Lead With We

Lead With We is currently on break, but we’ll be back soon with all new episodes featuring some of the most inspiring purposeful business leaders out there. In the meantime, I want to highlight one of my favorite conversations from 2020, with Frank Cooper, Senior Managing Director, Global Chief Marketing Officer of BlackRock.

It was fascinating to get Frank's perspective on how the world’s largest hedge fund is rethinking capitalism, like the threat climate change poses to business and how sustainability is becoming an innovation driver. Frank also gave me his take on why we should be optimistic about what we can achieve together through business in the future. 

Frank Cooper

Frank Cooper III, Senior Managing Director, is the Global Chief Marketing Officer of BlackRock. He is a member of the Global Executive Committee and Global Operating Committee. Frank has built his career on a unique capability: to unite business, human and cultural perspectives to make brands supremely relevant. As such, he has built a reputation as an agent of change, able to lead transformation for companies at an inflection point across multiple industries, from entertainment and consumer goods to technology and Finance. In his current role as Senior Managing Director and Global Chief Marketing Officer of global financial powerhouse BlackRock, Frank leads the company’s marketing across every region of the world combining the science of data-driven/technology-centered approaches with the art of creativity, culture and purpose. 

Frank has been lauded by Fast Company Magazine as one of the “100 Most Creative People in Business”; was a four-time recipient of Billboard Magazine’s “Power 100”; and recipient of AdColor’s coveted Legend award. 

Simon Mainwaring 

Simon Mainwaring is a brand futurist, global keynote speaker, and bestselling author. He is best known as the author of We First: How Brands and Consumers Use Social Media to Build a Better World and the Founder and CEO of We First, a strategic consultancy that works with brands to define their business strategy, company culture, and brand communications.

This episode of LEAD WITH WE was produced and edited by Goal17Media.com and is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify.

Resources

BlackRock Website: https://www.blackrock.com/

Frank Cooper’s, LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/frank-cooper-iii-0501a66/

We First Website: https://www.wefirstbranding.com/

I think we could all use a little rest right now, so the team and I are taking a little break in preparation for the new year. We’ll have more episodes for you soon, but for now please enjoy one of my favorite conversations from 2020 with Doug Palladini, the Global Brand President of VANS.

What I love about Doug’s approach to purposeful branding, is that it’s all about supporting passionate, creative communities. Doug shared with me how he and his team have sustained the company’s legacy by really listening to their customers and staying authentic. We also discussed how their approach translated into a truly unique response to COVID 19. 

Doug Palladini

A veteran of the action sports industry with more than 25 years of leadership across marketing, sales and product, Doug Palladini was appointed to lead Vans as its Global Brand President in July 2016. In his role, Palladini oversees the strategic direction of Vans’ more than $4 billion global business, while enabling the regional teams to develop and deliver local strategies to drive continued worldwide growth. A long-time leader within the Vans brand, Palladini has held various roles within the company. From 2004 through 2014, he served as Vans' global marketing leader. Palladini played an integral role in Vans’ transformation into a global icon of creative expression in youth culture, becoming the largest action sports footwear and apparel brand on the planet, available in more than 84 countries.

Palladini has also led production of hundreds of hours of award-winning television for Fox and its networks, as well as feature films such as Pipeline Masters. He is also the executive producer of the Vans Warped Tour documentary, No Room for Rock Stars and the newly released, Los Punks: We Are All We Have. Palladini is the author of the Vans tell-all coffee table book, “Off the Wall: Stories of Sole from Vans Originals,” and wrote two new chapters to commemorate Vans’ 50th Anniversary in 2016.

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Simon Mainwaring 

Simon Mainwaring is a brand futurist, global keynote speaker, and bestselling author. He is best known as the author of We First: How Brands and Consumers Use Social Media to Build a Better World and the Founder and CEO of We First, a strategic consultancy that works with brands to define their business strategy, company culture, and brand communications.

This episode of LEAD WITH WE was produced and edited by Goal17Media.com and is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify.

Resources

Vans Website: https://www.vans.com/

Doug Palladini’s, LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/doug-palladini-98164914/

We First Website: https://www.wefirstbranding.com/

When you look up ‘disrupter’, I’m pretty sure Kara Goldin’s name is the first one to pop up. That’s why I’m re-sharing the conversation I had with her in 2020. 

Kara is the founder and CEO of Hint, Inc., and she turned the bottled water industry upside down with her best known product, Hint water. As she was about to welcome her fourth child, Kara’s idea to help her lead a more healthy life, along with her bold scrappy approach, led to the creation of top-selling flavored waters without artificial flavors in an incredibly crowded category. Kara also discusses her political activism around access to clean water in America and how she doesn’t let her own fear get the best of her, a core theme in her new book, Undaunted.

So enjoy this episode, and we’ll be back with new ones soon. 

Kara Goldin

Kara Goldin is a disruptor. She is the Founder and CEO of Hint, Inc., best known for its award-winning Hint® water, the leading unsweetened flavored water. Hint, Inc., also produces the leading, award-winning, oxybenzone and paraben-free sunscreen, as well as aluminum-free deodorant.

She has received numerous accolades, including being named EY Entrepreneur of the Year 2017 Northern California, one of InStyle’s 2019 Badass 50, Fast Company’s Most Creative People in Business and Fortune’s Most Powerful Women Entrepreneurs. The Huffington Post listed her as one of six disruptors in business, alongside Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg.

Previously, Kara was Vice President of Shopping & Ecommerce at America Online where she helped lead the growth of its shopping and ecommerce business to over a $1 billion in revenue.

She is an active speaker and launched Unstoppable with Kara Goldin in 2017, a podcast where she interviews founders, entrepreneurs and disruptors across various industries. Kara’s first book, Undaunted, published by Harper Leadership, will be released in October 2020.

Follow Kara on her website at karagoldin.com and on all social handles @KaraGoldin

Simon Mainwaring 

Simon Mainwaring is a brand futurist, global keynote speaker, and bestselling author. He is best known as the author of We First: How Brands and Consumers Use Social Media to Build a Better World and the Founder and CEO of We First, a strategic consultancy that works with brands to define their business strategy, company culture, and brand communications.

This episode of LEAD WITH WE was produced and edited by Goal17Media.com and is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify.

Resources

Learn more about Hint at www.drinkhint.com and pre-order her new book, Undaunted at karagoldin.com/undaunted

Connect with Kara via LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/karagoldin/

We First Website: https://www.wefirstbranding.com/

As we come to the end of 2020, the team and I are getting some much needed rest as we gear up for 2021. We’ll be back soon with new episodes of Lead With We, but in the meantime, I hope you’ll enjoy listening to my conversation with Tim Brown, the Co-Founder and CEO of Allbirds.

Allbirds quickly gained a cult following after launching a simple and sustainable sneaker in 2016. And I got the chance to learn how Tim and his team are working to reduce their carbon footprint and bringing the rest of the world along with them. From partnerships with “the competition,” to award-winning innovations and inventing a universal metric for carbon, Tim shared his many insights on how business can be a force for positive, rapid change.

Tim Brown

Tim is the creative mastermind behind Allbirds, focusing on all things design. His experience as a World Cup soccer player for New Zealand led him to think about things on a grand scale, driven by the desire to do things better, whether that be crafting shoes or running a business. For him, it’s not about the specific product or sport, it’s about the meaning and intention behind it. Tim holds a BS in Design from the University of Cincinnati before playing professional soccer, followed by a Master’s in Management from the London School of Economics.

Simon Mainwaring

Simon Mainwaring is a brand futurist, global keynote speaker, and bestselling author. He is best known as the author of We First: How Brands and Consumers Use Social Media to Build a Better World and the Founder and CEO of We First, a strategic consultancy that works with brands to define their business strategy, company culture, and brand communications.

This episode of Lead With We was produced and edited by Goal17 Media and is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify.

Resources

Reach out to Tim on LinkedIn

Learn more about All Birds

For case studies and other free resources about purposeful business, go to WeFirstBranding.com

How would you describe 2020? Wait, don’t answer that question. I think it’s safe to say that we could all use a bit of a break, as well as a chance to reflect. Personally, as we wrap up 2020 and head into a new year, I’ve been looking back and appreciating my conversations with purposeful business leaders in our first season. So with this episode, I’ll take you through some of my favorite moments from the show, key takeaways and give a little peek into my own story.

Simon Mainwaring

Simon Mainwaring is a brand futurist, global keynote speaker, and bestselling author. He is best known as the author of We First: How Brands and Consumers Use Social Media to Build a Better World and the Founder and CEO of We First, a strategic consultancy that works with brands to define their business strategy, company culture, and brand communications.

This episode of Lead With We was produced and edited by Goal17 Media and is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify.

Resources

Connect with Simon on LinkedIn

For case studies and other free resources about purposeful business, go to WeFirstBranding.com

Sunny Vanderbeck launched his investment firm, Satori Capital, in the midst of the 2008 financial crisis. At the time, it was a difficult sell met with resistance within the institutional investment community: he wanted to invest in business as a force for good.

In this episode, Sunny explains how he puts conscious capitalism into practice, from investing with longer time horizons to transforming the employee experience at the company-level, to going above and beyond minimum environmental standards. At this time of great uncertainty and instability, I’m excited to share Sunny’s refreshing take on how the world is moving toward a more sustainable version of capitalism.

Sunny Vanderbeck

Sunny Vanderbeck is an investor, entrepreneur, best-selling author, and former military leader focused on accelerating the growth of mid-market companies and creating best-in-class, built-to-last businesses.

Sunny is co-founder of Satori Capital, a multi-strategy investment firm founded on the principles of conscious capitalism. By providing real-world insights from its experienced team and long-term funding with no fixed time constraints, Satori acts as a true partner for its portfolio companies as it challenges them to pursue extraordinary outcomes for all stakeholder groups.

Before founding Satori, Sunny co-founded and served as CEO of Data Return, a leading provider of managed services and utility computing. The company sustained 40% quarter-over-quarter growth for more than three years and reached a $3 billion market capitalization, making Sunny one of the youngest CEOs ever to lead a Nasdaq company. For more than a decade, Sunny led the company through all phases of growth and transformation, received numerous honors including an “Entrepreneur of the Year” finalist designation from Ernst and Young, and nurtured a conscious culture for all of the business’ stakeholders.

His experiences with building, selling, buying back, and re-selling Data Return, along with his subsequent involvement with dozens of private businesses at Satori, led Sunny to publish his first book, Selling Without Selling Out: How to Sell Your Business Without Selling Your Soul. The book serves as a roadmap for business leaders who face the unique challenges and quandaries involved in selling a business or taking on a financial partner. Drawing on hard-won wisdom earned through decades of experience, Sunny and other business founders and CEOs provide pragmatic guidance on navigating the complicated ins and outs of the sale process while preserving what matters most. Visit Sunny Vanderbeck.com for more information on the book and supplemental materials.

Simon Mainwaring

Simon Mainwaring is a brand futurist, global keynote speaker, and bestselling author. He is best known as the author of We First: How Brands and Consumers Use Social Media to Build a Better World and the Founder and CEO of We First, a strategic consultancy that works with brands to define their business strategy, company culture, and brand communications.

This episode of Lead With We was produced and edited by Goal17 Media and is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify.

Resources

Connect with Andras on LinkedIn

Learn more about Satori’s investment approach

For case studies and other free resources about purposeful business, go to WeFirstBranding.com

Andras Forgacs went from venture investor to entrepreneur when he co-founded two biotech companies with his father, Organovo and Modern Meadow, in a quest to bring about a more sustainable world. In this episode, Andras takes me through his journey, from pioneering lab-grown human tissues technology at Organovo for pharmaceutical testing, to applying that same technology to consumer products at Modern Meadow. With Modern Meadow’s lab-grown leather about to hit the market, I couldn’t be more excited to share my conversation with Andras.

Andras Forgacs

Andras Forgacs, Co-Founder and CEO of Modern Meadow, is a serial entrepreneur in deep tech and life sciences. He is leading the company into a new age of biofabrication to transform the material world by unlocking the power of nature. Andras is also co-Founder of 3D bioprinting company, Organovo. Previously he held positions with an international technology-focused venture fund, McKinsey & Co., and Citigroup. Andras is founding chairman of the international non-profit Resolution Project and was a Kauffman Fellow with the Center for Venture Education. He holds an MBA from The Wharton School and a Bachelor of Arts with honors from Harvard University. Named as a 2018 Tech Pioneer by the World Economic Forum, Modern Meadow has created a novel platform of biofabricated materials at the frontier of biotechnology and partners with some of the world’s most thought-leading brands to offer design that contributes to a healthier planet.

Simon Mainwaring

Simon Mainwaring is a brand futurist, global keynote speaker, and bestselling author. He is best known as the author of We First: How Brands and Consumers Use Social Media to Build a Better World and the Founder and CEO of We First, a strategic consultancy that works with brands to define their business strategy, company culture, and brand communications.

This episode of Lead With We was produced and edited by Goal17 Media and is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify.

Resources

Connect with Andras on LinkedIn

Learn more about ZOA, Modern Meadow’s brand of sustainable biofabricated materials

For case studies and other free resources about purposeful business, go to WeFirstBranding.com

Warby Parker first disrupted the optical industry by offering direct-to-consumer glasses at an affordable price, but now the company is also shaking things up in the social arena. In this episode I speak with the company’s Founder and co-CEO, Dave Gilboa, about how the company has embraced access to voting in 2020 and partnered with other businesses to spread their message far and wide. We also discuss what’s next for this ten-year-old brand, the possibility of going public and choosing purpose-driven investors in the next stage of growth.

Dave Gilboa

Dave Gilboa is the co-founder and co-CEO of Warby Parker, a transformative lifestyle brand offering designer eyewear at a revolutionary price while leading the way for socially conscious businesses. In 2015, Fast Company named Warby Parker the most innovative company in the world.

Prior to Warby Parker, Dave worked at merchant bank Allen & Company and Bain & Company. Dave has worked extensively with non-profit organizations, and serves as a founding member of the Entrepreneur Board of Venture for America, an organization dedicated to mobilizing graduates as entrepreneurs in low-cost cities. He is a member of the Aspen Institute’s 2014 Henry Crown Fellowship class and the Aspen Global Leadership Network, received the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year award, and was recognized as part of “The Next Establishment” by Vanity Fair.

Born in Sweden and raised in San Diego, Dave graduated with a BS in Bioengineering with Honors from UC Berkeley and holds an MBA from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

This episode of Lead With We was produced and edited by Goal17 Media and is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify.

Resources

Connect with Dave on LinkedIn

Learn more about Warby Parker’s social mission

For case studies and other free resources about purposeful business, go to WeFirstBranding.com

Allbirds quickly gained a cult following after launching a simple and sustainable sneaker in 2016. In this episode of Lead With We, Allbirds CEO Tim Brown talks about how he and his team are working to reduce their carbon footprint and bringing the rest of the world along with them. From partnerships with “the competition,” to award-winning innovations and inventing a universal metric for carbon, Tim shares his many insights on how business can be a force for positive, rapid change.

Tim Brown

Tim is the creative mastermind behind Allbirds, focusing on all things design. His experience as a World Cup soccer player for New Zealand led him to think about things on a grand scale, driven by the desire to do things better, whether that be crafting shoes or running a business. For him, it’s not about the specific product or sport, it’s about the meaning and intention behind it. Tim holds a BS in Design from the University of Cincinnati before playing professional soccer, followed by a Master’s in Management from the London School of Economics.

Simon Mainwaring

Simon Mainwaring is a brand futurist, global keynote speaker, and bestselling author. He is best known as the author of We First: How Brands and Consumers Use Social Media to Build a Better World and the Founder and CEO of We First, a strategic consultancy that works with brands to define their business strategy, company culture, and brand communications.

This episode of Lead With We was produced and edited by Goal 17 Media and is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify.

Resources

Reach out to Tim on LinkedIn

Learn more about All Birds

For case studies and other free resources about purposeful business, go to WeFirstBranding.com

Founded in 1862, Mammut built its reputation amongst outdoor enthusiasts by creating the strongest mountaineering ropes out there. Now, as they look to the future, my dear friend Oliver Pabst is leading the company with a new purpose: to create a world moved by mountains. Listen to my conversation with Oliver to learn how the company is leaning on their purpose to reach a diverse set of global consumers, how they partner with other companies on sustainability, and more.

Oliver Pabst

Oliver Pabst (born 1966) has been managing Mammut Sports Group AG since September 2016. He is a member of the Conzzeta Executive Committee, the parent company of Mammut. Oliver also sits on various boards of directors with a focus on tech startups. After his PhD (St. Gall) he started his career in 1993 at McKinsey & Company in Zurich. From 2002 to 2005 he was Managing Partner at Boards & More Holding SA in Montreux. From 2006 he was a Member of the Board of Willy Bogner KGaA in Munich, and Managing Director of various units with strategic and operational responsibilities for international business, retail and e-commerce business, among others. Oliver grew up in a textile entrepreneurial family and has since childhood developed a keen instinct for textiles, sports and entrepreneurship. With his talents, his education and the affinity for sport of every kind, he is able to unite both work and hobby in his role at Mammut.

Simon Mainwaring

Simon Mainwaring is a brand futurist, global keynote speaker, and bestselling author. He is best known as the author of We First: How Brands and Consumers Use Social Media to Build a Better World and the Founder and CEO of We First, a strategic consultancy that works with brands to define their business strategy, company culture, and brand communications.

This episode of Lead With We was produced and edited by Goal17 Media and is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify.

Resources

Reach out to Oliver on LinkedIn

Learn more about Mammut

For case studies and other free resources about purposeful business, go to WeFirstBranding.com