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Leadership and entrepreneurship in the tech space: Michael Brown '94, CEO of Skyline Robotics
94 Plays1 year ago
Join us for a discussion on leadership, team building, and how to foster a high-functioning organization. Michael Brown '94 joins us to offer his insights from many years leading startups in the technology sector, including his latest venture as the CEO and chair of the board of Skyline Robotics.
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Transcript
Introduction of Michael Brown, CEO of Skyline Robotics
00:00:13
Speaker
coming to you live from the School of Information Studies at Syracuse University. Our guest today is Michael Brown, CEO and chairman of the board at Skyline Robotics. His role, Michael serves as both a veteran strategic advisor and is leasing the expansion of Skyline into the US market. Michael's 35-year career has focused on business services, distributions, and roll-ups. He has led two previous companies and with revenue over $400 million,
00:00:42
Speaker
both of which were sold to publicly traded companies. During Michael's career, the companies he has led have generated in excess of $5 billion while leveraging a proven model, drive and growth, and market expansion through business acquisition, cross-selling, and organic growth steeped in data analysis and strategy. Additionally, Michael serves on the Sanitation Foundation's board of directors, the official nonprofit partner of the New York City Department of Sanitation.
00:01:11
Speaker
Michael holds a degree in information technology from Syracuse University. And I'd like to welcome you, Michael. Hey, Mike, thanks for having me. Anytime, anytime. It's great to have you here.
The Origin and Innovation of Skyline Robotics
00:01:22
Speaker
Can you tell us a little bit about where you are now, Skyland Robotics, and how the idea for the company came to be? Yeah, sure. So I'm based out of New York City, live on the Upper East Side.
00:01:37
Speaker
work out of Manhattan mostly.
00:01:42
Speaker
After I sold my last business, I had signed the seven year non-compete, and being in the service distribution business for 30 plus years needed to find that new, something new. And most of the things that I've done in my past have been disruptive technologies, bringing it to more from a commodity standpoint.
00:02:08
Speaker
Um, and I liked robotics and originally I was looking at, um, the healthcare industry for, um, elderly patients, um, for like their robot assistants. Um, but, uh, I saw the opportunity one day when I was driving down the West side highway, looking at skyscrapers and said, I can't believe people are still cleaning skyscrapers by hand.
00:02:37
Speaker
So I found Skyline Robotics. And from there, I started in December of 20. That's awesome. And such a great idea. You think about potentially hazardous jobs and jobs where there aren't as many people doing them anymore. And window washing is probably right up there. Yeah. So it's right up there is right. It's that dirty, dull, dangerous job.
00:03:07
Speaker
Very, when you look in the United States, 76% are over the age of 40 in the industry with only, I want to say 9% under the age of 30. And when you look at growth in buildings being built over the last 10 years, it's only grown by, I don't know, 10, 15, 20 times in very large skyscrapers.
00:03:33
Speaker
And when you look at just in New York City, I want to say there used to be 1300 window washers in the union. Today, there's probably less than 500. So it's just it's it's it's a very difficult job. It's very dangerous. And there are just a lot better job offerings out there than to be
00:04:01
Speaker
you know, out in 120 degree weather, getting, you know, hit on by sun or rain or, you know, wind. And it's, it's a real, it's a very tough job to have.
Leadership Insights and Advice
00:04:16
Speaker
That's awesome. You've read several companies and you were named one of the world's most inspiring leaders in 2023 in world leaders magazine. What have you learned a bit about leadership since you began your career?
00:04:30
Speaker
Oh, I think leadership has a couple of different spokes. So one, I think that
00:04:41
Speaker
You need to practice what you preach. I think you need to be, people are gonna look towards you on how you're behaving to see how they behave. And so I would say that's one big issue. And I would say the other biggest is listening. Recognizing that your people are your number one asset,
00:05:10
Speaker
And if you listen, you're gonna get a better culture and more of a consensus. So the leadership becomes more, it becomes less than one individual and it becomes more spread out. That makes a lot of sense.
00:05:37
Speaker
On that, what advice would you give new graduates as far as if they want to lead a company? So, you know, if you want to lead your own company, you have to have that entrepreneurial spirit, right? So, and with that comes, how do you raise capital to put that together and so forth. But I think that
00:06:05
Speaker
Early on, there are great companies to go to that have some really good programs in your early years to give you the basics of what the expectations are in the work environment, how to navigate, you know, understanding managers. And, you know, you want to get at least some sort of structure
00:06:31
Speaker
in your past because when you just go 100% entrepreneur, there's usually a lot of different problems you create that had you had the called one to two year experience, you would not have those issues. Well, that makes a ton of sense. Being able to, if I can unpack that, being able to sort of learn from a culture or any culture, right?
00:06:59
Speaker
sort of helps you become a better leader because you've seen how things have been done, good or bad. It makes a lot of sense. I see a lot of student entrepreneurs and that's one of the things I think, they're never short on ideas, but it's knowing how things work and working somewhere else and seeing how the sausage gets made. Well, 100% and one of the biggest opportunities for people in, let's say that have the experience
00:07:29
Speaker
is going into these companies that have young entrepreneurs that have come up with phenomenal ideas, but don't know how to get it to market, that don't know how to put it together, that don't know how to focus and everything else.
Turning Around Struggling Companies
00:07:43
Speaker
And for me, what we brought in to this already, you know, existing company that was basically in fairness in solving,
00:07:54
Speaker
but had great ideas, but never, it never, they, it was a prototype, never commercialized and anything. So until we came in and said, okay, hey, listen, here's how you run a business. They were really, you know, I would say wild with their ideas. So you came in and like kind of reigned it in.
00:08:19
Speaker
It was almost like a turnaround. It was almost like a turnaround. It was, you know, and, and I got, I don't want to say lucky, but from a timing standpoint, I happened to sell business. I was looking for another business. You know, a lot of things moved in the right direction to get me to where I was and.
00:08:42
Speaker
I saw that these were two young individuals that had great ideas. And I thought it was much further along because I didn't even understand the technology. But what I found literally in the first 90 days as a team with what was there, I mean, the company had raised, I want to say $3 million at the time,
00:09:09
Speaker
And we found $250,000 in double payments and things. I mean, like just basic stuff. So 10%, so, so if you, if 10% of your money is basically unaccounted for, what else are you going to find? So that has been a real big, um,
00:09:30
Speaker
plus for the company because it went from an idea prototype and someone that has management experiences come in and has been able to at least shore it up. That's pretty neat. I'm going to pivot a little bit and ask you another question. Being a leader is hard, right?
00:09:56
Speaker
We, you have to deal with different personality types. You have to figure out how to motivate and inspire. Could you share some wisdom with us? Yeah, you know, first of all, I try to, like I said, lead by example. In my role today, I'm more of, I don't want to say a cheerleader, but
00:10:23
Speaker
Our company is separated by R&D and by a business that's being built out in an ecosystem that doesn't exist. So for me, the education that I'm providing to all the employees that are in R&D, just about what's going on on the business side, they very much are into that. At the same time,
00:10:54
Speaker
To motivate, first of all, I always think you have to have a positive attitude if you're leading. I think that yelling at people and belittling people is just not right. I'm into respect.
00:11:13
Speaker
Um, and I'm not into the pyramid type of managing. So I like flat organizations. I like to surround myself with subject matter experts in their area and know that they know more than I do and feel comfortable that.
00:11:32
Speaker
they are getting this, the job done that needs to get done. And that I can look at all the pieces together and try to manage it from that standpoint. And sometimes, you know, at certain points in people's lives, they need different types of motivation and different types of inspiration. You know, people that are not at work do have another life, right?
00:12:02
Speaker
family, they have friends, they have problems, doctors and everything else. And I think that if you can be supportive, I think that is one of the greatest, you know, self motivations for the other to be like, wow, I don't want to disappoint X because they're invested in me, not just as an employee, but as a person. That's, that's a,
00:12:30
Speaker
I love everything you're saying here because you're spending about a third of your life at a place of employment, right? And so working for someone who thinks that way and has respect for people's things going on outside of time, but also gives them the opportunity
00:12:48
Speaker
to sort of see how they fit within the organization. Right. And it's, it's all about everybody kind of working together to achieve a common goal. I mean, that's a, that's a really great way to think about leadership. Yeah. And it's tough to build that culture. Right. And you know, in my previous businesses, when you have acquisitions as rollups,
00:13:11
Speaker
having your corporate culture that you've created to try, if it's the right culture, to try to disseminate to those satellite offices so they can feel it. Because every time people would come visit us in our corporate offices, everyone's like, oh, I wish I was working here. It's so much, I mean, all the action and everything else.
00:13:37
Speaker
It's not easy to do, but I think that if you start at the top, it's got a great way of making its way all the way through to the bottom. Can I ask you one of these really, I think it's a funny question, but like, what is most important to be successful in your career? What do you feel is the most important characteristic or aspect or skill
00:14:05
Speaker
I think you have to be a people person. And I think that there is tremendous opportunity, given where technology has gone today, that we used to have a very, you used to know someone by voice, right? You used to talk on a phone, you knew their voice, whatever. Then video conferencing came out. They're like, oh my God, that's the greatest thing.
00:14:35
Speaker
Now, I don't have any business calls unless it is via video, right? So what's happened is that's replaced the personal interaction where you'd have meetings and so forth, which has now created a whole different dynamic. So I believe that personal relationships in business is essential
00:15:05
Speaker
for success because you cannot depend on technology. Yes, if you're running a SaaS business and you're selling licenses, of course, that the revenue is gonna grow there. But trust me, the person that is making the deals on the other side, that's what's most important.
00:15:32
Speaker
Another sentiment that I'm happy to hear, Michael, because that's what we try to preach here at the iSchool. It's not just about the technology. It's very much about people and your interactions with people and getting to know the people you're working with, getting to know your clients, getting to know your customers, understanding technology is an end to a means. Your technology washes windows. And that's the means.
00:15:59
Speaker
but how you achieve the means involves a lot of interactions with people. By the way, when you're the leader of the business and it matters what type of businesses you are, usually you're the leader in an entrepreneurial business is always the salesperson and is the driving visionary. But when you have
00:16:24
Speaker
what I would call mature businesses and businesses that have been around for many, many, many years, the leaders are not running the business. The leaders are focused on so many other things that they don't even get to really focus on the business. They're dealing with finance, they're dealing with, you know,
00:16:50
Speaker
human resources, which is a huge undertaking. And it's dealing with banks and things of that nature. So being a leader is a tough situation because people are looking towards you. And if you don't have people that are leading on a daily basis,
00:17:19
Speaker
then you leave yourself a gap. So it's being able to delegate leadership out, making sure you have people that understand what's needed. I was just taking, in fairness, I've been doing this for 30 plus years. I've been around it my whole life with my father. So I got a very good education as it relates to running a business.
00:17:48
Speaker
So having a long career like that, can you look back and tell us what your proudest accomplishment of your career has been? I would definitely have to say the company that we had was Allied, which was sold to Office Depot in 2006. That company went through one of the most incredible
00:18:16
Speaker
transitions and turnarounds during crazy times in life. It was 1998 the company started and day one it was 12 companies being purchased
00:18:32
Speaker
all together that then had to be put together that then had to have cultures put together and all these other things and That was during the dot-com boom and people couldn't get employees and then you had 9-11 happen and then you had you know this mass recession and
00:18:54
Speaker
You know, I went from 1,300 employees down to 700 employees in a mat to just make it because I was business in New York. So, you know, there have for me and then to be able to exit out of the company from a shareholder standpoint, that was the greatest turnaround for the shareholders standpoint. From an educational standpoint, what I learned
00:19:23
Speaker
was after the company was sold and I was fixed to Office Depot and Office Depot basically dismantled and destroyed the company literally in less than six months was how impacted the employees were by their culture being changed and now going under this completely different type of management that they didn't want to work for.
00:19:53
Speaker
And what I really have seen is I enjoy building and creating and continuing business. I'm not always looking to just make the quick buck and sell it because you live through, I mean, you can imagine that my company is based out of Israel.
00:20:23
Speaker
You can imagine what's going on there for the past eight months with 12 employees being in the middle of the war and mentally and being able to support the families and so forth. So even with all my experience that I had with 9-11 trying to deal with that and hurricanes and other catastrophes,
00:20:47
Speaker
I never ever had anyone working for me that's been in a war. And that has changed my whole outlook on life. So it's a learning experience every year that we continue. So in other words, 35 years, you're still learning, right? Oh, every day. Every day. Because listen.
00:21:14
Speaker
life changes rapidly, right? And every day you're gonna wake up, every day there's a new problem thrown at you and you gotta figure it out. So if you're not dealing with solving solutions, you're usually just standing still.
Networking and Hiring Philosophy
00:21:33
Speaker
So how important do you feel networking is in your career? And do you have any networking advice for students? So networking,
00:21:45
Speaker
is probably one of the most important things out there. And it's not just business, you know, people, especially when you're young, and I'll never forget what my father used to tell me all the time. When I was younger, I used to, I was playing soccer all the time and I played a little golf and I was, you know,
00:22:12
Speaker
I hit the ball really far and show signs of greatness. And he said, listen, when you get in business, if you think you're going to call up Joe and say, Joe, let's go down to the park and go kick the soccer ball around and you're going to scream across the way, hey, how's business? He's like, that's not going to happen.
00:22:34
Speaker
He's like, the way it's going to happen is you need to go out there, get in the, go figure out how to get better at golf. He's like, and then everyone's going to want to play with you. He's like, and then in business, you'll see that the most important people are going to want to play with the best golfers. He's like, so don't go to soccer, go learn how to play golf. Um,
00:22:59
Speaker
Great. It was a great life lesson. I mean, I'm not saying that everyone needs to go play, play golf, but it is the opportunities in college, for instance, right? Everyone that you are leaving from.
00:23:16
Speaker
basically is pretty Northeast, you know, surrounded. I mean, I walked down the street. I see people that I went to Syracuse with all the time. And I still see, and I see people that graduated ahead of me, people that graduated that are younger than me. And Syracuse, especially in the Northeast is just, it's a, it's a great community. So it's very easy to network. People want to be helpful.
00:23:46
Speaker
I mean, one of the great things about LinkedIn that the students will learn as they get older is that just having that, you know, where I'm from Syracuse, you're from Syracuse, you get a little bit of a thread and a look at like, Hey, I'm from Syracuse. I got a question. I'm looking for help. As long as you're not like cold calling them and so forth. I think that they're going to be of help.
00:24:16
Speaker
but it's who you know in this world that's going to get things done. And that's in medical, that's in schools, that's in business, that's life. And it's just the reality. You mentioned LinkedIn. Do you want to talk a little bit about LinkedIn? I mean, you and I are from the generation pre LinkedIn, right? Our networking was a lot different. So let's talk a bit about LinkedIn.
00:24:45
Speaker
So LinkedIn is a phenomenal tool. Different people use it, different professionals that I work with that use it differently. But basically it is probably the largest business repository of contacts.
00:25:09
Speaker
where people keep it to business, more or less. And it is people are very open to being able to communicate to get to the right person.
00:25:28
Speaker
in an organization and I find that to be, uh, LinkedIn to be essential in my daily routine. Uh, I'm getting, I dunno, somewhere between eight to nine requests a day. Um, and I would say probably 10% of them.
00:25:55
Speaker
or can be worthwhile for what I'm interested in. But, you know, marketing companies, they love it. You know, you need to cold call. Great. You need to figure out, you know, who's in an industry and who the competitors are and so forth. Also, really a powerful tool. So,
00:26:23
Speaker
going back to new students for a bit and new students going out there looking for jobs. What do you look for in a new hire? And maybe you could talk a little bit about advice for negotiating that first salary. Yeah. So in, when you're coming out of college, right?
00:26:45
Speaker
unless you're gonna be in a specialized field, unfortunately, there's not much negotiating that's gonna happen, right? You're gonna walk in and let's say you're gonna be a salesperson, right? And they're gonna pay you a base salary, maybe some commissions. The window of negotiation, they might have some leeway of 5%,
00:27:12
Speaker
You know, it's a fit could be an $80,000 job. Maybe they can play with 82 82 five. But, um, so one, I don't know that you really need to be able to negotiate a deal. However, I do believe that you need to be open about
00:27:34
Speaker
If, you know, let's say you're someone that wants to travel during the summer, you know, it's something to say, Hey, during the summer, I usually go hiking in the Adirondacks for two weeks. Is that going to be a problem in the future? I don't want it to be. So that that's like a great opportunity. I think people listening, interacting, asking, um,
00:28:04
Speaker
interesting business questions to what the business is doing, I think can be engaging. But in fairness, when you're coming out of college, it's kind of like cookie cutter, unless you're going to go try to start something on your own. And it's not a bad thing to go right into cookie cutter because cookie cutter gives you
00:28:29
Speaker
the tools to at least know what to do when you go to an office in the future. No, that's very fair. And I think that's great advice as well. So you're an high school alum. You're a third or fourth generation SU alum. I'm a third generation. My son's a fourth. Your son's a fourth. So how do you feel Syracuse has impacted
00:28:58
Speaker
your family and your career. Syracuse has been a part of my life since I was born. So, um, I knew I was going to go there when I was growing up. Um, it wasn't like it was forced on me, but I was kind of like, Hey, I don't know, should be pretty easy to get in third generation. Everyone says it's an unbelievable grade school.
00:29:27
Speaker
sign me up, I'll be great. My grandfather was a townie at Syracuse. He wound up getting two degrees from Syracuse. My father got his degree, I got my degree. And then there's like, I want to say nine other family members that have also gone, whether it be cousins or nieces or nephews, were there a lot.
00:29:56
Speaker
We always did business in Syracuse as well when we were in the distribution business. So we did business with the school, so we'd always been around. And now with my new business with Skyline,
00:30:14
Speaker
I've been getting involved in it in a different way because with artificial intelligence and regulations and there's a company jma wireless you know the the dome so there's a lot going on in my world that i'm trying to build today with Syracuse because with micron technologies coming and with
00:30:42
Speaker
A lot of, hopefully, other businesses now going to support Micron. I think there's a huge opportunity for Syracuse over the next five, 10 years.
00:30:57
Speaker
where if I can develop a program and I can get, you know, people that can learn how to robotics and artificial intelligence and machine learning and algorithms. Now, all of a sudden I see that. So that's what I'm trying to put together now.
00:31:17
Speaker
I just need the business to like, you know, get there and then, but I'm laying down the groundwork and I'd love to do something with the school.
Skyline's Autonomous Robots and Human Collaboration
00:31:28
Speaker
That's pretty neat. Can I ask you a question a bit about the robots that you're using? Are they semi-autonomous or are they autonomous? Do you just put them up on a scaffold and they just... Our robots are 100% autonomous.
00:31:45
Speaker
Um, they are calculating their speed to it, their movements, 250 times every second. Um, and in our business differently than a regular robotic business. So regular robot, you program to do a certain set of tasks and so forth.
00:32:06
Speaker
in our world, we can't program it to do any tasks because it's sitting there and it's in a totally unstable environment. So what we do is we teach it to learn and react as fast as humanly possible, which is pretty cool. And when you're at, you know, when you're
00:32:32
Speaker
hundreds of meters in the air or thousands of feet in the air, you want to make sure that that is being calculated correctly. Absolutely, absolutely. That's pretty cool. That's very interesting because, you know, that brings up a lot of science that we teach in the iSchool about how to do AI and apply AI. And it's not just that, it's
00:32:57
Speaker
We are using LiDAR technology to scan the buildings. We're not pre-scanning the building, so it just goes right to the building. LiDAR technology is looking at through transparent windows, but being able to pick up all the sills
00:33:15
Speaker
Then we use sonic, uh, waves to make sure that it doesn't crash into the building. And it's, yeah, there's so many cool, different things between, um, the communications, you know, you've got rivers and rivers of frequencies and big cities. So how do you noise filter out and keep stable communications 300 meters so you can pass data real time? Yeah.
00:33:42
Speaker
I imagine an early problem was like, an early problem was probably whoops, you're actually cleaning the brick, you're not cleaning the glass. Right, no. And then, you know, when our business is really moving from
00:33:57
Speaker
uh, what I would call window washing into data collection and, and how do you, and how do you give the health of the facade and you know, what's that building look like and what ESG, um, initiatives can you be after when you've got HVAC leaks and water infiltration? Yeah, that's, that's really neat. And that's, um, I think very common
00:34:23
Speaker
When you enter into an industry, you think differently than the human replacement. The human replacement, they go up there, they wash the windows, they come down. But not when you have a robot out there with all these sensors on it, it can also detect other potential problems and issues with the building. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. But the good news is we work with the union.
00:34:43
Speaker
Um, so that it becomes more of a collaborative service because you're still always going to need humans, but they're going to be more in what I'll call detailed work. Then what I would say the 90% bulk of the building that just needs, you know, it's basic stuff. It's not getting in the nooks and crannies and, you know, polishing the knobs.
00:35:09
Speaker
That's awesome. That caters to the, the cobot idea, right? Where the future of work involves robots helping people do their jobs better and more efficiently and taking away the tasks that just aren't maybe, maybe are more menial. Yeah. I mean, the cobot, the cobot's biggest function is to make sure that it doesn't run over a human. Um, so it's got this exoskeleton.
00:35:32
Speaker
on it that basically when it touches, it just, it fails or it stops immediately. We had to actually build our industrial robot because there are humans around the scaffolding. We actually had to create a waterproof air skin. The company it's called an air skin so that the industrial robot can act as a cobra. Pretty cool.
00:36:04
Speaker
It's another thing that I didn't know that I needed to figure out, that we needed to figure out when we got this business. So I'm gonna leave with this last question. You've been asked to be our convocation speaker and you've agreed. And is it maybe, can you offer us a sneak peek about what you're gonna say at convocation without giving it all away?
00:36:25
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, listen, there's nothing revolutionary that I'm going to say. But what I am going to talk about is your personal ecosystem and how important it is to when you talk about networking, but your personal ecosystem for family, friends, business and making sure that you're always looking at it and saying,
00:36:56
Speaker
Am I aligned? Are these people aligned with where I want to go? Are they not aligned? And it's not that you have to get rid of people, but what you can do is you can segment, right? And you can put them in your world, like my college friends. I have many, many, many, many, many college friends.
00:37:21
Speaker
However, I have five college friends that I speak to on a regular basis and I put them in a different category and I speak to them on a infrequent basis, but I can pick up a conversation like it was yesterday because they have the history. So learning how to surround yourself with people that are going to help you
00:37:50
Speaker
get things done and move your life forward to me is the most critical point because if you surround yourself with, and the right people doesn't mean celebrities or rich or poor, it's just for what you're trying to accomplish, you should always just be looking at, are these people aligned? You know, people grow up,
00:38:18
Speaker
other people don't. I have friends from college that when you turn 50, you kind of start acting a certain way. And you can't be jumping off things and acting like an idiot. So those people, while they're, of course, my friends, I'm not going to be socializing with them as much. So it's always looking into, because
00:38:46
Speaker
You are the most as an individual, your own personal ecosystem is the greatest asset that you can have for yourself. And then you want to pass it on to your children and have them learn and build and say, yeah, that's really what I'm going to talk about is really just how important it is to surround yourself with people so that you can get there because you can't ever do it alone.
00:39:17
Speaker
I chuckled through that story because you took me back to college, you really did. I have my circle of college friends that I still relate to. I have a smaller circle of college friends where I'm like, are you ever gonna grow up? It's funny, it's funny. Yeah, and listen, and relationships, and that's, you know, like I was talking about,
00:39:39
Speaker
Technology is great. Technology should make life easier. Technology should make life safer and should provide you with great information so you make great decisions based on facts. However, you as an individual need human interaction and need relationships to be able to live and be happy.
00:40:07
Speaker
I've never met, I've never met a happy loner in my life. And as you and I both know, the technology will change. And so you just cannot, you can't put your eggs in the technology basket because it's always going to change. It's always going to be different and you're going to have to adapt. You have to pivot. And if, if your plan, you have long-term plans, right? But if you're,
00:40:36
Speaker
what I call, when we do a budget in the beginning of the year, trust me, there's a second version and then there's a third version throughout the year because things change so quickly in today's age, you know, it's look, just look at the iPhone, what they, what they keep doing every year. You got to change your cable. So true. So true.
00:41:03
Speaker
Well, I thank you very much for your time. I'm looking forward to your convocation speech next week. And thank you, Michael Brown. And this is a wrap. Hey, Mike. Great time. Thanks again. Really appreciate it.