Laurie McGraw is speaking with Inspiring Woman Dr. Jenny Schneider about the new Home[ward] Grown program to elevate women founders and leaders that was launched last year. Nikita Singareddy and Cydney Kim, co-founders of Fortuna Health, are the first mentee graduates of Home[ward] Grown and join this Inspiring Women conversation.
Home[ward] Grown has both an external and internal focus to strengthen and support women in their leadership journeys. Jenny shared Home[ward] Grown was launched because empowering women is more than just a matter of equitable representation – It’s a business imperative. Jenny believes in order to achieve the ultimate promise of healthcare’s triple aim of improved patient experience, outcomes and cost requires us to elevate the vital perspective of healthcare’s leading consumers: women.
In this discussion, Jenny, Nikita and Cydney discuss how this program went and how they all benefitted. Mentorship and mentEEship is fluid. Setting up regular calls with open ended agendas put responsibility on the shoulders of Nikita and Cydney. One of their important conversations was about simply discussing all of the hard business problems they were facing at the company today. How should they approach a current business decision, and could they go through how it might impact their trajectory in the future? For Nikita and Cydney, they were able to take these discussions and use them in their reality of building Fortuna Health. For Jenny, while she has significantly more experience in building and scaling companies, she too learned new approaches to business problems – or certain areas of healthcare where she wasn’t as familiar. From this conversation you can also hear the energy that Jenny, Nikita, and Cydney drew from this opportunity to work together in a concentrated way during the course of the program. Energy from solving big problems. Energy from getting to know other passionate builders who also dream of solving big problems and aim to have a large impact.
The Home[ward] Grown model for mentorship is a new time based and concentrated approach to mentorships which is so important for leadership success. As the first “graduates’ of this quarterly program, both Nikita and Cydney were effusive regarding the opportunity and how they felt it was helpful to them and their company. For other leaders who want to give of their time and experience to other founders/leaders, this approach to mentorship may be appealing and may also align with otherwise busy calendars.
Inspiring Women looks forward to showcasing future conversations with women in the Home[ward] Grown mentorship program.
Guest Bios:
- Nikita Singareddyis the co-founder and CEO of Fortuna Health, a multi-lingual platform to easily check eligibility, enroll, and recertify on Medicaid (backed by Andreessen Horowitz). Nikita has worked as a healthcare investor and served in strategy and operations roles at Oscar Health and Truepill. She is a former Medicaid beneficiary.
- Cydney Kimis the co-founder and COO of Fortuna Health, a Medicaid navigation platform. Prior to Fortuna, Cydney served as VP of Strategy & Operations and GM for a Series C health tech company (HALO Dx) where 30% of the patients were Medicaid beneficiaries. Cydney has worked in a number of commercial and operator roles spanning healthcare and tech/media.
- Dr. Jenny Schneider is the CEO of Homeward, a technology-enabled healthcare provider delivering care to those who don’t have it, starting in rural America. Previously, she served 5 years as the Chief Medical Officer and President of Livongo responsible for product, data science, engineering, marketing, clinical operations, and growth strategy. In her final year at Livongo, they led the company through the largest consumer digital health Initial Public Offering in history, a secondary offering, a convertible debt offering that raised over $540 million, and the industry’s largest merger ever between Livongo and Teladoc Health, valuing Livongo at $18.5 billion and beginning a new era of consumer centric virtual care. Honored by Modern Healthcare as one of the 50 Most Influential Clinical Executives and by Fierce Healthcare as Woman of Influence for work empowering women and modeling diversity and inclusion in the workplace.
[00:00:00] and it's hard, it's hard to be a mentee. It's hard to get value as a mentee unless you come with questions to ask and like questions have to have your ego has to go completely out the gate and say like look I am doing this I have no idea and we had a really interesting conversation all of the three of us where it was like we're just going to ask hard questions egos at the gate and like how do we get to a solve them that or what's your thoughts on a potential solve it's a discussion I'm not in a decision making capacity but
[00:00:30] we're going to approach each conversation or time slot with coming with questions and I think it's for people who are listening to this like finding a mentor who has had experience is great finding a mentor who will go to bat and be a sponsor is is what you should be looking for.
[00:00:49] The job is a mentee is not for the mentor to bring you ideas but to come in with humility and no ego and ask all the hard questions and have an open conversation and that that is I think what makes mentorship, mentorship and sponsorship work really well and and you may you may not find the right person that's okay too.
[00:01:09] I think those are the key ingredients that make something very effective.
[00:01:16] This is inspiring women I'm very excited about today's conversation now I'm speaking with Dr. Jenny Schneider now you know Dr. Jenny Schneider because she is an iconic leader across the healthcare industry with several unicorn companies under her belt but she's the CEO and founder of the company.
[00:01:37] She's been on the podcast before when she was just announcing the launch of home word which focuses on rural healthcare and recently also announced the achievement of be corporation status Jenny congratulations on that that is talking about your social impact in addition to your business impact but why are we having this episode because of the many innovative things that home word does Jenny announced last year.
[00:02:06] She was announced last year that she was setting up a new program called home word grown and today that is a mentoring program where she mentors key entrepreneurs innovative women leaders and today we're also going to be speaking with Nikita Singareti and Sydney Kim and they are the co founders of fortuna health Nikita Sydney thank you for being on inspiring women.
[00:02:32] Thank you.
[00:02:35] Well let's dive in Jenny let's talk about this mentoring program that you launched last year you announced I mean we talk about mentoring all the time here on inspiring women how important it is but you decided to do something specific and different with this mentoring program so what is home word grown.
[00:02:56] Thank you Lori for the opportunity to be here and truly just to showcase Nikita and Sydney who are awesome female founders like you I believe mentorship is critical for mentorship and sponsorship I would add for for female success and we know that there's a fewer female founders and CEOs and there are relative to men.
[00:03:19] And we can change that and the not because there's no talent is just because of historical system that has led us that direction and so part of home word grown the inspiration for home word grown was really to give back into invest into women leaders and women founders in a way that I could make it very.
[00:03:39] Kind of boxed if you will like make it very meaningful and so in my professional journey and i'm sure in yours and i'm sure in cities and Nikita there's often people asking us questions and you want to have the time to be as helpful as you can.
[00:03:55] And you want to be able to have information flow and so home word grown has two different components to it one is identifying female founders of the gate and and figuring out a time a set schedule time over three months where we can actually just have an open dialogue and that is very open can go any direction because as a founder you're often.
[00:04:18] Often dealing with really, really big strategic questions and really, really minutia questions and sometimes you need somebody you can just do a quick sounding board that maybe has been through it or has an opinion so that you can factor that into your decision making.
[00:04:32] And so that was the genesis for home word grown in the external we also launched a home word grown internal where we're supporting and developing our own female employees to advance in their leadership within the organization and into other jobs as they go through their career.
[00:04:48] So it has two different key components to it.
[00:04:51] Well, today we're going to focus on the external component of this and you know Jenny when you first were talking about this program with me I was just so excited about it because it's just so you know for many many busy.
[00:05:05] executives who want to give back in that kind of way you're providing a new structure so we want to learn more about that but Nikita and Sydney let's just start with you before we even go into the mentoring part tell us a little bit about each of who you are and also a bit about the company that you co founded together.
[00:05:25] Yeah, I'm sure i'm happy to go ahead and yeah why don't you share more about the company too so really nice to meet you and a Sydney i'm co founder and CEO of or tuna I started my career doing very much the safe thing college management consulting then went and joined a client and industry.
[00:05:45] And it took me many years to actually get into tech and to get into the idea of being comfortable bounding a company thinking I had the confidence to do it thinking I had the skills to do it.
[00:05:55] And so throughout you know that journey in that path a lot of it was finding mentors and having mentors who brought me up in terms of skillset trajectory who gave me the skills and so about a year ago really feeling like I had done a couple years at a different health tech startup having helped scale it from seed to series.
[00:06:16] I still from seed to series see I felt the time was right to really found a company you know on my own with a fantastic team and I was looking for co founders in the health care space who really wanted to build something with a very clear mission.
[00:06:30] Something and to really just do something that had a lot of impact in the world and that's how I came across Nikita and our third co founder to build a really big company in the Medicaid space.
[00:06:42] And that's like Nikita what about you I mean you are it's just the story behind like how you found this company were chatting about it.
[00:06:50] You know pre getting on air here so tell us about Nikita like who are you and how did you come up with this idea for for tuna health.
[00:06:58] Yeah so I'm Nikita co founder and CEO of for tuna and what we do is help folks the 90 million who are eligible or already on Medicaid understand their eligibility enroll and renew and recertify it's a really challenging fragmented our newest experience today.
[00:07:17] And what we've done is try to really simplify that and personalize it for households for individuals on the team that support them.
[00:07:26] And part of the reason we also love working with Jenny that the focus of homeward is in the rural in rural communities and those are traditionally folks that are often on Medicaid and are facing barriers to care, barriers to access in a very material pandrical real world way.
[00:07:45] And so even in you know just as we continue the conversation what I love about being able to talk to Jenny and having mentors like Jenny is not just here in the mentor that's a woman leader it's two things that you can actually ask at a strategic business questions at the high level as well as the tactical level that she was mentioning that is super valuable when a lot of the mentoring that has been done today that.
[00:08:14] And I talk about this it's very much you know here's a coffee chat so you can go to with different leaders and that's just not going to be helpful as someone building a business for.
[00:08:26] We need to deliver value we need to do right by our customers and by our users those aren't just things that we can you know at 30 minute coffee chat meeting that's just nice it is not going to get us.
[00:08:37] But the way that Jenny has thought about this program is about the tactical and about the strategic.
[00:08:42] And you're also you know you're in a health care industry where you are looking to tackle an enormous problem 90 million Americans who have the ability perhaps to get on to Medicaid and that process is arduous so maybe before we go on to the mentoring program tell us a little bit the problem that you're trying to solve and the why you decided to tackle such an enormous issue.
[00:09:06] Yeah I can so I can describe the current world and what we like to say the the experience before for tuna.
[00:09:16] Understanding if you're eligible or your household is eligible for Medicaid is contingent on what state you're in the type of Medicaid that you could enroll in beyond income which a lot of people understand to be the basic requirement for for Medicaid eligibility there is status of disability.
[00:09:34] Immigration etc all of these edge scenarios that might make you including medical debt eligible for Medicaid.
[00:09:42] The average person shouldn't be expected to know this it's like knowing all the tax rules in X state but there's nothing that's a really clear simple experience to understand in a simple sense one of my eligible for an additional two things I'll add on to that is folks are nervous to provide information like social security etc just to check at a high level.
[00:10:03] Am I eligible and those are some of the structural things today that they have to go through the second that I'll add is language barriers and understanding even what is Medicaid to begin with can be very confusing so to make that easier and simple is an you know it is a question of designing a beautiful understandable experience not that we've been trying to do with or to not.
[00:10:26] And the second part that we're trying to do it for us in terms of barriers is just enrollment enrollment is right with people making mistakes filling out application some parts of the application may be online but it's only some type one specific type of Medicaid application others are only available manually and then when you go back and forth with the state or with the county or whatever the administrative body is that might adjudicate the Medicaid that you might that you're eligible for there are a lot of things that fall in the in between because.
[00:10:56] People miss mail or they don't understand the thing that they're supposed to go back and forth on not as separate from remembering to renew on time when only about 11 states send any form of electronic communication to remind you to do your renewal so imagine that's most states.
[00:11:12] You may be one piece of mail that says hey remember to renew on Medicaid and if you miss that then you likely won't renew on time so close to 70% plus of all the churn that happens in Medicaid is because of these procedural reasons so that's really what we're trying to tackle with our product is here are all things that should be solved should be simple should be easy and personalized if there was a digital navigation way to get through the process so that's really the world before or two not and then how we're thinking about the world.
[00:11:42] I'm just smiling because I just love the crispness of the way that you're talking about this problem and then how you are trying to provide a solution to address it in a really impactful way so congratulations on that first really critical step of founding what I hope will be a very, very successful company let's move to the mentorship because I think there are a lot of people that would like to.
[00:12:12] So I think it's really important to get on Jenny's calendar and pick her brain and get some advice so how did you hear about this homeward grown program how did you get into it.
[00:12:22] Yeah, I can answer that quickly too so one of the investors that we had talked through through our fundraising process new Jenny recommend and Jenny and that's how we got in touch and we learned about the program we also knew a couple of other folks in common which both very highly too those people knew Jenny and spoke.
[00:12:42] And said great things about her so I figured meeting her and getting to know her would be amazing so that was you know number number one and then the second is just I heard from a lot of people we were early in the company building.
[00:12:56] People that'll give you the best advice no matter what you can have great investors you can have great advisors that just give good things to think about former founders and former executives are going to be the best people to talk to they just know exactly not just how to answer the question.
[00:13:11] But they know what you've gone through before because they've done not just this scenario but five other permutations and the scenario that you're thinking about so that's really why I was beyond learning about the program why I was very excited to do it with with Cindy and Jenny.
[00:13:26] So so Jenny you you made people apply yeah so like how did you like even figure out how to like you know determine who to give your concentrated time to.
[00:13:39] Well so I would say you could see the passion that Nikita and Sydney have in founding and so like that's a big part of this like I am a firm believer that if you're passionate about what you're building your chances of success skyrocket and so they have a Christmas you are articulated this lawyer crisp understanding what they're solving and a true passion.
[00:13:59] And so for me from my perspective I have the opportunity and privileged actually look at where people are in their journey what is the what is the thing that they're solving and is that of interest to me and serving underserved people holistically my whole career has been interesting to me.
[00:14:18] And so really excited by the idea of the business but also understanding where people are in the journey of building that business I agree with Nikita like there's nothing like talking to another founder it's there is no equivalent there's like a theory and a strategy but actually having been in the trenches and done it like you have a lot of scars and those scars are very valuable to other people.
[00:14:40] To decrease their scars or give them scars in different directions or new scars like you get to collectively learn together and for me personally I mean so as I look at where are people in the journey of their business I think can I be useful from the outside of their specific ways and also you know I get a lot back so being a mentor and a mentee is not a one way relationship but to buy directional conversation and so.
[00:15:03] There is a lot of learning that I get but also inspiration that I receive on behalf of getting to be on a team with other and collaborate with other strong we know smart women founders.
[00:15:15] Yeah there's a lot of energy that comes out of that and there's no end to the scars of the future right that that never never ends okay so let's just on nuts and bolts so this was a what once like what was the structure of the program.
[00:15:32] Yes or didn't go ahead Sydney because we haven't heard much from Sydney go for it yeah so you know it what's amazing about this program is kind of regular sessions where I think you know even in that first session it was and Jenny was very clear early on there's no kind of you know a forced format to it where we cover one topic and another topic because a lot of this as we said the benefit is kind of the just in time need to discuss a business case a decision something like that.
[00:16:01] It's a decision something top of mind for us as we're navigating a complex problem or some business decision to make so even in our first session and the first five minutes you know as we were talking about how we wanted to even structure these calls how do we want to spend the time together I think within five minutes we jumped into.
[00:16:19] We're actually at a crossroads on whether we scale into a second state or scale to another customer versus doubling down on something that we have how do we make that decision and we kind of very quickly fell into that rabbit hole strategizing debating all the various kind of sides of that approach and so that naturally became the format for that first session where I think we spent the majority of it talking through that decision that we had to make at that time.
[00:16:43] And that and we walked away from that with a lot more clarity a lot of perspective on how we were going to make that decision something that we had to make within a week and so it was super valuable from you know a business perspective a tactical perspective and you know I think that's what we're so excited about other sessions being you know about decisions we're facing about strategic next steps that we need to discuss and decide.
[00:17:08] And I'll add on to the 30 minute sessions that we had roughly about once a month.
[00:17:13] Yeah, to be specific on that was Jenny was amazing and continuing to not just email us about opportunities or things that we should be thinking about which was really proactive like she didn't have unless you cared about mentoring she wouldn't have done any of those things to we were you know put in a list of top 20 x y z thing.
[00:17:36] And Jenny with the first email I got congratulating so I don't know if she has a Google alert set up for us or whatever it is but it's the tactical sessions that of course are those 30 minutes and we're helpful but the ongoing hey this is just someone who is champion and identifying opportunities for us is the combination of I think what made it really great and special.
[00:17:59] yeah and what you're talking about is what Jenny mentioned it's not just the mentoring aspect of problem solving and advice giving but that sponsorship.
[00:18:09] The cheerleader in your corner behind the scenes whether you know that they're cheerleading for you or not and then it's showing up and that.
[00:18:17] It's confidence building it just knowing that you have some other you know highly visible highly prominent highly known leader like Jenny does must feel fantastic for you just to know that persons there for you.
[00:18:32] Jenny what type of thing so so I get the energy that comes with it and that is inspiring to you as an individual leader wouldn't you learn out of these sessions in terms of some of the things that Sydney and Nikita were tackling during the mentorship period.
[00:18:50] yeah so it's a great so there are specifics you know there are their business specifics on the topic of what they're doing and you heard some of that out the gate around kind of this is a.
[00:19:01] Programmatic failure around and rolling people in Medicaid and and then therefore feels like it should have a fix and yet the fix has not arrived and it's like what are the different areas that you have to tackle to get that.
[00:19:13] What are the different who are the different stakeholders at the different levels and how do you how do you work your way through that and so I have not navigated that before and so I get as in as i'm hearing the questions around.
[00:19:25] We're thinking about Sydney giving example of do we broaden do we go deeper do we go wider right.
[00:19:30] So I get to hear like what are the what are that issues as you're going through that you're going to have to tackle how harder they so I learned a lot more around the just the operationally operational pieces of getting at the front of an enrollment to Medicaid.
[00:19:43] So like that's that's fun for me to learn in a in a conversation that you typically don't get to unless your problem solving something specific and so one of the things that I love.
[00:19:55] And it's hard it's hard to be a mentee it's hard to get value as a mentee unless you come with questions to ask and like questions have to have.
[00:20:04] Your ego has to go completely out the gate and say like look i am doing this, I have no idea and we had a really interesting conversation all of the three of us where.
[00:20:13] It was like we're just going to ask hard questions egos at the gate and like how do we get to a solve them that or what's your thoughts on a potential solve it's a discussion i'm not in a decision making capacity, but.
[00:20:24] These two approach each each each conversation or time slot with coming with questions and I think is for people who are listening to this like.
[00:20:33] Finding a mentor who has had experience is great finding a mentor who will go to bat and be a sponsor is is what you should be looking for.
[00:20:43] And that your job as a mentee is not for the mentor to bring you ideas but to come in with humility and no ego and ask all the hard questions.
[00:20:52] And have an open conversation and that that is I think what makes mentorship mentee ship and sponsorship work really well and and you may if you may not find the right person that's okay to.
[00:21:03] You may find a great person and outgrow them that's okay to that's all part of the process, but I think those are the key ingredients that makes something very effective.
[00:21:12] And Sydney and Nikita so you came to these half hour sessions with your list of hard business questions things that you were looking on to solve for can you give us an example of maybe something that wasn't on that list that i'm sure you prepped for to go into these conversations that was also useful that came out of these this this mentorship program.
[00:21:36] Yeah, I mean we're it's just in the life and especially early stages and even now actually more so now we have tens of decisions that we're making on the daily and each one feels like.
[00:21:47] Are we making bad decisions is this going to ruin the trajectory is this going to ruin.
[00:21:54] You know how we scale as a company and so I think we came in wanting to really you know get some value out of a question around scaling states the go wide or go leave strategy for the company.
[00:22:05] I think where we ultimately landed too was a different area during that call about as we scale, how do we scale thoughtfully do we you know hire 10 people quickly do hire to actually solve the needs of the you know the first couple customers and scale very quickly.
[00:22:21] Or do you more methodically figure out what your product is build a bit more slowly and we kind of entered into that topic as well, and that we hadn't really prepared for but we realize while talking to Jenny that that's a really big pain point for us to figure out as well this completely other area.
[00:22:38] And because we had such great discussion on the first topic we were just going down various rabbit holes with all the different pressing topics concern at that moment.
[00:22:48] And what I liked about that particular particular session to was there's no binary effort to a lot of business decision.
[00:22:57] And I think especially when you know we're pretty high founders.
[00:23:00] We are always hoping okay there's a right answer someone's going to give us the magic bullet.
[00:23:05] And especially remember after first call with Jenny like okay well we got was helpful actually a framework to help us think through this that is not the silver magic billet that people are you know we're hoping for
[00:23:17] But there isn't going to be one.
[00:23:19] So once you do understand or do have a sense of how you develop the framework, the job doesn't just stop at the mentoring session.
[00:23:27] It's okay now we have to take action and we have to take additional steps on top of that because it's just a place to start
[00:23:36] And a framework to start from and then ultimately decisions will always fall on the will always fall on the team.
[00:23:42] Yeah, so you can take high quality inputs and that's always high quality inputs the strongest correlation to a high quality output.
[00:23:50] So whatever you can do and gather that can be as you know as helpful as possible.
[00:23:56] You never know unfortunately what the outcome is going to be the outcome can differ because of a variety of variables you never thought of.
[00:24:03] But if you can be as thoughtful about your upfront approach as strategic about your upfront approach hopefully that materializes and I think that that was like the biggest yeah for me the biggest thing is okay there's never going to be a right answer.
[00:24:16] So how do you try to learn how to think through problems.
[00:24:20] Um, probably yeah and the only to add that just really triggered for me a really important feeling that I got out of that was just like the confidence to make decisions quickly.
[00:24:30] And knowing that there isn't a binary but knowing that there are many different possible outcomes to just make that decision decisively, confidently and own up to whatever the outcomes were.
[00:24:40] So we talked about all the different pros and cons and different ways to look at things of many different topics.
[00:24:46] But coming out of that I think we came out with a really strong feeling of okay let's just decide that by the end of the day and let's just pick it pick up pick it up and then move on.
[00:24:55] And that was like you know smiley because it's like I wanted to ask you, you know how you're thinking about taking the learnings from these mentorship sessions and then applying it after your home or ground period ends.
[00:25:12] So is it is it mainly decision a framework for decision making? How did you bring how did you bring it like from the session to, you know, the team rooms and where all the work is being done.
[00:25:24] Yeah I mean one concrete example is I think we before that call we had to make a decision on whether we were going to take on an additional pilot that could test different new concepts for us or did we maybe not have the resources.
[00:25:39] Did we potentially not have the bandwidth to take on this additional thing and we kind of came in hoping to get some you know perspective.
[00:25:47] And I think when we left we left with the feeling of there is no right answer but a lot of really good perspective, but we left with that confidence we took it back to the team.
[00:25:56] We all sat around and we said we're just going to make a gut call and all stand behind whatever decision we make on this pilot and we're going to either contract or not by the end of the day.
[00:26:04] And so that was a very so at the end of I think we did decide to take on an additional pilot and kind of throw ourselves and our energy at that.
[00:26:13] And even though it felt kind of uncomfortable in that moment just the feeling that you know what we decided to do it and this is a part of the learning process and we're going to, you know, be very positive and confident about it. That was that was been changed.
[00:26:27] Yep. So as my real good that part of entrepreneurship around and we all do this I do this, I do this today like.
[00:26:37] Like how much risk should I take and can I for confidence can I look for reassurance that i'm doing the right thing.
[00:26:44] And you have a conversation and the conversation allows you to be open to possibilities for the business that will either be great or they won't.
[00:26:54] Yes, and both are okay and that's that's the like discussion around we all feel that is founders.
[00:27:01] We all feel that almost every day and you're and you're asking yourself like is that okay because you're you're used to like doing things with assuredness right like having a right answer having a right direction.
[00:27:13] So the ability to actually have a framework and and recognize that it's okay to fail like what like is the failure little failure a little laugh for a big F right.
[00:27:22] What does that mean and how do you plan for that, you know, downstream, you know consequences that might happen like those are the types of conversations that the framework really helps you work through that are very real.
[00:27:34] For those of us who are doing something that we've never done before because the business has not existed before.
[00:27:40] Even if you're even if you've been a founder before the new business has not existed so you're still asking yourselves those similar questions.
[00:27:46] These are such important sort of like principles for building a business that comes from live successful experience of a founder to you both as founders.
[00:27:58] I want to talk about you as individuals and leaders, I want to ask you know Nikita and Sydney you this question and then Jenny I want to see the same question in terms of your perspective.
[00:28:08] This program homework ground how do you do you think that you have changed as leaders and you know during this on time and it's a relatively short time just a couple of months was that did that impact your leadership style and if so how and then I want to ask Jenny on the same question for for you.
[00:28:30] Yeah, I'm happy to answer that I think what was really helpful in terms of this program was also that something that Jenny mentioned earlier.
[00:28:40] It has in some ways it has to be at the right time so for us it was perfectly at the right time for things that were happening for us and our business not only we'd never run into certain scenarios before.
[00:28:53] But just we were learning how do you run a company and how do you be in your particular roles like what did the end Jenny and I've actually talked about this a couple of times before.
[00:29:02] Being at CEO when you're the founding team versus being a CEO when you're a team of 10 versus being a CEO and you're a team of 100 versus BFCO 0 at a team of 50.
[00:29:11] All of those things you are going to change out the person no matter what because what's required of you it's needed of you is going to adapt and change because you need to.
[00:29:20] You're building a different business and many ways each time and when Jenny first shared that that's oh that's what's going to happen and that's okay.
[00:29:30] When we started you know with these conversations and sessions with Jenny.
[00:29:35] That was the for that for us was the the beginning in many ways of our business starting to scale so a lot of the questions we were asking Jenny the things that we needed to do adapt to have processes as as leaders.
[00:29:48] We're just that it was it was the right place and the right time for the business.
[00:29:53] Yeah, I was going to say something super similar that you know as Jenny shared her journey and story of how the company had grown throughout the various stages a big kind of take away from me was just you know just
[00:30:06] A bit about like forgiving yourself and allowing yourself to just like move on from things that don't feel perfect so as we make mistakes people mistakes which often feel you know the worst right when it comes to hiring or firing.
[00:30:18] Or when it's business mistakes or kind of commercial mistakes whatever they are to just you know allow ourselves to move on from it.
[00:30:27] It's that moment in time the type of company we are the people we are wrote the next stage and be ready for a whole different set of challenges and that's never going to stop feeling like we're doing it wrong or feeling like it could go wrong so just you know when you accept that that's going to be almost the entirety of the path to as we scale.
[00:30:45] It gives you a level of comfort of okay that's the mistake of the day that we are the bad decision of the day so ready for the one tomorrow.
[00:30:54] Yeah awesome.
[00:30:55] Jenny was your perspective did you see leadership capability changes in the key to Sydney during this program time.
[00:31:02] Well, well first I would say that they're incredible individuals before the program and incredible leaders before the program so I'm not sure that like I did anything that changed that change that at all but I would say that
[00:31:14] the comfort level what we just all talked about around being confident that it's okay to be wrong and finding those places like to acknowledge that and that leading with vulnerability is a process.
[00:31:27] It's a process for all of us and so watching them you know think through that and they have a very trusting team a very strong culture, a very strong dynamic as co founders which can also be tricky.
[00:31:39] We talked a little bit about that but they are on a beautiful trajectory a beautiful path and again it's humbling for me to get to see people so talented coming in and doing things it was just a great a great pleasure.
[00:31:53] Great well we're going to close out with sort of like a final question and so Nikita and Sydney if you want to mind for other women CEOs, founders, senior executives like yourselves who are aspiring to build important impactful companies.
[00:32:09] What advice would you give them on mentorship on seeking mentors and sponsors.
[00:32:17] I think it was yeah yeah I think for me it wasn't actually you know Jenny from this to it's kind of asking for something specific so whether it's reaching out proactively to someone who could be a mentor or reaching out to one of your mentors and asking for advice you know asking for something very specific of their time.
[00:32:35] Help with a certain question a certain favor an introduction to someone I think that also kind of helps a lot of the instead of you know a general coffee chat or a general.
[00:32:47] You know life advice those are great those are great sessions but i've gotten absolutely the most value and often like the best discussions when you know i've had the confidence for the courage to ask for a specific type of.
[00:32:59] Favorite introduction that type of thing yeah I really like that one, the one I would add just as i've seen it during our sessions and then beyond that.
[00:33:09] I turn to many different people for different forms of mentorship and that's only become more clear over time as certain things have appeared and I keep going back to certain people for certain types of advice because they just.
[00:33:24] For some whatever reason whether whether it was the role of the company that they had the circumstances that their business ran into.
[00:33:30] They're the right sounding board and so being open to not having an idea necessarily who all those specific mentors are going to be but leaving it.
[00:33:39] Organic over time and letting that relationship play out for who ends up being the multiple different mentors that you go to or.
[00:33:47] Different things that you will need support hell on as as you build the business yeah that is that is such profound.
[00:33:56] In terms of those comments there are so many people I mean how much often have you said or heard.
[00:34:03] How can I be helpful I want to help you and it's so open ended it's actually not actionable so that is just so wonderful I really love.
[00:34:12] How you both framed it Jenny as we close out your last little like closing comments on your first graduates of homeward grown.
[00:34:22] Well again couldn't have been more impressed or proud of them before we're grown and so just a pleasure to get to meet them and share them on for what I know is going to absolutely be a successful business and I think.
[00:34:34] Nikita and Sydney both represent.
[00:34:37] What what it the tenacity it takes to find people to help you answer your questions and the vulnerability to go ask them and when you're asked a specific question you feel great by being a thought partner in that process.
[00:34:52] Understanding that it is your providing a perspective to allow them to facilitate advance their own thinking and so this this idea around matching and this is one of the things that I most love about this program which is like come in ask really hard questions so I got fireworks going off.
[00:35:08] I was.
[00:35:12] Come in ask questions that you you need help with like that is the entire point so I cut to the chase ask the questions the the mentor or sponsor may be helpful they may not be helpful that's that's all okay but continue to continue to advocate on your behalf and the and behalf of your company to get to what you need.
[00:35:31] That is that is the ultimate goal and then when that happens things work really well.
[00:35:36] Well and and fireworks happen and that is pretty.
[00:35:40] It's amazing listen this has been just a fantastic inspiring women conversation Nikita and Sydney so congratulations to both of you for what you've already done and what you're building with your company for tuna health Jenny thank you for being an inspiring women and forming this program.
[00:35:58] Homeward grown I think it's really impactful and I'm looking forward to continuing to talk to exciting incredible women like both of these young women here thank you both very much excellent.
[00:36:10] Thank you Lori.
[00:36:12] This has been an episode of inspiring women with Laurie McGraw please subscribe right in review we are produced by Kate Cruz at executive podcast solutions more episodes can be found on inspiring women.
[00:36:26] .show I am Laurie McGraw and thank you for listening.