Podcasts about Deluxe Corporation

Georgia Technology Summit brings together 1000+ Georgia-focused technologists to network, learn, and engage with the latest trends in Georgia innovation. This year's summit was held at the Woodruff Arts Center, a stunning and iconic cultural landmark located in the heart of Midtown Atlanta. Yogaraj (Yogs) Jayaprakasam joined Deluxe Corporation in May 2022 as Chief Technology and […]

Georgia Technology Summit brings together 1000+ Georgia-focused technologists to network, learn, and engage with the latest trends in Georgia innovation. This year's summit was held at the Woodruff Arts Center, a stunning and iconic cultural landmark located in the heart of Midtown Atlanta. Yogaraj (Yogs) Jayaprakasam joined Deluxe Corporation in May 2022 as Chief Technology and […] The post Georgia Technology Summit 2025: Yogs Jayaprakasam with Deluxe appeared first on Business RadioX ®.

About the Guest:Being only the 9th CEO in Deluxe Corporation's 109-year existence, Barry McCarthy feels the weight of that history, saying, “You start with a deep sense of humbleness that you are carrying on a legacy that has been so significant for so long.” But that doesn't mean Barry will treat any company with kid gloves. He says, “I think of myself as something of a fixer, a reinventor, an innovator.” And there's no better spot to drive innovation than in how we connect as people within a company. Barry has made it his mission to extend humble leadership, a listening ear, and a helping hand to all those he is responsible for. As a firm believer in mentorship at every level of an organization, Barry is here to spread his wisdom to us today.What You Will Learn:Strategies for focusing on what you can do for people, not what they can do for youInsights into the three critical things that together help people succeed as leadersLessons on why kindness, decency, and respect will get you further than demandsJoin us to discover why Barry says employees are “the most important asset the company has.” You'll learn new ways to support your team and build your organization. From setting visions that inspire people to the importance of being transparent when things aren't going well, the advice in this episode is not to be missed. Listen in today!   Please rate and review this Episode!We'd love to hear from you! Leaving a review helps us ensure we deliver content that resonates with you. Your feedback can inspire others to join our Take Command: A Dale Carnegie Podcast community & benefit from the leadership insights we share.

Heidi is a venture capitalist, a corporate director, a Stanford lecturer, and at heart, always an entrepreneur. She co-founded the software company T/Maker and served as its CEO for over a decade until its acquisition by Deluxe Corporation. After a stint as VP of Worldwide Developer Relations at Apple, She entered the VC industry with Softbank, and currently is a partner at Silicon Valley-based Threshold Ventures. She is a corporate director for a bunch of public and private companies such as Memphis Meats, Lumity and Polarr. And most importantly she is known for her strong and warm professional relationships.

Heidi Roizen is a venture capitalist, corporate director and former technology CEO/entrepreneur. Today, Heidi is a partner at leading venture firm Threshold Ventures and serves as a board member for private companies Upside Foods and Polarr in the Threshold portfolio. She is currently also an independent corporate director for Invitation Homes (NYSE:INVH) and Planet Labs PBC (NYSE:PL). Heidi is also an Adjunct Lecturer at Stanford University and leads Stanford's Threshold Venture Fellows Program in the Management Science and Engineering department. At Stanford, Heidi also serves on the advisory councils of the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI) and Stanford Technology Ventures (STVP). She started her career as co-founder of software company T/Maker and served as its CEO for over a dozen years until its acquisition by Deluxe Corporation. After a year as VP of Worldwide Developer Relations at Apple, Heidi then became a venture capitalist in 1999. She has undergraduate and MBA degrees from Stanford and is the proud mother of two kids and two rescue dogs. In this podcast, we cover - 1. The adventure of building and scaling your business 2. The art of having difficult conversations 3. Nuances of gender dynamics in entrepreneurship 4. Leveraging your social network to advance social good 5. The joy of giving back Read her HBS Case Study: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/item.aspx?num=26880 Check out her podcast: https://www.threshold.vc/podcast

Glen chats with Generative AI's self- described Chief Optimist (and OpenAI's onetime Head of Go to Market) Zack Kass about how we've arrived at the brink of AGI, potential regulatory avenues to safeguard the technology, and why he sees more likely good than harm. Also- Elon's latest gambit and another Easter egg in the Capital One/Discover deal.   Links related to this episode:   Zack Kass's website: https://zackkass.com/  Zack's Newsweek article on the risks of anthropomorphizing AI: https://www.newsweek.com/perils-anthropomorphizing-machine-intelligence-opinion-1836493  Wired's bizarre take on Elon Musk's bizarre lawsuit against OpenAI: https://www.wired.com/story/wild-claim-at-the-heart-of-elon-musks-openai-lawsuit/  Our recent CU Town Hall dissecting Capital One/Discover's impact on credit unions: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZIDagUCgb4 Glen's blog on the Capital One/Discover deal: https://www.big-fintech.com/Media?p=the-capital-onediscover-deal-a-test-of-typical-battle-lines-and-a-credit-union-angle  SRM's report on Capital One/Discover: https://info.srmcorp.com/assessing-the-shockwaves-from-capital-ones-plan-to-purchase-discover  Deluxe Corporation: https://www.deluxe.com/    Join us for our next CU Town Hall on Wednesday March 20 at 3pm ET/Noon PT for a live and lively interactive discussion of the key issues facing credit unions. (Did we mention there'll be a cool tech giveaway to one FI attendee?) It's free to attend, but advance registration is required:  https://www.cutownhall.com/     We've joined BlueSky social! Find us at @bigfintech, @jbfintech and @154Advisors  You can also follow us on LinkedIn:  https://www.linkedin.com/company/best-innovation-group/ https://www.linkedin.com/in/jbfintech/  https://www.linkedin.com/in/glensarvady/

Choosing the right sales enablement solution and getting your sellers to adopt it can be challenging, as more than half (51%) of our customers struggled with low sales team adoption of their previous solution before Highspot. So how can you choose the right solution for your team and encourage adoption? Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi and welcome to the Win Win Podcast. I'm your host, Shawnna Sumaoang. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Nicole Olson, director of sales readiness at Deluxe. Thanks for joining, Nicole! I'd love for you to tell us about yourself, your background, and your role. Nicole Olson: Shawnna, thank you so much for having me. I’m very grateful to be here and be able to tell our story. As you mentioned, I am Nicole Olson, the director of sales readiness at Deluxe Corporation. I started my sales enablement career seven years ago. I came in as an administrative assistant and worked through the corporate world and found myself in sales enablement. I never thought I would be here, but I love every second of it. It’s exciting to see how the environment is changing and staying up with the current trends, especially the technological ones. SS: Wonderful. Well, Nicole, again, thank you so much for joining us today. You actually recently became a Highspot customer. To start us off, tell us a little bit about the enablement journey at Deluxe. What led you to decide to invest in Highspot as your enablement platform? NO: We are in the early implementation stages of Highspot, so it’s super exciting. We’ve been with a current enablement platform for three years. Our contract is coming up at the end of this year, which is what pushed us into the market to vet all vendors. We put everybody on the table really to decide what was best for our business. We made the move three years ago to our current vendor. As our business changed and enablement, even in Deluxe has changed as well, it really made us reevaluate what our needs were and what’s going to support our sellers best. Ultimately Highspot came out on top and we have a lot of excitement internally around it. Everyone’s super excited for the implementation to be complete, but I do remind them that it is a heavy lift. Everyone’s been really enjoying the ride so far. SS: I love that. Prior to Highspot, as you mentioned, you had a different platform in place. Can you tell us about the experience and maybe some of the challenges your teams were facing? NO: Ultimately, one of the biggest sticking points for us was analytics. That was one that even our leadership came down on. We need to be able to prove our ROI as an enablement team, but then also to help our cross partners, such as marketing and product. They want to know what’s being used in the market, content-wise. Are we training our reps? It was really hard for us to get those analytics, and so that was one of our top priorities when we went out to the market to vet. Can you provide us with those analytics? The other challenge is our sales teams were losing adoption because they would go out to their enablement site, search for something, not find it, and then give up. It’s really hard to get somebody to buy back in if they’ve had a poor experience. Since our contract was coming up, it just gave us a clean start and if we wanted to make the change, now would be the right time. Between the analytics and then a less-than-ideal user experience, those are kind of the two main things that really pushed us to make the move toward Highspot. SS: How have you started to work towards solving some of these challenges since switching to Highspot? NO: We’ve been deep in the weeds of global lists and thinking through how we want to organize our content. This time around, we’re really involving a lot of different stakeholders, not trying to keep it enclosed in our sales enablement team. We’re pulling in marketing, we’re pulling in the product team, we’re listening to the sellers, what they need, what they want, and what really works for them. I think just by gathering everybody’s feedback, we’re going to be able to push out a much better platform that works for everybody and solves all the needs and not just us working in a vacuum. SS: I love that. Now, for our broader audience, tell us about your process for rolling out a new tool. What are some of your best practices to ensure not only a successful implementation but making sure that you’re also seeing a good amount of adoption? What role does a strong support team play in this? NO: I think the biggest thing that I pride Deluxe in is that we’ve created a content governance guideline document. We’ve laid everything out from how to write a title, how to write a description, what this looks like, tagging categories, and how lists should be utilized in different spots. We really broke it down pretty granularly so there’s no question when a seller is going out to search for something, we can kind of follow that thought process. We are using sales enablement to lay out that framework. Now, we’re in the process of having marketing, product, and sellers vet what we’ve come up with. Again, I don’t want to be the end-all be-all because I’m not the one ultimately using it. Getting that feedback from everybody within the company that’s going to be using the platform is really important. That just makes our support team grow because yes, sales enablement is driving this platform and really building it, but we also need the support of everybody else that’s going to be using it. They have to have the buy-in. They have to feel like it was built for them because that’s what’s really going to help drive the adoption for us because they felt like they had a seat at the table. They were able to provide their input and as long as we listen, which I think we are doing, I think it’ll be super successful in terms of adoption when we do pull it out. SS: Do you have advice for our audience on what are some of your best practices or your ideas that you guys are thinking about in terms of how to drive adoption of the platform among your reps? NO: We’re going to meet them where they work. A big push in our leadership is just getting them in Salesforce more. Another reason we went with Highspot is their deep integration with Salesforce really feels like the systems talk closely together. We’re going to work really hard to develop those sales plays and sales guidance within the opportunity. I think that a key piece we’re missing today is that they have to jump to a different tab or browser to get what they’re looking for. With this implementation, we’re really trying to meet them where they work. Even in Outlook, if they’re sending emails, we don’t want them to have to think about where to get that content. It’s coming right to them. That’s one thing that we’re really focusing on meeting those sellers where they’re at. SS: I love that. I think that is absolutely crucial to adoption and you guys had to navigate some barriers to adoption with your previous platform. What were some of those barriers? NO: The biggest one was just the analytics piece. Being able to prove our ROI of why we are making this investment in an enablement platform and n show our value. With Highspot, it eliminated that barrier completely with one click of a button to show us a scorecard. Our partner’s marketing and product are super excited about that feature. Then, another barrier is our previous vendor ended up being a company of companies. You start to feel the pain points when you’re jumping between a training platform to your content management system platform. Sometimes it kicks you out so you have to sign back in. It really was not giving that seamless experience that we want to provide to our sellers. We really started to feel the effects of that and that’s where some of our adoption was lost. Highspot being a natively built system really solves that barrier and we’re excited to reap the benefits from that. SS: I love that. To that point, how does having Highspot’s Unified Enablement Platform help you continue to overcome those barriers and maybe a few others? NO: We throw a lot of technology at our reps. They have a huge tech stack and so allowing them to just, once they’re in the platform that they want to work in, whether it be for an hour or throughout the entire day, we want it to be seamless. We don’t want them logging in and out, jumping from tab to tab. We’re meeting them where they’re at. The unification that Highspot provides with the training. If we set up our sales plays and guidance correctly, they’ll be none the wiser whether they’re looking at a piece of content or if they’re taking training, which is, I think will benefit our sales team because again, it’ll just become second nature that everything they’re looking for and need an answer to is either right in a sales play. It is nice for them to be guided to them, pulling up at their opportunity. I’m really making it seamless and hopefully allowing them to have more time to sell, which is ultimately what we want to do. SS: Continuing on the topic of Unified Enablement, I know that you plan to leverage Highspot to support your partners in addition to your Internal sales teams. How does a unified enablement platform help you drive partner growth? NO: I had our team raise our hand, whether they were excited or not. We have a big solution and a big opportunity in terms of supporting our partners and our resellers. Right now, we kind of have a couple of different pockets where they can go to get resources, but there’s nothing consistent throughout the company. I told them that we were in this negotiation with Highspot. They can sell for the platform and marketing was really exciting. They’re one group that really spoke up because it’s one spot for them to keep the content, whether it’s for internal use or those external partners to come and grab. Again, I keep harping on the analytics, but marketing can come and see what content is resonating in the market, whether it be for our partners who are reselling our product or internally. They can start using those analytics to feed what they’re doing next in their roadmap. Really being able to have just that central location where marketing can get a holistic view of what’s going on in the market is, I think, going to be a huge win. SS: Absolutely. On the note of analytics, what has the business impact been so far of investing in Highspot? Do you have any early results you can share? NO: No, I still think we’re too early in the implementation, other than the fact that everybody’s excited. Highspot is allowing us to also include those view-only licenses, which we didn’t do in our previous platform. We can get those support folks or operations who didn’t really have insight into what sellers were doing. By bringing all of those teams onto the platform, letting them know what’s going in front of customers or prospects, I think helps Deluxe, and us, succeed because then there’s no confusion on what’s being sent and if it worked. Everybody has a line of sight into that. I think that will quickly prove our ROI, just in terms of having that central location that nobody is getting denied from. They can access it and they can see what we’re doing and hopefully build great adoption throughout. SS: I love that and I imagine it’ll create a more seamless cohesive experience for your buyers and your customers as well. NO: Absolutely. SS: Now, last question for you. To close, what advice do you have for listeners who are interested in investing in an enablement platform and are maybe currently evaluating solutions? NO: I would say just make sure you put everything on the table and really prioritize what your needs are. The space is getting very competitive. It was a ton of fun just in my role to go out to the market and just see where all the different vendors are, what’s new, and what’s trending. AI has made it very interesting and that’s coming into play as well. Really just making sure that you have your North Star of what you’re trying to accomplish with a platform. Every time you come up with functionality, if it doesn’t quite fit or meet your needs, challenge it with the vendor and see if they can work with you to solve it. Highspot has been great for us in terms of that we threw them the partner portal and we have a distributor network. We kept throwing them curve balls and they answered every single one of them. Don’t be afraid to say what your needs truly are because most platforms can adapt and work with you and really truly build a platform that’s going to solve the need for your company. SS: I love this. Well, Nicole, thank you so much for joining us and sharing your insights and your enablement journey at Deluxe. I really appreciate the time. NO: Thanks so much, Shawnna. It was great being here. SS: Thank you for listening to this episode of the Win Win podcast. Be sure to tune in next time for more insights on how you can maximize enablement success with Highspot.

The Do's and Don't of an Impactful Customer Experience Discipline with Bob Azman Bob is a CX veteran.  He's been around long enough to know what works and what doesn't.  In this episode he helps you accelerate the path to delighting customers as we discuss:His mountaintops and potholesThe difference between behavioral vs. skill trainingThe importance of a strategic envelope around technologyWhere corporate social responsibility intersects CXMeet BobBob Azman is the Chief Customer Service Officer and Consultant for Innovative CX Solutions, LLC.  Innovative CX Solutions is a Customer Experience Consulting firm specializing in CX Design and Execution, Sales and Service Experience Design and Talent Development. As a Certified Customer Experience Professional (CCXP), Bob is a thought leader, practitioner, podcaster, educator, and business partner helping organizations become more customer focused and easy to do business with. Bob is an Emeritus Chair of the Board of the Customer Experience Professional Association (CXPA.org).  He is the former Vice President, Traveler Experience, Americas and Global responsible for all customer operations in Canada, the United States and Latin America as well as global sites located in Poland, Manila, Bogota, and Costa Rica as well as related experience in India and Australia.  In this role, Bob transformed the customer experience for clients and travelers of Carlson Wagonlit Travel.  Prior to joining CWT, Bob was Chief Experience Officer, at Avtex Consulting Solutions, LLC.  In that role, he consulted with companies in a variety of industries on developing and implementing strategies to improve their overall customer experience and service operations.  Bob also brings a wealth of diverse, general operations and business background as an executive at large corporations such as Thomson Reuters, Ceridian, and Deluxe Corporation.  Bob earned both his MBA and bachelor's degrees from the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, MN. He is an Adjunct Professor in the University of Minnesota Carlson School of Management's Supply Chain and Operations department and at the Rutgers University School of Business Executive Education programs.He is a frequent speaker on developing effective customer experience and service strategies at industry forums and conferences where he receives top ratings on his interactive approach and unique ability to combine academic principles with real life experiences.  Email:  bob@innovativecx.comWebsite: www.innovativecx.comPodcast:  https://linktr.ee/AllThingsConsideredCXTwitter:  @innovatve_cxSubscribe to The Delighted Customer Podcast so you don't miss an episode: https://www.empoweredcx.com/podcast Subscribe to The Delighted Customer Newsletter for practical tips and insights: https://www.empoweredcx.com/delightedcustomersnewsletter

This week we discuss the Caregiver Support Program at the Minneapolis VA Health Care System, learn about Deluxe Corporation becoming a Beyond the Yellow Ribbon Company and get an update from the MN Patriot Guard. Guests include: Jill Vinge – … Continue reading → The post Caregiver Support Program and Deluxe Corporation appeared first on Minnesota Military Radio.

David Mead, Director of Sales Intelligence at Deluxe Corporation, joins Andrew to discuss how he uses data to shorten the sales cycle and help sellers get in front of actionable buyers. As open market data becomes more valuable and software as a service tool becomes more prevalent, sales processes are becoming increasingly complex. However, this doesn't automatically translate into more profits. David shares the value of sales intelligence and how companies can more efficiently allocate their sales resources. Connect with David Mead | Follow us on LinkedIn

Where is there value in networks? How do you optimize your use of networks? On today's podcast, Craig Jeffery is joined by Chris Clausen from Deluxe Corporation for a conversation on the power of networks with a focus on accounts payable and accounts receivable. Listen to Chris's previous episode on Modernizing AP Processing Survey results

Best Life Brands is a family of companies focused on the well being of clients at any stage of life and includes - ComForCare, At Your Side, premier franchised providers of in-home caregiving and private-duty nursing services, CarePatrol, the nation's largest franchised senior placement organization, Boost Home Health Care and Blue Moon Estate Sales, the leading estate sales franchise in the U.S.  As CEO, JJ Sorrenti oversees the strategic growth of Best Life Brands. A franchising and retailing expert, J.J.has led multiple companies to award-winning results over the past 25 years. Formerly president of Safeguard Business Systems, a division of Deluxe Corporation, his experience also included serving as CEO and board member of Hollywood Tans, CEO of Huntington Learning Centers, and Senior Vice President and General Manager at General Nutrition Centers. JJ is also involved with the International Franchise Association (IFA) and sits on the board of trustees for the IFA Education Foundation.

In this episode of Become an IDOL, I'll be chatting with Dina Beavers about her journey from being a high school math teacher to a Senior Instructional Designer with Deluxe Corporation after enrolling in the IDOL Courses Academy. We will be discussing how she found her way to instructional design, her experience as a part of the fourth cohort of students in the IDOL Courses Academy, and how that led to her current instructional design position. Connect with Dina on LinkedIn Learn more about the IDOL courses Academy: the only implementation program and pre-authorized trade school of its kind that not only shows you exactly how to create your job application assets and build a portfolio from scratch, but also includes credentials, mentorship, expert coaching, and paid experience opportunities in corporate instructional design and online learning for life!

On November 16th, we welcomed Amanda Brinkman, Chief Brand Officer for Deluxe Corporation, Renay Dossman, President, Neighborhood Development Center, Tameka Jones, Founder & CEO, Lip Esteem, and Kenya McKnight Ahad, Founder, Black Women's Wealth Alliance, to the stage for a candid discussion about the hurdles and roadblocks that black and brown-skinned entrepreneurs face in their quest to build a business. The stories from Small Business Revolution Season 6 and the stories shared by the panel were both a wake-up call and inspiring for the audience. The common theme was to begin with relationships. If you want to make a difference for diverse businesses, patronize them. Utilize your gifts and experience to help elevate businesses. Teach, train, engage.

In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interview Barry McCarthy. Barry was named President and CEO of Deluxe Corporation in November 2018 and is a member of its board of directors. He's also the author of Small Business Revolution: How Owners and Entrepreneurs Can Succeed.

On this episode of the podcast, Host Craig Jeffery joins Rick Scholz, Managing Director of Payments Advisory Services at Deluxe Corporation, to discuss practices and plans for modernizing and automating accounts receivable processing. They examine the influence of recent disruptions, the calibration of various pain points that drive change, and other motivators. Listen for strategies that can help position your company for success.   Download the 2021 Modernizing AR Processing report here: http://ow.ly/B32750GxvCB

On this episode of the Treasury Update Podcast, Host Craig Jeffery sits down with Chris Clausen, Executive Director of Product Management at Deluxe Corporation, to discuss practices and plans for modernizing and automating accounts payable processes. They examine the influence of recent disruptions, the calibration of various pain points that drive change, and other motivators. Listen in to the discussion to find out more.

Small businesses are as American as apple pie. When the pandemic began in 2020, Main Streets in towns and cities everywhere began to experience challenges like never before. My guest today has seen firsthand the effects of COVID-19 on small business owners. My guest today is Amanda Brinkman, the Chief Brand and Communications Officer behind Deluxe Corporation. She is also a creator, producer, and host... Read More The post Amanda Brinkman: Champion for Small Business Owners appeared first on Healy Success Solutions.

Sonia St. Charles, co-founder and CEO of Davenport Group, brings more than 40 years of business experience to the company she helped create in 2001. Using her operational expertise in private, public and non-profit sectors, along with her extensive knowledge in human resources, she has created one of the country's fastest-growing IT Solution Providers. Prior to founding Davenport Group, St. Charles was a senior vice president at Deluxe Corporation and served as the vice president of human resources of PaperDirect. Today, St. Charles focuses on leading the strategic vision and direction of this rapidly growing IT Solution Provider. Under her guidance, Davenport Group has achieved double-digit growth for over a decade. In 2020, Davenport Group was ranked as one of Inc. Magazine's 500|5000 Fastest Growing Private Companies for the 8th consecutive year, was selected as one of Inc. Magazine's Best Places to Work, and was also named to CRN's Fast Growth 150, Solution Provider 500 and Tech Elite 250 lists earning them the honor as one of CRN's Triple Crown Award winners for the second consecutive year. Personally, Sonia St. Charles has been honored by CRN as a Power 30 Solution Provider, named among the Top Women of the Channel and featured as the Woman of the Day. https://www.davenportgroup.com/

Take a listen as George and Deluxe’s President and CEO Barry McCarthy discuss how the company continues to adapt to and prosper in the digital age. Barry talks about the journey the company has taken, in recent times shifting from a conglomerate model grown via acquisition to today’s streamlined and focused small business focused organization. The Journey from Paper to Digital Services In Glenbrook’s Payments Boot Camps® we make the point that fintechs rarely invent new functions out of whole cloth. What they do excel at is reimagining and reengineering the processes that incumbent players have been locked into for years. It’s the incumbent’s inability to adapt that puts them at a competitive disadvantage. As Charles Darwin put it: “The species that survives is the one that is able best to adapt and adjust to the changing environment in which it finds itself.” We make this point in our training. Incumbent firms, no matter what the industry, survive and succeed over decades only if they have the ability to adapt to change in their environment. You only have to glance at the moves Visa and Mastercard have made over the last five years - the acquisitions of Plaid and Vocalink (among many) come to mind - and it’s obvious adaptation is at the core of their respective strategies. In this episode, we speak with a company that has over 100 years of adaptation behind it. Starting with the invention of the checkbook a century ago Deluxe Corporation has expanded and adapted its offerings to the digital needs of its customers. Take a listen as George and Deluxe’s President and CEO Barry McCarthy discuss how the company continues to adapt to and prosper in the digital age. Barry talks about the journey the company has taken, in recent times shifting from a conglomerate model growing by acquisition to today’s more streamlined and focused organization.  

Insurance companies just can’t shake the paper check. In a podcast with PYMNTS, Todd Tracey, executive director at MPX, Deluxe Corporation said eChecks and AI are being used to adjudicate claims and issue payments.

On this special episode of the Treasury Update Podcast, Strategic Treasurer features its panel discussion on payments from the 2020 AFP Virtual Conference. Moderator Dave Robertson, Managing Director of Deluxe Corporation, interviews Doug Cranston of Bottomline Technologies, Sylvia Rodee of Fifth Third Bank, Leigh Moore of Visa, and Craig Jeffery of Strategic Treasurer on new payment channels and types across the world. Listen in to this lively panel discussion and debate on technology developments, issues, and predictions around payments.

My guest for Episode 22 is Garry Capers, who is General Manager of Cloud Solutions at Deluxe Corporation. I met Garry at Equifax when we worked together in their commercial division of the company. Garry has had a very successful career, first as a consultant and then made the transition to industry work. I have always been impressed with Garry's intelligence, analytical decision making, and his ability to stay calm in high pressure situations. He shared some of his steps to success, including knowing your strengths, being patience, and then taking action when the situation presents itself. We also talked a little bit about today's social issues and Garry offered up some advice on being an ally for positive change. I enjoyed our conversation and I hope you do as well! You can learn more about Garry on LinkedIn or his company Deluxe.

The Digital Banking Report has just completed research on the impact of the pandemic on financial marketing. We found that changes in almost every area of financial marketing were more dramatic than in any of the previous 7 years. This is primarily because consumer adoption of digital alternatives advanced a decade in a matter of weeks. We found major changes in marketing spend, solution prioritization, use of data and technology, and even marketing talent deployment that will unlikely revert to pre-pandemic norms. Some of these changes represent accelerations of previous trends, while some are new trends altogether. It is yet to be seen the duration of these changes, but each deserves a careful review. To discuss the findings of our State of Financial Marketing report, we are joined by Barry McCarthy, president and CEO of Deluxe Corporation, the sponsor of the report. In this episode, we discuss this year’s findings and the ramifications for financial institutions in the future.

With COVID-19 upending our work and home lives, how does user experience need to change to reflect the "new normal"? This week on The Inbound Success Podcast, I dig into this question with guest Bob Berry, a virtual operations and user experience expert who is a principal at AnswerLab and founder of ItsTheUsers. Bob has helped some of the world's largest companies, including Google, Apple, Amazon, Facebook and others, to create new, optimal online experiences in the age of Coronavirus and in this interview, he explains why companies must relearn what their customers and prospects ant and expect as their lives are transformed by the pandemic.  Bob says that to not only survive, but compete and win in the future, businesses need to create optimal online experiences now. Check out the podcast to get his advance on how to go about doing that. Highlights from my conversation with Bob include: The sudden shift to working from home during the Coronavirus has put digital, virtual and online experiences front and center in a way that they have not been before. This makes it imperative that companies develop a deep understanding of what their customers' lives look like now in this new normal so that they can craft experiences that match that.  Bob believes that virtually everything that happens in business is a set of individual choices or decisions by real people and the sum total of those choices is what drives the global economy. This is why user experience design is so critical. Because of changes related to the pandemic, we're going to have to determine, as marketers, whether the assumptions we've made about how people buy are still valid. And if they're not, we're going to have to learn what the new patterns are. One area that Bob believes will change is how people think about data and privacy. He predicts we'll have a quicker movement to more stringent privacy rules, prompted in part by the need to do more contact tracing related to Coronavirus. Changing user experience require that you look holistically at a business. Bob gave the example of his work with Deluxe Corporation, where he undertook an omnichannel business assessment that looked at the entire lifecycle of a customer's experience with the company. The result of that assessment and the changes the company made drove an additional $3 million to the company's bottom line. Bob says the best way to get started is by doing an inventory of every touchpoint that a customer has with your business. From there, you can use that data to develop a new narrative around what the buying journey looks like today. Understanding customer buying journeys is not an event, according to Bob, but rather a process that must be undertaken on an ongoing basis. One way to accomplish this is through survey tools and diaries that require your customers to document their interactions with your business. Bob has used a tool called dscout to do this in the past. For now, the two things that businesses can focus on are how they will stay in touch with and maintain relationships with their customers in the future, and what their products/services need to look like going forward. Resources from this episode: Visit the ItsTheUsers website Visit the AnswerLab website Connect with Bob on LinkedIn Follow Bob on Twitter Listen to the podcast to learn how the keys to business success have shifted, and what companies need to know -- and do -- right now to create user experiences that will position them for success in the future. Transcript Kathleen Booth (Host): Welcome back to the Inbound Success Podcast. I'm your host Kathleen Booth. And this week my guest is Bob Barry who is the founder and principal of it's the users. Welcome to the podcast, Bob. Bob Berry (Guest): Thanks Kathleen. Glad to be here. Looking forward to this. Bob and Kathleen recording this episode. Kathleen: I am really looking forward to this because this is an interesting time and as we're recording this we're I don't even know how many weeks -- seven, eight weeks, what have you -- into pandemic quarantine. I guess it depends on where you live and et cetera, but it feels like forever and the world has undeniably changed quite a bit in that time. I think many people are just starting to kind of find their footing in what may or may not become the new normal. So we're going to talk a little bit about that and what that means for user experience. About Bob Berry and ItsTheUsers Kathleen: But before we do that, could you please tell my audience a little bit about what ItsTheUsers is and your background, and how you came to be doing what you're doing today? Bob: Certainly. So, my history goes actually back quite a ways. I originally got my degree in computer science and out of college, I actually worked for Hewlett Packard back in the day when bill and Dave were still alive. It was a very different company back then and I was one of their early eCommerce business managers when the internet and the web came along. And that's where I first started getting involved in this whole idea of experience and how experiences can really influence what we do in business. Back in those days, we developed some of the early social media, online learning, e-commerce and cloud based services before a lot of those terms even existed. I actually left HP to get involved in a number of startups during the dot com boom, and started a company that did a lot of training and learning and curriculum for youth. We actually embedded some pretty interesting experiences for young people to help them get ready for life. We were pretty far into that as we approached the great recession when a lot of the spending was starting to dry up and entrepreneurs like myself were struggling. My wife sat me down. We had five kids, four cats, and a dog at that time. And we were surviving on her teacher, principal income. She worked in public education. She sat me down and said, Hey, this isn't working. We need to find a way to have my income be more stable and more predictable. So I actually made a big shift at that point, that was around 2007, 2008 and actually became full time involved in user experience and really understanding what impact that has on business, what impact that has on people. And I've been doing user experience in one form or another since then, both as an independent and working in a corporate environment. Now I'm working for a company called AnswerLab. I do that in addition to ItsTheUsers.com. AnswerLab is really focused on working with a lot of major companies. We work with Google, Facebook, Amazon, and doing projects for all of those companies right now around user experience and helping them to figure out how to adapt what they're doing and shift their online presence and their digital strategies into this new world we're about to enter. ItsTheUsers.com is focused on bringing new people into the world of user experience and really understanding how to do that. So it's focused on a lot of people that may not have a tremendous amount of money to spend who can't pay the big ticket research studies that some of those big brands can. So it's a really interesting mix. I get to work with those big companies, you know, they invent a lot of cool new stuff and I get to work with them and put those out in the public and learn how real people react to things that those companies are inventing. And then with ItsTheUsers.com I get to work with a lot of small businesses, professionals, entrepreneurs and help introduce them to this whole world as well. And of course now we're entering this whole new phase. Like you say, we've only been a few weeks into this and we're all very interested to see how this is going to unfold and what's going to happen as we try to go back to work as we try to get our businesses restarted. I think we all have a lot to learn about how this new world is going to function. Kathleen: Absolutely. Boy, listening to you tell your story, I just have to share that it really hit close to home because when that recession hit in 2008/9, my husband and I owned a digital marketing agency together and we had four kids and two dogs. I'm listening to you tell the story and we looked at each other and we were like, Oh God, we're in the same company. We're totally in this boat together. It's either gonna sink or it's gonna float. You know, it was, those were some crazy times. I guess for that reason, my heart goes out to people who own businesses right now because I've been through that experience and I just remember so clearly the stress that that put us under at the time. So that could be a whole other podcast that we talk about, but we won't, it would probably be very stressful. It could be several podcasts, but you know, focusing on the situation that the world is in right now, it's such a unique situation, but it's also, in some very interesting ways, at least to me, it's presenting us with a unique, once in a lifetime opportunity because it's really speeding up some things that I think were going to happen anyway as far as movements to remote work and the acceleration of companies really doing more business online and all of these things that we were sort of creeping towards over time. But that process has accelerated dramatically as a result of what's happened, and I know a lot of companies are kind of scrambling to figure out what it means for them. So in terms of user experience, I'm just going to hand it over to you and I would love to hear what you're seeing as far as the changes and what you've seen done well and where companies need to improve. It's a big topic. So, you know, where do we start with this? How is COVID-19 changing user experience? Bob: Yeah, it's a big question and there are a lot of challenges wrapped up in this. I think one of the major effects that's happening right now is because of the need to quarantine, the social distance, all the lockdowns that are happening, you know, not just here in this country, but really all over the world. It's putting digital, virtual, online in the center of what we're all going to need to adapt to in a much bigger way. Fortunately, we've been working on this for a long time with the internet and the web and a lot of these virtual tools and platforms have been around long enough that all of us, or most of us, are pretty familiar with them. But as we drive that massive shift to digital and virtual, if you look at all the industries out there -- look at education, finance, entertainment, sports -- the ways we interact socially, you know? Medicine, commerce... So many things now are being transformed by this and digital and virtual really becomes the centerpiece of how we're going to have to conduct business and interact with one another. In the midst of that, there are going to be a lot of new innovations. Things are gonna change. So some of the old ways of doing things are going to go away and there are going to be a lot of new technologies. We're already seeing some of these now. A lot of new innovations are coming out just dealing with the virus. We're coming out with a lot of new technologies and new ways and of course people, as they're working remotely or as they're living and socializing remotely, we're inventing a lot of new ways to apply this technology. So to cope with all of that and deal with all of this change, the experience really is the centerpiece of all that. And so Kathleen, I kind of have this crazy idea that I promote, you know, both in my role with ItsTheUsers.com and then in my research role with AnswerLab, and the premise is that virtually everything that happens in business is a set of individual choices or decisions by real people. So certainly in inbound marketing, if somebody is going to respond to some content marketing, if they're going to react to a paid ad, if they're going to click on anything online, it's all about individual people making individual choices and decisions. And all of those decisions happen within whatever experience we put out there for them to encounter. And in fact, the other part of this theory for me is that the sum total of all of those choices is really what drives the global economy. So if that's really true, if experience is that centerpiece, if that's truly what happens, then all of it is being transformed right now. When I talk about user experience, it's more than just sort of the traditional usability. It's really about understanding people. Who are they? What are their lives like? What are their challenges? What's their personal narrative? So understanding that whole journey that they're on and therefore how do they accomplish what they need to -- that's a key part of the experience as well. So, those trends that the personal and business people that were going through this massive pivot to digital and all of the new innovations that are going to occur as a result of this, they all intersect in the experience. So we have to figure out how to invent better and new experiences so people can function, so business can function, so we can continue to run and do what we do. And we're going to have to find new ways of building, deploying and verifying all that, because now we have to do it all remotely. Kathleen: Yeah, it's so true. It's very interesting as I listen to you talk about it, I thought of a personal thing that happened in the last couple of days that I think for me at least illustrates part of what's changed. Everybody's talking about how the whole world is all of a sudden using Zoom. I've used them for years. I've worked remotely for a long time and sometimes I feel like I spend more time with Zoom than I do with my husband. So for me, Zoom has always felt very easy to use and very intuitive. I think it was designed for a person like me who is relatively, you know, technologically fluent, spends a lot of time on their computer, working remotely, et cetera. But in the last two months, the number of users of zoom has mushroomed and it includes a lot of people who are not as technologically fluent, who don't spend as much time on computers. And for me, the way this has really come to light is, I joke that my unpaid second job is that I'm now a Zoom tutor and I have taught my sister in law, my parents and my mother-in-law all how to use Zoom so that we could do these family calls. My mother in law in particular just is really reticent about it and you know, she's a little older. It was really interesting because I got her to the point where she could get on and join a call. But the other day she called me and said, I want to be able to start a call. And we went onto that little, the Zoom screen. I'm sure most people are familiar with it by now, where it says like, join, start, schedule, et cetera. And she didn't understand the difference between schedule and start and join. So I was listening to you talk. It got me thinking that Zoom is a great example, it has this new audience that doesn't just intuitively understand the differences in those meanings and it's almost like they need to change that little screen. Just say I want to start a meeting, schedule one for later, join someone else's meeting. It needs to be even more explicit now for those people who aren't as much digital natives as maybe it's prior user base wise. So I just wanted to share that story because it's so fresh in my mind and it's nothing that I ever would have thought of. To me, the interface of zoom just seems so easy and simple. But then when I was walking through it with her, I was able to see it through a different lens. Bob: Yeah. I have to laugh because I'm sure you've heard the Zoom story yesterday with the Supreme court. So the Supreme court is trying to hear cases and make decisions using Zoom and similar kind of situation, there are probably a lot of them in the same age group as your mom. Well, apparently somebody used the bathroom and there was the sound of a flushing toilet. That's now referred to as the flush heard round the world. And I haven't heard yet who exactly was. So here's these most distinguished members of our society and they're struggling with something as simple as remembering to hit mute when they do something personal or they're on zoom. So that's a really good example. Another really important dimension of this that I wanted to bring up and kind of get your perspective on as well, because we're so early in this process, speaking of inbound and I've been, you know, been around the internet and the web since the very beginning and I've seen so many changes and one of the major changes that of course has occurred is our access to data. In such a big way, data drives what so many inbound programs and capabilities do. I think we're in the beginning of a major shift in data. I've also done a lot of research around data privacy and personal data on how individuals deal with this. As we try to deal with this pandemic, I think one of the things that's coming is we have to increase our ability to test, trace and track who's got the virus, who's had the virus, et cetera. We're in the middle of this big experiment where big parts of the country are trying to go back to work, but we don't have that capability yet. Google and Apple have announced that their devices can communicate, and we hear about new apps now being launched that are supposed to provide this capability. Well, I suspect that people, in order to trust this process of gathering all this data to manage the virus, are going to have to be very confident that that data is protected in a whole different kind of way. If that happens, does that mean new regulations are going to come into effect, new practices, new principles around how we gather and use data and are those practices and principles now and probably going to be a lot more strict, are they going to apply to the data that we acquire for marketing purposes, for inbound marketing purposes? And so what does that future look like? And so it's really difficult to predict where that's going to go, but that's something I'm really keeping a close eye on to see what kind of data requirements are going to be needed. What influence is it going to have on all the other data that we have out there right now? And, you know, then I think it also begs the question of is the data that we have now on our customers that we use so widely in inbound marketing, is that data still valid? Is the world changing enough that we're going to have to relearn some of that because people's buying patterns or their preferences or their economics have changed? So there's some big issues at work that we're looking at. Kathleen: Oh, I, I totally agree with you. I think there's absolutely a heightened awareness around data now, especially health data as you pointed out. Interestingly, I think businesses and marketers in particular are having to rethink the whole notion of personalization and tracking because so much of it was done based on IP addresses, corporate IP addresses, which, with everybody working from home, you lose the ability to track that way. Not to mention then the whole topic of accessibility. You know, when you have people who are visually or hearing impaired, who might have been able to physically come into a business in the past more easily now really can't. There's always been this requirement that websites be built in a way that's accessible. But so few businesses have really done it. I just think it's going to happen on so many fronts that we have no idea the tidal wave of change that's going to hit us. Bob: Yeah, I agree. And I think one of the key aspects of this that we're trying to implement and that's really a lot of what we're trying to stay on the forefront of is to figure out ways to track all of this, to stay in touch with these people, to learn, you know, individuals in businesses. There are so many ways that individual businesses are trying to adapt. Now businesses are coming up with some very creative ways of reacting to this. And then, you know, how our individual lives are changing and you know, how are we going to keep our fingers on the pulse of everything that's going on. And there's, again, so many dimensions to this. So from a research standpoint, there's a lot that we need to pay attention to, and a lot of new tools and methods and approaches that we have to put in place in order to continue this relearning process. And again, it's what kind of new experiences are going to be required to help people that maybe have never used Zoom before that are now going to have to deal with new apps on their phones because they're going to be tracking health data or you know, they're not working in an office anymore. They're working at home and what does that mean about their whole set of digital experiences that they have to deal with? So being able to relearn it, retrack it, gather all the data that's required, create all the new experiences -- that's what we're trying to stay in front of and trying to help other companies and individuals figure out how to do that as well. How are companies changing user experience in response to the Coronavirus? Kathleen: Well, there's no doubt that the changes, it's not just coming, it's already started. So I'm curious to dive into some specifics. What are some, some specific things that you have seen or worked with? I know you probably can't talk about specific clients and what you're doing for them, but, in generalized terms, can you share any specific examples of things that have had to change already in order to adjust user experiences to the new environment? Bob: Yeah, so there's a lot going on out there right now. So again, being able to understand, first of all, who is your audience and how is that changing? So who are these individuals? What kind of things are they dealing with? I think it's important to make the distinction between whether you're talking to B2B or B2C, because those are different types of dynamics. There's a lot of business and instructional and operational changes that organizations have to deal with as far as how to go remote. So in this process of staying in touch with your customers and learning what they're up to, how are you going to manage your workforce? How are you going to manage whoever your teams are as you go through that process? I think there's also a tendency to want to stay in touch with the larger trends out there. So what's happening, you know, socially and politically, economically? There's money available from the government and how are you going to get access to that and how are your customers and your clients getting access to that and how does that change what you might be doing with them? An example that I can name, where we actually did a pretty massive business transformation process, maybe it's helpful in this context to give you an example of the kinds of things that we've done that will need to evolve but that are still very sound practices. So a few years ago I did a study for Deluxe Corporation.This was actually in the midst of the great recession. So they were in the process of doing a pretty major business transformation and their business is very much about financial documents and checks and related types of products. We did what was called an omni-channel business assessment, and this was something that took place over a couple of years. We looked at a number of different touch points. The reason it's called Omni channel is because we look at a variety of different ways that they interact with customers. So we looked at email, we looked at web, we looked at their call center, we looked at all of their print programs and we also assessed their direct sales force. This was a combination of both B2B and B2C. The problem with just looking at any one of those is, any one customer can touch multiple aspects of their business. Somebody can pick up a catalog and interact with that and then they may find a phone number and then dial the number and talk to somebody in the call center. They may get an email message with that, which then sends them to a website. So there's all sorts of aspects of inbound marketing involved with this. There's probably a few outbound aspects as well. And so long story short, over a couple of years, we assessed all of those different touch points and made sure that the overall experience was effective, that people could find their way around that, the pathways from one aspect of it to another were smooth, that the messaging was consistent, and that the people that different aspects of that you could hand a customer off effectively from one, one part to another. At the end of the day we were able to drive over $3 million of new business to their top line by optimizing all that. And this was in the midst of the great recession when things were financially very challenging. So that type of approach I think is going to be a really important, that sort of omni-channel, multi touchpoint approach is going to be really useful, really important as we enter this new world. Because in a lot of ways, all of those different touch points are going to be changing and evolving for businesses. And if you don't pay attention to all of them, you won't have the big picture of what's really going on and the different journeys and pathways that customers might be taking in interacting with your business. How to get started Kathleen: So where can companies get started? How do they begin? You know, if somebody is listening to this right now and they're thinking, okay, things are going to need to change. We don't maybe know how much permanent change that it's going to be, but obviously things need to change. How do they begin to wrap their heads around this and, and begin to figure out what's the right approach? Bob: I think you have to start, I think a lot of cases with where you are. So what do you know now about who your buyers, your prospects, your customers, your users? You have to start with them. If you haven't already, it's important to begin to develop some sense of their story, their narrative, and again, who they are, what they're challenged with, where do they live and work? Are they still in an office? Are they still in their store? Is that whole work environment now changing? How they make buying decisions -- is that still the same or how is that evolving? So you have to start by understanding what are those stories, those narratives, those journeys that people are going through. And there's a variety of ways to do that. There are a lot of a very effective tools out there right now because the demand for doing a lot of this remotely is increasing pretty rapidly as you can imagine. So you know, if you go out there and look, there's a lot of different ways that you can interact with these customers and gather a lot of information and survey them or really understand who they are and what type of interactions that they're dealing with. So once you have a sense of who they are, those journeys, those personas, those narratives about who they are, then it's a process of understanding. Again, what experiences do you need to put in front of them? Are those web experiences or those phone experiences? Are they mobile? Are they on an app? What are all the ways that you need to interact with them so that they can understand your business and what you offer? Do an inventory of all of your touch points, and certainly inbound marketing is a key part of that as well, and begin to measure how much business you're getting through those different channels and begin to put in place ways to actually understand and observe how they interact with those experiences. You're going to want to do this on an ongoing basis. This is a process and not an event. You want to make sure that over time you can start to identify what are some trends that are going on and begin to track those trends. Again, there are a lot of different ways and approaches to evaluate mobile experiences and a lot of different ways to evaluate in person or desktop or web based experiences. So there's a lot of different approaches and tools that are available to do that. Tools for doing audience research Kathleen: So you mentioned starting by learning more about your audience and your customers. Are there any particular tools that you've worked with that are favorites of yours? I imagine there are some that probably are better for larger companies with bigger budgets and some that are better for smaller guys with smaller budgets. Any, you know, sort of list of your favorite tools? Bob: Yeah, so there are various tools out there that can do a variety of what we consider like diaries. So we actually have tools that allow people to keep track over time of how different apps or devices or interfaces work within their lives. So, understanding a day in the life or a week in the life of somebody based on having them create a diary of how they interact with your business or your apps or your website gives you a good sense of putting those things into context of who they are and what they're dealing with. So diary tools are really important. One that we use is called Dscout and we have some of our own internal tools that we use as well.  Kathleen: How do you get somebody to follow through on it though? Because obviously you're asking them to spend time for you documenting how they interact with your business or your product. And I know just from experience myself and from working with other marketers that very often even just getting customers to agree to doing a 15 minute phone call or filling out a survey can sometimes be a battle. How have you found is the best way to get people to comply and follow through on keeping those kinds of records? Bob: We usually provide some kind of incentive. So in many cases we, they get paid for their time. Some companies, when they do this kind of research, they may provide some kind of in kind reward. So if it's a restaurant chain that's doing this kind of study, they might offer vouchers for food or something like that. It might include something simple like an Amazon gift card. And so usually we try and incent people, give them some kind of reward for whatever time they invest. And that can vary based on how much time you want them to participate, and how involved you want them to be. But that seems to be the best way. Kathleen: Any particular approaches that work well for B2B companies? Bob: We put quite a bit of effort into locating and recruiting the right people. So a lot of times in the recruiting phase, we have questionnaires that we put together, and we ask people about what they do and you can kind of gauge their level of interest or their level of willingness to participate in something like this. We have a lot of third party companies that we've worked with that have databases of people and companies that they've worked with. So we also have individuals that might be more inclined to want to be involved, make a contribution there and are willing to follow through on this kind of thing. How are companies adapting to the new normal? Kathleen: Got it. So I'm curious if you have any examples of specific changes that you've seen companies need to make as a result of Coronavirus and this new environment that we're living in? Bob: Yeah, so it varies a lot. So just in my own neighborhood here, I'm seeing companies become very creative. We have what used to be a cafe down the street. Because people can't go in and congregate there anymore, they've made the shift to providing produce. They obviously had suppliers that they used for doing whatever they were doing to serve their cafe. And so now they've evolved to actually using those food suppliers to providing fresh meat and cheese and produce to people in the neighborhood. And they restrict how many people can be in the store. So being able to adapt, looking at your available resources, supply chains, customer base, and being able to think of new ways, and doing a lot of this online. So now if you want something, you go online, you can order everything that you need. And the only time you need to spend physically in the store is just to go in and pick up your bag and leave. So all the ordering and payment and everything happens online. Another example is a local construction company. I have a videographer partner that I work with and he's doing work with them to take everything that they do and turn it into video. So if you want to do a remodel or if you want to do various types of home improvements, then you can go online and you can look at a lot of examples of things that they do with video. You can also take your phone and do a video walkthrough of your house and show the areas that you want to have remodeled. And then they will take that and turn it around and they'll provide another video that will describe to the homeowner exactly the steps that they're going to take and where they're going to be in the house or what they're going to do. And so the amount of time that they have to spend face to face is really minimal. There's so many examples of this, of companies figuring out how to adapt, and how to do things better, how to do things differently. Kathleen: That's really smart. Having now spent so much time in my house for the last several weeks, I would love to just have them come in and tell me what I should change in my house. Because I have found that being stuck at home through the Coronavirus, you start to see like every little maintenance project that you've ignored for so long becomes that much more in your face and annoying because you're spending so much time with it. So I imagine they're getting a lot of traction with that offer. Bob: Yeah, they are. And they'll even give you a video of when the work is actually going to occur. They'll kind of stage it out for you and say, you know, we need to be in your home on these days to do these steps. And obviously all the products and all the materials and colors and all that kind of stuff, they provide all that to make that available as well. So those are just a couple of examples of figuring out how to adapt and certainly digital and online creating those new kinds of experiences again, are going to be a critical part of how companies can do this. You know, at AnswerLab, we have offices in New York and San Francisco and in early March, like a lot of companies, we had to turn on a dime and figure out how to be remote. And so that's another aspect of this too. Depending on what your business is, you're going to have to get creative in building and managing and maintaining a remote workforce. Now obviously for some companies, this is going to be easy. Other companies, this is going to be a lot more challenging. So it varies a lot in how you might approach this and how you might go about doing that. If it would be helpful, I can share with you what we went through in this whole process of making our whole operation remote. And it's actually going quite well right now. And fortunately a lot of the companies that we work with have gone remote as well. So we've created a whole virtual culture and whole virtual operation that, right now is, is running quite smoothly. Kathleen: Oh, that's great. I think there are a lot of companies struggling with that, that weren't used to working remotely before. I've worked in places that have been almost entirely remote and there are definitely playbooks out there for how to do this and how to do it well. You just have to be willing to embrace them. It's things like being on video when you talk to other people and not everybody's ready for that, but, but it can really make a difference. Bob: Yeah. And we have what I like to say is a MacGyver kind of culture, which is, there's all these technical challenges and everybody's willing to jump in and just figure things out, trying out new tools, trying to figure out new ways of interacting with our clients. How do we share information? How do we conduct research? How do we do a lot of in person workshops and brainstorming sessions and, you know, how do you replicate that kind of team spirit and that kind collaboration interaction when you have to do it all through a computer screen? There are actually a lot of really creative ways to do it. So figuring it out, just jumping in with both feet, getting everybody involved, creating a culture of making it happen, is really important. Kathleen: Yeah. I think the same challenge is really facing the events industry. I've been parts of lots of calls with people who've been talking about how they used to hold in person events, conferences, et cetera, and now we're going to try to do them virtually. Let's not just make it into one long webinar. Let's try and capture some of that same feeling you get when you're there in person in a new way online. It's a similar challenge Bob: Yeah. And that's, that's another example of it. Entirely new excited experiences that we're going to have to figure out. I mean, there's so many large events. You know, before I got into podcasting, I used to do a lot of teaching and speaking at conferences and, you know, we have to completely rethink that now. And those are a whole new set of experiences that we're all going to have to figure out how to create. How to validate that they work and people are getting what they want out of them? And then we're gonna have to figure out how to participate in them and, and make them successful. What are some things you can do now to prepare your business for the future? Kathleen: Yeah. Well if there's a marketer or a business owner listening and they're thinking, okay, I need to focus on this for myself. Do you have like two or three key pieces of advice for them that they should really focus on in the next couple of weeks? Bob: So are you thinking about the whole process of going remote or the whole process of figuring out what this new digital world is gonna look like? Kathleen: The latter. Bob: I think a couple of things that people need to do is they need to figure out what are the ways that they're going to stay in touch with their customers. Who are your buyers, your purchasers, your prospects? How are you going to develop longterm connections with them as they evolve, as they adapt to what their new world is going to look like? And then to figure out how to put your business, whatever product or service you're offering, how are you going to evolve that along with them to stay relevant, to make sure that you're still something that they're going to need and be willing to pay for? Whatever those businesses and those individuals are going through, whatever is changing in their lives, that's going to determine how your business needs to evolve to stay with them. So number one, you need to figure out how you're going to maintain those connections and do that relearning that's necessary. And then the second part of it is, what kinds of experiences are going to be required? And of course a lot of those experiences are going to be virtual, digital, online. Does that mean you're going to need a new kind of app in order to communicate with them? Does that mean you're going to have to now, like with the example of the construction company or you're going to have to start developing new types of media, like video or audio, are you going to have to create new ways of selecting and ordering your products? Does that mean a new eCommerce system? So figure out who they are, where they're going, what they're up to, what they're experiencing, and then decide how you're going to create the right kind of virtual digital experiences that are going to be relevant and important to them and how you're going to make sure all that plays together. That's probably the most important thing right now because it's changing rapidly and now's the time to start relearning. Kathleen's two questions Kathleen: Good advice. Well, shifting gears, I have two questions I ask all of my guests and I'm curious to know your thoughts on these. The first is, is there a particular company or individual that you think sets the standard for inbound marketing? Bob: Yeah, I actually, I thought about that quite a while. As I mentioned, we work with a lot of the big brands, you know, Facebook and Amazon and Google and FedEx and they have obviously some great examples there. But another company that I worked with for a long time is actually a fairly small operation. They're based here in Colorado, and the leader is called Jeff Walker and he's in charge of something called Product Launch Formula and years ago, he developed an inbound system that allows you to go out and find a target audience and interact with them and provide them a lot of valuable content and draw them into your product or service through really effective content marketing. He does a lot of books and courses and affiliate programs and video and email and stuff like that. He does a lot of the things that work well. I think the number one thing that stands out for me though is so many organizations and companies that I see online are using his system, which to me is the greatest testimony. So you can tell your story through PR or marketing programs, but nothing speaks like success and the number of organizations and people and platforms out there that have adopted his model. I think if you look at a lot of the inbound programs now, they actually use a lot of the principles that he developed probably decades ago. So he's one that I pointed to it because he's had such, such a big influence on the whole digital and virtual marketing world. Kathleen: That's a great example. I'll definitely have to check that one out. Second question, marketers always talk about how difficult it is to stay abreast of the rapidly changing digital landscape. I think the conversation we just had is a perfect example of that. How do you personally stay up to date and keep yourself educated? Bob: Well, podcasts is certainly a big one. I listened to a lot of them. I listen to them pretty constantly. I do a lot of reading. LinkedIn is a big source for me as well. I do a lot in networking, so I learn from people and I get a lot of great information off of LinkedIn just from what's posted there in the form of learning and articles and also, another way is just really through my colleagues. I work with a lot of very talented people and they're constantly presenting new challenges and new technical things to solve. And so that, to me, is probably one of the best ways I learn is just sort of on the ground, you know, with my fingers in it and trying to figure out how to make it all work. That's probably a big one for me. Kathleen: Any particular podcasts that you really love? Bob: So I actually listen to a lot of historical podcasts. I'm also a big fan of Sam Harris. Right now I've been listening to a lot of podcasts on LinkedIn about LinkedIn to figure out how to do better as we now have to do a lot more things virtually. And we don't have to do as much face to face and really trying to get geared up for LinkedIn. I actually listened to a very interesting historical podcast yesterday about pandemics and putting all of this into context. It was very interesting to kind of see the big picture over history. Probably one of the big takeaways there is that there are a lot of people who hope we can get back to normal and I think they're thinking of the old normal, but we have to let go of the old normal because it's gone. We're looking at a new one and we have to figure out what that means. Kathleen: Yeah. It's amazing how quickly things can change, isn't it? How to connect with Bob Kathleen: Well this has been so fascinating and I think you're doing really interesting work with a lot of really interesting companies. If somebody is listening to this and they want to connect with you online or learn more, ask a question, what's the best way for them to do that? Bob: Certainly LinkedIn. So look up Bob Barry. That's B E R R Y on LinkedIn. And again, I'm associated with AnswerLab and with ItsTheUsers also. You can go to my homepage at inbound.itstheusers.com. You know what to do next... Kathleen: Awesome. All right. I'll put that link in the show notes. If you're listening and you liked what you heard today or you learn something new, I would really appreciate it if you would go to Apple podcasts and leave the podcast a five star review. That helps us get found by new listeners. And if you know someone who's doing great inbound marketing work, tweet me @workmommwork, because I would love to make them my next guest. Thank you so much for joining me this week, Bob. Bob: Kathleen, thank you very much. Good luck, so they say.  

Amanda Brinkman is the creator and co-host of Hulu's Small Business Revolution, as well as the Chief Brand and Communications Officer at Deluxe Corporation. She joins us to speak about one of the keys to effective leadership, creating a safe space.

From the grounding of planes during 9-11 to hurricanes and snowstorms to COVID-19, major issues wreak havoc on AR processes and disrupt vital cashflow and impacts a corporation’s relationship with their customers. Host Craig Jeffery joins Managing Director Dave Robertson and Product Manager Beth Bourgoin of Deluxe Corporation to discuss the reasons for and concepts around making accounts receivable undisruptible. They share valuable insights on major issues disrupting AR processes today and technology-enabled solutions to position companies for success. Listen in to the discussion to find out more.  

Think it's impossible to be an executive and a mom? Think again. Amanda Brinkman, Chief Brand Officer of Deluxe Corporation is shifting the narrative on what it means to be ambitious both at work and at home. Listen to the week's episode and find out what she finds to be the ultimate time prioritizer, how she still manages to volunteer at her kiddo's school, and what she's gotten wrong and right about her approach to her career and parenting over the years. RAVES: Maria: Carrie Underwood CALIA Workout Gear Emily: Thistle Farms Essential Oil Bracelet CONNECT: Emily: @thecorporatemomlife Maria: @confessions_of_a_corporate_mom The Podcast: @thecorporatemomlifepod  

When Amanda Brinkman joined Deluxe as Chief Brand & Communications Officer, she threw aside the traditional marketing playbook. Amanda knew content marketing would be the only way to open a dialogue with Deluxe and the small businesses they serve. She risked everything on producing and hosting a cinematic documentary series, Small Business Revolution.Through Small Business Revolution, she's revitalized the main streets of four inspiring small towns, and just kicked off filming for season five. Through deep, personal storytelling, the show highlights integrity, innovation, and perseverance.Amanda has inspired countless people to shop small and help rebuild American towns that are down, but not out. And, she's helped Deluxe remain true to the businesses they help on a daily basis. To truly succeed with content, you have to do more than talk about purpose, you have to drive action.Check out more of Amanda Brinkman's amazing work here: https://www.amandakbrinkman.com/

Amanda Brinkman is the Chief Brand and Communications Officer at Deluxe Corporation and creator, producer and host of the hit series “Small Business Revolution,” which was named among Inc. Magazine's top shows for entrepreneurs. In the inspirational reality show, Brinkman showcases her love for small towns by spearheading efforts to revitalize entire communities by increasing the effectiveness of small businesses. In its first season, “Small Business Revolution” documented the $500,000 revitalization of Wabash, Indiana, in an online series featuring Brinkman and celebrity entrepreneur Robert Herjavec. After a wildly successful first year, they headed to Bristol Borough, Pennsylvania, for a second season and another round of small-business makeovers. For season 3, Brinkman was joined by a new co-host, renovation icon Ty Pennington, and brought the Small Business Revolution movement to the town of Alton, Illinois. And now, in the hit show's fourth season, Brinkman and Pennington will tackle a variety of marketing challenges for small businesses in Searcy, Arkansas. Brinkman is a sought-after public speaker, sharing her “Do Well By Doing Good” philosophy on stages around the country. She demonstrates how both companies and individuals can make a meaningful and positive difference in people's lives, while increasing their own success in the process. It is her passionate belief that companies must identify their brand's purpose but they cannot stop there, they must find their unique brand action. What You Will Learn: What is the Small Business Revolution The difference between giving and giving back How Amanda is increasing the effectiveness of small businesses across the U.S. Typical mistakes that SMBs make in their marketing efforts What is an intrapreneur How to bring creativity into a corporate environment Resources: Twitter: @amandakbrinkman Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/deluxecorp/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amandakbrinkman/ Website: https://www.deluxe.com/small-business-revolution/ Website: https://www.amandakbrinkman.com/blog/qa-with-leadership-expert-sue-hawkes/ Effectiveness | Revitalizing Main Street Small Business Revolution Outside of Amanda Brinkman's role as the Chief Brand and Communications Officer at Deluxe Corporation, she is the creator and host of “Small Business Revolution.” Amanda was inspired to tell the stories of 100 small businesses across the country, but it has since developed into an immensely popular docuseries changing hearts and minds everywhere. Her goal is to revitalize the proverbial “Main Street” in small towns throughout the U.S. by increasing the effectiveness and strength of their small businesses. Giving Back “Giving back” is a non-negotiable. Our purpose on this earth is to make other people's lives better, but so many companies draw the line at philanthropy and volunteerism. Large companies have a responsibility to take it a step further because they have the means to “give back” on a grand scale. Amanda increased Deluxe's effectiveness in this territory by devising a plan to help small businesses where it really counts. She found that the best way to connect with small businesses is to work with them directly, and Deluxe's offerings reflect that. Inspire Support Deluxe's products and services increase the effectiveness of small businesses, but the number one thing a small business needs is customers. Amanda realized that she could provide marketing expertise to help them drum up support. The best way to help small businesses is to work with them on all of the areas that don't come naturally. Marketing is one of them and many small businesses struggle with it. Amanda is doing everything in her power to help small businesses create a ripple effect in their communities, and she is using Deluxe as a vehicle to change lives for the better.

This week on The Wealth Intersection we are joined by Amanda Brinkman, Chief Brand Officer at Deluxe Corporation and co-host of Small Business Revolution - Main Street. Most reality shows are full of problems and emotional ups and downs, but one focuses on small town America and the struggles of mom and pop businesses trying to survive… What started as a simple idea has taken off with thousands of entrepreneurs across the country vying for a chance at a half-million dollar Main Street makeover, courtesy of Deluxe. Now Brinkman along with Ty Pennington are focusing their fourth season of Small Business Revolution on the town of Searcy, Arkansas. Join host Megan Gorman on The Wealth Intersection as she discusses this new season with Amanda Brinkman as well as tips for entrepreneurs everywhere.

Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi, and welcome to the Sales Enablement PRO podcast. I am Shawnna Sumaoang. Sales enablement is a constantly evolving space, and we’re here to help professionals stay up-to-date on the latest trends and best practices so they can be more effective in their jobs. I would like you guys to just do a brief introduction to you, your role, and if one of you guys could give a brief introduction to Deluxe, that would be great. Tieg Herman: My name is Tieg Herman and I lead product marketing and sales effectiveness at Deluxe Corporation. Megan Friedrich: And my name’s Megan Friedrich and I work on our sales effectiveness team at Deluxe Corporation. SS: I would love to understand what you guys are doing to kind of provide a more holistic view to your sales reps around the buyers, and what they have done to date in their journey with your organization prior to the rep reaching out so that the rep can have those educated conversations. MF: I think a lot of that starts with our technology and making sure we use our technology to our advantage, and that our marketing teams are very aligned with our sales teams and we’re communicating. We try our best to communicate all marketing campaign activity out to our field so they know when campaigns are going out when a prospect or customer might be getting an email. That’s also tracked in our CRM system so that they can see that and really understand each client and when they’ve been targeted. So, using the technology to make sure we’re clear on our communication. Then also we really align our marketing story and our campaigns to our buying cycle and to our sales cycle to make sure that we are aligned throughout the sales cycle, that things are lining up depending on where that customer is. And then if they’re getting a campaign pushed, it’s at the right stage in the cycle along with the sales tools that the salesperson might also be pushing out. TH: Yeah that’s a really good point that I’ll build on. As I put my marketing hat on for a second – as we develop our messaging strategies for a defined period of time, we’ll pull those together and build out our marketing plans which include sales enablement plans. We’ll run those through the general manager of the business, the sales leader of the business, the head product manager for the business, to make sure that everyone’s very clear on exactly what the messaging strategy of the brand is going forward. That way we really ensure consistency both from that first touch from a demand generation or campaign sampling, all the way through the end of the buyer journey. One-to-one, seller-to-client or prospect, making sure that the message is consistent is really important to us. And then, like Megan said, using technology to help the salesforce understand exactly what’s going out there, to who, and when, and what the message is, is really important. SS: Absolutely. Thank you both so much. I couldn’t agree more that definitely aligning efforts and enabling across your go-to-market teams to really keep that buyer’s journey holistic, is absolutely a more modern way of doing both marketing and sales within B2B organizations today. So, I’d like to pivot a little bit. I want to talk about the sales enablement initiatives that you guys have implemented in the past. And the reason is – I’ll give you guys just a little bit more context – what we’ve heard from a lot of other sales enablement practitioners, especially the ones that are getting started, is that they want to understand what the initiatives are that other practitioners are running within their organization that have had the most impact. And just trying to understand from other practitioners, what were those initial pain points that they were feeling? How did they go about coming up with a plan to resolve that? And then, what did implementation, rollout, and the results look like? So, with that in mind, I would love to talk about maybe some of the initiatives that you guys have done recently. I don’t know if each of you maybe has one that we could talk about, but I would love to understand the most impactful sales initiative to date and why. Tieg, if we could start with you, I would love to do that. TH: Yeah. We’ve talked a lot about sales process and I would say that that’s definitely one of our most impactful initiatives to date. It’s something that never really stops. We have been working on this for three years and I expect we’ll continue to work on it in perpetuity because the market is always changing. But really, it goes back to what we’ve been talking about which is: how do we make sure that everything that we do aligns with a buyer journey and adds value to our buyers throughout that entire journey. There are technological components to that. We’ve got to make sure we have sales stages defined the right way. We have to make sure that we develop content to support each of those stages. But the most important thing is – and I guess it’s a bit more philosophical – is how we as an organization approach the market and the perspective that we have as we go into the market to focus less on us and more on our customers. That has been the most important, or one of the most important initiatives that we’ve had in the last several years. SS: And if I could just ask a follow-on question about that, I would love to know how you guys are measuring the success of those efforts. TH: Right, yeah. I mean, obviously when you’re looking at was it successful or not, you look at cycle time – did it get shorter? You look at deal size, did it get bigger? And you respond accordingly. So those are some pretty basic things that we look at. We also look at, as we translate that messaging strategy into marketing campaigns, are we getting traction on those? Are we generating leads based on that same appreciation for the buyer journey? So there are a lot of different ways that we look at it from a quantitative perspective. We also want to make sure that we are maintaining a really strong connection to the sales force, and getting their feedback. Did this work? Did the buyers appreciate that perspective? Did they get value out of that perspective? And if the answer isn’t yes, then we refine and make sure that we’re always pursuing, creating value for our clients. SS: I love that. Thank you, Tieg. Megan, could I ask you the same question? I would love to understand from your perspective what the most impactful sales enablement initiative is for you to date? MF: Yeah, I think one of the biggest projects we’ve done in the last couple of years now is we implemented a new sales enablement platform about two years ago. We had an existing platform, it was not managed probably the best it could have been, so we really took a new look at this and strategically developed and launched a new site to our sales organization. And we really had a launch plan, we hyped it up, we really wanted to get adoption going from the get-go. Our sales enablement platform encompasses content management, it has our communication system in there, it’s integrated with Salesforce, we also have an LMS tied to it. So really, we wanted it to be kind of that one-stop-shop where they could get anything they needed. We’ve put a lot of energy not only into putting that site up but constantly making that site relevant. We don’t want it to get stale. We want to make sure the content is up-to-date. We have been launching a lot of new playbooks, and those are really needy documents within our site, that we want new reps to use and we want existing reps to use to learn about a new product. They take a lot of time from our end, also with marketing and product. Because the sales enablement platform is the most visible thing we can produce in sales enablement, we’ve put a lot of energy around that. And I think we’ve had a lot of really good success. We’re just bringing some new teams onto it this year and I think they’re really excited to use it. Some of these teams have been using SharePoint sites or just their own shared drives, so we’re going from a lot of users that have had a very manual process to now this centralized hub, which is exciting. We’ve also got some sophisticated sellers that have come from different places and we’re getting their feedback and just constantly making that better, and looking at what new technology is out there and never allowing it to get stale. SS: I love that. If I can actually drill in a little bit into a couple of areas, I would love to understand how you built out the criteria for what it was that you needed when you went out to evaluate sales enablement solutions. MF: Yes. A couple of years ago when we first initially looked to switch platforms we had an existing site; so we had a good baseline of what we needed. It was basic. It was mostly just content management. We needed to move our sales assets to another site. As we looked at the solutions that were out there, we really immersed ourselves pretty in-depth with what the functionality there is. What do we need? It’s as simple as, “here’s a list of all the functionality – you may not be ready for all that right now.” You need to determine what are the requirements that are relevant to you. So for us, it was obviously having the content management capabilities. It was having a way to communicate in a centralized communication process. It was being able to sort our content by organizational unit or by function or product team – however, you wanted to get the right content to the right person. Also, it was very important for us to integrate with our CRM. So we made a list of those requirements. A lot of it also – as Tieg mentioned – was a cool experience of seeing the buying cycle on the buyer’s side. So, we evaluated solutions based on how we interacted with them: are they understanding our problems? Are we able to morph and change over time? As I said, we don’t ever stay stale, so we’re always evaluating what solutions are out there. Where is the market going? It’s changing really fast. The cool thing about sales enablement platforms is that it is technology. It’s changing fast, you need to stay up to speed on it, and there’s a lot of cool features out there, but you need to make sure that it aligns to what you need in your organization. SS: Absolutely, absolutely. And I think rep satisfaction, as you alluded to earlier, as well as adoption, is absolutely critical with these platforms, as well as finding a partner that can scale with you. So that was excellent, thank you for walking me through that. One of the other things I wanted to just drill in on – just for a moment if you don’t mind – you mentioned the notion of a sales playbook. I know that there’s a wide variety of types the playbooks that come to mind with sales enablement practitioners. When they think about that the term “sales playbook”, it’s been around for a while. If you go back a couple of decades, it could even invoke an image of a three-ring binder that you give to your reps when they’re on board and, “Here, flip this tab, you have this conversation and then this will tell you how to handle this scenario.” I would love to hear from you guys what you guys are doing with your sales playbook today. MF: Yeah, just like you mentioned, I remember the times where I created the sales binders and we mailed them out to the teams. So we’ve morphed and changed, and to be honest the term “playbook” sometimes has a negative connotation with our team just because they think it’s something that is printed out and set on their desk and they will say, “I already know how to do my job.” So, we’ve really looked at it as providing our sales teams with the information that they need at the appropriate sales stage so we really align it to our sales process stages. It’s what do they need to understand about the market and the industry at that point in time? What are some insights that they need to speak to? What are the things, the best practices they need to do or the objections they need to understand at that point in time? And then what else is the content they need to show, whether it’s a white paper or another sales tool? You know, all the way through the sales process. When you get to the later sales stages and they need to understand the product, they need to know how to talk about the product. So making sure we’re not throwing everything at them at once, but really when they’re at this point in time in a sale stage, this is what they need to know and talk about to their customer. TH: I think another thing to think about as you think about sales playbooks from 2019 is this content dynamic. When you take the old binder example, a week and a half after your mail it out, half of it is not relevant. I think this is another really important part of the power of the sales portal. It is a source of truth. So, as all that market perspective goes into a sales playbook and as tools that align a sales process go into a sales playbook, we’ve really put a lot of effort into making sure that those are always updated and coaching our sales partners to go to that playbook first rather than downloading items and saving them on their desktop. We are able to make adjustments and updates, enhancements on the fly so that the sales playbook remains really, really dynamic and is always the source of truth for our team. So, that’s a really important part of our focus in creating it. SS: Thanks for listening! For more insights, tips, and expertise from sales enablement leaders, visit salesenablement.pro. If there’s something you’d like to share or a topic you want to know more about let us know – we’d love to hear from you.

Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi, and welcome to the Sales Enablement PRO podcast. I am Shawnna Sumaoang. Sales enablement is a constantly evolving space, and we’re here to help professionals stay up-to-date on the latest trends and best practices so they can be more effective in their jobs. I would like you guys to just do a brief introduction to you, your role, and if one of you guys could give a brief introduction to Deluxe, that would be great. Tieg Herman: My name is Tieg Herman and I lead product marketing and sales effectiveness at Deluxe Corporation. Megan Friedrich: And my name’s Megan Friedrich and I work on our sales effectiveness team at Deluxe Corporation. SS: I would love to talk to you guys and better understand how long you have had sales enablement within your organization. TH: Yeah, we’ve really been focused on sales enablement for about five years. We’ve had different permutations of sales enablement for many years prior to that. But I think, along with the rest of the industry, we’ve really been on this transition from what I’ve heard one person in the industry refer to as “random acts of enablement” to a strategic asset to the organization. We talk about being sales enablement with a capital E. Really moving beyond being the helpdesk for a sales organization and focusing more on enabling the sale of our products. It has been about a five-year journey with that, and we are making a lot of progress. SS: And could you tell me a little bit about the key roles and responsibilities that you have on your current team? TH: Yeah. Before we developed org charts and specific roles we wanted to start with the end in mind. We always try to do that. We coach our sales team to start with the end in mind as they engage with a client or prospect, and so we want to live by that as well as we build out the organization. So, to do that we wanted to identify the areas of expertise that we thought were important to the sales enablement group and to get there we built out a charter. We think that’s really important to always have a charter in developing a team, whether that’s sales enablement or otherwise. And in that charter, we identified several areas that were really important to us. We talked about tool development, sales process, communications, strategy, technology, and several others. We were able to construct roles that addressed each of those and divided out responsibilities. Those are the kind of primary areas that we focus on and think about: sales effectiveness and sales enablement. MF: Yeah, and if I could just jump in there too, I think when we talk about roles we really have focused on what are the unique attributes of a successful sales enablement person in those roles. This is really – as Tieg mentioned – it’s a newer role in the industry and there are some specific things that we really focus on for our team. Who we bring to the team and as we look to expand and grow, these people that are on our team, we really rely on them to build credibility. They need to be able to build credibility with people up to the VP and C-level internally in our organization. It can be really hard if you’re unknown. So, Tieg and I both have this luxury of having past credibility within the organization and having been in both product and marketing roles that transferred over. That’s crucial. Part of that is because you need to build that internal navigation: you need to know how to navigate with product and sales and marketing partners and all their unique cultures. The other thing you really need to know is that you need to understand how salespeople work. You need to know what motivates them. Both Tieg and I have never held a quota, so we need to understand how our salespeople are motivated. We need to be adept at knowing what a quota is and how are they incentivized. And then another thing is sales enablement people need to understand how to work in an ambiguous situation. There are a lot of large problems that we’re looking to solve and we don’t necessarily have a specific roadmap or project plan right now written out. We need to be able to work through that. We need to be able to be strategic but also be able to execute on the back-end and really have that analytical mindset. SS: I love that. I love that you guys are being that thoughtful both about how your org is structured and in addition to that, the people that you’re bringing onto your team. And I think that that is a lot of great criteria for folks that are on a sales enablement team. I would love to understand, Megan, just a little bit more background on you. You’ve led the implementation and management of your sales enablement technology at Deluxe. I would love to hear from you some of the core types of technology that other sales enablement professionals should consider having in their tech stack. MF: Yeah. So, I think that it all kind of centralizes around a CRM system. This is typically owned by a sales operations team, sometimes also sales enablement depending on how your team a structured. In our role, we really need to be critically aligned to how the sales teams are using the CRM and ensure that our other tech tools in our tech stack integrate with our CRM and they speak to each other so we’re coming across as a centralized tool for our sales teams. Along with that, I would say a content management platform with advanced analytics capabilities that allow you to measure content, understand how your content ties to your sales process, and also developing success criteria around that, is really important. Some type of technology that allows you to communicate with your field – sometimes that’s within your CRM, sometimes that’s a standalone system – but something that allows you to effectively communicate with your field, however, that works in an organization. Collaboration tools are really critical. Sometimes these are owned by the enterprise, sometimes they’re owned by sales enablement, but allowing you to collaborate internally with your sales teams but also with product and marketing and the other functions in your organization that you work with. We specifically, at Deluxe, also have a couple of other systems that we look at. We have a value proposition or a business case tool that is specific to our sales tools tech stack that we use to integrate with our business cases. RFP software is important if you are having RFPs come in and if your team owns that process. And then also if you are focused on training or if your organization to have training involved, a learning management system or some type of learning management module builder is important, as well. SS: Absolutely, absolutely. And I am sure as you’re well aware of, one of the things that we hear from a lot of sales reps is that the biggest inhibitor to getting them to actually use this is really adoption because there’s often tool fatigue within a lot of organizations. So how have you successfully rolled these out to your teams to secure high adoption and avoided the whole notion of dealing with tool fatigue among your reps? MF: Yeah, this is really hard. I won’t say it’s easy. We talk a lot about the power of the status quo both when we’re talking about B2B sales or any type of sales, but internally as well. For salespeople, just like human nature, the status quo is super powerful. It’s easier to just do what you’ve always done, especially if you have a tenured sales organization. If they are used to producing results the way they’ve done it, they’re probably not going to change. We really focus on starting at the top. We need to start with our leaders and we need to start with our key stakeholders. We think this is critical to develop those strong relationships and partners with your sales leaders because if they’re willing to adapt and encourage their team, that’s going to go a long way. We focus a lot on training, training, and training again. We focus on customized training to that specific sales team’s culture, as we nuance to who we’re talking to. It’s just that constant reinforcement and also making it as easy as possible for them to use. If it’s a tool or if it’s training, don’t make it hard for them to get the content. Make it easy for them to access it. And then lastly, we have a really big focus on governance, and we think that this is where sales enablement can really play a strong role. It’s often forgotten – reporting on tools, making sure you have the analytics on what’s being successful, highlighting where there are areas of opportunity to improve or maybe there are some teams that are succeeding and some that aren’t, and using and developing the use cases internally to really promote adoption. SS: Excellent. On the whole notion of actually getting your reps easy access to content, Tieg, as a director of product marketing and sales effectiveness, how do you help ensure that marketing holistically is partnering with sales enablement? To not only ensure that you’re producing high-quality content that your reps are actually going to be using, but that you’re also getting feedback from your reps back into your marketing organization around what they need and how to prioritize their needs? TH: I think that it all starts again, with starting with an end in mind. That’s something that I get made fun of in the office for using that phrase so often. But I really believe in it, and as I reflect back on previous roles that I’ve had – I was in product marketing before I was in sales enablement, and then I was back in kind of both areas – I think about the tools that we’d produce at that time. I’d heard from the sales organizations, “Hey, we’re having problems with overcoming this conversion objection. Can you put something together that addresses that?” or “We need to justify pricing.” Whatever the particular objection was, we had to, in response, create tools to support that – and I hope those were effective in some way. But as we have started to understand the sales enablement market better and understand the dynamic B2B buying environment better, we’ve really worked hard to align every sales tool that we create to a buying stage. We always want to work with our clients and our prospects to help them succeed. Ultimately that’s what we want to do, help our clients succeed. If they don’t succeed, then we don’t succeed. So, getting back to starting with the end in mind. If our end in mind is to lead with insight, then creating a marketing tool that’s aligned to an early sales stage is about that insight. If our end in mind is to position our product or offer against a competitor, align that to a later sales stage. So, that’s what is really important to us: to make sure that we have congruence between how our buyers buy and how we’re helping them by adding value throughout the entire buying process. I think the same can be said as we think about marketing campaigns that we develop. We want to make sure that every tool that’s created within a marketing campaign can also be used as a standalone sales tool to try to maximize our effectiveness that way. And then you talk about feedback. Feedback comes in a lot of different ways. That comes both through personal relationships and it comes through technology. So, we want to make sure that we have both of those channels open at all times. Megan talked about working with sales leaders, also working directly with the sales organization, we always want to hear about the tools that we put into the market and if they’re effective or not. We want to get those verbatim or anecdotal stories. We also want to be able to track usage patterns through some of our technology. We can do that, like recently, where we put something new out and can go out and say, “Well, I was able to go and see only a handful of sellers have actually accessed this tool, so let’s follow back up on this. Did this hit the mark or not?” There’s functionality where inside our sales portal we can get our sellers to give a piece of content a thumbs up or a thumbs down. That’s very simple, but when you start to aggregate those numbers it tells you a story on whether that piece is effective or not. So – just to steal Megan’s phrase again – it’s not easy but we try to come at it from a lot of different ways to help us figure out where to double down or where to pull back. SS: I love that. And actually, if you guys don’t mind me deviating from the question a little bit, Megan, what’s your background? You are also on the marketing side of the house historically? MF: Yes, so I have a little bit of a blended background. I started my career in marketing, in a marketing communications role. I spent several years in a product management and program management role at Deluxe, before moving over to sales enablement. So, I’ve worked directly with sales, both in marketing and on the product side, and then now with sales effectiveness. SS: Very cool. And I just wanted to get that context because I love a lot of the things that you guys are calling out during this conversation. I think, as a marketer myself as well, one of the things that I’d love to drill in on a little bit is maybe just getting your perspective. You mentioned this earlier that the B2B buying environment is changing. I would just love for you to elaborate on what that is and the impact it’s having on sales reps. TH: Yeah, the B2B buying environment is changing a lot. There are more players involved in a purchasing decision than ever before. So, as more players get involved, the likelihood of getting a decision, “yes” or “no,” decreases pretty dramatically. There are a lot of studies out there that quantify that change. But that really just reinforces what Megan said earlier about the power of the status quo. A lot of times Megan and I will take calls with different organizations just to see how we’re being approached because we get to see the B2B buyer. To see different approaches, you get pitched new technology that seems really interesting or to have a lot of bells and whistles and looks pretty cool, but you can’t really connect into how that’s going to impact your organization. You can’t really connect into what business problem that solves, or why you should move off the status quo. You’ll remember six months down the line having a generally favorable or curious opinion of what that company does, but not really remembering what they could do from an impacting your business perspective. You look at other organizations, and this is what we aspire to do as well, that come in and demonstrate that they understand the market your in, demonstrate expertise in that market, demonstrate an understanding of us as a buyer, and then help us navigate through problems that we’re facing throughout that buying journey. Those are the organization that you’re doing business with because you believe that they’re invested with you and helping you succeed. So, we believe that it is less about pushing product than it is about solving problems for customers and helping them understand what the market looks like and demonstrating expertise in that market and helping them succeed. Megan, I’m sure you have a lot to add there, but that’s sort of some of the manifestations of that change in the marketplace. MF: Yeah, I mean, I think the one thing I would add is that we focus pretty heavily on what we would add to our sales process. And we don’t mean that in terms of just our stages and our pipeline – we’re talking about changing how we sell. So much of that aligns to the buyer’s buying process and we need to be more focused on that than ever before. We can’t just go out and sell how we’ve always sold. Like Tieg said, we really need to understand our customer and understand where they’re at in the buying process, and then align our efforts and our sales tools to where our customers are at. As he said, it’s such a complex environment when you’re dealing with selling B2B. Especially to large organizations, you could be dealing with six buyers, you could be dealing with 20 buyers, you could be dealing with a year and a half-long sales lead cycle, and it’s just really navigating that cycle and that process aligned to what the issues and the problems the buyers are facing versus your solutions. SS: Thanks for listening! For more insights, tips, and expertise from sales enablement leaders, visit salesenablement.pro. If there’s something you’d like to share or a topic you want to know more about, let us know – we’d love to hear from you.

Dave Robertson Managing Director at Deluxe Corporation is interviewed in this episode. Deluxe helps clients increase revenue and profits through proprietary data mining solutions and sales enablement tools Follow Adam on Instagram at Ask Adam Torres for up to date information on book releases and tour schedule. Apply to become a featured co-author in one of Adam's upcoming books: https://www.moneymatterstoptips.com/coauthor --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/moneymatters/support

Brian talks with Amanda Brinkman, Chief Brand Officer at Deluxe Corporation and Co-host, Executive Producer of the popular show "Small Business Revolution." They discuss Amanda's multi-year journey across the country, meeting passionate business owners who are looking for advice on how to overcome the obstacles in front of them. The podcast includes tips and suggestions on how listeners can overcome their own obstacles in order to keep doing what they love to do - run a small business!

Dave Kozel is EVP and Chief Human Resources Officer of PVH Corp, the global apparel company that owns brands such as Calvin Klein, Tommy Hilfiger, Izod, Speedo and Arrow. PVH employees around 36,000 people and has locations in 40 countries. Dave is responsible for Human Resources, Compensation, Benefits, Talent Management & Development, Inclusion & Diversity, Communications and Facilities for one of the largest global apparel companies in the world.  PVH has been recognized for its commitment to creating an inclusive environment where every individual is valued, including being named one of Forbes’ Best Employers for Diversity and earning 100% on the HRC Corporate Equality Index. The Company was also ranked among the top 100 Most Inclusive and Diverse companies globally on the Thomas Reuters Global Inclusion Index and named one of Forbes’ and JUST Capital’s Most JUST Companies.  Dave joined PVH in 2003 as Senior Vice President, Human Resources, and was promoted to Executive Vice President, Human Resources in 2013. He changed to his current title in June 2015. Prior to joining PVH, Dave served as the Executive Vice President of Human Resources for J. Crew and held executive HR positions at Grey Advertising and Deluxe Corporation. His early career was spent at Citicorp and Pacific Gas & Electric in various Human Resource positions.Dave has a Bachelor's Degree in Political Science from Lehigh University and a Masters Degree in Industrial Relations from University of Illinois. A major focus of the organization is having a people first strategy in order to bring in the best talent, and keep them engaged and motivated. It also involves allowing employees to be truly successful in what they're interested in from a career standpoint. And if they're successful and engaged, it only increases the company's probability of having success.  This is what is driving their leadership curriculum. Dave talks about one of the company’s programs, which is the PVH University. It is a fairly robust university program where they have a leadership academy in which they offer entry level,first-time manager training programs and then second-level training programs to managers. They have a global leadership program that works with The Wharton Business School. When asked about work-life balance, Dave said he believes, people really need to spend,  10% to 20% of their time away from their work. Even while at work everyone should try to designate some time to not think about the day to day and the tasks they have to complete. The world of work is definitely changing. Some of the most significant changes Dave has noticed include:   Work environments have fundamentally changed The advent of technology has changed the way people work The rate of change is so fast, we have to find new ways to work and leverage technology in order to keep up One thing that is certain is what we're doing today is going to change tomorrow Trends Dave is focusing on include: It's all about talent A people first strategy The importance of creating a culture and a workplace that has purpose What you will learn in this episode: How Dave and his team are creating a workplace that can attract and retain the best talent Dave’s insights and experience building up the HR function at PVH from the ground up How Dave deals with being told ‘no’ His advice to HR professionals and managers on how to get new programs in place What to do as an HR professional if an employee tells you they are unhappy Trends Dave is paying attention to Contact: https://www.pvh.com/company/leadership/dave-kozel https://www.linkedin.com/in/davekozel1

Amanda Brinkman and her team at Deluxe Corporation have championed the Small Business Revolution as a way to help small businesses grow and enhance their communities.ep. 121Support the showFollow the Makers of Minnesota on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram @MakersofMN. Send story ideas to Stephanie@stephaniesdish.com If you appreciate the work we do here, please subscribe on Patreon Please subscribe to My newsletter at https://stephaniehansen.substack.com/ so you don't miss an epiosde of the Makers of Minnesota This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit stephaniehansen.substack.com/subscribe

Amanda Brinkman and her team at Deluxe Corporation have championed the Small Business Revolution as a way to help small businesses grow and enhance their communities. ep. 121Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/StephanieHansen)

Amanda Brinkman and her team at Deluxe Corporation have championed the Small Business Revolution as a way to help small businesses grow and enhance their communities. ep. 121Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/StephanieHansen)

Kim, Brim, Zambo and Mr. Greer are back at it again. Apart from all the usual shenanigans, the gang chats about everything pop culture with all the trimmings and the cast is joined by the CEO of the Deluxe Corporation talking about his series, Small Business Revolution and other stuff 'n things. Plus Brim finally breaks the silence on a surprise for the gang. Enjoy! This episode is brought to you by Soundcloud

Amanda Brinkman is the Chief Brand and Communications Officer at Deluxe Corporation. She is also the host of the Small Business Revolution series that works with small towns in America to revitalize them and get the businesses the help they need to thrive. In this podcast, we talk about Amanda’s philosophy of Doing Well by … Continue reading Do Well by Doing Good →

Kim, Brim, Zambo and Mr. Greer are back at it again. Apart from all the usual shenanigans, the gang chats about everything pop culture with all the trimmings and the cast is joined by the CEO of the Deluxe Corporation talking about his series, Small Business Revolution and other stuff 'n things. Plus Brim finally breaks the silence on a surprise for the gang. Enjoy!

Kim, Brim, Zambo and Mr. Greer are back at it again. Apart from all the usual shenanigans, the gang chats about everything pop culture with all the trimmings and the cast is joined by the CEO of the Deluxe Corporation talking about his series, Small Business Revolution and other stuff 'n things. Plus Brim finally breaks the silence on a surprise for the gang. Enjoy!

Thanks for listening! Here’s our November episode: The Quick News & Quick Takes segment this month includes a great resource for employee advocacy programs (2:30), blogging stats and trends from Orbit’s annual survey (6:15) and a writer’s idea on how to fix podcasting before it jumps the shark (8:20). The Talking Points Spotlight highlights a battle of the bands in Minnesota, to help raise money to fund scholarships designed to foster more diversity in the creative industry (12:00). And, the three Talking Points in this episode feature discussions about corporate storytelling and content strategy (13:35), the 2019 Relevance Report from USC Annenberg’s Center for Public Relations (25:05) and a survey of global communicators, including their challenges (33:15). Plus, the Talking Points Shoutout for this month goes to Cameron Potts of Deluxe Corporation (39:20). He talks about what could be one of the bigger content marketing campaigns ever built. For show notes and links to the stories we talked about, visit TheTalkingPointsPodcast.com. If you have feedback or a suggestion for an interview, article or topic, reach out to us on the show’s Facebook group. Or, find each of us on LinkedIn.

Global Product Management Talk is pleased to bring you the next episode of... The Everyday Innovator with host Chad McAllister, PhD. The podcast is all about helping people involved in innovation and managing products become more successful, grow their careers, and STANDOUT from their peers. About the Episode: I’m currently on a tour through the northeast of the US, visiting product managers and innovators. On my way, I stopped in Minneapolis and found an incredible innovation case study at Deluxe Corporation. You’ll hear from Chris Clausen, Executive Director, how this company that is more than a century old is avoiding being disrupted by embracing innovation. He’ll share: why they had to innovate,how they discovered the new product and market opportunity,how they decided what to build and what to buy to make the product a reality,that the innovation was viewed by many in the organization as cannibalizing their main business, much in the same way as Kodak viewed work on digital cameras as cannibalizing their core business, andhow they used customer testimonies to sell the innovation internally. It’s a fabulous story with many lessons. The written summary of our discussion is at www.TheEverydayInnovator.com/194.

Product managers can move the wheel forward by reinventing it I’m currently on a tour through the northeast of the US, visiting product managers and innovators. On my way, I stopped in Minneapolis and found an incredible innovation case study at Deluxe Corporation. You’ll hear from Chris Clausen, Executive Director, how this company that is […]

Product managers can move the wheel forward by reinventing it I'm currently on a tour through the northeast of the US, visiting product managers and innovators. On my way, I stopped in Minneapolis and found an incredible innovation case study at Deluxe Corporation. You'll hear from Chris Clausen, Executive Director, how this company that is […]

The CandEs Shop Talk Podcast welcomes Mike Anderson, Employment Brand and Marketing Strategist at Deluxe Corporation — and a proud multi-year Candidate Experience Awards winner. Listen in on how improving candidate experience impacts recruiting and the business bottom line.

Data Scientist Eugene Geis ( https://www.linkedin.com/in/eugenegeis) from the Deluxe Corporation (https://www.deluxe.com/) stops by the People Stack to talk about data, stats, the metaphors which are helpful when explaining stats, and some applications of data you might not think of. Special Guest: Eugene Geis.

Global Product Management Talk is pleased to bring you the next episode of... The Everyday Innovator with host Chad McAllister, PhD. The podcast is all about helping people involved in innovation and managing products become more successful, grow their careers, and STANDOUT from their peers. About the Episode: Product managers need to think more strategically to expand their success. This is what executive teams want from their product managers, and this interview with my guest is a great case study for thinking strategically and reshaping an entire organization. What if you could create a new product that significantly increased the visibility of your brand – making it top of mind for your ideal customer – resulting in new sales and increased brand equity while at the same time creating a rich market research platform? Oh, and if that isn’t already enough, do real good in the process – transforming your organization’s brand from traditional corporate America to one of the good guys – a company doing genuine good for people that further attracts your ideal customer. That is what Deluxe Corporation has done with the creation of the Small Business Revolution – Main Street, a TV series spotlighting the importance of small business in American small towns. The show is hosted by Robert Herjavec, known for his work on Shark Tank, and Amanda Brinkman, the Chief Brand and Communications Officer at Deluxe.  I talked with Amanda to learn more about the creation of the show and its impact. Amanda is a veteran brand and creative visionary who is drawn to purpose-driven marketing and brand transformation. Her work is currently turning around Deluxe Corporation, a 100-year-old company. What she is accomplishing is phenomenal and contains many lessons to inspire product managers and innovators. 

Our guest this week is Mike Nealy - he serves as the executive director of the Arizona Sports Foundation and the Valley of the Sun Bowl Foundation which are community-based organizations who operate the Fiesta Bowl, the Cactus Bowl, and numerous community events across Arizona.   A Minnesota native, Mike spent eight years with the Phoenix Coyotes and served as President and COO prior to joining the Fiesta Bowl.  And before that, Mike spent four seasons with the Minnesota Wild and 14 years with the Deluxe Corporation.   In our conversation, Mike shares his journey from Minnesota to Arizona and lessons he has learned along the way.  He discusses the challenges of balancing work with family, how hard work today can lead to unexpected opportunities tomorrow, and the lesson of 212 degrees.  He also discusses how he passes his principles and values on to his children and the importance of leading by example at work and at home.

Adam Dince (@AdamDince) is the Director of Earned Media at Deluxe Corporation and the co-founder of #Spoofchat. He brings over fourteen years of internet marketing experience to the podcast including everything from SEO, web development and social media.  As I caught up with Adam this past week, he was just getting back from one of his speaking gigs at Minnesota Blog Con. Adam has lived in Arizona and New York prior to his move to settling in Minnesota. His experiences and strong network have continued to gain him opportunities and ultimately led to his current role at Deluxe Corporation.  #Spoofchat is discussed in the last part of the podcast and is a weekly twitter chat mixing pop culture, humor, and social media into a unique blend of crazy fun. This Week on Why I Social, Ali and I discuss:  Moving from New York to Minnesota  The creation of #Spoofchat Why he believes in holistic digital marketing strategy The Why I Social podcast is brought to you by Zoomph. Zoomph transforms digital marketing with real-time streaming analytics. Our platform provides you with an end-to-end solution to ignite your content, your marketing and your business from start to finish. Exclusive to Why I Social, receive 20% off all annual plans with the promo code WhyISocial20. Want to learn more about Zoomph? Check out their analytics page: http://bit.ly/WhySocialAnalytics Share with #WhyISocial Subscribe on iTunes or Stitcher RadioFollow at @WhyISocial.

We had a chance to chat with Heidi Roizen of DFJ and hear her story and what she looks for in founders as well as how to manage key stages in a company's life. Heidi Roizen is the operating partner at DFJ. She has spent her life immersed in the Silicon Valley ecosystem as an entrepreneur, corporate executive, venture capitalist, educator, and member of the boards of directors of private and public companies, trade associations and nonprofit institutions. After receiving her undergraduate and MBA degrees from Stanford University, Heidi co-founded T/Maker Company (an early personal computer software company) in 1983, where she served as CEO from inception through its acquisition by Deluxe Corporation in 1994. In 1996, Heidi joined Apple as vice president of worldwide developer relations. From there, Heidi entered the venture capital world, serving as a managing director of Mobius Venture Capital from 1999 to 2007. Heidi is also a Fenwick and West Entrepreneurship Educator in the Department of Engineering at Stanford University, where she teaches the course Spirit of Entrepreneurship. Heidi is a member of the boards of directors DMGT (LSE:DMGT), ShareThis, and Technorati, and serves on the advisory boards of Springboard Enterprises and the National Center for Women in Information Technology.

Adam Dince @AdamDince Director of Earned Media (SEO, Social Media & Content Strategy) at Deluxe Corporation drops by @DriveThruHR  to talk about Personal Branding DriveThruHR was designed to be a captivating and easy-to-digest lunch discourse that covers topics relevant to HR professionals.  Each 30-minute episode features a guest speaker who shares her or his knowledge and experience in human resources. Our hosts and special guest cover a wealth of topics, including HR Technology, Recruiting, Talent Management, Leadership, Organizational Culture and Strategic HR, every day at 12:00 pm Central Time.  The radio program is hosted by @williamtincup, @Thehrbuddy@TheOneCrystal & @MikeVanDervort..  The #1 HR show, with amazing HR conversations and follow us on the twitters at  @drivethruhr and #dthr. http://www.facebook.com/drivethruhr http://instagram.com/drivethruhr  

IIT 2013 Conference Podcast Interview with Arjun Malhotra Arjun Malhotra served as Chairman of Headstrong's Board of Directors before its acquisition by Genpact in May 2011. Prior to Headstrong he was Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of TechSpan, which merged with Headstrong in October 2003. A pioneer of the Indian IT industry, Mr. Malhotra founded TechSpan in 1998 with funding from Goldman Sachs and Walden International. The merger of TechSpan with Headstrong had built an end-to-end services organization. Mr. Malhotra led the seamless integration across businesses and cultures, resulting in Headstrong's recognition as one of the fastest-growing IT-based Financial Services companies Mr. Malhotra has a long string of entrepreneurial successes. He co-founded the HCL group in 1975, taking it from a six-person "garage operation" to one of India's largest Information Technology corporations. The first leading Indian entrepreneur to relocate to USA, Mr. Malhotra took over HCL's US operation in 1989 and grew it to nearly $100 million annual revenues. In 1992 he ran the HCL-HP joint venture in India, and in 1996 he set up and ran the joint venture with Deluxe Corporation. He consolidated and grew HCL operations in Hong Kong, Australia and New Zealand. Mr. Malhotra studied at The Doon School, Dehradun, and Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur. He graduated from IIT with B.Tech. (Hons.) in Electronics & Electrical Communication Engineering and received the Dr. B.C. Roy Gold Medal. In 1985, he attended the Advanced Management Program at Harvard Business School. Mr. Malhotra is a Member of the Board of Governors, IIT (Kharagpur) Foundation, Member of the Board of Governors of the Indian School of Business, Hyderabad, Member of the Board of Governors of Rajiv Gandhi Indian Institute of Management, Shillong and IIM Udaipur. He founded the Prof. G.S. Sanyal School of Telecommunications at IIT Kharagpur through a personal endowment. In "recognition of his outstanding contribution and services to the Institute", Mr. Malhotra was declared Life Fellow of IIT Kharagpur in February 2003 and has been awarded Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa) in September 2012. Mr. Malhotra was awarded the Albert Einstein Technology Medal for 2001. The Award salutes the high tech industryís vanguard who "with their vision ... have revolutionized the perception of time and space, linking mankind with ever growing speed and ingenuity. Their cutting-edge breakthroughs have empowered countless others." The Institution of Engineers (India) has named Mr. Malhotra an Eminent Engineering Personality. Mr. Malhotra is a Fellow of the Institute of Electronics & Telecommunication Engineers, India (FIETE), and a Member of the Institute of Engineers, India (MIE). He is a Member of Indian Public Schools Society and is on the Board of Governors of The Doon School. He is a past Co-Chair of the Global Pan-IIT Alumni Association and has served on the Board of Governors for the Delhi College of Arts & Commerce, University of Delhi, and as Vice President of The Doon School Old Boys Society. Mr. Malhotra is a Charter Member of The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE), a non-profit network with over 10,000 members across 61 chapters in 13 countries. He has previously served as the Chairman of the TiE Global Board. TiE fosters global entrepreneurship through mentoring, networking and education. He is also one of the founding members of SPIC-MACAY, the Society for Promotion of Indian Classical Music and Culture amongst Youth and is presently on their Advisory Board. SPIC-MACAY is today Indiaís largest non-government, not for profit, social and cultural organization.

Audio File:  Download MP3Transcript: An Interview with Heidi Roizen Managing Director, Mobius Venture Capital Date: August 15, 2007 NCWIT Interview with Heidi Roizen BIO: Heidi Roizen has spent her entire life in the entrepreneurial ecosystem of Silicon Valley, first as an entrepreneur and ultimately as a venture capitalist helping other entrepreneurs build the great companies of tomorrow. She is currently a Managing Director of Mobius Venture Capital, a venture fund with over $2 billion under management. In that capacity, Heidi serves on the Boards of Directors of Reactrix, Ecast, Perpetual Entertainment and AuctionDrop. Heidi began her career in 1983 by co-founding T/Maker Company, a software publisher and developer for early personal computers including the IBM PC and the original Macintosh. As CEO, Heidi led the company for over a decade, raised two rounds of venture capital and ultimately consummated a successful acquisition of T/Maker by Deluxe Corporation. In 1996, she joined Apple Computer as VP of Worldwide Developer Relations. After one year at Apple, Heidi decided to return to her entrepreneurial roots, this time as a Mentor Capitalist and ultimately a Venture Capitalist. Heidi has also been actively involved in the trade associations critical to the Valley. She is a past president of the Software Publishers Association and served on its board from 1987 to 1994. She also represented the venture industry as a member of the Board of Directors of the National Venture Capital Association from 2003 to 2007. She also served on the board of Great Plains Software from 1997 until its acquisition by Microsoft in 2001, and is a past Public Governor of the Pacific Exchange. She is also a frequent guest lecturer at Stanford as well as a speaker at conferences for technologists, entrepreneurs, or women executives. Heidi holds a BA and an MBA from Stanford University. She is married to orthopedic surgeon David Mohler and has two daughters. Lee Kennedy: Hi. This is Lee Kennedy, board member of the National Center for Women and Information Technology, or NCWIT. And this is part of a series of interviews that we're having with fabulous entrepreneurs, women who have started IT companies in a variety of sectors, all of whom had insightful stories to tell us about being entrepreneurs. With me, I have Larry Nelson, from w3w3.com. Hi, Larry. How are you doing? Larry Nelson: Oh, great. It's wonderful to be here again. And one of the things that is so exciting for us at w3w3.com is that we are helping support, I think, the most fabulous program that we've experienced since we got in the radio business in '98, and the idea that we're helping inspire young women, girls, getting into IT, looking into that, as well as being an entrepreneur. But now, we're also getting phone calls from business leaders, people in schools, who say, "This is such a great program. We'd like to help promote it, too." Lee: Well, that's wonderful. Larry: One of the interesting things that we have here that's a little bit of a twist is that we're interviewing an entrepreneur who became a venture capitalist, and also, of course, then, therefore works and helps support entrepreneurs. And we're very pleased that we're interviewing Heidi Roizen, who is a managing director of Mobius Venture Capital. And we've got a little bit of a twist here. Lee and I are here in Colorado, and Lucy Sanders, the CEO and founder of NCWIT, is in California, at Heidi's home base. So, Lucy, let's get started. Lucy Sanders: All right. Hi, everyone. I'm sitting here with Heidi in her beautiful home in Atherton. I've been here a few times, and I just think it's so much fun to be here and interview you here in your office. Heidi Roizen: Well, thank you. I hope the dogs don't participate. Lucy: Or they might. They might have something profound to say. Heidi: They often do. Lucy: One of the things that makes it so exciting to interview you is that when I think, about Silicon Valley, I think, about you. And I think that you're synonymous with Silicon Valley. You've done a lot, as Larry mentioned. You've started companies. You're in venture capital. You were educated here at Stanford. You're a part of the community... Heidi: I was actually born at the Stanford Hospital, which I think, I'm probably the only one in Silicon Valley... Lucy: And why don't you spend a minute or two bringing us up to speed about what you've been doing lately? Heidi: Well, I am currently serving on four boards. They keep me very busy. They are all companies that are definitely not in their "two guys and a dog and a laptop" stage any longer, but they're all still companies that aren't through to the end of the road yet. So, lots of interesting challenges in terms of recruiting, customer acquisition, strategic business development, and all the normal things one goes through in startup land. So, I'm working on those companies, and then I'm working on a few entrepreneurial ventures on the side, helping out some friends. I always love having my fingers in the very, very early stages, and so I like having a few of those to work on as well. Lucy: Well, and I happen to know you're very generous with your time for nonprofits and for Stanford students. Heidi: Yeah. Lucy: The last time I was here, we had a great dinner, where you brought them back to your home. And I think, you're going to have some great advice for us, so why don't we just get right to the interview? Heidi: OK. Lee: Well, Heidi, I'll jump in and ask our first question, and that's: how did you first get into technology? Was it when you were a child or in college? And then, what technologies do you think are really cool today? Heidi: OK. Well, the first question is one that I think, if you're born and raised in Silicon Valley, at this time ‑ born in 1958, graduated from Stanford, undergrad in 1980 ‑ you couldn't help but apply for a job and end up at a tech company. So, even though I was not a technologist ‑ in fact, my undergraduate degree is in creative writing ‑ I ended up as the editor of the company newsletter for a little startup called Tandem Computers. Lee: Wow. Heidi: And that's really where I got my first inkling that there was something really exciting about the computer industry. What I realized, at that time, was I kind of looked around, and everybody getting ahead either had an engineering degree or an MBA. And it was a little late for me to go get an engineering degree, I thought, but I figured the MBA thing looked like a pretty good idea. So, I went back to Stanford and got that, and really fell in love with personal computing at the time. It's hard for people... I mean, I sound like such an old geezer when I say this. But, I was the class of 1983, and there were only three people ‑ I was one of them ‑ who owned their own personal computer at school. And now, can you imagine being a graduate student and not having a personal computer? You'd be hopeless. So, started my company right out of school and just never looked back. I had the good fortune to have a brilliant programmer as a brother, who really didn't like the business side, and I loved the business side. And the thing I like to tell people, often, who are non‑technologists, who wonder about being in the technology field, I tell them, "You know, need a mix of people." I don't have to know how to build a car to drive one. And in fact, I'd say, particularly in my early times working with my brother, who was the genius programmer, sometimes he'd build features that were so genius that only he could use them, and they weren't very practical. So, I think, sometimes it's good to be the petunia in the onion patch, as I used to call it in the development hall. Lucy: Tell us a little bit about the technology that you're thinking about as being the next wave of technical, cool gadgets. Heidi: I think, gadgets is always a slippery slope, because there are gadgets that I just love. I mean, we're investors in Sidekick and Sling, so we definitely have some gadgets companies out there. If any of you have seen a Reatrix system in the malls and in the theaters, and the Reactive television systems, or an Ecast jukebox ‑ we've got tons of portfolio companies I can tell you about that all have exciting gadgets and technologies. To me, where I'm focused right now is I've been thinking a lot about the demographic that is me ‑ the woman who still wants to look good and feel good, who has more free time, who has more money, who, however, still has family obligations, has a career. We're hitting 50, and when our parents hit 50, we thought they were pretty much close to death... Heidi: Now, we are shocked to find that we are 50. And I think, what's interesting is that the Silicon Valley ‑ and it's a little bit like Hollywood ‑ get so focused on youth and the youth culture and the spending money that youths have and advertising to youths. And while I've got nothing against young people, I think that the people my age and women my age have been an underserved demographic, when it comes to utilizing the web as a medium for exchange, as a community, as an outlet for all sorts of things and a place to go learn about things. And I'm seeing more and more activities around that, and I can't tell you how many times... this is probably hitting all of my same‑age brethren entrepreneurs, but we're all sort of getting up and saying, "I don't really want to start the next teen cell phone. I really want to start something that my friends and I could use." And so I'm seeing a lot of really interesting companies come about, a lot that combine community with some of the really innovative things that can be done online. Lucy: Give it some time. Heidi: Yeah. Lucy: Give it some time. Larry: Yeah, you bet. I'm not that old yet. But, anyhow... Lee: That's right, Larry. Larry: They're laughing... Heidi: Somebody once asked me to predict the future of venture investing, and I said, "Just about the time we finally invest in the ultimate weight‑loss pill and the instant‑tan pill, culture will change so that it's not cool to be thin and it's not cool to be tan, and we'll lose again." Larry: Oh, boy. My personal friend, Mark Twain, said, "Youth is wasted on the young." Heidi: That's right. Larry: Anyhow. I can't help but ask this, Heidi. Many people don't look at venture capitalists as entrepreneurs, but anybody who is a managing director, believe me, they are entrepreneur. But, of course, Heidi has the background and experience of being an entrepreneur. She's now continuing to support and work with entrepreneurs. What is it about you that makes this all happen? And what makes it tick, in terms of an entrepreneur? Heidi: Well, there are so many answers. And I've had the pleasure to listen to many of your wonderful speakers on this series before myself, and I think, a lot of things have been mentioned about tenacity and creativity and mission and a passion about what you're doing. There are so many things that I can think of. And of course, if you look me up on LinkedIn, I refer to myself as a "recovering entrepreneur," which is a little bit of an inside joke at Mobius. We're recovering entrepreneurs. Heidi: I think, what I had to learn, going from being an entrepreneur to being a venture capitalist, is it's like being the quarterback and then being the coach. When you're a venture capitalist, you do work behind the scene, you do help a lot. But, they're sort of not your losses, and they're not your victories. And if you're doing your job right, the entrepreneur is on the cover of "Time" magazine, not you. When you're an entrepreneur, the buck stops here. It's funny. I just went on a walk with a fellow entrepreneur of mine, and he was talking about a friend who used to be a vice president of a big company and is now the CEO of a small company, and one of the things he was saying to her is, "Now you understand how the buck really stops here." Heidi: And I think, for me, what really defines an entrepreneur is something that somebody said to me once. When I was running T/Maker, we had this product line called ClickArt, which is still around today, and it's basically electronic clip art. But, you have to remember, when we did that product in 1984, there were no scanners; there was no PostScript; there was no anything. We were literally sitting artists down, at 128K max. We didn't even have a stylus. They were drawing with the mouse in 72 DPI to create electronic clip art. I mean, that's as basic as it was. And when we shipped that product, I remember staying at a trade show, and I can't remember how many people came up to me and said, "Wow! You know, I thought of that, too." Right? And in the back of my mind, I thought, "Yeah, you thought of it. But, we did it." Heidi: And I think, for most of these things, it's that "one percent inspiration, 99 percent perspiration." There are so many ideas that just die on the vine because a person doesn't go out and try to actually do them. They think they're a cool idea, but other things get in the way and they don't really work hard at it. And not only do they not work hard at the creative process, but the process I'll loosely call is the destructive process. With entrepreneurs, one of the things I respect the most is, when you come up with an idea, that instead of working on it for the first five days about how you're going to accomplish it, you spend five days trying to prove that it's already been done or it's not doable ‑ not because you're being pessimistic, but before you engage in the creative process, sometimes you have to go and say, "What else is already out there?" And one of my pet peeves as a venture capitalist is when somebody comes and pitches me an idea, and I say, "Have you ever heard about blahblah.com?" And they go, "What's that?" And I get on and I show them, and it's the exact company they were talking about building, but it already exists. My feeling is, today, particularly with Google and other search engines and the Internet, you can find a lot of this stuff out there, and you need to go out and look. But, I do think, ultimately, a long and winding answer, but the short answer is it's like Nike, man. It's "just do it." If you just do it, that's the only way to be an entrepreneur. If you're not willing to just do it, you're never going to be an entrepreneur. Lee: That is such great advice, Heidi, because so many people, even when they just go out and do it, it's not that first idea that they even end up doing sometimes. It's just having the guts to get out there and start the business and get in that industry and figure out what it is. Heidi: That's right. And ask a lot of questions and meet a lot of people and kiss a lot of frogs. Larry: Yeah. Heidi: It's always easy, in retrospect, to say, "Why did I take that meeting with that person?" But you don't know because, just as likely, you could take a meeting with another person. And I just had something happen this weekend, where I was helping someone on a music project. And we were talking to someone who was totally unrelated, and they just said, "Oh, what are you up to?" Totally unrelated to the music industry. And we told him what we were doing, and he said, "Hey, I'm good friends with..." And I won't name the names because it's all proprietary, but let's just say one of the most Grammy‑winning artists in the world. And he said, "I'll give him a call tomorrow and see if he's interested in helping you with this." So, it's like one of those random, like that's not what we were even there to talk about. But, that's how the conversation ended up going, and it could take us in a really exciting direction. You just never know when that kind of serendipitous stuff is going to occur. Lucy: Your remark about 1984, when you were doing T/Maker and you had to have the ClickArt, I just have to go back to that for a moment and say, in 1984, we were trying to draw things in P‑Roth inside... Lucy: That's not revolutionary. Heidi: Yeah, yeah. I remember the first time I showed my husband QuickTime, whenever it came out ‑ 1989, whatever. And I'd bring home my file, because we were under nondisclosure with Apple. And I'd show him this postage‑sized, grainy thing, and he goes, "Wow. I am really underwhelmed." Heidi: For me, as a computer geek, it was so exciting to see television on a computer. And for him, he was like, "Uh, honey? Have you looked at our TV set? It's like a lot better than this." Lucy: Because I know you, I think that one of the things that makes you a great entrepreneur is, in fact, you see potential, and you're willing to take the risk to develop the potential. Heidi: Yeah. It does make one quite dangerous. It's that joke about the person who buys houses because they see the good in every house. And I tend to be a person who sees the upside in things. Which I think, again, in order to be an entrepreneur, you have to be an optimist. You have to believe things are going to work out your way. But, you have to be realistic. And that's where I, again, for lack of a better word, call it the destructive process ‑ testing your idea, going out and thinking about the boundary cases: "What's the worse that could happen here? What's the worse that could happen here? How am I going to prepare for it?" And also going out and really combing the markets to make sure that what you're doing is unique, or, if not unique, that you're going to be the best somehow. Lucy: Well, along the way ‑ you've been here in Silicon Valley. You were born here. Heidi: Yeah. Lucy: And you've got a great network. And we are really curious to also understand who helped you the most. Who would you look to as being your mentor? Heidi: I was very fortunate to be born into a family where entrepreneurship was not a bad thing. I think, it's one of the things that makes California such a great place and will play a continuing role in the world economy is because we are just a culture, for 150‑plus years, of people striking out and doing something on their own, and failure not meaning social failure. You can be a business failure and still hold your head up and go to your kids' school and not be embarrassed about it. Lucy: "I failed today." Heidi: "I failed today." It's part of the process. I think that, for me, my father was a great role model for me because he was an entrepreneur. He was always thinking. He would say things to me like, "Today is the best day of my life because I have every day before today that I can draw on what I learned to apply to today." So, he was just that kind of person. And he wasn't like Mr. Rogers. I mean, he was just a great role model about how one could look for the opportunity in everything. And he was a very poor immigrant. I think, he graduated from high school. I'm not really sure. His dad died when he was 12, and he had to make money for the family to make ends meet. I mean, he had one of those really hard upbringings that made him very grateful and thankful, and very creative and resourceful. And he treated me like one of the boys. He never said to me, "Oh, you're a girl. You shouldn't do this," or "You can't go to graduate school," or "You can't do anything." In fact, if I said I couldn't do something because of being a woman, he would scoff at me. And my brothers joke that I'm the most like him... Heidi: So, he actually made me in his image, not my brothers. But, I was very lucky about that. I was very lucky, also, just to be in the computer industry in the late '70s and early '80s, because I really did get to grow up with the people who are the leaders in the industry. And so somebody said to me, "Wow! How did you get to be friends with Bill Gates?" And it's like, "Well, started 25 years ago." [laughs] Heidi: He was easier to get to then. But, it's things like that, that I think, I just had the great fortune to have a front‑row seat and be a participant in an industry that I really believe has changed the world. So, it gave me a lot of opportunities to learn from other people and have mentors and role models. Lee: So, Heidi, when you think about all you've done in your career ‑ building your own companies, being an investor ‑ what has been the toughest thing you've had to do in your career? Heidi: You know, you face so many tough challenges when you are the CEO and "the buck stops here." Someone once said to me, "Gosh, you're so lucky. You're the CEO. You have so much freedom." And I laughed, and I said, "You don't understand that when you're the CEO, you have the least freedom, because you can't just quit." I raised that money. I hired every one of these people. I gave those venture capitalists my commitment that I was going to bring it home for them. I'm not just going to walk out the door. I remember walking into my company every day. We had about 100 employees. And I would count the cars in the parking lot, and I would think about the car payments and the mortgage payments... Heidi: Everything that was dependent on this company. And so I would say, still, to this day, that the hardest thing you have to do is lay people off. I mean, the hardest thing you have to do is downsize your firm. It's not as hard to fire someone. This is an interesting thing. I would much rather terminate somebody for cause than lay people off because we can't afford it. When you terminate someone for cause ‑ and "for cause" is a real legal term. I don't want to use the legal definition of that. But, what I really mean is, when somebody's not a good fit for the job they're in, I find that it's really in their best interest to tell them and get them to move on to something else. And while that is sometimes hard, I think, it's the right thing to do, and I think, it's the right thing to do for the person. And I've often found that you check in with them a couple years later, they're better off where they are, even though this can be very difficult. I do think, going through the dot‑com bust and having to lay people off, knowing that there wasn't going to be another job they could just waltz into, was a really, really hard thing to do. To me, those were the hardest things I ever had to do. In fact, my T/Maker employees still joke about this time where we had our first loss ever and we had to lay off some people, and it was Christmas. I was about four‑months pregnant. I said to my husband, "I've got to do it myself. I hired all these people. I'm going to do it myself. I'm going to give each one of them the news." So I'm in my office, and they're coming in, or I'm going to their offices. And I'm pregnant, and so the hormones coursing through my veins. So, I am sobbing through these terminations, and they are comforting me. Heidi: They feel sorry for me. But, I have to lay them off. Sobbing, sobbing, sobbing. And I say to my husband, "This is the worst business day of my life, where I'm terminating some people who've been with me five, six years, and I just feel terrible. And it's Christmas, and I had to tell them, 'No bonuses for you guys, and you're getting laid off.'" I said, "Please go to Blockbuster and rent a funny movie so that when I get home, I can take my mind off of it." So, I come home, and what had he rented, but Chevy Chase's "Christmas Vacation." Heidi: And I don't know if you guys have seen this, but of course, the whole story is about a guy who believes he's getting a Christmas bonus and builds a swimming pool or something, and then he doesn't get the bonus, and he ends up kidnapping his boss. Heidi: It was just one of those moments: I just didn't know whether to laugh. I'll never forget that moment. I still cry when I see that show. It was on TV last Christmas, and I'm like crying through it. My kids are looking at me. They're like, "Mom, it's a comedy." Not for me. Lucy: Not for me. In fact, my answer to this question is the same. I think that laying people off is clearly one of the hardest things that I've ever had to do. Heidi: Absolutely. Lucy: We've heard a lot of great advice so far in this interview from you about entrepreneurship, and the Nike "just do it," and who cares if you've thought about it? Just get it done. Heidi: Yeah. Lucy: And other types of advice around doing your homework and seeing the potential. If you were sitting right here with a young person and you were giving them advice about entrepreneurship, what else would you tell them? And one of the things that comes to mind is a conversation we had sometime about networking. Heidi: Yeah. Lucy: And I thought you had some of the best advice about networking that I've ever heard. Heidi: Well, I have a ton of advice about networking. I'm a little typecast as a networking speaker because Harvard did a case on me a number of years ago that really is about my philosophy of networking. And when they approached me to do the case, I said, "Why would anyone want a case on this? It's all just common sense." It's kind of like that book: "Everything I needed to know about networking, I learned in the second grade." But, it's just commonsense and practical and courtesy. And so, they did do this case, and I do speak on the case a lot. And my fundamental belief is that it's very rare that anything happens as a singular effort. Yeah, you can go climb ‑ well, even climbing Mount Everest, it's a team, right? And entrepreneurship is a team sport with very many lonely moments. So, you have to be the one. I'm working on this project with someone. I got up at four o'clock in the morning a couple of days ago because I thought of something, and I knew if I waited till morning, it wasn't going to be the same. So, I had to get up and come down here and sit at the computer for an hour and write up my thoughts while they were fresh. I think, there are a lot of times when you're just singularly approaching something, but I think, you have to know how to ask for help, and how to give help. Students say this to me all the time, they say, "Well, I don't have anything to give." You always have something to give, everyone has something to give. Good lord, you can come and talk to me and baby‑sit my children while you're talking me. I had one guy who traded me, I would talk to him about his business and he was a personal trainer, so he would train me while I was talking to him about his business. Heidi: And I think that one of the errors that people make in networking is they try to hard to gather business cards, and they don't think about "What is my connection with this other person, and what do I have to give them? What in return am I going to ask them for?" Again, I will bring it back to this other comment, a lot of times you don't know how the other person is going to help you, and you're not quite sure always how you're going to help them. Sometimes, it's quite surprising, but if you put yourself open to that, and you use some of the modern tools ‑ like I've become a real LinkedIn convert, because I love being able to get on LinkedIn and see who my friends know that I might want to talk to about industries completely foreign to me and vice versa. If somebody has a good friend from college who now wants to do something in the out of home advertising market and sees I'm on the board of Aventure and would like to talk to me. I don't mind doing that stuff because I sort of feel like there's this great, you know, we all help each other in this community and I'm a little bit of a believer in that kind of pay it forward. It's interesting right now because in Aventure I'm working closely on, I have to reach out and ask for a lot of favors, and I've been very aware that for a lot of my current roles in life I'm the one that asks for the favors than asked. Now that I'm doing the asking it's interesting, I'm uncomfortable. I'd much rather do a favor for someone else than ask somebody for a favor. It's my nature, and it's the nature of many people. But, I think that you have to get good at understanding "What am I asking for? Is it appropriate for me to ask it? Is the person capable of delivering it? Is it an appropriate amount of time for them to send and do something for me? And what could I possibly do for them?" I always try to make sure that people know I'm quite open to doing something for you in exchange, and by the way, no is a perfectly good answer, too. If I ask you a favor and the answer is no, just tell me no. I'm very comfortable with that. Lucy: That's great advice because so many people they really are either afraid to network, or don't know how to network, and that just makes it really clear. Heidi: Networking is also very awkward; somebody from Stanford called me up once and said, "Can I network with you?" What is that is that like my pen pal or something? Lucy: Just network. Heidi: Let's say you want to meet someone, and I guess, with the powers of Google and the Internet and all that, you might want to meet some important person. If you have no context, it's going to be a very fruitless conversation. But, every one of them, their kids go to school, they are on a charitable board, they may enjoy a certain kind of athletic activity. I'm not saying become a stalker, but generally, for example, if you want to get to know a person and they happen to be on the board of a charitable organization go find out what the annual fundraiser is on that charitable organization and volunteer to work at it. Chances are you're going to be able to meet that person over time if you get involved in something like that. And, by the way, you're doing something good too. That's again, one of the powers of Silicon Valley ‑ both good and bad ‑ you've got to be careful, you've got to find out if other moms and dads on the soccer sidelines have MBAs because everybody's kind of in this business. Heidi: It is interesting that you have so many different places where you meet and run into people, and so many people I do business with are friends of mine in other context. Lucy: So Heidi, you had talked earlier in the interview about different characteristics that you thought were really important to help entrepreneurs grow and build companies, but when you think about yourself, what are some of your personal characteristics that you have that have helped you to be successful as an entrepreneur? Heidi: Certainly tenacity. I mean, I'm very tenacious about... you put me on something I'm on a mission and I'm not going to let it go. I like to learn new things, so I like to push myself and try to learn something new. I think, when you're constantly learning it helps you get a better job, [laughs] and in so many areas. I'm definitely a people person, I love talking with people, I love meeting people. I'm very comfortable asking people for their opinions and I think, I'm a pretty good listener. So, I think that that also helps me be an entrepreneur, because you learn from other people, you gather opinions, you mold what you're doing. Frankly, it helps you in terms of going back to asking for favors, giving favors, recruiting people. People generally want to work with people they like and people they respect, which is another thing. My belief is that I'm going to be in this world for, I hope, a pretty long time. One thing I've learned being almost 50 and being in the Valley all this time is that you run into the same people over and over and over again. So, don't burn a bridge unless you've decided that's the best course of action. I like to sleep at night. I don't like to do bad deals, and I don't like to squeeze the last nickel out of somebody just because I have the upper hand. I like to live that way. While there's always different opinions about anything you do, I try to test everything. Does this match my ethics? Can I sleep at night? If my husband or my kids knew I did this, would they think less of me as a person? I like to live that way. I think, an entrepreneurship is not a zero sum game. Your gain doesn't have to come out of somebody else's loss. Larry: Boy, I'll say. You know, Heidi, one thing I've learned to do is that I'm going to call you "Coach" from now on. I just want to clarify one little thing. You said something earlier about kissing the frogs, or was it kissing your dogs? Heidi: Yeah, kissing frogs. Although frogs wish it was kissing dogs. Larry: Yeah. And you also just mentioned that you should ask for help. Do you want to introduce me to Bill Gates? Heidi: No. Larry: No. OK. Heidi: That's a good one you bring up, because it is one of those, how do you manage a relationship towards a person who's very important or famous? One thing I had to decide early on is, I just set certain rules. And I've gotten very comfortable saying "No" to people. So, people will say to me, "Can you introduce me to Bill Gates?" And the answer is, "No, I can't," because if I did that for everybody, they would.... And the hardest part is people thinking, "I have the best charity in the world. I have something that would be so interesting to the Foundation. Please help me get to the right person. Can you please send this to Bill and Melinda?" And I say no. One of the things that gives me comfort in saying no is that I say, "Look my own husband runs a charitable organization called Refugee Relief that does medical assistance in countries under conflict. He'd be a perfect candidate, and he hasn't even asked Bill and Melinda for money." One of the things I try to do is live by my own rules. The other thing I try to do is, for example, when I sold a company from my portfolio to Microsoft I didn't even talk to Bill about it. I'm not going to mention, "Hey, I'm selling one of my portfolio companies" to him. It's not relevant. I really try to respect that, particularly people who are in positions like Bill where everyone's approaching you all of the time, you need to be respectful of the pressures on that person's time. I think, that's one of the reasons why Bill and Melinda and I have a good and long‑standing relationship. They know that I respect that there needs to be boundaries there, because they don't have the luxury of living normal lives. Larry: Yeah, that's fact. By the way, of course, you know I was just saying that to.... Heidi: Oh, I know. Larry: However, last week we interviewed Brad Feld and he did say, "Hi to Heidi." Heidi: Oh, that's so sweet. I adore Brad. Larry: All right. Let me ask you this question. In your approach to your professional life, you do so many things. How do you bring about balance? Heidi: That's an excellent question. If you'd like I can bring my 12 and 14 year olds in here right now to continue the counterpoint to that. Larry: oh. Heidi: I do try to set limits. In my house, although we have wireless access, I'm not the person who walks around with my laptop and uses it everywhere. We certainly have a "no laptop in the bedroom" rule. I don't tend to watch TV and do email at the same time. I have a home office that I come in to do my work and then I try to leave it. I also try to have a commitment with my kids. If I say, "I'm going to stop working at seven," then I'm going to stop working at seven. I mix business and pleasure a lot. I have a lot of social engagements with people. I have a lot of people over for dinner. I try to engage my kids in some of that, because luckily at their ages they find some of that very interesting. In one of the projects I'm working on right now, I ask them for advice a lot. I've been able to pick their brains a lot about it. And they've been really great. I tell them, you know, if I'm having a bad day, you know I had a bad day about a legal contract I was working on. And because it didn't get done I missed a window of production for something. And I said to them, they said you know, "Why are you in such a bad mood?" And instead of saying something like, "Well, I had a bad day at work." I said, "Well, let me explain to you. This company needs a piece of paperwork before we can contract this production facility. We didn't get the piece of paperwork. Now because this production facility can only do things in, you know, they have another client the next three weeks that pushed me out a month. So, here's a one day delay on a contract that's going to cost me a three week delay on the production. And that's why I'm so mad about this today." And so that what is the thing? A teachable moment right? You know, I try to bring them in to the things that I'm doing. But, it is important sometimes to just close the door and say, "I'm sorry I'm not going to do this." I try very hard not to schedule meetings on the weekends. I try very hard not to schedule meetings at night. I try to really limit my travel because it is very disruptive to my family when I travel. And so, I try to make accommodations. Lucy: Well, and your daughters are wonderful. And having seen them at a couple of dinners. I mean the integration works really well. Heidi: They're pretty cute. Yeah. Lucy: They're pretty cute. It works really well because they get to see a lot of different people over here. Heidi: Yes they do. Lucy: That they wouldn't ordinarily see. They lead unusual lives. Heidi: We had a nice conversation about Norwegian and other things this morning. So, it was very good. Lucy: They were very funny. Heidi: And they do provide very funny moments. One time actually, Bill and Melinda were coming over for dinner. And Nicky was playing on her Xbox. And she knew Bill was coming over and said like "Can I have him sign my Xbox?" "Oh, I guess, you can ask him to sign your Xbox." Which she didn't ultimately do when he came over because she was too embarrassed. But, she said to me, "Microsoft, yeah, they make the Xbox. Do they make any other products?" And I just had to laugh. Heidi: You know, the eyes of a thirteen year old is like all they make is the Xbox. Lucy: Well you really have achieved a lot. And you have front row seats to a lot. And I have no doubt, fifty or not, that you are going to be on the front row for many, many years. Heidi: Not done yet. Lucy: Not done yet. So, tell us what's next for you. Heidi: Oh, I'm so excited about what I'm doing. But, I can't tell you. Sorry. Lucy: I'm going to jump across the desk and strangle her. Heidi: I know. I know. I am. You know I'm continuing to do my work with Mobee and then a company that we work on. And Brad and Jake my partners there. I mean, you know, we have a great relationship and I'm enjoying that. But, I am definitely an entrepreneur at heart. In fact I've been thinking, at some point on my link and profile. Right now, it says venture capitalist and recovering entrepreneur. And someday soon it's going to say "Relapsed entrepreneur and venture capitalist" because I just can't help myself. Heidi: So, I just started a little company. I actually funded it yesterday. I'm fortunate enough to have provided my own seed capital. I joke to my husband. I said, "It's very important tonight because we're having cocktails with my lead investor," which of course was me. [laughter] So, we laughed about that. So, I have a little start up that I'm working on, which I will hope to tell you all about really soon. But, it's not quite baked enough yet. So, you'll just have to wait. Lucy: I just hope it's about fifty year old women. Heidi: You will, you will buy one of these products. Well, I'm going to give you one. And Lucy. Larry Series: Entrepreneurial HeroesInterviewee: Heidi RoizenInterview Summary: Born and raised in Silicon Valley, Heidi spent the first part of her career founding and growing tech companies. Now she enjoys helping entrepreneurs build companies as a coach instead of a player. Release Date: August 15, 2007Interview Subject: Heidi RoizenInterviewer(s): Lucy Sanders, Larry Nelson, Lee KennedyDuration: 34:33