate everybody. Jon then emphasized how important it is to regard three factors - mindsets, relationships and environment - and how they shape our personality. From then on, we moved on to discuss Jon's category design and what makes him different from other motivational speakers. Jon mentioned the role of charity in his life and he explained his path to recognition of life in the front row. We then moved on to mention a few examples of unique category design. We talked about how telling the correct story appropriately can build up the right motivation and design the correct category. Jon explained how discovering and telling amazing stories helped him develop his ideas, as they didn't contain a specific meaning, but rather they were very easy to interpret. We also touched upon the obligation we feel to offer advice in difficult times and how that's not always the right thing to do. Finally, we agreed that work life and personal life can exist together and that our family life can teach us a lot about our business and vice-versa.

In this episode, we also talked about;