Fortune's Path Podcast

Robert Carroll, successful entrepreneur and product leader, tells Tom about his journey as a father and how he’s approached different stages of his career based on his personal needs. Robert tells about an early digital video product he built that sold for $300,000 a unit, and then discusses how a technical advantage can evaporate quickly. Tom asks if it's better to be consistently bad in software interfaces than to be uniquely good. Robert talks about how markets define standards like the QWERTY keyboard. Robert tells about creating one company to help people with physical disabilities use computers effectively and another one that helped Fortune 500 companies apply principles of product management to their sales processes. Tom and Robert talk about the psychology of pricing and why companies choose expensive options. Tom asks Robert how he decides between self funding and getting outside investors when he starts a new business. Robert talks about how understanding intent when founding a business is critical for knowing how to fund the business. Robert tells about the founding of his three businesses and how different ideas about what he wanted to achieve affected each. Robert tells how product managers need to understand the capabilities and deficiencies of the technology their products use. Tom and Robert talk about learning styles and teaching strategies, managing technical teams, and being a servant leader. Robert tells about defining clear goals for teams and his resistance to "embracing ambiguity" instead of being clear about objectives. Finally, Robert talks about being in the “fourth quarter” of his career and how he's defining what he wants to do next.

John Farkas, founder of Golden Spiral Marketing, tells how his first job working in a hardware store prepared him for a career in marketing. According to John, marketing is largely about helping people find the right tools to get a job done. John talks about how his first career in theater led to the founding of his digital agency. From theater John learned there are many different ways to get an idea across, and how important audience interactions are to communication. John followed his love of theater into production and directing. Theater production led to corporate events which led to building websites for businesses. John is a student of pragmatic marketing and believes "our opinions, while interesting, are irrelevant." The customer has the one opinion that matters. Technologists have to imagine the world in the way it ought to be while building a bridge to where users and customers are today. Marketing tells the story of how and why people should "cross the bridge" to the new way. John tells Tom to create value with his marketing. "If we're going to put a blog out, we better learn something when we write it," says John. “Do research that adds to your own knowledge and then share that new knowledge with your audience,” is John’s advice for content creators. Tom asks John if activity is more important that content quality. John says social media allows us to have fun with marketing, but the end goal of marketing is serious: value creation. Tom asks John what to look for to know that a marketing spend is worth the price. John says product information takes a long time to show any return while valuable information can attract an audience. “You have to have valuable information to give away if you want to succeed in digital marketing,” says John. Tom asks John about running a family business – John’s son is the leader of creative at Golden Spiral. John tells how working with family makes you smarter but requires a lot of discipline around respecting boundaries. Candor is essential for making the relationship work. Finally John talks about differentiation for software products and the importance of how value is delivered when features between products are similar. “If you understand who you are and what you bring, and you understand it extraordinarily well, you’re going to see results.”

Chris Gann started in product development when he was very young, working in healthcare EDI at the dawn of HIPAA while promoting his punk band. Chris taught himself to use the resources available and "read recipes" to make new products. "I learn through doing," says Chris, "and it can be hard to give direction to others when you learn through doing." Today Chris is a leader of other product managers. When he's hiring he looks for disposition and character over direct product experience. Curiosity is the big thing for Chris. "If you already know the answer, then you're not a product manager," says Chris. Being engaged and grit are close seconds to curiosity for Chris. Chris loved playing bass in bands and feels that product managers are like bass players  – they make everyone around them sound better. Chris knows he's the right fit for product management because he's comfortable working between worlds; a negotiator with everyone else's perspective in his head. Chris can see all sides equally and believes  "objective truth is not a thing to be found." Chris feels more rewarded by curiosity then by knowing. Tom and Chris talk about the differences between committing to a course of action and making a final decision. Chris and Tom then get into a discussion of free will and agency versus determinism. "There's the grand sense of things, and there's what you're forced to live in," says Chris, a sentiment that works for product managers prioritizing work and people prioritizing things in their life. Chris and Tom wrap up by talking about strategy, how to help people say "no" to bad ideas and unproductive work, and how important expertise in a discipline other than product management is import for product managers.

Bob "Batch" Batcheler shares his secret for growing his consultancy and finding great companies. He gives his services away, and that makes people want more. Batch tells how his initial conversations lead to one of three outcomes: he has no interest (almost never), he knows someone who can help more than him, or he knows how he can help. Batch tells how his free exploration leads to a request for a commitment to an engagement, and how some of those commitments lead to full-time employment. Batch also talks about how product management is a job that requires 30 ways to say no. "Sell what's available today," is one of his mantras for good relationships between sales and product. Batch sells against alternatives rather than the ideal, and knows how to show that his product is way better than alternatives. "You don't have to be perfect, but you do have to be better than what they can do on their own or with another vendor." Batch tells how he handles the CEO who tells him what needs to be done, CEO's who are often leading organizations that lack focus and have limited ability to deliver. Batch talks about the power of focus and why that leads to more value than spreading yourself too thin. Batch enjoys being engaged and solving hard problems, and tells us why he applies Lean principles to his own life. "There's not an organization or an industry that Lean principles cannot transform," says Batch. Finally, Batch struggles with his APS beeping during a power outage.

Ann Howard, product and technology leader, talks about how leaders need to share information widely and make decisions publicly. Ann says leaders are charged with predicting the future. She lays out her method for making decisions, knowing that there are very few decisions that are irreversible. Ann describes how to scale decisions down, test them, and get information about risks, describes the differences between leadership and management, and how she builds teams that are accountable to each other. Tom and Ann spend some time talking about what makes for bad leaders. Ann talks about when people are drawn to leadership for the wrong reasons, and why you can't be a leader alone. Ann tells why she admires Ray Dalio's idea of hyper realism and the difference between kindness and niceness. Tom asks Ann who is the best leader she ever worked for and why. Tom and Ann talk about raising kids as a test of letting people fail and dig their way out. Tom asks Ann why she doesn’t think of herself much when she's leading. Ann talks about how her personal story informs her desire to lead. After Ann tells a story about her daughter on the playground, Tom asks how things have changed for women since Ann was a kid.

What makes a great sales person? And how do you pick a company to invest your money and talent with? These are some of the questions we ask old friend of Fortune's Path Adam Zais. Adam is a longtime technology leader with many early stage successes and positive exits to his name. Tom and Adam discuss what the early days of the PC were like, and how Adam created a product that integrated both hardware and software to create dashboard reports. Adam talks about how reselling someone their own data in a way that helps them run their business is a product people won't just pay for, but will thank you for. Tom talks about how healthcare startups are doing this by getting usable information from the EHR. Tom and Adam talk about how innovation can come from packaging existing technologies in a new way. Adam shares a story about working for a hardware company and how it taught him that success is not always about the best idea and how he found Atria, a great company solving an easy to understand and hard to solve problem that affected a lot of people. It was the CEO and the people at Atria that made Adam want to work as the VP of marketing even if he was only the second non-engineer in a company of 19 people. After a weird digression about AI from Tom, Adam brings the conversation back to knowing where to put your money when choosing companies to invest in. It's best to have both a technology advantage and great people, but if there's no obvious technology advantage, do you trust the people? Tom brings things home by talking about the framework he uses to assess the viability of a new venture.

Carm Huntress, CEO of Credo Health and four-time company founder, talks to Tom about improving access to medical records and other things digital health. Carm explains what Credo does, and why it's good. Tom and Carm disagree about why healthcare systems spend money. Carm tells why he believes transparency and data will lead to cannibalization in not-for-profit healthcare as expensive procedures are replaced with less expensive alternatives. Carm talks about how systems like Intermountain Healthcare have found cheaper, more efficient ways to deliver care, but their processes may not be scalable across markets. Carm then schools Tom on what strategy is and why it's important. Tom transitions the conversation to talk about one of his passions, audiophile equipment. Carm talks about how high margins and addicted customers can be a recipe for success even in a small market. Carm then discusses why capital allocation is the most important skill for growing a business. Carm tells why building enterprise value is his North Star for allocating capital. Carm uses Steve Jobs as an example of how hard it is to get a business right and reminds us of Steve's many years in the wilderness before coming back to Apple for his most prolific period of creativity. Carm and Tom then talk about Amazon's narrative approach to product creation. Carm finishes with why he thinks hospitals that are building more beds are in for a reconning. Tom wraps things up with an idea for an illegal insurance product for healthy people.

Eric Caroll grew up in an entrepreneurial household. His father did the “grind” of running his own business but always made time for his family, even if it meant burning the midnight oil once the kids were asleep. Eric appreciated his dad’s clear-eyed focus on what mattered most. In his career as a product leader, Eric has strived to be equally clear in his vision - for his products, for his personal ambitions, and for his family’s goals. 

Eric discusses his daily work rituals, how he reviews goals with cross-discipline teams, and the joy of creating a product that solves users’ problems. Tom asks Eric whether he would prefer to have a good boss or be a good boss. Eric explains that constantly asking “why” is the key to building up your curiosity muscle. Tom wonders if you can apply product management principles to family life and Eric gives living proof by sharing his family roadmap for 2021. Eric talks about scoping your goals to fit your means. And Tom casually mentions reading some Seneca.

Bill Horne built the foundation of his career in sales at IBM and realized his dream of becoming an executive at age 40. He is a committed lifelong learner who believes in active listening - and it shows. Bill follows staffing advice he learned from a rug merchant on a flight from Atlanta to Salt Lake City in the 1980s. And credits his mentor with teaching him how to gather and be discerning about data in new and difficult leadership situations. He also reflects on advice from IBM sales legend Monte Stern and the kind and accepting example of his wife’s “Meemaw.” 

Tom asks Bill how you decide where to focus your energy as a leader. Bill says that the key is to start with five disparate data points before you make any decisions. But it’s crucial to dial in and really listen to what you’re being told - don’t listen to see what fits the story that you’re looking for. Tom and Bill discuss the limits of what you can control as a leader. Tom asserts that investors don’t talk about customers enough in board meetings. And Bill explains that you have to tell the customer story in a language that expert money managers can understand. Bill talks about how hard it is to fire people and Tom confirms that you can’t fire your kids when they fail at the tasks you’ve assigned them to do.

Anne Chaconas likes vanilla, but she doesn’t want to be vanilla. She’s visually “out there” in most tech leadership spaces and wears her beliefs on her sleeve. Anne explains that knowing yourself and being honest alienates some people but keeps the people who matter most close, forming your tribe. She hopes that her visibility in tech spaces invites other people like her to see themselves in the same spaces. 

Tom asks Anne if the purpose of marketing is to generate sales. She calls “total bullsh*t” and leads a conversation on building love, trust, and consistency through marketing, making connections to dating apps and parenting. Anne explains why gambling with trust is such a dangerous game. Tom and Anne talk about empathy in corporate governance, the three rules of parenting, and why Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion make some people so uncomfortable. Tom asks Anne the impossible question: How do you define love? And then he asks her about God. In the end, Anne brings it all back to a few simple rules: shut up; listen to what people need; and help them achieve it if you can.