[{"_1":2,"_3":-5,"_4":-5},"loaderData",{"_5":6,"_7":8},"actionData","errors","root",{"_139":-5,"_140":-5,"_141":142,"_143":144,"_145":146},"routes/clips.$id.$slug",{"_9":10,"_11":12},"clip",{"_13":14,"_15":16,"_17":-5,"_18":19,"_20":-5,"_21":22,"_23":24,"_25":26,"_27":28,"_29":30,"_31":32,"_33":34,"_35":36,"_37":38,"_39":40,"_41":-5,"_42":-5,"_43":-5,"_44":45,"_46":-5,"_47":48,"_49":50,"_51":-5},"canonicalUrl","https://howleaderslead.com/clips/3294/you-have-to-evolve-from-manager-to-leader","id",3294,"title","You have to evolve from manager to leader","subtitle","transcript","WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.080\nSo there's that incredibly important distinction between leading and managing.\n\n2\n00:00:05.080 --> 00:00:09.360\nI think most leaders need to first figure out how to be good managers, not all\n\n3\n00:00:09.360 --> 00:00:10.160\nof them,\n\n4\n00:00:10.160 --> 00:00:15.250\nbut most should go through that evolution because it helps you be a better\n\n5\n00:00:15.250 --> 00:00:15.800\nleader.\n\n6\n00:00:15.800 --> 00:00:20.080\nBut understanding that being a leader is different from being a manager, that\n\n7\n00:00:20.080 --> 00:00:20.760\nit is your job\n\n8\n00:00:20.760 --> 00:00:26.410\nto set the strategies, set the vision, communicate that clearly, and that you\n\n9\n00:00:26.410 --> 00:00:27.640\n're responsible\n\n10\n00:00:27.640 --> 00:00:30.720\nfor execution as well as ideation.\n\n11\n00:00:30.720 --> 00:00:35.780\nWe've all seen leaders that were all strategy all the time and couldn't get it\n\n12\n00:00:35.780 --> 00:00:36.080\ndone.\n\n13\n00:00:36.080 --> 00:00:39.420\nSo you have to do both, but understanding the difference between managing the\n\n14\n00:00:39.420 --> 00:00:40.280\nday-to-day,\n\n15\n00:00:40.280 --> 00:00:44.440\nthe people, and then leading a team, it's different.\n\n16\n00:00:44.440 --> 00:00:50.310\nAnd I really respect and appreciate great managers, you know, the great manager\n\n17\n00:00:50.310 --> 00:00:51.120\nwho knows how\n\n18\n00:00:51.120 --> 00:00:54.440\nto get the best out of every person.\n\n19\n00:00:54.440 --> 00:00:58.970\nWhen you become a leader, you then have to be able to think systems, structures\n\n20\n00:00:58.970 --> 00:01:00.400\n, strategy,\n\n21\n00:01:00.400 --> 00:01:03.120\nyou know, frameworks.\n\n22\n00:01:03.120 --> 00:01:08.200\nAnd those are different skills and embracing those skills and learning that\n\n23\n00:01:08.200 --> 00:01:09.000\nthey're different\n\n24\n00:01:09.000 --> 00:01:11.320\nfrom the skills that may do a great manager.\n\n25\n00:01:11.320 --> 00:01:14.000\nThat would be, I think, especially for newer leaders, really important.\n","pretty_transcript","start_time",2954229,"end_time",3028229,"keywords","Manager, management, strategy, vision, execution, career, career path","slug","you-have-to-evolve-from-manager-to-leader","origin","cms","mux_playback_id","uNCgLLfdZP4OR6FBPUBbO4yupTJ6NpZPQPtXJveT1OE","mux_asset_id","ZyMlTmdQRAuSZKpFjIzQFm8UQueG7ljmzDU59McQeHQ","leader_id",274,"episode_id",425,"updated_at","2026-04-16T15:47:47.000000Z","meta_title","meta_description","og_image_media_id","web_url","https://www.howleaderslead.com/clips/3294/you-have-to-evolve-from-manager-to-leader","og_image_url","leader",{"_13":36,"_103":104,"_105":106,"_107":108,"_25":109,"_110":111,"_61":112,"_58":112,"_113":114,"_68":115,"_39":116,"_117":-5,"_41":-5,"_42":-5,"_43":-5,"_118":119,"_91":120,"_44":121,"_122":123,"_124":125,"_46":-5,"_126":127,"_128":129,"_95":130,"_51":-5},"episode",{"_13":38,"_15":52,"_27":53,"_17":54,"_55":56,"_18":57,"_20":-5,"_58":59,"_60":-5,"_61":59,"_62":-5,"_63":64,"_65":66,"_67":-5,"_68":-5,"_69":70,"_71":72,"_73":74,"_35":36,"_39":75,"_41":-5,"_42":76,"_43":-5,"_77":78,"_79":80,"_81":82,"_83":84,"_85":-5,"_86":-5,"_87":88,"_89":90,"_91":-5,"_46":-5,"_92":93,"_94":-5,"_95":-5,"_51":-5},"og_image_media","Don’t fear change","dont-fear-change","If your business isn't changing, it's dying. So instead of resisting change, run toward it — and help your team do the same.","summary","

Most leaders say they’re comfortable with change.

But what happens when the change is so big, it threatens your entire business model?

Julie Hansen is no stranger to disruption, having spent her career in online media. Now, as CEO of the language learning app Babbel, she’s facing the biggest one yet. AI is changing the way we learn languages — and raising questions about whether we’ll need to at all.

But Julie doesn’t fear change. In fact, in her words, “if your business isn’t changing, it’s dying.”

In this episode, she shares how to lead through uncertainty with clarity and conviction — and how to help your team see disruption as an opportunity, not a threat.

You’ll also learn:

How to navigate cultural differences in working styles
A surprisingly simple strategy to get buy-in on an idea
How to help your team get more comfortable with AI
What it means to “rip the band-aid off” as a leader

","WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.220\nHello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of How Leaders Lead with David\n\n2\n00:00:04.220 --> 00:00:04.960\nNovak. Today,\n\n3\n00:00:04.960 --> 00:00:09.280\nwe have Julie Hansen on the show. Julie is the CEO of Babel in the U.S. and the\n\n4\n00:00:09.280 --> 00:00:10.560\nChief Revenue Officer\n\n5\n00:00:10.560 --> 00:00:14.890\nfor the Global Organization. Babel is one of the world's leading language\n\n6\n00:00:14.890 --> 00:00:16.080\nlearning platforms,\n\n7\n00:00:16.080 --> 00:00:20.960\nhelping millions of people learn new languages all across the world. Before\n\n8\n00:00:20.960 --> 00:00:21.760\nBabel, Julie also\n\n9\n00:00:21.760 --> 00:00:26.910\ndrove significant change in momentum for big brands like penguin, golf.com, and\n\n10\n00:00:26.910 --> 00:00:28.160\nbusiness insider.\n\n11\n00:00:28.160 --> 00:00:32.220\nAnd in this episode, you're going to understand what really drives Julie's\n\n12\n00:00:32.220 --> 00:00:34.080\nsuccess. Enjoy this\n\n13\n00:00:34.080 --> 00:00:37.630\nconversation between David and Julie, and I will see you at the very end of the\n\n14\n00:00:37.630 --> 00:00:39.040\nepisode for the debrief.\n\n15\n00:00:39.040 --> 00:00:50.130\nNow, I got to ask you, if I dropped you into a country tomorrow where you didn\n\n16\n00:00:50.130 --> 00:00:50.800\n't speak the\n\n17\n00:00:50.800 --> 00:00:59.280\nlanguage, what would be your strategy in the first 24 hours? Wow. Definitely\n\n18\n00:00:59.280 --> 00:01:00.720\nstart using Babel. If we\n\n19\n00:01:00.720 --> 00:01:05.850\nteach that language, use a little AI translation because that is pretty handy\n\n20\n00:01:05.850 --> 00:01:08.160\nthese days and do a\n\n21\n00:01:08.160 --> 00:01:13.070\nwhole lot of listening. What would be the toughest country to go in and do that\n\n22\n00:01:13.070 --> 00:01:13.840\nthat's where you\n\n23\n00:01:13.840 --> 00:01:20.360\nactually offer the language? Where we offer the language, probably like Turkey,\n\n24\n00:01:20.360 --> 00:01:21.840\nbecause Turkish\n\n25\n00:01:21.840 --> 00:01:26.350\nis pretty different from any language I speak. Yeah, that's where East meets\n\n26\n00:01:26.350 --> 00:01:27.040\nWest and there's\n\n27\n00:01:27.040 --> 00:01:32.180\nall kinds of different languages for sure. You know, for people who may not\n\n28\n00:01:32.180 --> 00:01:33.360\nknow Babel that well,\n\n29\n00:01:33.360 --> 00:01:39.040\ngive us a snapshot. What do you actually do and who's Babel for? Yeah, we're a\n\n30\n00:01:39.040 --> 00:01:40.080\n19-year-old\n\n31\n00:01:40.080 --> 00:01:46.560\ncompany. We teach 14 languages. We are for the more serious language learner\n\n32\n00:01:46.560 --> 00:01:47.600\nwho actually wants\n\n33\n00:01:47.600 --> 00:01:55.200\nto get to a conversational stage. We're not primarily a way to spend time on\n\n34\n00:01:55.200 --> 00:01:55.600\nyour phone,\n\n35\n00:01:55.600 --> 00:02:00.560\nbut rather a way to actually learn a language. We're trying to create an\n\n36\n00:02:00.560 --> 00:02:01.520\nexperience that's also\n\n37\n00:02:01.520 --> 00:02:06.470\nfun and enjoyable. Most of our learners, they tend to be on the beginner side\n\n38\n00:02:06.470 --> 00:02:07.360\nand app when you\n\n39\n00:02:07.360 --> 00:02:11.240\nthink about it as a great starting point for language learning, you really want\n\n40\n00:02:11.240 --> 00:02:11.600\nto learn a\n\n41\n00:02:11.600 --> 00:02:14.500\nlanguage, you have to do more than that, you have to immerse yourself, you have\n\n42\n00:02:14.500 --> 00:02:15.840\nto listen,\n\n43\n00:02:15.840 --> 00:02:20.880\nwatch movies, all the rest of it. But the app is a great starting point and\n\n44\n00:02:20.880 --> 00:02:21.920\npeople come to Babel\n\n45\n00:02:21.920 --> 00:02:26.520\nfor a variety of reasons. Some people are learning for work, so we teach a fair\n\n46\n00:02:26.520 --> 00:02:27.680\namount of English\n\n47\n00:02:27.680 --> 00:02:32.000\nfor people who are learning, you know, trying to advance their career, career\n\n48\n00:02:32.000 --> 00:02:32.560\nmobility,\n\n49\n00:02:32.560 --> 00:02:37.080\nbut we teach a whole lot of Spanish as well in the US in particular, and that's\n\n50\n00:02:37.080 --> 00:02:38.080\noften for,\n\n51\n00:02:38.080 --> 00:02:43.040\nyou know, relationship reasons, family reasons. One of the charming things\n\n52\n00:02:43.040 --> 00:02:43.920\nabout language learning\n\n53\n00:02:43.920 --> 00:02:47.150\nin the US is we also have a lot of what we call heritage learners, people who\n\n54\n00:02:47.150 --> 00:02:48.560\nlearn, you know,\n\n55\n00:02:48.560 --> 00:02:54.100\ntheir grandparents' language. They think that's very funny in Europe, but so we\n\n56\n00:02:54.100 --> 00:02:55.760\n're teaching people\n\n57\n00:02:55.760 --> 00:02:59.150\nwho want to learn a language for a variety of reasons, whether it's for self-\n\n58\n00:02:59.150 --> 00:03:00.080\nimprovement or\n\n59\n00:03:00.080 --> 00:03:03.660\nactually because they need to speak a language and they want to get convers\n\n60\n00:03:03.660 --> 00:03:04.320\national.\n\n61\n00:03:04.320 --> 00:03:09.200\nI've always wanted to speak Spanish, started. I've always wanted to speak\n\n62\n00:03:09.200 --> 00:03:09.920\nMandarin because we\n\n63\n00:03:09.920 --> 00:03:14.800\nhad a big business in China, and I started, but I gave up. I got to believe\n\n64\n00:03:14.800 --> 00:03:16.640\nthat's a big, big problem,\n\n65\n00:03:16.640 --> 00:03:21.780\nand people just play an instrument, they start and stop. I mean, how do you\n\n66\n00:03:21.780 --> 00:03:23.680\ndeal with that issue?\n\n67\n00:03:23.680 --> 00:03:27.440\nYeah, actually funny enough, we do offer a lifetime subscription, and one of\n\n68\n00:03:27.440 --> 00:03:29.200\nthe reasons is for that\n\n69\n00:03:29.200 --> 00:03:32.880\non and off journey, and you know, when you think about it, there are many\n\n70\n00:03:32.880 --> 00:03:33.920\nreasons your motivation\n\n71\n00:03:33.920 --> 00:03:37.580\ncan ebb and flow. Like maybe you're learning Spanish because you want to go to\n\n72\n00:03:37.580 --> 00:03:38.960\nMexico for a month,\n\n73\n00:03:38.960 --> 00:03:42.960\nand you went, and now you're back, and you know, you don't have quite the same\n\n74\n00:03:42.960 --> 00:03:48.440\nimpetus you had before, but we're working very hard on the whole motivation\n\n75\n00:03:48.440 --> 00:03:49.200\ntopic.\n\n76\n00:03:49.200 --> 00:03:53.680\nWe've introduced streaks so that you feel, you know, some little dopamine hit\n\n77\n00:03:53.680 --> 00:03:54.480\nfor continuing\n\n78\n00:03:54.480 --> 00:03:59.010\nto do your daily work. That's surprisingly powerful. We're trying to make our\n\n79\n00:03:59.010 --> 00:04:00.000\nlessons shorter\n\n80\n00:04:00.000 --> 00:04:05.440\nbecause these days, people's intention spans are shorter. So a lot of work is\n\n81\n00:04:05.440 --> 00:04:06.320\nactually focused on\n\n82\n00:04:06.320 --> 00:04:10.880\nthat motivation topic right now. I'm sure that like so many different markets,\n\n83\n00:04:10.880 --> 00:04:11.280\nyou know, the\n\n84\n00:04:11.280 --> 00:04:15.070\nlanguage market is really crowded, it's really competitive, you know. How do\n\n85\n00:04:15.070 --> 00:04:16.480\nyou differentiate\n\n86\n00:04:16.480 --> 00:04:22.560\nbabble and how do you keep innovating? No. What's your secret? It is, in fact,\n\n87\n00:04:22.560 --> 00:04:23.600\na crowded marketplace\n\n88\n00:04:23.600 --> 00:04:27.760\nand more so than a few years ago, because we're seeing a lot of AI-driven\n\n89\n00:04:27.760 --> 00:04:28.240\nentrance.\n\n90\n00:04:28.240 --> 00:04:33.920\nNumber one thing, we are laser focused on efficacy. We are working hard to make\n\n91\n00:04:33.920 --> 00:04:34.800\nsure that babble\n\n92\n00:04:34.800 --> 00:04:39.180\nactually works. There's a lot of learning science that goes into that. It's not\n\n93\n00:04:39.180 --> 00:04:39.600\njust,\n\n94\n00:04:39.600 --> 00:04:45.200\nyou know, flashcards of vocabulary, but rather ways that we can repeat spaced\n\n95\n00:04:45.200 --> 00:04:46.960\nrepetition, the whole\n\n96\n00:04:46.960 --> 00:04:52.210\nkind of scaffolding of how people learn as baked into the product. A lot of the\n\n97\n00:04:52.210 --> 00:04:53.280\ninnovation that\n\n98\n00:04:53.280 --> 00:04:57.550\nwe're focused on right now is driven by AI and machine learning. That's\n\n99\n00:04:57.550 --> 00:04:58.960\nfocusing on things like\n\n100\n00:04:58.960 --> 00:05:05.120\npersonalization, shortening the lessons. Frankly, we know our attention spans\n\n101\n00:05:05.120 --> 00:05:05.680\nare shortening.\n\n102\n00:05:05.680 --> 00:05:10.800\nEveryone's motivation is different. We can respond to that. And then we're also\n\n103\n00:05:10.800 --> 00:05:11.760\nvery focused on\n\n104\n00:05:11.760 --> 00:05:16.680\nthe motivational aspects of it, not turning babble into a game, but making sure\n\n105\n00:05:16.680 --> 00:05:17.680\nthat our users are\n\n106\n00:05:17.680 --> 00:05:23.110\nrewarded for that our products enjoyable and that we reward people for\n\n107\n00:05:23.110 --> 00:05:24.800\ninvesting their time in it.\n\n108\n00:05:24.800 --> 00:05:28.590\nI guess, in a way, of course, the competition is part of what helps you to\n\n109\n00:05:28.590 --> 00:05:29.280\ninnovate as well.\n\n110\n00:05:29.280 --> 00:05:34.160\nYou know, if we had a monopoly, that might be nice, but we wouldn't be as\n\n111\n00:05:34.160 --> 00:05:35.360\ninnovative.\n\n112\n00:05:35.360 --> 00:05:39.680\nThe competition could definitely make you better. When did you first realize\n\n113\n00:05:39.680 --> 00:05:40.320\nthe power of\n\n114\n00:05:40.320 --> 00:05:44.460\nunderstanding someone in their own language? I mean, on a personal level, I\n\n115\n00:05:44.460 --> 00:05:46.880\nguess, in college,\n\n116\n00:05:46.880 --> 00:05:52.970\nbecause I did spend a semester in France, and I was a decent speaker before I\n\n117\n00:05:52.970 --> 00:05:54.320\nwent, but it was\n\n118\n00:05:54.320 --> 00:05:58.110\nonly when I was there that I got anywhere close to fluency and just being able\n\n119\n00:05:58.110 --> 00:05:59.840\nto talk to a stranger,\n\n120\n00:05:59.840 --> 00:06:05.670\ntalk to a kid. I was an au pair for a couple of months, and you know, my kids\n\n121\n00:06:05.670 --> 00:06:06.720\ndid not speak\n\n122\n00:06:06.720 --> 00:06:11.050\nEnglish. So if I wanted to communicate with them, it had to be in French. That\n\n123\n00:06:11.050 --> 00:06:12.720\nwas fun. That's\n\n124\n00:06:12.720 --> 00:06:16.270\nunlock. You know, it was really fun. Yeah, you definitely had a burning\n\n125\n00:06:16.270 --> 00:06:17.200\nplatform to learn the\n\n126\n00:06:17.200 --> 00:06:20.810\nlanguage at that point. You know, I remember so distinctly one time where there\n\n127\n00:06:20.810 --> 00:06:21.440\nwere two little\n\n128\n00:06:21.440 --> 00:06:26.660\nboys and we were wrestling, and one of them pulled my hair. And I answered, I\n\n129\n00:06:26.660 --> 00:06:27.920\nsaid, ouch,\n\n130\n00:06:27.920 --> 00:06:31.800\nbut of course that meant nothing to him until I remember to say like, I, and\n\n131\n00:06:31.800 --> 00:06:33.040\nthen he's pulling my\n\n132\n00:06:33.040 --> 00:06:38.830\nhair. So kids are, kids are relentless. They're very good teachers. That's a\n\n133\n00:06:38.830 --> 00:06:39.680\ngood point. You know,\n\n134\n00:06:40.480 --> 00:06:43.520\nI want to get into everything you're doing in Babylon. Now you're leading. But\n\n135\n00:06:43.520 --> 00:06:44.000\nfirst,\n\n136\n00:06:44.000 --> 00:06:47.600\nI want to take you back a little bit. What's the story from your childhood that\n\n137\n00:06:47.600 --> 00:06:48.800\nreally shaped the\n\n138\n00:06:48.800 --> 00:06:54.160\nkind of leader you are today? I guess one thing is maybe a pattern rather than\n\n139\n00:06:54.160 --> 00:06:55.360\none story, but we,\n\n140\n00:06:55.360 --> 00:07:02.000\nI grew up in a bunch of different places. In reverse cron, we lived in\n\n141\n00:07:02.000 --> 00:07:02.880\nPittsburgh, Cleveland,\n\n142\n00:07:02.880 --> 00:07:07.900\nPhiladelphia, New Jersey. I was born upstate New York. At one point, as between\n\n143\n00:07:07.900 --> 00:07:08.640\nseventh, eighth,\n\n144\n00:07:08.640 --> 00:07:13.760\nninth, and tenth grades, I went to four different schools. And so I don't have\n\n145\n00:07:13.760 --> 00:07:15.040\nan inertia problem,\n\n146\n00:07:15.040 --> 00:07:22.560\nand I don't fear change. I don't make, I try not to be change for change sake.\n\n147\n00:07:22.560 --> 00:07:23.680\nI\n\n148\n00:07:23.680 --> 00:07:28.960\nrecognize that people do like continuity and, you know, building on things, but\n\n149\n00:07:28.960 --> 00:07:29.360\nlike,\n\n150\n00:07:29.360 --> 00:07:33.600\nI don't fear change. And so I think that's been very helpful to me as a leader\n\n151\n00:07:33.600 --> 00:07:34.080\nand is something\n\n152\n00:07:34.080 --> 00:07:38.960\nthat I've tried to help the team understand. Because if you don't, if your\n\n153\n00:07:38.960 --> 00:07:39.840\nbusiness isn't\n\n154\n00:07:39.840 --> 00:07:43.520\nchanging all the time, it's dying. And it can be harder, especially for people\n\n155\n00:07:43.520 --> 00:07:44.240\nyounger in their\n\n156\n00:07:44.240 --> 00:07:50.920\ncareer and maybe for people who are less enamored of change, change can be hard\n\n157\n00:07:50.920 --> 00:07:52.720\n. For me, it's not\n\n158\n00:07:52.720 --> 00:07:57.120\nas hard. And I try to impart that to my teams. So, you know, what advice can\n\n159\n00:07:57.120 --> 00:07:57.920\nyou give to people\n\n160\n00:07:57.920 --> 00:08:02.320\nwho, let's say they have a big project, it requires change in their\n\n161\n00:08:02.320 --> 00:08:03.840\norganization. You know,\n\n162\n00:08:03.840 --> 00:08:07.440\nwhat have you learned about change management that could really help others?\n\n163\n00:08:07.440 --> 00:08:13.500\nYeah, that is a whole art and science unto itself. The first thing is you have\n\n164\n00:08:13.500 --> 00:08:14.720\nto treat\n\n165\n00:08:14.720 --> 00:08:20.000\nit as such. In other words, you have to be thoughtful, deliberate. You have to\n\n166\n00:08:20.000 --> 00:08:20.720\nrecognize\n\n167\n00:08:20.720 --> 00:08:25.060\nthis is a situation that requires change management. We will make a plan for\n\n168\n00:08:25.060 --> 00:08:25.600\nthat.\n\n169\n00:08:26.800 --> 00:08:34.580\nThe amount of over communication you have to do in a change scenario is huge. I\n\n170\n00:08:34.580 --> 00:08:35.360\ntry to think of it\n\n171\n00:08:35.360 --> 00:08:38.910\nas when when I get to the point where I'm just sick of hearing myself say\n\n172\n00:08:38.910 --> 00:08:39.520\nsomething,\n\n173\n00:08:39.520 --> 00:08:44.550\nthat's about the point where it's sinking in. So remembering to do that,\n\n174\n00:08:44.550 --> 00:08:46.720\nhelping people understand\n\n175\n00:08:46.720 --> 00:08:50.650\nthe context of like you're moving the goalposts. And if you work with people\n\n176\n00:08:50.650 --> 00:08:52.160\nwho are very oriented\n\n177\n00:08:52.160 --> 00:08:57.360\ntowards scoring a goal, that is really tough. So you have to make people\n\n178\n00:08:57.360 --> 00:08:58.320\nunderstand why the\n\n179\n00:08:58.320 --> 00:09:03.140\ngoalposts are moving, what the new goalposts are, how we're going to get there.\n\n180\n00:09:03.140 --> 00:09:04.240\nSo really giving\n\n181\n00:09:04.240 --> 00:09:09.810\npeople an understanding of that journey. And then also giving them the space to\n\n182\n00:09:09.810 --> 00:09:10.880\nhelp create that\n\n183\n00:09:10.880 --> 00:09:14.910\njourney. It's not like I have all the answers for any change we would be\n\n184\n00:09:14.910 --> 00:09:16.800\nundergoing. It's all about\n\n185\n00:09:16.800 --> 00:09:22.880\nthe team embracing that change and making it happen. What's the biggest change\n\n186\n00:09:22.880 --> 00:09:23.680\nproject or\n\n187\n00:09:23.680 --> 00:09:27.700\ninitiative that you've had to personally spearhead? One of the things I'm\n\n188\n00:09:27.700 --> 00:09:29.040\nworking on at Babel and\n\n189\n00:09:29.040 --> 00:09:34.640\nwe've actually just finished the current first phase of it, which feels really\n\n190\n00:09:34.640 --> 00:09:35.360\ngood,\n\n191\n00:09:35.360 --> 00:09:39.690\nis we are changing our billing management platform. I know this sounds like\n\n192\n00:09:39.690 --> 00:09:40.240\nplumbing.\n\n193\n00:09:40.880 --> 00:09:46.640\nYou think we're a 19 year old company when we started as a subscription service\n\n194\n00:09:46.640 --> 00:09:51.030\none year in. We're going to be as supported in the beginning that's a bad, we\n\n195\n00:09:51.030 --> 00:09:51.440\nfelt that that\n\n196\n00:09:51.440 --> 00:09:56.400\nwas a bad solution. It interrupts the learning. So subscription. So 18 years\n\n197\n00:09:56.400 --> 00:09:57.440\nago effectively,\n\n198\n00:09:57.440 --> 00:10:02.560\nthere weren't off the shelf solutions. We built our own subscription billing\n\n199\n00:10:02.560 --> 00:10:04.000\nmanagement platform.\n\n200\n00:10:04.000 --> 00:10:08.540\nAnd then we hung on to that thing for 15 more years before we thought about\n\n201\n00:10:08.540 --> 00:10:09.600\nchanging anything.\n\n202\n00:10:10.320 --> 00:10:16.640\nIn that time, many compelling products came to market. So I've been leading the\n\n203\n00:10:16.640 --> 00:10:17.280\nproject to\n\n204\n00:10:17.280 --> 00:10:20.830\nroll that out at Babel. And it really started with the evaluation. And there\n\n205\n00:10:20.830 --> 00:10:21.280\nwere a lot of\n\n206\n00:10:21.280 --> 00:10:25.740\npeople internally who felt like, wait, we have a system. Let's enhance what we\n\n207\n00:10:25.740 --> 00:10:26.080\nhave\n\n208\n00:10:26.080 --> 00:10:30.960\nand trying to get people over the hump of, no, no, no, we build language\n\n209\n00:10:30.960 --> 00:10:32.080\nlearning tools.\n\n210\n00:10:32.080 --> 00:10:38.560\nThat is our special sauce. Other companies build billing management platforms.\n\n211\n00:10:38.560 --> 00:10:39.440\nLet us buy. We\n\n212\n00:10:39.440 --> 00:10:43.640\nshould buy that. We should focus our efforts on creating the best language\n\n213\n00:10:43.640 --> 00:10:44.720\nlearning experience\n\n214\n00:10:44.720 --> 00:10:49.740\nwe can. So from the, just from that initial context of why we would even make\n\n215\n00:10:49.740 --> 00:10:50.720\nthat change\n\n216\n00:10:50.720 --> 00:10:55.920\nto the whole step by step plan, the milestones, I mean, it has been a multi\n\n217\n00:10:55.920 --> 00:10:57.760\nyear project. And\n\n218\n00:10:57.760 --> 00:11:03.680\nwe just launched the last country, the US beginning of the month. It went great\n\n219\n00:11:03.680 --> 00:11:05.280\n. I feel like I should\n\n220\n00:11:05.280 --> 00:11:11.590\nknock on wood. But we're almost fully on the new platform. And that has been a\n\n221\n00:11:11.590 --> 00:11:12.320\njourney.\n\n222\n00:11:12.320 --> 00:11:18.240\nFeels really good now. But the whole time we've talked about the need for this\n\n223\n00:11:18.240 --> 00:11:18.640\nchange,\n\n224\n00:11:18.640 --> 00:11:24.000\nwhy we're doing it, what we're doing, and then the fact that the real goal is\n\n225\n00:11:24.000 --> 00:11:25.120\nnot just to swap\n\n226\n00:11:25.120 --> 00:11:30.480\nout the plumbing, because that's not worth the effort. But rather to have the\n\n227\n00:11:30.480 --> 00:11:31.760\nnew capabilities\n\n228\n00:11:31.760 --> 00:11:35.690\nthe system will give us new products we can bring to market, new ways of\n\n229\n00:11:35.690 --> 00:11:36.240\nbilling,\n\n230\n00:11:36.240 --> 00:11:39.360\nall of those benefits. That's why we're doing this.\n\n231\n00:11:39.360 --> 00:11:45.440\nYou know, you've had such a successful career, Julie. Was there anyone in your\n\n232\n00:11:45.440 --> 00:11:46.080\nlife that really\n\n233\n00:11:46.080 --> 00:11:49.870\nbelieved in you before you actually believed in yourself and what you could\n\n234\n00:11:49.870 --> 00:11:51.200\npossibly do in\n\n235\n00:11:51.200 --> 00:11:57.280\nbusiness and with your career? I'm very grateful for my parents being, you know\n\n236\n00:11:57.280 --> 00:11:57.360\n,\n\n237\n00:11:57.360 --> 00:12:04.240\nbig Julie fans being super supportive. You know, my mom didn't have a full time\n\n238\n00:12:04.240 --> 00:12:04.880\ncareer outside\n\n239\n00:12:04.880 --> 00:12:10.180\nof the house. I mean, we were her main career, we kids, but she did have some\n\n240\n00:12:10.180 --> 00:12:11.360\nwork she did part\n\n241\n00:12:11.360 --> 00:12:14.830\ntime, etc. But she always said to me, you know, you can do anything you want to\n\n242\n00:12:14.830 --> 00:12:15.040\ndo,\n\n243\n00:12:15.040 --> 00:12:20.240\nwhich is not really true. But that's an amazingly empowering thing to say to a\n\n244\n00:12:20.240 --> 00:12:21.040\nhigh school kid,\n\n245\n00:12:21.040 --> 00:12:26.790\nyou know. And then I've sort of, I appreciate that from her. And then I learned\n\n246\n00:12:26.790 --> 00:12:27.440\nso many\n\n247\n00:12:27.440 --> 00:12:31.120\nbusiness lessons from my dad. And Julie, what did your dad teach you?\n\n248\n00:12:31.120 --> 00:12:37.630\nLot of stuff. Probably the most important takeaway was accountability. He had,\n\n249\n00:12:37.630 --> 00:12:38.640\nhe has an expression.\n\n250\n00:12:38.640 --> 00:12:47.040\nJules, excuses are like noses. Everybody has one. And that's really all was\n\n251\n00:12:47.040 --> 00:12:48.160\nstuck with me.\n\n252\n00:12:48.160 --> 00:12:52.700\nSo to him, I'll be grateful forever to him for that one. He also taught me a\n\n253\n00:12:52.700 --> 00:12:53.680\nlot around discipline.\n\n254\n00:12:53.680 --> 00:13:00.080\nYou know, my dad's a fun guy, like he much, much more than me. But he is very\n\n255\n00:13:00.080 --> 00:13:00.880\ndisciplined at the\n\n256\n00:13:00.880 --> 00:13:04.670\ncore, very structured, disciplined, organized. Like he gets stuff done. And I\n\n257\n00:13:04.670 --> 00:13:05.200\nthink I learned\n\n258\n00:13:05.200 --> 00:13:09.680\nthat from him as well. You know, I want to go through a little rapid fire here\n\n259\n00:13:09.680 --> 00:13:10.480\nof a few of your\n\n260\n00:13:10.480 --> 00:13:15.990\nearly career stops. And have you given me sort of a key leadership lesson from,\n\n261\n00:13:15.990 --> 00:13:17.360\nfrom what you picked\n\n262\n00:13:17.360 --> 00:13:20.560\nup at each one of them? And now let's start with Penguin, which is one of the\n\n263\n00:13:20.560 --> 00:13:21.440\nmost iconic and\n\n264\n00:13:21.440 --> 00:13:26.550\nrespected book publishers in the world. You built penguin.com when the internet\n\n265\n00:13:26.550 --> 00:13:27.840\nwas still brand new.\n\n266\n00:13:27.840 --> 00:13:31.860\nWhat did that experience teach you? I guess that was the first time I really\n\n267\n00:13:31.860 --> 00:13:33.120\nsaw something that I\n\n268\n00:13:33.120 --> 00:13:37.310\nwanted to go after and just went after it. I mean, I did have to build a\n\n269\n00:13:37.310 --> 00:13:38.800\nbusiness plan ultimately.\n\n270\n00:13:38.800 --> 00:13:44.000\nAnd it was very, it was laughable in terms of a real business plan. But you\n\n271\n00:13:44.000 --> 00:13:44.640\nknow, I had to go\n\n272\n00:13:44.640 --> 00:13:49.520\nthrough some level of formality, but I literally were shown, and really I'm\n\n273\n00:13:49.520 --> 00:13:50.640\ndating myself here.\n\n274\n00:13:50.640 --> 00:13:57.440\nI was shown the Netscape browser by a friend from college a couple of years\n\n275\n00:13:57.440 --> 00:13:58.640\ninto my career.\n\n276\n00:13:58.640 --> 00:14:02.660\nAnd I was like, that, that is what I want to do. Which was interesting because\n\n277\n00:14:02.660 --> 00:14:03.040\nI have gone\n\n278\n00:14:03.040 --> 00:14:05.700\ninto book publishing, like absolutely knowing that I wanted to be in book\n\n279\n00:14:05.700 --> 00:14:06.800\npublishing. That was\n\n280\n00:14:06.800 --> 00:14:11.130\njust a given. Eventually, I figured out that book publishing is more like a\n\n281\n00:14:11.130 --> 00:14:12.160\nhobby, less like a\n\n282\n00:14:12.160 --> 00:14:17.680\nbusiness. And that I wanted to chase something that was more evolving and new\n\n283\n00:14:17.680 --> 00:14:18.720\nand growing. But at the\n\n284\n00:14:18.720 --> 00:14:22.620\ntime, I didn't think of it in those strategic terms. It was just like that is\n\n285\n00:14:22.620 --> 00:14:23.520\ncool. That's the\n\n286\n00:14:23.520 --> 00:14:28.050\nfuture. That's what I want to do. So first time, I kind of really saw something\n\n287\n00:14:28.050 --> 00:14:29.040\nthat I felt like\n\n288\n00:14:29.040 --> 00:14:34.610\nI had to do that. Yeah. And then at golf.com, you took it from inception to the\n\n289\n00:14:34.610 --> 00:14:36.000\nnumber one website\n\n290\n00:14:36.640 --> 00:14:41.920\nfor golfers. What'd you learn from that? That was an amazingly fun experience.\n\n291\n00:14:41.920 --> 00:14:42.320\nI actually,\n\n292\n00:14:42.320 --> 00:14:47.450\nI got that job by writing a letter to the editor in chief of golf magazine\n\n293\n00:14:47.450 --> 00:14:48.080\nsaying,\n\n294\n00:14:48.080 --> 00:14:52.960\nhey, you need a website and I can build it for you. And they hired me. You\n\n295\n00:14:52.960 --> 00:14:54.400\nbetter be careful\n\n296\n00:14:54.400 --> 00:14:59.280\nwhat you asked for. So that was everything from like how to get started, how to\n\n297\n00:14:59.280 --> 00:15:00.160\nbuild a team.\n\n298\n00:15:00.160 --> 00:15:05.120\nBut also, frankly, that was the first time I ever had. My job as a general\n\n299\n00:15:05.120 --> 00:15:06.240\nmanager was anything to\n\n300\n00:15:06.240 --> 00:15:10.790\ndo with the website. But pretty soon, once we were up and running, the most\n\n301\n00:15:10.790 --> 00:15:11.680\nimportant thing was\n\n302\n00:15:11.680 --> 00:15:16.570\nbuilding a revenue stream. And so getting, being personally responsible for\n\n303\n00:15:16.570 --> 00:15:17.520\nsales, learning how\n\n304\n00:15:17.520 --> 00:15:22.560\nto sell, that was a pretty compelling experience for me and really helpful.\n\n305\n00:15:22.560 --> 00:15:24.320\nLater in my career,\n\n306\n00:15:24.320 --> 00:15:30.000\na mentor, someone I really respect a lot said, Julie, in the startup world, you\n\n307\n00:15:30.000 --> 00:15:30.400\nshould either\n\n308\n00:15:30.400 --> 00:15:35.740\nbuild it or sell it. Don't count it, meaning don't be in finance. Nothing wrong\n\n309\n00:15:35.740 --> 00:15:36.640\nwith all due respect\n\n310\n00:15:36.640 --> 00:15:42.310\nto my finance friends. But that was a really good way of crystallizing the\n\n311\n00:15:42.310 --> 00:15:43.520\nnotion of value\n\n312\n00:15:43.520 --> 00:15:48.020\ncreation. You're either creating the product that is why a company exists. Well\n\n313\n00:15:48.020 --> 00:15:48.880\n, the customers\n\n314\n00:15:48.880 --> 00:15:51.970\nare why a company exists, but the product is what they offer. And then, or you\n\n315\n00:15:51.970 --> 00:15:52.720\n're creating the\n\n316\n00:15:52.720 --> 00:15:57.600\nrevenue, which is how the company stays in business. You also were employee\n\n317\n00:15:57.600 --> 00:15:59.040\nnumber five for for\n\n318\n00:15:59.040 --> 00:16:05.120\nbusiness insider and help scale it and then go on to sell it as the president\n\n319\n00:16:05.120 --> 00:16:06.000\nand chief operating\n\n320\n00:16:06.000 --> 00:16:10.240\nofficer. What was the big lesson there? Everything. I mean, that was an\n\n321\n00:16:10.240 --> 00:16:12.560\nincredible learning journey.\n\n322\n00:16:12.560 --> 00:16:20.450\nIt felt like I was the person laying the track and the train was coming very\n\n323\n00:16:20.450 --> 00:16:22.400\nfast. So it was really\n\n324\n00:16:23.040 --> 00:16:27.920\nlessons around scaling, around team building, building up the right level of\n\n325\n00:16:27.920 --> 00:16:28.880\nteam and company\n\n326\n00:16:28.880 --> 00:16:34.940\ninfrastructure for that moment in time. Learning those hard lessons in a fast\n\n327\n00:16:34.940 --> 00:16:36.160\ngrowing company,\n\n328\n00:16:36.160 --> 00:16:39.830\nsometimes you have employees that can keep scaling with the company. And\n\n329\n00:16:39.830 --> 00:16:41.360\nsometimes people\n\n330\n00:16:41.360 --> 00:16:49.680\ncan't and how you manage that. Really, that's the first time I learned to be, I\n\n331\n00:16:49.680 --> 00:16:50.480\nthink excellence\n\n332\n00:16:50.480 --> 00:16:54.160\nin performance management and people management that I learned a ton of that's\n\n333\n00:16:54.160 --> 00:16:54.720\nprobably the most\n\n334\n00:16:54.720 --> 00:16:58.740\nimportant lessons I learned there. If you had to crystallize the most important\n\n335\n00:16:58.740 --> 00:16:59.280\nthing you learned\n\n336\n00:16:59.280 --> 00:17:03.560\nwhen it comes to performance management, what would it be? Ripping the band aid\n\n337\n00:17:03.560 --> 00:17:04.560\noff, clarity,\n\n338\n00:17:04.560 --> 00:17:10.080\ntransparency, giving people feedback. I remember early on, we had a writer who\n\n339\n00:17:10.080 --> 00:17:11.120\nwasn't performing\n\n340\n00:17:11.120 --> 00:17:15.600\nand I knew that because they had been speaking with the editors about it quite\n\n341\n00:17:15.600 --> 00:17:17.680\na bit. And ultimately,\n\n342\n00:17:17.680 --> 00:17:24.560\nwe let her go. And in that process, she was genuinely surprised. And I thought,\n\n343\n00:17:24.560 --> 00:17:31.120\nI will never again let that happen in my teams, never. Because people, they may\n\n344\n00:17:31.120 --> 00:17:37.360\nfeign surprise, which is why we put things in writing, but no one should ever\n\n345\n00:17:37.360 --> 00:17:38.240\nbe surprised\n\n346\n00:17:38.240 --> 00:17:42.570\nthat their performance isn't good enough. Yeah, absolutely. And that's a tough\n\n347\n00:17:42.570 --> 00:17:43.200\nlesson. I think\n\n348\n00:17:43.200 --> 00:17:48.480\nall of us learn as we come up. And then, you know, so you really have an\n\n349\n00:17:48.480 --> 00:17:49.200\nentrepreneurial\n\n350\n00:17:49.200 --> 00:17:54.720\nbent. There's no question. So what convinced you that Babel was the right next\n\n351\n00:17:54.720 --> 00:17:55.600\nchapter?\n\n352\n00:17:55.600 --> 00:18:01.740\nSo when we sold that business, I realized I needed to do something more\n\n353\n00:18:01.740 --> 00:18:02.800\nentrepreneurial. We sold it\n\n354\n00:18:02.800 --> 00:18:07.290\nto a big company. I didn't want to compete with Business Insider. And at that\n\n355\n00:18:07.290 --> 00:18:08.160\npoint in time,\n\n356\n00:18:08.160 --> 00:18:12.040\nBusiness Insider had gone very broad. They had just launched Insiders, General\n\n357\n00:18:12.040 --> 00:18:12.960\nMedia. I was like,\n\n358\n00:18:12.960 --> 00:18:17.840\nthey were sports. They had kind of every category. And so I was really thinking\n\n359\n00:18:17.840 --> 00:18:18.480\nhard about what was\n\n360\n00:18:18.480 --> 00:18:22.690\nnext. And Babel found me. And what I really liked about Babel, besides the fact\n\n361\n00:18:22.690 --> 00:18:23.520\nthat I thought,\n\n362\n00:18:23.520 --> 00:18:27.310\nyou know, this company and this product, it's a diamond in the rough in America\n\n363\n00:18:27.310 --> 00:18:28.400\n. It was so well\n\n364\n00:18:28.400 --> 00:18:32.690\nestablished in Europe. It was an overnight success. They invented the category.\n\n365\n00:18:32.690 --> 00:18:33.920\nBut in the US, it was\n\n366\n00:18:33.920 --> 00:18:38.810\nnot well known. And obviously, the US is a very different market when it comes\n\n367\n00:18:38.810 --> 00:18:39.760\nto language learning.\n\n368\n00:18:40.560 --> 00:18:44.640\nSo I liked the fact that, you know, I would be employee number 13 in the US\n\n369\n00:18:44.640 --> 00:18:45.280\ncould build that\n\n370\n00:18:45.280 --> 00:18:49.650\nbusiness up, but also that in Europe, it was a scale up. So I had a startup and\n\n371\n00:18:49.650 --> 00:18:50.560\na scale up\n\n372\n00:18:50.560 --> 00:18:55.600\nall in one. And I felt like if it went well, I could contribute on both levels,\n\n373\n00:18:55.600 --> 00:18:59.600\nwhich is in the end, how it worked out. So that was what drew me to Babel.\n\n374\n00:18:59.600 --> 00:19:03.620\nWhat did you have to learn personally when you entered a completely new\n\n375\n00:19:03.620 --> 00:19:04.080\nindustry?\n\n376\n00:19:04.080 --> 00:19:07.760\nAnd what, you know, what was your process? How did you go about it?\n\n377\n00:19:07.760 --> 00:19:11.360\nFor me, it was kind of going around the other side of the table. I had been\n\n378\n00:19:11.360 --> 00:19:12.560\nselling media for a long\n\n379\n00:19:12.560 --> 00:19:18.240\ntime. Now, I'm responsible for buying media. So I had to learn, while I had the\n\n380\n00:19:18.240 --> 00:19:19.040\nhigh concept of\n\n381\n00:19:19.040 --> 00:19:23.600\nthat, I had to learn the inner workings of it. That was a big thing. The bigger\n\n382\n00:19:23.600 --> 00:19:24.320\nlearnings were\n\n383\n00:19:24.320 --> 00:19:30.230\nreally about working with a company based in Germany, where you think the\n\n384\n00:19:30.230 --> 00:19:31.680\ncultures are pretty\n\n385\n00:19:31.680 --> 00:19:38.020\nsimilar to American work culture, but it is night and day and learning how to\n\n386\n00:19:38.020 --> 00:19:39.120\nnavigate that,\n\n387\n00:19:39.120 --> 00:19:45.180\nunderstanding the importance of cultural nuance. When we have new managers here\n\n388\n00:19:45.180 --> 00:19:47.280\nin the US who\n\n389\n00:19:47.280 --> 00:19:52.160\nmight be managing someone in Berlin, I personally sit them down and give them a\n\n390\n00:19:52.160 --> 00:19:53.120\ntalk about how it's\n\n391\n00:19:53.120 --> 00:19:57.200\ngoing to be different for them, not just the HR rules of which there are many,\n\n392\n00:19:57.200 --> 00:19:59.840\nbut the cultural\n\n393\n00:19:59.840 --> 00:20:04.750\ndifferences. You know, the fact that our German employees are trained in the\n\n394\n00:20:04.750 --> 00:20:05.840\nGerman work culture\n\n395\n00:20:05.840 --> 00:20:12.800\nto be more precise and careful and conservative. That is just the work culture.\n\n396\n00:20:12.800 --> 00:20:13.280\nAnd they're going\n\n397\n00:20:13.280 --> 00:20:19.410\nto look at you and think that you are ready, fire aim. They think you're a\n\n398\n00:20:19.410 --> 00:20:22.400\ncowboy. You guys need\n\n399\n00:20:22.400 --> 00:20:26.160\nto learn how to work together, how to meet in the middle. And, you know, people\n\n400\n00:20:26.160 --> 00:20:27.120\n's eyes get very big\n\n401\n00:20:27.120 --> 00:20:30.640\nwhen I explain that to them, but it's really an important insight.\n\n402\n00:20:30.640 --> 00:20:35.840\nSo, as I understand, you walked into a struggling US division. What felt most\n\n403\n00:20:35.840 --> 00:20:36.720\nbroken that you had\n\n404\n00:20:36.720 --> 00:20:41.600\nattacked? Yeah, I later found out that at the time they were trying to figure\n\n405\n00:20:41.600 --> 00:20:42.080\nout, should we just\n\n406\n00:20:42.080 --> 00:20:46.220\ngive up on the US? Or should we try again? And they were like, okay, we'll give\n\n407\n00:20:46.220 --> 00:20:47.120\nher a chance.\n\n408\n00:20:47.120 --> 00:20:54.580\nWe had to do a few things differently. One, we had to understand that the US\n\n409\n00:20:54.580 --> 00:20:55.120\nconsumer\n\n410\n00:20:55.840 --> 00:21:01.360\nof language learning is very different from the European consumer. And what\n\n411\n00:21:01.360 --> 00:21:02.560\nworked in Germany\n\n412\n00:21:02.560 --> 00:21:06.720\nwas not going to work here. So that has to do with new messaging, of course,\n\n413\n00:21:06.720 --> 00:21:07.440\nhow you approach\n\n414\n00:21:07.440 --> 00:21:12.320\nit, but how you think about demographics, the audience we're targeting, but\n\n415\n00:21:12.320 --> 00:21:13.840\nalso media.\n\n416\n00:21:13.840 --> 00:21:21.300\nThat was step number one. And number two was really how to convince this\n\n417\n00:21:21.300 --> 00:21:23.440\nbusiness culture that was\n\n418\n00:21:23.440 --> 00:21:29.040\npretty hardwired to be conservative and careful. And maybe sometimes a little\n\n419\n00:21:29.040 --> 00:21:30.240\nslow that we could\n\n420\n00:21:30.240 --> 00:21:34.760\ngo a little faster and we could push harder and figuring out how to make that\n\n421\n00:21:34.760 --> 00:21:36.000\nmessage stick\n\n422\n00:21:36.000 --> 00:21:39.280\nin a different cultural context. That was one of the big challenges too.\n\n423\n00:21:39.280 --> 00:21:45.230\nBabel was the world's first language learning app. Sometimes, you know,\n\n424\n00:21:45.230 --> 00:21:45.840\ncompanies that,\n\n425\n00:21:46.880 --> 00:21:55.680\nyou know, are first, isn't the company that wins? You get disrupted. What have\n\n426\n00:21:55.680 --> 00:21:56.400\nyou had to guard\n\n427\n00:21:56.400 --> 00:22:02.080\nagainst when you're out front like you've been out front?\n\n428\n00:22:02.080 --> 00:22:06.460\nIt's a great question. It's been a huge challenge for Babel. I think,\n\n429\n00:22:06.460 --> 00:22:07.680\nespecially in the early days,\n\n430\n00:22:07.680 --> 00:22:13.180\nespecially in Europe, we were so successful so quickly. It's still the case\n\n431\n00:22:13.180 --> 00:22:14.160\nthat in\n\n432\n00:22:14.160 --> 00:22:18.040\nBabel, Germany, we have like a 90% brand awareness. You can literally get in\n\n433\n00:22:18.040 --> 00:22:18.880\nthe taxi and the taxi\n\n434\n00:22:18.880 --> 00:22:25.360\ndriver will know Babel. So that is easy to get comfortable from that. We kept\n\n435\n00:22:25.360 --> 00:22:26.000\nus on our toes,\n\n436\n00:22:26.000 --> 00:22:30.880\ntwo things. One, the U.S. in general, because that market is simply more\n\n437\n00:22:30.880 --> 00:22:31.840\ncompetitive and more\n\n438\n00:22:31.840 --> 00:22:36.970\nchallenging and different. So it forces us to question some of our product\n\n439\n00:22:36.970 --> 00:22:37.760\nchoices,\n\n440\n00:22:37.760 --> 00:22:42.080\nthink differently, be open to doing things in another way. So the U.S.\n\n441\n00:22:42.080 --> 00:22:43.760\ninfluence to be specific,\n\n442\n00:22:44.240 --> 00:22:49.680\nbut the push for Mexican Spanish, the idea that, you know, we don't learn\n\n443\n00:22:49.680 --> 00:22:54.630\nSicilian Spanish in the U.S. We need that other language. So we had to, you\n\n444\n00:22:54.630 --> 00:22:55.200\nknow,\n\n445\n00:22:55.200 --> 00:23:00.980\nopen eyes to the needs of a different market. We pushed hard for podcasts over\n\n446\n00:23:00.980 --> 00:23:02.320\nhere and they've\n\n447\n00:23:02.320 --> 00:23:06.800\nbecome a very important part of our language toolbox. We would have gotten\n\n448\n00:23:06.800 --> 00:23:08.640\nthere eventually in Germany,\n\n449\n00:23:08.640 --> 00:23:12.400\nbut we got there faster because of the U.S. operation. But the single biggest\n\n450\n00:23:12.400 --> 00:23:13.360\nthing, for sure,\n\n451\n00:23:13.360 --> 00:23:17.760\nwas the competition here. Our main competitors, we had a legacy competitor that\n\n452\n00:23:17.760 --> 00:23:18.880\nwas quite well\n\n453\n00:23:18.880 --> 00:23:23.250\nknown in the English language world, not known in Germany. So they caused us to\n\n454\n00:23:23.250 --> 00:23:24.160\nbe a little sharper\n\n455\n00:23:24.160 --> 00:23:30.050\nin our marketing. And then, of course, our new app competition challenged us\n\n456\n00:23:30.050 --> 00:23:31.040\nhere in the U.S.\n\n457\n00:23:31.040 --> 00:23:36.160\nfirst. And so that competition was actually really helpful to the company in\n\n458\n00:23:36.160 --> 00:23:37.520\nquestioning what\n\n459\n00:23:37.520 --> 00:23:42.480\nwe're doing, rethinking our, the way we address consumers, like all of it.\n\n460\n00:23:42.480 --> 00:23:43.680\nHello, friends. I hope\n\n461\n00:23:43.680 --> 00:23:47.560\nyou are loving this conversation between David and Julie. As always, please\n\n462\n00:23:47.560 --> 00:23:48.640\nstay tuned to the very\n\n463\n00:23:48.640 --> 00:23:52.210\nend of the episode. David and I have a great discussion where we debrief some\n\n464\n00:23:52.210 --> 00:23:53.040\nof the concepts\n\n465\n00:23:53.040 --> 00:23:57.450\nthat he is talking about with Julie on this interview. So stay tuned to the\n\n466\n00:23:57.450 --> 00:23:58.240\nvery end of the\n\n467\n00:23:58.240 --> 00:24:03.520\nepisode. And I will see you at the debrief. You know, as you mentioned earlier,\n\n468\n00:24:03.520 --> 00:24:04.320\nAI\n\n469\n00:24:04.320 --> 00:24:08.560\ntranslation tools are improving so fast and AirPods promising real-time\n\n470\n00:24:08.560 --> 00:24:09.360\ntranslation,\n\n471\n00:24:09.360 --> 00:24:15.110\ncompetitors leaning heavily into AI along with yourself. When you see that,\n\n472\n00:24:15.110 --> 00:24:15.920\nwhat goes on in your\n\n473\n00:24:15.920 --> 00:24:19.820\nmind? I mean, you just said competition is a positive, which is a nice way to\n\n474\n00:24:19.820 --> 00:24:20.640\nframe it. But,\n\n475\n00:24:20.640 --> 00:24:25.550\nyou know, what's what's going on in your mind? And the one hand, we are, there\n\n476\n00:24:25.550 --> 00:24:26.720\n's probably a\n\n477\n00:24:26.720 --> 00:24:32.470\nlittle, a small chunk of our audience that was learning a language for really\n\n478\n00:24:32.470 --> 00:24:33.840\ntransactional\n\n479\n00:24:33.840 --> 00:24:39.040\npurposes, you know, for a few months for a trip or what have you. And probably\n\n480\n00:24:39.040 --> 00:24:40.320\nthose types of very\n\n481\n00:24:40.320 --> 00:24:45.680\nuncommitted transactional learners are not going to bother with learning with\n\n482\n00:24:45.680 --> 00:24:46.720\nBabel or the other\n\n483\n00:24:46.720 --> 00:24:50.600\nplatform. And you know what? That's great. Because there was, it's hard work\n\n484\n00:24:50.600 --> 00:24:51.200\nlearning a\n\n485\n00:24:51.200 --> 00:24:56.900\nlanguage. And if you just need to speak a few words to it in a cafe, then by\n\n486\n00:24:56.900 --> 00:24:58.880\nall means use your\n\n487\n00:24:58.880 --> 00:25:03.070\ntranslation tool. And so we kind of welcome that, frankly, because language\n\n488\n00:25:03.070 --> 00:25:04.000\nlearning, you know,\n\n489\n00:25:04.000 --> 00:25:09.680\nit's like an exercise program. It's a lot. There's a lot of commitments. So the\n\n490\n00:25:09.680 --> 00:25:10.400\nusers who would be\n\n491\n00:25:10.400 --> 00:25:15.680\nmore easily frustrated, it's great that there's a better solution for them.\n\n492\n00:25:15.680 --> 00:25:16.720\nWhere we think the\n\n493\n00:25:16.720 --> 00:25:21.210\npotential that is incredible for the personalization piece we talked about\n\n494\n00:25:21.210 --> 00:25:23.920\nbefore, but also practice.\n\n495\n00:25:25.760 --> 00:25:30.650\nWhat we're doing right now is not something that we would want to do through a\n\n496\n00:25:30.650 --> 00:25:31.520\ntranslation\n\n497\n00:25:31.520 --> 00:25:38.020\ntool. If every time you ask me a question, I sat there and listened for 20\n\n498\n00:25:38.020 --> 00:25:39.280\nseconds, and then I\n\n499\n00:25:39.280 --> 00:25:42.530\nresponded, and then there was an equivalent pause when it came back to you.\n\n500\n00:25:42.530 --> 00:25:43.760\nThat's not a satisfying\n\n501\n00:25:43.760 --> 00:25:48.670\nway to have a conversation. And by the way, if your mother-in-law happens to\n\n502\n00:25:48.670 --> 00:25:50.080\nspeak French or Spanish,\n\n503\n00:25:51.360 --> 00:25:55.710\nshe doesn't want to talk to you through an earbud either. So there really are\n\n504\n00:25:55.710 --> 00:25:57.040\nsome, as long as human\n\n505\n00:25:57.040 --> 00:26:00.430\nbeings have a multitude of languages, we think there will be a need for\n\n506\n00:26:00.430 --> 00:26:01.760\nlanguage learning, and it\n\n507\n00:26:01.760 --> 00:26:05.120\nmight look a little different than it does now, but that need is not going away\n\n508\n00:26:05.120 --> 00:26:06.560\n. We don't think\n\n509\n00:26:06.560 --> 00:26:10.180\nelectronics are going to replace it. You know, you're in the business of\n\n510\n00:26:10.180 --> 00:26:11.200\nhelping people learn,\n\n511\n00:26:11.200 --> 00:26:16.080\nthere's no question about that. What do most people misunderstand about how\n\n512\n00:26:16.080 --> 00:26:16.880\nlearning actually\n\n513\n00:26:16.880 --> 00:26:22.320\nworks? You've got to become experts out of the Bible, for sure. You are experts\n\n514\n00:26:22.320 --> 00:26:22.640\n.\n\n515\n00:26:22.640 --> 00:26:27.530\nI think people underestimate the level of effort that it will take. I'm sure\n\n516\n00:26:27.530 --> 00:26:28.880\nyou remember the easy\n\n517\n00:26:28.880 --> 00:26:34.940\nbutton ad campaign that we had here in the US. That campaign spoke to a primal\n\n518\n00:26:34.940 --> 00:26:35.920\nurge of Americans,\n\n519\n00:26:35.920 --> 00:26:41.120\nand there's no easy button in language learning. You cannot hypnotize yourself\n\n520\n00:26:41.120 --> 00:26:42.160\ninto learning.\n\n521\n00:26:42.160 --> 00:26:46.880\nSo that's one thing. The other thing is that I think people know that language.\n\n522\n00:26:46.880 --> 00:26:47.280\nIt's important\n\n523\n00:26:47.280 --> 00:26:52.960\nto speak it out loud, but it is so intimidating, terrifying, scary, that they\n\n524\n00:26:52.960 --> 00:26:54.160\ndon't, and they think\n\n525\n00:26:54.160 --> 00:26:59.040\nthey'll be okay. And that's, again, why we're so excited about AI tooling as a\n\n526\n00:26:59.040 --> 00:26:59.920\nway to practice\n\n527\n00:26:59.920 --> 00:27:06.220\nthat with repetition, that there's no judgment in your AI robot conversation\n\n528\n00:27:06.220 --> 00:27:07.680\ncoach. There's only\n\n529\n00:27:08.240 --> 00:27:14.000\nencouragement, endless patience. That's really powerful. You mentioned earlier\n\n530\n00:27:14.000 --> 00:27:14.640\nthat you're\n\n531\n00:27:14.640 --> 00:27:19.800\nreally working on ways to motivate people to stick to it and to really get the\n\n532\n00:27:19.800 --> 00:27:20.720\njob done.\n\n533\n00:27:20.720 --> 00:27:26.800\nHow are you doing that? I mean, how are you going to motivate someone like me\n\n534\n00:27:26.800 --> 00:27:28.480\nto stay after it?\n\n535\n00:27:28.480 --> 00:27:35.200\nWell, of course, we're going to have a streak feature, and that has been wildly\n\n536\n00:27:35.200 --> 00:27:35.840\npopular. I'm\n\n537\n00:27:35.840 --> 00:27:40.330\nstating the obvious there. When our streak feature broke, it was sort of the\n\n538\n00:27:40.330 --> 00:27:41.840\nsingle biggest influx\n\n539\n00:27:41.840 --> 00:27:48.810\nto customer service in many years. So that's one huge thing. Two, we're trying\n\n540\n00:27:48.810 --> 00:27:49.840\nhard to meet\n\n541\n00:27:49.840 --> 00:27:55.950\npeople where they are. So shorter lessons, different styles of learning, even\n\n542\n00:27:55.950 --> 00:27:57.280\nin our communications,\n\n543\n00:27:57.280 --> 00:28:01.600\nour email communications reminders, but also just bringing more of the learning\n\n544\n00:28:01.600 --> 00:28:02.960\nto you wherever you\n\n545\n00:28:02.960 --> 00:28:07.840\nare. A long time ago, we went to Switzerland for a ski vacation. I'm not a good\n\n546\n00:28:07.840 --> 00:28:08.480\nskier.\n\n547\n00:28:08.480 --> 00:28:16.630\nAnd so we had a, I was put in the beginner lesson, and one day we had a German\n\n548\n00:28:16.630 --> 00:28:17.440\nteacher,\n\n549\n00:28:17.440 --> 00:28:21.840\nand he was very strict. And when I had trouble getting up, when I fell, he was\n\n550\n00:28:21.840 --> 00:28:22.560\nmad at me,\n\n551\n00:28:22.560 --> 00:28:26.970\nand I was very sad, and I was not motivated. And the next day, we had an\n\n552\n00:28:26.970 --> 00:28:28.000\nItalian teacher,\n\n553\n00:28:28.000 --> 00:28:33.350\nand he was so warm and nice and encouraging that I was so excited about my\n\n554\n00:28:33.350 --> 00:28:34.400\nlesson that day,\n\n555\n00:28:34.400 --> 00:28:38.720\nand I did better. So okay, now you know a little bit more about me personally,\n\n556\n00:28:38.720 --> 00:28:40.480\nbut I think that style\n\n557\n00:28:40.480 --> 00:28:46.160\nof coaching and teaching might have some cultural relevance to it. And so we're\n\n558\n00:28:46.160 --> 00:28:46.960\njust trying to make\n\n559\n00:28:46.960 --> 00:28:52.350\nthe product a little nicer, a little warmer, a little more encouraging, and\n\n560\n00:28:52.350 --> 00:28:53.680\nmost people respond\n\n561\n00:28:53.680 --> 00:28:57.960\nto that. And you go from employee number 13 in the United States to be in the\n\n562\n00:28:57.960 --> 00:28:58.480\npresident of the\n\n563\n00:28:58.480 --> 00:29:04.890\nUS business, you know, and now you're both the, that, the president, and you're\n\n564\n00:29:04.890 --> 00:29:06.080\nthe chief revenue\n\n565\n00:29:06.080 --> 00:29:13.200\nofficer for the global organization. What does the chief revenue officer role\n\n566\n00:29:13.200 --> 00:29:14.240\nactually look like for\n\n567\n00:29:14.240 --> 00:29:19.160\nyou day to day? It's where I spend the most of my time, for sure. We are a\n\n568\n00:29:19.160 --> 00:29:21.600\nworldwide marketer.\n\n569\n00:29:22.560 --> 00:29:27.440\nOne of the reasons why this role could make sense is that, as I said earlier,\n\n570\n00:29:27.440 --> 00:29:32.320\nmedia evolution does tend to happen in the US first, you know, TikTok launched\n\n571\n00:29:32.320 --> 00:29:33.200\nhere before it\n\n572\n00:29:33.200 --> 00:29:39.270\nlaunched in Europe as one example. So we're able to kind of use our US\n\n573\n00:29:39.270 --> 00:29:41.520\nmarketing operations as\n\n574\n00:29:41.520 --> 00:29:46.400\nsomewhat of a crystal ball. If it works here, it's going to work in Europe in a\n\n575\n00:29:46.400 --> 00:29:47.120\nyear or two,\n\n576\n00:29:47.120 --> 00:29:51.680\nprobably. No, there are differences in creative, there are differences around\n\n577\n00:29:51.680 --> 00:29:52.480\nprivacy and\n\n578\n00:29:52.480 --> 00:29:57.860\nattitudes toward privacy. Those all make a difference. But for example, you\n\n579\n00:29:57.860 --> 00:29:58.400\nknow,\n\n580\n00:29:58.400 --> 00:30:02.890\nwe developed an email cadence in the US that drew more revenue. We send more\n\n581\n00:30:02.890 --> 00:30:03.840\nemails, but we do\n\n582\n00:30:03.840 --> 00:30:07.150\nit in a certain way. And for a long time, I was told like, no, no, we can't do\n\n583\n00:30:07.150 --> 00:30:07.840\nthat here.\n\n584\n00:30:07.840 --> 00:30:12.720\nYeah, we can. And it's working really well. So a lot of the times we're\n\n585\n00:30:12.720 --> 00:30:13.680\nexporting what we\n\n586\n00:30:13.680 --> 00:30:18.050\ndevelop first in the US just because of where the media evolution is here, and\n\n587\n00:30:18.050 --> 00:30:18.880\nwe apply it\n\n588\n00:30:18.880 --> 00:30:22.760\nworldwide. But most of the time I'm working with our media, our channel\n\n589\n00:30:22.760 --> 00:30:24.080\nmanagers, every channel\n\n590\n00:30:24.080 --> 00:30:29.190\nis kind of managed, vertically working with the creatives. We spend a lot of\n\n591\n00:30:29.190 --> 00:30:30.320\ntime on product and\n\n592\n00:30:30.320 --> 00:30:36.080\ntech, because we do run basically our own our tech products is handled in the\n\n593\n00:30:36.080 --> 00:30:37.040\nrevenue org,\n\n594\n00:30:37.040 --> 00:30:42.470\nnot in some separate technology, Oregon, Berlin. So I'm kind of a nice mix of,\n\n595\n00:30:42.470 --> 00:30:42.960\nI guess I'm back\n\n596\n00:30:42.960 --> 00:30:47.110\nto being a general manager in that sense. And then I guess I enjoy that\n\n597\n00:30:47.110 --> 00:30:48.000\nactually.\n\n598\n00:30:48.000 --> 00:30:51.120\nIt's on the other thing, it seems like you enjoyed Julie's, you'd like taken on\n\n599\n00:30:51.120 --> 00:30:52.160\nthe\n\n600\n00:30:52.160 --> 00:30:57.040\nbasic, basic traditional thinking and saying, hey, doesn't necessarily have to\n\n601\n00:30:57.040 --> 00:30:58.400\nbe that way. I mean,\n\n602\n00:30:58.400 --> 00:31:04.880\nyou like take it on maybe the stereotypical view. Am I corrected saying that or\n\n603\n00:31:04.880 --> 00:31:04.880\n?\n\n604\n00:31:04.880 --> 00:31:10.320\nYeah, I guess that is a feature or a bug depending on your perspective.\n\n605\n00:31:10.320 --> 00:31:15.360\nNo, I think it's a good feature. But you know, how do you how do you get the\n\n606\n00:31:15.360 --> 00:31:16.320\ncourage to take up\n\n607\n00:31:16.320 --> 00:31:20.480\npeople, take people on? Because you you're not going to change something unless\n\n608\n00:31:20.480 --> 00:31:21.200\nyou have the\n\n609\n00:31:21.200 --> 00:31:26.080\ncourage to have the thought of the people saying, no, I disagree with you. You\n\n610\n00:31:26.080 --> 00:31:26.880\nknow, you got to,\n\n611\n00:31:26.880 --> 00:31:31.280\nhow do you deal with productive conflict? Because you got to be good at it.\n\n612\n00:31:31.280 --> 00:31:35.300\nThere are there is nuance to that. It helps if you know the person with whom\n\n613\n00:31:35.300 --> 00:31:36.000\nyou might have\n\n614\n00:31:36.000 --> 00:31:40.020\nconflict, because we are all different. And we all like to receive our\n\n615\n00:31:40.020 --> 00:31:41.520\ninformation differently.\n\n616\n00:31:42.560 --> 00:31:47.450\nMost people that I'm working with at a company of our size and, you know, it\n\n617\n00:31:47.450 --> 00:31:48.240\nstarts with data.\n\n618\n00:31:48.240 --> 00:31:53.200\nSo if the numbers are not on your side, it doesn't really matter what you have\n\n619\n00:31:53.200 --> 00:31:54.400\nto say about it.\n\n620\n00:31:54.400 --> 00:31:58.960\nSo we do try to start, I do try to start with a data grounded conversation.\n\n621\n00:31:58.960 --> 00:32:06.500\nYou know, I though know enough about my audience to know, you know, that one\n\n622\n00:32:06.500 --> 00:32:08.160\nwants a song and dance,\n\n623\n00:32:08.160 --> 00:32:13.590\nand that one wants a presentation with lots of data in it and some quiet time\n\n624\n00:32:13.590 --> 00:32:14.320\nto read it before\n\n625\n00:32:14.320 --> 00:32:20.220\nwe talk. So I think knowing whom you're interacting with is super powerful, I\n\n626\n00:32:20.220 --> 00:32:21.200\n've come to learn about\n\n627\n00:32:21.200 --> 00:32:27.520\nall the power of a good document. I once had a before I was responsible for\n\n628\n00:32:27.520 --> 00:32:28.400\nrevenue worldwide,\n\n629\n00:32:28.400 --> 00:32:32.080\nwe were doing we're taking a certain approach to revenue growth in the US and I\n\n630\n00:32:32.080 --> 00:32:32.880\nwanted to get\n\n631\n00:32:32.880 --> 00:32:36.940\nsome tech support that we needed to enable more of it. And so I wrote a\n\n632\n00:32:36.940 --> 00:32:38.160\ndocument like this is,\n\n633\n00:32:38.160 --> 00:32:41.600\nyou know, just a couple pages on this thing we were doing. And that thing went\n\n634\n00:32:41.600 --> 00:32:42.320\naround the company,\n\n635\n00:32:42.320 --> 00:32:46.630\nlike more people shared it and read it. And I realized, aha, this is a company\n\n636\n00:32:46.630 --> 00:32:47.440\nwhere putting\n\n637\n00:32:47.440 --> 00:32:50.900\nit on paper is actually incredibly important. People were coming up to me\n\n638\n00:32:50.900 --> 00:32:51.920\nasking about it. I\n\n639\n00:32:51.920 --> 00:32:55.600\ndidn't write a document with that in mind. It was just assembling my thoughts.\n\n640\n00:32:55.600 --> 00:32:57.360\nSo learning\n\n641\n00:32:57.360 --> 00:33:01.440\nsometimes what works every company is different, learning what works at a given\n\n642\n00:33:01.440 --> 00:33:02.160\ncompany is pretty\n\n643\n00:33:02.160 --> 00:33:07.050\nimportant. So you got to start out with data. That's that's a given. How do you\n\n644\n00:33:07.050 --> 00:33:08.160\nbring creativity to\n\n645\n00:33:08.160 --> 00:33:14.220\ndriving revenue? Well, I mean, that's the fun part. I guess part of it is just\n\n646\n00:33:14.220 --> 00:33:15.520\nloving media and\n\n647\n00:33:15.520 --> 00:33:20.650\nmarketing and loving the fact that it is just never over it. We're always\n\n648\n00:33:20.650 --> 00:33:22.400\nevolving. And that's\n\n649\n00:33:22.400 --> 00:33:26.300\nthe impact of digital. I mean, I was lucky enough to kind of grow up in a media\n\n650\n00:33:26.300 --> 00:33:27.440\nworld that was in\n\n651\n00:33:27.440 --> 00:33:33.150\nthe throes of that digital transformation. We're still in it. But as a person\n\n652\n00:33:33.150 --> 00:33:33.520\nwho\n\n653\n00:33:33.520 --> 00:33:37.890\nended up working in legacy media, but always, you know, was focused on the\n\n654\n00:33:37.890 --> 00:33:38.800\ndigital side of it,\n\n655\n00:33:38.800 --> 00:33:45.920\njust always been on the front lines of this constant evolution. You know, it's\n\n656\n00:33:45.920 --> 00:33:46.240\nfunny when\n\n657\n00:33:46.240 --> 00:33:51.220\nyou think about it, we're having a podcast right now. That was an audio format\n\n658\n00:33:51.220 --> 00:33:52.400\nfor a long time.\n\n659\n00:33:52.400 --> 00:33:57.760\nAnd now here we are on video and everyone watches their podcast on YouTube. Why\n\n660\n00:33:57.760 --> 00:33:59.680\n? It's still just audio.\n\n661\n00:33:59.680 --> 00:34:06.280\nBut you know, media is constantly evolving. And so the way we use media to\n\n662\n00:34:06.280 --> 00:34:07.120\nreach people\n\n663\n00:34:07.120 --> 00:34:13.120\nand to convince them and to tell stories constantly involving. I love that.\n\n664\n00:34:13.120 --> 00:34:16.000\nWhat do you think is the most creative thing you're doing at Babel right now?\n\n665\n00:34:16.640 --> 00:34:22.710\nSome of our we're doing some new creative development that's a little bit edg\n\n666\n00:34:22.710 --> 00:34:23.440\nier for us.\n\n667\n00:34:23.440 --> 00:34:32.320\nWe've finally got OTT working. So, you know, or CTV, whatever we want to call\n\n668\n00:34:32.320 --> 00:34:38.380\ndigital television. Took us a long time to understand the right creative\n\n669\n00:34:38.380 --> 00:34:39.040\nformats for that,\n\n670\n00:34:39.040 --> 00:34:42.440\nbecause you can't just take your TV commercial and slap it on YouTube. That\n\n671\n00:34:42.440 --> 00:34:43.040\ndoes not go.\n\n672\n00:34:43.840 --> 00:34:52.240\nSo, that's been creative and fun. We've had a lot of fun creativity too in\n\n673\n00:34:52.240 --> 00:34:54.000\ncoming up with new\n\n674\n00:34:54.000 --> 00:35:01.540\nexperiences to ensure that we still receive some SEO love. So, as you know,\n\n675\n00:35:01.540 --> 00:35:03.600\nwith the advent of AI\n\n676\n00:35:03.600 --> 00:35:09.030\noverviews, most websites are receiving a fraction of the traffic that the users\n\n677\n00:35:09.030 --> 00:35:10.240\nreceive. Yes,\n\n678\n00:35:10.240 --> 00:35:14.120\nit's more qualified, but it's still a fraction. But there are certain\n\n679\n00:35:14.120 --> 00:35:16.160\nexperiences that an AI cannot\n\n680\n00:35:16.160 --> 00:35:24.370\ncan't summarize. So, for example, in about 10 days, we're going to launch a\n\n681\n00:35:24.370 --> 00:35:26.640\ncognate finder tool.\n\n682\n00:35:26.640 --> 00:35:31.050\nIf you're not deeply immersed in the language world, you might not know that a\n\n683\n00:35:31.050 --> 00:35:31.680\ncognate\n\n684\n00:35:31.680 --> 00:35:34.880\nis a word that sounds and means the same thing in two languages.\n\n685\n00:35:36.800 --> 00:35:40.680\nSo, there are tons of these, but there's also false friends, you know, things\n\n686\n00:35:40.680 --> 00:35:41.840\nthat sound the same,\n\n687\n00:35:41.840 --> 00:35:46.700\nmean, different things, like, \"embarrassada\" in Spanish is not embarrassed. It\n\n688\n00:35:46.700 --> 00:35:47.120\n's pregnant.\n\n689\n00:35:47.120 --> 00:35:55.280\nSo, many, many words like that. And this is a very commonly searched thing in\n\n690\n00:35:55.280 --> 00:35:56.720\nthe language world.\n\n691\n00:35:56.720 --> 00:36:00.620\nSo, we're creating a fun tool that lets you search, that lets you, like, play\n\n692\n00:36:00.620 --> 00:36:01.520\nwith cognates\n\n693\n00:36:01.520 --> 00:36:06.950\nand false friends. Google can't summarize. No AI tool can summarize that. So,\n\n694\n00:36:06.950 --> 00:36:08.160\nclearly,\n\n695\n00:36:08.160 --> 00:36:12.180\nhaving a lot of fun, I think that's... I was very proud of the creative team\n\n696\n00:36:12.180 --> 00:36:12.960\nthat came up with that\n\n697\n00:36:12.960 --> 00:36:19.120\nidea. So, it's like we, as a marketer, we primarily use media to reach whether\n\n698\n00:36:19.120 --> 00:36:20.480\nit's paid or organic.\n\n699\n00:36:20.480 --> 00:36:24.800\nIt doesn't matter. That's how we reach people. And the fact that media is so\n\n700\n00:36:24.800 --> 00:36:26.160\ndynamic and changing\n\n701\n00:36:26.160 --> 00:36:29.750\nall the time, especially now, this moment we're living in, I find that so\n\n702\n00:36:29.750 --> 00:36:30.480\nexciting.\n\n703\n00:36:31.520 --> 00:36:35.210\nRevenue is the lifeblood of any company. So, you know, it's the Chief Revenue\n\n704\n00:36:35.210 --> 00:36:35.680\nOfficer.\n\n705\n00:36:35.680 --> 00:36:40.720\nYou got to have a lot of pressure on it. I would imagine, you know, because\n\n706\n00:36:40.720 --> 00:36:41.680\nwhen the\n\n707\n00:36:41.680 --> 00:36:45.560\nrevenue is not moving in the right direction, man, that puts pressure on\n\n708\n00:36:45.560 --> 00:36:46.880\neverything, margins,\n\n709\n00:36:46.880 --> 00:36:51.770\nyou name it. You know, how do you deal with the pressure of having to get the\n\n710\n00:36:51.770 --> 00:36:52.640\nsale?\n\n711\n00:36:52.640 --> 00:36:57.120\nYes, honey, isn't it? When things are going great, all the meetings are so easy\n\n712\n00:36:57.120 --> 00:36:57.120\n.\n\n713\n00:36:58.320 --> 00:37:03.200\nAnd when things are not going great, the meetings are a little more challenging\n\n714\n00:37:03.200 --> 00:37:03.360\n.\n\n715\n00:37:03.360 --> 00:37:07.240\nI guess I'd like pressure at the end of the day. I mean, I'm a competitive\n\n716\n00:37:07.240 --> 00:37:09.440\nperson. I like goals.\n\n717\n00:37:09.440 --> 00:37:16.040\nI like exceeding goals. You know, some people thrive on that. I think I'm one\n\n718\n00:37:16.040 --> 00:37:17.120\nof those people.\n\n719\n00:37:17.120 --> 00:37:20.530\nHow do you personally stay connected with your customers and what they're\n\n720\n00:37:20.530 --> 00:37:21.120\nsaying?\n\n721\n00:37:21.120 --> 00:37:26.550\nWe do do some live customer interviews. Those are very helpful. We have quite a\n\n722\n00:37:26.550 --> 00:37:27.360\nbit of research\n\n723\n00:37:27.360 --> 00:37:32.560\nand that we do. One of my absolute favorite ways is we have a Slack channel\n\n724\n00:37:32.560 --> 00:37:33.680\nwhere we pipe in the\n\n725\n00:37:33.680 --> 00:37:39.200\nreviews in real time from Apple. And we started, there's a bunch of them now,\n\n726\n00:37:39.200 --> 00:37:40.080\nbut we started with\n\n727\n00:37:40.080 --> 00:37:44.960\nthe U.S. reviews. And actually, we started up, frankly, to help the folks in\n\n728\n00:37:44.960 --> 00:37:45.440\nheadquarters\n\n729\n00:37:45.440 --> 00:37:49.120\nunderstand that the customer here was different and was saying different things\n\n730\n00:37:49.120 --> 00:37:49.520\nthan they were\n\n731\n00:37:49.520 --> 00:37:53.540\nused to hearing. But every day, you know, we see what people are talking about,\n\n732\n00:37:53.540 --> 00:37:54.960\nasking about,\n\n733\n00:37:55.520 --> 00:37:59.040\ncomplaining about, really, really love that, actually.\n\n734\n00:37:59.040 --> 00:38:03.200\nWhat is something you've learned as CEO in the past year that really surprised\n\n735\n00:38:03.200 --> 00:38:03.920\nthe heck out of you?\n\n736\n00:38:03.920 --> 00:38:16.620\nI guess how fast AI is changing our world and how different people embrace it,\n\n737\n00:38:16.620 --> 00:38:17.040\nshrink from it,\n\n738\n00:38:18.640 --> 00:38:24.240\nhow people react to that. I mean, I've lived through the internet revolution,\n\n739\n00:38:24.240 --> 00:38:26.160\nthe mobile revolution,\n\n740\n00:38:26.160 --> 00:38:30.390\nthe social revolution, if we can call all of those technology waves as\n\n741\n00:38:30.390 --> 00:38:32.400\nrevolutions, AI is a revolution.\n\n742\n00:38:32.400 --> 00:38:38.240\nAnd it's so obvious to me, and yet I find that some of my colleagues\n\n743\n00:38:38.240 --> 00:38:42.260\ndon't seem to feel the same sense of urgency, and then some of them just want\n\n744\n00:38:42.260 --> 00:38:43.360\nto hide under a rock.\n\n745\n00:38:43.920 --> 00:38:48.800\nAnd that has surprised me, actually. As a leader, how do you think a leader\n\n746\n00:38:48.800 --> 00:38:49.200\nshould\n\n747\n00:38:49.200 --> 00:38:52.480\nreact to AI? I mean, what should you be doing? What are you doing?\n\n748\n00:38:52.480 --> 00:38:57.360\nA few things. One, we're making sure that we have as much AI tooling at our\n\n749\n00:38:57.360 --> 00:38:58.720\ndisposal as we can\n\n750\n00:38:58.720 --> 00:39:05.040\nafford. And we're making it available. We're giving training to really trying\n\n751\n00:39:05.040 --> 00:39:05.760\nto model that\n\n752\n00:39:05.760 --> 00:39:09.920\nbehavior. So we've had various sessions where we have someone from the team\n\n753\n00:39:09.920 --> 00:39:10.800\ncome forward and say,\n\n754\n00:39:10.800 --> 00:39:15.680\nhey, this is what I did with AI this week. I have shown the team my own\n\n755\n00:39:15.680 --> 00:39:16.240\npersonal\n\n756\n00:39:16.240 --> 00:39:20.260\nvibe coding project, trying to make sure that everyone understands it wasn't\n\n757\n00:39:20.260 --> 00:39:21.520\nmuch, David, to be clear.\n\n758\n00:39:21.520 --> 00:39:29.280\nIt was fun. So modeling the behavior, encouraging the behavior, training is\n\n759\n00:39:29.280 --> 00:39:35.030\nbeing explicit about our expectations around it, setting goals that include AI\n\n760\n00:39:35.030 --> 00:39:35.680\nachievements.\n\n761\n00:39:37.040 --> 00:39:42.960\nWe're not-- we are sometimes-- we have a different business culture, again, as\n\n762\n00:39:42.960 --> 00:39:43.840\nI mentioned, and the\n\n763\n00:39:43.840 --> 00:39:49.920\nEuropean laws around privacy sometimes make our adoption of AI internally\n\n764\n00:39:49.920 --> 00:39:51.440\nslower than other\n\n765\n00:39:51.440 --> 00:39:57.170\ncountry companies, but making sure that I'm pushing on that. And we want to do\n\n766\n00:39:57.170 --> 00:39:57.840\nit the right\n\n767\n00:39:57.840 --> 00:40:03.040\nway with the right guidelines and support for the team, support, I guess, is an\n\n768\n00:40:03.040 --> 00:40:04.240\nimportant word to,\n\n769\n00:40:04.800 --> 00:40:08.820\nbut just making sure that we understand it's coming. We are equipping them, and\n\n770\n00:40:08.820 --> 00:40:10.640\nwe are expecting them\n\n771\n00:40:10.640 --> 00:40:16.160\nto start using it. If everyone watching this decided to learn one new language,\n\n772\n00:40:16.160 --> 00:40:17.440\nwhat would\n\n773\n00:40:17.440 --> 00:40:22.870\nchange about how we lead, how we work, and how we understand each other? Quite\n\n774\n00:40:22.870 --> 00:40:24.240\na bit, actually,\n\n775\n00:40:24.240 --> 00:40:30.640\nbecause speaking another person's language gives you a whole new empathy,\n\n776\n00:40:30.640 --> 00:40:32.640\ncultural empathy,\n\n777\n00:40:32.640 --> 00:40:37.520\nbut personal empathy when you can connect with someone on that different level\n\n778\n00:40:37.520 --> 00:40:37.920\nreally changes\n\n779\n00:40:37.920 --> 00:40:43.860\nthings. Many people say that in their second language or other language, they\n\n780\n00:40:43.860 --> 00:40:44.640\nhave a different\n\n781\n00:40:44.640 --> 00:40:50.160\npersonality. That's kind of a fun thought for a leader, and could your people\n\n782\n00:40:50.160 --> 00:40:51.920\nunlock an aspect\n\n783\n00:40:51.920 --> 00:40:57.090\nof themselves that they didn't know they had? Is that a facility that's open to\n\n784\n00:40:57.090 --> 00:40:58.160\npeople? That's\n\n785\n00:40:58.160 --> 00:41:03.760\nsuper cool. Mostly, the number one thing, though, is that notion of empathy, of\n\n786\n00:41:03.760 --> 00:41:04.960\nunderstanding\n\n787\n00:41:04.960 --> 00:41:10.320\nthe world in a richer way. I know you're an athlete, Julie, and I read an\n\n788\n00:41:10.320 --> 00:41:11.600\narticle in Fast Company\n\n789\n00:41:11.600 --> 00:41:16.480\nrecently talking about how 94% of women in C-suite positions have a sports\n\n790\n00:41:16.480 --> 00:41:17.360\nbackground.\n\n791\n00:41:17.360 --> 00:41:23.320\nWhat did sports teach you that prepared you to be in the leadership role that\n\n792\n00:41:23.320 --> 00:41:24.400\nyou're in?\n\n793\n00:41:25.840 --> 00:41:35.690\nSo many things. Teamwork, the importance of teamwork. All of those euphemisms\n\n794\n00:41:35.690 --> 00:41:36.880\nthat come with a team,\n\n795\n00:41:36.880 --> 00:41:42.190\nthey're all true. There's no \"I\" in team. The importance of trust in a team\n\n796\n00:41:42.190 --> 00:41:43.760\nsetting, that's just\n\n797\n00:41:43.760 --> 00:41:49.840\nhuge. I'm an avid rower. I've come to that late in life, and I have really come\n\n798\n00:41:49.840 --> 00:41:51.040\nto appreciate that\n\n799\n00:41:51.040 --> 00:41:54.920\nyou're only as strong as the weakest link in the boat. If you want to succeed,\n\n800\n00:41:54.920 --> 00:41:55.440\nyou've got to make\n\n801\n00:41:55.440 --> 00:42:00.320\nsure that everyone's upskilling. Everyone is going as fast as they can, and\n\n802\n00:42:00.320 --> 00:42:01.600\nthen also that if you have\n\n803\n00:42:01.600 --> 00:42:06.610\nsomeone in the boat who's not trying, who's not pulling as hard as they can, it\n\n804\n00:42:06.610 --> 00:42:07.920\nis so toxic.\n\n805\n00:42:07.920 --> 00:42:14.720\nEveryone else in the boat will know it and resent it, whereas if everyone gives\n\n806\n00:42:14.720 --> 00:42:15.200\ntheir all,\n\n807\n00:42:15.200 --> 00:42:23.600\nif you don't win, it's still amazing. Those lessons are huge. From golf, I've\n\n808\n00:42:23.600 --> 00:42:24.080\nlearned,\n\n809\n00:42:26.080 --> 00:42:30.470\num, lessons around measurability. I mean, it's an incredibly measured sport,\n\n810\n00:42:30.470 --> 00:42:32.080\nright? Engineers\n\n811\n00:42:32.080 --> 00:42:35.480\nlove golf. There's a thousand stats you can collect, but at the end of the day,\n\n812\n00:42:35.480 --> 00:42:36.240\nyou're measuring\n\n813\n00:42:36.240 --> 00:42:41.950\nyour performance. How are you doing last week, this week? It's everything. I've\n\n814\n00:42:41.950 --> 00:42:42.960\nalso learned\n\n815\n00:42:42.960 --> 00:42:47.280\nthe importance of first impressions. I've, you know, I've played some corporate\n\n816\n00:42:47.280 --> 00:42:48.160\ngolf in my life,\n\n817\n00:42:48.160 --> 00:42:48.160\nand most of the time, it's with mostly guys. And, you know, so you're there at\n\n818\n00:42:48.160 --> 00:42:55.200\na corporate outing,\n\n819\n00:42:55.200 --> 00:42:58.100\nand maybe you're on a team. Usually you're on a team. It's a scramble at\n\n820\n00:42:58.100 --> 00:42:59.200\nwhatever it is,\n\n821\n00:42:59.200 --> 00:43:04.090\nand everyone's a milling around. And, um, I have a lousy short game. I can't\n\n822\n00:43:04.090 --> 00:43:05.200\npot to say in my life,\n\n823\n00:43:05.200 --> 00:43:10.080\nbut I'm 5'11\". I hit the ball pretty far, so I get up on the foot, and the\n\n824\n00:43:10.080 --> 00:43:10.960\ndriver is the best\n\n825\n00:43:10.960 --> 00:43:16.150\nclub in my bag. So I get up on the tee, and I hit it pretty good. And all the\n\n826\n00:43:16.150 --> 00:43:19.280\nguys, oh, look,\n\n827\n00:43:19.280 --> 00:43:23.040\nwe've got a winner here. Well, and like they're, you know, they gotta hit it\n\n828\n00:43:23.040 --> 00:43:23.920\nwell now because the\n\n829\n00:43:23.920 --> 00:43:27.710\ngirl just hit it really far, you know, that kind of thing. And it's all about\n\n830\n00:43:27.710 --> 00:43:29.200\nthat first impression.\n\n831\n00:43:29.200 --> 00:43:33.800\nNobody remembers that I didn't make a putt all day, um, because they just\n\n832\n00:43:33.800 --> 00:43:34.720\nremember, like, we'll have\n\n833\n00:43:34.720 --> 00:43:40.150\ntee shot. So first impressions really do matter, and putting effort into that\n\n834\n00:43:40.150 --> 00:43:41.840\ncan be important in\n\n835\n00:43:41.840 --> 00:43:46.760\nrelationships. There's so much more, but those are a couple of my, my golf, my\n\n836\n00:43:46.760 --> 00:43:48.000\nsports lessons.\n\n837\n00:43:48.000 --> 00:43:51.460\nJulie, this, this has been so much fun, and I want to have some more with my\n\n838\n00:43:51.460 --> 00:43:52.240\nlightning round of\n\n839\n00:43:52.240 --> 00:43:56.260\nquestions. So are you ready for this? I'm ready. What three words best describe\n\n840\n00:43:56.260 --> 00:43:56.400\nyou?\n\n841\n00:43:56.400 --> 00:44:03.200\nResourceful, resilience, determined. If you could be one person for a day\n\n842\n00:44:03.200 --> 00:44:04.160\nbeside yourself,\n\n843\n00:44:04.160 --> 00:44:09.040\nwho would it be? I think I'd be Michaelis Shiffrin right now. With my gold\n\n844\n00:44:09.040 --> 00:44:10.240\nmedal, I work hard for that.\n\n845\n00:44:10.240 --> 00:44:17.760\nWhat's your biggest pet peeve? I don't like repeating myself.\n\n846\n00:44:21.440 --> 00:44:25.320\nWho would play you in a movie? Well, I'm not going to give you anything\n\n847\n00:44:25.320 --> 00:44:26.240\nrealistic here. Like,\n\n848\n00:44:26.240 --> 00:44:30.530\nI'll give you my dream, my favorite actress, Meryl Streep. I see you a little\n\n849\n00:44:30.530 --> 00:44:30.720\nbit of a\n\n850\n00:44:30.720 --> 00:44:34.600\nreason. Well, it's there too. All right. What's the, what's the number of\n\n851\n00:44:34.600 --> 00:44:35.600\nlanguages you speak?\n\n852\n00:44:35.600 --> 00:44:41.570\nI mean, um, let's go with, could at one point in time speak reasonably well, I\n\n853\n00:44:41.570 --> 00:44:42.160\n'm going to go with\n\n854\n00:44:42.160 --> 00:44:46.650\ntwo and a half. What's something you've been curious about lately that has\n\n855\n00:44:46.650 --> 00:44:47.920\nnothing to do with work?\n\n856\n00:44:48.480 --> 00:44:51.880\nI'd really like to get better across country skiing, curious about how that\n\n857\n00:44:51.880 --> 00:44:52.400\nworks.\n\n858\n00:44:52.400 --> 00:44:57.450\nWhat's the one thing you do just for you? Swim. Besides your family and friends\n\n859\n00:44:57.450 --> 00:44:57.600\n,\n\n860\n00:44:57.600 --> 00:45:03.920\nwhat's your most prized possession? Wow, I golf clubs. If I turned on the radio\n\n861\n00:45:03.920 --> 00:45:04.800\nin your car,\n\n862\n00:45:04.800 --> 00:45:10.640\nwhat would I hear? It depends. Is either going to be NPR or Bloomberg? What's\n\n863\n00:45:10.640 --> 00:45:11.360\nsomething about you\n\n864\n00:45:11.360 --> 00:45:17.680\nthat few people would know? I am tougher than you think. Hey, what's the\n\n865\n00:45:17.680 --> 00:45:18.400\ndifference between\n\n866\n00:45:18.400 --> 00:45:24.370\nbeing tough and tough-minded? I suppose it's about resilience versus being open\n\n867\n00:45:24.370 --> 00:45:25.120\n-minded.\n\n868\n00:45:25.120 --> 00:45:29.280\nI think of tough-minded as not necessarily being open-minded. What's one of\n\n869\n00:45:29.280 --> 00:45:29.920\nyour daily\n\n870\n00:45:29.920 --> 00:45:35.280\nrituals? Something that you never miss? I always check my email. Um, I wouldn't\n\n871\n00:45:35.280 --> 00:45:36.000\nsay I never miss\n\n872\n00:45:36.000 --> 00:45:40.240\nexercise, but I try not to. You know, that's your out of the, what, light you\n\n873\n00:45:40.240 --> 00:45:41.440\nround? Great job. It's,\n\n874\n00:45:41.440 --> 00:45:45.230\nit's really great to be interviewing Meryl Streep. You know, I've been trying\n\n875\n00:45:45.230 --> 00:45:46.160\nto get you on the show\n\n876\n00:45:46.160 --> 00:45:55.120\nfor a long time. You know, getting back to technology and we'll wrap this up. I\n\n877\n00:45:55.120 --> 00:45:55.840\njust have a few more\n\n878\n00:45:55.840 --> 00:46:00.720\nquestions. You know, you stayed on top of technology, you know, scaling digital\n\n879\n00:46:00.720 --> 00:46:03.040\nand now AI with language\n\n880\n00:46:03.040 --> 00:46:08.510\nlearning. What's the common thread to how you've led through the digital\n\n881\n00:46:08.510 --> 00:46:10.320\ntransformations that you've\n\n882\n00:46:10.320 --> 00:46:17.010\nseen? Curiosity. I think it all starts with that. I am genuinely curious and\n\n883\n00:46:17.010 --> 00:46:18.560\ninterested in all of\n\n884\n00:46:18.560 --> 00:46:25.830\nthese new technologies. Um, not in a hobbyist way, but in a, what does this\n\n885\n00:46:25.830 --> 00:46:27.520\nmean for me for the world\n\n886\n00:46:27.520 --> 00:46:32.880\nway? And, you know, you're obviously leader. How do you, how do you lead at\n\n887\n00:46:32.880 --> 00:46:34.080\nhome? What do you take\n\n888\n00:46:34.080 --> 00:46:38.960\nhome with you when it comes to leadership? You learned so many things from your\n\n889\n00:46:38.960 --> 00:46:40.240\nkids, don't you?\n\n890\n00:46:40.240 --> 00:46:44.800\nI remember taking economics class for the first time and we started out with\n\n891\n00:46:44.800 --> 00:46:45.760\neconomics is the\n\n892\n00:46:45.760 --> 00:46:50.690\nstudy of the allocation of scarce resources. Like it is? I thought it was like\n\n893\n00:46:50.690 --> 00:46:52.000\nthe study of business\n\n894\n00:46:52.000 --> 00:46:57.470\nand money and whatever. No, that is the definition of economics and you, you\n\n895\n00:46:57.470 --> 00:46:58.240\nsee all the charts in\n\n896\n00:46:58.240 --> 00:47:02.120\nthe grass and you think, okay, supply, demand, got it. When you have kids, you\n\n897\n00:47:02.120 --> 00:47:03.040\nunderstand that\n\n898\n00:47:03.920 --> 00:47:09.860\nbecause everything for them is about scarce resources. Your attention that\n\n899\n00:47:09.860 --> 00:47:10.960\npiece of candy,\n\n900\n00:47:10.960 --> 00:47:16.530\nthe choice of the movie, everything is a scarce resource and they're always\n\n901\n00:47:16.530 --> 00:47:17.440\nfighting for it.\n\n902\n00:47:17.440 --> 00:47:23.540\nAnd so that insight, by the way, so helpful. It came from home. It definitely\n\n903\n00:47:23.540 --> 00:47:24.640\napplies at work.\n\n904\n00:47:24.640 --> 00:47:28.360\nUnderstanding how employees, even though we're all going for the same goal,\n\n905\n00:47:28.360 --> 00:47:29.760\nsometimes we feel\n\n906\n00:47:29.760 --> 00:47:34.180\nwe're in competition with each other for resources. That's hugely powerful\n\n907\n00:47:34.180 --> 00:47:34.720\ninsight.\n\n908\n00:47:34.720 --> 00:47:40.320\nAt home, I am the organizer. I am the one that maintains schedules and\n\n909\n00:47:40.320 --> 00:47:43.120\nregulations and routines.\n\n910\n00:47:43.120 --> 00:47:48.000\nDid you pick up that, make up that working for the Germans or is that something\n\n911\n00:47:48.000 --> 00:47:48.960\nyou've always had?\n\n912\n00:47:48.960 --> 00:47:56.240\nThat's just me. So no wonder they hired you. No, I'm a cowboy, remember. They\n\n913\n00:47:56.240 --> 00:47:56.800\nactually thought\n\n914\n00:47:56.800 --> 00:48:03.120\nyou're a kindred soul, but you're not a cowboy. It's all relative. What do you\n\n915\n00:48:03.120 --> 00:48:03.680\nsee as your\n\n916\n00:48:03.680 --> 00:48:09.270\nunfinished business, both for Babel and you personally? For Babel, we're not\n\n917\n00:48:09.270 --> 00:48:10.960\ndone. We have to,\n\n918\n00:48:10.960 --> 00:48:16.480\nthis new chapter for us is absolutely incredibly important. I'm really excited\n\n919\n00:48:16.480 --> 00:48:17.280\nabout making sure\n\n920\n00:48:17.280 --> 00:48:26.210\nthat we are winners in the AI age and not crushed by it. And candidly, we're a\n\n921\n00:48:26.210 --> 00:48:27.200\n19-year-old startup.\n\n922\n00:48:27.200 --> 00:48:31.330\nWe still have our VC investors, so there has to be some kind of something that\n\n923\n00:48:31.330 --> 00:48:32.240\nhappens in our\n\n924\n00:48:32.240 --> 00:48:37.970\nfuture. That feels like an unfinished business to me. In my personal life, we\n\n925\n00:48:37.970 --> 00:48:40.000\n're building a house\n\n926\n00:48:40.000 --> 00:48:44.120\nright now, and that feels very unfinished. It feels like it may never be\n\n927\n00:48:44.120 --> 00:48:45.520\nfinished, but I'm kind of\n\n928\n00:48:46.320 --> 00:48:51.520\nlooking forward to the point where it's mostly finished and the endless parade\n\n929\n00:48:51.520 --> 00:48:52.480\nof decisions\n\n930\n00:48:52.480 --> 00:48:59.080\nhave been mostly taken. That would be really satisfying. What's one piece of\n\n931\n00:48:59.080 --> 00:49:00.320\nadvice you'd give\n\n932\n00:49:00.320 --> 00:49:05.280\nto anyone who wants to be a better leader? I think it would be to dream big.\n\n933\n00:49:05.280 --> 00:49:08.080\nThat's for you as an\n\n934\n00:49:08.080 --> 00:49:13.730\nindividual contributor as well, but to be ambitious for your team. I think also\n\n935\n00:49:13.730 --> 00:49:14.640\nthere's that\n\n936\n00:49:15.440 --> 00:49:19.840\nincredibly important distinction between leading and managing. I think most\n\n937\n00:49:19.840 --> 00:49:20.960\nleaders need to first\n\n938\n00:49:20.960 --> 00:49:26.690\nfigure out how to be good managers. Not all of them, but most should go through\n\n939\n00:49:26.690 --> 00:49:27.600\nthat evolution\n\n940\n00:49:27.600 --> 00:49:31.920\nbecause it helps you be a better leader. But understanding that being a leader\n\n941\n00:49:31.920 --> 00:49:32.400\nis different\n\n942\n00:49:32.400 --> 00:49:37.280\nfrom being a manager, that it is your job to set the strategies, set the vision\n\n943\n00:49:37.280 --> 00:49:38.240\n, communicate that\n\n944\n00:49:38.240 --> 00:49:44.960\nclearly, and that you're responsible for execution as well as ideation. We've\n\n945\n00:49:44.960 --> 00:49:45.760\nall seen leaders that\n\n946\n00:49:45.760 --> 00:49:50.770\nwere all strategy all the time and couldn't get it done. You have to do both,\n\n947\n00:49:50.770 --> 00:49:52.320\nbut understanding the\n\n948\n00:49:52.320 --> 00:49:57.390\ndifference between managing the day-to-day, the people, and then leading a team\n\n949\n00:49:57.390 --> 00:49:58.480\n, it's different.\n\n950\n00:49:58.480 --> 00:50:05.280\nI really respect and appreciate great managers, the great manager who knows how\n\n951\n00:50:05.280 --> 00:50:06.160\nto get the best\n\n952\n00:50:06.160 --> 00:50:11.040\nout of every person. When you become a leader, you then have to be able to\n\n953\n00:50:11.040 --> 00:50:11.840\nthink systems,\n\n954\n00:50:11.840 --> 00:50:20.240\nstructures, strategy, frameworks, and those are different skills and embracing\n\n955\n00:50:20.240 --> 00:50:20.880\nthose skills\n\n956\n00:50:20.880 --> 00:50:25.010\nand learning that they're different from the skills that may do a great manager\n\n957\n00:50:25.010 --> 00:50:25.840\n. That would be,\n\n958\n00:50:25.840 --> 00:50:28.240\nI think, especially for newer leaders, really important.\n\n959\n00:50:28.240 --> 00:50:35.700\nAnd last question, when you think about women and business, female leaders,\n\n960\n00:50:35.700 --> 00:50:36.960\nwhat advice can\n\n961\n00:50:36.960 --> 00:50:40.240\nyou give to them on how to maximize their potential?\n\n962\n00:50:40.240 --> 00:50:46.160\nWomen often don't ask for more responsibility. I'm not trying to victim blame\n\n963\n00:50:46.160 --> 00:50:46.720\nhere. I'm just\n\n964\n00:50:46.720 --> 00:50:51.920\nsaying, we've all seen that women often just wait to be recognized and rewarded\n\n965\n00:50:51.920 --> 00:50:51.920\n,\n\n966\n00:50:52.560 --> 00:50:58.960\nand doesn't always work that way. I would counsel most women to be bolder,\n\n967\n00:50:58.960 --> 00:51:00.080\nraise your hand,\n\n968\n00:51:00.080 --> 00:51:04.800\nask for responsibility. As I said, I'm a pretty good listener, and I think that\n\n969\n00:51:04.800 --> 00:51:05.200\n's important,\n\n970\n00:51:05.200 --> 00:51:11.840\nactually. But I am not afraid to interrupt or be bold or put my ideas out there\n\n971\n00:51:11.840 --> 00:51:13.280\nwhen the time is\n\n972\n00:51:13.280 --> 00:51:19.100\nright, respectfully. But I think a lot of the times, women don't know how to do\n\n973\n00:51:19.100 --> 00:51:19.760\nthat, aren't\n\n974\n00:51:19.760 --> 00:51:24.200\nencouraged to do that. I don't know whether that's a personality, again, bug or\n\n975\n00:51:24.200 --> 00:51:24.720\nfeature,\n\n976\n00:51:24.720 --> 00:51:31.680\nwhether it's a learned behavior. I am, as I said, I'm 5'11. I see eye to eye\n\n977\n00:51:31.680 --> 00:51:32.560\nwith most men,\n\n978\n00:51:32.560 --> 00:51:38.480\nthat does help. But I think whatever it is that's taught me how to do that,\n\n979\n00:51:38.480 --> 00:51:40.640\nI would want to pass that on to other women.\n\n980\n00:51:40.640 --> 00:51:45.680\nGreat. And, Julie, I want to thank you for passing on your insights to all the\n\n981\n00:51:45.680 --> 00:51:46.160\nleaders that\n\n982\n00:51:46.160 --> 00:51:51.680\nlisten to this show, and appreciate you for taking the time. And I'm going to\n\n983\n00:51:51.680 --> 00:51:52.880\ntry to\n\n984\n00:51:52.880 --> 00:51:55.680\nget motivated to really finish one of these languages.\n\n985\n00:51:55.680 --> 00:52:01.760\nWell, the end. You should. Very satisfying. David, thank you so much. It's been\n\n986\n00:52:01.760 --> 00:52:02.320\na lot of fun.\n\n987\n00:52:02.320 --> 00:52:04.560\nI really appreciate your questions. Thank you.\n\n988\n00:52:04.560 --> 00:52:15.340\nDavid, after hearing this episode, I am desperate for you to speak to me in\n\n989\n00:52:15.340 --> 00:52:15.920\nMandarin,\n\n990\n00:52:15.920 --> 00:52:17.520\nfor the remainder of our conversation.\n\n991\n00:52:17.520 --> 00:52:19.680\nNeil.\n\n992\n00:52:19.680 --> 00:52:23.680\nIs that where it ends? Is that where your Mandarin ends?\n\n993\n00:52:23.680 --> 00:52:25.520\nShishi. There you go.\n\n994\n00:52:25.520 --> 00:52:31.270\nI love it. Well, David, I so enjoyed this conversation between you and Julie.\n\n995\n00:52:31.270 --> 00:52:32.000\nAs you know,\n\n996\n00:52:32.000 --> 00:52:36.160\nI've even talked about it on this show before. I am a language lover. I speak\n\n997\n00:52:36.160 --> 00:52:37.680\nSpanish. I play\n\n998\n00:52:37.680 --> 00:52:41.430\naround with speaking Greek because of my grandparents. And I just love what\n\n999\n00:52:41.430 --> 00:52:42.160\nlearning new\n\n1000\n00:52:42.160 --> 00:52:47.200\nlanguages allows you to experience. And so I thoroughly enjoyed this\n\n1001\n00:52:47.200 --> 00:52:47.760\nconversation.\n\n1002\n00:52:47.760 --> 00:52:50.660\nAnd I'm excited, David, to get your take on some of the themes that you and\n\n1003\n00:52:50.660 --> 00:52:51.760\nJulie discussed\n\n1004\n00:52:51.760 --> 00:52:56.080\nthroughout the episode so that our listeners can leave with some real tangible\n\n1005\n00:52:56.080 --> 00:52:56.800\ntools that they\n\n1006\n00:52:56.800 --> 00:53:00.850\ncan apply to their leadership and to their life. So the first one I really want\n\n1007\n00:53:00.850 --> 00:53:01.520\nto talk about is\n\n1008\n00:53:01.520 --> 00:53:06.000\nthis idea of empathy. Julie mentions in the episode that when leaders learn a\n\n1009\n00:53:06.000 --> 00:53:07.360\nnew language and learn\n\n1010\n00:53:07.360 --> 00:53:10.610\nhow to communicate with folks who come from a different background, it gives\n\n1011\n00:53:10.610 --> 00:53:11.520\nthem a whole new\n\n1012\n00:53:11.520 --> 00:53:16.400\nlevel of empathy for the people that they lead. And I just love that concept\n\n1013\n00:53:16.400 --> 00:53:17.600\nand what language\n\n1014\n00:53:17.600 --> 00:53:22.090\nallows people to experience. David, what are some other ways that leaders can\n\n1015\n00:53:22.090 --> 00:53:22.880\ndevelop empathy?\n\n1016\n00:53:22.880 --> 00:53:25.840\nBecause learning a language takes a lot of time and it's pretty hard.\n\n1017\n00:53:25.840 --> 00:53:33.300\nYeah. Well, first of all, I think learning another language shows such respect\n\n1018\n00:53:33.300 --> 00:53:36.800\nto the people that\n\n1019\n00:53:36.800 --> 00:53:44.950\nknow that language. And one of the things that I did when I went to Japan is I\n\n1020\n00:53:44.950 --> 00:53:45.760\nhad the first\n\n1021\n00:53:45.760 --> 00:53:53.520\nthree paragraphs of my speech written out in Japanese so that I could share it\n\n1022\n00:53:53.520 --> 00:53:55.120\nwith the Japanese\n\n1023\n00:53:55.120 --> 00:54:02.090\nfranchisees. Now, I did an absolutely terrible job. I butchered the Japanese so\n\n1024\n00:54:02.090 --> 00:54:02.800\nbad. And they\n\n1025\n00:54:02.800 --> 00:54:07.600\nliterally were laughing all the way through it. But when I was done, they gave\n\n1026\n00:54:07.600 --> 00:54:08.400\nme like a standing\n\n1027\n00:54:08.400 --> 00:54:15.050\novation because I tried. And I think learning a new language is hard. Putting\n\n1028\n00:54:15.050 --> 00:54:16.720\nyour neck out there\n\n1029\n00:54:16.720 --> 00:54:25.550\nand trying to offer it up in some way that just uniquely yourself is very hard.\n\n1030\n00:54:25.550 --> 00:54:26.960\nBut people appreciate\n\n1031\n00:54:26.960 --> 00:54:33.280\nthe effort. And I think that's really the cool thing about languages. It takes\n\n1032\n00:54:33.280 --> 00:54:34.080\na lot of effort\n\n1033\n00:54:34.080 --> 00:54:37.220\nto learn a second language. I think the United States were spoiled because we\n\n1034\n00:54:37.220 --> 00:54:38.160\n're the universal\n\n1035\n00:54:38.160 --> 00:54:41.920\nlanguage. Everybody learns our language and we expect everybody to know it,\n\n1036\n00:54:41.920 --> 00:54:43.360\nparticularly in the\n\n1037\n00:54:43.360 --> 00:54:46.260\neducated world because there's no way you're going to move up in a global\n\n1038\n00:54:46.260 --> 00:54:47.120\ncompany if you can't\n\n1039\n00:54:47.120 --> 00:54:50.300\nspeak English. So everybody has to learn English, but you don't have to learn\n\n1040\n00:54:50.300 --> 00:54:51.120\nSpanish if you're\n\n1041\n00:54:51.120 --> 00:54:56.000\nan American. You don't have to learn Mandarin. You know, you can get by because\n\n1042\n00:54:56.000 --> 00:54:56.560\neverybody's\n\n1043\n00:54:56.560 --> 00:55:03.840\nexpected to learn your language. So I wish I could speak more languages. I have\n\n1044\n00:55:03.840 --> 00:55:04.160\na hard\n\n1045\n00:55:04.160 --> 00:55:08.060\nenough time with this one. But the fact of the matter, the fact of the matter\n\n1046\n00:55:08.060 --> 00:55:08.960\nis, is if I could,\n\n1047\n00:55:08.960 --> 00:55:15.440\nI think I could be more relevant and more empathetic with a lot of other\n\n1048\n00:55:15.440 --> 00:55:16.320\nnationalities.\n\n1049\n00:55:16.320 --> 00:55:20.590\nBut you know, how can you develop empathy? I think the biggest thing I'd\n\n1050\n00:55:20.590 --> 00:55:21.520\nremember is this,\n\n1051\n00:55:21.520 --> 00:55:25.120\nis that, you know what, in every business, you have to study your customers,\n\n1052\n00:55:25.120 --> 00:55:26.880\nright? You have\n\n1053\n00:55:26.880 --> 00:55:30.480\nto study your customers. You got to know how your customers are thinking. If\n\n1054\n00:55:30.480 --> 00:55:31.120\nyou know how your\n\n1055\n00:55:31.120 --> 00:55:35.050\ncustomers thinking, you can be relevant to them. You can frame up what you\n\n1056\n00:55:35.050 --> 00:55:36.080\noffer to them in the\n\n1057\n00:55:36.080 --> 00:55:40.960\npositive way in a way that they're going to embrace it. Well, what I would say\n\n1058\n00:55:40.960 --> 00:55:42.400\nis, people\n\n1059\n00:55:42.400 --> 00:55:47.440\nthat you work with are customers too. Just think about it that way. Think about\n\n1060\n00:55:47.440 --> 00:55:48.320\npeople as\n\n1061\n00:55:48.320 --> 00:55:54.080\ncustomers. And if your success depends on your ability to communicate and lift\n\n1062\n00:55:54.080 --> 00:55:54.800\nand understand\n\n1063\n00:55:54.800 --> 00:56:00.150\ncustomer needs, then why don't you look at your people the same way? And I\n\n1064\n00:56:00.150 --> 00:56:01.520\nthink if you look at\n\n1065\n00:56:01.520 --> 00:56:05.150\nyour people the same way you think about customers, I think you will be more em\n\n1066\n00:56:05.150 --> 00:56:06.160\npathetic because you'll\n\n1067\n00:56:06.160 --> 00:56:10.040\nget inside their heads and you'll understand how they're really thinking. So\n\n1068\n00:56:10.040 --> 00:56:10.800\nthat would be my\n\n1069\n00:56:10.800 --> 00:56:14.530\nbiggest piece of advice. It reminds me that question that you always ask, what\n\n1070\n00:56:14.530 --> 00:56:15.120\nperceptions\n\n1071\n00:56:15.120 --> 00:56:18.550\nhabits or beliefs do I need to build change or reinforce in order to accomplish\n\n1072\n00:56:18.550 --> 00:56:19.040\nwhat I'm trying\n\n1073\n00:56:19.040 --> 00:56:23.420\nto accomplish? And I use that same question when I was thinking about how do I\n\n1074\n00:56:23.420 --> 00:56:24.240\nlead people.\n\n1075\n00:56:24.240 --> 00:56:28.790\nAnd that's why I wrote the book, Taking People With You. And it's all geared\n\n1076\n00:56:28.790 --> 00:56:29.680\ntowards being\n\n1077\n00:56:29.680 --> 00:56:33.230\nempathetic towards the people that you lead, understanding where they're coming\n\n1078\n00:56:33.230 --> 00:56:33.440\nfrom,\n\n1079\n00:56:33.440 --> 00:56:38.320\nand then you can overcome obstacles and inspire. Well, speaking of overcoming\n\n1080\n00:56:38.320 --> 00:56:38.800\nobstacles,\n\n1081\n00:56:38.800 --> 00:56:42.320\ngreat dovetail into the next topic that I want to get your insights on David,\n\n1082\n00:56:42.320 --> 00:56:47.200\nit's change management. And in the episode, Julie talks about how important it\n\n1083\n00:56:47.200 --> 00:56:47.520\nis\n\n1084\n00:56:47.520 --> 00:56:51.760\nto over communicate when you're going through a season of change. She says that\n\n1085\n00:56:51.760 --> 00:56:52.720\nwhen she is sick\n\n1086\n00:56:52.720 --> 00:56:57.860\nof hearing herself say something, that's about when it's finally sinking in for\n\n1087\n00:56:57.860 --> 00:56:59.360\nher team. Now,\n\n1088\n00:56:59.360 --> 00:57:03.380\naside from over communicating, what else should leaders focus on during a\n\n1089\n00:57:03.380 --> 00:57:04.480\nseason of change?\n\n1090\n00:57:04.480 --> 00:57:10.720\nHer point about over communicating is a good one to really start on, you know,\n\n1091\n00:57:10.720 --> 00:57:14.940\nor at least reinforce, because in media, there's this thing called effective\n\n1092\n00:57:14.940 --> 00:57:15.360\nreach,\n\n1093\n00:57:15.360 --> 00:57:21.520\nand that you're not going to get your message across in media unless people\n\n1094\n00:57:21.520 --> 00:57:22.960\nhave seen your\n\n1095\n00:57:22.960 --> 00:57:30.720\ncommercial or your advertisement at least four times. And that is why you look\n\n1096\n00:57:30.720 --> 00:57:32.160\nat effective reach,\n\n1097\n00:57:32.160 --> 00:57:36.400\nyou know, in terms of your media plans, because you want to make sure that\n\n1098\n00:57:36.400 --> 00:57:36.800\npeople\n\n1099\n00:57:37.360 --> 00:57:41.120\nsee your message at least four times. And if they don't see it four times, it's\n\n1100\n00:57:41.120 --> 00:57:41.680\nnot going to really\n\n1101\n00:57:41.680 --> 00:57:45.230\nsink in. So yeah, that's the way our life is. You got to communicate,\n\n1102\n00:57:45.230 --> 00:57:47.040\ncommunicate, communicate,\n\n1103\n00:57:47.040 --> 00:57:54.080\nbecause, you know, the more you say it, the more it will ultimately sink in. I\n\n1104\n00:57:54.080 --> 00:57:55.360\nthink when it comes to\n\n1105\n00:57:55.360 --> 00:57:59.720\nchange management and advice in that area, I think the most important thing you\n\n1106\n00:57:59.720 --> 00:58:00.320\nhave to do\n\n1107\n00:58:00.320 --> 00:58:04.480\nto drive change is you got to create a burning platform. People got to realize\n\n1108\n00:58:04.480 --> 00:58:05.040\nthat they keep\n\n1109\n00:58:05.040 --> 00:58:09.280\ngoing down the same path they're going to fail. And if you don't change, you're\n\n1110\n00:58:09.280 --> 00:58:10.240\ngoing to be in\n\n1111\n00:58:10.240 --> 00:58:15.150\ndeep water. And then what you have to do is make sure that that reality is\n\n1112\n00:58:15.150 --> 00:58:16.320\nreally understood,\n\n1113\n00:58:16.320 --> 00:58:20.560\nand then you got to create hope about what it's going to take to really drive\n\n1114\n00:58:20.560 --> 00:58:21.120\nthe change\n\n1115\n00:58:21.120 --> 00:58:26.800\nthat that'll take you to the promised land. So number one, you got to drive\n\n1116\n00:58:26.800 --> 00:58:27.920\nextreme pain\n\n1117\n00:58:27.920 --> 00:58:33.140\nand communicate that pain so clearly that everybody understands that, hey, they\n\n1118\n00:58:33.140 --> 00:58:33.760\ngot to\n\n1119\n00:58:33.760 --> 00:58:38.640\ndo something different, or we're going to keep getting the same results or\n\n1120\n00:58:38.640 --> 00:58:39.920\nworse results or\n\n1121\n00:58:39.920 --> 00:58:44.420\nbasically go out of business or lose our job. You know, you got to create pain.\n\n1122\n00:58:44.420 --> 00:58:45.280\nThen you got to\n\n1123\n00:58:45.280 --> 00:58:51.520\ncreate hope by having a process and an approach that's going to help you find\n\n1124\n00:58:51.520 --> 00:58:52.720\nthe answer that's\n\n1125\n00:58:52.720 --> 00:58:57.210\ngoing to get you moving in the right direction where you can succeed and your\n\n1126\n00:58:57.210 --> 00:58:58.400\npeople can win.\n\n1127\n00:58:59.280 --> 00:59:06.800\nAnd if people are motivated by pain and then the hope and the desire for a\n\n1128\n00:59:06.800 --> 00:59:08.320\nbetter outcome,\n\n1129\n00:59:08.320 --> 00:59:15.360\nI think you can drive it. But I think that's really important.\n\n1130\n00:59:15.360 --> 00:59:22.080\nAnd I will tell you this, all change management comes down to why. Why is it\n\n1131\n00:59:22.080 --> 00:59:24.160\nnecessary? What's in\n\n1132\n00:59:24.160 --> 00:59:32.310\nit for me and you as a leader? Are you going to do it too? That's very, very\n\n1133\n00:59:32.310 --> 00:59:32.720\npowerful.\n\n1134\n00:59:32.720 --> 00:59:37.040\nI love that third one because it invites that accountability to and\n\n1135\n00:59:37.040 --> 00:59:37.920\ntransparency with the\n\n1136\n00:59:37.920 --> 00:59:42.160\nteam. Hey, the pain's affecting me too. We all got to go here. And I'm going to\n\n1137\n00:59:42.160 --> 00:59:42.640\nlead the way I'm\n\n1138\n00:59:42.640 --> 00:59:46.030\ngoing to do it too, because if I don't do it, I'm going to be a deep one or two\n\n1139\n00:59:46.030 --> 00:59:47.760\n. So with change\n\n1140\n00:59:47.760 --> 00:59:52.880\noften comes conflict. And the theme of productive conflict is another one that\n\n1141\n00:59:52.880 --> 00:59:53.360\nI want to break\n\n1142\n00:59:53.360 --> 00:59:57.600\ndown with you, David. In the episode, Julie talks about when she is engaging in\n\n1143\n00:59:57.600 --> 00:59:58.640\nconflict. She usually\n\n1144\n00:59:58.640 --> 01:00:02.660\nalways leads with data because she loves numbers and she likes leaning on that\n\n1145\n01:00:02.660 --> 01:00:03.920\nwhen she's making\n\n1146\n01:00:03.920 --> 01:00:08.800\nher argument. But she also studies her audience first and she knows how they\n\n1147\n01:00:08.800 --> 01:00:09.840\nlike to receive\n\n1148\n01:00:09.840 --> 01:00:14.320\ninformation, whether they want a quiet room with a printout that they can read\n\n1149\n01:00:14.320 --> 01:00:15.040\nand reflect on,\n\n1150\n01:00:15.040 --> 01:00:19.280\nor if they want this big presentation with a lot of energy. When you think\n\n1151\n01:00:19.280 --> 01:00:19.920\nabout productive\n\n1152\n01:00:19.920 --> 01:00:23.840\nconflict, what advice would you give people who want to get better at it?\n\n1153\n01:00:23.840 --> 01:00:30.240\nWell, number one, recognize that no one even likes conflict. It's the least\n\n1154\n01:00:30.240 --> 01:00:30.880\nfavorite thing\n\n1155\n01:00:30.880 --> 01:00:37.120\nfor almost everybody in the world. If I asked a people, if I asked a thousand\n\n1156\n01:00:37.120 --> 01:00:38.000\npeople in a room to\n\n1157\n01:00:38.000 --> 01:00:41.560\nraise their hand if they like conflict, nobody'd raise their hand. So I think\n\n1158\n01:00:41.560 --> 01:00:42.080\nthe first thing you\n\n1159\n01:00:42.080 --> 01:00:47.820\nhave to do to have productive conflict is to embrace it. And I think what you\n\n1160\n01:00:47.820 --> 01:00:49.440\nhave to do is\n\n1161\n01:00:49.440 --> 01:00:54.320\nsniff out the conflict. Where is the conflict? And then when you know there's\n\n1162\n01:00:54.320 --> 01:00:54.640\nconflict,\n\n1163\n01:00:54.640 --> 01:01:02.400\nbring it up and seek productive conflict is when you seek an outlet outcome\n\n1164\n01:01:02.400 --> 01:01:03.680\nwhere the conflict\n\n1165\n01:01:03.680 --> 01:01:10.080\nno longer exists. Or you have an outcome that takes you down a path to where\n\n1166\n01:01:10.080 --> 01:01:10.560\nyou're going to\n\n1167\n01:01:10.560 --> 01:01:13.890\nminimize that conflict because you're going to come up with a much better\n\n1168\n01:01:13.890 --> 01:01:14.560\nsolution.\n\n1169\n01:01:14.560 --> 01:01:21.040\nProductive conflict means getting rid of the conflict through a better option\n\n1170\n01:01:21.040 --> 01:01:21.680\nand a better\n\n1171\n01:01:21.680 --> 01:01:26.560\nsolution. But you can't do that if you don't at least raise the issue. So I\n\n1172\n01:01:26.560 --> 01:01:27.680\nalways really believe\n\n1173\n01:01:27.680 --> 01:01:34.080\nthen I taught people in my leadership program to sniff out the slow nose. You\n\n1174\n01:01:34.080 --> 01:01:34.960\n've got to have\n\n1175\n01:01:34.960 --> 01:01:38.520\nan eye for conflict. You've got to be just watch the body language. A\n\n1176\n01:01:38.520 --> 01:01:41.840\nstereotypical example is,\n\n1177\n01:01:42.880 --> 01:01:49.760\nlet's say the finance guy always wants to raise prices. The marketing guy wants\n\n1178\n01:01:49.760 --> 01:01:50.640\nto keep the prices\n\n1179\n01:01:50.640 --> 01:01:55.060\nlow. That's a stereotypical conflict. So when somebody talks about a price\n\n1180\n01:01:55.060 --> 01:01:56.080\nincrease, make sure\n\n1181\n01:01:56.080 --> 01:01:59.790\nboth those people get engaged in the discussion. Don't let them let them just\n\n1182\n01:01:59.790 --> 01:02:00.800\nsit there with their\n\n1183\n01:02:00.800 --> 01:02:05.680\narms crossed saying, I think that's a dumb idea. Okay. You know, I think that's\n\n1184\n01:02:05.680 --> 01:02:06.560\nimportant.\n\n1185\n01:02:06.560 --> 01:02:11.440\nThe last thing I would say is that if you really want to have great productive\n\n1186\n01:02:11.440 --> 01:02:12.080\nconflict,\n\n1187\n01:02:12.080 --> 01:02:15.760\nyou have to have team together, team apart. Team together means you get\n\n1188\n01:02:15.760 --> 01:02:16.880\neverybody's input on a\n\n1189\n01:02:16.880 --> 01:02:20.330\ndiscussion. You know, get all the conflict out on the table, let everybody\n\n1190\n01:02:20.330 --> 01:02:21.520\nprovide their input,\n\n1191\n01:02:21.520 --> 01:02:26.080\nand then you as a leader, you know, work with the team to come up with the best\n\n1192\n01:02:26.080 --> 01:02:26.560\noutcome,\n\n1193\n01:02:26.560 --> 01:02:30.480\nthe best solution that you have at that point in time. Get everybody to agree\n\n1194\n01:02:30.480 --> 01:02:30.800\non it,\n\n1195\n01:02:30.800 --> 01:02:37.310\nand then execute the heck out of it. But demand everybody that now that we've\n\n1196\n01:02:37.310 --> 01:02:38.000\ntaken the time to\n\n1197\n01:02:38.000 --> 01:02:41.550\ngo through the productive conflict, to go through all the, to come up with the\n\n1198\n01:02:41.550 --> 01:02:42.480\nsolution, demand\n\n1199\n01:02:42.480 --> 01:02:46.810\neverybody to stay on the same page when they walk out the room. That is, now we\n\n1200\n01:02:46.810 --> 01:02:48.160\n're, we just\n\n1201\n01:02:48.160 --> 01:02:51.210\ndid team together. Now we're going to be team apart, and we're going to be,\n\n1202\n01:02:51.210 --> 01:02:52.080\nwhen we're apart,\n\n1203\n01:02:52.080 --> 01:02:55.130\nwe're going to be a team. We're going to stay true to what we just decided here\n\n1204\n01:02:55.130 --> 01:02:55.920\n. You don't want\n\n1205\n01:02:55.920 --> 01:03:00.200\npeople walking out after you have a discussion to try to, to where you deal\n\n1206\n01:03:00.200 --> 01:03:01.440\nwith all the conflict\n\n1207\n01:03:01.440 --> 01:03:05.760\nthat might be there. You don't want them walking out of the room and, you know,\n\n1208\n01:03:05.760 --> 01:03:06.560\ngoing off going,\n\n1209\n01:03:06.560 --> 01:03:10.640\ncan you believe Tim wants to do this? Can you believe Kula wants to do this? I\n\n1210\n01:03:10.640 --> 01:03:11.600\ncan't believe that.\n\n1211\n01:03:11.600 --> 01:03:15.620\nHey, if they do that after you've gone through the effort to have productive\n\n1212\n01:03:15.620 --> 01:03:16.880\nconflict and get\n\n1213\n01:03:16.880 --> 01:03:21.070\nall the issues out on the table, man, when I would see that happen, I'd hunt\n\n1214\n01:03:21.070 --> 01:03:22.000\nthose people down,\n\n1215\n01:03:22.000 --> 01:03:27.960\nand they would get one bit of two by four action by me. Okay? Because it's\n\n1216\n01:03:27.960 --> 01:03:28.960\nunacceptable. That's,\n\n1217\n01:03:28.960 --> 01:03:32.980\nthat's just not the way how you are as a team. You're going to be a team. You\n\n1218\n01:03:32.980 --> 01:03:33.680\nwork together to\n\n1219\n01:03:33.680 --> 01:03:37.340\ncome with the best solution, then you make the decision, then we all execute\n\n1220\n01:03:37.340 --> 01:03:38.880\nthe decision together.\n\n1221\n01:03:38.880 --> 01:03:43.760\nI'm so fired up by this, David, because I mean, candidly, I am someone who is\n\n1222\n01:03:43.760 --> 01:03:44.400\nnaturally pretty\n\n1223\n01:03:44.400 --> 01:03:47.640\nconflict diverse. And one thing that you've been encouraging me recently to do\n\n1224\n01:03:47.640 --> 01:03:48.080\nis to look\n\n1225\n01:03:48.080 --> 01:03:52.430\nfor opportunities to respectfully disagree. And so I wrote that down and it's\n\n1226\n01:03:52.430 --> 01:03:53.360\non a stick, you know,\n\n1227\n01:03:53.360 --> 01:03:58.820\non my laptop, it says look for opportunities to respectfully disagree. And I\n\n1228\n01:03:58.820 --> 01:04:00.480\nthink it's so true,\n\n1229\n01:04:00.480 --> 01:04:05.680\nbecause when conflict goes unspoken, it just turns into resentment, it turns\n\n1230\n01:04:05.680 --> 01:04:06.400\ninto distrust,\n\n1231\n01:04:06.400 --> 01:04:10.680\nand it turns into toxicity. So if you don't air it all out in the team together\n\n1232\n01:04:10.680 --> 01:04:11.200\npiece,\n\n1233\n01:04:11.200 --> 01:04:16.160\nyou're, you deserve a two by four by you. Yeah, right. Well, you know, I use\n\n1234\n01:04:16.160 --> 01:04:17.520\nthat only as an example\n\n1235\n01:04:17.520 --> 01:04:23.280\nto make my point. I never use the two by four literally, although I was very\n\n1236\n01:04:23.280 --> 01:04:23.840\ndirect to my\n\n1237\n01:04:23.840 --> 01:04:28.360\nfeedback when I have to be. And I think that's what, that's what you, you, you\n\n1238\n01:04:28.360 --> 01:04:29.600\nmust be able to do.\n\n1239\n01:04:29.600 --> 01:04:34.960\nAnd I've never seen anyone become a great leader without being able to deal\n\n1240\n01:04:34.960 --> 01:04:36.160\nwith conflict in a\n\n1241\n01:04:36.160 --> 01:04:39.900\nproductive fashion. Well, David, I've learned so much from you and from Julie\n\n1242\n01:04:39.900 --> 01:04:40.720\nthroughout this\n\n1243\n01:04:40.720 --> 01:04:45.680\nentire episode. So thank you again for such a great conversation. And thank you\n\n1244\n01:04:45.680 --> 01:04:46.480\nto our listeners\n\n1245\n01:04:46.480 --> 01:04:50.200\nfor tuning in to another episode of how leaders lead. We will see you next\n\n1246\n01:04:50.200 --> 01:04:50.960\nThursday.\n","is_pinned",false,"pinned_at","is_featured","featured_at","mix_url","https://chtbl.com/track/DCB44F/traffic.megaphone.fm/DVL4622140681.mp3","dx_media_id",3595,"video_media_id","thumbnail_image_media_id","published_date","2026-04-16","itunes_episode_id",287,"youtube_id","kAY1TbIoisg","2026-08-19T21:37:37.000000Z","Listen to this leadership podcast with Julie Hansen, CEO of Babbel, and discover how to fearlessly lead through big change and industry disruption.","dx_url","https://dnl.nyc3.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/uploads/ZrJvtTYqJJtL8N7A0arIfjAUxgkKuCOctq8OoQIs.mp3","dx_filename","ZrJvtTYqJJtL8N7A0arIfjAUxgkKuCOctq8OoQIs.mp3","dx_mux_playback_id","6Bg8LU8qCGK3grR01XWsr2WfpEfRqlimJi02XDiuIgR900","dx_waveform_url","https://dnl.nyc3.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/uploads/waveforms/3595.json","video_url","video_mux_playback_id","duration",3891635,"thumbnail_url","https://img.youtube.com/vi/kAY1TbIoisg/maxresdefault.jpg","thumbnail_image_url","dx_media",{"_13":66,"_96":80,"_97":78,"_98":-5,"_31":82,"_33":99,"_100":-5,"_101":84,"_87":88,"_102":-5},"video_media","thumbnail_image_media","filename","url","status","3KXufs00Wmp02d7BQcaXYDYHa9sWOZ00AXmLbUwzecVQlU","mux_upload_id","waveform_url","preview_media_id","first_name","Julie","last_name","Hansen","job_title","Babbel, CEO","Julie Hansen, Babbel, tech, CEO, female, woman","external_links","https://www.linkedin.com/in/juliehansenalexander",0,"image_media_id",3565,3566,"2026-07-20T20:33:34.000000Z","send_push_notification_at","image_url","https://dnl.nyc3.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/uploads/IVb6aNYrhqg0AOSDX65kpdq9DSh7yohXueVpmNye.jpg","https://dnl.nyc3.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/uploads/wNRjOVtMoW8emMjVEfQnce3Hs15HfEyRxf5hlJ8P.jpg","https://www.howleaderslead.com/leaders/274/julie-hansen","industry_id",2,"industry",{"_13":123,"_134":135,"_136":138},"industries",[133],"image_media",{"_13":114,"_96":132,"_97":119,"_98":-5,"_31":-5,"_33":-5,"_100":-5,"_101":-5,"_87":-5,"_102":-5},{"_13":115,"_96":131,"_97":120,"_98":-5,"_31":-5,"_33":-5,"_100":-5,"_101":-5,"_87":-5,"_102":-5},"wNRjOVtMoW8emMjVEfQnce3Hs15HfEyRxf5hlJ8P.jpg","IVb6aNYrhqg0AOSDX65kpdq9DSh7yohXueVpmNye.jpg",{"_13":123,"_134":135,"_136":137},"name","Technology","pivot",{"_35":36,"_122":123},{"_35":36,"_122":123},"user","token","favorites",[],"collections",[],"env",{"_147":148,"_149":150,"_151":152,"_153":154,"_155":156},"GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID","644017954836-qpllhu38r0tsrtfq85ukntcvsb0akbht.apps.googleusercontent.com","APPLE_CLIENT_ID","com.howleaderslead.webapp","APPLE_REDIRECT_URI","https://www.howleaderslead.com/auth/apple-callback","APP_URL","https://howleaderslead.com","GTM_ID",""]