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Tanya Van Court – Being the bridge for others, driving on the Autobahn, and educating for generational wealth | Episode 15
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Welcome to episode fifteen of Builder, Banker, Hacker, Chief! Joining me today is Tanya Van Court, Founder and CEO of Goalsetter.
On this show, I’m unpacking the stories, decisions, and influences that make people successful leaders. Tanya comes from a line of strong women who became living bridges to support their families and communities. Tanya is carrying that legacy forward and scaling it way up.
My name is Nathan Baumeister; I am the Co-founder and CEO of ZSuite Tech and the host of this podcast.
As an single mother and elementary school teacher Tanya’s mother was devoted to her children and her students. Unfortunately, she passed away when Tanya was six-years-old. Tanya’s aunt stepped into the gap and adopted her nieces and nephews.
With those loving and unbelievably resilient role-models as her springboard, Tanya went on to earn a double engineering degree from Stanford, and then work in multiple high-profile roles in technology and media, including QWEST, Cablevision, ESPN, Nickelodeon and Discovery.
The impetus for starting her own company, Goalsetter, came from a financial catastrophe early in her career, when more than a million dollars in stock options went to almost nothing as the Dot Com Bubble burst in 2001. Many years later, Tanya saw a massive opportunity to teach children the knowledge and habits of wealth building.
Today, Tanya Van Court is bringing all of her wisdom and technical expertise to bear on this issue. Goalsetter is award-winning company that is transforming how families learn and practice sound financial principles. The stories she tells about what these young kids are achieving with their money is so inspiring.
Maybe you saw Tanya on Shark Tank back in 2009 and wondered what happened. We’re thrilled to say that Goalsetter is making major waves in the industry, recently closing another round of funding with investors such as Edward Jones, MassMutual, and Fiserv.
Now you get to the full story of how Tanya has built this incredible company to be a financial bridge for the next generation of children.
Resources:
Tanya’s recommendations:
Book: Finding Me: A Memoir by Viola Davis
Connect:
Recommended
Transcript
Struggles and Collaborations in Creating an MVP
00:00:00
Speaker
Fast forward sitting in my coffee shop trying to figure out how we get a wireframe done and what was that program that steve was using to make all of our wireframes back at nickelodeon do i need that. Who's gonna do my ah design and development who's going to market this thing i mean i am literally just trying to figure out how i get an mvp out the door.
00:00:24
Speaker
And when you're trying to figure that out, you need help. And you need to be able to ask people for help and and feel comfortable doing so. And that's a hard learning when you have always been in the seat of giving to be in the seat of receiving.
Podcast Introduction: Builder, Banker, Hacker, Chief
00:00:42
Speaker
Hi, my name is Nathan Baumeister, and you're listening to Builder, Banker, Hacker, Chief, a podcast where executives from the world of finance and technology share the story of how they got where they are and the decisions that made them who they are. I'm looking for hidden moments of truth and sacrifice, wisdom and folly, and what it's like to navigate the treacherous waters at the helm of a growing company.
00:01:07
Speaker
I wanna do all that so that together we can learn from their journey and use that insight personally and professionally.
Tanya Van Court's Journey and Financial Lessons
00:01:15
Speaker
In episode 15, my guest is Tanya Van Court, founder and CEO of Goalsetter, a company that is revolutionizing family finance. With a double engineering degree from Stanford and a resume of massive product launches in tech and media, Tanya has forgotten more about building and scaling companies than most leaders learned in a lifetime.
00:01:36
Speaker
Tanya literally became a millionaire with company stock options while working in Silicon Valley before losing it all when the dot-com bubble burst. Instead of turning resentful, she went on a mission to teach children how to spend smart, build wealth, and keep it.
00:01:52
Speaker
But, before she started fulfilling that mission, she had some amazing experiences that shaped her as a leader. She was instrumental in the introduction of DSL Internet in the US, s as well as Japan, India, and Europe.
Rejecting Shark Tank and Nickelodeon Initiatives
00:02:05
Speaker
She launched commercial voice over IP for Cablevision, as well as ESPN3. Yes, that yeah ESPN. She also launched major initiatives at Nickelodeon and Discovery,
00:02:16
Speaker
We've interviewed some heavily qualified leaders on this show, but I don't know that we've ever talked to anyone with such a range of high-profile successes who then decided to leave it all behind and start a new company from scratch. Tanya even took her company to the hit show Shark Tank, where she turned down an offer from Kevin O'Leary. Tanya knows exactly how valuable her company is and isn't willing to compromise.
Goalsetter's Mission for Financial Literacy
00:02:42
Speaker
That company is Goalsetter, an award-winning app and financial curriculum designed to help parents cultivate financial literacy and wealth management skills in their children. While many financial technology startups seemed focused on helping people spend money faster, Tanya is achieving the holy grail of financial literacy, education paired with building positive money habits.
00:03:04
Speaker
Looking past all her success and media coverage, Tanya is a grounded human being who exudes grace and humility and equal measures to her ambition and confidence. We couldn't be more thrilled to have Tanya Van Kort as our guest on episode 15 of Builder, Banker, Hacker, Chief. Let's step across the living bridge that is Tanya's leadership example and marvel at the other side.
00:03:33
Speaker
Tanya, I can't tell you how grateful I am that you've come and join us today on Builder Banker Hacker Chief. Nathan, I am more grateful that you invited me here. What an honor, thank you. Well, I've i've just i've been a huge fan. ah you know We've had the chance to to meet a couple times in person, but really haven't had ah a big opportunity to to dive into your past, but following everything that you're doing and learning more about your backstory and stuff like that, I was like, man, our our listeners have so much they could learn from your story, and I can't wait to to dive into it with you.
00:04:10
Speaker
Awesome. Me too. So with that, let's just go all the way back, Tanya. Oh my gosh. That's a few years. You mean that's a lot of opportunity for great stories. That's one way to look at that glass of tafel.
Influences and Leadership Style Development
00:04:28
Speaker
Well, but I have to tell you, there are so many things that I can point back to from my childhood and growing up that have influenced the type of leader that I've become, that it's only become clarified now that now that the years have passed. And so when you think about those things that drive you, the things that you care about, the things that that make you the leader that you are, retrospectively, when you think back to to growing up, to your childhood, to your school age years, are there a couple experiences that you can point to that has had an outsized impact on your life?
00:05:05
Speaker
That's such a great question, Nathan, because you know so often I think that a lot of people think that leadership is somehow this this set of attributes that's like taught in business school or you know learned in your first two decades of being an experienced manager and leader. And and the truth of the matter is I really do believe that you know my connection to being six years old and seven years old and eight years old. I got so much then that has actually informed many of the key principles that I live by today, both personally and professionally. And so for me, when you ask about, you know what are those formative experiences? um The first thing that I'll say is my mom was an elementary school teacher.
00:05:53
Speaker
And she was the single mom of six kids. She was a teacher. She was a counselor at the school as well. And so she was, you know for so many people, that that point of contact. For kids who were in need, she was that point of contact. For families who you know were struggling and they had nowhere where to turn, she was that point of contact. And so when you talk about the fabric the fiber of leadership. That's what she embodied. And there is no leadership that is more important or more critical than when you are guiding a young person who you know may have lacked food that week. and it isn't studying or isn't paying attention in your classroom because they didn't have breakfast. Not only did they not have breakfast, they didn't have dinner the night before and and they're too ashamed and too embarrassed to say that, right? That's leadership to not only bring that out of that person, but figure out how do you help to close the gap and build the bridge for that person and give them the resources that they need to be successful.
00:07:03
Speaker
I just can't stop thinking about how this microcosm of a teacher and student navigating genuine hardship in the midst of an abstract goal like public education is similar to challenges that happen between bosses and employees every day. As adults, we work so hard to project confidence and stability. As a leader, it's tempting to allow people to hide their pain and struggle behind masks of professionalism.
00:07:31
Speaker
Both parties are tiptoeing through the same dance, but our masks cover our true humanity. When leaders can help people remove their masks and have caring conversations about the hardship of life, we create the possibility of moving forward and being stronger on the other side.
Balancing Leadership Styles and Empowerment
00:07:54
Speaker
you know i am When I was at Stanford, I um had a ah woman I spoke at an event, and a woman came up to me afterwards and said, Tanya Van Court was your mother, Norma Van Court. And I said, yeah. And she said, my son was in her sixth grade classroom. And um in the middle of the year, we had to abruptly move across town.
00:08:15
Speaker
And I couldn't take my son to her sixth grade class anymore. And so your mother would come and pick up my son every day from across town, take him to school. And then every day after school, she would drop him off again. And this is my mom, who was a single mom with six kids of her own, who used to do that for other people's kids. So so for me, those were my fundamental Lessons of leadership how you stand up for other people how you solve problems for other people how you do work That's not just work for the sake of work, but work for the sake of impact. That's what leadership means to me Wow, what a beautiful example and what a giver um As you as you think about that and what you're doing now is
00:09:07
Speaker
How has that fit into this mental model of kind of the stereotypical leader, you know, of, you know, I'm in charge. I'm running the ship versus no, I'm here to serve. Yeah. Wow. Nathan, it's such a great question because the truth of the matter is, you know, um, I probably walk a fine line between both of those. And not necessarily in a good way, right? We've all got to admit our leadership faults. But for me, my mother was the problem solver. And so that I'm in charge, right? Sometimes we step into that mode of I'm in charge, not because I i want to dominate um or want to take away the ability of people to lead, but because I truly am.
00:09:57
Speaker
trying to solve their problems and maybe over solving for them right and that and so in some ways that's what my mother did she would she was there in a capacity where she said look you know if your mom isn't present in your own home or if your dad isn't present in your own home or if you have needs that you can't solve i'm here to do that for you and so sometimes i think even in a servant leadership model We can take too big of a step and say, I'm going to fix all the problems. I'm going to solve all your issues, right? So I do believe that servant leadership is so important, but we all have to think about servant leadership as I'm here to serve you and eliminate those barriers.
00:10:42
Speaker
that prevent you from solving your own problems. Because ultimately, that's what growth is for the leaders who work for you. And that's what they want, too. They don't want you to step in and solve all their problems. And by the way, I'm not even capable of doing that. One, I don't have the knowledge. Two, I don't have the time. ah So they don't want me to solve their problems. And so that's been a growth area for me that I have to realize.
00:11:04
Speaker
My role as a servant leader is to remove the roadblocks and let them solve their problems. My role as a servant leader is not to solve the problems on their behalf. yeah No, I love that and that. It jives a lot with ah how how I look at leadership as well. I just love this idea that as you become a better leader, you give away more and more control.
00:11:30
Speaker
You give away more of that authority. You empower people. You're there to support people. You're there to take out obstacles. and i just I love that mental model. Thank you so much for sharing that. It's funny that you said that, Nathan. I saw i talked to the CEO of a major foundation today, a community foundation that does a great job of ah serving their larger community and helping to transform that community with the grants that they make.
00:11:56
Speaker
So when I talked to the CEO, the first time we had a conversation, he said, um so tell me about your organization. And and he said, but before you do, a lot of people mistake me as having the power to write checks. I don't have the power to write checks. So tell me what your organization does, and then I'll tell you about my organization.
00:12:15
Speaker
And so I told them about our organization, but I scratched my head a little bit because I was like, you're a major community foundation. I've researched you on your website. What do you mean you don't have the power to write checks? You wrote $150 million dollars worth of checks last year. And by the time we got to our and end of our conversation, what I learned that he meant was he has three people working on his team that are two layers below him. And those people have the budgets,
00:12:41
Speaker
to uh you know that they can write those checks from and they do the vetting of all the organizations that they work with and that's where the decisions start and that's where the decisions end and so he said you know my role is to go out and do fundraising to manage the organization to do all of these other things so i have a lot that i do that's one of the things that i don't do And so to your point, right, when you think about even the core mission of an organization like we are a foundation that writes checks to help serve the community, he's saying, I don't do that because I do a lot of things, but I can't do anything. And I have great people that I've hired that are that are invested with the appropriate authority and decision making that I support them, but I don't do their job for them. Yeah.
00:13:29
Speaker
Absolutely. so it's like That's a great story. The better leader you are, the less you do to your point, Nathan. No, I love that. so You shared a ah beautiful example of your mom as a great example of the type of leader that you aspire to aspire to do. As you think back again through kind of those growing up years through high school and such, is there any any other examples that come to mind or stories that have have had an outsized impact on you?
Resilience Shaped by Family Challenges
00:13:57
Speaker
ah um Yeah, i would I would certainly say so. um you know When you asked me that question, I think about oh when I was in high school. And um one of the things about my mom that you know you should also know is my mom died when I was six years old. She died of a brain aneurysm. And so um you know as a single mom, she left behind six of us.
00:14:26
Speaker
And my aunt, my mother's sister, stepped in and stepped up. And she adopted all six of us. And so she wasn't having one child to seven overnight. um And so that fundamentally changed everything for me. I can only imagine.
00:14:44
Speaker
but Yeah, and I think quite frankly, Nathan, that was you know one of those foundational experiences that turned me into a leader because what I realized at a very early age was you know life happens and you have to control as much of life as you can and step up and um take advantage of all the opportunities that you can because, you know, this beautiful paved road won't just exist for you. And so I remember when I was in high school, you know, I was on the debate team, I was senior class president, I had straight A's. I mean, it was the reflection of that little girl who says, well, look, you know, if life happens, then I have to
00:15:34
Speaker
I have to do as much as I can to make sure my life is as good as as I can possibly make it. um And I remember I was applying to colleges. And of course, you know we we didn't have much um in the way of extra resources. we lived We lived a very fine life. My aunt was a school teacher and then a social worker and then an administrator at UC Berkeley. But somehow, she made those checks stretch. And she was a single mom, too.
00:16:01
Speaker
She made those checks stretch to cover eight people in the family, which now, with you know my own family, I'm like, I don't know how that happened. like you know We had wonderful Christmas, and we had great birthdays, and she didn't carry a lot of debt. So I don't know what was going on there. She had like magic purse strings somehow.
00:16:21
Speaker
But I was applying for college scholarships. And I remember that there was a girl who was new to our senior class, literally come to the senior class that year. And she had this college scholarship application. And I was like,
00:16:38
Speaker
applying to every scholarship I can find. You could imagine, right? I mean, yes, we lived a fine life, but we didn't have extra money. I knew that my my aunt couldn't afford for me to go to college. um And so I said, hey, where'd you get that application? And she said, oh, I got it from you know Mr. Johnson in the counselor's office. And so I went to Mr. Johnson and I said, hey, I'd like the application for that particular scholarship. And he said, I'm sorry, I could only give one to one girl in the senior class and one boy in the senior class. I was floored because here I was like, I was literally kind of queen of the school. I'd done everything in the school and you know this this um particular counselor had given it to this new girl who had just joined the school community two weeks before for whatever reason.
00:17:28
Speaker
And so I remember going to my high school counselor, her name was Mrs. Williams, and I was in tears because this was a really big scholarship application. And I was applying to schools like MIT and Stanford and Harvard. The inexpensive ones. The expensive ones, exactly. And I remember Mrs. Williams said, you don't worry about that, Tanya. I'll make sure you get that application. And what she taught me was that,
00:17:58
Speaker
There are rules, and then there are unwritten rules, right? Or rules that you can write yourself. And I didn't really realize that to that day, right? I was a rule follower. I was the one who the teacher said, do this assignment. And i was and so Mrs. Williams went.
00:18:18
Speaker
And she worked some kind of magic and she came back the next day and I had that scholarship application too. And it was supposed to be only one girl and only one boy, every single high school, not more than that. But she got me that scholarship application. We live in a rules-based society. And it's vitally important that everyone participates in those rules because the alternative leads to chaos and, well, the breakdown of civilization.
00:18:46
Speaker
But here's what Tanya learned, and most entrepreneurs and hackers and artists will tell you as well. The rules aren't what you think they are. Often they can be bent, broken, or rewritten, and the result is better than previous iteration. This is how new inventions become commonplace benefits like electricity or the internet. This is also how we dismantle systemic discrimination and bias.
00:19:12
Speaker
Ultimately, you need to understand the rules so that you can break them when the situation calls for it. Mrs. Williams' advocacy for Tanya was a shining example of this spirit in action.
00:19:28
Speaker
And I got that scholarship, not the newbie girl. And that scholarship for me made the difference, made all the difference. um I ended up going to Stanford, but it was a $10,000 scholarship a year. And it was truly, I mean, it allowed me to to go to Stanford and get the kind of education that I got. So that was another you know fundamental learning for me.
00:19:54
Speaker
That when you hear no, that actually means maybe, right? like that is um And as a leader, particularly as a leader and in the fintech space, particularly as a woman leader, particularly as a woman of color leader, you have to hear maybe when people say no. Because people will tell you no more than they tell other people no. So you always have to hear maybe.
00:20:17
Speaker
I love that. I'm, I'm guilty as a ah rule follower as well. And I think just like you, I can point to very specific times in my life when I realized the world wasn't just black and white, like there wasn't right or wrong. There wasn't just yes or no. And that there's all these facets of in between and grayness that is really where the actual world operates.
00:20:44
Speaker
A hundred percent. And Nathan, I don't know if you've seen this with your kids yet, but for me, it's so funny to watch my kids now operate in that space of grayness. Like my daughter, who's 19, she's a freshman at Penn. And when I talk to her and she's like, yeah, mom, you know, this summer I have two jobs and two internships.
00:21:06
Speaker
I'm scratching my head and I'm like, how does one fit two jobs and two internships into one summer? And she's like, well, the internships are unpaid and the jobs are paid. So I just do the internship work when I met my job. And so, you know.
00:21:23
Speaker
Because I need the internships to build my resume, but I need the money in order to live this summer. and so you know You can do both at the same time, mom, given everything is virtual now. so When I'm sitting at the front desk of you know ah um the the gym that I work at, I'm working my internship too. and I'm like, it's a beautiful thing. I would have never thought to have done that when I was her age. No, I love that.
00:21:47
Speaker
um yeah Tanya, you you shared some two beautiful examples of servant leaders, both in your mom as well as her sister ah afterwards as well. And um what a great story you know to kind of cap off that that you went to Stanford, right? I mean, and what a wonderful school. um And if I remember correctly, you were a ah double engineering degree there, is that right?
00:22:14
Speaker
I was indeed. I majored in industrial engineering and stayed and got my master's in IE as well. I love that. and so with As you think about kind of the the the time when you're getting your undergrad and master's at Stanford, are there any stories from there that you can look back that had a have a big impact of now as you look back on who you are as a leader? Yeah.
00:22:37
Speaker
wow um so So at Stanford, I will say one of the things that I learned very early on is that there are a whole lot of people around me who are way smarter than I am.
00:22:53
Speaker
David, I remember that um it was freshman year, and I had a couple of people who were sophomores tell me, Tanya, you're majoring in engineering. There are two tracks of physics. There's the 20 series and there's the 50 series. The 20 series is what freshmen take. The 50 series is you know what people who are sophomores and or juniors take.
00:23:16
Speaker
You should definitely take the 20 series. It's an easier series of physics. But, you know, as I said, I was the straight A student who was hard charging and a type A personality. um And so I said, no, I think I'm going to take the 50 series. Well, I got back my first test from my first physics class, physics 51.
00:23:41
Speaker
And I remember looking at the test and I, you know, you open it up. I don't know why they were folded in half. I can't remember the start, but I remember opening it up and I got a 17. 17 out of a hundred. Yes. And I got a 17. Oh, how did that straight A student feel then?
00:24:01
Speaker
The Australian student literally thought to myself, oh, jeez, I mean, I knew that people here were smart. I didn't know they were that much smarter than me. And then the second part of my brain went to, oh, I cannot possibly call my grandmother and tell her that I failed out of Stanford. I got to figure something out.
00:24:23
Speaker
So I talked to two of my friends who were sitting to the left and the right of me, and they both happened to be sophomores, and they said, Tanya, how'd you do? And I said, I can't tell you. I'm too embarrassed. I i can't even speak the words. how did And so they said, no, Tanya, truly. just It's OK. How'd you do? I opened up my paper, and I showed them the 17. And they said, Tanya, that's a B. They grade on a curve B.
00:24:53
Speaker
But fundamentally, B or no B, curve or no curve, I knew in that moment that physics, I was okay at it, but it probably wasn't my gift. And there were other people who were way more gifted at physics sitting in those chairs than I was.
00:25:11
Speaker
And by the way, that's something that you don't learn when you're in the minor leagues, also known as high school, right? You're getting 100 on every test. You think you're going to be the next, you know, that the next physics genius in the world because you are getting, you're doing very well.
00:25:28
Speaker
and So once you get into the big leagues and you see people who are really talented at other things, you have a healthy appreciation for the fact that you don't need to be great at everything. You can surround yourself with people who are great at those things that you are not great at, and together, you can really create something special. and So I think that was you know my first big learning at Stanford. and and The reinforcement of that was, I took a class with Guy Kawasaki.
00:25:58
Speaker
Now you can imagine this was early tech years Yahoo was just launching I think when I graduated from Stanford right so very early tech years and this is the story that he told in this class the class was a ah one credit class called entrepreneurship and high technology.
00:26:15
Speaker
he said you want to build a great technology company here's what you do you find the best product person you know you invite them to breakfast you find the best marketing person you know you invite them to the same breakfast you find the best engineer invite them to the same breakfast you get them all together you bring the bagels you bring the the orange juice and you say hey guys i've got a great idea for our company we're gonna build at And he said, you know, you just fill in fill it in with whatever crazy widget thing you can think of. He said, and immediately the product person will say, that's a terrible idea. Instead of building X, you should really build Y. He said, and the engineering person will say, oh, that's fantastic. And here's how I think I would build it. And then the marketing person would say, well, I can market that. And this is the demographic I would go after. And here's how I would market it.
00:27:06
Speaker
He said, so after about an hour, you've got a fantastic company. And all you did was deliver the bagels and the orange juice. I love it. And that's the point, right? The point is that as a great leader, you don't have to be a great product person. You don't have to be a great engineer. You don't have to be a great marketing person. You've got to be a great person to bring all those facets together and let them shine. Yeah. I think I'm going to change my job description to I just bring the bagels and orange juice.
00:27:39
Speaker
That's a good job description. Can I steal that from you? But I stole it from you. yeah no that's what i love how the I love those two stories and how they bookend each other to a individual takeaway that you had, just as an individual. hey I'm probably not gonna be the smartest person in the room in a lot of different things. I need to figure out where I can shine and what's the thing I could be the best at to a business application and a startup application of how does it actually play out in the real world. Get those people that can do the things they're with best at, get them all in the room together. I can facilitate that and then magic magic will happen, right? Magic will happen.
00:28:20
Speaker
Absolutely. so One of the things that I've ah had a lot of conversations here on this podcast with with leaders is the role of formal education and is it necessary, is it not, as a leader? and As someone who did go through some amazing formal education in Stanford, I'm just curious now as a CEO and founder of your current company as well as someone that has led in really large organizations,
00:28:46
Speaker
ah how you think about the role of formal education in someone who aspires to run companies some days.
00:28:56
Speaker
That's a great question, Nathan, because um yeah as I think about my formal education and I think about um both of my degrees from Stanford, there are certainly nuggets that I picked up that I never would have picked up, I don't think, had I not gone through Stanford. So I'll give you an example. um Decision analysis. I absolutely use decision trees for really critical decisions that I'm making.
00:29:20
Speaker
um And I think it's become an important tool in my leadership toolkit for me. um Organizational design and organizational behavior. I took those classes and certainly reflect on you know reading Don Quixote in one of those classes and thinking about what his leadership style was. um So there are are certainly nuggets and pieces here or there that I say had I not had a formal education, I may have missed out on some of those principles. But I can absolutely at the same time emphatically say that the best leadership training I've gotten has been from people who either I really admired as leaders
00:30:05
Speaker
or people who I really detested as my own leaders, and I didn't want to mirror anything that um that they represented. and And so I do believe that so much of leadership can be learned.
00:30:20
Speaker
And you know when any of us gets out of college as an example, all we have is the theoretical knowledge, not the practical knowledge. And I don't care if we're talking about leadership or personal finance. You need both.
00:30:38
Speaker
You need the theoretical knowledge you need the practical knowledge right some of the um the people who i admire as an example you know bob noling junior was my leader when i worked at um the telephone company at a america techch and this is my first job after.
00:30:56
Speaker
um college after graduating from Stanford. I moved to Chicago. I took a process redesign and engineering job. And I wasn't working for Bob. I was working for a woman named Sue, whose last name will not be revealed to to protect the not so innocent. um But I was working for Sue and Sue was really awful. She was awful to her people. Her entire team was afraid of her. She would berate people. She would curse people out. I mean, it was like,
00:31:25
Speaker
You have a sitcom somewhere but just not funny when you're living through it in real life and um the situation was so bad and my my own job situation i was there to do process redesign and then my project got cancelled and so literally they had me stuffing envelopes.
00:31:47
Speaker
and inviting people to training. So I literally had to like stuff an envelope with training materials, write someone's name on the envelope and send it out to them and invite them to training. That became my whole job instead of process redesign with two engineering degrees from Stanford. And so um I went to Sue, my boss, and I said,
00:32:05
Speaker
Hey, I really don't think that this job is um you know reflective of the skills that I'm bringing to the table. And I really want to do something that challenges me. I've talked to other people in the company. And I've gotten two job ah offers at other places in the company. And I i really like for you to allow me to to go to those other departments and work in one of those other departments. And she said, absolutely not.
00:32:31
Speaker
um When you signed a contract with my department, it was a three-year contract. I don't care that your project has been canceled. I want you to stay here for three years, and so you'll stay here for three years. Wow. That was her response.
00:32:45
Speaker
And so one day, I went to a corporate event, and I saw Bob Newling speaking at the corporate event. And he was the most inspirational, um engaging,
00:32:56
Speaker
um motivational speaker I had ever heard. And I walked up to him, and this was shortly after my conversation with Sue. And I said, excuse me, sir. I'm going to be leaving the company soon, but I would love to have a few minutes with you before I leave. And he said, but Why are you leaving, young lady? And I said, it's a long story, but I promise if you give me 30 minutes of your time, I will tell you that story. And I can also hopefully learn something from you. And he said, OK, you've got it, 30 minutes of my time. So we scheduled a meeting. I went to his office. He was on the 35th floor of the corporate office. And I had never been to an office like this. There was mahogany wood everywhere. Like, this is the hangway.
00:33:38
Speaker
um um of you know the the telephone companies. And so it was this beautiful big grandiose office. I told them my story. I told them about my experience with this other leader. And he said, so let me understand this. You have two other job offers within the company, and she won't let you go. And I said, that's right. And I said, Anne, both of those jobs are paying me $10,000 more than I make for her.
00:34:05
Speaker
And he said, OK, I've got it. Well, listen, now you have three job offers in the company because I'm going to make you an offer to come work for me. Those two other job offers, they will pay you ten thousand dollars more and I won't. But I will give you opportunities. You go home and think about it and call me on Monday. Let me know what your decision is.
00:34:28
Speaker
So I went home and I agonized. I'm directly out of Stanford, $10,000, more than a forty thousand my $40,000 base. This was huge. And so I called them on Monday and I said, thank you so much, Mr. Noling. I'm going to take your job.
00:34:48
Speaker
And so I worked for him and worked tirelessly for him. And he taught me so much. And just six months into my work with him, he um sent a note. I accomplished something pretty sizable on the project that I was working on, measurable, saved the company millions of dollars. He sent a note to the CEO and said, this is the star athlete that I hired.
00:35:13
Speaker
away from that person who I asked you to release her from. This is the kind of work she's doing for our firm now. I want to give her a promotion and pay her $10,000 more. Are you okay with that? And the CEO said, absolutely. So now I have visibility to the CEO as a you know one-year newcomer to this massive organization with tens of thousands of employees. I had a promotion, so a better job, and I had the extra $10,000. But most importantly, I had fantastic mentorship and sponsorship from this person who would become my mentor um truly until this day. Wow, that's amazing. And I also love how how bookended those experiences are.
00:35:58
Speaker
just the horrible experience to this wonderful experience. Same organization, the same CEO, the same culture, like all those different types of things, but such vastly different experiences that both had a huge influence on your life.
00:36:13
Speaker
Absolutely. Absolutely. Thank you. It's telling, right? Because as you said, there could be one organization, one culture, but two very different leaders. so Sometimes you can't paint the entire organization with a brush just because you happen to have the bad leader when the good leader may be directly across the river. Yeah. now that's ah That's a great story. Thank you so much for sharing that. so You had this wonderful experience at this telephone company in Chicago. What was next?
00:36:45
Speaker
Well, what was next was that that amazing mentor of mine, Bob Nolan Jr., left the telephone company and left me in Omaha, Nebraska um but while he flew off to Silicon Valley to become CEO of a company called COVID Communications.
00:37:01
Speaker
They were an early digital subscriber line company, so you know for those folks who don't remember DSL, it was one of the first high-speed internet technologies where companies in Silicon Valley were riding over the telephone company um infrastructure in order to provide high-speed internet services before the cable companies were doing it, before the telephone companies were doing it. These startups in Silicon Valley were doing it.
00:37:25
Speaker
And so Bob went to go lead one of those startups and I called him and said, you've got to be kidding me. I'm a California girl and you think you're going to leave me in Omaha? Where's my job? And he laughed and said, I've absolutely got a job for you. Come on out.
00:37:42
Speaker
And so I went out to Silicon Valley, I worked at COVID Communications, and I started as the Director of Process Design. um And then I had and a number of other roles within the company. um And all very, you know, as the company grew, I just, I shapeshifted. right So I did process design, and then they said, hey, you're doing process design. You know all of our processes within the company. We are now thinking about um acquiring some other companies that are in the DSL space that aren't doing as well as we are. Can you go and vet those companies and figure out how their processes might integrate with ours? So we're going to put you onto the business development team. You're going to be responsible for M and&A work and M and&A activity and do that for a while. And so I did that for a while. And then they said, hey, we want to expand internationally. Now you have been looking at other companies here. You know all of our processes. We want you to work with some companies overseas in order to help them launch digital subscriber line services overseas. And so I worked in the international team. So I had a bunch of really interesting jobs. um but that And so I was very busy. right And one of the things that was a ah ah true change for me at this company is
00:38:55
Speaker
I was granted stock and stock options, right? This is a Silicon Valley company. That's a big part of the allure of coming to a Silicon Valley company very much unlike the telephone company, right, where you're pretty much getting paid in cash and bonus. So I had no idea how this stock thing worked. I had no idea what stock options were.
00:39:15
Speaker
No one in my family, right we talked about my mom. My mom was a single mom, an elementary school educator. She didn't know about stock or stock options. and so I get to the company, they gave me the stock. I'm like, okay, great. Thank you very much. But I'm new to Silicon Valley and new to this whole space and I'm just worried about proving myself. and so I keep my head down and I'm doing my job and obviously doing a pretty good job because they're you know moving me from place to place and giving me increased responsibility.
00:39:44
Speaker
And I just leave the stock there. And one day I picked my head up and that stock that I just left there was worth about a million dollars. And I was 28 years old. But that was at the beginning of the day because by the end of the day, the big tech bubble had burst. It was 2001. And my stock went from a million dollars at the beginning of the day to about $20,000 by the end of the day. Oh, gut punch. True gut punch.
00:40:11
Speaker
And a gut punch truly, Nathan, because here's the deal. I didn't know if I could have prevented it or if it was like a hurricane that just came for your house, where you're like, there's really not much I could have done done here. Because I didn't know about asset allocation or diversification. I didn't know core finance terms that had I known, I would have immediately, the minute that stock vested, diversify, diversify, diversify, right? It's like personal finance 101. Unfortunately, you know, I didn't get it at home. I didn't get it in my public schools that I went to growing up. I didn't get it at Stanford. I didn't get the personal finance 101.
00:40:53
Speaker
so um So, I'm staring at my, you know, $9.98 million dollars loss. ah as and And I'm thinking to myself, wow, I can't turn back the hands of time. All I can do is make sure this doesn't happen to my own kids. And I didn't have kids then, but fast forward a few years. I moved out to New York because Silicon Valley was just too depressing. um And I got married and I had my daughter, Gabrielle. And when she was born, I started teaching her everything about money that I could and everything about money that I had since learned that I didn't know before.
00:41:32
Speaker
And so when Gabrielle was eight, about to turn nine, she said, mommy, for my ninth birthday, I know exactly what I want. I only want two things. And Nathan, look, you've got kids. You know how this goes. These kids have too much already. You have no idea what to get them on the next birthday because you're like, what are you talking about? You've got the Lego set. You have a butterfly kit. You have a weaving loom. You're never going to do weaving. Why do you have a weaving loom, right?
00:41:58
Speaker
so I was really happy that she could tell me this is what I want for my birthday because I had no idea. and She said, I want enough money to save for an investment account and I want a bike. I thought if I can get every kid who's eight years old to say that, I can change the world.
00:42:19
Speaker
Tanya is 100% right, and with Goal Setter, she is absolutely changing the world. For those of you who've worked in financial services or watched your children struggle to grasp financial responsibility, this story is pure gold.
00:42:34
Speaker
Money may not make the world go round, but it greases the wheels of society. It won't create happiness, but the lack of it can cause misery. If we don't teach people how to have power over their money, then money will gain power over them. I can't say enough good things about the work that Tanya is doing at Goalsetter. This kind of foundational transformation is what I live for.
00:43:03
Speaker
And so that major tragedy for me, that you know Silicon Valley thing that had happened 10 years prior changed the life of my daughter and by extension put me into a place where I realized that we can do so much better For kids, as we teach them about core principles of spending and saving and investing, we can do so much better than anyone ever did for me and anyone ever did, quite frankly, for the majority of people in my generation. And so that was the moment where I said, wow,
00:43:43
Speaker
I can take all the tools that I've now since gotten in my career and bring them to kids like Gabrielle, kids like my daughter, and that can change their lives. Yeah, I love that. And spoiler alert for those that don't know Tanya's background, that's what she's dedicated her professional career to now with the the company that she's founded. But a couple of leadership principles that I wanted to point from that I've learned just from hearing that story,
00:44:10
Speaker
the ability to take hardship is inspiration. You know, what a what a huge loss, right? I mean, i that has not yet happened to me. I've i've been a millionaire multiple times in my but Excel spreadsheets and all of my models, um but that was never actually like options, right, that I could exercise. um But going from being part of that, the tech bubble bursting,
00:44:41
Speaker
to saying not only what can I do for myself for it to be different, but now I want to take that and I want to make it so that doesn't happen to anyone else. And I just can't help but think of those two examples of your mom and your aunt who were givers, who were always thinking, how can I help someone else?
00:45:07
Speaker
And that inspiring you to take such a horrible event in your life to now be a mission that you're taking to the world. i just I just love that. Thank you so much for sharing that. And that ability to take those hard things and figure out a way to turn it into a good thing, I think to me is another just quintessential example of ah of a powerful leader.
00:45:34
Speaker
real quick before the founding story of Goal Setter and the tech bubble bursting. I think you did something that, you know, a kid that grew up watching Nickelodeon.
00:45:49
Speaker
All of this, ah the the media and entertainment stuff, I would just love to hear a little bit about that. And again, if there's any you know stories that that that are from your time in media that really helped to kind of shape you and give you some skill sets that you lean on as a leader.
00:46:06
Speaker
Absolutely, Nathan. Well, yes. So after COVID communications, I moved to New York. And when I get to New York, I get a job at Cablevision. And at Cablevision, I launched the first voiceover IP service in the cable industry. It was called Optimum Voice. And it was essentially when the cable industry was competing with the telephone industry, and they wanted to have a triple bundle. So the triple bundle was cable, voice, and internet services. So my team launched Optimal Voice, and it was fantastic. um And by the way, I have a great leadership, ah aha, in learning from that time.
00:46:47
Speaker
So my ah I was the general manager for the product, and my counterpart was the head of engineering. And because we were the very first ones to launch this service, we were using a Siemens switch that had never been used before for this kind of voiceover IP service.
00:47:06
Speaker
um And so Siemens, of course, wanted to demonstrate that their switch was was great for the surface and go and sell it to many other companies in the country. And so we were that you know initial pilot case. So they invited us out to Germany um to a meeting with all of their executives and to talk about you know our usage and the product that we were launching. So we get out to the airport in Germany.
00:47:31
Speaker
and There were you know five guys from Siemens there who greeted us at the airport. and They said, Tanya, Wayne, welcome. They turned to Wayne, my counterpart, the head of engineering, and they said, Wayne, do we have a great surprise for you? and He said, what is it? and They said, let's walk outside. We walked outside and there was a Porsche 911 sitting there waiting for Wayne to drive on the Autobahn.
00:47:58
Speaker
anne I never felt more humiliated in my life. And I turned to them and I said, that's a great car. Where's mine? And then they all looked very embarrassed. And ah after much trimming and hawing, I said, don't worry. Wayne can drive there and I'll drive back.
00:48:27
Speaker
And so that was a leadership lesson of inclusivity and you know ensuring that you don't make suppositions about people, what they want, what they like, who they are, what they would enjoy based on gender or background or ethnicity. um you know They figured Wayne was a car guy and Wayne wanted to drive a 911.
00:48:53
Speaker
My very first car was a stick. I used to sneak it out from the front of my aunt's house and go driving it in the hills of San Francisco and El Cerrito where I lived while she was at work. And I make sure I parked it right back in front of the house exactly as she had parked it. And then finally, when she would have time to go and take me driving so that I could practice my driving, you know, I'm rolling her up and down hills. And she's like,
00:49:23
Speaker
Have you done this before? Exactly. And so you know my desire to drive a Porsche on the Autobahn was just as great as Wayne's. So that was one of my my other you know learnings from that time.
00:49:42
Speaker
But I was i was there um at Cablevision, and I left Cablevision to go to yeah ESPN. At ESPN, I led the launch of ESPN3, which was the first digital video streaming player in the cable industry. It was before HBO Now and HBO Go and you know all of the other streaming players launched by cable companies, so we were really at the forefront of that.
00:50:04
Speaker
um And then I got a call from folks at Nickelodeon. And in case you guys haven't realized by now, I love kids. And so while I really, really loved my time at ESPN, you know, one of the things that I tell everyone who I mentor who's younger than me is, your only responsibility when choosing jobs in your life is to get two steps closer to who you're meant to be.
00:50:28
Speaker
You're not expected to choose the perfect job every time you make a job transition because you just can't know. But what you can know is, what are the things that I didn't love so much about the previous places I've been? Or what are the things that I didn't love so much about the previous jobs I've had?
00:50:46
Speaker
And what are the things that are tugging at my heartstrings? And how do I get closer to that for me? And when you do that, when you just keep taking two steps closer to who you're meant to be, then you really find yourself landing in that place. That's exactly right for you. But no one can expect that they can do that between the ages of 22 and 24, right? You just don't have enough experience yet.
00:51:11
Speaker
um And so that's what I did. And so next I went to Nickelodeon, I led Nickjunior.com and noggin.com. And after Nickelodeon, I went to Discovery Education and I led the launch of digital textbooks.
00:51:23
Speaker
and to classrooms across the country to help kids with multimodal learning, because we all learn differently. And you know learning with pen and paper or chalk, board and chalk, um you know doesn't work for everyone. And so those were all of the the skills and tools that I was bringing to this new space to you know goal-setter, because I had experience with education, entertainment, gamification.
00:51:50
Speaker
And how do you fundamentally excite and engage kids and at the same time teach them things that are really important for them to know? um And so bringing all of that into the financial services space for me meant that all of those kids who thought finance was boring, finance was over their heads, financial concepts were too complicated for them to understand, or they were fundamentally for someone else.
00:52:18
Speaker
for other people who didn't look like them who didn't sound like them who didn't talk like them i could change those perspectives by introducing finance to them in a way that was fun in a way that was funny in a way that was engaging and in a way that was the way that they want to learn and so those are all the things that i brought to goal setter um that i i truly believe have changed countless families, but have also changed the industry. Yeah, I love that. Now, when you when you think about the trajectory of your career and you ended up working at all of these huge corporations, huge product initiatives, huge rollouts, like all these different types of things, then you made the decision, hey, you know what I want to do? I want to start from zero.
00:53:08
Speaker
i want to go I want to start something from nothing, where you went from you know all the support structure you could possibly think, pretty much ah as much capital as you needed to do the product launches that you needed, all that fun stuff to say, you know what? Let's let's go ahead and hit the reset button and do it. I'm curious, what going through that process, either the decision-making process or the actual process of it, you know what are what are some learnings or takeaways that you have from that?
00:53:39
Speaker
Great leaders ask for help. That was my fundamental learning and takeaway, Nathan. I mean, to your point, I went from sitting in a chair where I could help people, where I could you know give people advice, give people connections, give people introductions, give people counsel, give people jobs. I mean, I could give so much.
00:54:03
Speaker
um and I love being in that seat. Who doesn't love being in a position where you just get to to give and enable and support other people all day long? and Then I moved into a seat where I was literally sitting by myself in the middle of a coffee shop trying to figure out how to start a fintech company.
00:54:23
Speaker
i um In my previous roles, I had a head of marketing, a head of user experience design, ah had a head of product, a head of engineering, all reporting into me in some capacity or another. Fast forward, sitting in my coffee shop trying to figure out, how do we get a wireframe done? What was that program that Steve was using to make all of our wireframes back at Nickelodeon? Do I need that?
00:54:50
Speaker
Who's going to do my ah design and development? Who's going to market this thing? i mean I am literally just trying to figure out how I get an MVP out the door. and When you're trying to figure that out, you need help. Tanya is doing some serious myth busting here.
00:55:09
Speaker
We tell stories about leaders who could do everything. We study the polymaths of history and try to figure out if we too can master their secrets to genius and wealth. But here's the reality. Even the most independent bootstrap startup entrepreneurs in the world rely on helping hands from other people, or they go down in flames. There isn't much room in the middle. If you want to build something that lasts, you start by building teams, not shrines.
00:55:37
Speaker
And you need to be able to ask people for help and and feel comfortable doing so. And that's a hard learning when you have always been in the seat of giving to be in the seat of receiving. Yeah. Yeah. I love that. Thank you so much for sharing it. Great leaders ask for help. I love that. Tanya, one of the things that you're sharing a lot is this idea of being able to have impact outside of just business results.
00:56:02
Speaker
um both on people as well as what you're going after. I know that's a huge portion of what you're doing at Goal Setter. So could you share a story or something about what that actually looks like in real life?
00:56:17
Speaker
um I would love to I remember I was speaking one time it was actually two years ago at an MX conference and there's a woman who walked up to me after the conference and She was waiting and there were several other people who were talking to me and I felt so bad because I could see her out of the corner of my eye and she was waiting like 10 minutes to speak to me and finally I said I'm so sorry you were waiting to talk to me and she said I know I seem like a stalker, but you have fundamentally changed my kids life and I said, what do you mean? and She said, and my kid had another debit card before and it was like pouring money down the tubes. He'd asked me for money, I'd send him money. He'd asked me for money, I'd send him money. I woke up one day and I said, what is going on? This is not what I wanted for my kid in terms of his financial life.
00:57:07
Speaker
and She said, that's when I found Goal Setter. In particular, what I loved about Goal Setter is your learn before you burn rule, where my kid's debit card will automatically freeze on Sunday morning if he hasn't taken his financial literacy quiz for the weekend. and The minute he takes the quiz, the card unfreezes again.
00:57:27
Speaker
She said, I've been using that with my son and my son has a goal setter account now. In the past year since he got his goal setter account, he has saved $3,000 on his account. What?
00:57:43
Speaker
Yes. She said, and he knows key financial principles because he takes your weekly financial education quiz. She said, he told me the other day, mom, you said you would match however much I've saved by the time I'm 16. This kid is 13. He said, my goal is to save $15,000 so then you can match it and I can get a used Tesla.
00:58:11
Speaker
Yeah, wow So, you know, that's one family, one family where, you know, the product that we've brought to the market has changed their lives. It's not just the debit card. It's not just teaching their kids how to send and spend money. We are preparing that kid for life. And it's so funny because literally this past weekend, Nathan, she sent me a text. So that was two years ago that, you know, that I met her.
00:58:40
Speaker
and Her kid was 13, so her kid is 15 now. Remember his goal by the time he's 16. She sent me a text over the weekend that said, Jack has almost $10,000 now, $2,000 in investments. What you did is so meaningful. That's awesome. That's a great story and also just a great inspiration that as we look for opportunities to lead and do so in a way that can change people's lives, you actually see it and it can happen.
00:59:11
Speaker
So as as we wrap up, there's always there's always two questions we like to ask our guests. The first one is, there's a lot of places where people talk about their favorite business books and stuff like that. And so that's boring. Let's not do that. but I'm curious if you have any non-business book recommendations.
00:59:32
Speaker
Yes. So my non-business book recommendation is Finding Me by Viola Davis. I think it is an extraordinary story. You know, we've talked a lot on this podcast about stories and how the stories help you to find your path, but the stories also help you to find yourself and they help you to define yourself and who you are and what's important to you and what makes you you. um And so you know I love her story and would highly, highly recommend it to you know anyone looking for um that inspiration of how do you connect all of the dots throughout your life and make them make sense and help to inform not only who you are, but who you're meant to Yeah, I love that. It sounds very apropos for the general theme of what we're trying to do on this podcast as well. So thank you. Absolutely. All right. And the last one, a leader. Are they born or are they made? Nathan, leaders are absolutely made. Um, I will tell you, I have five older siblings.
01:00:52
Speaker
My oldest sister is 13 years older than I am. She's my best friend. And she's probably my best friend because for the first six, seven, eight, nine years of my life, I just spent it like tethered to her skirt, walking around behind her, going to her friend's house, sitting quietly in the corner reading books.
01:01:14
Speaker
um just so that I could you know be in their presence. I was painfully shy, and I was painfully shy even up through high school. um In high school, my Spanish teacher one day, also um she also led the debate team. She came to me and said, Tanya, ah you need to join the debate team.
01:01:39
Speaker
And I said, Mrs. Berman, I cannot and will not speak in front of people. And she said, Tanya, um no matter what career you choose, you're going to have to speak in front of people. And I said, there's no way I would ever choose a career where I have to speak in front of people.
01:02:01
Speaker
ah um And she insisted that I join the debate team and because I just had such a great relationship with her and such healthy respect for her, I did. And that helped me to become less shy. It helped me to become more of, um to to use my voice more. And, you know, an important part of a leader is using your voice. You may not use it all the time, but you can use it and you know when to use it. And you know when it's important that you use it, either on behalf of yourself or your organization or the company you're pitching or your team members.
01:02:39
Speaker
right And so um so that helped me to be a leader. you know As we talked about before, my mother dying helped me to be a leader because I knew that life was going to require something extra of me without the that protection and nurturing of a mother. And so I think circumstances um guide you to leadership. So I think that that leaders are absolutely made.
01:03:05
Speaker
Yeah, I love that. I think it's the circumstances, but then and also a choice that the individual has to make to take that circumstance to learn. um And you shared so many beautiful and poignant stories where those opportunities came to you and you took them. So thank you so much for sharing so many of your stories in your life with us. um I learned so much um that I'm definitely going to be thinking about over the next couple of days and how I can apply that in my own leadership here at Zsuite. So thank you. Thank you.
01:03:39
Speaker
but In the epigraph to his book, The Song of Significance, Seth Godin shares this absolute gem. When you dance on the edge of infinity, there's always enough because you aren't taking opportunity from anyone else you're creating. Let that soak in.
01:03:58
Speaker
And remember back to the beginning of this episode, when Tanya talked about her mother single parenting six children on a teacher's salary? Then think about our aunt single parenting seven children. If those stories don't inspire you to believe in the infinite resource of love and creativity, I don't know what will.
01:04:17
Speaker
Tanya is creating massive opportunities for the next generation to achieve financial security and reach confidently for their dreams. That's the goal. And that's why purposeful leadership matters. What you heard in this episode is a leadership lesson that goes well beyond management tips or productivity hacks or habits of the rich and famous. You heard about the importance of building bridges so that people can walk out of hardship, poverty, and lack of education.
01:04:47
Speaker
Tanya's generosity isn't in the dollars and cents that she's helping families save or invest. It's in the gift of knowledge, confidence and self-respect. Things that no one can take from you once you have them. Those are the resources that every leader should aspire to give their teams, their colleagues and their community. And Tanya Van Kort is definitely leading the way. Thanks again for listening to Builder Banker Hacker Chief. This show wouldn't mean anything without your time and attention.
01:05:17
Speaker
You'll find the link to Tanya's book recommendations in the show notes. You've been listening to Builder, Banker, Hacker, Chief, a podcast produced and distributed by Zsuite Technologies Inc., All Rights Reserved. I'm your host, Nathan Baumeister, the CEO and co-founder of Zsuite Tech. This show was co-produced, written, and edited by Zach Garver. Sound engineering was done by Nathan Butler at Nimble Whip Productions.
01:05:42
Speaker
If you enjoyed the episode, please take a moment to leave us a review or share the episode. This helps other people to find our show. You can also listen on all major podcast platforms, including Apple Podcasts, YouTube Music and Spotify.