Kelli and Nolan are joined by Roxanne Petraeus, CEO of Ethena, to talk about her journey from the US army to founding an HR tech company. She shares her views on leadership, the distinction between training and learning, and building a culture of intellectual meritocracy in a remote-first environment.

The conversation explores how compliance training evolved from her military experiences, covers the role of Chief People Officers, and reveals how military discipline shaped her approach to building high-performance tech cultures without superficial perks.

*Email us your questions or topics for Kelli & Nolan: hrheretics@turpentine.co

For coaching and advising inquire at https://kellidragovich.com/

HR Heretics is a podcast from Turpentine.

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KEEP UP WITH ROXANNE, NOLAN + KELLI ON LINKEDIN

Roxanne: https://www.linkedin.com/in/roxanne-bras-petraeus-2292b8109/

Nolan: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nolan-church/

Kelli: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellidragovich/

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RECOMMENDATIONS:

Ethena: https://www.goethena.com/

‘We’re not recording’ podcast with Roxanne Petraeus:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLTcvuUiuTe9nFXLMIPy4gjHv67-bFl8Do

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TIMESTAMPS:

(00:00) Intro

(01:36) How Roxanne ended up in the Army

(03:29) Career path from Army to McKinsey to founder

(04:29) The insight behind Ethena's founding

(07:11) Problems with traditional LMS approaches

(10:04) Debate on employee vs company-driven learning

(14:00) Making training relevant to day-to-day work

(15:43) Sponsor: Metaview

(17:38) The best L&D: great managers and top performers

(20:47) Learning from people vs structured courses

(22:40) Hiring a CPO at an HR tech company

(24:45) Building a culture of intellectual meritocracy

(27:27) Founders set company culture, not HR

(28:44) The expanding role of modern CPOs

(33:08) Functional leaders' accountability vs HR

(35:19) CPO as strategic partner and executive coach

(37:55) Maintaining high talent density and expectations

(41:33) Leading a female-led company with high standards

(43:16) Thanksgiving with David Petraeus

(43:54) Wrap

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