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David Guttman on Why Servant Leadership Beats Genius Every Time
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In this episode of MustardHub Voices: Behind the Build, Curtis Forbes sits down with David Guttman, a 35-year serial entrepreneur who has bought and sold 15 businesses across fintech, edtech, crypto, health tech, and dozens of other industries, to talk about what it actually takes to lead with humanity in a business world that often rewards the opposite.
David makes the case that servant leadership isn't just the right way to lead, it's the smartest one for anyone who isn't a once-in-a-generation visionary. He shares the practical systems he installs in every company he runs or mentors, including making every employee a shareholder, holding company-wide variance reviews after every board meeting, and building core values the entire team votes on rather than ones handed down from the top.
The conversation gets personal too, from the near-death misdiagnosis at 24 that reshaped how David defines success, to the boss who once sent him home before a triathlon and earned his loyalty for decades, to the nonprofit he's now building with his 84-year-old father. Along the way, David and Curtis dig into why almost no Fortune 500 CEOs come up through HR, what changes when talent strategy gets treated as a revenue driver instead of a cost center, and why humility, not intelligence or charisma, is the trait that most reliably separates leaders who break out from those who stall.
Whether you're scaling a startup, mentoring the next generation of founders, or just trying to lead with more heart without losing your edge, this conversation offers a grounded, often funny, and genuinely moving look at what it means to measure a life by who you make better.
About the Guest
David Guttman is a serial entrepreneur, executive leader, and business strategist with more than 35 years of experience building, scaling, and exiting companies. He has bought and sold 15 businesses across Fintech, EdTech, Crypto, HealthTech, and more than 40 other industries, raising over 25 million dollars along the way and mastering the art of applying sound business principles to drive success no matter the industry. He is a three-time Inc. 500 entrepreneur and a two-time TEDx speaker, with one talk ranking in the top one percent of all TEDx Talks. He holds an undergraduate degree in computer science from Brown University and an MBA from the Wharton School. Today, David mentors a group of high-growth CEOs, runs a longevity business, hosts two weekly podcasts where he interviews C-level executives and servant leaders, and is finishing his first leadership book. He is also launching a nonprofit called 30 Acts of Kindness alongside his 84-year-old father.
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Transcript
Introduction and Guest Welcome
00:00:05
Speaker
Welcome back. This is another installment of Mustard Hub Voices Behind the Build. In these episodes, I sit down with the people building, backing, and running better workplaces. I'm your host, Curtis Forbes, and my guest today is David
David Gutman's Entrepreneurial Journey
00:00:18
Speaker
Gutman.
00:00:18
Speaker
David is a serial entrepreneur, executive leader, business strategist with more than 35 years of experience building, scaling, and exiting companies.
00:00:30
Speaker
He's bought sold 15 businesses across fintech, edtech, crypto, health tech, and more than 40 other industries raising over $25 million dollars along the way and mastering the art of applying sound business principles to drive success no matter the industry. He's a three-time 500 entrepreneur and a two-time TEDx speaker with OneTalk ranking in the top 1% of all TEDxTalks. He holds an undergraduate degree in computer science from Brown University, an MBA from the Wharton School.
Mentoring and Upcoming Leadership Book
00:01:02
Speaker
Today, David mentors a group of high-growth CEOs, runs a longevity business, hosts two weekly podcasts where he interviews C-level executives and servant leaders, and is finishing his first
The TEDx Talk Experience
00:01:15
Speaker
leadership book. He's also launching a nonprofit called 30 Acts of Kindness alongside his 84-year-old father,
00:01:22
Speaker
Welcome to Behind the Build, David. Thank you for joining me today. I'm exhausted already listening to all that. Isn't it crazy to hear it back? And I have no idea how we're going to cover all of these things because I have so many questions.
00:01:36
Speaker
After we met and going through this, I'm thinking to myself, maybe we should maybe we should really plan out like five or six of these. But I'm curious to hear about these TEDx talks. You know, what... what Had this always been a goal of yours to do those? or were you a first to me, that was one of the first things that I was really curious about, given all the experience that you had So about 15 years ago, i saw this one TED Talk by this woman, Renee Brown, about vulnerability and authenticity.
00:02:11
Speaker
It's my all-time favorite TED Talk. And over the last 15 years, I probably shared it with well over 100 people. And ever since I watched that, I remember thinking, oh, you know, it'd be nice if I had, you know, ah something to say there would be that would be worthwhile of a TED talk. And um and so I had planted this seed in the back of my mind.
Challenges and Successes of TEDx Talks
00:02:29
Speaker
and And then the more I thought about it, actually, you know, and a lot of encouragement from my wife um that, you know, I actually did feel like I had something really worth saying, an idea worth spreading, if you will, like they say in their their tagline. And um it was a two-year odyssey from the idea to actually oh wow to where we are now.
00:02:49
Speaker
And um there are very few things that I put as much time and energy into as I did this because it was that important to me. It's like, I'm going to do it and it's going to be out there forever. i want it to be really good. And and and I'm really'm really glad with how it it came out. It probably only turned out that way because I'm an OCD control freak.
00:03:06
Speaker
um Because everything that could have possibly gone wrong went wrong on the actual day. ah The audio didn't work. They didn't have enough camera. like It was a mess, but um i had I got them to agree to let me have my own videographer team there, so I had backup of everything. and they They even gave me control to do all the post-production editing, not me and my team. yeah um and So it ended up coming out really good, um but only because I'm a I'm a control freak. Hey, man, that that that kind of over-preparation, first of all, is is definitely a learned skill over 35 years ah in business, right? You learn how to prepare for what you can prepare for. And, um you know, it's it's an asset, right? So this is one of those moments where... um
00:03:49
Speaker
where you can see that. Well, I kind of want to start with some of that.
Universal Business Principles
00:03:53
Speaker
You've built, bought, boughtt you've sold something over a dozen, 15 businesses across you know dozens of industries over your career.
00:04:03
Speaker
So for folks meeting you for the first time, how do you even describe to them what you actually do? i remember when my daughter was younger um and she would tell people what I do, she'd be like, my dad doesn't actually do anything. He just bosses people around. Yeah.
00:04:19
Speaker
And it's so funny because then when she was, i guess she was 19 and she interned for a company I was president of at the time. She didn't work for me. She didn't want to. She wanted to know it nothing to do with working for me. Right. She was happy to work for my company. And then she actually got an understanding of it. um I mean, look, you know, to me.
00:04:39
Speaker
the industry doesn't matter. Like if you look at any business, there's always the common, the commonalities, even whether it's a product or service, what does it cost you to get in a customer? What's the lifetime value of a customer? What's your churn? I mean, they're, you the principles are not that different.
00:04:54
Speaker
And, and I think that, Part of the problem people have when they're trying to grow and you know and scale a business is they think it's some magic formula and they take their eye off the ball and they end up spending their days dealing with the minutia, what's on fire that day. And they don't have the ability to come up to 10,000 feet, take a little bit longer view ah because you need to balance both. You need to be focused on the day to day execution, but you need to have an eye towards what's down the road.
00:05:24
Speaker
um and i And I think most entrepreneurs get that wrong. You know, um it's that's an interesting through line, right? and And I would agree that it kind of kick those same principles carry from one industry to the next, kind of no matter how different they they they look on the surface.
00:05:44
Speaker
If you rewind, I'm curious about, so that's also that's also an experienced right way of of kind of
Influences and Personal Challenges
00:05:52
Speaker
looking at things. And I'm curious about the early early version of you. I mean, was there was there a moment or a person that kind of set you on this entrepreneurial path in the first place?
00:06:03
Speaker
So there's a few things that were really impactful. um So my my dad was an entrepreneur. He started a software company in his late 20s that eventually IPO'd. It was a precursor to AI, actually. So he would design the screens and the reports and it would generate the code automatically.
00:06:18
Speaker
And he had a client and my dad was delivering these projects on time and on budget. No one ever delivers IT projects on time and on budget. And so they're like, well, how do you do that? He's like, well, I wrote these programs that write the programs. And they said, well, would you sell it to us?
00:06:31
Speaker
And he's like, sure, for a million dollars, thinking there's no way they'll say yes. And then they said yes. And then he had to actually productize what he had done. And that company eventually IPO. So I always knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur.
00:06:42
Speaker
um And then i would say the other two big impacts on me, one obviously was my misdiagnosis and being told I had six months to live when I was 24, the topic of my TED talk.
00:06:54
Speaker
um That obviously, and what that really did was it got me to be less focused on me and more focused around the people around me. And what I realized was that i i decided very consciously I was going to make make my success the side effect, not the goal.
00:07:12
Speaker
And that just changed everything for me. um And I would say that the third real big impact for me, um you know, when i when I finished business school,
00:07:24
Speaker
and a bunch of consulting offers all of which i turned down to do a search fund and that was a bunch of the acquisitions we did were in that search fund we we did a roll up in the in the call center space now i knew enough to know i didn't know what i was doing so i brought on ah an experienced management team from a competing company and while they technically reported to me my chief operator ah sharon grossman was her name she was amazing an amazing leader an amazing manager sadly she's passed away but um But I remember i remember this one conversation. I'm ashamed to admit this, but um I had I had said something really obnoxious in a meeting.
00:08:02
Speaker
And she said to me, you know, Dave, you should never ask a question to which the only answer someone can give you is I'm an idiot. And because I really respected her.
00:08:13
Speaker
It was like someone had splashed a cold bucket of water in my face. And I will say from that minute forward, um literally from that moment forward, I let it manage in a very different way. Interesting.
00:08:24
Speaker
That's a, wow, that's powerful. Now you're finishing your first book on leadership. i Sounds like, right? This, this summer. And ah I'd love for you to kind of tell us a little bit ah about it, kind of unpack the ideas behind it.
Servant Leadership vs. High-Profile Leadership
00:08:38
Speaker
What's the core message that you're, that you're getting across?
00:08:40
Speaker
You know, i think that um people see very successful, you know, entrepreneurs like an Elon Musk or a Steve Jobs or, you know, um other Larry Ellison or someone like that. And they they want to emulate that.
00:08:56
Speaker
And the reality is those are not nice guys. Right now. and And I would argue that they're successful in spite of their leadership style, not because of it. that for if you're truly gifted, like Steve Jobs as a visionary or Elon Musk as an engineer and first principles kind of person, people will tolerate your bad leadership because there's so much they're learning from you.
00:09:21
Speaker
But when you're not among the most gifted human beings to ever live, you know, that's not available to most of us, right? As mortals. um And my argument would be a servant leadership approach is the best approach for us mere mortals.
00:09:36
Speaker
um Because, you know, and people always say, you know, should you put your employees first? One, I actually hate calling them employees. like to call them co-workers because I don't like to think hierarchical hierarchically.
00:09:47
Speaker
um But who do you put first, your customers or your employees? You put your coworkers first, because if you take care of them, they will take care of your customers. And um that principle is is lost. In fact, it's the underlying you know through line for my podcast is I want to talk about those people that have been successful and already and also managed to maintain a good moral compass. They shouldn't be as few and far between as they are, but they are.
00:10:12
Speaker
And I would argue it's very similar to the kind of person who wants to be a policeman, maybe shouldn't be, the kind of person who wants to be a politician, maybe shouldn't be. i think it's true, the people that wanna have power and control in a company that wanna be the CEO, um Oftentimes there's a lot of dark triad, you know, characteristics that go with that. um You can see why I would attract a more narcissistic person to that.
00:10:37
Speaker
And so you see a lot of psychopathy in the C-suite, unfortunately. And so part of what I'm trying to do is demonstrate to people that you can be successful and also be a wonderful human being. Those things don't have to be ah mutually exclusive.
00:10:52
Speaker
I love that. And, you know, when we spoke before, ah you You told me a story, right, that you you told your daughter that being a good parent, right, comes down to doing, you know, the the things that your your parents did that you loved and and doing the opposite of the things that you hated. And so leadership is a lot, yeah you know, you've you've said that leadership is kind of a lot like that.
00:11:16
Speaker
Walk me through what that looks like in practice, right? Sure. So it's funny. It actually made it into my TED Talk. In fact, I um i joke with my wife because she likes to say she co-authored my TED Talk. I have a lot of wonderful input. In fact, the best line from the TED Talk was hers. I have to give her credit, which is the measure of a life isn't what you build. It's who you make better.
00:11:38
Speaker
That's her line. like that. I give her full credit. But anyway... um One of the guys I talk about in my TED talk is this guy, his name is Mike Hess. And i'm actually going to have him on my podcast because he's still alive, it turns out.
00:11:51
Speaker
But he was my boss when I was 24, actually 23. It was about a year before my misdiagnosis. And we were working, it was a crazy project. We were working 80 to 100 hours a week. It was crazy.
00:12:02
Speaker
And I was a competitive triathlete at the time. And Mike, you know, really nice guy. um And he really, I just could tell he really cared. Like he knew I was doing triathlons and it was the night before a big race.
00:12:16
Speaker
And um I didn't, I was surprised to even remember that I had a race, but he's like, Dave, like it's getting late, wrap it up. And, you know, you got an early bike check in for your race tomorrow, i would get out of here so you can do your race. And like, Mike, it's okay. Like ah there'll be other races, not that big a deal.
00:12:30
Speaker
And he's like, I'm not giving you a choice. Go home, get out of here. You can come after your race tomorrow. the The reality is, there's nothing I wouldn't have done for that guy because he actually cared. It's like, we've all had the boss who doesn't give a crap about you.
00:12:44
Speaker
And that person might get some good work from you, but they're not going to get your absolute best work. yeah Mike got my absolute best because I knew he actually cared about me. He wasn't faking it. And, you know, I think that um when you can lead that way, you know, and it's funny. I actually sent him a link to the TED talk, which obviously you can imagine how that must have felt for him. Like he had no idea he had that impact on me, but here it is 35 years later,
00:13:06
Speaker
You know, I still remember. You sent him a link to it before and he had no idea that. that No idea. Oh, I love that. Yeah. And so I'm going to have him on my podcast here in a few weeks. I'm really looking forward to that episode, actually.
00:13:18
Speaker
um You're going to have to make sure, let's not leave today without telling everybody where they can find that and, ah you know, watch all those episodes. Now, you also said that, like, if you're not at least 30% therapist, you're not doing your job as a leader.
00:13:37
Speaker
And I guess I would i would ask, like, what does the, you know, quote unquote therapist part of leadership actually involve? Yeah. Depends on the circumstances. Let me let me give you an example that might seem a bit extreme.
00:13:53
Speaker
But um I had a woman that worked for me, um I think at like four or five different companies over the years. but i originally brought her When I originally hired her, it was just like a controller. She eventually became a CFO of multiple companies that I ran. And um she was a very, very heavyset woman, 210, 220 pounds doing triathlons. Wow.
00:14:12
Speaker
two hundred and ten two hundred and twenty pounds doing triathlons and um oh You know, for people that are really fit, you know, race day is a big deal. Right. And, you know, it's like your your day to shine, if you will.
00:14:29
Speaker
But, you know, here's someone who's very overweight. And by the way, she was trained to do an Ironman triathlon. So you're swimming two point four miles, you're biking one hundred and twelve and then you're running a marathon. And this is someone who's, you know, it'd be like me doing it, carrying it, like carrying a hundred person, a hundred pound person on my back. Right. Um, and anyway, i went to, to the race to support her and and she had trained towards this goal for like four years.
00:14:54
Speaker
I mean, she put her heart and soul into it. And, uh, so I went up to the race to support her and she, she could have finished, but she wouldn't have made the time cut off.
00:15:05
Speaker
And um so she decided she decided to quit, unfortunately. should have finished, and but which she didn't. And and i remember thinking to myself, now mind you, this person had worked for me at that point for probably three or four years.
00:15:18
Speaker
And I knew how important this was to her. And I had, what I had originally planned was to have this big, you know, I knew she was taking the next day off to recover, but the day after that, she'd be back at work. And so I was going to decorate her office and all this, but now obviously it didn't turn out to be a celebration because she didn't finish the race.
00:15:34
Speaker
And I probably spent 20 hours writing her a card. Like you'll think I'm exaggerating, but I'm not. Cause I'm like, what could, so if I was her, what could someone say to me make me feel after putting in all this effort that would make me feel, you know, like it wasn't all for nothing.
00:15:55
Speaker
And and i accomplished it. But and, you know i would argue that part of the reason she followed me at four other companies and did amazing work every place you know she was was because of how much care I gave to her, her professional journey, but also her as a person.
00:16:12
Speaker
um And so that's just an example. You know, that's not necessarily being a therapist per se. But um but to me, it's like if you really genuinely care about the people that you work with, um they're going to they're going to feel that and they're going to they're going to perform in a different way than they would for someone who's just a job.
00:16:32
Speaker
I mean, I think it's it's it's about humanity, right? and And I know that's something you kind of wanted to talk about today is is this idea about humanity and in corporate America. um and and and And that's a lot of what I'm hearing, you know.
00:16:47
Speaker
um But from where, I guess I would ask for from where you sit, you know, where did where did that humanity
Focus on Journey in Leadership
00:16:55
Speaker
go? and in in what can it ultimately cost you as a business leader if you don't?
00:17:02
Speaker
you know, lead with that style? Or if you don't have that, we'll even call it just a capability. You know, i ah I think the hardest thing, because there's so many parallels between being ah a really good parent and being a really good leader, because ultimately a parent is a good leader of your child, right? Right, yeah.
00:17:23
Speaker
And I think the hard, I mean, there's no more selfish act than having a child, my son, my daughter, my son, the lawyer, my, you know. I looked at it that way. I guess you're right. Whatever, right?
00:17:35
Speaker
um and And, but I think in order to be an exceptional parent, you have to not make it about you. You have to make it about them. and And I really think that, you know humanity comes down to that, which is um at the end of the day, you know, no one is putting corporate logos on their coffin.
00:17:54
Speaker
You know, um the it really, again, my my maybe it's my, you know, my near-death experience, if you will, that really kind of ingrained this in me, which is,
00:18:05
Speaker
If I'm not going to enjoy the journey and feel good about the journey, then why bother? I mean, for me, you know, the company I worked for, I just IPO'd. I had $300,000. I was worth $300,000 on paper at 24. Back when that was a lot of money. um You know, I've been a division one, you know, college wrestler at an Ivy League school and then got accepted into a second Ivy League school. So by most people's measure, really successful. And I'm like, I'm going to be dead in six months. All that was for nothing.
00:18:32
Speaker
like for nothing. and And so when i when I didn't die and I was like, okay, I'm going to take a different approach. I have to enjoy the journey.
00:18:43
Speaker
And yes, the destination is not meaningless, but if I don't enjoy the journey, and don't know don't enjoy the journey then the destination is meaningless. You know, i mean, I just kind of want to let that sit for for a second, right? I mean, that it's...
00:18:58
Speaker
It's inspiring words, you know, and, and um you know, I pay i guess i would I would even say that I generally follow, i think, the same the same paradigm.
00:19:12
Speaker
You know, if you I guess, had to, if you were approached by a small, mid-sized business owner who who wants to put people first, right, who wants, you know, feels stretched thin,
00:19:27
Speaker
What does that actually look like on a Tuesday afternoon when everything is on fire, right? I mean, you talked about um how a lot of business owners, right, can get so caught up in that day-to-day, you know, and maybe an inability to to lift themselves to that 10,000-foot view to manage their businesses.
00:19:45
Speaker
You know, what happens when things are on fire? They have to get down into the trenches. What does people first look like in that instance? Yeah. Well, it it it can't happen in the instance. It has to happen before that for it to work in my experience. The good news is it's a lot easier to do than people think. And they're um there are three things that i that I do at any company I'm at or advise or that I give advice to.
00:20:14
Speaker
They don't know all ill take my advice, but when they do. um And the first one is i make every single employee a shareholder. And the reason I do that is if you want people to act like owners, you have to make them owners. You you will occasionally have the employee who is just so self-motivated and directed that they'll act like an employee even when they're not.
00:20:35
Speaker
I'm sorry, and an owner or even when they're not. But I would argue you're taking advantage of that person. And that doesn't feel good to me, right? So and the reality is, even if you just set aside 10% of the equity for non-founders,
00:20:50
Speaker
I guarantee you with zero hesitation that giving away 10% of your company 100% of the time will increase the value of your company by more than 10%.
00:21:03
Speaker
So even if you're just a selfish prick, you'd be better served to give away 10% of your company to your employees. Now, better not to be a selfish prick and do it for you, right? even if you only cared about the outcome, that would be the smart move. So number one, make every single person a shareholder.
00:21:20
Speaker
Um, number two, um, i insist that any company that I run or that, um, or that I mentor that they have quarterly board meetings. And at those quarterly board meetings, one of the main things that i always do is i do a variance analysis of, Hey, what was our budget? What was our actual results? And where, where were things better than we thought? Where were things worse than we thought?
00:21:42
Speaker
Why, how are we going to modify things moving forward? And then what I always do is I give effectively that same presentation that I gave to the board. I give in a company-wide meeting the week after the board meeting.
00:21:56
Speaker
Because again, I wanna treat every single employee like a shareholder, which they are. And so every person in the company knows what's going better than we thought, what's going worse than and we thought, why those things are true.
00:22:11
Speaker
and It just makes everyone row in the in the same direction much better. So give everyone equity and then treat everyone like a shareholder, have a effectively a company-wide board meeting, if you will, the week after your regular board meeting. And the third thing I do that I used to think was really hokey, but I don't anymore because I see how effective it is, is that every company, um again, that i either it's my decision or I'm or i' mentoring people, I insist on them having two sets of core values, and an an internal set of core values and an external set of core values.
00:22:42
Speaker
the internal core values is the filter that is used to hire, promote, and reward people within the organization. So if your if your core values are grit and integrity and you know whatever they are, right um you create an award for each of, let's say you had four core values, you create a reward for each one. And every quarter, so the first quarter that I have them, I give the awards away as the CEO.
00:23:07
Speaker
And every quarter after that, um the person who gets the award gives it to somebody else in the organization. So there's a small monetary, you know, a couple hundred dollars that comes with it and a little trophy that they get that they can put on their desk or their mantle at home or whatever.
00:23:21
Speaker
And it reinforces those core values. But what I do is I don't come up with those core values myself. I work with the executive team and I have the entire company vote on those core values, both the internal and the external.
00:23:32
Speaker
And now everyone feels bought into those. Everyone sleeps better in a bed they make. um And so those three things um make an enormous difference in being seen and in in performing as a servant leader. And then when you have things that catch on fire and people need to work through the weekend, you don't even need to ask.
00:23:51
Speaker
They're volunteering to it because of how you've included them in the process. And they see it as much as their problem as it is yours. They have skin in the game. um You know, I'm listening to this and i'm i'm i'm I support this like 100,000%. And we do we do the same things. In fact, we did our We did our um are internal, we we do also have internal and external core values.
00:24:16
Speaker
We did our internal core values as a um tournament bracket where we voted on them in brackets until we came down to the core set that we wanted. And we actually made it that kind of fun, um you know, sort of almost gamified ah thing. We did it over a couple of weeks and it was actually really, really, really cool. But 100% agree, you know, giving them,
00:24:37
Speaker
that um that experience of of of being owners, right? Gives them skin in the game. And, um you know, those are definitely good notes to ah to take. And i I wanted to make sure that that I asked you about this.
00:24:52
Speaker
you you I know this is this is personal to you, and and I think it kind of captures, um you know, about this sort of people first approach. You and your 84-year-old dad, right?
30 Acts of Kindness Nonprofit
00:25:05
Speaker
fouryearold dad are launching a nonprofit called 30 Acts of Kindness. And he built the app himself. With the help of Claude Code, yes. With the help Claude Code. Yeah, you did all development. Tell me the story. Tell me where it came from. Tell me what it's like working with your father. um Yeah, give me give me it all.
00:25:27
Speaker
So the nexus of it was i was a division one college wrestler. My dad wrestled a bit in high school college as well. And so once a year we do a father and son wrestling, college wrestling trip where we go to see a college, and an interesting college match. So this year was Penn State and Iowa.
00:25:42
Speaker
My dad lives in Chicago. So I flew into Chicago, three and a half hour drive each way. My dad's retired and he was lamenting the fact that he has nothing to do, no reason to get out of bed in the morning. And I'm like, well, dad if you could do anything what would it be and he said i want to make the world a nicer place i want people to be nicer to each other and i was like okay well i love my dad so what can i do to be helpful so my original thought was You know, what if we did, if you're familiar with 75 hard, where you document your fitness journey for 75 days, I was like, what if we, so my original thought was what we called it 75 nice.
00:26:14
Speaker
I know some people that know Andy Frazella, the guy who created 75 hard, maybe he'll give us a waiver or whatever. and then I'm like, let me shrink it to 30 days. um And, and the idea is someone documents 30 days in a row, 30 acts of kindness.
00:26:29
Speaker
And at the end of the 30 days, um you know, they get a bracelet that basically says they're certifiably. We basically send them a bracelet that says they're certifiably kind with a serial number on it that's tied to their acts of kindness.
00:26:41
Speaker
We'll also allow people that want to to extend to 90 days or 365 days and give them a nicer bracelet. But but ultimately, 30 acts of kindness, again, we're just trying to get people... to be conscious and aware of trying to be kind to the people around them in the world we're in Everyone can agree that we need more of that.
00:26:58
Speaker
and And I haven't seen my dad this excited in 20 years, maybe ever. And um we talk almost on a daily basis. We were talking this morning about, you know the product roadmap and, you know, what we're going to have in the MVP and, you know, what we're going to do subsequent and stuff like that. And so it's just been really delightful you know,
00:27:18
Speaker
You know, ah it's one more thing on my plate, but it's something I really enjoy. Look, my dad's really healthy for an 84 year old, but he's 84. And I really want to enjoy, you know, as much of the time together as we have left. And it's a way for me to honor him. And and and and he's really excited. So it's been fun.
00:27:36
Speaker
I love that. And I imagine working on a project with your father has probably taught you things that even carry back into how you lead and and and run a business, right? I mean, having that kind of perspective um sitting with you every day, right, is ah is a pretty powerful thing.
00:27:53
Speaker
um I want to pivot a little bit and go somewhere, you're arguably, a little little spicy because you said something in our pre-chat that really kind of stuck with me and I never realized thought about this before.
HR and Business Outcomes Alignment
00:28:06
Speaker
You pointed out that there's zero or virtually zero Fortune 500 companies with a CEO who came up through HR. And from your perspective, I mean, why why do you think that is? what What is it? First of all, what does it even tell us that that that's the case?
00:28:26
Speaker
And, you know, why why why is it the case I mean, look, if um I mean, I was in the telemedicine business for five years, and so I dealt with ah HR and benefit consultants for five years. I mean, I had over 500 meetings with, you know, with folks in that area.
00:28:44
Speaker
And I think. it it's like It all comes down to incentive alignment, right? You look at the compensation structure for people that are in HR and it's, you know, it's a fraction of what it would be if you're in marketing or sales or something that's moving the top line. So you're not going to attract as good a talent because the incentives aren't there, right?
00:29:04
Speaker
It's just that it's a pure incentive alignment issue. So I think that's part of it, but it doesn't actually have to be that way. Like I would never run a Fortune 500 company, but if I did, I would actually hire someone that came from marketing or sales and have them run my HR department.
00:29:20
Speaker
And I would compensate them based on my ability to attract, retain and motivate talent. um It absolutely could be done, but nobody does it that way. And it's a shame because it's a huge missed opportunity because talent is everything.
00:29:34
Speaker
you know It's like that that is what makes a business succeed or fail. And it's not just again, you have to attract the talent, you have to motivate the talent and you have to retain the talent. You have to do all three. um And the only way you can do that ah is to, I think, do it in a way that puts the it's counterintuitive that puts the employees first and it puts the company second.
00:29:58
Speaker
That's what will get you the best result. But but almost nobody does that. um You know, it's interesting that, that you know, obviously ah HR is often treated as a cost center.
00:30:09
Speaker
And, um you know, I can imagine that being maybe one of the, you know, one of the reasons why there might, you know There could potentially be a more mediocre talent pool. i don't know. um But I think being, you know, that that critically important piece of the organization, of that function of the company, um you know, i would agree. Especially as as the company grows, right, in size, especially if we're dealing with mid-market up onto enterprise, I mean, um it may be the single most important function or or certainly one of them, obviously. so
00:30:45
Speaker
um I'm curious, like, what what changes when you treat the the attracting and motivating and and retaining the talent as a revenue-driving job instead of an administrative one, right? So for me, and you didn't necessarily, like, say this explicitly, but for me, I think about turning that
00:31:16
Speaker
you know, so idea of it as a cost center into, you know, into a ah revenue generating one, right? and And, you know, you look at retention economics and um I certainly think that if you look at it through that lens, right, it has a different meaning.
00:31:38
Speaker
So, you know, with somebody with your experience who's done what you've done across the industry that you've done it, Tell me what that means when youre when you when you when you treat that as more of a revenue driving job instead of how it's perceived now, purely administrative.
00:31:55
Speaker
You know, it's funny, you know, so you're right. Clearly, HR is a cost center, but so is your financial function. And there are plenty of Fortune 500 CEOs that there were CFOs. um You know, a COO is usually ah more of a cost center, not a revenue center. And and then plenty of COOs that have become CEOs of Fortune 500 companies. HR is usually the redheaded stepchild, right? Let's just be honest. You know, and, you know, people even joke that that's where, you know, people say, oh that's where careers go to die. And, you know, and the reality is it doesn't have to be that way.
00:32:27
Speaker
the I think everything has to be measured differently. the The reality is, let's even take something like turnover. Okay. Turnover isn't necessarily bad. It depends on the role. It depends on, um you know, the compensation. There are a whole bunch of, it depends on the economy.
00:32:43
Speaker
There are a whole bunch of variables and turnover isn't necessarily bad. In fact, One of the most critical success factors, I think, in scaling a business is hiring really well. But part of hiring really well is firing fast.
00:32:58
Speaker
And so if you punish people for for letting people go, for having turnover, makes it hard for them to fire fast. So I think you have to think about each situation a little bit differently and and be clear eyed about how you're going to. So and it also depends what stage the company's in. So if I'm in a super high growth stage, I'm going to have to accept you know the fact that I'm going to make more hiring mistakes because I'm doing more hires in a shorter period of time. versus I'm a more mature company stable, I should be able to make less hiring mistakes you know then. So there's so many variables that that sort of you know kind of tie into it, if you will. For for for the SMB leader, right?
00:33:39
Speaker
Maybe the the owner, the operator, the HR of one, as we like to kind of refer to them, what's what's the takeaway for them? I mean, how do they start treating their people strategy like it actually drives the business?
00:33:52
Speaker
I mean, for me, when even companies that were doing 150 million in revenue and had 100, 150 employees, I wanna interview every single person that we're gonna, even if it's for 15 minutes. So I won't necessarily be the only interview, won't necessarily be the final interview. um But you know if it's my job to be the one responsible for the company culture,
00:34:19
Speaker
There's nothing more important about that with regards to the company culture than the people that are in it. And I don't have to be best friends with everyone that I work with, but I want to have ah at least a little bit of a read on that person before. um And I can also be helpful downstream if things don't go as well with a particular person if I was involved in the process. So I think that you know people like to...
00:34:41
Speaker
um you know, outsource that a little too much too early in the growth of their organization. And I would say that at a minimum, whenever it's a key role, i mean, I see CEOs, you know, outsource that all the time, that these are, they're fairly important roles, but maybe one or two levels down from them. And they're not involved in the interview process. The other thing that I do, that's probably a little bit unusual is, um especially for any key hire, I do at least one reference to check myself.
00:35:11
Speaker
um You know, if I'm using a recruiter or I have an internal team, they might do if I'm checking three references, four references, you know, I'll let them do all of them. But I'm going to do at least one myself um because there's no one who's going to care about it as much as I will.
00:35:27
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah, that's for sure. um David, you you mentor a group of CEOs. Yeah. And you hold equity in their companies. You're genuinely invested. When you look at those who really do well, who really break out versus the ones who stole, from your perspective, what separates them? Humility.
00:35:54
Speaker
Humility. Humility is probably the single biggest differentiator. And I'm embarrassed to admit that it took me as long into my career. I was in my mid fifties before I realized how important humility was yeah um as a characteristic, not just for anyone in your organization, but especially for leaders in your organization.
00:36:14
Speaker
And the reason humility matters so much is without that, you can't remain, you can't really remain open-minded. You can't really be as open to new information that might be counter to what you thought was gonna be true. I like being right as much as the next person, okay?
00:36:32
Speaker
Maybe even more than the next person. But I would rather be happy or rich than I would be to be right. and And so to me, I have very strong positions loosely held. um And I have the humility to know I've been wrong plenty in my career. How can I be so sure this isn't that I'm not wrong in this situation too?
00:36:51
Speaker
And so having that humility is maybe the single biggest variable. And I think it's hardest when you're the boss, when ultimately the failure is success of success for the business is your responsibility, um both to the positive and to the negative. um It's easy to lose a lot of that humility.
00:37:08
Speaker
And one of the kids I mentor that I'm so impressed with, he's 25. He's going to be worth over $100 million dollars here in the next year. He's unbelievably good looking. You know, he's like six three looks like a GQ model. If there's anyone that could be an obnoxious prick, it'd be this guy.
00:37:24
Speaker
And he's the nicest, humblest, down-to-earth guy. Which, by the way, it makes it that much more impactful because he could be that way and chooses not to be.
00:37:35
Speaker
Everyone's just blown away by this guy, partly because of that. Wow. um You know, I remember years ago in ah in a company I had had owned and had since exited, there there was a there was a moment where we had a really, really challenging customer issue.
00:37:55
Speaker
And one of the ladies who was working for me at the time, who was helping this particular person, was really struggling with um how to resolve, I think, the the the issue that was happening at the time. And um i genuinely had asked wanted her input. I wanted her to come to the you know the the conclusion on on her own, right? It's not just about me kind of pointing fingers and and directing folks. And I asked her, I said, i asked her to to tell me the approach, you know, what's the approach that, you know,
00:38:31
Speaker
you would need to take or someone would need to take and in this instance. And she said something that I will never forget because, and this was years ago, right? So, you know, it was early in my career and I'm still sort of figuring out my own leadership style. And she said to me, and she was, she was a young person. She said to me, I think you have to decide, or at some point you have to decide if you want to be right or you want to be helpful. Right.
00:38:58
Speaker
And, you know, i'm i'm I'm a young CEO at at the at the time and and she's younger than I am. Right. And I i just was like blown away with like that.
00:39:10
Speaker
And I've remembered it ever since. And it kind of speaks to what you're talking about. Right. I mean, yeah, being right is one thing. um You know, I learned through my years and, and, you know, playing and performing music on the, on the, on the jazz circuit that ego gets you absolutely nowhere.
00:39:27
Speaker
Ego gets you absolutely nowhere and ultimately can turn that music that you're making. Right. And, and, and think about the, the, the, the cast, right. The ensemble in your business organization can ultimately turn it into a dumpster fire.
00:39:42
Speaker
Um, You know, and ah and so what she said just hit me like a ton of bricks, made me step back and I'm like, you're good. You got this whole thing. ah You don't even need me here. So ah good on you. And I, you know, really, really kind of proud of her for for doing that, but also.
00:40:00
Speaker
for articulating what I think at the time I really wasn't able to articulate. um What do you say? I like that phrase by the way, because like it better. So would rather be right? Because I've heard people say, rather be right or would be happy? actually like that one better. rather be right would you rather be helpful?
00:40:16
Speaker
I like that one better actually. Um, yeah, I mean, it's, it, it, it seemed to work at least in that moment, because in that moment, that was really, that, that was the fork in the road, right? You can be right, or you can make a decision that helps this come to some positive resolution.
00:40:37
Speaker
And, um, what do you see, what do you see younger founders get wrong most often? You know, especially when it comes to their people, I guess something maybe you wish, you know, someone had told you early in your career?
00:40:50
Speaker
I mean, they, yeah they really pushed back hard against having a budget, having quarterly board meetings. You know, I don't want to be- Who wants a budget? I know, like, I don't want to be corporate. I'm like, would you like to be rich? Would you like to make the people that work for you rich? Because I promise you without that, without those two things, without a budget and without a, without quarterly board meetings, your ability to execute,
00:41:15
Speaker
it's going to sound crazy. I think it's cut in half. Interesting. thing Because if you do it properly and i'm not going lie, doing it properly is not trivial. It's not rocket science either, but it's not trivial.
00:41:27
Speaker
What you do is for the next 12 months, You are super granular about everything, the decisions you think you make are going to make, the hires you're going to make, what you're how much you're going to pay those people, when you're going to do it ah you know add new SaaS tools, whatever it might be. You're as thoughtful as you can possibly be about the next 12 months.
00:41:49
Speaker
And then years two through five, much, much, much less granular. right And then you just kind of have that rolling 12 months where you're super, super granular. And then what that does is it makes it super easy for you to do the budgeting process for the subsequent year. And it allows you to do a really good mix of really managing the day to day well.
00:42:08
Speaker
professionally, you're on top of it, you know what's going on, but you'll also always have an eye to the future. Because the one thing you can be certain of is whatever your plans are, that's not how it's going to turn out. You're going to make adjustments and pivots that are different from whatever you planned.
00:42:21
Speaker
And i mean, it's always amazing to me, like I'll finalize a budget and like literally four days later, we'll make some big change and something that's like a very material impact in the economics for the business moving forward. Kind of stuff happens all the time.
00:42:34
Speaker
But you still want to have the plan and then make sure that that plan, you know, because that's what's going to allow you to make adjustments and have you feel confident and comfortable in those adjustments. And as an example, you know, with Menufit, the 25-year-old is moving towards the – nine figure exit, that business is complicated because most of our revenue comes through the app store and there's like ah you have to wait for that revenue for 60 days. So you know you're paying for your advertising now, you're paying your influencers currently, but you're having to wait almost two months for the for the cash to come in. managing that thoughtfully and professionally requires you to really have a granular understanding of all the ins and outs in a business like that. And if it wasn't for us having that, his ability to confidently be able to spend the right amount and be able to sleep at night would disappear.
00:43:25
Speaker
Yeah. Wow. What, um, well, let, I, I'd like to look ahead a little bit.
AI's Impact on Leadership and Team Dynamics
00:43:31
Speaker
Um, You know, ai let's talk a little bit about that. Changing not just the tools, right, but but teams and how teams work together. Sometimes you're not even working with a human.
00:43:42
Speaker
um You know, a lot of teams are becoming more fractional, and more distributed. um What do you think gets harder for these leaders? What do you think gets gets easier? Um, AI is a, is a giant wild card. I mean, you know, people talk about the internet and social media, not that those weren't also big, you know, uh, you know, um, interrupters in terms of, you know, changing the game, disruptors in the space for sure they were, but nothing like ai AI is another order of magnitude, and I think people are underestimating it even still.
00:44:18
Speaker
um I think it's really hard to predict. I mean, people literally have AI teams that have meetings without the people that created the agents even being present for those meetings. And they're getting meeting summaries from meetings they're not in that there were no human beings in. Like that's happening now.
00:44:36
Speaker
And so I think that that landscape is gonna change. The one thing you can be certain of is if you don't embrace AI, It's game over yeah for you.
00:44:47
Speaker
And you know you don't really have a choice. You've got to really embrace it. And what I would say is the way i experience it is AI is a force multiplier for me. that I already understand, you know, you know, I have a deep understanding of business and how to grow and scale them. I understand people in leadership, you know, now I'm able to outsource the grunt work of the part of my job that I didn't like, and I can retain the part that's the creative part.
00:45:15
Speaker
And so for me, um i see it as mostly good. um I do think, i mean, there's no getting around the fact that it's going to eliminate a lot of jobs. i mean, you see this in, ah you know Oracle, I think, just laid off another 20,000 people, Microsoft, Facebook. They're know they're laying people off you know in the five digit numbers, you know like you know consistently.
00:45:36
Speaker
um And that's going to continue. And so I think this next 10 to 15 year period, before we figure some of this stuff out, is going to be very bumpy. yeah um But the one thing that you can be sure of is if you want to be on the right side of that bumpiness, you have to embrace AI as deeply as you can.
00:45:52
Speaker
As more of that work does get automated, I mean, what what becomes more valuable about the human side of leadership? So obviously, I don't know that, you know, leading AI is going to, you know, like know leading an AI agent. i don't know that that's really going to be a thing. but I think what's going to happen is you're going to have a higher concentration of ah of really talented people.
00:46:19
Speaker
There's, you know, because it's the Pareto principles unbeaten in human history. So it's going to be that 80-20 rule like most things. And there's going to be 20% of the people that are just super capable. They've built up their talent stack. They've embraced AI. They're well-rounded individuals.
00:46:34
Speaker
and And the companies that do the best are going to be the ones that can attract, retain, and motivate those people. So I would argue your leadership will become even more important because you're going to be fighting for a scarcer resource, a scarcer, more talented resource.
00:46:49
Speaker
And so I feel like um humanity becomes even more important then. David, I want to i want to wrap up with one more one more question that I always like to ask. you know If a leader business leader were going to come to you and really want to get it right,
00:47:04
Speaker
you know, by their people, I guess, maybe they could only act on one piece, one piece of your advice, right? You're on an elevator with them before it gets to the top floor and the doors open and they walk right out of there. What is that one thing that you tell them?
Key Leadership Advice
00:47:18
Speaker
ah It's a two sided coin, um deflect as much credit as humanly possible and absorb as much blame as humanly possible. like that.
00:47:30
Speaker
This is a new one. i mean, that's it's it's it's it's not a new concept. I mean, it's a new one for this podcast. I like the originality. It's good. um And also powerful advice. David, thank you. Thanks so much for joining me. Appreciate ah you being here and taking the time.
00:47:49
Speaker
Curtis, thanks for having me on and and asking thoughtful questions. There's not enough of this out there. And um you know the more I can be helpful to people, you know the happier I am. Awesome. Awesome. Well, thank you. Thanks all you watching and listening to Mustard Hub Voices behind the build. Be sure to subscribe so you don't miss the next episode. Visit mustardhub.com to learn more about what we do and discover how we help companies become destinations for workplace happiness and turn culture into a competitive edge. Until next time.