Kat Cole joins to discuss her leadership experience at companies like Hooters, Cinnabon, and Athletic Greens and how she find ways to motivate her teams and keep the company moving forward through times of crisis. Recorded on October 14, 2022 for Crypto Packaged Goods Genius Call series.
Kat Cole is the President & COO of Athletic Greens. She advises high growth companies and has invested in over 70 early stage companies. Prior to that, she was the President and COO at Focus Brands, running a multibillion dollar company with nine presidents, seven brands, two divisions, 80 countries, thousands of franchisees, and hundreds of thousands of retail points of distribution.
Follow Kate Cole at https://twitter.com/KatColeATL
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Introduction
Welcome to Crypto Podcast Goods, the audio home for Club CPG. As a reminder, the hosts of CPG Pop and their guests are not registered investment advisors. All opinions are of the hosts and guests alone. Nothing discussed today should be treated as investment advice and all content from our Genius Calls is solely for informational and entertainment purposes only. Now, let's get to that genius Call.
Mikey Piro
All right folks, we are back once again a Genius Call. And here we have Kat Cole. We are going to start at the beginning, so please cat introduce yourself and let's talk a little bit about you and where your journey started.
Kat Cole
Sure I am, Kat. I am a mom of a three and a five year old wife to an awesome human who's kind of big in endurance athletics and venture capital. And I'm the president, CEO and board member of Athletic Greens. I have been with the company for almost 18 months now, but mostly as an advisor, first in 2021, and formerly in this role for almost a year. And we are the fastest growing nutrition company in the world. Exclusively Ddosy, famous for AG One, our signature like hero product that is making comprehensive nutrition super easy. And it's this insanely high quality combination of a multivitamin, a probiotic green powders, like so many fucking delicious, amazing things good for you are in this tiny little scoop that you put in water and you shake and you drink every morning and there's literally nothing that you could do in 60 seconds that is as good for your health. And I'm really proud to be a part of not just a fast growing company and a respected company, but one that's mission is literally health and wellness. And the way we do it fully global, fully remote, carbon neutral, and there's only upside. So very excited about AG and this chapter of my life. Prior to AG, I took a year to advise high growth companies. I am on the board of Milk Bar and Slice and HumanCo, the SPAC, and I'm an angel investor in over 70 early stage companies, many of them in wellness DATASEE or in Better for you or modern versions of beloved consumer categories, as well as SMD Tech. Prior to that, I was President and CEO at Focus Brands, running a multibillion dollar company, managing nine presidents, seven brands, two divisions, 80 countries, thousands of franchisees, and hundreds of thousands of retail points of distribution. I was with that company for ten years, started as president of Cinnamon, became group president of the parent company, launching the Ecommerce licensing and manufacturing division, and then became president and COO of the entire parent company. And prior to that, I spent 15 years at Hooters Restaurant. So I was a hostess, a waitress, manager, and then a corporate employee at the age of 20 and moved up in that company as the company grew. So that's the kind of early days to now for me.
Mikey Piro
Personally, I'm going to bring a little bit of my background here in that I was in the army for a while and I studied a bunch of leadership, specifically, like, the definitions of it and wrote about it. And I'm really excited to explore your vision and your view of leadership as you've progressed all the way through from the beginning till now, because it's impressive, all that you've done. So for me, the army definition is the one that I adopt, and for leadership, it is the act of influencing others by providing purpose, direction and motivation to accomplish the mission and improve the organization. And so I kind of want to pick that apart a little bit and specifically have you give us some of your favorite stories from your early career through now specifically to kind of pull apart that piece of leadership, because it's clear that you're a leader here and it's clear that the work speaks for itself. We'd like to get a little bit closer on how you're thinking about leadership in reflection now by continuing to lead large organizations to success. And I'm super excited. I'm an AG one user. It's helped across so many different parts of my life. I think it's just like a very interesting culmination of where you're at, but we'll talk about that in a little bit. So your early career was at Hooters and you started there pretty young and you had to launch a bunch of different franchises with different teams in different countries. And so from that definition of leadership, I kind of want to probe on giving people purpose in that specific instance and how you navigated your early career.
Kat Cole
Yeah. Well, first, thank you so much for your service and so cool that you've translated those lessons and maybe what is the ultimate school of leadership to other parts of the world and life. I was just with a group of veterans at a summit actually talking about this exact thing and their transition to civilian life, into business, into the private sector. And I just think it's very cool for me, the early lessons, I mean, one was this the company was growing really quickly. Hooters was when I was there, and so there was this dynamic of very often I was a peer who then became a leader, and then I was the peer and then I became the leader. And when you're constantly becoming the leader of your peers, it does a few things, or at least it did for me. One is it reminds you that I might be in a position to lead these people. So when I am an individual contributor or a peer, I should like, do things well. So there's a level of respect. I mean, I should do things well because they should be done well. And there's another motivator that should I get in a position of leadership, people will remind you of how you operated as a peer. And I would never let someone telling me, oh, well, you didn't do it perfectly when you were one of us. And who were you to tell me? I wouldn't let that hold me back from my responsibilities of management and leadership. But it's nice to keep it in mind that that dynamic is going to play out and one more motivator to deliver excellence no matter the role in a group because one day you may lead. The other dynamic is just this idea of trust. And trust gets built in a lot of ways. Being there for people evidencing through your actions, not just your words, that you're there for them as a leader, that literally your success is their success and they are not separated in any way. And so there are lots of ways to show that depending on the team or the situation or the company, something as simple as being thoughtful about when people come together and bringing them coffee or juices or something in advance to say not to say I thought of you this morning, but to show that I thought of you this morning. I got up earlier, I took my time, I did these things and I used to do that when I was a 19 year old opening franchises around the world. I always made sure I was doing things for the teams that showed that I was thinking of them and to minimize their destruction. I didn't want people to peel away because they were hungry or want to go do other things because they wanted a coffee, hey, I brought it all for you so we can focus. So it was a little bit selfish as well. So this idea of trust and showing that I'm here for you and that I've thought about you also holding everyone to a fair standard builds trust. Strong players don't like to work with people who are not as committed. And so if you don't hold those people accountable or hold a consistent standard, you'll lose your best players over time. And then finally this idea of making tough decisions when you need to, which is sort of a cousin of holding people to a high standard. People respect it over time, even though it can feel tough or uncomfortable. And over time you realize it's the job, right? If you don't make tough calls or hold people accountable or make changes, who will if you're the leader? So those are a few things between building trust and remembering this transition from peer to leader, peer to leader. That those were my early observations, my experiences and my observations from the early days.
Mikey Piro
What comes to my mind is this idea of having a specific practice that you have to both do yourself and then also give an example of and show. And like for me as an infantryman, you can earn this badge where if you know how to like, you know, the thing where you put your blindfold on and you take apart your rifle. If you can do that across a lot of different things, you earn this badge and it's really like a physical thing that you can show off, but it also gives you this level of respect of like, I did that, I know how to do that to a very high standard and I'm going to hold you to that high standard. So I think it's really just fascinating and wonderful that the perspective of the layering that you talked about, because it is something that you're going to have to commonly navigate. So, shifting gears a bit and talking a bit about Focus Brands, you left Hooters and then you went to leading Cinema and then becoming the president of Focus Brands. And again, using this leadership framework as a kind of way to ask a question. So what was different about the aspect of improving the organization that you're stepping into at Cinnabon that maybe you didn't experience at Hooters that you had to sort of build and how that trajectory worked?
Kat Cole
There were so many things that were different conditions at Cinnabon. One, I was going into a different category with a completely different business model, the different franchisee type, and a different structure of unit level economics of the business. And that means a lot to how you get things done in a company if they're smaller business owners versus larger business owners, if they own multiple units or fewer units if they're well capitalized or not. So there were just very different conditions where leadership is leadership, but how that gets applied and how you navigate cascading impacts throughout a company changes based on some of these dynamics. And then it was the heart of the recession and the business was struggling and so that's a little bit more wartime leadership. And I use that term even when I'm not talking with a veteran. But this idea of things are tough. And so people need a little bit of different things when things are tough, when they don't have the typical inputs of winning, when they don't have the typical metrics and reinforcements and celebration. There's a different navigation and approach of finding what can motivate to your point of purpose, like why are we here and how is that playing out in this difficult moment? And thank goodness it's us. We get to not, we have to, we get to help our franchisees navigate this moment. We get to make the most of this crisis. I'm so glad it's us. Just the framework around tough times, the mental framework is powerful. And so that was very different. And then, of course, the other part that was different is I was new. And at Hooters I had been there for 14 years. So by the time I left Hooters, I was one of the most tenured people in the company by miles. I knew everyone I had helped literally work in and build a lot of what existed in the system and set up on. I was brand new and I was learning while I was leading in more equal proportion than was true when I was a ten year leader. So you got to manage that. I manage, I'm here to learn. There's a lot I don't know, but that doesn't mean you can't trust that I'm a qualified, capable leader for things that are just about leading humans, having high integrity and making strategic decisions for the business.
Mikey Piro
So in terms of how you are thinking about inspiring your teams as you transitioned in focused brands, seems like there are ups and downs and tough times. And so that motivation aspect of leadership, are there any stories that come to your mind about those changes and that turbulence and something that you would really point to of like yeah, this was a point where motivation was really key for what I had to do and pull some relevant stories there.
Kat Cole
I mean, you know, I was at Focus Brands for ten years and the recession didn't last all of it and I was only at Cinnabon for a few years. So there were just boom times also, right? There's peace time, growth time, more time. When you're somewhere for ten years, you get to experience all of it. And so there are plenty of examples of motivation mean. One I would say, when things are really tough and the traditional feedback loops don't provide motivation, like when you see the reports, they're negative instead of positive. People aren't achieving their bonuses, people aren't achieving. There's just a lot that is in place in a good time that's not in place in a tough time. And so there are certain techniques to use when a lot of those things are gone, which is first asking what can I control? And then what can I control is learning and education. Things might not be great, but I can keep teaching, I can keep helping people feel that they're growing and developing when the traditional metrics of achievement are missing. So we leaned into a lot of education, leadership, development, spending time with franchisees. Those are things that feel good and in fact elevate people. The next was finding what we can celebrate. And maybe it wasn't sales year over year at that time in that brand or again the typical metrics financially of the business, but we could unlock operational improvements, we could invest in our facilities and get prepared for when this would eventually get better. Because things don't say bad for forever, just like they don't say awesome for forever. And so it's sometimes never let a good crisis go to waste. And so making the investment in people and in processes and in this case of a physical brickandmortar business facilities is a really smart thing to do when it's a little tough on the top line. And then we found cost savings measures that helped the franchisees have a little more profitability even though sales were down and that we celebrated that and that also earned us trust. And you find small wins, like pick off a bunch of small wins wherever you can to not only build confidence, but to remind people progress is possible. Even with headwinds. You may not get as far as fast, but you're building, and that feels good. And then finding areas of the business that actually were bright spots, which in the case of Cinnabon, when I took it over, was the potential of the licensing, grocery and CPG business. I mean that it was so clear that that was an untapped channel and almost unlimited opportunity. And while that didn't directly, immediately help the franchisees who were like, fighting for their lives in the recession, running a mallbased business in the heart of the Great Recession, it was clearly a bright spot for the brand. And we were able to lean into that and use that channel and its prosperity in a way that we then took some of the proceeds and invested it at our own decision, not because we had to, because we wanted to in the franchise business. And of course that feels good, right? Something else you're doing, even though it doesn't benefit me, obviously immediately you're still making sure it benefits me because really you wouldn't have this brand if it weren't for the franchisees and for their work. And so that's an example of using not necessarily motivation leadership, right? Like, what should we be working on? Where are we heading? Reminding everyone of the vision, reminding them this is temporary, but I don't have a silver bullet or a magic eight ball, so I can't tell you how long, but practically it won't last forever. So what can we do now? And how can we make people feel as good as possible with what now is?
Mikey Piro
I mean, what it sounds like is you had a number of levers that you needed to pull in terms of not only addressing profitability and addressing, like, the operational function of the business, but also having these emotional levers to be like, we're investing in you and we want you to feel like we are and helping you out. And also like, we're going to try a bunch of things and we're going to show you that total experience. And so, yeah, it's like classic leadership, I think, in terms of how you kept people motivated but also kept solving the problems. It's really great. And that's a hell of a tenure to extend a lot of time thinking about and trying to make a lot of people successful. And the results speak for themselves. Can we talk a little bit about early pandemic and what those challenges were specifically? I think we sort of lost over the recession not lasting forever, I think I think about it in terms of, like, that Jake or that K curve that happens. What were some of the most important aspects of your leadership to guide the brands that you had for the early days of the Pandemic.
Kat Cole
I mean, part of it is just care for people. It was very clear, one, when there's a crisis, people don't really want Positivity. One, because it's not practical. Two, because if you are like delusionally positive and everyone else is in turmoil, it shows you are living on a different planet. You're not connected to their reality. So what I believe people need more than Positivity is what is possible, like possibility and clarity. And out of that comes focus on a few things that we can or in this case must do. And so for us and for many businesses, but I'll just give you hours, it was very clear that we needed to spend our time only on things that protected people and protected capital. And if a conversation or an initiative wasn't doing one or both, we didn't talk about it because it's a matter of survival. And so crisis is this beautiful thing in that it brings the important things into focus for most. And those were the two things. Like the goal is to live to fight another day. And if you don't have people, whether it's employees or customers or franchisees or their trust or their business or their presence, you won't have a business. And if you don't have capital, the same is true. And while there was this immediate and radical erosion of both of those right, the ability to have people in their roles and as customers and certainly capital, because sales went to close to zero, at least in the brick and mortar business, the grocery business took off the benefit of being diversified. And so focus was one approach clarity, people and cash. That's it. And everything was about optimizing those two. And it was incredibly difficult because there was so much out of our control. Normally I am a pro at identifying the things immediately within our control. And just when I thought something was within our control, it wasn't anymore. Whether it was access to PPE like Sanitiser and gloves, whether it was scheduling, whether it was masks or no masks, gloves or no gloves, open or closed, delivery or not, it's just like the hits kept coming. And not only did they keep coming, but they varied wildly. Not by country, not by state, not by city, by like county by neighborhood. And when you're thousands of locations, all of a sudden I'm not managing a global standard, I'm managing a hodgepodge like a broken puzzle, pieces of standards. And so navigating that giving our franchisees the tools to just stay up to speed and our team and then figuring out where can we develop a global standard that meets the minimum of the most strict standard so we can manage a few global standards and what can we then promise to our customers as a brand versus what do we leave to based on local situation. This operating principle will be different. And so all of a sudden, some of the power of being a franchise, which is consistency, was fractured. And we had to shift that to not just do the things we say as the brand operating principles, but let us help you figure out what is that in the ever changing landscape of what your city council says you need to be doing or your state government says you need to be doing. So we became more resource funnel, information funnel than we had ever been because that was changing so much. And it affected their ability to be open or closed, literally to pay the bills or not, to employ people or not, and then doing everything we could to help them protect cash. When I say protect people and protect cash, I don't mean just us in the office, I mean helping the franchisees do that. Because without them, we were maybe not nothing but close to nothing. And they felt that. And we navigated it with quite a degree of speed and grace and empathy because we had large franchisees who, I mean, they weren't happy, but they weren't on the verge of bankruptcy after a month of being closed. We have some small franchisees that were not well capitalized for whom it was a life or death moment or it could have been, how do we not stepped in in the way that we did. And so solving for that broad diversity of stakeholders and complexity of business models was also a real challenge. But as soon as business was able to come back, our brands came back online and thrived. Not only similar sales to prepandemic, but also greater profitability faster than many other brands. Not only because of how we work together, but because of the capabilities we had built years prior to the Pandemic. Digital capabilities, third party delivery capabilities, licensing, grocery and CPG, like all these things allowed our businesses to lean into when the consumer accelerated to these places, as opposed to having to figure it out from zero.
Mikey Piro
I'm always looking for success stories out of the Pandemic and this is one that probably needs a whole session in and of itself because it was a hard time, I think, for a lot of folks. And I love that you started with people for sure. Profitability is something that you need cash for sure. But there's this saying in the army, it's a mission first, troops always. And so, yeah, that's where you start, but people make it go. We're going to turn a little bit now towards Athletic Greens and hopefully some more Web Three type discussions. It's been a ton of fun watching the Genesis group where this all started with Chris and Jamie and you being one of the founding mentors there and how your approach with athletic greens has just been fantastic. We have this athletic group and it's not sponsored by Athletic Greens for trying to work on that, but we have this athletic group where we talk a lot about, like, what's happening in each of our lives. We motivate each other. It's been a real source of energy for me and just watching people come and go, but mostly come and share what they're up to or ask questions, it's been great. I think what's fantastic about Athletic Greens is that if you don't know what it is, you should really go look at it. I'm sure Kat will talk about it more, but it is really the supplement, in my experience, that has this there's like, no downside. It's all up. And it's one that, like you had mentioned earlier, it's so simple. And when people were joining the Genesis Group, you were so gracious and just being like, yeah, here if you need to know more, here's how you can find out more. And, oh, by the way, if you just send me this, you'll be able to get some good things from it. The Web Three space particularly, has brought together a lot of interesting folks and we talk about a bunch of different areas in Web Three. We're also in this kind of bear market where the builders are building hard and I think a lot of folks are bootstrapping their business. And Athletic Green started there as a bootstrapped business. So what's different in terms of that mentality for Athletic Greens as a brand that did not start with venture backing in your experience and how has that shifted your mindset and how you approach leadership there?
Kat Cole
Don't know that it hasn't affected my mindset on leadership because as you discussed, this idea of like, mission and team is universal. It's just different mission, different team. But the bootstrapped part is unique and interesting in that it was bootstrapped not just like in the early, early days, but for almost a decade to $160,000,000 annual run rate. That's unusual, especially for a physical product business. Maybe you see that in SAS. But a physical product business where you're buying inventory and not fast turn inventory. Like you're buying 75 ingredients in AG One, the highest quality being sourced around the world. Like, that's an inventory with a Capital I heavy business which takes capital. So to be able to use that and fuel what became insane high growth, that's the part that when you put those together, it's like, oh, this is a unique picture. The individual pieces are not unique, but when you put them together, it's like, wow, that is really special. And the lesson there, which I can't take credit for, that occurred before I was ever involved in the business. I was just becoming an advisor at that point, is the founder and CEO is an expert capital allocator, and he built truly a phenomenal, singular, high quality product that people love. So when you find a customer or when they find you. When they found AG One. A lot of them stayed and it became a daily habit and then a subscription and then they tell their friends. And you can do the math that if you're not having to acquire a customer's moment with you over and over and over. Because they're there. They're saying. They're telling their friends. That is a very special flywheel and it doesn't happen without a product that is high quality and that people trust and that they feel something different with. So those are the two building blocks, expert capital, allocator phenomenal product in the early days that made this even possible. Then you get to more of the leadership wrapper on that, which is, yeah, but okay, that's possible in the early days, but then as you get bigger, you get more visible, you have more team members, all this gets harder. And what I will say again, testament to Chris Ashenden, the founder and CEO who I am partnered with running the company today. It was so impressive to me meeting a founder who has built a business to that level of success without any outside capital, who is as humble as he is. He is incredibly humble and coachable. He is constantly looking for what great looks like. He is constantly questioning his own beliefs. He looks for help and wants it for the good of the customer and their health journey and the business I wouldn't have joined otherwise, like, it's very special. And so I hope that others would use similar descriptions for me over time, but as it relates to athletic greens specifically and the question around bootstrapping and that's all him. And so now it is my role and my responsibility and my joy to protect all of that. That is magic and special, while fusing it with things that we do need to do differently for a different scale, in a different era, with a larger team in more countries.
Mikey Piro
The idea that as you alluded to, you have this really unique intersection of these three things that are not unique on their own, but really form something super special, I think it's a beautiful description of how AG One has kind of moved through the world. And you did touch on something that we want to pull the thread on, which is around subscriptions, because this is crypto packaged goods. And so in terms of where we've been exploring and where Chris specifically is very vocal about this, is that Web Three and subscriptions are a natural fit for changing the space, the current subscription space, but also kind of building community around that subscription. So how do you see, just in general, not necessarily for AG One subscriptions playing out in the Web Three space, and then if you happen to want to drop some alpha or something or tell us what your plans are, we're happy to take the alpha there as well.
Kat Cole
I'll share a few things. One, again, a testament to Chris, he's like so Web Three, Chris Ashendon, the founder of AG, but also Chris Jamie Cris, he's just always had this sharing. In the success of the company mentality. Back in the crypto ICO days, he was thinking about issuing a coin so that customers could share in ownership of the company. So he was like, web three ish before it was what it has become. And it's his mindset. And that's evidence by the fact that in the early days, AG and he leaned into the creator economy. I mean, some of our greatest advocates and longest term customers happened to turn into some very visible and influential creators. Ted Ferriss dr. Peter Atea andrew Huberman. I mean, they were customers long before they had a platform. And so we're fortunate. And they then talked about AG, and AG won as a product. But then Chris didn't stop there, like, oh, hey, he's kiwi. So he'd say, hey, mate, thanks for mentioning us. Good that you're sharing us. He's like, how can I share in the success of the company that you're bringing? So it's this like, web three mindset is in his bones and therefore is in the company's bones. So it made it very easy to start to think about and ideate the bridge between what is largely a subscription business. People subscribe to AG one. It's easier, it's better from a price perspective. It's a daily habit, so it's really good not to run out. I've accidentally traveled and forgot my travel packs and felt the anxiety of not having that nutritional insurance and foundational nutrition I have every day. And so this idea of an on chain relationship or some digital ongoing relationship is also in our bones, which just screams web three. So I don't have new alpha. What I will say is when I joined AG at peak NFT, like hype moment dow NFP hype moment. Web three, I think, is still in its hype and in its journey. There's just pieces of it that are ebbing and flowing from crypto valuations to NFT portfolios. Don't look at my wallet of shame right now or do and commiserate, but when I first joined, I was excited about what you're pointing out. The obvious connection between AG's business model and Chris, the founder mindset and web three opportunity got us a wallet. Actually, it was the team from club CPG that helped me get athletic greens e. So thank you. Thank you to this team power of network and community. And then my plan was first, the authentic support projects that have a connection to our brand and our product and nutrition, or wellness or New Zealand, where our founders from, and just be authentic and watch and support and then figure out what capabilities we had in the company to lean into whatever version of web three we were ready to lean into. We will lean into web three. We will add web three layers to our company. Yet a few things occurred once I joined one, I realized we had some pretty fundamental things in the organization in terms of team and capabilities that we just needed to do first. Like, I have an obligation to be a leader of the business first. As excited as Chris and I were to add in the Web Three layer, we needed to get our house in order first. And so we've been doing that organizationally and from a physical product perspective and working on our future innovation and our international expansion. There was just a lot to do before we added a layer. We also needed to really lean into what is this beautiful community of AGRs, of AG runners. We power millions of Mornings, literally, and we had not even an IRL started to meaningfully bring those people together. And so I really believe in be do, say like, before you go, promise something, do it consistently, and before you do it, like, be it and believe it. And so we hired ahead of activations, ahead of community, this amazing team to help us start to again, just act before we ask people to further join us in this new journey and really make the most of people who already have been loyal to us, who are already our subscribers. And so the team has been curating events and bringing people together, both influencers who are already AG partners and everyday customers who are just excited about connecting with other members of the community and really treating it like community and not audience. So that I just recognized we had work to do before we pulled the Web Three layer in, but we're getting closer and we're talking about it a bit more often. And whether it is NFPs or potentially tokens in the future, long in the future that's a little hairier or even just learning from how Chris, Jamie and all of you, the whole crew, have built a true community and club CPG, I'm learning from that. I pay attention, I watch, I look at this long road of connecting people with each other and adding value and I find a lot of inspiration in that. And so just want to do it authentically and not cringey. I'll err on the side of progressive and authentic and learning and flow so we can do it well.
Mikey Piro
100%. I applaud you for really having this discipline and a framework to operate from, to really drive it forward. I think it's fascinating that like, yeah, activating IRL is something sort of web three is like backing into. But I would feel like you're powering millions of Mornings, the mornings of triathlons, the mornings of Marathons, the mornings of CrossFit competitions. Like, there's a tremendous opportunity there to get lots of people together who are believers and that's fantastic. So we're going to probably turn towards questions in the chat, so I will have to relay some of these. But I just want to take this moment to say I could probably spend three or four more hours talking about this. And so I hope that someday we cross paths and there is opportunity to have some indepth conversations. I think leadership is something that when you see it, you know it, and when you have it, you know it, and when you don't, you really feel it. And I think that every team that has had the privilege of working with you, there's one thing where you can abstract results, because the results of the companies that you've been with are clear think. It's another thing when you actually listen to you talk about your approach and how much we call it in the army a force multiplier. It's like you could take an average leader and put them in charge of ten people and they'll act like maybe ten people, but you take an exceptional leader and put them in front of ten people and they act like a hundred. And so that is something that I applaud you for and I'm just a big fan and admire. I do have some other leadership questions as we continue to queue up the comments and questions. And so one of the things is getting feedback and difficult feedback specifically. I think as a leader, it's one where you have to deliver it, it's another where you also have to receive it. And so it's one of these roles where it's so critical to deliver it in a way that is effective but also be vulnerable enough I'm a big fan of Renee Brown to accept it and put yourself out there. So what are some of your thoughts and lessons about feedback and or criticism from your career to this point? And what are some tactics and also some beliefs you have about that feedback?
Kat Cole
Like anything else, if you don't do it often, giving or receiving feedback, it's harder. And so the question to ask, answer and act on is how can you give and receive feedback more often? Like build the feedback muscle. And there are lots of ways. One is ask for it often and that does a few things. One, you'll receive it more often and it's happening at your request. And so that just psychologically feels a little better. But you build a muscle to hear things that still might be a little uncomfortable, then other people learn that you want to receive feedback. Now what you've got to do also is make sure you're reacting in a way that sends the message that this is productive, not I'm going to make you sorry you gave me feedback even though I asked whether it's through my overreaction or shutting you down or tuning out. So this is a journey, but asking for it, creating an environment and a reputation and building a culture where people are more likely to answer candidly and then acting on what you hear, ask, answer, act like it's just a framework for life, then giving it. There's all kinds of approaches. One is if I need to give really tough feedback, like it's heavy and I need their full presence, there are many times when I say, can I have your permission to give you some direct feedback? And while most people say, absolutely, and then that's a different again, mindset, because it's almost as if it's happening at their request, even though it's happening at mine. There have been a few times where people have said no, but often it's like, no, I'm having a really tough day, or no, I'm going to have to leave early and so can we do this another time? And thank goodness, otherwise it would have been an unproductive feedback session. Being candid, clear, concise, sharing evidence. I heard this acronym from an author named Bruce tolgan wants fast, fast feedback. Frequent doesn't just mean all the time. Some people don't respond well to non stop feedback. That's more about turning into someone's frequency. Getting to know them, understanding their style, helping them understand yours. So frequency accurate. I'm telling you how I know what I'm giving you feedback on and making sure I'm not reacting to hearsay. Specific is it actionable? So saying good job or do better. It's not specific. Saying, Next time, do X, more or less or in this way. And then timely within close proximity to the moment or the situation. Because over time, then it's, one, it loses its power. Two, you've got all this time thinking this and not given me the opportunity to be better sooner. And then, three, can also feel that someone's been holding on right, like it's like pent up so fast, frequent, accurate, specific, timely. And then again, how you respond, how you deliver. Especially in a remote world, a video world, is really powerful. I've unfortunately had to have really tough or what others would consider tough. Let's just say heavy or meaningful conversations over zoom or overflow I would have loved to have been in person. But there were times that I couldn't be so communicating as much context. Care. Compassion and candor it's a lot of seeds as I can because I care about that person. Because there's a lot they're missing without being able to be in person all the time. Those would be some thoughts that come to mind on feedback. And then again, if you get it, it is a gift. And so the question is what you do with it over time and people pay attention. And even if you ask for feedback and you get it, if you're not changing or evolving and acknowledging like, oh, hey, this person gave me this feedback, I'm so glad they did and I've changed this. If you're not doing that, it makes the whole culture of feedback very difficult. And I have what feel like millions of examples of times people have given me feedback on little things like, hey, the way this came across, I don't think is the way you intended. And then immediately I go back to the group and say, thank you to Mikey for pointing out that the way this came across was not what I intended. I want to correct that. What I intended was it shows I'm human. It shows I'm never done evolving. And that was very positive. Right? I'm actually giving kudos to the person who gave me feedback. Some would say who had the courage to give feedback. It shouldn't take courage. There should be a culture in which people are like, hey, I know you better than this. That sucked. You probably should acknowledge it and fix it. I've had times where I've sent memos where there was a word, and it where someone's like, oh, you missed. And I go right back in, and if I make an edit, I say, I want everyone to know I've made an edit here because of the feedback from this person. I'm sorry if this didn't come across the right way. This is nonstop. This shit happens daily because there's a culture of feedback. And as a result, I hope my organization would say, my teams would say, thoughts, helpful thoughts don't get stuck in their heads. It comes out of their mouth or through their fingers. And then I respond, and then our whole company is better because of it, and I'm better because of it. And it also makes when I need to give feedback far more of a natural thing instead of something that's like pent up and to be dreaded.
Mikey Piro
Amazing. So many thoughts that come to mind about this one. I subscribe to feedback as a gift. I try and seek it as often as possible. I love Fast as an acronym, and I think it's really important to just double click on the link or just highlight, like, frequency. It doesn't mean do it all the time. As you said. It is about finding, like, a harmony of what that other person's frequency is, to give and receive it because some people, it's a long cycle, and they'll operate better that way. One thing that comes to mind is when I worked at Meta, I had this debate internally where there were managers and there were leaders and they were labeled differently. And it was odd in that leaders were like, only leaders were the top of the company. And it was very different from the army, where we have this leadership at all levels type approach. Like, we're constantly assessing privates and corporals and sergeants and lieutenants for leadership traits. How does your leadership style think about where do leaders come from? I would assume, and maybe this is wrong, that from the focus brand side of things, you are constantly looking for leaders at all levels. And I feel like you yourself, from working at a young age to building yourself all the way up, it's like somebody along the line was like, that's a leader. And maybe you were like a raw lump of clay and you got molded that way. But I think it's like an important distinction for me and for how we operate in CPG too. Is there's leaders at every position and it's irrespective of like a title or a rank or anything. But what's been your experience in how you think about identifying and then mentoring and building leaders in your organizations?
Kat Cole
I mean, I'll add a question that feels like it's common and inside of all of those points you just made, which is like, our leaders borner made, and, you know, is can it be learned? And again, how do you find it? And so there are a few things in the world that can't be learned and I think it's super disconnected and just not inspiring to think otherwise. So and yes, management traditionally is like management of things and processes. And leadership is the ability to be clear on where we're going and help people get there. And then there are more businessy definitions of that one. I believe in leadership of self. There are times when I've been a very good leader for myself in my life and my decisions and times when I've been less so. And as I've become a better leader in, like the meta definition, it shows up in my personal life for my individual decisions as much as my teams and my businesses. And so it's always interesting thinking about are you a leader? And do I call you a leader in a company? And often that gets conflated with management and are you a supervisor of other humans? Or what if you're an individual contributor but you're a leader of processes and partnerships, are you not a leader? Do you not need to articulate vision and where we're going and allocate resources and help the stakeholders in your universe contribute to that goal and vision? Of course you do. So then how do you find it? So really good question. One is, yes, sometimes people have had a life journey that builds what others would call leadership acumen, leadership muscle. And that's true. And so they seem like very natural leaders. Maybe they do have some personality traits that make leading others and influencing others a little easier and or maybe they've had life experiences that have forced them to be able to do that. And then when they're in a situation where they're not forced but where that muscle can show that talent can shine, that skill can be seen, then people are like, wow, you're really good, even though you're pretty new here. And they probably had a lot of tough life experiences or moments that have allowed them to make things look a little easy in those moments. Certainly true for me. Right. I started leading my sisters. I helped to raise my sisters since I was nine years old. My mom left my dad when I was nine years old. And I've been leading people and teams ever since. And so, yeah, of course, when I become a vice president at 26 with a company doing a hundred million in revenue, I make it look easy to some people. But it's because I've been in the trenches since I was a kid, and I've been responsible for other humans since I was very young and take it very seriously and enjoy it. So it's probably a little bit of both nature and nurture for identifying one. Sometimes people are in a position and they have to lead. They may not even want to, but they're there, and it's their responsibility, and they're called upon to do it, and they're choosing to stay in the spot. So sometimes those are the moments where leaders are made and born or where they step up because they're more receptive to the responsibility that they have for others or for a business or for their family or something. And there are other times where there's just raw potential and someone wants to develop and they want to grow, and they express that desire. Not everyone is confident enough to express that desire, depending on their culture or their background or what they've experienced in their life. And then I do view it as the responsibility of other existing leaders, management people who are doing both, to identify that and begin the conversation and provide the feedback and development and the mentoring and the advocacy and the experiences more than anything, the experiences. You can read all the books you want, you can listen to me talk on this. It's not going to do anything for you compared to just doing it right. Just like going to meet someone and ask them if they want to work with you for the first time. That's daunting. But when you've done it a hundred times, you look like a fucking boss. Not because you're just great at it, because you've been doing it. And so giving people opportunity, giving people experiences, and providing some framework for support and feedback is one of the greatest gifts and one of the fastest paths to building what I think are the four mindsets of great humans and also great leaders. Humility, curiosity, courage, and confidence. Humble enough to know you need help. Curious enough to ask the questions. Courageous enough to speak up when it may be uncomfortable or not. The pattern around you, and confident. By confident, I don't mean I know what I'm doing. Nobody knows what they're doing, not fully, because the world changes so much, including me. But confident, like a humble confidence. And the difference is, maybe confidence used to be, I know what I'm doing, so you should follow me. A humble confidence, a modern leader. A modern confidence is, I know we can figure it out. It's different, but confidence. And so this those are the muscles that I look for. I look for the potential. I heard an acronym once, we used to use it when I was head of training and development at Hooters called Map. Merit ability potential. So you have the merit, the ability, and the potential. Do I see any signs of that? That could be Fertilized, Kat Cole, be nurtured that could be given an opportunity. And that's the wet clay for leadership. And then it's experiences and feedback and supportive environment and then time to a degree that allows someone to have the courage to truly be a leader. And if there's anything that I see lacking in leadership in the modern world, it is courage.
Mikey Piro
I have to just say you are an acronym dictionary of just amazing insights and they're all like, top of mind for you. It's really impressive to have you draw from your experiences, just like on the fly here. And, yeah, I'm super fan. We are going to Pivot now. I could go for another 20 minutes on that. I have to ask some of these questions from the audience. So thank you for providing your insights to this point. I'm also just going to time check you because I think we have another 17 minutes or so ish let me double check while you're checking that, I'm going to ask that question. This is from NATO. I'm a young professional one year into my first career as a son of immigrant parents, but I had to be the first immediate family to learn important interpersonal skills. How do you manage your growth as a person while also being an effective in your work and professional relationships? How do you protect yourself from unhealthy behaviors in professional environments?
Kat Cole
You may enter one, I would say for anyone. And I heard this quote from Sofia Amaroso, like, years ago and she's so fun and she's so great and she like tweeted or posted. Don't compare your hustle to someone else's highlight reel. Meaning I'm farther along in the journey.
And that's where we have to end it for today. If you want to check out the full Q and A and learn more about joining Club CPG, visit cryptopackagegoods.com. Thanks to all our CPG and Pop members for making these kinds of events possible. Crypto Podcast Goods produced by Genius Media a division of Crypto Packaged goods.