Lay of The Land

TJ Gliha, Co-Founder of Journey Wealth.Established in 2021, Journey Wealth is a full-service wealth planning firm that helps entrepreneurs explore the world of opportunities availed by their success, by addressing their needs and enabling them and their families to lead the lives they aspire to. From its humble beginnings with just 4 employees, Journey Wealth has grown as a self-governing Registered Investment Advisory firm to nearly 20 professionals, with the strategic acquisition of a significant equity stake in FSM Wealth, offering multi-family office services primarily to professional golfers.This was a really fun conversation for — as a long-time student of public market investing, TJ and I got to unpack the wealth management business and industry overall, the intersection of investing and entrepreneurship, the psychology and cognitive biases of investors, how to balance structure and growth, his formative past as portfolio manager and trader on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange floor, the evolution of Journey Wealth in service of helping entrepreneurs make the most of their time — all of our most valuable asset — leadership, and so much more.Outside of his professional endeavors, TJ also plays an active role in the community as a board member of the Make-A-Wish Foundation and Cleveland Clinic Children’s Council in addition to his role as Treasurer of the Avon Lake Football Club, stemming from his passion for football!-----Lay of The Land is brought to you by Ninety. As a Lay of The Land listener, you can leverage a free trial with Ninety, the platform that helps teams build great companies and the only officially licensed software for EOS® — used by over 7,000 companies and 100,000 users!This episode is brought to you by Impact Architects. As we share the stories of entrepreneurs building incredible organizations throughout NEO, Impact Architects helps those leaders — many of whom we’ve heard from as guests on Lay of The Land — realize their visions and build great organizations. I believe in Impact Architects and the people behind it so much, that I have actually joined them personally in their mission to help leaders gain focus, align together, and thrive by doing what they love! As a listener, you can sit down for a free consultation with Impact Architects by visiting ia.layoftheland.fm!-----Connect with TJ on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/t-j-gliha-aif%C2%AE-cepa-a4ba801/Learn more about Journey Wealth — https://www.journey-wealth.com/-----For more episodes of Lay of The Land, visit https://www.layoftheland.fm/Past guests include Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, Steve Potash (OverDrive), Ed Largest (Westfield), Ray Leach (JumpStart), Lila Mills (Signal Cleveland), Pat Conway (Great Lakes Brewing), Lindsay Watson (Augment Therapy), and many more.Stay up to date on all our podcasts by signing up for Lay of The Land's weekly newsletter — sign up here.Connect with Jeffrey Stern on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreypstern/Follow Jeffrey Stern on Twitter @sternJefe — https://twitter.com/sternjefeFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter @podlayofthelandhttps://www.jeffreys.page/

Our conversation this week is with Tom Lix — founder & CEO of Cleveland Whiskey — on pushing the boundaries of convention while building on tradition to artfully blend science with craft to create unique award-winning Whiskey.Tom is a serial entrepreneur — prior to founding Cleveland Whiskey, he founded Public Interactive which he sold to National Public Radio, he served as President/COO of Yankelovich Partners, and as you'll hear later, Tom has always been a tinkerer through and through.Lix spent some formative years in the US Navy where in addition to some early bootleg distilling; he was cross-trained in nuclear physics and thermodynamics along with seawater/freshwater distillation. A college dropout who hitchhiked across the country fought forest fires in Alaska at the age of 17, and founded the first University-sponsored Motorcycle Club in America. He later earned his Doctorate in Business from Boston University.Originally published as episode #21 back in April of 2021, this conversation with Tom Lix is one of my personal favorites! Tom is a deep eloquent orator, with an eclectic entrepreneurial background, and is one of the best and most engaging storytellers I know, making for one of the most entertaining conversations so far! Cleveland Whiskey continues to push the boundaries of Whiskey’s conventions as they’ve racked up award after award since our original recording and break ground on their new distillery and restaurant planned at the Flats South Bank in the Malcom Building, home to the Consolidated Fruit Auction company more than 100 years ago. Tune in for a spirited conversation!-----This episode is brought to you by Impact Architects and Ninety. As we share the stories of entrepreneurs building incredible organizations throughout NEO, Impact Architects helps those leaders — many of whom we’ve heard from as guests on Lay of The Land — realize their visions and build great organizations. I believe in Impact Architects and the people behind it so much, that I have actually joined them personally in their mission to help leaders gain focus, align together, and thrive by doing what they love! As a listener, you can sit down for a free consultation with Impact Architects or leverage a free trial through Ninety, the software platform that helps teams build great companies, by visiting ia.layoftheland.fm!-----Connect with Tom Lix — https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomlixLearn more about Cleveland Whiskey — https://clevelandwhiskey.com/Follow Cleveland Whiskey on Twitter — https://twitter.com/clevewhiskeyFollow Cleveland Whiskey on Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/clevelandwhiskey/-----For more episodes of Lay of The Land, visit https://www.layoftheland.fm/Past guests include Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, Steve Potash (OverDrive), Ed Largest (Westfield), Ray Leach (JumpStart), Lila Mills (Signal Cleveland), Pat Conway (Great Lakes Brewing), and many more.Stay up to date on all our podcasts by signing up for Lay of The Land's weekly newsletter — sign up here.Connect with Jeffrey Stern on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreypstern/Follow Jeffrey Stern on Twitter @sternJefe — https://twitter.com/sternjefeFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter @podlayofthelandhttps://www.jeffreys.page/

Todd Goldstein — Founder & CEO of Whoa DoughIn 2008, Todd co-founded LaunchHouse with the mission to invest, develop, and foster promising idea-stage startups in Northeast, OH through Community, Education, Coworking, and Investment — and through LaunchHouse, has helped grow a diverse portfolio of 65 companies that collectively raised more than $30 million in follow in funding.Todd’s most recent endeavor — among his many as a serial founder, entrepreneur, investor, and advocate for intellectual property rights — and where we’ll spend most of the conversation today, is Whoa Dough, which he founded back in 2019 in the aftermath of discovering his 3 boys were diagnosed with severe gluten intolerance and now sells millions of healthy snack bars per year.The reality is that 32 million Americans suffer from food allergies, of which 5.6 million are children — a number that has grown drastically over the past few decades. At first, Todd thought he and his family’s cookie-dough-eating days were over, but he quickly realized that he was intolerant of that too and took it upon himself to create a snack-happy, natural cookie-dough that could satisfy his family’s sweet tooth without wreaking havoc on their bellies. Two years and many dozens of recipes later, Whoa Dough was born — and today is a growing brand that Todd and his team have grown to boast distribution in brands like American Airlines and participation in Mondelez’ Snackfutures program all while creating a gluten-free, dairy-free, egg-free, plant-based, kosher, non-GMO, Vegan, natural product!Really enjoyed learning about Todd’s journey, passion for building this out in Cleveland, and the momentum of Whoa Dough going forward!-----Lay of The Land is brought to you by Ninety. As a Lay of The Land listener, you can leverage a free trial with Ninety, the platform that helps teams build great companies and the only officially licensed software for EOS® — used by over 7,000 companies and 100,000 users!This episode is brought to you by Impact Architects. As we share the stories of entrepreneurs building incredible organizations throughout NEO, Impact Architects helps those leaders — many of whom we’ve heard from as guests on Lay of The Land — realize their visions and build great organizations. I believe in Impact Architects and the people behind it so much, that I have actually joined them personally in their mission to help leaders gain focus, align together, and thrive by doing what they love! As a listener, you can sit down for a free consultation with Impact Architects by visiting ia.layoftheland.fm!-----Connect with Todd Goldstein on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/toddgoldstein/ Learn more about Whoa Dough — https://www.whoadough.com/ Follow Whoa Dough on Twitter @WhoaDough — https://twitter.com/whoadoughFollow Whoa Dough on Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/whoadough_/Learn more about LaunchHouse — https://lhcowork.com/-----For more episodes of Lay of The Land, visit https://www.layoftheland.fm/Past guests include Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, Steve Potash (OverDrive), Ed Largest (Westfield), Ray Leach (JumpStart), Lila Mills (Signal Cleveland), Pat Conway (Great Lakes Brewing), Lindsay Watson (Augment Therapy), and many more.Stay up to date on all our podcasts by signing up for Lay of The Land's weekly newsletter — sign up here.Connect with Jeffrey Stern on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreypstern/Follow Jeffrey Stern on Twitter @sternJefe — https://twitter.com/sternjefeFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter @podlayofthelandhttps://www.jeffreys.page/

Gerald Hetrick (CEO of Docket (formerly Bezlio) & Professional EOS Implementer) Gerald has been on the show once before; those of you who’ve been with Lay of The Land from the beginning may recall Gerald as one of the first entrepreneurs to make an appearance back on Episode #6, which I’d encourage anyone interested in learning Gerald’s personal and entrepreneurial journey co-founding and leading two companies from inception to exit — spanning his time building Vox Mobile and Able — to take a listen to that episode… Gerald’s an incredible storyteller and sets a great stage there for our conversation today where we pick up on where we left off and cover what’s transpired in the years since.And it’s pretty incredible how much has changed in this interim period and how impactful Gerald has been in driving that change. As CEO of Able, Gerlad led the organization through five years of 100% Year-Over-Year growth, a $7 million Series B fundraise, and ultimately a successful exit in early 2022 to Bullhorn, a leading software platform for the staffing and recruiting industry.With the time and space to reflect post-acquisition, Gerald resolved to be retrospective and learn from the lessons of his failures and successes over his 25 years of entrepreneurial experience. In this time, he came to the conclusion that he loves building great companies and that so many of the issues he struggled with in the process of building great companies were self-inflected, recognizing how much more impactful he could have been if he had prioritized running on a consistent business operating system, like EOS, and that ultimately these operating systems provide leverage, and not overhead.Collectively, these realizations amounted to Gerald becoming CEO of another Cleveland growth-oriented technology startup called Docket (recently rebranded from Bezlio), and starting his own EOS implementation practice, coaching other growth-minded leaders willing to invest in making their visions reality and their teams as healthy as possible!At Docket, Gerald is focused on ensuring manufacturing shop-floor employees know what to do next and how to do it right, believing deeply in the opportunity to significantly drive middle-market manufacturing growth and prosperity. To that end, he recently closed a $4.5 million seed round to invest in massive product improvements to its cloud-based mobile ERP (Enterprise resource planning) platform, their go-to-market strategy, and customer relationships.This was a really fun and candid conversation, understanding how Gerald has evolved as a leader, closing Able’s chapter, starting Docket/Bezlio’s chapter, building his coaching practice in service of other founders trying to build great organizations, his approach to dreaming big and operating practically, and many other reflections along the way.-----Lay of The Land is brought to you by Burton D. Morgan Mentoring at JumpStart. It's impossible to tell the stories of the entrepreneurs building in Cleveland and across northeast Ohio without acknowledging the impact of our collective mentoring community. Over the past decade, Burton D. Morgan Mentoring at JumpStart has helped hundreds of mentees, some of whom we’ve heard from as guests on this podcast, realize their innovative visions. Our guest today, Gerald Hetrick, serves as a Burton D. Morgan mentor alongside other local serial founders and subject matter experts. These volunteers are passionate about sharing their time, talent, and lessons learned to grow and accelerate the next generation of entrepreneurial students and startup leaders. To learn more about Burton D. Morgan Mentoring and other free services available to Northeast Ohio entrepreneurs, go to jumpstart.org/startups. Burton D. Morgan Mentoring is made possible with funds from the Burton D. Morgan Foundation.-----Connect with Gerald Hetrick on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/geraldhetrick/ Follow Gerald Hetrick on Twitter —  https://twitter.com/geraldhetrickLearn more about Gerald's EOS Practice — https://www.eosworldwide.com/gerald-hetrickLearn more about Docket — https://usedocket.com/Bezlio Redirect to Docket — https://bezl.io/Learn more about Able (Acquired by Bullhorn) — https://www.bullhorn.com/products/able-by-bullhorn/-----For more episodes of Lay of The Land, visit https://www.layoftheland.fm/Past guests include Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, Steve Potash (OverDrive), Ed Largest (Westfield), Ray Leach (JumpStart), Lila Mills (Signal Cleveland), Pat Conway (Great Lakes Brewing), Lindsay Watson (Augment Therapy), and many more.Stay up to date on all our podcasts by signing up for Lay of The Land's weekly newsletter — sign up here.Connect with Jeffrey Stern on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreypstern/Follow Jeffrey Stern on Twitter @sternJefe — https://twitter.com/sternjefeFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter @podlayofthelandhttps://www.jeffreys.page/

Jack Greco, co-founder and former CFO and COO of ACV Auctions, a Buffalo-based wholesale online marketplace for cars (ACV Auctions went public in 2021 and is currently valued at approximately $3 billion dollars)Now an active angel and venture investor through his fund Far Out Ventures, Jack runs a weekly newsletter called Buffalo Bridge which tells the stories of Buffalo’s startup community and has made nearly 200 investments in other founders and startups!Jack is the first guest to come on Lay of The Land outside of NEO, but I think after heairng this awesome conversation you'll understand why! In this special episode of Lay of The Land, Jack is unfettered and candid in his reflections on building a multi-billion dollar company, the journey of ACV Auctions, the parallels of Cleveland, OH & Buffalo, NY, his passion for investing and for founders, and the work he is excited about next.-----Lay of The Land is brought to you by Ninety. As a Lay of The Land listener, you can leverage a free trial with Ninety, the platform that helps teams build great companies and the only officially licensed software for EOS® — used by over 7,000 companies and 100,000 users!This episode is brought to you by Impact Architects. As we share the stories of entrepreneurs building incredible organizations throughout NEO, Impact Architects helps those leaders — many of whom we’ve heard from as guests on Lay of The Land — realize their visions and build great organizations. I believe in Impact Architects and the people behind it so much, that I have actually joined them personally in their mission to help leaders gain focus, align together, and thrive by doing what they love! As a listener, you can sit down for a free consultation with Impact Architects by visiting ia.layoftheland.fm!-----Connect with Jack Greco on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacklgreco/Learn more about ACV Auctions — https://www.acvauctions.com/Learn more about Far Out Ventures — https://www.farout.vc/Subscribe to Buffalo Bridge (Jack's Newsletter) — https://buffalobridge.substack.com/-----For more episodes of Lay of The Land, visit https://www.layoftheland.fm/Past guests include Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, Steve Potash (OverDrive), Ed Largest (Westfield), Ray Leach (JumpStart), Lila Mills (Signal Cleveland), Pat Conway (Great Lakes Brewing), Lindsay Watson (Augment Therapy), and many more.Stay up to date on all our podcasts by signing up for Lay of The Land's weekly newsletter — sign up here.Connect with Jeffrey Stern on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreypstern/Follow Jeffrey Stern on Twitter @sternJefe — https://twitter.com/sternjefeFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter @podlayofthelandhttps://www.jeffreys.page/

Tracy Strobel — CEO of the Cuyahoga County Public Library (CCPL)Tracy Strobel was appointed Chief Executive Officer of CCPL in July 2019 after serving in the Deputy Director role for nearly 15 years. CCPL has 27 branches that serve the 610,000 residents of 47 communities in Northeast Ohio. CCPL has earned the prestigious five-star rating in Library Journal’s Index of Public Library Service for the last decade; and received the publication’s highest overall score among America’s largest metropolitan library systems for 10 consecutive years (2010-2019).Tracy’s career in public libraries began with a focus on technology at Medina County District Library (1996-1999) and Cleveland Public Library (1999-2005), where she developed the nation’s first 24/7 virtual reference service. Prior to becoming CEO, she led its 27 branches, Information Technology, Technical Services and Literacy & Learning divisions. Her major accomplishments at CCPL include leading the largest capital improvement program in the Library’s history, which included the replacement of twelve branches and several renovation projects over a period of ten years.From 2011 to 2013, Tracy served as the U.S. representative to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s International Network of Emerging Library Innovators. She was a member of the Public Library Association (PLA) Board of Directors (2016-2019) and the American Library Association’s (ALA) Office for Information Technology Policy Advisory Committee (2015-2019). Tracy served as chair of the ALA 2020 Census Library Outreach and Education Task Force (2018-2020) and is currently a member of the PLA’s Continuing Education Advisory Committee.In February 2020, Tracy was appointed to the board of The Center for Community Solutions, a nonpartisan think tank focused on solutions to health, social and economic issues. She also serves on the board of Youth Opportunities Unlimited and chairs their Community Collaboration Committee.This was an amazing conversation — we cover Tracy’s childhood dream of being a librarian, the history of the Cuyahoga County Public Library, the business and operations of libraries, their responsibility and role as a civic institution and bastion for education & the robust exchange of ideas, their evolution and relevance in ever dynamic and technologically enabled world, offering opportunity as a product, lesser-known and unexpected services of libraries, and ultimately, Tracy’s vision for the future of the Cuyahoga County Public Library!If you can’t tell, I am personally a huge fan of libraries, and as Tracy and I will discuss, I think they are of the most underrated public institutions we have, so it was a real treat to hear from Tracy about her experience leading the Cuyahoga County Public Library!-----Lay of The Land is brought to you by Ninety. As a Lay of The Land listener, you can leverage a free trial with Ninety, the platform that helps teams build great companies and the only officially licensed software for EOS® — used by over 7,000 companies and 100,000 users!This episode is brought to you by Impact Architects. As we share the stories of entrepreneurs building incredible organizations throughout NEO, Impact Architects helps those leaders — many of whom we’ve heard from as guests on Lay of The Land — realize their visions and build great organizations. I believe in Impact Architects and the people behind it so much, that I have actually joined them personally in their mission to help leaders gain focus, align together, and thrive by doing what they love! As a listener, you can sit down for a free consultation with Impact Architects by visiting ia.layoftheland.fm!-----Connect with Tracy Strobel on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/tracy-strobel-44421531/Learn more about The Cuyahoga County Public Library — https://cuyahogalibrary.org/Follow The Cuyahoga County Public Library on Twitter — https://twitter.com/CuyahogaLibFollow The Cuyahoga County Public Library on Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/cuyahogalib/-----For more episodes of Lay of The Land, visit https://www.layoftheland.fm/Past guests include Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, Steve Potash (OverDrive), Ed Largest (Westfield), Ray Leach (JumpStart), Lila Mills (Signal Cleveland), Pat Conway (Great Lakes Brewing), Lindsay Watson (Augment Therapy), and many more.Stay up to date on all our podcasts by signing up for Lay of The Land's weekly newsletter — sign up here.Connect with Jeffrey Stern on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreypstern/Follow Jeffrey Stern on Twitter @sternJefe — https://twitter.com/sternjefeFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter @podlayofthelandhttps://www.jeffreys.page/

Ethan Karp — President and CEO of MAGNET: The Manufacturing Advocacy and Growth Network which, founded in 1984, has been dedicated to fostering local manufacturing and supporting local manufacturing businesses across technological innovation, workforce training and improved management practices.Ethan joined as CEO of MAGNET in 2013 after a consulting career at McKinsey & Co. and academic studies in biochemistry and physics and ultimately a Ph.D. in Chemical Biology from Harvard.We cover a lot in our conversation today — from Ethan’s path to MAGNET, to MAGNET’s Blueprint for Manufacturing and plan to fuel a true manufacturing revival in Northeast Ohio. We cover the rich industrious and manufacturing history of Northeast Ohio and prominence of manufacturing in the local economy today, the implications for automation on the future of manufacturing, the importance of apprenticeship programs, making manufacturing cool again, showcasing career paths for younger talent to join the industry, reshoring, upskilling and workforce shortages… and we cover what this work looks like in practice and examples of companies MAGNET has worked with, including some who’s stories we’ve told on the show like Tom Lix of Cleveland Whiskey (Episode #21)!Ethan exudes a real passion for this work and is an involved community builder outside of MAGNET sitting on the boards of the Cleveland and Cuyahoga County Workforce Development, American Small Manufacturers Coalition, Cleveland Leadership Center, MidTown Cleveland, Inc., Cleveland Jewish Publication Company and the Jewish Education Center of Cleveland.I really enjoyed learning more about the state of manufacturing in Northeast Ohio and MAGNET’s role in helping to impact its future — please enjoy my conversation with Ethan Karp!-----Lay of The Land is brought to you by Ninety. As a Lay of The Land listener, you can leverage a free trial with Ninety, the platform that helps teams build great companies and the only officially licensed software for EOS® — used by over 7,000 companies and 100,000 users!This episode is brought to you by Impact Architects. As we share the stories of entrepreneurs building incredible organizations throughout NEO, Impact Architects helps those leaders — many of whom we’ve heard from as guests on Lay of The Land — realize their visions and build great organizations. I believe in Impact Architects and the people behind it so much, that I have actually joined them personally in their mission to help leaders gain focus, align together, and thrive by doing what they love! As a listener, you can sit down for a free consultation with Impact Architects by visiting ia.layoftheland.fm!-----Connect with Ethan Karp on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/ethankarp/Learn more about MAGNET: The Manufacturing Advocacy and Growth Network — https://www.manufacturingsuccess.org/Follow MAGNET on Twitter @magnetohio — https://twitter.com/magnetohio-----For more episodes of Lay of The Land, visit https://www.layoftheland.fm/Past guests include Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, Steve Potash (OverDrive), Ed Largest (Westfield), Ray Leach (JumpStart), Lila Mills (Signal Cleveland), Pat Conway (Great Lakes Brewing), Lindsay Watson (Augment Therapy), and many more.Stay up to date on all our podcasts by signing up for Lay of The Land's weekly newsletter — sign up here.Connect with Jeffrey Stern on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreypstern/Follow Jeffrey Stern on Twitter @sternJefe — https://twitter.com/sternjefeFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter @podlayofthelandhttps://www.jeffreys.page/

Mike Maczuzak — a product designer, early-stage investor, and founder of SmartShape Design — an innovative product development and industrial design firm he started here in Cleveland back in 1989.SmartShape's beginnings were richly steeped in this world of industrial design leveraging Mike’s own background and experience in it — however over time, Mike evolved the firm’s competencies and capabilities to cover mechanical engineering, integrated manufacturing, and strategic product development across a plethora of industries like Medical, Consumer, IoT, Pacakging, digital, and many others — SmartShape’s client list is a formidable and growing group of emerging brands covering Northeast Ohio leaders like Avery Dennison, Gojo, Diebold, Sherwin Williams, Nestle, and many others, to a handful of companies who’s stories we’ve shared on Lay of The Land like David Levine of Wireless Environment and My Home Park (Episode 132), Chris Wentz of EveryKey (Episode 75), and Chelsea Monty-Bromer of SweatID (Episode 77), to international brands like BMW — and as a result, their products are ones that many of us enoucnter on a day to day basis in the real world!While we do delve into Mike’s entrepreneurial journey building SmartShape in our conversation, we actually spend just as much time unpacking Mike’s literal walk across the United States and later, walk across much of the rest of the World — covering Mike’s motivations for walking across the country and other continents, the logistics of how he prepared and executed these walks, how he’s balanced running business while walking, and some of the incredible stories he recalled from his adventures on the road!This was a really fun conversation that certainly plants the seeds of inspiration to embark on your own walking adventure and build an entrepreneurial organization to support that kind of freedom!-----Lay of The Land is brought to you by Ninety. As a Lay of The Land listener, you can leverage a free trial with Ninety, the platform that helps teams build great companies and the only officially licensed software for EOS® — used by over 7,000 companies and 100,000 users!This episode is brought to you by Impact Architects. As we share the stories of entrepreneurs building incredible organizations throughout NEO, Impact Architects helps those leaders — many of whom we’ve heard from as guests on Lay of The Land — realize their visions and build great organizations. I believe in Impact Architects and the people behind it so much, that I have actually joined them personally in their mission to help leaders gain focus, align together, and thrive by doing what they love! As a listener, you can sit down for a free consultation with Impact Architects by visiting ia.layoftheland.fm!-----Connect with Mike Maczuzak on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikemaczuzak/Learn more about SmartShape Design — https://smartshape.design/-----For more episodes of Lay of The Land, visit https://www.layoftheland.fm/Past guests include Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, Steve Potash (OverDrive), Ed Largest (Westfield), Ray Leach (JumpStart), Lila Mills (Signal Cleveland), Pat Conway (Great Lakes Brewing), Lindsay Watson (Augment Therapy), and many more.Stay up to date on all our podcasts by signing up for Lay of The Land's weekly newsletter — sign up here.Connect with Jeffrey Stern on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreypstern/Follow Jeffrey Stern on Twitter @sternJefe — https://twitter.com/sternjefeFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter @podlayofthelandhttps://www.jeffreys.page/

Adam Rakestraw — co-founder, chairman, general counsel, and chief business development officer of MediView XR, based here in Cleveland Ohio! With approximately $29.5 million in capital raised from strategic partners like the Cleveland Clinic, Mayo Clinic GE HealthCare, JobsOhio, and many others since its founding in 2019, MediView is a medical technology company working to advance human health through its digital augmented reality ecosystem.MediView's AR visualization platform aims to unlock the full potential of 3D data to transform image-guided medical procedures with intuitive 3D X-ray visualization, seamless remote collaboration, and evidence-based data insights. And this dream to democratize healthcare by removing barriers to patient access and to address the long-standing limitations of current medical imaging technologies is well underway as the company secured the first 510(k) clearance of its kind for an AR device with live imaging combined with 3D X-ray visualization by the FDA!Adam has an extensive legal and medical device background with over 20 years of experience across organizations like Merck and Medtronic in addition to his other entrepreneurial undertakings like FreeNav — a wireless electromagenetic tracking system for surgical navigation and healthcare applications he co-founded back in 2021.This was such an awesome conversation that feels like a genuine clairvoyant portal into the future of healthcare and how Adam and his team at MediView are leading the charge to make it happen.-----Lay of The Land is brought to you by Ninety. As a Lay of The Land listener, you can leverage a free trial with Ninety, the platform that helps teams build great companies and the only officially licensed software for EOS® — used by over 7,000 companies and 100,000 users!This episode is brought to you by Impact Architects. As we share the stories of entrepreneurs building incredible organizations throughout NEO, Impact Architects helps those leaders — many of whom we’ve heard from as guests on Lay of The Land — realize their visions and build great organizations. I believe in Impact Architects and the people behind it so much, that I have actually joined them personally in their mission to help leaders gain focus, align together, and thrive by doing what they love! As a listener, you can sit down for a free consultation with Impact Architects by visiting ia.layoftheland.fm!-----Connect with Adam Rakestraw on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-e-rakestraw-j-d-8165279/Follow Adam Rakestraw on Twitter — https://twitter.com/ae_rakestrawLearn more about MediView — https://mediview.com/Follow MediView on Twitter — https://twitter.com/MediViewXR-----For more episodes of Lay of The Land, visit https://www.layoftheland.fm/Past guests include Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, Steve Potash (OverDrive), Ed Largest (Westfield), Ray Leach (JumpStart), Lila Mills (Signal Cleveland), Pat Conway (Great Lakes Brewing), Lindsay Watson (Augment Therapy), and many more.Stay up to date on all our podcasts by signing up for Lay of The Land's weekly newsletter — sign up here.Connect with Jeffrey Stern on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreypstern/Follow Jeffrey Stern on Twitter @sternJefe — https://twitter.com/sternjefeFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter @podlayofthelandhttps://www.jeffreys.page/

Michael Sirpilla, co-founder and CEO of Society Brands.Under Michael’s leadership as CEO, Society Brands has raised $205 million in capital to continue their rapid consolidation in the e-commerce sector with many completed and successful acquisitions since inception. Society Brands, based in Canton, Ohio, is a tech-enabled consumer products company that acquires e-commerce native brands and powers them with a global growth platform, scaling and evolving them into household brands. They provide meaningful liquidity for the founders of each acquisition while allowing those founders to stay on board at Society Brands, building out a community of entrepreneurs who help one another reach new heights. In addition, these founders have the ability to roll equity into Society Brands’ parent company so that they can enjoy a second exit down the road that may likely be even larger than their first.Michael, who grew up here in Ohio, has been in and around retail his whole life with extensive M&A experience throughout his career and has been part of multiple business ventures where he’s primarily focused on organic growth. He founded a financial services wholesale agency with a team of 40 and built it into a multi-million-dollar business, and in addition, he led a population health management business and scaled it from $0 to $150 million in revenue within five years.This was an awesome conversation — Michael does an excellent job explaining what the world of e-commerce looks like, how it has evolved over time, Society Brand’s role to play within this goliath market, and the way he’s been able to rapidly scale this organization over time.-----Lay of The Land is brought to you by Ninety. As a Lay of The Land listener, you can leverage a free trial with Ninety, the platform that helps teams build great companies and the only officially licensed software for EOS® — used by over 7,000 companies and 100,000 users!This episode is brought to you by Impact Architects. As we share the stories of entrepreneurs building incredible organizations throughout NEO, Impact Architects helps those leaders — many of whom we’ve heard from as guests on Lay of The Land — realize their visions and build great organizations. I believe in Impact Architects and the people behind it so much, that I have actually joined them personally in their mission to help leaders gain focus, align together, and thrive by doing what they love! As a listener, you can sit down for a free consultation with Impact Architects by visiting ia.layoftheland.fm!-----Connect with Michael Sirpilla on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-sirpilla-a5113142/Learn more about Society Brands — https://www.societybrands.com/-----For more episodes of Lay of The Land, visit https://www.layoftheland.fm/Past guests include Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb, Steve Potash (OverDrive), Ed Largest (Westfield), Ray Leach (JumpStart), Lila Mills (Signal Cleveland), Pat Conway (Great Lakes Brewing), Lindsay Watson (Augment Therapy), and many more.Stay up to date on all our podcasts by signing up for Lay of The Land's weekly newsletter — sign up here.Connect with Jeffrey Stern on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffreypstern/Follow Jeffrey Stern on Twitter @sternJefe — https://twitter.com/sternjefeFollow Lay of The Land on Twitter @podlayofthelandhttps://www.jeffreys.page/