Jeff York 0:14
Welcome to part two of career distillation live at Uppsala. All right, so last episode ran a little long. But Matt Cutter of upslope co founder and president of upslope Brewing Company was done such an interesting story. We didn't want to cut it off.
Brad Werner 0:32
I don't have to tell you, Jeff, anytime you go to upslope, you just have a good time. Well, I think we just Yeah, actually,
Jeff York 0:37
that I'm actually bringing my MBA class back here Monday night mats Jerison. Guy is he's hosting that. And then we even talk about is up slopes, amazing strides and sustainability. They just became a certified B Corp. They've done amazing pilot programs over the years with various CU, scientists and people that were products are an amazing, so the
Brad Werner 0:56
product is great, but it always comes down to values. And the values here I think aligned with the community, I think aligned with their target customers. So
Jeff York 1:03
here's what I love supporting. And we got another German pill. So we're ready to go with part two of this crib distillation live podcast. So we have now very cleverly positioned a bunch of really smart business people in the audience to ask us any question they want about entrepreneurship. The way this is going to work, Brad will answer first, on the first round, and it will switch between rounds. You ask your question Brad will answer then we have a very scientific iPhone applause meter. Push boys Stewart, one of the directors of our Executive MBA Program will be scientifically measuring She's over there doing science right now. I could see her she's got a lab coat on, we'll measure the applause, then we will mark up first person to three points wins. And the loser has to drink and as to buy the winner, some upslope track he'll do that for a game on Friday. And by the way, this is supposed to be somebody we actually believe it leads that the quality of what we offer an education business is when we combine practitioner expertise, as well as the latest research findings. I am a researcher I you know, sacrificed five years of salary to go get a PhD. I write research papers, Brad just makes one of their titles, in the meantime makes a lot more money than I do and invest in things. And it really honestly Brad has founded like almost any business you can think of he used to be a judge in my MBA class. It was brutal, as you guys will find out at the end of your class. Next semester. Yeah, he was a guest judge. Absolutely. So come forth and ask your question our first contestant Whoa, give her a round of applause.
Unknown Speaker 2:44
Hi, guys, my name is Chantel doll. I'm obviously an MBA student at Leeds School of Business. I also do consulting in the sales enablement, sales training space for large companies. My question for you, one of the pillars of the Leeds School of Business is bringing in values like diversity. So as your company grows, your responsibility grows. When do you start incorporating values, I assume you know, where you're based in some of the things that you've told us about you. You have sustainability goals and community goals, things of that nature, when and how do you start implementing those into your business plan?
Jeff York 3:18
Okay, so we are having a very strict competition. Now, by the way, if you hear this in the background, this is actually the green auger and upslope that is pumping green into the master, which is just freaking awesome. Alright, bread.
Brad Werner 3:31
shed tell I love your question. I love this. Me too. Bottom line is, if the question if I understand this correctly, is when you start to incorporate your values. Values are incorporated in day one or before, right. So if you were to start a company, and as a consultant, I would suggest, tell your folks to they're working in teams, whatever they're doing to talk about their own personal values. I mean, there is some self exploration that happens here. And then out of that discussion, comes long term values for the company. And I think that we could talk about hundreds of examples that have come companies have grown personal experience. Brad, you invested a lot of these I know. So but personal is curious. Were they actually start with strong values. But once you go in the VC route, it turns into money. And we could talk about private companies that that doesn't have that doesn't happen. Number one, I firmly believe that values. If you're not a values based company, that in 10 years, you're gonna be out of business period. Right? Number two, it's all about understanding also in aligning the values with your core customers. And number three, especially we can talk about this today, and we're all going through this problem right now. When it comes to hiring to bring in the best talent values come first, right? People have a choice and where they want to work. Yeah, I don't know if that answered your question.
Jeff York 4:49
No, not really, Brad. It was a very terrible answer. But but let's hear from everyone. How many people like Brad's answer
in no way shape or form, am I trying to influence this? Okay, so there's a ton of research about values based companies. And the way that you want to do that is from day one, but you have to do it right, you have to do what we refer to and research. And we would never tell us to a company as a process called hybrid organizing, what you're looking for is how you take what people often view as conflicting values, capitalism being a business person. And people often can view as values that don't align with that, for some bizarre reason, sustainability, diversity, and how you actually get those things aligned in a way with the more you live your values, the more money you make, the more money you make, the more you're able to live your values, it becomes a self perpetuating process. Where that comes into being a problem for companies is when they hire people that are embedded in one or the other value system, and they don't buy into the opposite. So you as business people, what I would urge you to do, and this is based on psychological research, what I just talked about his research at the organizational level, and also at the industry level, and industries such as craft brewing, and the wind industry, wind energy industry, solar energy, at the psychological level, what you want to look for in what you want to develop is the ability to live with both feet in the ground. And the way you do that is by taking on a role, not just a belief in sustainability, for example, but working with a local NGO and a volunteer role. Because then you develop what's called a role identity that's embedded within you. And you can talk to people who are embedded in both those identities. And you're going to be able to screen employees that actually believe in what you're doing. So I would say do it for day one. But be very careful about the stakeholders you involve and try to make sure you can live both of those roles authentically, and find ways to synergize them and find that hybrid values between that's all based on research and area called hybrid organizing social entrepreneurship as well as social psychology. Okay, can I just follow No, no, no, no, no. Philosophers.
Brad Werner 6:58
Let's talk of plus sorry. Laurie discord. Yeah. All I would say is though, that's all I got to talk about practicality. Just talking about this whole freaking value chain. Every tower when it comes to actually implementing it's all about people. Yes. That's what I said, No,
Jeff York 7:27
no, I know what I said. I said, you want to find people that live those values as your employees because when organizations have conflict, and when they try to do this hybrid organizing is when they heart so I'll give you an example. Silvia Dorado mazing, Professor, she was at Rhode Island University at times now she's at Boston University, I believe, did a study of microfinance organizations in Africa. What she found was when they hired bankers and people from NGOs into those organizations, they tended to fail, because the people would come into conflict because they both were trying to approach it. This was 2010. So at the time, microfinance was this emerging category. And people fought with each other about what they were about when they hired people who were either in one or the other. So you have people that worked in NGOs, ICU, Jana grad, that's very nice. And they had business experience or vice versa. In other words, these people had experience in both sectors, those organizations are more successful than those people are hard to find. Great. I know you've been social entrepreneurs.
Brad Werner 8:22
Talk about personal experience. Okay, so I found
Jeff York 8:24
the next question. I mean, this is fine. Oh, no. Okay.
Brad Werner 8:28
But their values actually was an actual very, very large partner conflict when you're talking. Yeah. So
Jeff York 8:35
because they didn't have the research to help them.
Brad Werner 8:36
Oh, God. Now, we've gotten too much research. Did you do Oh, no,
Jeff York 8:45
I'm not saying they should do the research. I'm saying they could benefit from the research. Okay, that's fine. All right. Next question. We gotta keep rolling here.
Unknown Speaker 8:53
Quick question. I did have a question for Matt follow up, which was on the supply chain. And so as your entrepreneurial Adventures Continue, and you're sourcing ingredients, you're sourcing, spare parts for your manufacturing process. How are you doing today? I mean, long lead times disruptions. I don't know, you know, where your supply chain is located. But if you can comment, that'd be great.
Unknown Speaker 9:14
Yeah, so we've benefited from a lot of the malt contracts that we've had. So we have three year malt contracts that keep us in pretty good shape. Shipping with that hasn't really been a problem. Right now our malt is coming in via rail in Denver. So I think that has helped our situation. Hops, similar story hops been fine. We have lengthy contracts for for all of our hops. It helps the growers also to know what they should be producing from year to year. And as that evolves, and then water, we're we're doing okay with water. The pipes are still flowing. Yeast, not a problem. We have local yeast suppliers, one in Denver Hold inland Island, another one in San Diego white labs that we use no problems there. Cans. Yeah, cans is a whole different deal. So remember before the pandemic when used to go to Subway and get a fountain drink? Well guess what, during COVID You had that and it can also things like Dasani water owned by Pepsi,
Jeff York 10:28
they moved into aluminum. Well, that's just for the recycling profile as soon as cooks trying to, you know, wave their hands at sustainability, right? Yeah, man.
Unknown Speaker 10:37
Yeah. Which is great. I mean, it's a good thing to not be in plastic bottles. But our supplier is has primarily been bulk Corp for years and years, but right down the road and golden. And we got to notice at the end of November that we would have to go with five truckload minimums, which is a million cans. For what for one SKU, we have nine skews that we run year round plus our limiter releases, like the German mills. And they, the the upper cut was a 45% price increase. Oh, wow. What I'd heard is their largest suppliers. I mean, let's just call it who it is. Coca Cola, Miller, Coors, AB InBev. You know, they came back to ball with very large forecasts for 2022. So little craft brewers like us, we're paying the ass. Hey, can you just can we just head do a half a truckload of this particular SKU and, and they've got more customer service people that deal with, you know, little craft brewers. So we got squash. That was a big scramble since the end of November. And we've put a patch on it for now. But the future is uncertain.
Jeff York 11:52
Shoot, man, that's tense. All right. So your next question, Brad wants a chance to meet his brutal failure on the first question is that it was pretty fine. Scientifically speaking, how far how far away? Were
Brad Werner 12:07
you? The difference in the in the applause between the two people really close?
Jeff York 12:14
Yeah, they're on the table. All right. All right. Next question that question, unbiased, we're gonna we're gonna limit Alright, every two minutes. Here we go.
Unknown Speaker 12:22
Hi, I'm Jennifer Bixler. I'm the VP of program management for a biotech startup in the Bay Area. Matt, I actually similarly have a master's certificate from George Washington. So we'll talk about that later. But I have a question back to the point of values, and the people that you bring on board and this is an academic versus reality question perfect. In the situation that we're in now we're we're having a very difficult time bringing people on board with the basic skills. How do you find that balance of having the right people who fit your corporate values? While you're struggling to make ends meet with the people that you have? How do you find that balance?
Jeff York 13:13
From research?
Brad Werner 13:18
Oh, by the way, this, this is a common a common problem, which I've actually faced many times, oh, I
Jeff York 13:26
know I have, but I can't talk about that. All I can talk about is the research. I know I'm okay, I'll go. I cannot speak to a large company. But you said you're working in a biotech startup. So so in a startup phase, what we know is that bringing people on board, you are way better off with finding self selected stakeholders, then you are on selling people on joining the company because of whatever economic outcomes you offer, or things like this. We know this because people have done research about how expert entrepreneurs build companies over time. And it turns out, what you're looking for is people that will put skin in the game. So this sounds like a terrible answer. And I'm gonna get shellacked on this, but I don't know, we'll see what Brad says, I'm just going from research, not my personal experience, I have to, what you're going to want to do is you're going to want to feature those values up front, you're going to offer the people fair compensation, but you may not want to actually compete for the quote unquote best talent, because you're actually according to the research going to be better off by bringing employees and other stakeholders beyond employees. This is a generalizable insight from entrepreneurship research, that actually care about putting skin in the game. And putting skin in the game in this sense means actually making a little bit of a sacrifice. Now, I know you're trying to hire people, and that can be very tough, but I'm talking about long term success. I think now I can do things I read not just academic research necessary. I think we're gonna see this employment upcycle I think we're gonna see a that were off pretty quick as people who rage quit their jobs during the pandemic are gonna go, oh, well, that maybe wasn't the best idea. And I think this will settle down within the next six months. That's just my own estimate based on my reading of the popular press. That's obviously not based on a academic research. That was a tough one, because I really wanted to answer from my own experience, if I didn't do it, I'm staying honest.
Brad Werner 15:19
Yeah. So thank you for being honest. So Jennifer, can you ever imagine yourself not trying to hire the best talent? Can you imagine going into the boardroom and saying, or your executive team or your founders and say, You know what, we can't find value people with the values that match our company. So let's just hire somebody that sucks. No fucking way.
Jeff York 15:39
I'll be like, Brad, wait, hold on a second.
Brad Werner 15:43
That doesn't happen. Right? This is this is this is once again, Ivory Tower Fulshear. So the bottom line, Arthur, I would say that this is a really common problem that you're looking for Taylor sold the bread. Here's how you solve it. So there's two ways to do it. Right, you have to throw that net out and go through the process of interviewing. But the other thing is part part of good strategy for an early stage startup. And I don't know what level you're at are creating alliances that you grow with to those alliances can actually be really good attractors for talents. And I'm assuming that those alliances, share your values, right. But they're not just suppliers of whatever they're doing. But they actually are tied to you because of your values. So So in a sense, you've, you've thrown out two nets now. And so you're part of its networking, which I know is a cap up, but it's really, really important. But I would say that if you if you dummy down and hire the average person versus best talent, I actually think that that hurts you in the long run. And I did that with 30 seconds left.
Jeff York 16:54
And I can't wait to listen to the recording where I said you should hire the average person because that's why I said hire the average person on the street. Alright, let's, let's just just hire somebody. If they were nice. Let's, let's just find out I forgot to do a Palazzo meter at a disadvantage here. That's fine. Let's do a pause for me first. It's kind of a golf class. I Brad. Oh, you gotta Whoo.
Brad Werner 17:24
Yeah. All right. So I can talk to you afterwards, or we can connect and I could actually talk to you and give you some strategies.
Jeff York 17:30
Yeah. And I won't, because the applause is done. I'm just kidding. I'd be happy to talk to you about what I was talking about. tried to make it more clear. Okay. I have our next question. I get to go first. No, no, you get to go first. You go first. Fantastic.
Unknown Speaker 17:44
Oh, man, you guys have another beer. I'm Emily Ryan, I have actually bootstrapped to have my own company as an as an entrepreneur, as well as am the current CCO of a another bootstrapped startup that I did not start, but I've been very close to as it has grown. As somebody who has primarily bootstrap experience, one of the fun and exciting chasms that we get to cross which Matt, you kind of alluded to earlier, is that challenge of trying to make sure that you have the lights on in your in your business as your as you are chasing that revenue, right? And that that push pull between having the money that you need to keep the lights on to continue to accelerate, and having the people that you need to service that revenue? So from an academic and an experiential perspective, as someone who's been through this a number of times, how would you advise me to really know that Genesis a QA, of pushing for that revenue versus hiring ahead? That especially in that early stage,
Brad Werner 19:02
and we can ask you one question, this goes both for Jeff and I, of course, it's really important is when you're when you're going through this consideration, yeah, what is your 10 year plan? Are you looking to build these two exits? Or are you looking for these as kind of a family organization? Something like
Unknown Speaker 19:18
that? Totally. Yeah. So so we won't talk about my first two, I started my first company in 2008, as well, it was an excellent learning experience. For the company that we're at right now, myself and the CEO are aligned that we will eventually exit we do want to sell this company. And so we, we understand that we need to kind of invest first in order to make our profit margins look really, really lovely for when we're ready to sell this thing. So that's our 10 year plan. Our shorter term, three to five year plan is just growth. So we are pedal to the metal and that's my job as Chief client officer is to make sure that We are able to both expand at a reasonable rate. And of course service at a reasonable
Brad Werner 20:06
rate. One more question. Yes, sir. What is the industry? No, no, there's nuance to
Jeff York 20:11
this. Right? They're just narrowing it down.
Brad Werner 20:13
So I mean, there's different pathways.
Unknown Speaker 20:18
So so the company that I work with, we are a consulting firm. So we are services based, we do have some innovation into technology that we are exploring. So that's, that's going into our topics as far as r&d. But my responsibility is cogs. And my entire COGS is services right now. So people are my product.
Brad Werner 20:40
Okay. So, if it was me, I would be all about organic growth. Truthfully, you will, in data shows in my personal experience shows that if you're looking to exit five to 10 years, get that VC partner, so you have two paths, you said that 10 years would be a nice exit. If that 10 year path is truly where you want to go, bring in the outside capital, bring in the VCs. And if you're not ready for VCs yet, figure out what that beauty show looks like on your timeline where they would be interested. And that's your focus is just to get to that beauty show that the beauty pageant where you bring in all of your prospective suitors and say, Hey, we're gonna onboard here hope hopefully, there's a match for for even one of their portfolio companies, or they they're thinking five year exit, I want to make sure I have all of your questions here. Profit margins in consulting have to be extremely high. Right? So we're talking 90% And your industry plus Correct, right. So you have to maintain those profit margins, they can dip if you actually point to growth, though. So if for using a for using profit margin as your number one KPI, you could actually allow that to come down to the 60s for that customer acquisition part because it's really easily explainable. That's right. It's that take that tip, because growth is expensive. And whatever business you're in, everybody here knows that right? So it's expensive. So you can you can't forego margins for time, once again, for this, this beauty pageant for the VCs. So I would say you have a 10 year timeline, your real timeline is this three year timeline to get the VC growth. And I would say continues, continue to go organic. If you can tap into friends and family that's easily explainable, keep it in house until you're ready for that series A plus right route. Great, thanks. Does that help?
Unknown Speaker 22:36
Yes, yeah. Do you want to do
Jeff York 22:37
apply to the applause meter?
Thought that was a very I, you guys don't know, Brad. And I really, we have a ton of respect for each other as you listen to podcasts. Just because it's such a great Listen, now that plug that so I think it's pretty obvious that if you're seeking an exit, you would want to have investors come in. And if you're not, then you probably shouldn't. No offense, Brad, but I think people kind of knew that I'm sure. I'm sure that our audience is aware of that. So I'm gonna take a slightly different route, you said you were doing some innovations as well as some internal consulting. That's correct. I think what you need to look at, if you're looking for that exit, is actually and I have no idea what your innovations are. And that's okay, because I'm a researcher and we try to find generalizable insight, we tried to find generalizable insights. This is based on my own research, as well as the research on emerging categories grad which if you're not sure what that is, anyway, the idea is that when you're creating a new category, I assume you're creating some new categories, some new innovation within consulting that is not currently done. If you can, you don't have to grow that as much as you have to grow your bread and butter business. You have to continue to focus on your brand or business. But you have to put enough into that to gain legitimacy. How do you gain legitimacy, adoption, adoption, by whom, by clients that other clients will respect and look to. So what you really want to focus on is trying to find that client that is going to say this innovation helped us that establishes legitimacy for legitimacy in your consulting world for that category. And you don't have to worry about growing that fast. Meantime, you keep your I agree with everything Brad said you definitely focus on get growth, you keep your cash flow going from your core business. But this is sort of your you do dedicate resources to this for sure. Think of it almost like a skunkworks. So you want to take your people that are our most aggressive, most innovative, most thoughtful, have just been working on this and you're just looking for a few breakthroughs that start to legitimize that category. Anyway, thank you for your question. It's a great one. Thanks, guys. Hopefully it helped you. Yeah, hopefully it's helpful to different views on thinking about it. Yes. Thank
Unknown Speaker 24:56
you very much. All right. Cheers.
Unknown Speaker 25:11
Science Science once again. Yeah, no, I'm definitely, you know, I definitely
Jeff York 25:20
you're gonna look good and that upslope, Pat bread and bread. And you have to drink too. I don't think you should drink this our Christmas beer. I'll drink. Chug, chug, chug.
Brad Werner 25:33
This is for our founder.
Unknown Speaker 25:34
I really like it.
Brad Werner 25:38
100% you got to drink. I'll drink.
Jeff York 25:41
I didn't drink the first time, so I'll drink too. Alright, here we go. Cheers. As always,
Brad Werner 25:46
I the judges now we're starting to piss me off.
Jeff York 25:51
This is Greg with the shoes on the other night. We have a question. Let's go right.
Unknown Speaker 25:56
Name's Raul. I'm definitely questioning Lori's app. It's definitely Oh, man. But as you mentioned, kind of mentorship. And my support starts earlier and kind of digging deeper into that, as an entrepreneur, what kind of support structure should you have in place? And I would love to hear all three years from an institutional investor, the researcher as well as somebody who's in the shed, like, how do you guys balance that and set that up? So if you don't go,
Jeff York 26:28
mentorship, yeah, I'm gonna go first. Okay. Anytime. All right, cool. So what kind of support system should you have in place? So, interestingly enough, like what expert entrepreneurs do a lot of the time, it turns out, is they don't worry about getting the right mentor, I think this is something I see my students worry about a watt, like, oh, they can only get Matt Cutter, no offense, Matt, you'd be a fantastic mentor. If I could only get Matt to be my mentor, then everything would be great. And they put all their hopes and dreams wrapped around this one person. And it turns out that person's not particularly interested in their business. And that's a huge waste of time. So first thing I would say is if that person is not returning your calls, and is not interested in what you're doing, no matter how successful and how bright they are, forget it. Just stop, you're looking for someone who will meet you halfway and meet you for coffee, put skin in the game once again, and wants to meet you and help you and how do you know they're actually interested in mentoring? Is it because they shut up and you bomb a beer and they listen to you? No, it's because they said, hey, you know what I can introduce you to this person to that person. I'm interested in putting my resources to MIT, I'm happy to help introduce you to this person we make you heard Matt telling the story earlier about some of his work with Oskar Blues. And those people putting skin in the game and putting together his first canning like, that's what you're looking for as a mentor. The other thing you want to look for is people who are not like you, but are willing to work with you. So lot of times people are like obsessed with getting someone from their industry. And that is important and critical. But just as important and critical is getting someone who actually doesn't know your industry, but is successful in another industry, and can look at your business model rather than the industry and take an outside view and say, You know what, I think you could be really innovative here if you just tweaked a few things here. That is based on research done and accelerator programs across multiple studies. And actually, we're very excited here at Leeds. We just hired a guy from MIT, Ethan paws cancer, who did research for over three years following Boston Area accelerators and their mentorship relationship. More to come from him. Cool. You need to? Yes, the highly scientific and absolutely accurate measure, like I believe in science, Brad, I don't know about you.
Unknown Speaker 28:45
That has a good starting time.
Brad Werner 28:47
Go ahead. So actually, I think you asked a few questions. You talked about support systems. You talked about mentors, and I think it's all towards growth. And I think you're referring to early stage correct. So support systems are different from mentors, we're talking about your immediate family, your significant other, maybe really good buddies that have done things, maybe not in your in your realm. But you need to have those in I've had just to reach out to personal friends, all those types of things, because it is a tough road, right? Nobody in here is kidding yourself about how hard it is. And then we could talk about mentors. And then we could talk about advisory boards, because there's really different tiers here. So it depends about the stage. I agree 100% with Jeff, you don't need to find the big name person, it doesn't matter. You need some you need to find somebody that believes in you. And that will also be honest with you. And actually finding honest feedback is much, much harder than you would imagine. Because I would like you for me to say by the way, there's no fucking way that these customers are coming right even though they told you when you were interviewing them on a product when a time comes time to turn over money. They're not going to be there. Right so so experience not maybe in your industry, but just experience it. new businesses. And I think that Matt could probably attest to this too. So there's three levels. And to find those type of mentors, get out wherever you can, especially trade shows, all of those types of places. I think that the new the new normal for work has allowed us to incorporate zoom into everyday life, we were just talking about it a minute ago, which means your universe of potential mentors has expanded greatly from well, I don't know if you're where you're from, but if it's from here to actually the world, which is awesome. And then number three, though, 100%, set up an advisory board advisory board doesn't cost you anything. The one recommended mendation, I'd give you about an advisory board is term limited, because you never want to burn bridges. You want to set up advisors for whatever stage you're at. And by the way, if they're still valuable two years or three years later, just get another term. Right. So So there's three tiers to this, I think you need to be really, really strategic, but I would just be open to advice first.
Jeff York 30:57
Scientific measure of applause. Wow, Brad, come from behind. You're pulling ahead. It's tight. It's all comes. Oh, my God. Oh, and she asked a really hard question earlier of No. Oh, yeah. I'm sorry. Yeah, yes, please, man, I'll be I'm so sorry.
Unknown Speaker 31:20
I'll be super brief. My mentors are my peers, my peers in craft brewing. We have pretty tight knit community here in craft beer in Colorado. And I'm with a group, a very organic group. We call ourselves the insomniacs. It's a group of essentially consumer products, companies and startups. They're all founders. It's the same shit we're all going through. You may not be going through it at that particular time, but you're going to hear them. And then you're either going to learn from that, and then try to emulate that. Or you're going to call them up and be like, Hey, man, how did you pull that off last time? Those Those are my mentors. Yeah,
Brad Werner 32:03
by the way, I love that man said that. So I'm from Chicago. Now, if Oh, nice. But if you're in Chicago, and you just spent 10,000 bucks for some sort of HR report or something, someone was stabbing you in an elevator to take that. In Boulder, they'll hate it. So in a sense, setting up your company, in the correct geographic area, where it in a sense, it recognizes your values that goes back to values and think over here. And that's really, really critical. So geography matters, right? If you did this in Chicago, Matt, it's a whole different.
Jeff York 32:38
Industry matters to I think, the craft brewing industry is renowned for I remember when when Avery got sued, you probably remember this. They they got sued over some name every one of our local big brewing companies, they got sued or the name of their beer, and some other brewery, I think they were actually they might have been Chicago based, as I recall. But anyway, I might just be thinking of that. But they did this beer called collaboration, not litigation. And they they co brewed a beer together and both named that thing. I mean, it was just that's I mean, that's the kind of industry it is the industry. It's unbelievable. Like, I mean, I think that varies a lot. Russian River with the rest of our you're right, I'm sorry.
Brad Werner 33:17
All right. We have another question. Oh,
Jeff York 33:18
oh, this is what's that? You know, first of all? I'm pretty sure I go first. No, no, I went first last time you go. Because I that amazing applause that you just barely edged out. Oh, god. Yeah. Anyway, all right.
Unknown Speaker 33:33
This is Debra Russell, business coach. This is personal advice. So I am a business coach. I've been a business coach for 20 years. And I have primarily worked with solopreneurs are under 10. And under a million as far as the size of the company team
Brad Werner 33:53
of 10. Or under Yeah, yeah. Or under a million in sales here. Yeah.
Unknown Speaker 33:58
Primarily in the arts and entertainment industry, professional athletes and just small business owners, which is why I was asking you about your business. I want to transition one of the reasons I'm taking the NBA is I want to transition into working more in corporate as a business coach and professional development trainer. And to transition also, I love love working with startups, accelerators, incubators, I've done a bit of that. So my question for you is how do I make that transition?
Jeff York 34:37
Oh, boy. He's done the research. Come on.
Brad Werner 34:45
One question for you. You want to go into the corporate world, right? Oh, yeah. So why don't you Why don't you said that you love working with startups so much? Why do you want to do that?
Unknown Speaker 34:53
Yeah. Curious to why do I want to go into corporate or why do I want to work with startup you said
Brad Werner 34:58
that you love startups. That was the disk Next seems Why are you going into corporate? Data? Okay. So you want to make some money doing what you're doing? I yeah, I'd
Unknown Speaker 35:07
like to make a living. It would be nice.
Jeff York 35:08
Yeah, well, sure, sure. Right.
Brad Werner 35:11
I don't even know how to answer this.
Jeff York 35:13
This is so great. You have two minutes, I
Brad Werner 35:14
have two minutes to that answer. So Jennifer, this is all this, this is all about you and you've been a business coach for 20 years, you said, you would know the answers. For me, I think that you're actually making a mistake, if it's all about the money. My life, and this is personal experience. For my first half of my career was all about the money, and it was miserable. It was a miserable way of life. So I would say to you, instead of going corporate, as your business advisor over this beer and a podcast, I would say go into mid stage startups versus corporate, I actually don't think that you may be a player in the corporate world, what do you bring? Getting that first customer is gonna be really hard. What's that specialty that you bring? Right? Your core competence? And Intel? You tell us what that is that core competence, I would want 100% Say corporate is actually a mistake for you just find five startups that are, you know, three years 40 people, just just going for that growth stage. Maybe the round a to help them start and growth scale are two different things. We can talk about that. But I think you want to find growth, where they're talking, every dollar spent, they're getting getting $1 Return versus the scaling stage where every dollar spent, you're getting 1015, whatever the number is, but I would focus on that growth stage. I think your value would be well received there. I personally think that you're making a mistake, just just for the two seconds that I heard about your passion going into corporate
Jeff York 36:43
alright. Positive.
Brad Werner 36:54
Ah, all right. Good luck. Thanks. Reach research,
Jeff York 37:03
I completely disagree. No, I mean, I actually do, we all have multiple roles we play in life. And those roles can be accepted by audiences or not, depending on what we want to achieve. If I was to sit here and start waxing about fish, my favorite rock band, or Dungeons and Dragons, then Joel and Brad will roll their eyes. Because I've done that on multiple podcast, I am invoking my role as someone who plays Dungeons and Dragons, or a fish fan and an appropriate setting, I am playing the role of a professor and a podcaster. Here. I think similarly, you're saying, You know what, I love what I do with these entrepreneurs, I don't think you have to stop doing that. I think what you need to do is understand that your role as advising these corporate organizations is not necessarily that's not just who you are. Our work is not our life, we all play multiple roles, we all exhibit multiple identities. How do you do that? Oh, my God, man. I'm like trying to think of something from the research about how an individual goes from entrepreneurial saying to a corporate say all the research is about the opposite. I think what you have to do is you have to get the biggest clients, you've worked with the most impressive clients you've worked with, to have testimonies, you have to use their network to people they know, in corporate settings, and you're going to have to network your way into law, I used to work in a fortune 500 company. And a lot of the people we brought in as consultants were because they knew somebody, frankly, it's just like the rest of the world. You know, it's not all going to be Bain and McKinsey necessarily, sometimes you hire one person to come and work with a team for a specific function. And a lot of times that corporate saying you have some function do that. So I think you can absolutely do that and hold on to who you are and what you do. I you know, I'm not sure I agree with Brad on this one.
Brad Werner 38:58
I have a follow up and
what I would what I would say it I get asked this question all the time, and it really comes down to work life balance, right? There is no such thing. It's life. It's the life that you want to make. And that is what you need to set up I disagree
Jeff York 39:25
with Yeah, and I'm going to disagree with Brett. Okay, now the rest of this I can talk about my personal experience. Like it is totally possible. And many, many people do it. They go and work a job where they are able to help some other people and it's not necessarily like everybody doesn't have to be an entrepreneur, I guess. I know you're not saying that. But I mean, like everybody doesn't have to love entrepreneurship. Some people could, you know, go and do things in a corporate saying the very satisfied with and then do other things. Okay, what are you saying?
Brad Werner 39:53
Ownership though to me, is not where you work. It's how you think. Well, okay, fair enough. Yeah. So But you told us you I asked you what you're passionate. Tell me what it was. There's there's a pathway there. And I would keep working that pathway. That's the bottom line. Well, I
Jeff York 40:11
actually, I mean, I'm not gonna tell you not to do that. But the question you asked was, No, I said that there is a pathway to do what she asked us how to achieve. She didn't ask me to tell her what to listen to work. I listened to her. Anyway. Thank you for an awesome question to end this. I'm pretty sure Brad won that not not at all surprised. Congratulations, Brad. Yeah. I'm honestly thrilled that I competed. I set this up. I was like, Man, I'm gonna get shellacked. I knew it. And the good thing is Brad owes me 45 bucks from a pizza. I paid for a while back for him. So So you know, even now. Right? All right, cool. Now, what would you say? What would you say about this? You have any thoughts on this having worked? You worked in a corporate setting and moved entrepreneurship? What are your thoughts?
Unknown Speaker 40:57
Yeah, I think what Brad said, resonates with me quite a bit.
Jeff York 41:01
I didn't want to admit it during the competition,
Unknown Speaker 41:03
you know, but it depends on who you are and what your priorities are. In my running back to my corporate world, no, oh,
Jeff York 41:11
my god, nightmares. I really have nightmares as you go back and work in a corporate setting. I honestly, I wake up in a cold sweat that I like, somehow get fired from see you and I have to go work in a corporate say I can't do it. I just can't I mean, so. You have a similar nightmare
Unknown Speaker 41:28
nightmare about that. Just thoughts once in a while about working in a corporate setting, or just working directly for somebody else, it would have to be a very certain kind of person. Yeah. To work for all stage of the game.
Jeff York 41:42
Well, cool. I think that's a good conclusion. Hey, guys, thank you for hanging in here with us into our first live podcast, we
Unknown Speaker 41:48
really appreciate
Jeff York 41:49
it. Congratulations on being the inaugural class of our Executive MBA Program. We're just so thrilled to have you all join us. We hope you've had a good time tonight. We hope out there listening, you've enjoyed this little competition between Brad and I, you know, you might see Brad and up slow Pat. But thankfully, I came in here knowing you owe me a little bit of money. So I was confident read what you think about some
Brad Werner 42:10
I had a great time. I hope that all of you if you'd like to reach out to the MBA departments, I'm happy to talk to any of you coffees zoom, I'm not sure seems like a lot of you actually you've traveled for this, but I'm around I'm amazed and actually admire what you're doing this stage of life. I did it myself, I know how hard it is, perhaps, please, there's a lot going on in your life. My hat is off to you. This is a big lift. Investing in a lifetime of learning is great. If you had told me 10 years ago, that I would be working at a university I would have bet all the money in the world.
Jeff York 42:48
It took me quite a while to talk you into it as I recall. So
Brad Werner 42:51
So you we have no idea what our paths look like. Right? So just being armed and continuously building yourselves with these tools. I think it's fabulous. So I hope this isn't the first or excuse me the last time that we talk I hope that this is the start of a long relationship. So thank you.
Unknown Speaker 43:07
Yeah, here here bread.
Jeff York 43:10
Well, it's it's definitely not gonna be the last time we talk because I'm teaching a class for you guys next semester and know that I do not base it just in research. This is totally a false thing to build up Brad's ego where it'd be like,
Unknown Speaker 43:22
totally wasted. No,
Jeff York 43:24
I mean, we just thought it make for good podcasts. I definitely will bring in perspectives from my own entrepreneurial experience as well as the research and I'll be bringing great folks like Brad to bear and and help out as well. And the same offer goes for me if you want to talk anytime reach out to us, or frankly, you can reach out to us at CD that sees in Charlie Diaz and Daniel's creativity is in District distillation podcast. Great. Anyway, I won't go into the academic theory behind our names. But please, if you liked the podcast, leave us a review. If you don't like the podcast, leave us review. Either way, hit the subscribe button cuz it really helps us out and we appreciate you listening. And thanks once again to the inaugural class of the Executive MBA program at the Leeds School of Business. Thanks a lot guys.
Unknown Speaker 44:10
And thanks again to Matt Cutter and upfront for Have a great day.
Jeff York 44:15
We'll see you next time. Thanks very much.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai