The BreakLine Arena

Join us in the BreakLine Arena for a conversation with Henry Schuck, CEO and Founder at ZoomInfo, a platform that empowers business-to-business sales, marketing, and recruiting professionals to hit their number by pairing best-in-class technology with unrivaled data coverage, accuracy, and depth of contacts. The company’s large and diversified customer base consists of over 20,000 customers from global enterprises, mid-market companies, and small businesses. On June 4, 2020, ZoomInfo became a publicly traded company, listing on Nasdaq as one of the largest technology initial public offerings of the past decade.Henry shared the formative experiences his mother imparted to him that ignited his relentless work ethic and the intuition to pivot from an early career in law to co-founding ZoomInfo. Henry's advice spanned funding, storytelling, the importance of surrounding yourself with people who believe in you, and the keys that allowed him to overcome imposter syndrome.Please like, rate, subscribe, or review our show if you’ve liked what you’ve heard! We’d love to hear your thoughts. If you’re interested in joining our community, please visit www.breakline.org.

Join us in the BreakLine Arena for a conversation with Steve Kalush and Javaria Braden, Solutions Engineers at Blend. Blend is a FinTech company that is re-architecting the banking sector by making essential banking services more secure and accessible.Steve and Javaria share insight about the impact of the customer-centric approach to the Blend business model, setting up a framework for diverse and holistic problem-solving solutions, and the benefits that a diverse team brings to a company. Additionally, hear about how the partnership between Blend and BreakLine helped to find and grow diverse talent and teams.“If you have everyone saying the same thing in the same way, you’re not growing and you’re not learning.”Please like, rate, subscribe, or review our show if you’ve liked what you’ve heard! We’d love to hear your thoughts. If you’re interested in joining our community, please visit www.breakline.org.

Join us in the BreakLine Arena for a conversation with Jennifer Tejada, CEO, and Joe Militello, CPO of PagerDuty, the Saas incident response platform.Both Jennifer and Joe walked unconventional paths toward Pagerduty. Jennifer, a woman of color and a member of a military family, grew up in CPG selling "peanut butter and diapers" before transitioning into the tech sector. Joe served in the Marine Corps infantry before jumping to a career in human resources. They drew from their personal and professional experiences to discuss the enormous advantage of a unique perspective and a beginner’s mind. Jen said, “By definition, the tech industry is not particularly diverse, and I think we have been successful because of the fact that we are intentional about inclusive leadership, because we bring people from different, racial, ethnic, gender, age, and vocational backgrounds, and it helps us understand problems through a variety of lenses.” Jen and Joe also share with the BreakLine Arena PagerDuty’s recent conversation about vision and mission, character, and the importance of committing to shared values.Please like, rate, subscribe, or review our show if you’ve liked what you’ve heard! We’d love to hear your thoughts. If you’re interested in joining our community, please visit www.breakline.org.

Join us in the BreakLine Arena for a conversation with Oleg Rogynskyy, Founder and CEO of People.ai.Oleg joins the Arena and shares about the personal impact that Russia's invasion of Ukraine has had on him as a Ukrainian native and some of the incredible initiatives he is working on to keep Ukrainians connected. In this episode, Oleg shares his take on the world’s first ‘Open Source War’, what he did to position President Zelenskyy to communicate with the US government, and the power that corporations have to mobilize technology for good and ‘Walk the walk' by taking actions that align with their culture’s values. “What I observed in our culture values — like ‘We take care of our people’ — was not just a no-brainer for me. It was a no-brainer for everybody on the team. It made a huge difference.”Please like, rate, subscribe, or review our show if you’ve liked what you’ve heard! We’d love to hear your thoughts. If you’re interested in joining our community, please visit www.breakline.org.

Join us in the BreakLine Arena for a conversation with Reena Ninan, an award-winning journalist, news anchor, podcast co-host, and founder of Good Trouble Productions. Reena joins with an incredible breadth of experience. She reported on the aftermath of the September 11 attacks and worked as a correspondent on the ground during the war in Iraq. Listen for a deeper dive into how she got to where she is now, and the challenges she faced as a South Asian woman. Reena describes the lessons that she learned from being in war zones and living alongside the military, and the advice her father gave her that inspired her to shape the professional space around her. She shares why being kind and listening to people from all walks of life are tenets that she lives by, and how humor is key in coping with traumatic situations. In wrapping up, Reena talks about the current distrust of news in the US, and her advice on finding the truth. Please like, rate, subscribe, or review our show if you’ve liked what you’ve heard! We’d love to hear your thoughts. If you’re interested in joining our community, please visit www.breakline.org.

Join us in the BreakLine Arena for a conversation with Derek Lo, CEO of Medallion. Derek joins us on the podcast to talk about his inspiring journey, and the important steps on this path, from founding Py, and then subsequently Medallion, to the people and ideas that have influenced him most deeply. Derek is an anomaly in the startup world, having experienced success at such a young age, and shares what factors contributed to such successes, including all the hard work and sacrifices that he made to get ahead. Listeners can expect to gain some fresh insight into a less common path, with Derek underlining why his natural passion and determination for building businesses is the main driver of his work. As well as some insight to the inner workings at Medallion, covering company culture, hiring philosophy, and much more! Please like, rate, subscribe, or review our show if you’ve liked what you’ve heard! We’d love to hear your thoughts. If you’re interested in joining our community, please visit www.breakline.org.

Join us at the BreakLine Arena for a conversation with Linda Shaffer, Chief People and Operations Officer at Checkr.Linda brings to light the unique combination of skills that have positioned her as a leader in her various roles. She shares her expertise on how fair chance hiring works, and how prioritizing inclusivity can help companies retain employees during the Great Resignation. Listen in to hear more about what people want out of their work environments and why Checkr is so well-positioned to fulfill the higher-level needs of all their employees. Linda reveals the details of Checkr’s big future plans, which include international expansion, and more! “What people underestimate is, good communicators spend a lot of time preparing to be good communicators. Writing something that is short and clear usually takes three times as long as writing something long that has all the details in it.”Please like, rate, subscribe, or review our show if you’ve liked what you’ve heard! We’d love to hear your thoughts. If you’re interested in joining our community, please visit www.breakline.org.

Join us at the BreakLine Arena for a conversation with Matt Abrahams, an educator and coach in the strategic communications field. He is currently a Lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Business.Matt brings extensive expertise in how we can all optimize our communication practices to better collaborate, influence, and connect with others. He covers best practices in framing your experiences in a way that is relevant to your audience, tactful techniques to reduce anxiety in interviews, and how to build trust and empathy to overcome resistance and breed trust with whomever you are interacting with.“Communication is essential to everything we do in life. It’s the way in which we share our ideas, thoughts, and feelings. It’s the way we listen, appreciate, and empathize with other people. It’s critical to invest in those skills.”Please like, rate, subscribe, or review our show if you’ve liked what you’ve heard! We’d love to hear your thoughts. If you’re interested in joining our community, please visit www.breakline.org.

Join us at the BreakLine Arena for a conversation with Spencer Kimball, CEO at Cockroach Labs, Inc.Spencer shares his insights on some of the key pillars that helped him build a successful business. He discusses the importance of strong early investors, establishing credibility in yourself and in your company, building company culture to strengthen cooperative resilience, and how to effectively capitalize on product market fit.Spencer highlights how important it is to be flexible and keep an open mind to fully maximize growth potential. "My perspective on everything is that ideas are cheap. Execution is extremely hard and it's what's going to differentiate you."Please like, rate, subscribe, or review our show if you’ve liked what you’ve heard! We’d love to hear your thoughts. If you’re interested in joining our community, please visit www.breakline.org.

Join us in the BreakLine Arena for a conversation with Payton Iheme, Head of Americas, Public Policy at Bumble.Payton shares her lessons learned from an impressive career spanning from the US Army, Capitol Hill, Facebook and now Bumble. She covers how her international service has lent her a keen perspective of the value of an engaged citizenry, how to exist as an ally that builds bridges to the marginalized, and her focus on building safe and equitable spaces for everyone.“Bet on yourself. Don’t wait for an invitation because we are already waiting to welcome you.”Please like, rate, subscribe, or review our show if you've liked what you've heard! We'd love to hear your thoughts. If you're interested in joining our community, please visit www.breakline.org.