Podcasts about pitchwerks

This is our last episode of the year, and we've brought in a big guest for it!  Pittsburgh mayor Bill Peduto is in the studio, telling Scot MacTaggart about how he and the city are working to attract top businesses and individual talents with a “4P” strategy that goes above and beyond the usual thinking.  Mayor Peduto shares his ideas of how the city will further promote entrepreneurship, and cites Andrew Moore of Carnegie Mellon and Google fame in his argument for clean air and clean water as key tools to bring the best employers and opportunities to the city. 

In honor of Thanksgiving, we're giving you a giant feast of information to sink your teeth into!  Leah Jakaitis is the head of marketing science at Tulco Labs, which uses data science to help their companies to compete in certain targeted industries.  This week, Leah tells Scot MacTaggart all about the accountability and “janitorial work” of her job, and the ways in which she sees marketing - online and offline - getting better at serving everyone involved. 

When it comes to telling stories by producing videos and other types of content, very few people can match Jordon Rooney, just in terms of sheer numbers alone.  Whether you're talking about impressions, conversions, engagement, or clients, Jordon has an incredible track record. He started off as a young guy making positive content for younger audiences, and now he's a slightly-older young guy who makes content for all kinds of people, including well-known brands that take in billions in revenue each year.  This week, Jordon shares tons of insights and observations with Scot MacTaggart and the Pitchwerks audience.

This week, John Dick, CEO of the super-advanced market research firm CivicScience is in the Epicast studios, and he's got the goods, turning his appearance into one of the strongest shows we've ever done. Talking with Scot MacTaggart about everything from unexplored market connections to the specific mechanics of the CivicScience sales funnel, John gives a master class in managing your business, explaining mature tactics and philosophies that are making CivicScience into the obvious choice for major consumer brands.

A few years ago, Jon Shanahan was making a good living, following a fairly mainstream career path, and decided to start a YouTube channel called The Kavalier, where he reviews and recommends mens clothing, shoes, watches and more.  He's now produced well over 600 videos, he has 90,000 subscribers, and The Kavalier is his full-time job. This week, Jon comes in to talk to Scot MacTaggart about how he mustered the courage and energy to pivot out of a perfectly good career situation, overcome the predictable doubts about his new path, and put food on the table for his kids. 

This week, we take it a little easy and let Scot MacTaggart's friend Mitch Turck bring Origin, his new card game into the studio so our celebrity panel can try it out!  Origin is a combination of history trivia and poker, where the players guess when events happened, and try to convince other players that their guesses are correct. By day, Mitch is a transportation and autonomous vehicles expert, but in his spare time, he has been developing Origin to launch on Kickstarter where it can now be found.  The other players in the room are Jared Raszewski, the CEO of Dissolves from last week's show, and Marta Mazzoni from the popular Epicast travel and entertainment podcast Marta on the Move.

If you're tired of measuring and scooping powdered drink mix, this week's guest will interest you.  Jared Raszewski is the founder of Dissolves, and he has invented the Tide Pod of drink mixes. Like the name says, the pod dissolves in your drink!  It's completely safe for all diets, and solves a lot of different problems of measuring, mixing, and cleanup. Jared talks to Scot about what he learned in the University of Pittsburgh's Blast Furnace, Founder Institute and AlphaLab Gear, the decisions he has made along the way, and where he sees things going from here.

Whether you call it “people operations”, “human resources”, or something else entirely, you have to admit that there seems to be a lot more marketing floating around in the department that deals with people and talent and such lately.  This week's guest is Anessa Fike, the founder and CEO of Fike and Co, and she's here to tell Scot MacTaggart all about that marketing mindset that has taken hold, and is now called “employer branding”. Anessa was once in charge of recruiting for The Motley Fool, one of the best-loved employers in the country, and has shared her knowledge with employers of all sizes ever since.

Jim Krenn is the creator and co-host of the successful “No Restrictions” podcast, now produced by the team at the Pittsburgh Current.  He has stayed local to his hometown of Pittsburgh and still remained successful in his entertainment career, which now spans more than 30 years.  Jim Krenn will always be a comedian -- many Pittsburghers think of him as the personality that put the WDVE morning show on the map, others as the backbone of Nickelodeon's cult hit “Action League Now!”   This week, Jim comes into the Epicast Studios to talk with Scot MacTaggart about his many innovative and entrepreneurial reinventions - from his new “Yinzer” line of cards and candy to a brand-new live show in December that will feature him doing musical impressions - and the mindset that he uses to stay grounded so he can succeed. 

It's October, so let's talk about Scarehouse, the nation's top haunted attraction!  Scot's friend Katie Dudas - aka Dudders - is the sales and marketing director for the all of the various Scarehouse projects and attractions, and this week she opens her playbook all the way up for Pitchwerks listeners.  Immersive experiences, data analytics, geography, social media, customer reviews, and what regular retailers can learn from attractions like Scarehouse and its sister properties -- everything's on the table. If you're in the area, be sure to thank Katie for sharing her insights by checking out the Scarehouse “Scream District” in Pittsburgh's Strip District all this month!

From the individual operator working a sales or marketing job on their own, to the major ad agency or corporate brand, everyone's in the media business right now.  This week's Pitchwerks features Andrew Knox of AKM Productions. AKM is the company behind a couple of media production toolboxes, such as Remaster Media and Kontent Core, and Andrew is the CEO and founder behind all of it.  With Remaster Media, Andrew is looking to give content creators a fast way to master their products, and with Kontent Core, he provides professionally produced clips through an efficient self-service window. Andrew talks to Scot about making your own material, the complexities of licensing tracks, and what he has learned from building all of these products.

There was a time, not that long ago, when selling ads and sponsorships in a “pro-cannabis lifestyle magazine” would have sounded like an insurmountable challenge in Western Pennsylvania.  Things are changing though, because Gina Vensel is bringing Sensi - a free, pro-cannabis lifestyle magazine - to her hometown of Pittsburgh. Gina has assembled the sponsors and advertisers necessary to make Sensi Pittsburgh successful, and this week she answers Scot MacTaggart's questions on messaging, strategy and how Gina and her team target prospective clients as they build the Pittsburgh version of a well-known publication.

This week, we get a call from New York City!  Elyce Henkin jumps on the line with Scot MacTaggart to talk about how marketing and advertising work in the world's most competitive theater market.  Elyce is the director of partnerships and brand experience at AKA NYC, and her firm handles the marketing for major Broadway shows like Come From Away, The Prom, and Harry Potter and the Cursed Child.  Elyce and Scot spend quite a bit of time talking about how important it is to find and use an authentic voice and approach when you're marketing art with a specific message and point of view, and also analyze how partnerships are formed with brands like Kenneth Cole.

If you're not familiar with the Awesome Foundation or Awesome Pittsburgh, then you have to check out this week's show.  If you go to an Awesome Pittsburgh pitch party, you'll leave with a smile on your face, after seeing a bunch of locals proposing off-the-wall civic improvement ideas in search of a $1,000 grant.  This week's guest is Scot's friend Mike Capsambelis, a founder and trustee of Awesome Pittsburgh who gets to vote on these pitches, and a very smart guy who oversees projects at Google. Mike explains what kinds of pitches they get, how they judge them, and what he thinks you should do if you want your project to be selected.

Later this year, Ingrid Cook and the SHzoom team will bring their long-awaited “Uptime” product to market to assist fleets with minor accidents and other types of service.  Uptime's release is the latest milestone on a 10-year journey that began when Ingrid had a regular job working for someone else. Along the way, Ingrid's team has assembled a portfolio of patents, performed extensive customer discovery and market validation, and taken a beta version of the offering to test users.  This week, Ingrid comes into the Epicast Studios to talk to Scot MacTaggart and the Pitchwerks audience about self-discipline, to debate about luck, and talk about some of the other paths that SHzoom could have taken.

Conturo Prototyping is a crazy place.  They create the first few versions of new components so that inventions can be perfected and turned into new products.  Right now, while you're reading this, they're building parts for new products that you probably haven't even imagined, and they're still a very young company.  This week, John sits down with Scot MacTaggart to explain his company's rapid success, the challenges of cash flow, and the business of building parts for autonomous trucks and mechanical lungs, and trying to level up so he can equip the International Space Station. 

This week we're talking strategic investment with our old friend Kevin Kelly, CEO of Rhabit Analytics, and Doug Reynolds, EVP of Development Dimensions International (DDI), who counts technology and innovation efforts among his responsibilities there.  They came in the Epicast Studios to talk about their collaborative efforts, as DDI's Venture Fund has now made a strategic investment in Rhabit, and to let Scot MacTaggart ask everything you ever wanted to know about strategic investment arrangements and the motivations behind them.

We did a show with Idea Foundry's Jason Jones a few months back, but then lost the whole thing when our road kit ate the recording.  Jason is a good sport though, and agreed to come back in to redo the show when he had time. We got him back into the studio, and halfway through, something major blew up on the utility pole and knocked out all the power on our block.  NO EXCUSES IN THE PODCAST GAME THOUGH - we did the rest of the show with AA batteries and cell phone lights. You'll be glad we did! Jason is a great guest, and Idea Foundry does important innovation and economic development work. Applications for their Equitable Entrepreneurship program (EE) are now being accepted through August 18th, and you are really going to want to tell someone about it.

This week's guests are incredible!  We have Toni Murphy, vice president of sales and marketing for Comcast, and Bill Flanagan, the iconic host of WPXI TV's Our Region's Business - and they're in to talk about their work with the Allegheny Conference on Community Development.  Specifically, they're here talking about “Our Next 75”, the Allegheny Conference initiative that brought a diverse crowd of 1000 locals into one room to talk about what the area needs to grow and thrive for the next 75 years. The trio gets into the methodology behind the effort, the brand and message work necessary to make sure that it's successful, and where things go from here. 

After starting businesses across various fields, including robotics and software, John Feghali has now turned his attention to something for the younger generation.  His latest venture is called Toaster Party, and this week we're talking about how they are marketing their new product, Toaster Pets Animation Studio. John sees his whole career as a mission to make life's best things available to everyone - and the Toaster Pets product is no different.  The Animation Studio addresses one of the biggest requests that young people make of their parents: they want to make online videos. John says his cartoon video kit allows them to express themselves earlier, but in a safe and anonymous way. He adds that the storytelling process and a “build-on-your-failures” mindset prepares young people for the many jobs that will require the skills this product develops. 

Super fun show this week!  Milena Roucka - who wrestling fans will know better as WWE's Rosa Mendes - comes into the studio to talk about Totally Fit Mama, the business she started with her partner Courtney Daylong.  During the course of conversation, she manages to drop a number of motivational and endearing truths about all the major changes in her life the past few years, including the birth of her daughter, her retirement from WWE, the breakup of her relationship, and adjusting to a new life in a new city.

Kurt Schnieders has had the kind of career that most of us can only dream of.  He is best known for having been the Chief Information Officer (CIO) at Dick's Sporting Goods, and before that he was the CIO of L Brands, the corporate parent of Victoria's Secret.  This week, Kurt stops into the Epicast Studios to talk to Pitchwerks host Scot MacTaggart about his post-corporate life as a consultant, the trends he sees in the technology space, and the frightening details of the stroke that he suffered in December of 2017.  Kurt explains something most of us will never fully understand - the corporate CIO's work day - and what the product, marketing, and sales landscape looks like from his perspective.  

This week our good friend Aaron Watson, the host of Going Deep with Aaron Watson and the CEO of Piper Creative is here to demystify LinkedIn and social content strategy for all of us.  Aaron and his partner Hannah Phillips have done a great job in developing their message, and in the short time that Piper has been in operation, they have learned to articulate the value of their services in a way that it seems truly effortless. Aaron is the first one to explain that that effortless appearance is actually the product of - you guessed it - tons of repetitions over long periods of time to get things right.  Check out this week's episode to learn a few of his LinkedIn and social video secrets, and to get a peek at some of the well-established philosophies at work behind these new tactics.

Our friend and prior guest Zak Slayback has written a new book called How to Get Ahead.  Scot devoured it - cover to cover - in a couple of days, and found it to be well written and perfectly framed for those people that are looking for clear steps to follow in careers and business.  This week, Zak tells us about how he took personal definitions of success into consideration in writing the book, he gets into how his collaboration with McGraw Hill Education publishing formed, and really explains the power of the personal website and email list that he recommends so strongly.  Expect all that and a lot more this week, as these two fast talkers compare notes about the current state of career development!

Greg Coticchia has a way of inciting mischief in the Epicast Studios, and this time is no different.  This week, the serial-entrepreneur-turned-educator is behind the mic talking about product management, a very useful discipline for those businesses that have expanded past the startup phase, and now need to organize their efforts.  One thing that sparks a number of different conversation points is the fact that product managers typically have no authority or staff, so they have to use data, trust, and negotiation to win people over and get the support that they need to make their product successful.  

We got an invitation to take a road trip to Youngstown, Ohio to visit our friend Robb Myer from Comeback Capital (comeback.vc) at the Comeback Conference on May 17, and we took it.  If you're not familiar, Comeback Capital tells founders to “be what they are, where they are”, and encourages investors to think of the area from Pittsburgh to Indiana as a potential target for venture capital investment.  There were a lot of people there, and a lot of activity, and we tried to strip out as much ambient noise and crosstalk as possible, but just like past conference recordings that we've done, this episode doesn't sound like one of the interviews we do back at home base.  We got some great insights from attendees though, including some that we know. Here's a list of everyone featured this episode:   Robb Myer, Comeback Capital Jeff Ericson, RubyRide Andy Chan, VIT Initiative Toby Asbury, Parketer Tino Go, Baru Apurbva Desai, Vuclip and Comeback Capital

No one likes medical errors, and no one likes being bad at their job, but this week's guest explains that lack of quality practice and insufficient access to hands-on training opportunities have created serious problems in healthcare.  Dr. Doug Nelson is not a medical doctor. He's a bioengineer and mathematician who took an interest in entrepreneurship after discovering a gap in the marketplace. This week, Doug tells Scot how he learned to give a great product demo, how he sells the value of Lumis, and the pair reflects on what makes practice and training more effective for the student.  

This week's a two-fer, as we talk about the business of professional consulting and also dig into the concepts and practices behind the economic development policy decisions that cities and states make as they move to foster entrepreneurship and create new jobs.  Our guest is Courtney Zaugg, founder of Plaka (plakaassociates.com). Courtney is an economic development consultant based in Indianapolis, Indiana, and knows Scot MacTaggart after partnering with him and KRNLS on a couple of projects.   While visiting Pittsburgh on one such collaboration, Courtney brought her wealth of experience into the Epicast Studios, and shared information on how she became an independent consultant, and the differences between top-down economic development decision making and the “bottom-up” kind that Courtney recommends.

This week, college professor and entrepreneur Dr. John Stakeley comes in to talk to Scot about how our colleges and universities are teaching students about entrepreneurship, and reflecting on his personal experiences to tell that story.  Dr. Stakeley teaches at the University of Pittsburgh, Robert Morris University, and Chatham University here in Pittsburgh, and brings experience as an entrepreneur, an investor, an Army officer and much more. Scot uses the interview to learn more about how entrepreneurship curriculum programs are devised, and seeks John's insights on how to lead the upcoming Pitchwerks Professional Sales Bootcamp (krnls.co/bootcamp) which starts June 10th.  

In 2019, if you're selling professional services or technology, you're sharing articles and blog posts with prospective clients.  Curated third party articles from reputable sources are the name of the game - and they're a really effective way to underline your points and prove that your product or business is as good as you say it is.  Our guest this week is Scott Rogerson, the CEO of UpContent, and his product helps companies to find these articles, sort the good ones from the bad ones, showing clients that you're credible, and that they won't regret choosing you.  This episode, Scott comes in to explain the new rules of social proof and content creation.

One thing we haven't given enough time to on this show?  Sales engineers. It's a lucrative career path, and the people that do that job play a vitally important role.  Meanwhile, we've barely mentioned them. (Sorry.) We fix that this week by talking to Lisa Conturo of the German American Chamber of Commerce, who are making a conscious effort to bring the German apprenticeship model to cities like Pittsburgh.  Lisa and the GACC have actually developed a nicely compensated sales engineering apprenticeship that combines classroom learning with practical on-the-job training (OJT) that gives the learner thousands of hours of experience before they graduate.

For a long time, Scot has been waiting for an opportunity to point to a really effective partnership that matches his own personal preferences.  This week, John Chamberlin and Rachael Rennebeck of YaJagoff Media come in to do just that. YaJagoff Media is best known for the podcast of the same name, but their show is just one component of the larger media and marketing company that they built.  It's a full-time job from which they make their living. Rachael and John are very honest with Scot throughout the entire interview - including a discussion about how they had been arguing the entire day before coming into the studio - but they also explain how when it comes time to set their differences aside and get to work, they're some of the best in the business.   Fair warning - this week's show is marked explicit because it's a little spicy.  Not bad - it's like a 1.5 out of 5 on the podcast scale - but still, you might get in a bit of trouble if you work at an uptight place and bust out the speaker system.  

This week, we talk professional art direction with Mark Ramdarass, who has recently moved to offering fractional services after building up a great list of brands that he has contributed to, including VaynerMedia, Nike, Michael Kors, Adidas, Budweiser and more.  A graphic designer by education, Mark is here to make more sense of creative roles and art direction for those of us that aren't trained in it, and to help us make sense of how it figures into the larger communications strategy of a business or brand. Find him on LinkedIn and reach out if you're interested in more information!

The last time Vivek Kumar was in the studio, this fine program was celebrating its 40th episode, and Qlicket was primarily selling into the hospitality space.  A lot has happened since then, including the addition of John Goldschmidt, who brought a history of sales, business development, and customer success. The company has been tested several times, and in several ways, since Vivek's last visit.  This week, Vivek and John come in to speak with Scot MacTaggart about pivots and struggles, and the huge month-over-month gains that they're now seeing since they've adapted and survived.

This week's episode has it all!  Journalism, market validation, crowdfunding, Donald Trump, tasers, rocket-propelled grenades, the NFL, coal mines and steelworkers!  Our guests this week are Matt Stroud and Carmen Gentile from Postindustrial Media, and they sit down with Scot MacTaggart to talk about the Kickstarter campaign they are doing with Scot and his partner Olga Pogoda, for a product that they are reluctant to call “slow news”.  The trio talks about the value of telling “the full story” in the postindustrial region, which they define as the Rust Belt and Greater Appalachia, and use 2016 election coverage to illustrate the difference between what is available now, and what they seek to provide in the future.  The campaign starts 4/22/2019 and will run for 30 days!

Curtis Wadsworth has been working in patent law for the last 12 years, and if he has his way, his new product Dorothy is going to change that field forever.  This week, Scot MacTaggart gets under the hood of Curt's very young patent search company to help Curt and Dorothy to get ready for the market. Just based on the sheer number of hours that law firms spend on patent searches, and the money they pour into that labor, there's a lot of evidence to suggest that Dorothy will get a warm reception from IP attorneys throughout the country when its user interface is finished.  Curt and Scot put their heads together to make sure that it all goes according to plan.

A great analytical mind steps into the Epicast studios this week as Prashant Ambe, president of TiE Pittsburgh - a nonprofit startup support network - gets behind the microphone.  Prashant starts with his 3-axis theory on career development, recommending diversity in cultures, skills, and industries. After that, he shares recipes that build successful businesses, the importance of taking responsibility for your own path, and a deep dive into the history and mission of TiE and its Pittsburgh chapter.  Be sure to check this week's episode out!

This week, Scot is on the road in Columbus and talks to Matt Wald, President and CEO of the Columbus Collaboratory.  Matt has a few surprises up his sleeves, like when he lists the giant organizations that have co-invested in the Collaboratory, or how difficult it can be for any organization to pivot to compete with digital-native firms.  Matt explains how executive leadership of the 7 founding companies created the Columbus Collaboratory, how reluctant executives should look at their options, and what is waiting for them if they don't build a good plan from the outset.  

Kelauni Cook is the founder of Black Tech Nation, and we've been trying to get her into the studio for some time now because we have seen her sacrifice firsthand.  Kelauni has made some real sacrifices to get where she is today. The Howard University grad is a software developer, a community builder, and now - a funded non-profit executive looking to create a space for black tech workers, who often find themselves feeling isolated.  Kelauni talks to us about how she got here, what comes next, and how big of a factor time management is playing in her life now that she and BTN have built some momentum.

This week, Alison Falk gives us a glimpse of the future by explaining her advocacy of “sex tech” - and no, it isn't just VR and robots.  Alison is the brains behind SexTechSpace (.com), a digital publication that talks about everything related to the intersection between technology and human sexuality.  Alison talks to Scot MacTaggart about her mission, the “boring realities” of building an industry, and in doing so details a very credible vision of future of what will eventually be a multi-billion-dollar space.  Alison has one master's degree and is a candidate for a second, and while she does that and runs SexTechSpace, and on top of all that, she runs Women In Tech Pittsburgh. Don't miss this episode!

An entrepreneur who is 50% player, 50% coach, and 50% cheerleader, Kit Mueller is a hurricane of can-do builder spirit and supportive energy - with a definite mischievous streak - and Scot enjoys his company tremendously.  Kit has had an open invitation to come to the Epicast Studios and appear on the Pitchwerks Podcast since the show started, but he has always suggested others for the show instead. This week he finally comes in and talks about what he thinks real mentorship looks like, and tells us about his efforts to bring the Startup Boost program to Pittsburgh, working with our friend Jim Gibbs and serial entrepreneur Mitch Turck.  Applications for the first cohort will be closing soon, so if you've got a young company you might want to listen to this show right away!

If you're not familiar with the Hardware Cup, it's time to get familiar.  Startups that make physical products are getting hot again, and the Hardware Cup is the leading pitch competition for entrepreneurs in that space.  The Pittsburgh event is coming up on February 28th, so we invited Hardware Cup event coordinator Kayce Karlo to come into the studio and talk to us about what makes this event so special, what kinds of companies have competed in the past, the prizes and support the winners get to claim, and what's going on in the United States with regard to building and making physical products.  

Jon Providence is the Vice President of EagleDream Technologies, who holds the #1 spot among resellers of Amazon Web Services (AWS) in the Northeast United States.  It's a very competitive space - there are 58,000 other AWS resellers out in the world, and considering just because of Boston and New York City alone, the Northeast is an incredibly competitive territory.  Jon talks to Scot about how EagleDream climbed to the top spot, makes a few predictions regarding what the future might hold, and even tells us how he makes those predictions, providing instructive examples from history that tell us what we might expect from the future.     This is a special bonus episode of Pitchwerks, provided in addition to our usual Wednesday programming because EagleDream has just announced a partnership with KRNLS, the firm that Scot started with Olga Pogoda to help businesses grow.  KRNLS is handling EagleDream's launch in Pittsburgh, providing value-add tools and discounts to Amazon Web Services clients in the area.   If you're interested in such things, check out krnls.co/eagledream

Hey kids! Do you like brilliance? Wanna know how to plan for change so it doesn't kill yinz?  This week we've got Ben Mosior, founder of Hired Thought, who was recommended to us by some of the smartest people we know.  He's a “go-to” strategic thinker who practices Wardley Mapping, among other things - and since we didn't know what that was, we asked.  It's a huge, wide-ranging discipline that studies and diagrams complex systems to understand them, so we only focused on a couple of aspects of it for this episode.  Ben explains the relative value of mapping - which includes efficiency and savings you get from doing things in a strategic order of operations - and then helps Scot to understand the evolution of ideas from genesis to commodity.  

Francois Gau has managed major initiatives for some huge worldwide corporations including Honeywell and Kennametal, but he started out as an accountant and innovator in Toulouse in Southern France.  He now owns Levy Industrial, which helps companies from $25 - $200 million per year to upgrade their processes and integrate their departments so that they can attract new clients, keep existing ones and multiply their revenues.  In this extended-length episode, Francois tells Scot MacTaggart about his “sweet spot” method for quickly identifying opportunities for improvement, the value of ethnography (cultural study), and a practice he swears by called “hard listening”.  These tactics have served him well over the years, and resulted in major improvements for manufacturing and industrial firms as well as their clients.

Trained as a lawyer, teaching classes in the Duquesne University MBA program, dragging a track record of high-dollar deals around with him, Mark Santo has seen a lot.  This week, he visits Scot and Buzzy in the new podcast studio at the Pittsburgh Technology Council, looking out to the common outdoor area of Nova Place. Mark and Scot talk about right and reasonable timing and methodology in taking a business into the global international market, today's competitive landscape, and how a young professional should prepare for the changes that are unfolding in the world.  

LOTS OF GREAT STUFF THIS WEEK as Dr. Courtney Williamson, CEO of Abililife, checks into the Epicast Studios to talk to Scot about being the head of a medical equipment startup that is already assisting Parkinson's patients in 40 of the 50 states after just a few short years.  Courtney's mom had Parkinson's, so she assembled a team and invented the a product that could help with some of the physical challenges of the disease. The Calibrace+ is now accepted by Medicare and private insurance under prescription from a doctor. Courtney and Scot hit it off big time in this interview, hitting on the risks that passion presents to entrepreneurs, the importance of valuing process and time management, and of course Steve Urkel and Family Matters.  Check it out!

This week, we've got one of those guests where it's hard to figure out if we can - or should - cover everything he has done in his career.  Andy Hannah is the CEO of Othot, an AI / machine learning company that assists colleges and university by predicting how likely it is that a prospective student will be a good match for one school or another.  Andy has been a CFO and a college professor as well, and has been noteworthy for his success in startup fundraising over the last 25 years. Even better, he attributes his success to building good relationships, good karma, and doing what you say you're going to do.  You're going to love this episode.

For the second week in a row, we've got a doctor in the house!  This week our guest is Alan Martello, who used his PhD in Electrical and Electronics Engineering to bootstrap, build and operate a company called Horizon Control, which he exited in 2011.  Alan has spent a lot of his time helping entrepreneurs since then, and from those efforts, the Entrepreneur Coloring Book was born. It's a simple and direct set of exercises for entrepreneurs (and business development people!) to set their direction.  This episode features discussion on bootstrapping, finding meaning, and how your locale can affect your beliefs and expectations.

Dr. Jonathan Weinkle is a well-traveled and experienced physician who wrote a book about certain soft skills that doctors can develop and use to become more efficient, and ultimately build better relationships with their patients.  Scot read it, and immediately thought “this book is really about how to listen, and how to ask follow up questions to solve your customer's true pain”. So this week, Jonathan's in the studio, and the two men dig deeper on the traditional ways that we listen to each other, and how to develop a problem-solving mindset that combines listening and thoughtful follow-up questions.