Think Like an Owner

Listen to Armon Petrossian talk about his experiences in China, founding Coalesce, data transformation with Snowflake, selling to enterprises, opportunities in data, investing capital, sales team evolution, and navigating sales cycles.

Sieva Kozinsky discusses the advantage of long-term thinking and compounding in business. He prefers buying over building, studies successful companies, and emphasizes documenting beliefs. The shift to long-term investments, optimizing incentives, and lessons on owning businesses are explored. Operational experience, effective learning strategies, and successful business tactics like Costco's pricing strategy are also discussed.

Eric Jorgenson, author of The Almanack of Naval Ravikant and The Anthology of Balaji, discusses the power of writing books, the publishing business, his new role as CEO of Scribe Media, and the impact of books vs. other creative mediums. He also talks about unexpected events leading to his CEO position, the rise of self-publishing, and lessons in team resilience.

Alex Bridgeman, Studying CEO's and Chief of Staff Roles, discusses his background, interest in data, and weird theories about restaurants. They also talk about the impact of his podcast, the Chief of Staff role in companies, and the structures of data companies.

Roland Lessard, former Co-CEO of Morningside, talks about M&A value creation. They discuss the 'why' of M&A, avoiding value destruction, assembling and leading an integration team, planning for integration, the role of debt, and common pitfalls to avoid.

Richard Reese, former CEO of Iron Mountain, discusses incentivizing teams with cash and stock, developing compensation plans, working with private and public investors, and shares stories from the early years of running Iron Mountain.

Savneet Singh, CEO of PAR Technology, discusses turning around teams, management techniques, and his views on software businesses. He shares his experience joining PAR and saving it from bankruptcy. Topics include retaining speed over time and stages of structural changes.

Former Chief Revenue Officer of ZoomInfo, Tim Strickland, discusses scaling sales teams in successful data companies, characteristics of high-performing sales teams, key growth cycle points, and qualities to look for in new sales hires.

Mike Wyman, with over 30 years of CFO experience, shares insights on the CFO role in newly acquired businesses with limited financial infrastructure. Topics include developing the CFO Mentality framework, early improvements in finance post-acquisition, and key characteristics for hiring a CFO or Director of Finance. The chapter also highlights the importance of building a competent finance team in the healthcare industry.

Ep.204: Alex (@aebridgeman) is joined by Mike Zani (@MikeZani). My guest today is Mike Zani, CEO of The Predictive Index, a talent optimization platform built around their nearly 70-year-old behavioral assessment tool. Today they help companies optimize their teams by identifying the key strengths of employees and hiring prospects to get the fit right. This is Mike's third time being a CEO and he brings a wealth of knowledge around early team construction and scaling. Mike and I talk about the story of The Predictive Index, the evolving role of human resources, the landscape of tools to help optimize talent, and all kinds of lessons on change management. Listen weekly and follow the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Breaker, and TuneIn. Learn more about Alex and Think Like an Owner at https://tlaopodcast.com/ I want to tell you about our audience survey we are currently running. These surveys help us create the best content for listeners and better understand your needs and interests. Thank you in advance for sharing your feedback, we greatly appreciate it. After 30 days we are giving $250 cash to 4 survey responders, just add your email at the end of the survey. Take the survey here: https://bit.ly/3QLBB1N Links: The Predictive Index Mike on LinkedIn The Science of Dream Teams by Mike Zani Topics: (00:00:00) - Intro (00:03:18) - Acquiring Predictive Index (00:07:15) - The keys to early success (00:12:28) - Goals and ambitions in the early days post-acquisition (00:22:13) - Developing HR Teams (00:37:49) - How do you create a cohesive portfolio of tools to gather team data? (00:44:28) - The T-shirt analogy (00:53:00) - Improving yourself: Not listening (00:57:17) - Preparing for the next CEO role (01:00:19) - Maintaining high levels of energy (01:02:50) - The joys and frustrations of growing a company alone vs. with a partner