The tech landscape is changing faster than ever, as we’re all trying to navigate big shifts in AI, consumer shopping habits, and more.

But it’s nothing new to Julie Bornstein. She’s been at the forefront of retail for decades, leading big brands like Nordstrom and Sephora through the ecommerce revolution.

And now, as the Founder and CEO of the AI-powered fashion search engine Daydream, she’s once again at the bleeding edge of technological change.

But through every shift, the thing she keeps coming back to is this: people skills matter most.

In this conversation, Julie will help you stay on the front edge of technology – without sacrificing the people skills it takes to make them work.

This episode is for you if:

You’re thinking about making the shift from corporate to entrepreneurship
You’re doing any work with customer-facing AI
You want to understand the future of retail and ecommerce
You’re trying to design a strong loyalty program

","WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.000\nHello friends, and welcome to another episode of How Leaders Lead with David\n\n2\n00:00:04.000 --> 00:00:05.040\nNovak. Today,\n\n3\n00:00:05.040 --> 00:00:09.490\nwe have Julie Bornstein on the show. She's the founder and CEO of Daydream,\n\n4\n00:00:09.490 --> 00:00:10.960\nwhich is an AI-powered\n\n5\n00:00:10.960 --> 00:00:16.040\nfashion search engine. But online shopping isn't new to Julie. She's been at\n\n6\n00:00:16.040 --> 00:00:17.360\nthe forefront of retail\n\n7\n00:00:17.360 --> 00:00:21.180\nfor decades, leading big brands like Nordstrom and Sephora through the e-\n\n8\n00:00:21.180 --> 00:00:22.560\ncommerce revolution.\n\n9\n00:00:22.560 --> 00:00:26.320\nThrough every shift that Julie and her team has made, the thing that she keeps\n\n10\n00:00:26.320 --> 00:00:27.120\ncoming back to\n\n11\n00:00:27.120 --> 00:00:33.840\nis this, people's skills matter most, especially in the age of AI. Enjoy this\n\n12\n00:00:33.840 --> 00:00:34.720\nconversation with\n\n13\n00:00:34.720 --> 00:00:37.440\nDavid and Julie, and I will see you at the debrief.\n\n14\n00:00:37.440 --> 00:00:48.000\nYou know, I didn't realize this, but I guess it's been almost a year since you,\n\n15\n00:00:48.000 --> 00:00:49.600\nyou almost today,\n\n16\n00:00:49.600 --> 00:00:54.640\nsince you launched Daydream. That's right. The longest year of my life.\n\n17\n00:00:55.440 --> 00:00:59.840\nThe longest year in your life. How do you feel about where you're at right now?\n\n18\n00:00:59.840 --> 00:01:05.040\nI mean, as most entrepreneurs feel, you know, it's never enough. There's still\n\n19\n00:01:05.040 --> 00:01:06.320\nso much to do,\n\n20\n00:01:06.320 --> 00:01:10.320\nbut I think it's been really exciting. We've learned a ton in the first year,\n\n21\n00:01:10.320 --> 00:01:13.120\nand I feel like we're still just at the beginning.\n\n22\n00:01:13.120 --> 00:01:17.630\nJulie, growing up, I understand that you loved watching the Jetsons. I love the\n\n23\n00:01:17.630 --> 00:01:18.240\nJetsons too,\n\n24\n00:01:18.240 --> 00:01:22.720\nbut you know, what wasn't about that show that made you like it so much?\n\n25\n00:01:22.720 --> 00:01:27.840\nI think before I realized it was all about technology, I loved the innovation\n\n26\n00:01:27.840 --> 00:01:30.160\nand the futuristic idea\n\n27\n00:01:30.160 --> 00:01:35.640\nof being able to get to people faster through flying, you know, not having to\n\n28\n00:01:35.640 --> 00:01:37.120\ndeal with traffic,\n\n29\n00:01:37.120 --> 00:01:41.120\nbeing able to talk to your friend by clicking a button and seeing their face.\n\n30\n00:01:41.120 --> 00:01:45.310\nIt was all the possibilities that innovation could bring and technology could\n\n31\n00:01:45.310 --> 00:01:45.680\nbring,\n\n32\n00:01:45.680 --> 00:01:49.410\nand I couldn't wait to have those things someday myself. I'm still waiting for,\n\n33\n00:01:49.410 --> 00:01:49.600\nyou know,\n\n34\n00:01:49.600 --> 00:01:53.120\nthe flying from our apartments, but I love the FaceTime.\n\n35\n00:01:53.120 --> 00:01:57.360\nYeah, we definitely have FaceTime, and here you are. You spent your career\n\n36\n00:01:57.360 --> 00:02:02.270\nhelping millions of people shop better, but I got to ask you, I mean, who's the\n\n37\n00:02:02.270 --> 00:02:03.200\ntoughest\n\n38\n00:02:03.200 --> 00:02:04.960\nperson in your family to shop for?\n\n39\n00:02:04.960 --> 00:02:14.320\nProbably my whole family would say me because they say I know exactly what I\n\n40\n00:02:14.320 --> 00:02:15.280\nwant and\n\n41\n00:02:15.280 --> 00:02:19.600\nhave everything I need. So my whole family says I'm impossible to get a gift\n\n42\n00:02:19.600 --> 00:02:19.840\nfor.\n\n43\n00:02:19.840 --> 00:02:27.280\nYourself like, you know, you've had a remarkable career transforming the way\n\n44\n00:02:27.280 --> 00:02:28.240\npeople shop. That's\n\n45\n00:02:28.240 --> 00:02:34.110\nreally what you focused on. And before we dive into your journey, I want to go\n\n46\n00:02:34.110 --> 00:02:35.600\nback to where it\n\n47\n00:02:35.600 --> 00:02:40.860\nall began. Can you share a story from your childhood that shaped the kind of\n\n48\n00:02:40.860 --> 00:02:42.080\nleader you are today?\n\n49\n00:02:42.640 --> 00:02:45.920\nI would say probably the thing that shaped my leadership the most is being a\n\n50\n00:02:45.920 --> 00:02:46.640\nmiddle child.\n\n51\n00:02:46.640 --> 00:02:52.720\nI had an older sister and a younger sister, and they, you know, a lot of my\n\n52\n00:02:52.720 --> 00:02:54.320\nparents fought quite a\n\n53\n00:02:54.320 --> 00:03:00.960\nbit, and my sisters were also very outspoken. We were sort of a typical opinion\n\n54\n00:03:00.960 --> 00:03:02.960\nated Jewish family,\n\n55\n00:03:02.960 --> 00:03:08.830\nand I was the peacemaker, and whether it was sort of negotiating a conversation\n\n56\n00:03:08.830 --> 00:03:10.000\nor finding a\n\n57\n00:03:10.000 --> 00:03:14.240\nrestaurant that everyone could agree on. I was very much sort of always aware\n\n58\n00:03:14.240 --> 00:03:15.120\nof what everybody\n\n59\n00:03:15.120 --> 00:03:20.030\nwanted and needed and figuring out how everyone could win. And I think that\n\n60\n00:03:20.030 --> 00:03:20.960\ndefinitely relates\n\n61\n00:03:20.960 --> 00:03:25.280\nto how I lead. I'm a, I like to listen to different perspectives and figure out\n\n62\n00:03:25.280 --> 00:03:26.000\n, you know,\n\n63\n00:03:26.000 --> 00:03:30.450\nplay some judgment on the different perspectives, but also figure out how we\n\n64\n00:03:30.450 --> 00:03:31.360\ncan all win together.\n\n65\n00:03:31.360 --> 00:03:38.130\nI learned that when you were 10 years old, you would read 17 magazine, and then\n\n66\n00:03:38.130 --> 00:03:38.880\nyou'd head to the\n\n67\n00:03:38.880 --> 00:03:45.840\nmall and try to recreate the outfits that were in 17. What was different about\n\n68\n00:03:45.840 --> 00:03:46.480\nthe way your\n\n69\n00:03:46.480 --> 00:03:52.960\nmind worked, even back then, even back then? Well, my mom tells me that as a\n\n70\n00:03:52.960 --> 00:03:53.520\ntwo-year-old,\n\n71\n00:03:53.520 --> 00:03:58.420\nI was very opinionated about what I wanted to wear. So I think style and\n\n72\n00:03:58.420 --> 00:03:59.200\ninterest in it is\n\n73\n00:03:59.200 --> 00:04:04.160\nsomewhat innate, and I always had a real interest in it. And, you know, to me,\n\n74\n00:04:04.160 --> 00:04:05.120\nsort of like what\n\n75\n00:04:05.120 --> 00:04:10.030\nyou wear expresses who you are and helps think, you know, how you feel. And so\n\n76\n00:04:10.030 --> 00:04:10.800\nI was just always\n\n77\n00:04:10.800 --> 00:04:14.980\nreally drawn to also beauty and aesthetics. And so I think that was innate in\n\n78\n00:04:14.980 --> 00:04:15.840\nme. And then,\n\n79\n00:04:15.840 --> 00:04:19.110\nyes, I was always interested in fashion. When I was young, I wanted to be a\n\n80\n00:04:19.110 --> 00:04:19.920\nfashion designer,\n\n81\n00:04:19.920 --> 00:04:24.880\nand I would draw. I also built a little business around making bets and selling\n\n82\n00:04:24.880 --> 00:04:25.680\nthose.\n\n83\n00:04:25.680 --> 00:04:31.440\nAnd I knew every corner of the mall, I spent my weekends there, and I knew when\n\n84\n00:04:31.440 --> 00:04:32.320\na product\n\n85\n00:04:32.320 --> 00:04:36.400\nbecame popular and it was in the magazines, it would take another six months to\n\n86\n00:04:36.400 --> 00:04:37.040\nactually\n\n87\n00:04:37.040 --> 00:04:40.960\nhit the mall and Syracuse, New York and be able to buy it. But I was definitely\n\n88\n00:04:40.960 --> 00:04:41.440\nsomeone who was\n\n89\n00:04:41.440 --> 00:04:45.370\nalways aware of what was out there, really interested in it, really interested\n\n90\n00:04:45.370 --> 00:04:46.800\nin the new things.\n\n91\n00:04:46.800 --> 00:04:51.710\nYou know, I remembered, you know, exactly what I laid out as my outfit in fifth\n\n92\n00:04:51.710 --> 00:04:52.480\ngrade to wear for\n\n93\n00:04:52.480 --> 00:04:57.360\nthe first day of school. That's great. And you were an entrepreneur, even back\n\n94\n00:04:57.360 --> 00:04:57.360\nthen,\n\n95\n00:04:57.360 --> 00:05:00.970\nyou started the bread company, you know, just tell me about that. That's kind\n\n96\n00:05:00.970 --> 00:05:02.320\nof a great idea.\n\n97\n00:05:02.320 --> 00:05:07.220\nWell, so I was always like good at doing my friend's hair. And so for summer\n\n98\n00:05:07.220 --> 00:05:07.680\ncamp, everyone\n\n99\n00:05:07.680 --> 00:05:12.590\nwould come to me and I would braid their hair and I would cut their hair. And I\n\n100\n00:05:12.590 --> 00:05:12.960\nlove, you know,\n\n101\n00:05:12.960 --> 00:05:18.850\na new trend came around, which was these braided barrettes. And so I figured\n\n102\n00:05:18.850 --> 00:05:19.680\nout how to make them.\n\n103\n00:05:19.680 --> 00:05:22.580\nI still don't understand how we did many of the things we did before the\n\n104\n00:05:22.580 --> 00:05:24.000\nInternet, but, you know,\n\n105\n00:05:24.000 --> 00:05:27.270\nsomeone taught me and I learned how to do it. And then I made them for my\n\n106\n00:05:27.270 --> 00:05:28.160\nfriends and they loved\n\n107\n00:05:28.160 --> 00:05:31.890\nthem. And so I started to sell them as a little business. Guys, you're just a\n\n108\n00:05:31.890 --> 00:05:33.360\nborn entrepreneur,\n\n109\n00:05:33.360 --> 00:05:37.990\nyou know, startup as a kid, you know, you know, one of my favorite stories that\n\n110\n00:05:37.990 --> 00:05:38.640\nI learned about\n\n111\n00:05:38.640 --> 00:05:43.660\nyou is that early in your career, you really, you really wanted to get in touch\n\n112\n00:05:43.660 --> 00:05:44.480\nwith Howard,\n\n113\n00:05:44.480 --> 00:05:48.590\nHoward Schultz. Can you tell us that story? So I met my husband in business\n\n114\n00:05:48.590 --> 00:05:49.440\nschool.\n\n115\n00:05:49.440 --> 00:05:54.350\nHe got a job early on at Amazon, actually, he met Jeff Bezos when he came to\n\n116\n00:05:54.350 --> 00:05:55.360\ncampus and ended up\n\n117\n00:05:55.360 --> 00:05:58.400\ndriving him to the airport and getting a job in that ride. So that was\n\n118\n00:05:58.400 --> 00:05:59.680\nfascinating. And I had\n\n119\n00:05:59.680 --> 00:06:02.740\ntaken a job in investment banking, working with retail and consumer companies\n\n120\n00:06:02.740 --> 00:06:03.600\nin San Francisco.\n\n121\n00:06:03.600 --> 00:06:08.510\nBut so I really wanted to move to Seattle because Brian loved his job and\n\n122\n00:06:08.510 --> 00:06:09.280\ninvestment banking was\n\n123\n00:06:09.280 --> 00:06:14.190\nclearly not my long term gig. And as I looked at the companies that were there,\n\n124\n00:06:14.190 --> 00:06:14.880\nStarbucks was the\n\n125\n00:06:14.880 --> 00:06:18.610\nmost exciting to me. Nordstrom was the other exciting company to me. But I had\n\n126\n00:06:18.610 --> 00:06:19.680\nheard that it was run\n\n127\n00:06:19.680 --> 00:06:22.840\nby the family and you had to have worked on the shoe floor since you were 12.\n\n128\n00:06:22.840 --> 00:06:23.680\nSo didn't even seem\n\n129\n00:06:23.680 --> 00:06:28.500\nlike an option where Starbucks seemed like a very dynamic, really amazing brand\n\n130\n00:06:28.500 --> 00:06:29.280\nand company.\n\n131\n00:06:29.280 --> 00:06:34.800\nSo I heard that he was speaking at an event in Seattle. So I read his book over\n\n132\n00:06:34.800 --> 00:06:35.760\nthe weekend.\n\n133\n00:06:35.760 --> 00:06:39.760\nAnd of course, I loved Starbucks, like, you know, everyone did. And it was this\n\n134\n00:06:39.760 --> 00:06:40.080\nwas in\n\n135\n00:06:40.960 --> 00:06:49.360\n1997. And so I went to hear him speak and I waited in line to talk to him after\n\n136\n00:06:49.360 --> 00:06:51.360\nhe spoke and basically\n\n137\n00:06:51.360 --> 00:06:55.420\njust went up to him and sort of took all the guts that I had and said, I would\n\n138\n00:06:55.420 --> 00:06:56.480\nlove to work for you.\n\n139\n00:06:56.480 --> 00:07:01.140\nAnd he said, well, you know, who are you and what do you do and, you know, what\n\n140\n00:07:01.140 --> 00:07:02.000\ndo you want to do?\n\n141\n00:07:02.000 --> 00:07:08.480\nAnd so I told him that I had worked on a deal at my investment bank that was in\n\n142\n00:07:08.480 --> 00:07:09.200\nthe coffee space.\n\n143\n00:07:09.200 --> 00:07:12.810\nI told him about that, which interested him. And then I told him a little bit\n\n144\n00:07:12.810 --> 00:07:13.520\nabout what I wanted to\n\n145\n00:07:13.520 --> 00:07:19.720\ndo. And he said, well, send me a resume. And so I flew back home down to San\n\n146\n00:07:19.720 --> 00:07:20.720\nFrancisco,\n\n147\n00:07:20.720 --> 00:07:27.880\nfaxed in my resume and got basically heard from him about a week later. So I\n\n148\n00:07:27.880 --> 00:07:28.960\ncalled his office\n\n149\n00:07:28.960 --> 00:07:32.400\nand his assistant said to me, oh, he's actually interested in meeting with you.\n\n150\n00:07:32.400 --> 00:07:33.120\nSo we set up a\n\n151\n00:07:33.120 --> 00:07:38.020\ntime and I got a chance to go meet with Howard Schultz. We spent over an hour\n\n152\n00:07:38.020 --> 00:07:39.360\ntalking and then\n\n153\n00:07:39.360 --> 00:07:43.810\nthey were trying to build a couple of new businesses. And so I got hired for\n\n154\n00:07:43.810 --> 00:07:44.880\none of those businesses.\n\n155\n00:07:44.880 --> 00:07:49.750\nYou know, a lot of people wouldn't have the gumption to, you know, stand in\n\n156\n00:07:49.750 --> 00:07:50.240\nline, you know,\n\n157\n00:07:50.240 --> 00:07:57.440\nask for that opportunity. You know, what is it about you that that gives you\n\n158\n00:07:57.440 --> 00:07:58.160\nthe kind of courage\n\n159\n00:07:58.160 --> 00:08:02.250\nto do things like that? And what advice can you give to others on how to do\n\n160\n00:08:02.250 --> 00:08:03.680\nsomething similar?\n\n161\n00:08:03.680 --> 00:08:08.230\nYeah, I mean, I think throughout my career, the thing that I learned is the\n\n162\n00:08:08.230 --> 00:08:08.640\nhardest part\n\n163\n00:08:08.640 --> 00:08:12.250\nis figuring out what you want, because there's so many things out there. And as\n\n164\n00:08:12.250 --> 00:08:12.960\na young person,\n\n165\n00:08:12.960 --> 00:08:17.860\nit's so hard to figure it out. And I always tell young people, you know, take\n\n166\n00:08:17.860 --> 00:08:18.480\nsomething that just\n\n167\n00:08:18.480 --> 00:08:22.770\nreally interests you. Don't worry about what the end game is because it's so\n\n168\n00:08:22.770 --> 00:08:23.520\nhard to know.\n\n169\n00:08:23.520 --> 00:08:27.610\nAnd with each job you take, you learn what you like and what you don't like,\n\n170\n00:08:27.610 --> 00:08:28.400\nthe kind of people\n\n171\n00:08:28.400 --> 00:08:32.060\nyou want to work with, the sort of skills that you have naturally and what you\n\n172\n00:08:32.060 --> 00:08:33.200\nreally shine at.\n\n173\n00:08:33.200 --> 00:08:37.410\nAnd so, you know, for me, I had had a few jobs leading up to this moment. I\n\n174\n00:08:37.410 --> 00:08:38.560\nlooked at Starbucks\n\n175\n00:08:38.560 --> 00:08:43.760\nand I knew that it was a company that I wanted to work for. And so my feeling\n\n176\n00:08:43.760 --> 00:08:44.560\nabout everything\n\n177\n00:08:44.560 --> 00:08:48.520\nin life is you have to create your own reality. And, you know, no one's going\n\n178\n00:08:48.520 --> 00:08:49.520\nto do it for you.\n\n179\n00:08:49.520 --> 00:08:54.880\nAnd so I knew that I wanted it to work at Starbucks. I had the benefit of being\n\n180\n00:08:54.880 --> 00:08:56.080\nlimited to a certain\n\n181\n00:08:56.080 --> 00:09:01.410\ntown because I wanted to move to where my boyfriend was. And so I just had to\n\n182\n00:09:01.410 --> 00:09:02.400\nlike, you know, get\n\n183\n00:09:02.400 --> 00:09:06.360\nthe courage up. I did feel like I had context. I read his book. I had sort of\n\n184\n00:09:06.360 --> 00:09:07.280\nprepared, you know,\n\n185\n00:09:07.280 --> 00:09:11.730\na little bit in my mind what I would say. And it's hard to put yourself out\n\n186\n00:09:11.730 --> 00:09:13.280\nthere. But if you don't,\n\n187\n00:09:13.280 --> 00:09:18.190\nyou will never know. And so I think you prepare as much as you can. But you do\n\n188\n00:09:18.190 --> 00:09:18.880\neverything in your\n\n189\n00:09:18.880 --> 00:09:22.880\npower. And my next set of jobs were also sort of the same way. You figure out\n\n190\n00:09:22.880 --> 00:09:23.680\nwhatever it's going to\n\n191\n00:09:23.680 --> 00:09:28.720\ntake to make your reality happen. Yeah, and you mentioned Nordstrom's was\n\n192\n00:09:28.720 --> 00:09:29.840\nanother company you\n\n193\n00:09:29.840 --> 00:09:35.600\nreally admired that was in Seattle. And you said, you know, you basically had\n\n194\n00:09:35.600 --> 00:09:36.960\nto work on the floor\n\n195\n00:09:36.960 --> 00:09:42.500\nsince you're whatever age or be a part of the family to be successful. You know\n\n196\n00:09:42.500 --> 00:09:42.640\n,\n\n197\n00:09:42.640 --> 00:09:46.770\nyet, you know, somehow you you made your way to Nordstrom and had a heck of a\n\n198\n00:09:46.770 --> 00:09:48.560\nrun there. How did\n\n199\n00:09:48.560 --> 00:09:53.590\nthat happen? So I had a terrific couple years at Starbucks. But what I realized\n\n200\n00:09:53.590 --> 00:09:54.320\nis I didn't,\n\n201\n00:09:54.320 --> 00:09:58.560\nI was doing corporate dev business development. And I realized I didn't want to\n\n202\n00:09:58.560 --> 00:09:59.360\ndo that. I really\n\n203\n00:09:59.360 --> 00:10:03.440\nwanted to be more of an operating role. And at Starbucks, the interesting jobs\n\n204\n00:10:03.440 --> 00:10:04.160\nreally were in\n\n205\n00:10:04.160 --> 00:10:08.240\nthe field. And that was sort of running a store. And that wasn't quite the life\n\n206\n00:10:08.240 --> 00:10:08.960\nI wanted to lead.\n\n207\n00:10:08.960 --> 00:10:12.240\nAnd so I started to think about what I wanted to do next. And e-commerce\n\n208\n00:10:12.240 --> 00:10:13.760\nemerged as a category.\n\n209\n00:10:13.760 --> 00:10:18.660\nAnd I was obsessed from the day that Amazon actually launched and was selling\n\n210\n00:10:18.660 --> 00:10:19.280\nbooks, which was what\n\n211\n00:10:19.280 --> 00:10:23.090\nthey were selling at first. I thought this could be so interesting for fashion.\n\n212\n00:10:23.090 --> 00:10:24.000\nAnd what happened\n\n213\n00:10:24.000 --> 00:10:28.960\nwas during the time I was at Starbucks, a few fashion companies started to\n\n214\n00:10:28.960 --> 00:10:30.320\nemerge on the internet.\n\n215\n00:10:30.320 --> 00:10:36.010\nAnd I just had a million ideas. And I knew that's what I wanted to do. So I was\n\n216\n00:10:36.010 --> 00:10:37.280\n, you know, stuck in\n\n217\n00:10:37.280 --> 00:10:41.280\nSeattle for better and for worse. And I thought I really want to do this. And I\n\n218\n00:10:41.280 --> 00:10:41.920\nstarted to talk\n\n219\n00:10:41.920 --> 00:10:45.020\nto a startup. And I was talking to a guy who didn't know what the hell he was\n\n220\n00:10:45.020 --> 00:10:45.840\ntalking about.\n\n221\n00:10:45.840 --> 00:10:49.450\nAnd I certainly didn't feel qualified to start a company to raise the money. I\n\n222\n00:10:49.450 --> 00:10:50.240\ndidn't have the\n\n223\n00:10:50.240 --> 00:10:55.960\naccess to the capital. And so Nordstrom was really actively going after this\n\n224\n00:10:55.960 --> 00:10:57.360\nspace. And as soon as\n\n225\n00:10:57.360 --> 00:11:00.890\nthey announced that they were launching e-commerce, I knew that's what I wanted\n\n226\n00:11:00.890 --> 00:11:02.240\nto do. So I basically\n\n227\n00:11:02.240 --> 00:11:05.690\nspent six months trying to convince Dan Nordstrom to hire me. I used every\n\n228\n00:11:05.690 --> 00:11:06.960\nconnection I had to him.\n\n229\n00:11:07.280 --> 00:11:11.280\nWhen he kind of ignored me, I came back and I said, I have some ideas for you.\n\n230\n00:11:11.280 --> 00:11:12.240\nAnd I basically\n\n231\n00:11:12.240 --> 00:11:17.650\nhad to create the job by describing to him what they needed to have, which was\n\n232\n00:11:17.650 --> 00:11:18.720\nthe sort of product\n\n233\n00:11:18.720 --> 00:11:23.980\nmanagement function, which was brand new in, you know, 1999. And explained to\n\n234\n00:11:23.980 --> 00:11:25.440\nhim why it would help\n\n235\n00:11:25.440 --> 00:11:31.880\nwhat I could do. And then, you know, I basically used my connections through my\n\n236\n00:11:31.880 --> 00:11:32.960\nhusband, a friend\n\n237\n00:11:32.960 --> 00:11:38.650\nof his, new and investor. So I sort of worked that route. And eventually, Dan\n\n238\n00:11:38.650 --> 00:11:39.440\nNordstrom couldn't\n\n239\n00:11:39.440 --> 00:11:45.400\nget rid of me and hired me. And good thing you did, you took a business, the e-\n\n240\n00:11:45.400 --> 00:11:46.080\ncommerce business,\n\n241\n00:11:46.080 --> 00:11:53.200\nfrom $10 million to $350 million in a very short time. You know, when you see\n\n242\n00:11:53.200 --> 00:11:54.640\nthat kind of kind of\n\n243\n00:11:54.640 --> 00:12:00.840\ngrowth, what belief did it reinforce that you've carried with you as you moved\n\n244\n00:12:00.840 --> 00:12:02.320\nalong in your career?\n\n245\n00:12:03.040 --> 00:12:09.240\nThe main thing that it reinforced was if you are the customer and you know what\n\n246\n00:12:09.240 --> 00:12:11.280\nthe customer wants,\n\n247\n00:12:11.280 --> 00:12:16.180\nit gives you such an advantage in building an experience. So I was so the\n\n248\n00:12:16.180 --> 00:12:16.880\ncustomer that we\n\n249\n00:12:16.880 --> 00:12:22.640\nwere targeting. And I had so many specific ideas of how I wanted the website\n\n250\n00:12:22.640 --> 00:12:24.160\nexperience to work\n\n251\n00:12:24.160 --> 00:12:29.070\nand what I needed to be able to buy online. And I was able to firsthand really\n\n252\n00:12:29.070 --> 00:12:29.520\nsort of\n\n253\n00:12:29.520 --> 00:12:34.950\ntranslate that experience to the product team, to the engineering team, to the\n\n254\n00:12:34.950 --> 00:12:35.760\ncreative team.\n\n255\n00:12:35.760 --> 00:12:40.660\nI hired other people who also really understood innately what the experience\n\n256\n00:12:40.660 --> 00:12:41.680\nwas they wanted.\n\n257\n00:12:41.680 --> 00:12:46.960\nAnd so we were really able to build something that we knew was needed in order\n\n258\n00:12:46.960 --> 00:12:47.920\nto get people\n\n259\n00:12:47.920 --> 00:12:51.680\ncomfortable with buying online because we were still back in those days. I also\n\n260\n00:12:51.680 --> 00:12:52.320\nneeded to be\n\n261\n00:12:52.320 --> 00:12:58.320\nable to go to all of the vendors that sell the brands that sell to Nordstrom\n\n262\n00:12:58.320 --> 00:12:59.040\nbecause we were a\n\n263\n00:12:59.040 --> 00:13:02.880\nseparate division and Nordstrom Inc didn't want anything to do with this sort\n\n264\n00:13:02.880 --> 00:13:03.520\nof like little\n\n265\n00:13:03.520 --> 00:13:09.130\nfledgling division of the dot com and convince the brands to sell to us online\n\n266\n00:13:09.130 --> 00:13:10.400\ntoo. And so that\n\n267\n00:13:10.400 --> 00:13:13.770\nwas kind of being able to paint a picture of what the future was going to look\n\n268\n00:13:13.770 --> 00:13:14.640\nlike, which I had a\n\n269\n00:13:14.640 --> 00:13:19.680\nvery clear sense of as a consumer with what I wanted. And I would say both of\n\n270\n00:13:19.680 --> 00:13:20.880\nthose experiences\n\n271\n00:13:20.880 --> 00:13:26.300\nreally underscored for me the ability to really understand your customer and be\n\n272\n00:13:26.300 --> 00:13:27.360\nable to express\n\n273\n00:13:27.360 --> 00:13:32.380\nthat in a way that's compelling to others. And whether it's to convince Nord\n\n274\n00:13:32.380 --> 00:13:33.360\nstrom Inc to give\n\n275\n00:13:33.360 --> 00:13:37.810\nus the money we needed or is to convince the brands to sell to us, all of that\n\n276\n00:13:37.810 --> 00:13:38.800\nwas really\n\n277\n00:13:38.800 --> 00:13:42.960\nhelpful to be able to paint the picture to these different constituents.\n\n278\n00:13:42.960 --> 00:13:48.050\nAnd that's obviously a towering strength that you have. And you've made your\n\n279\n00:13:48.050 --> 00:13:49.440\nway to Sephora. And\n\n280\n00:13:50.400 --> 00:13:56.480\nI understand the former CEO said that they ought to build a statue of you and\n\n281\n00:13:56.480 --> 00:13:57.760\nput it outside the\n\n282\n00:13:57.760 --> 00:14:01.600\noutside of the headquarters because of the impact that you had on the company.\n\n283\n00:14:01.600 --> 00:14:02.160\nTell us your\n\n284\n00:14:02.160 --> 00:14:07.830\nfavorite leadership story from your time at Sephora. Yeah, so David Solitiano,\n\n285\n00:14:07.830 --> 00:14:09.120\nhe was an\n\n286\n00:14:09.120 --> 00:14:13.220\nexacting person and not everybody loved working for him. He would say that\n\n287\n00:14:13.220 --> 00:14:14.160\nhimself, but he was\n\n288\n00:14:14.160 --> 00:14:22.670\nincredible, incredibly sharp and incredibly insightful. And it was the year\n\n289\n00:14:22.670 --> 00:14:25.520\n2009. And the\n\n290\n00:14:25.520 --> 00:14:34.440\nmarket was really in the doldrums. So this was the recession and basically the\n\n291\n00:14:34.440 --> 00:14:35.280\nhousing crisis,\n\n292\n00:14:35.280 --> 00:14:40.190\nwhich led to consumer confidence and consumer spending way down. And every\n\n293\n00:14:40.190 --> 00:14:41.360\nsingle company was\n\n294\n00:14:41.360 --> 00:14:45.200\nrethinking how they were going to keep their business alive.\n\n295\n00:14:45.200 --> 00:14:51.520\nAnd David basically pulled the entire company together and came up with seven\n\n296\n00:14:51.520 --> 00:14:53.120\nthings that we\n\n297\n00:14:53.120 --> 00:14:58.790\nwere going to do that year that was going to help the company survive this\n\n298\n00:14:58.790 --> 00:15:00.320\ndecrease in overall\n\n299\n00:15:00.320 --> 00:15:07.200\nbusiness. And they were so clear, they were simple. And he used metaphors and\n\n300\n00:15:07.200 --> 00:15:08.480\nstories to make each\n\n301\n00:15:08.480 --> 00:15:13.040\nof those points so important. They were all resonant across the business,\n\n302\n00:15:13.040 --> 00:15:14.160\nwhether you're in the store,\n\n303\n00:15:14.160 --> 00:15:18.610\nin corporate headquarters, running the e-commerce side of the business. And it\n\n304\n00:15:18.610 --> 00:15:19.200\nreally helped the\n\n305\n00:15:19.200 --> 00:15:25.920\nwhole company rally around what we were going to do to basically survive this\n\n306\n00:15:25.920 --> 00:15:26.960\nchallenging time\n\n307\n00:15:26.960 --> 00:15:31.920\nin retail. And it was so clear. And then every month we would get together and\n\n308\n00:15:31.920 --> 00:15:33.200\nwe would revisit\n\n309\n00:15:33.200 --> 00:15:38.110\nthese seven principles. And we would talk about examples that basically helped\n\n310\n00:15:38.110 --> 00:15:38.720\nthe business to\n\n311\n00:15:38.720 --> 00:15:43.560\ndo these. And it was really just an experience for me of when times are tough,\n\n312\n00:15:43.560 --> 00:15:44.480\nit's the best\n\n313\n00:15:44.480 --> 00:15:49.480\ntime to actually pull the team together and focus and stop a lot of the things\n\n314\n00:15:49.480 --> 00:15:51.200\nthat didn't matter\n\n315\n00:15:51.200 --> 00:15:55.520\nand feel really empowered and excited by the things that we could control.\n\n316\n00:15:55.520 --> 00:15:59.970\nSo what did you do at Sephora that is statue worthy? I mean, you know, when you\n\n317\n00:15:59.970 --> 00:16:00.800\nlook back on that,\n\n318\n00:16:00.800 --> 00:16:04.240\nwhy would he say that that's such a compliment, you know, that they should put\n\n319\n00:16:04.240 --> 00:16:05.200\na statue of you\n\n320\n00:16:05.200 --> 00:16:10.400\noutside the building? Well, I got to Sephora and there wasn't an e-commerce\n\n321\n00:16:10.400 --> 00:16:11.600\ndivision. We were,\n\n322\n00:16:11.600 --> 00:16:14.720\nyou know, marketing was run by the corporate marketing and merchandising was\n\n323\n00:16:14.720 --> 00:16:15.440\nrun by corporate\n\n324\n00:16:15.440 --> 00:16:20.450\nmerchandising. And there was no one who was really saying, here are the next\n\n325\n00:16:20.450 --> 00:16:21.840\nthings we could do\n\n326\n00:16:21.840 --> 00:16:26.720\nwith technology and sort of digital capabilities to make the experience better.\n\n327\n00:16:26.720 --> 00:16:27.280\nThe second thing\n\n328\n00:16:27.280 --> 00:16:31.910\nthat happened was when I got there was we had the idea of a loyalty program and\n\n329\n00:16:31.910 --> 00:16:32.640\nwe were about to\n\n330\n00:16:32.640 --> 00:16:36.820\nlaunch it, but we didn't have the specifics or people to run it and how it was\n\n331\n00:16:36.820 --> 00:16:37.920\ngoing to roll out.\n\n332\n00:16:37.920 --> 00:16:42.960\nAnd so those were my two challenges when I got to Sephora. How do we actually\n\n333\n00:16:42.960 --> 00:16:44.240\nbuild an e-commerce\n\n334\n00:16:44.240 --> 00:16:49.520\nbusiness and sort of modernize the way that we were thinking about customer\n\n335\n00:16:49.520 --> 00:16:51.280\ninteraction\n\n336\n00:16:51.280 --> 00:16:56.400\nas Facebook was becoming a thing. And as Google and YouTube were becoming a\n\n337\n00:16:56.400 --> 00:16:57.600\nthing and we were\n\n338\n00:16:57.600 --> 00:17:01.440\nstarting to get tons of feedback from customers through these new channels. And\n\n339\n00:17:01.440 --> 00:17:03.280\nwe basically needed\n\n340\n00:17:03.280 --> 00:17:09.360\nto rebuild an e-commerce site so that it could basically grow and allow us to\n\n341\n00:17:09.360 --> 00:17:10.480\nnot only sell product\n\n342\n00:17:10.480 --> 00:17:14.420\nbut make it a much more dynamic experience. We also had to launch a loyalty\n\n343\n00:17:14.420 --> 00:17:15.840\nprogram that was\n\n344\n00:17:15.840 --> 00:17:20.720\ngoing to resonate both in-store and online. And so in the next, I guess it was\n\n345\n00:17:20.720 --> 00:17:21.520\neight years of being\n\n346\n00:17:21.520 --> 00:17:27.000\nthere, we did those things. We built the most successful online beauty business\n\n347\n00:17:27.000 --> 00:17:28.320\n. We incorporated\n\n348\n00:17:28.320 --> 00:17:32.810\nall the learnings of what was happening on YouTube by pulling videos into the\n\n349\n00:17:32.810 --> 00:17:34.160\nsite. We understood\n\n350\n00:17:34.160 --> 00:17:39.840\nthat mobile was becoming an important mechanism and we basically educated both\n\n351\n00:17:39.840 --> 00:17:41.360\nthe company as well\n\n352\n00:17:41.360 --> 00:17:49.120\nas corporate so LVMH who owned us on why mobile, both web and mobile apps, we\n\n353\n00:17:49.120 --> 00:17:50.000\n're going to change\n\n354\n00:17:50.000 --> 00:17:53.610\nthe way we all shop and the way we think about things was going to become a\n\n355\n00:17:53.610 --> 00:17:55.600\nbridge from e-commerce\n\n356\n00:17:55.600 --> 00:17:58.950\nto the store that customers don't care where they're shopping. They want the\n\n357\n00:17:58.950 --> 00:17:59.840\nsame information.\n\n358\n00:17:59.840 --> 00:18:03.940\nWe launched Beauty and Cider which was one of the most successful loyalty\n\n359\n00:18:03.940 --> 00:18:04.800\ncompanies ever\n\n360\n00:18:04.800 --> 00:18:09.360\nand use as an example by lots and lots of other retail companies on what to do.\n\n361\n00:18:09.360 --> 00:18:14.960\nWe used the customer's love for beauty as our currency. So we gave product\n\n362\n00:18:14.960 --> 00:18:15.680\nbased on how many\n\n363\n00:18:15.680 --> 00:18:20.170\npoints you had. We understood that like our best shoppers, which we called, at\n\n364\n00:18:20.170 --> 00:18:20.880\nfirst we call them\n\n365\n00:18:20.880 --> 00:18:25.740\nVIBs, very important beauty insiders and then VVIBs. We had like the top tier,\n\n366\n00:18:25.740 --> 00:18:26.240\nwe created\n\n367\n00:18:26.240 --> 00:18:30.090\nexperiences for them and we sort of, you know, I think understood their love of\n\n368\n00:18:30.090 --> 00:18:31.360\nbeauty and really\n\n369\n00:18:31.360 --> 00:18:37.360\nleaned into that. So we really sort of modernized the company to create a very\n\n370\n00:18:37.360 --> 00:18:39.120\nsort of digital and\n\n371\n00:18:39.600 --> 00:18:44.500\nstore experience that felt like one. And what we were able to do is create\n\n372\n00:18:44.500 --> 00:18:45.280\nincredibly loyal\n\n373\n00:18:45.280 --> 00:18:50.190\ncustomers who felt like we were actually leveraging technology to make their\n\n374\n00:18:50.190 --> 00:18:51.600\nlife better. You can\n\n375\n00:18:51.600 --> 00:18:55.100\nscan a product in a store and read the review of it. You could walk into the\n\n376\n00:18:55.100 --> 00:18:56.240\nstore with your phone\n\n377\n00:18:56.240 --> 00:18:59.850\nand remember the color foundation that you love to buy. You know, and I think\n\n378\n00:18:59.850 --> 00:19:00.880\nthat there were just\n\n379\n00:19:00.880 --> 00:19:05.810\nso many, we did so many really interesting, both digital things that actually\n\n380\n00:19:05.810 --> 00:19:06.720\nhelped people\n\n381\n00:19:06.720 --> 00:19:11.630\nand also really thought about what that store experience coming back to the\n\n382\n00:19:11.630 --> 00:19:12.320\nsite should be.\n\n383\n00:19:12.320 --> 00:19:17.440\nSo we grew our business dramatically. We grew our web business to a billion\n\n384\n00:19:17.440 --> 00:19:19.520\ndollars. We doubled our\n\n385\n00:19:19.520 --> 00:19:25.480\nstore business in that period of time and became really the leader in, but I\n\n386\n00:19:25.480 --> 00:19:26.320\nwould say, you know,\n\n387\n00:19:26.320 --> 00:19:31.230\nmulti-channel retailing during that time period. And it was a lot of me and my\n\n388\n00:19:31.230 --> 00:19:32.480\nteam, who was amazing,\n\n389\n00:19:32.480 --> 00:19:36.800\nnothing is done alone, as we all know, you know, really sort of trying to\n\n390\n00:19:36.800 --> 00:19:38.880\nexpress before ahead of\n\n391\n00:19:38.880 --> 00:19:42.490\nthe time why this was going to be so important. And that's what I want to ask\n\n392\n00:19:42.490 --> 00:19:43.280\nyou about Julie,\n\n393\n00:19:43.280 --> 00:19:48.220\nbecause, you know, you really are a trailblazer. I mean, you wanted to get into\n\n394\n00:19:48.220 --> 00:19:49.200\ne-commerce,\n\n395\n00:19:49.200 --> 00:19:54.160\nyou know, you mentioned you start out banking, you go to Starbucks and then you\n\n396\n00:19:54.160 --> 00:19:55.360\nrealize you have\n\n397\n00:19:55.360 --> 00:19:59.290\nthis idea of what you can do at Nordstrom. And then, you know, just talked\n\n398\n00:19:59.290 --> 00:20:00.720\nabout how you really\n\n399\n00:20:00.720 --> 00:20:06.590\npioneered the whole digital loyalty transformation it's for. How did you\n\n400\n00:20:06.590 --> 00:20:08.880\neducate yourself on even\n\n401\n00:20:08.880 --> 00:20:13.910\nhow to do this? I mean, you know, how did you get prepared to do what nobody\n\n402\n00:20:13.910 --> 00:20:15.200\nelse was doing?\n\n403\n00:20:15.200 --> 00:20:20.400\nI think that mostly I'm just an early adopter. And so I was playing with the\n\n404\n00:20:20.400 --> 00:20:21.840\ntechnology and\n\n405\n00:20:21.840 --> 00:20:25.230\nthinking about how it could be used for other purposes. And so especially\n\n406\n00:20:25.230 --> 00:20:26.400\nbecause fashion is\n\n407\n00:20:26.400 --> 00:20:30.270\nsuch a passion of mine. And I love it so much. I'm thinking about it all the\n\n408\n00:20:30.270 --> 00:20:31.680\ntime naturally. And\n\n409\n00:20:31.680 --> 00:20:35.850\nI'm also always thinking of sort of an optimizer by nature. So I'm thinking,\n\n410\n00:20:35.850 --> 00:20:36.480\nhow can you do this\n\n411\n00:20:36.480 --> 00:20:40.090\nbetter? How can you do this more efficiently? I love, you know, the idea of\n\n412\n00:20:40.090 --> 00:20:40.960\nlike marrying those\n\n413\n00:20:40.960 --> 00:20:44.950\ntwo things and technologies, the ultimate, you know, efficiency driver. So what\n\n414\n00:20:44.950 --> 00:20:45.840\nI think about when\n\n415\n00:20:45.840 --> 00:20:50.740\nI was 10 and the first version of a portable TV came out and I just was\n\n416\n00:20:50.740 --> 00:20:52.320\nobsessed with that. And I\n\n417\n00:20:52.320 --> 00:20:56.080\nsaved my money and I bought it and I was going to bring it to camp where no,\n\n418\n00:20:56.080 --> 00:20:56.880\nyou know, it wasn't\n\n419\n00:20:56.880 --> 00:21:00.790\nlike people were told don't bring tech to camp like there was, there's no tech.\n\n420\n00:21:00.790 --> 00:21:01.360\nSo no one was\n\n421\n00:21:01.360 --> 00:21:04.970\nbringing anything like my bringing this was really exciting for everyone. And I\n\n422\n00:21:04.970 --> 00:21:05.680\njust think I've always\n\n423\n00:21:05.680 --> 00:21:09.090\nbeen really interested in it. So, you know, I remember that literally where I\n\n424\n00:21:09.090 --> 00:21:09.760\nwas sitting the\n\n425\n00:21:09.760 --> 00:21:14.640\nday Amazon went live. I mean, Jeff Bezos is really, you know, the pioneer of it\n\n426\n00:21:14.640 --> 00:21:15.680\n. What I did was took\n\n427\n00:21:15.680 --> 00:21:18.310\nlike his, you know, initial ideas and then thought about all the things you\n\n428\n00:21:18.310 --> 00:21:19.200\ncould do to make\n\n429\n00:21:19.200 --> 00:21:24.110\nshopping, especially for fashion and beauty better. And so I am constantly, I'm\n\n430\n00:21:24.110 --> 00:21:24.720\nsort of a problem\n\n431\n00:21:24.720 --> 00:21:29.070\nsolver by nature. And to me, technology is like the ultimate way to solve so\n\n432\n00:21:29.070 --> 00:21:30.640\nmany problems. And so\n\n433\n00:21:30.640 --> 00:21:36.320\nthat sort of naturally all comes together in my mind. Now you left the support,\n\n434\n00:21:36.320 --> 00:21:36.880\nyou didn't get the\n\n435\n00:21:36.880 --> 00:21:43.670\nCEO job there. And looking back now, what did that ultimately open up a door\n\n436\n00:21:43.670 --> 00:21:44.800\nfor you? You know,\n\n437\n00:21:44.800 --> 00:21:48.640\nsometimes I don't know if you wanted to be CEO or not, but you didn't get that\n\n438\n00:21:48.640 --> 00:21:50.720\njob. But you know,\n\n439\n00:21:50.720 --> 00:21:55.620\nbecause you didn't get it, what opportunity did it give you? When I was at Sep\n\n440\n00:21:55.620 --> 00:21:57.200\nora sort of later on\n\n441\n00:21:57.200 --> 00:22:00.810\nin my time there, the head of marketing left and they said, Julie, why don't\n\n442\n00:22:00.810 --> 00:22:01.840\nyou also take on the\n\n443\n00:22:01.840 --> 00:22:06.290\nCMO role? And at that time, David announced that he was leaving. And because I\n\n444\n00:22:06.290 --> 00:22:07.200\nhad just taken this\n\n445\n00:22:07.200 --> 00:22:11.920\nnew role is I think a factor in it, they brought on someone else to be CEO. And\n\n446\n00:22:11.920 --> 00:22:12.880\nI just, you know,\n\n447\n00:22:12.880 --> 00:22:19.600\nI felt a year in that this was not the sort of the place for me to stay that I\n\n448\n00:22:19.600 --> 00:22:20.320\nneeded to go out\n\n449\n00:22:20.320 --> 00:22:24.100\nand find something else. And I think in some ways, you know, it would have been\n\n450\n00:22:24.100 --> 00:22:24.800\nincredibly\n\n451\n00:22:24.800 --> 00:22:29.040\nfun to be CEO of Sepora. And I'm so proud of the fact that one of the women\n\n452\n00:22:29.040 --> 00:22:30.240\nthat worked for me,\n\n453\n00:22:30.240 --> 00:22:34.880\nwhile I was there, is now the CEO of Artemis Patrick. So she's amazing. And I,\n\n454\n00:22:34.880 --> 00:22:35.200\nyou know,\n\n455\n00:22:35.200 --> 00:22:38.320\nI think that there are a lot of things that we did during our time that\n\n456\n00:22:38.320 --> 00:22:39.440\nprobably helped her to\n\n457\n00:22:39.440 --> 00:22:43.450\nbecome CEO. So I'm proud of that. I'm mostly proud of how amazing she is. But,\n\n458\n00:22:43.450 --> 00:22:44.800\nyou know, I would say\n\n459\n00:22:44.800 --> 00:22:47.950\nthat that really led me to think, okay, what do I want to do next? And I had\n\n460\n00:22:47.950 --> 00:22:49.120\nalways wanted to start\n\n461\n00:22:49.120 --> 00:22:54.370\nsomething. But I was nervous. I'm, you know, not a millennial. I'm not a Gen Z.\n\n462\n00:22:54.370 --> 00:22:55.680\nI'm a Gen Xor. And so\n\n463\n00:22:55.680 --> 00:22:59.020\nthe idea of going out on my own and starting something still felt a little bit\n\n464\n00:22:59.020 --> 00:23:00.000\nscary. And I\n\n465\n00:23:00.000 --> 00:23:03.780\nhad been on the board of Stitch Fix. And I had really gotten to know Katrina\n\n466\n00:23:03.780 --> 00:23:04.720\nLake, the founder\n\n467\n00:23:04.720 --> 00:23:09.620\nwell, I had loved that experience was very involved. And she said, when I was\n\n468\n00:23:09.620 --> 00:23:10.400\nthinking about leaving,\n\n469\n00:23:10.400 --> 00:23:13.760\nwhy don't you come work for us? We have so much we need to figure out, you know\n\n470\n00:23:13.760 --> 00:23:14.800\n, the business had\n\n471\n00:23:14.800 --> 00:23:18.070\nso much potential in front of it. I knew everything about it. And I loved the\n\n472\n00:23:18.070 --> 00:23:19.120\nbusiness. And so I\n\n473\n00:23:19.120 --> 00:23:22.650\nthought, you know, this will be a great way for me to figure out if I want to\n\n474\n00:23:22.650 --> 00:23:24.320\ngo start my own company.\n\n475\n00:23:24.320 --> 00:23:28.060\nAnd so it was an incredible experience. I'd been on the board for two and a\n\n476\n00:23:28.060 --> 00:23:28.880\nhalf years.\n\n477\n00:23:28.880 --> 00:23:33.160\nI came in, you know, we had grown. It was an incredible growth story, that\n\n478\n00:23:33.160 --> 00:23:34.800\ncompany. So at first we,\n\n479\n00:23:34.800 --> 00:23:39.120\nduring the time as a board member, we grew from about 10 million when I started\n\n480\n00:23:39.120 --> 00:23:40.960\nto about 250 million.\n\n481\n00:23:40.960 --> 00:23:44.280\nAnd then I joined. And over the next two and a half years, we grew the business\n\n482\n00:23:44.280 --> 00:23:45.280\nto a billion.\n\n483\n00:23:45.280 --> 00:23:50.560\nAnd that growth was so exciting and was a result of many people and many\n\n484\n00:23:50.560 --> 00:23:51.760\nconditions in the market.\n\n485\n00:23:51.760 --> 00:23:56.080\nReally? I think you realize over time, there's definitely a lot of luck with\n\n486\n00:23:56.080 --> 00:23:56.640\nthis thing.\n\n487\n00:23:57.440 --> 00:24:01.250\nAnd so that was really an incredible experience and really, I would say,\n\n488\n00:24:01.250 --> 00:24:02.800\nconfirmed everything I\n\n489\n00:24:02.800 --> 00:24:07.290\nthought about starting my own business. And so that was what gave me, I would\n\n490\n00:24:07.290 --> 00:24:08.320\nsay the courage,\n\n491\n00:24:08.320 --> 00:24:13.520\nfrankly, and the experience I felt I needed to then go start my own company.\n\n492\n00:24:13.520 --> 00:24:18.430\nYeah, and I want to get to that in a second. But, you know, when you were at St\n\n493\n00:24:18.430 --> 00:24:19.680\nitch Fix,\n\n494\n00:24:19.680 --> 00:24:24.160\nyou really helped scale the business. You just talked about the dramatic growth\n\n495\n00:24:24.160 --> 00:24:24.160\n.\n\n496\n00:24:24.160 --> 00:24:30.000\nYet you left before the IPO. What made you not stick around for the IPO?\n\n497\n00:24:30.000 --> 00:24:35.480\nThere were a couple of factors. One is that I knew I wasn't going to stay. And\n\n498\n00:24:35.480 --> 00:24:36.560\nit's really hard\n\n499\n00:24:36.560 --> 00:24:43.300\nas an ex-top executive to leave right after an IPO. It really leads to all\n\n500\n00:24:43.300 --> 00:24:44.640\nsorts of questions.\n\n501\n00:24:44.640 --> 00:24:49.550\nSo we knew if I was going to leave that it should be before the IPO, it was\n\n502\n00:24:49.550 --> 00:24:50.880\nreally hard to leave\n\n503\n00:24:50.880 --> 00:24:54.490\nthen because I was so excited after having helped build the company to not be\n\n504\n00:24:54.490 --> 00:24:55.600\npart of that.\n\n505\n00:24:55.600 --> 00:24:59.680\nI also think that Katrina and I kind of came to a realization that she was\n\n506\n00:24:59.680 --> 00:25:00.800\ngoing to stay.\n\n507\n00:25:00.800 --> 00:25:05.520\nIt didn't make sense for me to stay. We were sort of at a point where we were,\n\n508\n00:25:05.520 --> 00:25:11.390\nI think she had left on maternity leave. I co-led the company with Mike Smith,\n\n509\n00:25:11.390 --> 00:25:11.840\nwho was,\n\n510\n00:25:11.840 --> 00:25:16.750\nhad been there for a long time. I loved doing that. And then, yeah, just became\n\n511\n00:25:16.750 --> 00:25:17.200\nclear that\n\n512\n00:25:17.840 --> 00:25:21.760\nshe at one point was thinking she might leave, decided to stay, and it was\n\n513\n00:25:21.760 --> 00:25:22.480\nreally time for me\n\n514\n00:25:22.480 --> 00:25:27.390\nto go and do my own thing. Years later, after she decided to leave, she reached\n\n515\n00:25:27.390 --> 00:25:27.920\nback out to see\n\n516\n00:25:27.920 --> 00:25:31.330\nif I was interested in coming back. But at that point, it didn't make sense. So\n\n517\n00:25:31.330 --> 00:25:32.800\nit's interesting\n\n518\n00:25:32.800 --> 00:25:36.970\nwith life the way these things work. Hello, friends. I hope you're loving this\n\n519\n00:25:36.970 --> 00:25:37.920\nconversation.\n\n520\n00:25:37.920 --> 00:25:41.760\nBe sure to stay tuned to the very end of the episode. As always, David and I\n\n521\n00:25:41.760 --> 00:25:42.720\nare going to debrief\n\n522\n00:25:42.720 --> 00:25:46.880\nsome of the concepts that he talks about with this week's guest. So stay tuned\n\n523\n00:25:46.880 --> 00:25:48.080\nto the very end,\n\n524\n00:25:48.080 --> 00:25:52.160\nand I will see you soon. You know, you once said that the job wouldn't be about\n\n525\n00:25:52.160 --> 00:25:54.160\ncreating something new,\n\n526\n00:25:54.160 --> 00:26:00.470\nit would be more about managing decay. What did you mean by that? Not at Stitch\n\n527\n00:26:00.470 --> 00:26:01.200\nFix. That was\n\n528\n00:26:01.200 --> 00:26:05.230\nsort of the idea of going to another big company at that point. Oh, okay. All\n\n529\n00:26:05.230 --> 00:26:06.400\nright. So, you know,\n\n530\n00:26:06.400 --> 00:26:10.150\nI was sort of at that moment, I was actually, when I announced that I was\n\n531\n00:26:10.150 --> 00:26:11.440\nleaving Stitch Fix,\n\n532\n00:26:11.440 --> 00:26:14.880\nand I was starting to work on my startup, I also got approached by a couple of\n\n533\n00:26:14.880 --> 00:26:15.840\nbig companies\n\n534\n00:26:15.840 --> 00:26:19.450\nfor the CEO role, and some companies that would have been, you know, a dream to\n\n535\n00:26:19.450 --> 00:26:20.480\nrun those companies.\n\n536\n00:26:20.480 --> 00:26:24.160\nSo I spent some time as I was thinking of starting up, do I want to go do that?\n\n537\n00:26:24.160 --> 00:26:27.770\nI'd always wanted to be the CEO of a big company. And so that would have been a\n\n538\n00:26:27.770 --> 00:26:28.720\nreal checkbox\n\n539\n00:26:28.720 --> 00:26:32.630\nof my dream. But what I realized over the years was that that actually wasn't\n\n540\n00:26:32.630 --> 00:26:33.760\nmy dream. My dream\n\n541\n00:26:33.760 --> 00:26:38.660\nwas to start a company. I just didn't really know that until this point. And so\n\n542\n00:26:38.660 --> 00:26:39.600\nthat was a great\n\n543\n00:26:39.600 --> 00:26:43.210\nopportunity to test out, you know, which direction I wanted to go. Such\n\n544\n00:26:43.210 --> 00:26:44.640\ndifferent directions. But\n\n545\n00:26:44.640 --> 00:26:48.450\nwhat I realized in going to these larger companies was that they had so many\n\n546\n00:26:48.450 --> 00:26:49.920\nheadwinds. And there were\n\n547\n00:26:49.920 --> 00:26:54.370\nthe focus of what I would be doing was, you know, to some degree managing decay\n\n548\n00:26:54.370 --> 00:26:55.040\nand other,\n\n549\n00:26:55.040 --> 00:26:58.320\nyou know, in other ways, trying to figure out how to transform. But it would\n\n550\n00:26:58.320 --> 00:26:59.360\nnot be leaning into\n\n551\n00:26:59.360 --> 00:27:03.850\nthe things that I love to do most and that I was best at. Yeah. And, you know,\n\n552\n00:27:03.850 --> 00:27:05.520\nso you were at that\n\n553\n00:27:05.520 --> 00:27:09.280\npoint in time in your life where you had to figure out which fork to go down,\n\n554\n00:27:09.280 --> 00:27:10.080\nyou decide that you're\n\n555\n00:27:10.080 --> 00:27:14.530\ngoing to be the entrepreneur, you're going to go the startup route. And you\n\n556\n00:27:14.530 --> 00:27:16.240\ncreate the yes, you know,\n\n557\n00:27:16.240 --> 00:27:21.150\nyou know, that takes a lot of courage. I mean, you know, you know, what, what\n\n558\n00:27:21.150 --> 00:27:21.680\nwas it that?\n\n559\n00:27:21.680 --> 00:27:27.550\nThe what was it? What was the tipping point that made you say, hey, I want to\n\n560\n00:27:27.550 --> 00:27:28.880\nrun my own thing versus\n\n561\n00:27:28.880 --> 00:27:32.540\ngo to the established company. I know you can. There are all kinds of\n\n562\n00:27:32.540 --> 00:27:34.480\nchallenges with that. But,\n\n563\n00:27:34.480 --> 00:27:37.440\nyou know, how did you get the courage to go start the yes?\n\n564\n00:27:37.440 --> 00:27:43.360\nYeah. I mean, I think that it's hard for a senior exec who has a cushy job in a\n\n565\n00:27:43.360 --> 00:27:44.720\ncorner office and,\n\n566\n00:27:44.720 --> 00:27:49.630\nyou know, all of these things to suddenly switch gears. And, you know, I\n\n567\n00:27:49.630 --> 00:27:50.560\nremember talking to an\n\n568\n00:27:50.560 --> 00:27:54.020\ninvestor. And he was saying to me, well, you're not going to really be like in\n\n569\n00:27:54.020 --> 00:27:54.720\nthe day to day,\n\n570\n00:27:54.720 --> 00:27:58.010\nright? Like, you're going to kind of oversee it. And I was like, Oh, no, I'm\n\n571\n00:27:58.010 --> 00:27:58.880\ngoing to be in a day\n\n572\n00:27:58.880 --> 00:28:02.490\nto day, I'm going to be building. And, you know, what I realized is, first of\n\n573\n00:28:02.490 --> 00:28:03.440\nall, it was very\n\n574\n00:28:03.440 --> 00:28:10.080\nhelpful to have Stitch Fix as a transition. Because I really got to sort of\n\n575\n00:28:10.080 --> 00:28:11.440\nlive the startup experience,\n\n576\n00:28:11.440 --> 00:28:15.170\nwhich is very different from corporate life. And it was very helpful both as a\n\n577\n00:28:15.170 --> 00:28:16.000\nboard member and\n\n578\n00:28:16.000 --> 00:28:20.090\neven being inside to know what it was going to take. I would say the reality\n\n579\n00:28:20.090 --> 00:28:21.200\nwas the thing that I\n\n580\n00:28:21.200 --> 00:28:25.100\nloved about my corporate jobs was actually the new stuff that we were building\n\n581\n00:28:25.100 --> 00:28:26.000\nand creating.\n\n582\n00:28:26.000 --> 00:28:30.910\nAnd that's what I was best at. And so I realized that number one, I liked to\n\n583\n00:28:30.910 --> 00:28:31.280\nbuild\n\n584\n00:28:31.280 --> 00:28:36.630\nfrom scratch. And number two, that I was making lots of money for these big\n\n585\n00:28:36.630 --> 00:28:38.080\ncompanies. And I would\n\n586\n00:28:38.080 --> 00:28:43.120\nmuch rather be the person that owned the business that I was creating and, you\n\n587\n00:28:43.120 --> 00:28:44.720\nknow, hopefully succeeding\n\n588\n00:28:44.720 --> 00:28:49.630\nat. So that was a motivation, but it was scary. I mean, I was 47 when I started\n\n589\n00:28:49.630 --> 00:28:51.040\nthe Yes. And I felt\n\n590\n00:28:51.040 --> 00:28:54.310\nlike am I too old? People said, you know, it's you shouldn't start a company if\n\n591\n00:28:54.310 --> 00:28:55.760\nyou're not young.\n\n592\n00:28:55.760 --> 00:29:00.210\nAnd you don't, you just don't understand, like, you know, the thinking. And so\n\n593\n00:29:00.210 --> 00:29:01.600\nI got some skeptical\n\n594\n00:29:01.600 --> 00:29:04.340\npeople, although the main person that told me that ended up investing in my\n\n595\n00:29:04.340 --> 00:29:05.760\ncompany. So, you know,\n\n596\n00:29:05.760 --> 00:29:08.510\nat the end of the day, I'm not sure he believed it, but he was sort of saying\n\n597\n00:29:08.510 --> 00:29:09.360\nit as a challenge.\n\n598\n00:29:09.360 --> 00:29:13.120\nAnd you know, you're putting, you're exposing yourself like any artist, you\n\n599\n00:29:13.120 --> 00:29:13.840\nknow, who goes out\n\n600\n00:29:13.840 --> 00:29:17.950\nthere and writes a song and, and or writes a book or creates a podcast like you\n\n601\n00:29:17.950 --> 00:29:18.960\n, you put yourself\n\n602\n00:29:18.960 --> 00:29:22.490\nout there in a way that's very different. And so, you know, you're like, are\n\n603\n00:29:22.490 --> 00:29:23.520\npeople going to like\n\n604\n00:29:23.520 --> 00:29:27.680\nthis? Am I going to be able to get higher people to work with me? There's so\n\n605\n00:29:27.680 --> 00:29:29.040\nmany questions. And it\n\n606\n00:29:29.040 --> 00:29:33.950\nreally was incredibly nerve racking. But I'm so glad I did it. And just days\n\n607\n00:29:33.950 --> 00:29:35.120\nafter the the launch\n\n608\n00:29:35.120 --> 00:29:41.630\nof the yes, COVID COVID shuts the world down. I mean, what was going on in your\n\n609\n00:29:41.630 --> 00:29:42.400\nmind when that\n\n610\n00:29:42.400 --> 00:29:45.670\nhappened? So interestingly, it actually we were about to launch. So we had it\n\n611\n00:29:45.670 --> 00:29:46.560\nlaunched. We were\n\n612\n00:29:46.560 --> 00:29:50.560\nplanning to launch on May, on March 20th. And COVID kind of, you know, became a\n\n613\n00:29:50.560 --> 00:29:51.200\nknown thing\n\n614\n00:29:51.200 --> 00:29:54.930\naround the first week of March. And so I kept thinking, because I'm the\n\n615\n00:29:54.930 --> 00:29:56.080\nultimate optimist,\n\n616\n00:29:56.080 --> 00:30:01.010\nwhich you have to be if you're a entrepreneur, because otherwise, you know, you\n\n617\n00:30:01.010 --> 00:30:01.520\nwould just see\n\n618\n00:30:01.520 --> 00:30:04.150\nall the problems and you couldn't move forward. I always assume things are\n\n619\n00:30:04.150 --> 00:30:05.040\ngoing to work out. And\n\n620\n00:30:05.040 --> 00:30:08.690\nso I said to my team, Oh, let's just wait three weeks, a single pass, and then\n\n621\n00:30:08.690 --> 00:30:09.600\nwe'll launch. So\n\n622\n00:30:09.600 --> 00:30:13.000\nwe held off on launching. And during that time, the good thing was there were\n\n623\n00:30:13.000 --> 00:30:13.760\nstill a bunch of\n\n624\n00:30:13.760 --> 00:30:17.060\nthings that I really wanted fixed before we launched. So we got a chance to fix\n\n625\n00:30:17.060 --> 00:30:17.840\nthose things.\n\n626\n00:30:17.840 --> 00:30:20.630\nBut you know, three or four weeks in, it was very clear that COVID was not\n\n627\n00:30:20.630 --> 00:30:22.320\ngoing away anytime soon.\n\n628\n00:30:22.320 --> 00:30:26.100\nSo we kind of retooled and we figured out what would be the right time to do it\n\n629\n00:30:26.100 --> 00:30:27.280\n. It felt very,\n\n630\n00:30:27.280 --> 00:30:32.190\nsort of out of place, because it felt superfluous to think about shopping for\n\n631\n00:30:32.190 --> 00:30:33.120\nclothes during this\n\n632\n00:30:33.120 --> 00:30:36.060\nmajor pandemic, where people were getting sick and dying. And there was, you\n\n633\n00:30:36.060 --> 00:30:36.880\nknow, the whole world\n\n634\n00:30:36.880 --> 00:30:40.490\nwas shut down. So we really had to sort of change the way we thought about it\n\n635\n00:30:40.490 --> 00:30:41.440\nand make it\n\n636\n00:30:41.440 --> 00:30:45.790\nabout entertainment and a little levity. You know, this is something to play\n\n637\n00:30:45.790 --> 00:30:46.880\nwith while you\n\n638\n00:30:46.880 --> 00:30:50.960\nare sitting at home, bored, scared, stressed, whatever you were doing. The\n\n639\n00:30:50.960 --> 00:30:51.840\nother thing is we\n\n640\n00:30:51.840 --> 00:30:55.840\nneeded to find the right moment in time. You know, as you remember, there were\n\n641\n00:30:55.840 --> 00:30:56.720\na lot of things that\n\n642\n00:30:56.720 --> 00:31:01.680\nhappened during COVID. And so we needed to find kind of a quiet moment where we\n\n643\n00:31:01.680 --> 00:31:02.800\nweren't stepping\n\n644\n00:31:02.800 --> 00:31:06.720\non the toes of something that was much bigger to get some publicity. So anyway,\n\n645\n00:31:06.720 --> 00:31:07.200\nwe ended up\n\n646\n00:31:07.200 --> 00:31:12.530\nlaunching in May. And we got lucky because it happened right before a lot of\n\n647\n00:31:12.530 --> 00:31:13.440\nother terrible\n\n648\n00:31:13.440 --> 00:31:17.510\nthings happened. And we had a moment where we had some, you know, space in the\n\n649\n00:31:17.510 --> 00:31:18.640\nmedia to launch.\n\n650\n00:31:18.640 --> 00:31:23.090\nAnd then we learned how, as every company did, how to pivot and work from home\n\n651\n00:31:23.090 --> 00:31:23.840\nand continue to\n\n652\n00:31:23.840 --> 00:31:29.630\nbuild and create an audience and a product in a very strange world. And you\n\n653\n00:31:29.630 --> 00:31:31.360\nknow, Pinterest ends\n\n654\n00:31:31.360 --> 00:31:37.600\nup acquiring the Yes. But I don't know that things really played out the way\n\n655\n00:31:37.600 --> 00:31:39.520\nyou'd hoped there.\n\n656\n00:31:39.520 --> 00:31:45.760\nYou know, what happened? And what'd you learn from it? So much learning. We\n\n657\n00:31:45.760 --> 00:31:48.080\nwere not looking to sell\n\n658\n00:31:48.080 --> 00:31:53.210\nthe company. We this was two years then after we launched, it was 2022. And we\n\n659\n00:31:53.210 --> 00:31:54.160\nwere just starting\n\n660\n00:31:54.160 --> 00:31:59.560\nto get traction and growing. And we were going to go out for our next raise.\n\n661\n00:31:59.560 --> 00:32:01.600\nAnd I got an outreach\n\n662\n00:32:01.600 --> 00:32:06.640\nfrom Ben Silberman and his head of product, Naveen. And they were really\n\n663\n00:32:06.640 --> 00:32:08.080\ninterested in what we were\n\n664\n00:32:08.080 --> 00:32:12.980\nbuilding. And so we started to talk. And I said, I'm not looking to sell the\n\n665\n00:32:12.980 --> 00:32:14.000\ncompany. But I love\n\n666\n00:32:14.000 --> 00:32:17.960\nPinterest. I always have. I actually remember exactly where I was when I\n\n667\n00:32:17.960 --> 00:32:19.280\nlearned about Pinterest\n\n668\n00:32:19.280 --> 00:32:23.010\nand when I started to use it. So it was exciting to hear from them. We had had\n\n669\n00:32:23.010 --> 00:32:24.000\ncalls from a lot\n\n670\n00:32:24.000 --> 00:32:27.620\nof the tech companies over the couple of years. There was a lot of interest in\n\n671\n00:32:27.620 --> 00:32:28.560\nwhat was sort of\n\n672\n00:32:28.560 --> 00:32:32.770\nevolving for shopping, how to sort of create a layer that didn't require owning\n\n673\n00:32:32.770 --> 00:32:33.440\ninventory,\n\n674\n00:32:34.160 --> 00:32:37.970\na tech layer that could help match people with the right product. And so we\n\n675\n00:32:37.970 --> 00:32:38.960\nwere just in women's\n\n676\n00:32:38.960 --> 00:32:43.870\nfashion. So we were pretty narrow at that moment. But it was we were interested\n\n677\n00:32:43.870 --> 00:32:44.800\nin, you know, sort of\n\n678\n00:32:44.800 --> 00:32:50.160\nwhat was happening with the social media space. And when we got the call, I was\n\n679\n00:32:50.160 --> 00:32:51.440\nintrigued. So I\n\n680\n00:32:51.440 --> 00:32:56.420\nstarted to talk to Ben and he is great and was really interesting and had lots\n\n681\n00:32:56.420 --> 00:32:57.120\nof interesting\n\n682\n00:32:57.120 --> 00:33:00.190\nideas around what he wanted to do with Pinterest. He had always thought about\n\n683\n00:33:00.190 --> 00:33:01.040\nmaking it more of a\n\n684\n00:33:01.040 --> 00:33:06.730\nshopping destination and not just kind of a search and browse destination. But\n\n685\n00:33:06.730 --> 00:33:07.680\nhe hadn't had the right\n\n686\n00:33:07.680 --> 00:33:11.290\nperson to sort of build out shopping for them. And he had loved what we built\n\n687\n00:33:11.290 --> 00:33:12.000\nat the Yes,\n\n688\n00:33:12.000 --> 00:33:15.730\nhe could tell that we had built something that was really for the user and\n\n689\n00:33:15.730 --> 00:33:17.120\nreally well saw through.\n\n690\n00:33:17.120 --> 00:33:22.870\nAnd so we had great conversations and lots of plans on how to work together.\n\n691\n00:33:22.870 --> 00:33:23.920\nAnd they were\n\n692\n00:33:23.920 --> 00:33:27.530\nwilling to pay the price that made sense for us to do the steal. And so we did\n\n693\n00:33:27.530 --> 00:33:28.560\nthe deal. And it\n\n694\n00:33:28.560 --> 00:33:33.920\nwas kind of a crazy moment. I learned how hard it is to be patient during an M&\n\n695\n00:33:33.920 --> 00:33:34.560\nA process.\n\n696\n00:33:34.560 --> 00:33:39.010\nAnd I learned a lot about the M&A process, which is really interesting and\n\n697\n00:33:39.010 --> 00:33:39.520\nuseful. But\n\n698\n00:33:39.520 --> 00:33:44.660\nthen we closed the deal and we started to work together. We did a town hall. It\n\n699\n00:33:44.660 --> 00:33:45.120\nwas really\n\n700\n00:33:45.120 --> 00:33:50.400\nexciting. All of Pinterest was thrilled to have the Yes, join them. And about a\n\n701\n00:33:50.400 --> 00:33:51.280\nmonth later, Ben\n\n702\n00:33:51.280 --> 00:33:55.240\nannounced that he was stepping down. And I was very surprised. I had no idea\n\n703\n00:33:55.240 --> 00:33:56.240\nthat was sort of his\n\n704\n00:33:56.240 --> 00:34:02.160\nplans. And then new CEO was announced. And unfortunately, as often happens,\n\n705\n00:34:02.160 --> 00:34:07.360\nthe new CEO had a very different agenda. He was very interested in building\n\n706\n00:34:07.360 --> 00:34:09.920\nonto the ads business.\n\n707\n00:34:09.920 --> 00:34:15.630\nAnd so he was not interested in building a shopping surface. And so we spent\n\n708\n00:34:15.630 --> 00:34:16.240\nsome time\n\n709\n00:34:16.240 --> 00:34:21.150\ntalking through, I tried to see if there were, you know, I could change his\n\n710\n00:34:21.150 --> 00:34:22.160\nmind that I couldn't.\n\n711\n00:34:22.160 --> 00:34:27.040\nAnd so it was really hard, I have to say, from an emotional standpoint, we were\n\n712\n00:34:27.040 --> 00:34:27.840\nso excited to\n\n713\n00:34:27.840 --> 00:34:34.190\nbuild this idea and vision that we had. And so in the end, I stayed for six\n\n714\n00:34:34.190 --> 00:34:35.120\nmonths.\n\n715\n00:34:35.120 --> 00:34:40.770\nAnd as an employee, I helped find roles for my team that was all there, that\n\n716\n00:34:40.770 --> 00:34:41.520\nwould make them\n\n717\n00:34:41.520 --> 00:34:48.560\nuseful in the new direction. And I stayed on as an advisor for six months and\n\n718\n00:34:48.560 --> 00:34:49.360\nwas helpful where\n\n719\n00:34:49.360 --> 00:34:55.280\nI could be. And during that time, ChatCHBT launched. And I had a whole new idea\n\n720\n00:34:55.280 --> 00:34:56.640\nfor the next wave of\n\n721\n00:34:56.640 --> 00:35:00.580\nshopping and started to think about what I would do next. But it was a really\n\n722\n00:35:00.580 --> 00:35:01.840\ninteresting experience.\n\n723\n00:35:01.840 --> 00:35:06.740\nI would say financially, it was a great opportunity for me and my team. And so\n\n724\n00:35:06.740 --> 00:35:08.000\nI'm very thankful for\n\n725\n00:35:08.000 --> 00:35:12.080\nthat. You know, I think Pinterest was able to use the tech we built in many\n\n726\n00:35:12.080 --> 00:35:13.200\nways. So that was a\n\n727\n00:35:13.200 --> 00:35:17.220\ngreat experience. But I definitely learned that you cannot predict what's going\n\n728\n00:35:17.220 --> 00:35:18.640\nto happen after\n\n729\n00:35:18.640 --> 00:35:24.320\na deal closes. And then it really led to this new idea that you have. And so\n\n730\n00:35:24.320 --> 00:35:24.960\ntell us about\n\n731\n00:35:24.960 --> 00:35:30.560\ndaydream and what makes it different. So one of the things that I had always\n\n732\n00:35:30.560 --> 00:35:31.520\nseen in e-commerce\n\n733\n00:35:31.520 --> 00:35:36.480\nis that about quarter of the population uses search when they're on a site to\n\n734\n00:35:36.480 --> 00:35:36.960\nfind what they're\n\n735\n00:35:36.960 --> 00:35:41.100\nlooking for. Search has traditionally not worked great on e-commerce sites and\n\n736\n00:35:41.100 --> 00:35:42.080\nespecially on a\n\n737\n00:35:42.080 --> 00:35:46.930\nperil and accessory sites. You know, if you don't use the right terminology,\n\n738\n00:35:46.930 --> 00:35:47.520\nthen the right product\n\n739\n00:35:47.520 --> 00:35:52.420\ndoesn't show up. So we've trained consumers kind of to be suspicious of search\n\n740\n00:35:52.420 --> 00:35:53.840\nand really rely on\n\n741\n00:35:53.840 --> 00:35:57.630\nmore of the navigation to find the things they're looking for. What happened\n\n742\n00:35:57.630 --> 00:35:58.880\nwhen CHATCHBT launched\n\n743\n00:35:58.880 --> 00:36:05.760\nwas that it started to train users. Not only could you actually use search to\n\n744\n00:36:05.760 --> 00:36:06.720\nleverage this new\n\n745\n00:36:06.720 --> 00:36:10.060\nform of technology to find what you're looking for, but you could go beyond\n\n746\n00:36:10.060 --> 00:36:11.120\nsort of simple terms.\n\n747\n00:36:11.120 --> 00:36:14.850\nLike instead of red dress, you can say, I'm going to a Valentine's Day party.\n\n748\n00:36:14.850 --> 00:36:15.600\nAnd I want to look\n\n749\n00:36:15.600 --> 00:36:20.500\nsexy. And, you know, I definitely need to wear sleeves. I would like something\n\n750\n00:36:20.500 --> 00:36:21.680\nwith lace. Show\n\n751\n00:36:21.680 --> 00:36:26.960\nme what you got. And no one had ever searched for fashion that way. But that is\n\n752\n00:36:26.960 --> 00:36:27.680\nhow we think\n\n753\n00:36:27.680 --> 00:36:32.610\nas consumers. We have a need, we have some desires, you know, about how we want\n\n754\n00:36:32.610 --> 00:36:34.240\nto look. And to me,\n\n755\n00:36:34.240 --> 00:36:39.720\nespecially in fashion, that is such a big on-block. And so I got really excited\n\n756\n00:36:39.720 --> 00:36:40.960\nwhat CHATCHBT would\n\n757\n00:36:40.960 --> 00:36:46.380\ndo on two dimensions. One is obviously using LLMs to marry to search and be\n\n758\n00:36:46.380 --> 00:36:48.080\nable to actually create\n\n759\n00:36:48.080 --> 00:36:52.430\na dynamic search that understands natural language, understands the user, and\n\n760\n00:36:52.430 --> 00:36:53.440\nunderstands the product\n\n761\n00:36:53.440 --> 00:36:57.540\nso we can actually show users the right products for them. But also we were\n\n762\n00:36:57.540 --> 00:36:59.120\ntraining users now\n\n763\n00:36:59.120 --> 00:37:02.600\ninstead of keyword search that they could actually use these prompts that\n\n764\n00:37:02.600 --> 00:37:03.760\nexpress what they want.\n\n765\n00:37:03.760 --> 00:37:07.760\nAnd both of those things were enormous unlocks for creating sort of the next\n\n766\n00:37:07.760 --> 00:37:08.960\ngeneration of a shopping\n\n767\n00:37:08.960 --> 00:37:12.400\nexperience. And that's really what drove me to launch Daydream.\n\n768\n00:37:12.400 --> 00:37:16.850\nHow does the business model work? The business model works. So we're basically\n\n769\n00:37:16.850 --> 00:37:17.840\na consumer\n\n770\n00:37:17.840 --> 00:37:23.230\nfacing search engine for fashion that links to all of the retailers and all of\n\n771\n00:37:23.230 --> 00:37:24.560\nthe brands out there.\n\n772\n00:37:24.560 --> 00:37:28.720\nAnd you as a consumer can come on and search for anything you want. When you\n\n773\n00:37:28.720 --> 00:37:29.840\nfind something,\n\n774\n00:37:29.840 --> 00:37:34.160\nyou can either go see who sells that product and link out to those sites. Or\n\n775\n00:37:34.160 --> 00:37:34.720\nyou can say,\n\n776\n00:37:34.720 --> 00:37:38.800\n\"I like this product, but it's not quite right. It's too expensive. It's too\n\n777\n00:37:38.800 --> 00:37:39.760\nlow-cut. It's not\n\n778\n00:37:39.760 --> 00:37:43.780\nthe right color.\" And you can tell the agent, \"I like this product, but I want\n\n779\n00:37:43.780 --> 00:37:44.720\nit in orange.\"\n\n780\n00:37:44.720 --> 00:37:48.890\nYou're looking for a short sleeve Henley, but you want a color that's going to\n\n781\n00:37:48.890 --> 00:37:50.000\npop. And that's kind\n\n782\n00:37:50.000 --> 00:37:54.820\nof maybe a common style in greens and blues, but is there actually an orange\n\n783\n00:37:54.820 --> 00:37:56.000\nout there? And so you\n\n784\n00:37:56.000 --> 00:37:59.450\ncan take the product and you can say, \"I want this, but in orange.\" And then\n\n785\n00:37:59.450 --> 00:38:00.080\nyou can find what\n\n786\n00:38:00.080 --> 00:38:05.040\nyou're looking for. And so some of those tools, the ability to combine text and\n\n787\n00:38:05.040 --> 00:38:06.160\nimage to find what\n\n788\n00:38:06.160 --> 00:38:09.430\nyou're looking for is quite powerful in fashion because it's such a nuanced\n\n789\n00:38:09.430 --> 00:38:11.360\ncategory. And so then\n\n790\n00:38:11.360 --> 00:38:15.600\nonce we find your orange short sleeve Henley shirt, you can see that you can\n\n791\n00:38:15.600 --> 00:38:16.880\nbuy it at Nordstrom,\n\n792\n00:38:16.880 --> 00:38:20.800\nor you can buy it directly from Farity or whoever makes it. And so you'll see\n\n793\n00:38:20.800 --> 00:38:21.840\nthe prices at those\n\n794\n00:38:21.840 --> 00:38:26.080\nplaces and you can click out and you can go buy that shirt. So we make money\n\n795\n00:38:26.080 --> 00:38:26.880\nwhen the retailer\n\n796\n00:38:26.880 --> 00:38:31.790\nmakes money and the consumer finds what they want. Once we actually learn about\n\n797\n00:38:31.790 --> 00:38:32.080\nyou,\n\n798\n00:38:32.080 --> 00:38:36.860\nthe more time you spend on Daydream, the better we understand your preferences.\n\n799\n00:38:36.860 --> 00:38:37.840\nAnd so the search\n\n800\n00:38:37.840 --> 00:38:41.590\nresults become more geared towards you and the whole thing becomes more\n\n801\n00:38:41.590 --> 00:38:42.960\npersonalized and easier\n\n802\n00:38:42.960 --> 00:38:46.600\nto shop. So that's the premise of the business. We're doing a lot of additional\n\n803\n00:38:46.600 --> 00:38:47.360\nthings as well,\n\n804\n00:38:47.360 --> 00:38:52.270\nbut I'll stop there. That is great. And I've talked to a lot of founders, Julie\n\n805\n00:38:52.270 --> 00:38:53.840\n. And every\n\n806\n00:38:53.840 --> 00:39:04.650\nfounder talks about what they learn when they start a new company. What's Day\n\n807\n00:39:04.650 --> 00:39:06.080\ndream teaching\n\n808\n00:39:06.080 --> 00:39:10.990\nyou right now that you didn't know when you started it? Well, I would say,\n\n809\n00:39:10.990 --> 00:39:11.600\nfirst of all,\n\n810\n00:39:11.600 --> 00:39:18.320\nthere is nothing like trying to build a startup to keep you humble. I think\n\n811\n00:39:18.320 --> 00:39:22.560\nthat we have successes\n\n812\n00:39:22.560 --> 00:39:25.520\nand then we think, OK, we could do this. We're really talented. We're really\n\n813\n00:39:25.520 --> 00:39:26.640\ncapable. And then\n\n814\n00:39:26.640 --> 00:39:30.670\nyou start a company. And one day is up and the next day is down. And it is an\n\n815\n00:39:30.670 --> 00:39:31.680\nemotional roller\n\n816\n00:39:31.680 --> 00:39:36.760\ncoaster because there are so many little wins and losses all the time. So I\n\n817\n00:39:36.760 --> 00:39:38.400\nwould say, if I was,\n\n818\n00:39:38.400 --> 00:39:42.400\nit didn't have enough humility before, definitely it has stopped me humility.\n\n819\n00:39:42.400 --> 00:39:43.840\nBut I would say the\n\n820\n00:39:43.840 --> 00:39:48.750\nother thing is just there's so much unknown. And so I have always been a huge\n\n821\n00:39:48.750 --> 00:39:49.680\nbeliever that\n\n822\n00:39:49.680 --> 00:39:52.950\npeople kind of know what they want. They may not know exactly what they want,\n\n823\n00:39:52.950 --> 00:39:53.600\nbut they know what\n\n824\n00:39:53.600 --> 00:39:57.210\ntheir needs are. So whether it's, you know, I need a dress to look great at a\n\n825\n00:39:57.210 --> 00:39:58.320\nwedding in Austin,\n\n826\n00:39:58.320 --> 00:40:03.800\nthat's a daytime wedding this summer, or it's, you know, I want a very specific\n\n827\n00:40:03.800 --> 00:40:05.600\nthing. I assume\n\n828\n00:40:05.600 --> 00:40:10.880\nstarting with search would just blow people away. They would come in droves.\n\n829\n00:40:10.880 --> 00:40:11.520\nThey would tell each\n\n830\n00:40:11.520 --> 00:40:15.710\nother about it. And, you know, this would be on fire because we really are the\n\n831\n00:40:15.710 --> 00:40:16.560\nbest search that\n\n832\n00:40:16.560 --> 00:40:20.170\nexists in the fashion space. And while we're definitely not perfect and we get\n\n833\n00:40:20.170 --> 00:40:20.720\nbetter every\n\n834\n00:40:20.720 --> 00:40:23.990\nday and every week, it's the best thing out there. And what we've learned is\n\n835\n00:40:23.990 --> 00:40:24.960\nthat's not enough.\n\n836\n00:40:24.960 --> 00:40:30.160\nWe need to build more capabilities, more tools, find new ways to drive users in\n\n837\n00:40:30.160 --> 00:40:30.800\n, and it's been,\n\n838\n00:40:30.800 --> 00:40:35.700\nit's been really humbling. And what I would say is also the other piece about\n\n839\n00:40:35.700 --> 00:40:37.200\nworking in technology\n\n840\n00:40:37.200 --> 00:40:40.810\nand working in a competitive space is that it's very hard to predict what's\n\n841\n00:40:40.810 --> 00:40:41.600\ngoing to happen,\n\n842\n00:40:41.600 --> 00:40:47.280\nespecially in today's world with AI. It is changing so quickly. You, one of the\n\n843\n00:40:47.280 --> 00:40:47.520\nthings\n\n844\n00:40:47.520 --> 00:40:51.520\nthat's really interested about working with an LLM, a large language model, and\n\n845\n00:40:51.520 --> 00:40:52.960\nyou relying on that\n\n846\n00:40:52.960 --> 00:40:57.860\nto sort of power what you're doing is that it's non-deterministic. And so you\n\n847\n00:40:57.860 --> 00:40:58.400\ncan type\n\n848\n00:40:58.400 --> 00:41:02.390\nthe same thing two times and get different answers, which makes for building a\n\n849\n00:41:02.390 --> 00:41:02.960\nconsumer\n\n850\n00:41:02.960 --> 00:41:06.950\nexperience really hard. And so, you know, there are a lot of parameters you\n\n851\n00:41:06.950 --> 00:41:08.000\nhave to build around it.\n\n852\n00:41:08.000 --> 00:41:12.000\nAnd so building the technology for this product has been so much harder than I\n\n853\n00:41:12.000 --> 00:41:12.960\nexpected. And I've\n\n854\n00:41:12.960 --> 00:41:17.060\nreally talented engineers and machine learning people working on the team. So I\n\n855\n00:41:17.060 --> 00:41:17.840\nthink that has\n\n856\n00:41:17.840 --> 00:41:22.880\nbeen very humbling is just how hard it is to build a consumer experience on top\n\n857\n00:41:22.880 --> 00:41:24.320\nof a new technology\n\n858\n00:41:24.320 --> 00:41:29.230\nthat is still being understood and improving and changing every day. And\n\n859\n00:41:29.230 --> 00:41:30.000\nsometimes you think,\n\n860\n00:41:30.000 --> 00:41:32.920\nyou know, if you're building a technology versus a physical store, let's say in\n\n861\n00:41:32.920 --> 00:41:33.360\nretail,\n\n862\n00:41:34.160 --> 00:41:36.620\nyou know, it's easier because you don't have to be out there sweating, you know\n\n863\n00:41:36.620 --> 00:41:37.200\n, blood, sweat,\n\n864\n00:41:37.200 --> 00:41:40.550\nand tears, but there are more controllables in the physical world than there\n\n865\n00:41:40.550 --> 00:41:41.600\nare in the technology\n\n866\n00:41:41.600 --> 00:41:45.680\nworld. And so that's been a really interesting experience more now than ever.\n\n867\n00:41:45.680 --> 00:41:47.760\nAnd you have this,\n\n868\n00:41:47.760 --> 00:41:51.490\nyou know, as you mentioned, when you have a startup, it's a roller coaster ride\n\n869\n00:41:51.490 --> 00:41:51.920\n, you know,\n\n870\n00:41:51.920 --> 00:41:56.830\nand how do you how do you take people with you on that ride? I mean, you know,\n\n871\n00:41:56.830 --> 00:41:58.080\nhow do you get\n\n872\n00:41:58.080 --> 00:42:03.840\nyour team to have that perseverance that you as a founder, you obviously have.\n\n873\n00:42:03.840 --> 00:42:04.640\nI mean, you've got\n\n874\n00:42:04.640 --> 00:42:08.250\nthat drive and you're optimistic and you're going to hear it out. I mean, you\n\n875\n00:42:08.250 --> 00:42:08.720\nfind a way.\n\n876\n00:42:08.720 --> 00:42:15.440\nI think by being honest and transparent and being in it with them, I mean, I\n\n877\n00:42:15.440 --> 00:42:16.000\ndefinitely\n\n878\n00:42:16.000 --> 00:42:19.150\nam a big believer in lead by example. I don't ask my team to do anything I\n\n879\n00:42:19.150 --> 00:42:20.000\nwouldn't do.\n\n880\n00:42:20.000 --> 00:42:24.880\nYou know, I'm in there with them solving problems. We had this amazing\n\n881\n00:42:24.880 --> 00:42:25.680\nexperience to do a project\n\n882\n00:42:25.680 --> 00:42:30.000\nwith Apple. And, you know, I was right there with my team building these new\n\n883\n00:42:30.000 --> 00:42:31.040\nthings that\n\n884\n00:42:31.040 --> 00:42:36.800\nwere exciting and hard. And so, you know, I think and sharing with them my\n\n885\n00:42:36.800 --> 00:42:38.000\nfears and sharing with\n\n886\n00:42:38.000 --> 00:42:42.450\nthem the hard things and not kind of sugar coding things and not pretending\n\n887\n00:42:42.450 --> 00:42:43.280\nwhen, you know,\n\n888\n00:42:43.280 --> 00:42:47.390\nwe see something that doesn't work that it works. And so, you know, I think\n\n889\n00:42:47.390 --> 00:42:48.240\nthat keeping\n\n890\n00:42:48.240 --> 00:42:52.400\nan eye on where we want to go and the problems we're trying to solve and what\n\n891\n00:42:52.400 --> 00:42:53.280\nthe vision is,\n\n892\n00:42:53.280 --> 00:42:58.240\nbut also being really realistic about, you know, trial and error and making it\n\n893\n00:42:58.240 --> 00:42:59.440\nfeel okay for people\n\n894\n00:42:59.440 --> 00:43:03.440\nto take risks and try things, even if they don't work. Those are kind of, I\n\n895\n00:43:03.440 --> 00:43:04.720\nthink, the most important\n\n896\n00:43:04.720 --> 00:43:09.630\nthings for keeping people engaged and motivated in a startup world and also\n\n897\n00:43:09.630 --> 00:43:11.040\nmaking sure they have,\n\n898\n00:43:11.040 --> 00:43:14.400\nyou know, they have skin in the game. I mean, equity is a cornerstone of being\n\n899\n00:43:14.400 --> 00:43:14.880\nable to get\n\n900\n00:43:14.880 --> 00:43:18.800\neverybody as excited and feeling like their owners in this process.\n\n901\n00:43:19.680 --> 00:43:24.590\nThe world is changing so fast. AI is changing so fast. You know, when you look\n\n902\n00:43:24.590 --> 00:43:25.840\nback at the last\n\n903\n00:43:25.840 --> 00:43:30.120\nfive years, Julie, what do you see happening today that you could have never\n\n904\n00:43:30.120 --> 00:43:32.000\npossibly even imagined,\n\n905\n00:43:32.000 --> 00:43:35.280\nyou know, happening five years ago? Well, first of all, I would say that\n\n906\n00:43:35.280 --> 00:43:39.280\nthis pace of change is so much faster because I think about the first wave and\n\n907\n00:43:39.280 --> 00:43:39.920\nthe second wave\n\n908\n00:43:39.920 --> 00:43:43.820\nof technology change first with, you know, the internet and then with mobile\n\n909\n00:43:43.820 --> 00:43:44.960\nreally transforming\n\n910\n00:43:44.960 --> 00:43:50.080\nthe way we all use technology. And, you know, I see this as the third wave and\n\n911\n00:43:50.080 --> 00:43:51.520\nof AI. And it's\n\n912\n00:43:51.520 --> 00:43:59.220\njust the pace of change is so much faster. And but the level of unknown is also\n\n913\n00:43:59.220 --> 00:44:00.400\nso much higher.\n\n914\n00:44:00.400 --> 00:44:06.080\nAnd so what I see is just a lot more stress and, you know, across the board,\n\n915\n00:44:06.080 --> 00:44:07.120\nhow do I work with this\n\n916\n00:44:07.120 --> 00:44:10.520\nthing? I'm supposed to use it. What does it mean? I'm supposed to be working\n\n917\n00:44:10.520 --> 00:44:11.440\nsmarter. I'm supposed\n\n918\n00:44:11.440 --> 00:44:14.970\nto be creating new things that suddenly transform the world. And so I think,\n\n919\n00:44:14.970 --> 00:44:16.400\nyou know, obviously,\n\n920\n00:44:16.400 --> 00:44:20.160\nI would have never expected a model to be able to answer the kind of questions\n\n921\n00:44:20.160 --> 00:44:20.960\nit can answer when\n\n922\n00:44:20.960 --> 00:44:24.870\nyou go to ask an LLM. Like, you know, people who are much more deeply technical\n\n923\n00:44:24.870 --> 00:44:25.840\n, they saw this. They\n\n924\n00:44:25.840 --> 00:44:31.160\nsaw this 10 years ago, 20 years ago. I don't have that in sight. So certainly I\n\n925\n00:44:31.160 --> 00:44:32.800\n'm blown away by what,\n\n926\n00:44:32.800 --> 00:44:37.700\nyou know, these what we can teach these models to do and the learning, the\n\n927\n00:44:37.700 --> 00:44:38.320\nspeed at which they're\n\n928\n00:44:38.320 --> 00:44:41.710\nlearning. But I think the thing that really surprises me the most is the level\n\n929\n00:44:41.710 --> 00:44:42.880\nof anxiety that this\n\n930\n00:44:42.880 --> 00:44:50.200\nis created among literally every human. You know, I think that we it really is\n\n931\n00:44:50.200 --> 00:44:51.200\nquite different in\n\n932\n00:44:51.200 --> 00:44:56.100\nthat regard. Like, there wasn't a huge level of anxiety when the internet\n\n933\n00:44:56.100 --> 00:44:57.120\ncreated and when mobile\n\n934\n00:44:57.120 --> 00:45:00.730\nwas created, there was like, cool, I like this, I want to try it. But with AI,\n\n935\n00:45:00.730 --> 00:45:02.960\nit has so many unknowns.\n\n936\n00:45:02.960 --> 00:45:06.770\nAnd so I just think it affects, you know, the psyche, the human psyche in a\n\n937\n00:45:06.770 --> 00:45:08.000\nwhole new way\n\n938\n00:45:08.000 --> 00:45:12.960\nthat creates a different vibe in the workplace. For the young leader, you know,\n\n939\n00:45:12.960 --> 00:45:14.000\nwatching this,\n\n940\n00:45:14.000 --> 00:45:18.880\nwhat skills would would you spend the next five years becoming great at?\n\n941\n00:45:18.880 --> 00:45:23.760\nI mean, I think that the people skills always matter the most unless you are\n\n942\n00:45:23.760 --> 00:45:24.240\nbuilding your own\n\n943\n00:45:24.240 --> 00:45:29.140\ncompany and you are going to be the only employee understanding how to work\n\n944\n00:45:29.140 --> 00:45:30.960\nwith people, communicate\n\n945\n00:45:30.960 --> 00:45:36.640\nhigher, fire, motivate, those things are always going to be the most important\n\n946\n00:45:36.640 --> 00:45:37.280\nbecause no matter\n\n947\n00:45:37.280 --> 00:45:42.180\nwhat you're working on, you're working with a team. And you know, one quick\n\n948\n00:45:42.180 --> 00:45:43.280\nstory from like the past,\n\n949\n00:45:43.280 --> 00:45:49.540\nwhen I was at Nordstrom and I was a young, very eager beaver, I got pulled\n\n950\n00:45:49.540 --> 00:45:50.960\naside by some senior\n\n951\n00:45:50.960 --> 00:45:53.940\npeople and said like, you are stepping on people's toes and you're pissing\n\n952\n00:45:53.940 --> 00:45:55.440\npeople off. And if you\n\n953\n00:45:55.440 --> 00:45:59.050\ndon't figure out how to work better with your peers, you're not going to be\n\n954\n00:45:59.050 --> 00:46:00.160\nhere. And it was the\n\n955\n00:46:00.160 --> 00:46:04.610\nmost embarrassing thing I had ever experienced in my life. I was mortified and\n\n956\n00:46:04.610 --> 00:46:06.080\nI was so ashamed.\n\n957\n00:46:06.080 --> 00:46:12.430\nAnd I realized in that moment that learning to work with people who worked for\n\n958\n00:46:12.430 --> 00:46:12.880\nme,\n\n959\n00:46:12.880 --> 00:46:17.920\nwho I worked for, and most importantly, who I worked with was so critical. And\n\n960\n00:46:17.920 --> 00:46:18.640\nI really\n\n961\n00:46:18.640 --> 00:46:22.990\nsort of attribute that moment to my success at Sephora, really realizing that I\n\n962\n00:46:22.990 --> 00:46:23.920\nwas working on\n\n963\n00:46:23.920 --> 00:46:28.820\none thing, but my thing could help everyone. And so we should all be looking at\n\n964\n00:46:28.820 --> 00:46:29.120\nthis and\n\n965\n00:46:29.120 --> 00:46:34.000\nworking on this together. And I think the best advice that I give people is,\n\n966\n00:46:34.000 --> 00:46:34.880\nyou know, put yourself\n\n967\n00:46:34.880 --> 00:46:40.280\nin the shoes of your boss and the shoes of sort of the CEO and think about what\n\n968\n00:46:40.280 --> 00:46:41.360\nthey would want\n\n969\n00:46:41.360 --> 00:46:46.270\ndone and behave that way because when you are focused on your own little world\n\n970\n00:46:46.270 --> 00:46:46.880\nand trying to\n\n971\n00:46:46.880 --> 00:46:52.750\nmake your fiefdom succeed, you are not actually thinking about the whole and\n\n972\n00:46:52.750 --> 00:46:54.320\nreally building the\n\n973\n00:46:54.320 --> 00:46:59.200\nrelationships across the team, no matter how small or how big it is. So helping\n\n974\n00:46:59.200 --> 00:46:59.600\nothers has always\n\n975\n00:46:59.600 --> 00:47:03.950\nbeen like at the top of my values list. And I think that it's really ties to\n\n976\n00:47:03.950 --> 00:47:04.960\nsort of the skills\n\n977\n00:47:04.960 --> 00:47:08.620\nthat we need for the future, which is learning how to work well with other\n\n978\n00:47:08.620 --> 00:47:09.840\npeople. Because we have\n\n979\n00:47:09.840 --> 00:47:14.330\nno idea what the actual technical skills are going to be needed are going to be\n\n980\n00:47:14.330 --> 00:47:15.840\n. And we don't know,\n\n981\n00:47:15.840 --> 00:47:20.980\nyou know, what the future is going to hold in terms of like where industry goes\n\n982\n00:47:20.980 --> 00:47:22.640\n. And I just think\n\n983\n00:47:22.640 --> 00:47:25.920\nwhether you're in the nonprofit world or in the business world, you're in the\n\n984\n00:47:25.920 --> 00:47:26.400\nlegal world,\n\n985\n00:47:26.400 --> 00:47:29.760\nyou're in the medical world, all of those things, of course, are going to need\n\n986\n00:47:29.760 --> 00:47:30.800\ntechnology. So pay\n\n987\n00:47:30.800 --> 00:47:35.710\nattention. Don't be allowed. I, you know, jump in there, try stuff out. But\n\n988\n00:47:35.710 --> 00:47:36.720\nultimately, I think\n\n989\n00:47:36.720 --> 00:47:41.610\nfocusing on how to build good relationships and motivate those around you, no\n\n990\n00:47:41.610 --> 00:47:42.160\nmatter where, you\n\n991\n00:47:42.160 --> 00:47:47.040\nknow, what position they sit in is always going to be the most important skill\n\n992\n00:47:47.040 --> 00:47:47.680\nin the workplace\n\n993\n00:47:47.680 --> 00:47:52.580\nand in the world. You know, you mentioned earlier, you look at patterns. You\n\n994\n00:47:52.580 --> 00:47:53.200\ntalked about looking\n\n995\n00:47:53.200 --> 00:47:57.360\nat Amazon, seeing what they're doing, and then figuring out what you could do\n\n996\n00:47:57.360 --> 00:47:58.720\nand the world that\n\n997\n00:47:58.720 --> 00:48:03.630\nyou're in. You know, that's pattern recognition. That's an important skill.\n\n998\n00:48:03.630 --> 00:48:07.360\nWhat advice could you\n\n999\n00:48:07.360 --> 00:48:12.510\ngive leaders on how to get better at recognizing the patterns out there that\n\n1000\n00:48:12.510 --> 00:48:13.920\ncould influence your\n\n1001\n00:48:13.920 --> 00:48:19.440\nbusiness or or help you identify something that isn't isn't being done today?\n\n1002\n00:48:19.440 --> 00:48:26.720\nI find that the best way that I am able to detect patterns as a leader is\n\n1003\n00:48:26.720 --> 00:48:28.720\nactually by making sure\n\n1004\n00:48:28.720 --> 00:48:34.950\nI'm not like sort of only focused on my own thing. So getting out there talking\n\n1005\n00:48:34.950 --> 00:48:36.560\nto other people both\n\n1006\n00:48:36.560 --> 00:48:42.140\nin your industry and even in other industries and, you know, talking to\n\n1007\n00:48:42.140 --> 00:48:43.360\ncustomers and\n\n1008\n00:48:43.360 --> 00:48:49.040\nlike reading things, it's these moments where you kind of start to see things\n\n1009\n00:48:49.040 --> 00:48:50.160\nthat you then\n\n1010\n00:48:50.160 --> 00:48:55.350\ncan realize the patterns. And, you know, I think being someone who sees\n\n1011\n00:48:55.350 --> 00:48:56.080\npatterns\n\n1012\n00:48:56.080 --> 00:49:00.990\nand recognizes them, that's probably more of an innate skill. And most strong\n\n1013\n00:49:00.990 --> 00:49:01.920\nleaders probably\n\n1014\n00:49:01.920 --> 00:49:06.000\nhave that because it's such an important skill in growing in your business and\n\n1015\n00:49:06.000 --> 00:49:06.800\nrising the ranks.\n\n1016\n00:49:06.800 --> 00:49:12.070\nBut I do think that you're not going to see the ideas that then lead to\n\n1017\n00:49:12.070 --> 00:49:13.360\npatterns if you're not\n\n1018\n00:49:13.360 --> 00:49:17.850\nactually out there paying attention to things that are happening outside of\n\n1019\n00:49:17.850 --> 00:49:18.720\nyour world.\n\n1020\n00:49:18.720 --> 00:49:23.170\nOne of the things I do is I sit on a couple of boards and, you know, I find\n\n1021\n00:49:23.170 --> 00:49:24.080\nthat the time\n\n1022\n00:49:24.080 --> 00:49:29.280\naway from my company is really hard. But I also find that the things that we\n\n1023\n00:49:29.280 --> 00:49:30.240\ntalk about\n\n1024\n00:49:30.240 --> 00:49:33.200\ntend to be things that even though it's a totally different industry,\n\n1025\n00:49:33.200 --> 00:49:38.100\nactually relate back to the things that are important to my business. And I\n\n1026\n00:49:38.100 --> 00:49:38.800\nalways come back\n\n1027\n00:49:38.800 --> 00:49:42.600\nnot only with, you know, of course, ideas for that business but also ideas for\n\n1028\n00:49:42.600 --> 00:49:43.360\nmy own business.\n\n1029\n00:49:43.360 --> 00:49:47.680\nSo I think you have to be out there listening and learning to make sure that\n\n1030\n00:49:47.680 --> 00:49:48.560\nyou're pulling\n\n1031\n00:49:48.560 --> 00:49:53.460\nfrom all sorts of places that can be helpful. Can you think of a time when you\n\n1032\n00:49:53.460 --> 00:49:54.080\nrecognized a\n\n1033\n00:49:54.080 --> 00:49:58.400\npattern that led you to make a decision that everyone else thought might be\n\n1034\n00:49:58.400 --> 00:49:59.200\npretty risky,\n\n1035\n00:49:59.200 --> 00:50:02.960\nbut to you, you've looked at it and said it's a no-brainer. I mean, it was just\n\n1036\n00:50:02.960 --> 00:50:04.480\ncompletely obvious\n\n1037\n00:50:04.480 --> 00:50:08.410\ngiven what was going on. I have a couple. I'm going to actually pick my\n\n1038\n00:50:08.410 --> 00:50:10.480\ndecision to go to Stickshrix.\n\n1039\n00:50:10.480 --> 00:50:17.040\nSo I was in an amazing job at Sephora. Our business was doing really well and,\n\n1040\n00:50:17.040 --> 00:50:18.320\nyou know,\n\n1041\n00:50:18.320 --> 00:50:23.200\nonly had like, you know, there was so much more to do. And I chose to leave and\n\n1042\n00:50:23.200 --> 00:50:24.320\ngo to a startup.\n\n1043\n00:50:24.320 --> 00:50:30.360\nAnd what I could see was that we were at the beginning of basically being able\n\n1044\n00:50:30.360 --> 00:50:31.040\nto use\n\n1045\n00:50:31.040 --> 00:50:38.800\nmachine learning and pattern recognition and data to actually create better\n\n1046\n00:50:38.800 --> 00:50:40.400\nconsumer experiences.\n\n1047\n00:50:40.400 --> 00:50:45.440\nAnd, you know, we had, we all had Netflix. So we were starting to see that at\n\n1048\n00:50:45.440 --> 00:50:46.240\nSephora,\n\n1049\n00:50:46.240 --> 00:50:51.200\nI was seeing that when we actually could get data on what a customer was doing\n\n1050\n00:50:51.200 --> 00:50:51.840\nand keep in mind,\n\n1051\n00:50:51.840 --> 00:50:58.200\nthis was 2013 to 2015. And we knew about the customer. We were able to\n\n1052\n00:50:58.200 --> 00:50:58.880\nbasically\n\n1053\n00:50:58.880 --> 00:51:03.840\nput the right content in front of her to make it feel so much more relevant and\n\n1054\n00:51:03.840 --> 00:51:04.400\nshe was so much\n\n1055\n00:51:04.400 --> 00:51:08.630\nmore likely to act on it because it was, you know, so much more personal. And\n\n1056\n00:51:08.630 --> 00:51:10.960\nso what I saw in\n\n1057\n00:51:10.960 --> 00:51:18.480\nStickshrix was this idea of building personalized user experience that could\n\n1058\n00:51:18.480 --> 00:51:20.240\nmaterially improve\n\n1059\n00:51:20.240 --> 00:51:24.400\nthe satisfaction of the customer. And that was pre-gen AI. And, you know, that\n\n1060\n00:51:24.400 --> 00:51:24.960\nis what then\n\n1061\n00:51:24.960 --> 00:51:31.520\nled me to start my own, you know, AI powered experience and recommendation\n\n1062\n00:51:31.520 --> 00:51:33.360\nengine with the yes.\n\n1063\n00:51:33.360 --> 00:51:38.240\nAnd I think that I saw that early because I was, it was so clear to me that we\n\n1064\n00:51:38.240 --> 00:51:38.800\nwere doing kind of\n\n1065\n00:51:38.800 --> 00:51:43.680\na one-size-fits-all experience. And that just wasn't where the future was going\n\n1066\n00:51:43.680 --> 00:51:45.040\n. So that's an\n\n1067\n00:51:45.040 --> 00:51:50.400\nexample. What's the belief that you have about retail and where it's going that\n\n1068\n00:51:50.400 --> 00:51:51.040\nmaybe people\n\n1069\n00:51:51.040 --> 00:51:56.940\ndon't quite see yet? I truly believe that physical shopping is here to stay. I\n\n1070\n00:51:56.940 --> 00:51:58.160\nthink that it is,\n\n1071\n00:51:58.160 --> 00:52:04.050\nyou know, it's going to markets and as an outing is a pastime since the, you\n\n1072\n00:52:04.050 --> 00:52:05.520\nknow, beginning of man.\n\n1073\n00:52:05.520 --> 00:52:12.960\nAnd as a someone who loves to shop in physical stores, you know, I think it's\n\n1074\n00:52:12.960 --> 00:52:13.600\nvery important.\n\n1075\n00:52:13.600 --> 00:52:18.500\nIt's important to touch and feel and it's a whole experience. I do think that\n\n1076\n00:52:18.500 --> 00:52:19.040\nretail is in big\n\n1077\n00:52:19.040 --> 00:52:24.910\ntransition. Having these huge stores with tons of inventory and so few\n\n1078\n00:52:24.910 --> 00:52:27.040\ncustomers is a very hard\n\n1079\n00:52:27.040 --> 00:52:32.240\nsituation to justify. And so I do think that, you know, being able to figure\n\n1080\n00:52:32.240 --> 00:52:33.840\nout how to get the\n\n1081\n00:52:33.840 --> 00:52:38.740\nright inventory and the right amount of inventory into a space, whether it's,\n\n1082\n00:52:38.740 --> 00:52:40.000\nyou know, in hardware\n\n1083\n00:52:40.000 --> 00:52:46.360\nor it's in clothing or in any other category. Being able to make that in-store\n\n1084\n00:52:46.360 --> 00:52:47.440\nexperience,\n\n1085\n00:52:47.440 --> 00:52:51.760\nactually not frustrating. It's a low bar, to be honest, you know. There's still\n\n1086\n00:52:51.760 --> 00:52:52.160\nso many\n\n1087\n00:52:52.160 --> 00:52:55.080\nfrustrating experiences where you walk in. You can't find what you want. You\n\n1088\n00:52:55.080 --> 00:52:56.240\ncan't find help.\n\n1089\n00:52:56.240 --> 00:53:00.410\nApple's at the standard. I think Nordstrom's also amazing. You know, we have to\n\n1090\n00:53:00.410 --> 00:53:01.280\nmake those\n\n1091\n00:53:01.280 --> 00:53:05.730\ninvestments make sense. And so I think it's going to take another 10 years to\n\n1092\n00:53:05.730 --> 00:53:06.320\nbe honest\n\n1093\n00:53:06.320 --> 00:53:10.240\nuntil we sort of right-size the physical box and what we're doing in it.\n\n1094\n00:53:10.240 --> 00:53:12.160\nUnderstanding the impact\n\n1095\n00:53:12.160 --> 00:53:16.190\nit drives to online and the impact that online drives to offline and being able\n\n1096\n00:53:16.190 --> 00:53:17.440\nto make that\n\n1097\n00:53:17.440 --> 00:53:21.360\nfinancially make sense by looking at the whole thing. So whether it's using the\n\n1098\n00:53:21.360 --> 00:53:22.000\ninventory in the\n\n1099\n00:53:22.000 --> 00:53:26.090\nstore to ship to people and making that cost effective, which Nordstrom's done\n\n1100\n00:53:26.090 --> 00:53:26.960\na great job\n\n1101\n00:53:26.960 --> 00:53:31.200\nof doing and retailers are more and more doing this, that makes a lot of sense.\n\n1102\n00:53:31.200 --> 00:53:32.160\nYour store in some\n\n1103\n00:53:32.160 --> 00:53:37.360\ncases can also be a warehouse. But I think that, you know, my hope is that\n\n1104\n00:53:37.360 --> 00:53:39.200\nretailers really\n\n1105\n00:53:39.200 --> 00:53:44.080\nfigure out that it's worth it to invest in making that store experience great.\n\n1106\n00:53:44.080 --> 00:53:44.800\nSo people have a good\n\n1107\n00:53:44.800 --> 00:53:47.950\nexperience, can learn what they need to about the product, can build that\n\n1108\n00:53:47.950 --> 00:53:49.200\nattachment to the brand\n\n1109\n00:53:49.200 --> 00:53:54.180\nor the retailer. And, you know, in a world where, you know, everyone has so\n\n1110\n00:53:54.180 --> 00:53:55.680\nmuch coming at them at\n\n1111\n00:53:55.680 --> 00:54:00.840\nevery moment. And it's so hard to sort of like actually land an idea or an\n\n1112\n00:54:00.840 --> 00:54:02.880\nexperience with somebody.\n\n1113\n00:54:02.880 --> 00:54:06.490\nPhysical retail is an amazing way to do that because you're actually getting\n\n1114\n00:54:06.490 --> 00:54:07.120\nthat time and\n\n1115\n00:54:07.120 --> 00:54:12.020\nthat attention. And hopefully, you know, everyone who spends money to have\n\n1116\n00:54:12.020 --> 00:54:12.880\nphysical retail will\n\n1117\n00:54:12.880 --> 00:54:16.610\nunderstand the importance of that experience so that they make that touch point\n\n1118\n00:54:16.610 --> 00:54:17.600\nreally count.\n\n1119\n00:54:17.600 --> 00:54:22.050\nAnd then, you know, I think leveraging online is never going to go away because\n\n1120\n00:54:22.050 --> 00:54:22.640\nwhen we need\n\n1121\n00:54:22.640 --> 00:54:26.640\nsomething specific, we go online to get it, you know, when we're looking for\n\n1122\n00:54:26.640 --> 00:54:27.600\nsomething in general\n\n1123\n00:54:27.600 --> 00:54:31.810\nor looking for a pastime, we go to a store and that sort of dichotomy needs to\n\n1124\n00:54:31.810 --> 00:54:32.560\nbe, you know,\n\n1125\n00:54:32.560 --> 00:54:37.460\nthought of as one overall experience. And, and Daydream is going to be the\n\n1126\n00:54:37.460 --> 00:54:38.240\nexperience that makes it\n\n1127\n00:54:38.240 --> 00:54:42.550\nreally easy and easy for you and something new as a consumer you've been\n\n1128\n00:54:42.550 --> 00:54:44.080\nlooking for forever.\n\n1129\n00:54:44.080 --> 00:54:50.960\nIt is. I believe that. And this has been so much fun. I want to have some more\n\n1130\n00:54:50.960 --> 00:54:54.870\nwith my lightning round of questions. So are you ready for this? Okay. The\n\n1131\n00:54:54.870 --> 00:54:55.680\nthree words that best\n\n1132\n00:54:55.680 --> 00:55:01.630\ndescribe you. Tenacious, loving and helpful. If you could be one person for a\n\n1133\n00:55:01.630 --> 00:55:02.960\nday beside yourself,\n\n1134\n00:55:02.960 --> 00:55:07.860\nwho would it be? Probably Oprah Winfrey. Your biggest pet peeved. People not\n\n1135\n00:55:07.860 --> 00:55:08.480\ndoing what they\n\n1136\n00:55:08.480 --> 00:55:12.930\nsay they're going to do. Who would play you in a movie? Jennifer Aniston. We\n\n1137\n00:55:12.930 --> 00:55:13.760\ntalked about the\n\n1138\n00:55:13.760 --> 00:55:18.000\nJetsons earlier. What's one invention from that show you still wish existed?\n\n1139\n00:55:18.000 --> 00:55:19.920\nBeing able to fly\n\n1140\n00:55:19.920 --> 00:55:25.400\nmy car or my motorcycle. What's something you've been curious about lately that\n\n1141\n00:55:25.400 --> 00:55:26.240\nhas nothing to do\n\n1142\n00:55:26.240 --> 00:55:31.440\nwith work? I am really obsessed with reproductive rights and access to women\n\n1143\n00:55:31.440 --> 00:55:33.600\nfor women everywhere.\n\n1144\n00:55:33.600 --> 00:55:38.680\nI think that bodily autonomy is like the most basic form of freedom. And so I\n\n1145\n00:55:38.680 --> 00:55:39.600\n've spent a lot of\n\n1146\n00:55:39.600 --> 00:55:43.330\ntime learning what's going on in states where abortion is outlawed and seeing\n\n1147\n00:55:43.330 --> 00:55:44.560\nhow I could help.\n\n1148\n00:55:44.560 --> 00:55:49.470\nThe one thing you do just for you? Hang out with my kids. Besides your family\n\n1149\n00:55:49.470 --> 00:55:49.920\nand friends,\n\n1150\n00:55:49.920 --> 00:55:55.100\nwhat's your most prized possession? Support.com. If I turned on the radio in\n\n1151\n00:55:55.100 --> 00:55:56.720\nyour car, what would I\n\n1152\n00:55:56.720 --> 00:56:01.920\nhear? Well, you'd hear today, you'd hear a song from fame because I just made\n\n1153\n00:56:01.920 --> 00:56:02.640\nmy daughter watch\n\n1154\n00:56:02.640 --> 00:56:08.150\nit with me. Great. What's something about you a few people would know? I'm\n\n1155\n00:56:08.150 --> 00:56:10.320\ntotally afraid of scary\n\n1156\n00:56:10.320 --> 00:56:16.560\nmovies and you couldn't pay me money to see a horror movie. So scream is not in\n\n1157\n00:56:16.560 --> 00:56:17.040\nthe future,\n\n1158\n00:56:17.040 --> 00:56:22.000\nhuh? Okay. What's one of your daily rituals? Something that you never miss?\n\n1159\n00:56:22.000 --> 00:56:23.520\nEvery morning,\n\n1160\n00:56:23.520 --> 00:56:28.590\nI have a cup of coffee and a bagel and no matter what happens with protein\n\n1161\n00:56:28.590 --> 00:56:29.920\ngoing up and carbs going\n\n1162\n00:56:29.920 --> 00:56:34.880\ndown. I love a good bagel and it's sort of like my moment to think about the\n\n1163\n00:56:34.880 --> 00:56:37.600\nday ahead. And yeah,\n\n1164\n00:56:37.600 --> 00:56:42.600\nI sort of really enjoy that five to 10 minutes of eating my bagel and drinking\n\n1165\n00:56:42.600 --> 00:56:43.280\nmy coffee.\n\n1166\n00:56:43.280 --> 00:56:47.200\nThat's great. All right. We're out of the lighting room. Great job. I just got\n\n1167\n00:56:47.200 --> 00:56:47.680\na few more\n\n1168\n00:56:47.680 --> 00:56:53.290\nquestions and I'll let you go back to work here. One thing I wanted to ask you\n\n1169\n00:56:53.290 --> 00:56:53.600\nearlier,\n\n1170\n00:56:53.600 --> 00:56:59.920\nI didn't ask you about, you really pioneered loyalty programs. What are leaders\n\n1171\n00:56:59.920 --> 00:57:00.240\nreally\n\n1172\n00:57:00.240 --> 00:57:05.940\nmiss out on when they think about loyalty programs? Yeah, I think that they are\n\n1173\n00:57:05.940 --> 00:57:08.960\nfocused on first\n\n1174\n00:57:08.960 --> 00:57:18.480\nkind of the economics and second kind of the very basic tenants of what people\n\n1175\n00:57:18.480 --> 00:57:19.440\nhave done in the past.\n\n1176\n00:57:19.440 --> 00:57:27.190\nSo it's either money or they get money back or and they're sort of trying to\n\n1177\n00:57:27.190 --> 00:57:30.320\nuse the reward\n\n1178\n00:57:30.320 --> 00:57:37.940\nsystem as a way to make people come back and buy or do the whatever they want\n\n1179\n00:57:37.940 --> 00:57:39.360\nthem to do.\n\n1180\n00:57:39.360 --> 00:57:43.870\nAnd I think that the thing that is single most important as you're thinking\n\n1181\n00:57:43.870 --> 00:57:44.720\nabout a loyalty\n\n1182\n00:57:44.720 --> 00:57:49.700\nprogram is your service experience overall. You can put the best loyalty\n\n1183\n00:57:49.700 --> 00:57:50.960\nprogram ever\n\n1184\n00:57:50.960 --> 00:57:55.000\non top of a shitty service experience and it's not going to do anything. And so\n\n1185\n00:57:55.000 --> 00:57:56.000\nloyalty is not\n\n1186\n00:57:56.000 --> 00:58:03.620\na solve for like bad customer retention, bad service and bad experience is the\n\n1187\n00:58:03.620 --> 00:58:04.080\nproblem.\n\n1188\n00:58:04.080 --> 00:58:09.680\nAnd so my feeling is I think people look at this as like a way to solve for\n\n1189\n00:58:09.680 --> 00:58:10.960\nother problems\n\n1190\n00:58:10.960 --> 00:58:14.290\nin the business and that just doesn't work. Whereas I think one of the things\n\n1191\n00:58:14.290 --> 00:58:16.000\nwe really did at Sephora\n\n1192\n00:58:16.000 --> 00:58:21.690\nis we had a good experience and people loved the experience and the company\n\n1193\n00:58:21.690 --> 00:58:22.800\nspent eight years\n\n1194\n00:58:22.800 --> 00:58:28.560\nbuilding that experience with so much love and attention and really refining it\n\n1195\n00:58:28.560 --> 00:58:29.280\n. And so by the\n\n1196\n00:58:29.280 --> 00:58:33.010\ntime we launched the loyalty program we had a couple of thoughts in mind. One\n\n1197\n00:58:33.010 --> 00:58:34.240\nis make sure this doesn't\n\n1198\n00:58:34.240 --> 00:58:38.770\nhurt the current experience. Don't slow people down. Don't make it like you\n\n1199\n00:58:38.770 --> 00:58:40.080\nknow sort of a hassle\n\n1200\n00:58:40.080 --> 00:58:43.180\nand make it the second is make it connected to what people love about the\n\n1201\n00:58:43.180 --> 00:58:44.560\nbusiness. And so\n\n1202\n00:58:44.560 --> 00:58:50.040\nwe used as I mentioned before we used beauty products as the currency and it\n\n1203\n00:58:50.040 --> 00:58:50.800\ngave people a\n\n1204\n00:58:50.800 --> 00:58:55.730\nchance to sample new things and always have new products to try out. And so you\n\n1205\n00:58:55.730 --> 00:58:56.480\nknow I think you\n\n1206\n00:58:56.480 --> 00:59:00.230\nneed to think about the customer experience and then sort of figure out the\n\n1207\n00:59:00.230 --> 00:59:01.280\neconomics and back\n\n1208\n00:59:01.280 --> 00:59:05.050\ninto it but you need to build this on top of a solid experience. And when\n\n1209\n00:59:05.050 --> 00:59:05.520\npeople\n\n1210\n00:59:05.520 --> 00:59:09.840\njump to loyalty as the solution I would say it is not it is an add-on.\n\n1211\n00:59:09.840 --> 00:59:15.520\nYou know that's great advice and you know speaking of leadership what's a\n\n1212\n00:59:15.520 --> 00:59:16.400\nlesson that you've\n\n1213\n00:59:16.400 --> 00:59:20.320\nlearned in your career that makes you a better leader at home?\n\n1214\n00:59:20.320 --> 00:59:25.800\nIt's funny because I think a lot about how my role as a mother has made me a\n\n1215\n00:59:25.800 --> 00:59:26.640\nbetter leader at work.\n\n1216\n00:59:27.920 --> 00:59:32.000\nYou know I think the patience that's required and sort of the ability to\n\n1217\n00:59:32.000 --> 00:59:37.480\nlisten really well and be able to like play back what you're hearing I find\n\n1218\n00:59:37.480 --> 00:59:38.000\nthat that works\n\n1219\n00:59:38.000 --> 00:59:43.480\nwell at work. I guess what I would say is you know at work you're really you're\n\n1220\n00:59:43.480 --> 00:59:45.360\nrequired\n\n1221\n00:59:45.360 --> 00:59:51.280\nby your team to be able to explain why you're doing something. If you don't do\n\n1222\n00:59:51.280 --> 00:59:52.320\nthat people just\n\n1223\n00:59:52.320 --> 00:59:56.320\ndon't get on board and they don't execute well. If they're just sort of given a\n\n1224\n00:59:56.320 --> 00:59:57.200\ndirection without\n\n1225\n00:59:57.200 --> 01:00:02.720\nthe context it's really useless and they're gonna fail. And so really being\n\n1226\n01:00:02.720 --> 01:00:03.680\nable to like\n\n1227\n01:00:03.680 --> 01:00:07.850\ntell the whole story and give the context is essential and I think that has\n\n1228\n01:00:07.850 --> 01:00:08.960\nmade me a better\n\n1229\n01:00:08.960 --> 01:00:14.100\nmother too by sort of not just saying yes or no but explaining the why behind\n\n1230\n01:00:14.100 --> 01:00:15.120\nmy reason\n\n1231\n01:00:15.120 --> 01:00:18.240\nI think has helped me become a better mother. And you know I have to ask you\n\n1232\n01:00:18.240 --> 01:00:19.200\nthis one you know\n\n1233\n01:00:19.200 --> 01:00:24.100\nwhat role is your husband Brian played in the person and the leader you've\n\n1234\n01:00:24.100 --> 01:00:24.560\nbecome?\n\n1235\n01:00:25.600 --> 01:00:30.160\nI literally would be nowhere without him. I mean you cannot have a family well\n\n1236\n01:00:30.160 --> 01:00:31.040\nyou can people have\n\n1237\n01:00:31.040 --> 01:00:36.960\nfigured it out but it's very hard to have a family and be a leader in a company\n\n1238\n01:00:36.960 --> 01:00:37.760\nwithout having a\n\n1239\n01:00:37.760 --> 01:00:42.660\npartner who helps you through it all. So Brian is you know I would say both my\n\n1240\n01:00:42.660 --> 01:00:43.600\npartner in everything\n\n1241\n01:00:43.600 --> 01:00:48.510\nin life in terms of like picking up what I can't take on. He's also been\n\n1242\n01:00:48.510 --> 01:00:49.600\nincredibly supportive of\n\n1243\n01:00:49.600 --> 01:00:56.800\nmy career and not at all you know I would say defensive or you know resentful\n\n1244\n01:00:56.800 --> 01:00:58.160\nhe very much is\n\n1245\n01:00:58.160 --> 01:01:02.450\nexcited for me and the things that I do and wants me to have success you know\n\n1246\n01:01:02.450 --> 01:01:03.680\nin my life the way he\n\n1247\n01:01:03.680 --> 01:01:07.860\nhas had success in his life and I would say also he's just a great sounding\n\n1248\n01:01:07.860 --> 01:01:09.760\nboard. You know whenever\n\n1249\n01:01:09.760 --> 01:01:13.980\nI'm like really struggling with someone I'm not someone who verbally processes\n\n1250\n01:01:13.980 --> 01:01:15.120\na lot I keep a lot\n\n1251\n01:01:15.120 --> 01:01:19.430\nin my head and I sort of think and write myself but when I have a problem that\n\n1252\n01:01:19.430 --> 01:01:20.400\nI can't solve\n\n1253\n01:01:20.400 --> 01:01:24.360\nhe's the best person on earth to talk to and he just makes things seem you know\n\n1254\n01:01:24.360 --> 01:01:25.680\nso much easier so\n\n1255\n01:01:25.680 --> 01:01:29.640\nfor all three of those reasons he's been an enormous part of everything that I\n\n1256\n01:01:29.640 --> 01:01:30.000\n've done\n\n1257\n01:01:30.000 --> 01:01:33.920\nincluding taking the risk to go start my own company which definitely is\n\n1258\n01:01:33.920 --> 01:01:35.200\nsomething the spouse\n\n1259\n01:01:35.200 --> 01:01:40.110\nis very much a part of too. And you know it's early days right now with with\n\n1260\n01:01:40.110 --> 01:01:41.120\ndaydream you know you're\n\n1261\n01:01:41.120 --> 01:01:47.660\nyou're going into your your your second year you've got a lot to do there but\n\n1262\n01:01:47.660 --> 01:01:49.200\nwhen you look at your\n\n1263\n01:01:49.200 --> 01:01:53.550\nyour life and who you are and where you want to go what do you what do you see\n\n1264\n01:01:53.550 --> 01:01:55.040\nas your your unfinished\n\n1265\n01:01:55.040 --> 01:02:01.870\nbusiness? Yeah I mean I think about it a lot I mean certainly building daydream\n\n1266\n01:02:01.870 --> 01:02:03.840\ninto a place\n\n1267\n01:02:03.840 --> 01:02:09.120\nthat truly helps people find the things they love and helps the industry by\n\n1268\n01:02:09.120 --> 01:02:10.560\ncreating more you know\n\n1269\n01:02:11.120 --> 01:02:17.780\ndemand and just understanding overall is really a big goal of mine and if day\n\n1270\n01:02:17.780 --> 01:02:18.960\ndream could become a\n\n1271\n01:02:18.960 --> 01:02:23.310\nhousehold name I mean there are few things that would make me more proud but I\n\n1272\n01:02:23.310 --> 01:02:24.800\nwould also say that\n\n1273\n01:02:24.800 --> 01:02:30.880\nI've always been someone who's very public-minded as well I've always had\n\n1274\n01:02:30.880 --> 01:02:32.480\nvolunteer efforts and\n\n1275\n01:02:32.480 --> 01:02:36.720\nother things that matter to me making the world a better place taking care of\n\n1276\n01:02:36.720 --> 01:02:39.520\nwomen and children\n\n1277\n01:02:39.520 --> 01:02:46.660\nmaking sure the earth stays alive and making sure democracy remains and so I\n\n1278\n01:02:46.660 --> 01:02:49.760\nsee myself over time\n\n1279\n01:02:49.760 --> 01:02:53.540\nand then of course the other thing that I'm so excited for is becoming a grand\n\n1280\n01:02:53.540 --> 01:02:55.280\nparent and enjoying\n\n1281\n01:02:55.280 --> 01:02:59.440\nyeah I've always loved kids when I was little I babysat I loved having my own\n\n1282\n01:02:59.440 --> 01:03:00.320\nkids although I've\n\n1283\n01:03:00.320 --> 01:03:03.590\nalso loved being an empty nest or don't get me wrong having that kind of\n\n1284\n01:03:03.590 --> 01:03:04.800\nfreedom is incredible\n\n1285\n01:03:04.800 --> 01:03:10.830\nbut I think that you know was I look at my life in the future it includes not\n\n1286\n01:03:10.830 --> 01:03:11.280\nonly\n\n1287\n01:03:11.280 --> 01:03:16.400\nsort of building a business that helps people and is successful but it also\n\n1288\n01:03:16.400 --> 01:03:17.040\nincludes\n\n1289\n01:03:17.040 --> 01:03:25.640\nbeing a great grandmother and having impact on the world in a way that I can I\n\n1290\n01:03:25.640 --> 01:03:26.240\nfeel like I've\n\n1291\n01:03:26.240 --> 01:03:31.120\nalready done some things that I'm very proud of there and then giving back to\n\n1292\n01:03:31.120 --> 01:03:31.760\nothers in\n\n1293\n01:03:31.760 --> 01:03:36.390\nthe business world so I love talking to entrepreneurs it's probably my favorite\n\n1294\n01:03:36.390 --> 01:03:37.280\nthing to do and the\n\n1295\n01:03:37.280 --> 01:03:40.890\nthing I think I will spend probably the most time doing when I when and if I\n\n1296\n01:03:40.890 --> 01:03:41.600\never retire\n\n1297\n01:03:41.600 --> 01:03:46.960\nand you know helping other people who are going through the same experience it\n\n1298\n01:03:46.960 --> 01:03:47.920\n's just really\n\n1299\n01:03:47.920 --> 01:03:52.080\nrewarding to be able to take all the lessons you've learned and pass them along\n\n1300\n01:03:52.080 --> 01:03:53.040\nand it's really\n\n1301\n01:03:53.040 --> 01:03:56.650\nrewarding for to hear from someone else thank you so much that was so helpful\n\n1302\n01:03:56.650 --> 01:03:57.600\nthat's going to help\n\n1303\n01:03:57.600 --> 01:04:02.090\nme do x y and z so those are the things that I think about when I think about\n\n1304\n01:04:02.090 --> 01:04:03.120\nyou know my later\n\n1305\n01:04:03.120 --> 01:04:08.130\nyears in life great the last question here what's one piece of advice you'd\n\n1306\n01:04:08.130 --> 01:04:09.280\ngive to anyone who\n\n1307\n01:04:09.280 --> 01:04:14.180\nwants to be a better leader either think about or ask the people you trust the\n\n1308\n01:04:14.180 --> 01:04:15.760\nmost where you\n\n1309\n01:04:15.760 --> 01:04:20.670\nthink you can improve the most it's so hard for people to tell leaders what\n\n1310\n01:04:20.670 --> 01:04:22.000\nthey're not doing well\n\n1311\n01:04:22.640 --> 01:04:27.580\nno one tells us the truth and so you have to find people that you trust who you\n\n1312\n01:04:27.580 --> 01:04:28.800\nknow say to you\n\n1313\n01:04:28.800 --> 01:04:33.030\nlike if there were one thing I would improve what would it be and you know\n\n1314\n01:04:33.030 --> 01:04:34.320\nreally listen and take\n\n1315\n01:04:34.320 --> 01:04:41.040\nit to heart and then work on it well Julie I'll tell you what you've obviously\n\n1316\n01:04:41.040 --> 01:04:41.840\nworked on being a\n\n1317\n01:04:41.840 --> 01:04:45.450\ngood leader and you are a great leader you're a great thought leader and you've\n\n1318\n01:04:45.450 --> 01:04:46.480\nyou know you're\n\n1319\n01:04:46.480 --> 01:04:51.520\nredefining what what can really go happen in in the retail space and I want to\n\n1320\n01:04:51.520 --> 01:04:52.320\ncongratulate you\n\n1321\n01:04:52.320 --> 01:04:56.770\non your all your success and I hope Daydream becomes that household name you\n\n1322\n01:04:56.770 --> 01:04:57.520\nwant it to be\n\n1323\n01:04:57.520 --> 01:05:02.420\nthank you and thanks for your time and interest I love your show so it's real\n\n1324\n01:05:02.420 --> 01:05:02.880\nhonor to be here\n\n1325\n01:05:02.880 --> 01:05:12.800\nDavid I don't know if you'll quite appreciate this the way that I did but the\n\n1326\n01:05:12.800 --> 01:05:13.760\nfact that Julie\n\n1327\n01:05:13.760 --> 01:05:17.640\nBornstein can say that her most prized possession aside from her family and\n\n1328\n01:05:17.640 --> 01:05:19.760\nfriends is Sephora.com\n\n1329\n01:05:20.320 --> 01:05:25.230\nis one of the most iconic answers to enlightening Ron question ever on our show\n\n1330\n01:05:25.230 --> 01:05:26.960\nexplain why she\n\n1331\n01:05:26.960 --> 01:05:32.560\nshe built Sephora.com most women on the planet have shopped at Sephora.com it's\n\n1332\n01:05:32.560 --> 01:05:34.160\nlike the place to go\n\n1333\n01:05:34.160 --> 01:05:40.760\nwhen you need anything related to beauty or aesthetics and she literally built\n\n1334\n01:05:40.760 --> 01:05:41.760\nthat platform\n\n1335\n01:05:41.760 --> 01:05:46.660\nit's crazy it's like saying that I don't know amazon.com is my most prized\n\n1336\n01:05:46.660 --> 01:05:48.000\npossession but it actually\n\n1337\n01:05:48.000 --> 01:05:52.910\nis her thing yeah I love it I love it I love how she still loves that company\n\n1338\n01:05:52.910 --> 01:05:54.160\nand still loves\n\n1339\n01:05:54.160 --> 01:05:57.120\nthe roots of it and felt great about the fact that one of the persons that\n\n1340\n01:05:57.120 --> 01:05:58.240\nworked for her\n\n1341\n01:05:58.240 --> 01:06:03.150\nher is now the CEO of the company and I think that says a lot about her I mean\n\n1342\n01:06:03.150 --> 01:06:03.840\nshe she went\n\n1343\n01:06:03.840 --> 01:06:11.520\ndown her path but she still still roots for the people that she's left behind.\n\n1344\n01:06:11.520 --> 01:06:12.320\nI love it David as\n\n1345\n01:06:12.320 --> 01:06:16.120\nwe do at the end of every episode I want to debrief some of the main themes\n\n1346\n01:06:16.120 --> 01:06:17.360\nthat stood out from your\n\n1347\n01:06:17.360 --> 01:06:21.990\nconversation with Julie and the first one is this concept of just going for it\n\n1348\n01:06:21.990 --> 01:06:22.720\nI mean she tells a\n\n1349\n01:06:22.720 --> 01:06:26.870\ncouple stories in the episode about how she envisioned the reality that she\n\n1350\n01:06:26.870 --> 01:06:27.760\nwanted and then\n\n1351\n01:06:27.760 --> 01:06:31.370\nshe just frickin went for it and made it happen the story about you know\n\n1352\n01:06:31.370 --> 01:06:32.960\ntracking down Howard Schultz\n\n1353\n01:06:32.960 --> 01:06:39.700\nand then begging Dan Nordstrom to let her work for him what does it take to get\n\n1354\n01:06:39.700 --> 01:06:40.240\nthat\n\n1355\n01:06:40.240 --> 01:06:45.150\ngumption and confidence to just go for what you want I always think about what\n\n1356\n01:06:45.150 --> 01:06:46.160\n's the alternative\n\n1357\n01:06:46.160 --> 01:06:51.060\ngoing to be like if you don't get what you want how are you going to feel if\n\n1358\n01:06:51.060 --> 01:06:52.800\nyou don't you know go\n\n1359\n01:06:52.800 --> 01:06:56.800\nafter something you know how are you going to feel about yourself you know and\n\n1360\n01:06:56.800 --> 01:06:58.080\nwhat do you have\n\n1361\n01:06:58.080 --> 01:07:03.950\nto lose you know if somebody says no you can handle it you just got to be tough\n\n1362\n01:07:03.950 --> 01:07:05.280\nyou got to be tough\n\n1363\n01:07:05.280 --> 01:07:10.190\nminded and you got to put yourself out there and she did and she got the job at\n\n1364\n01:07:10.190 --> 01:07:11.200\nStarbucks and she\n\n1365\n01:07:11.200 --> 01:07:14.860\ngot the job at Nordstrom she's those are great examples of just being\n\n1366\n01:07:14.860 --> 01:07:16.960\npersistent and and believing\n\n1367\n01:07:16.960 --> 01:07:21.940\nin herself and going for what she wants I thought it was great it's sort of\n\n1368\n01:07:21.940 --> 01:07:24.160\nlike this Kula you know\n\n1369\n01:07:24.160 --> 01:07:32.070\nNike Nike's commercials just do it okay you know if you don't go that easy yeah\n\n1370\n01:07:32.070 --> 01:07:33.520\nyeah no it's not\n\n1371\n01:07:33.520 --> 01:07:40.400\nthat easy but if you if you if you wait for somebody else to give you something\n\n1372\n01:07:40.400 --> 01:07:41.520\nvery rarely does it\n\n1373\n01:07:41.520 --> 01:07:46.030\nhappen you better go for it I love that she said she felt comfortable going up\n\n1374\n01:07:46.030 --> 01:07:47.040\nto Howard Schultz\n\n1375\n01:07:47.040 --> 01:07:50.770\nbecause you know she had read his book and studied up on what he was doing at\n\n1376\n01:07:50.770 --> 01:07:52.160\nStarbucks and you know\n\n1377\n01:07:52.160 --> 01:07:57.160\nhad done some M&A work with a coffee company in her past so there is a level of\n\n1378\n01:07:57.160 --> 01:07:58.400\npreparedness that\n\n1379\n01:07:58.400 --> 01:08:02.260\nyou have to go into those situations with but I just love that attitude what do\n\n1380\n01:08:02.260 --> 01:08:03.360\nyou have to lose\n\n1381\n01:08:03.360 --> 01:08:08.880\njust frickin swing for the fences but she wanted enough to get the context that\n\n1382\n01:08:08.880 --> 01:08:09.920\nwould make her\n\n1383\n01:08:09.920 --> 01:08:16.910\neffective when she went for it okay so if you want something get grounded in\n\n1384\n01:08:16.910 --> 01:08:18.160\nwhatever it takes\n\n1385\n01:08:18.160 --> 01:08:25.280\nfor you to get it and then go for it if you go in there you have no idea what\n\n1386\n01:08:25.280 --> 01:08:26.160\nyou want and you're\n\n1387\n01:08:26.160 --> 01:08:31.140\njust going for it and you don't have any in benefit for whoever you're trying\n\n1388\n01:08:31.140 --> 01:08:32.560\nto convince the that\n\n1389\n01:08:32.560 --> 01:08:38.430\nthey should give you a shot well good luck but she she had enough perspective\n\n1390\n01:08:38.430 --> 01:08:39.120\nand enough\n\n1391\n01:08:39.120 --> 01:08:43.370\nhey this is what's in it for you if you go with me that she got those\n\n1392\n01:08:43.370 --> 01:08:44.560\nopportunities and\n\n1393\n01:08:44.560 --> 01:08:49.600\nand the just going forward has to run in hand hand-in-hand with with substance\n\n1394\n01:08:49.600 --> 01:08:50.640\nso you bring up a really\n\n1395\n01:08:50.640 --> 01:08:55.760\ngood point there but I still think you should just do it I love it just do it\n\n1396\n01:08:55.760 --> 01:08:57.600\nthe first theme\n\n1397\n01:08:57.600 --> 01:09:01.500\nkind of runs into the second one that really stood out to me is the way that\n\n1398\n01:09:01.500 --> 01:09:02.880\nJulie shows up and\n\n1399\n01:09:02.880 --> 01:09:07.020\nit's this idea of passion I mean she talks about being a young girl and selling\n\n1400\n01:09:07.020 --> 01:09:08.160\nbarrettes and\n\n1401\n01:09:08.160 --> 01:09:11.890\nhaving this little business when she was younger or selling barrettes and then\n\n1402\n01:09:11.890 --> 01:09:12.880\nher obsession with\n\n1403\n01:09:12.880 --> 01:09:18.050\nfashion and 17 magazine and the mall and then that just continued on through\n\n1404\n01:09:18.050 --> 01:09:19.440\nher career and I think\n\n1405\n01:09:19.440 --> 01:09:24.420\nso many leaders today feel like you know their passion might be separate from\n\n1406\n01:09:24.420 --> 01:09:26.080\ntheir job what do\n\n1407\n01:09:26.080 --> 01:09:29.830\nyou have to say about finding your passion David I mean can your passion really\n\n1408\n01:09:29.830 --> 01:09:30.880\nbe the thing that\n\n1409\n01:09:30.880 --> 01:09:37.200\nyou do well it sure is wonderful when it happens and everybody always tells you\n\n1410\n01:09:37.200 --> 01:09:39.680\nyou know to do what\n\n1411\n01:09:39.680 --> 01:09:43.990\nyou love and and the reason why you do what you love is because you're not\n\n1412\n01:09:43.990 --> 01:09:45.360\nreally working you know\n\n1413\n01:09:45.360 --> 01:09:50.270\nyou want to learn everything about it you want to get better at it and you want\n\n1414\n01:09:50.270 --> 01:09:51.200\nto spend more time\n\n1415\n01:09:51.200 --> 01:09:56.460\nat it because you love it so much you know and you know and passion also gives\n\n1416\n01:09:56.460 --> 01:09:57.840\nyou enthusiasm\n\n1417\n01:09:57.840 --> 01:10:01.140\nthat takes you through the good and bad times then you just love the way she\n\n1418\n01:10:01.140 --> 01:10:02.080\nlit up when she\n\n1419\n01:10:02.080 --> 01:10:06.430\ntalked about you know her career I mean she got all excited and that excitement\n\n1420\n01:10:06.430 --> 01:10:08.480\ncreates a you know\n\n1421\n01:10:08.480 --> 01:10:14.350\na you know a contagious enthusiasm that that's important but I think she's she\n\n1422\n01:10:14.350 --> 01:10:15.360\n's building something\n\n1423\n01:10:15.360 --> 01:10:19.360\nthat she's passionate about and it's making her life much more meaningful and\n\n1424\n01:10:19.360 --> 01:10:20.400\nshe's passionate\n\n1425\n01:10:20.400 --> 01:10:25.520\nabout a lot of lot of things and you know I think that really really helps her\n\n1426\n01:10:25.520 --> 01:10:26.960\nI think to know what\n\n1427\n01:10:26.960 --> 01:10:32.160\nyou're passionate about first you have to know yourself really really well and\n\n1428\n01:10:32.160 --> 01:10:33.760\nthat passion that\n\n1429\n01:10:33.760 --> 01:10:38.670\nJulie has has kind of acted like a filter for her in terms of where she's gone\n\n1430\n01:10:38.670 --> 01:10:39.760\nin her career I mean\n\n1431\n01:10:39.760 --> 01:10:45.190\nshe talks about when she was approached to be a CEO of several companies that\n\n1432\n01:10:45.190 --> 01:10:46.720\nshe took some time\n\n1433\n01:10:46.720 --> 01:10:49.860\nto think about it and then she ultimately said no because she knew that she\n\n1434\n01:10:49.860 --> 01:10:50.960\nwanted to start her\n\n1435\n01:10:50.960 --> 01:10:54.570\nown company and David we talk about the idea of knowing yourself of self-\n\n1436\n01:10:54.570 --> 01:10:55.920\nawareness on this show\n\n1437\n01:10:55.920 --> 01:11:00.830\na lot but what stood out to you about the way that Julie stays true to who she\n\n1438\n01:11:00.830 --> 01:11:01.840\nknows herself to be\n\n1439\n01:11:01.840 --> 01:11:07.440\nyou know I think that what stood out to me was that she had opportunities to go\n\n1440\n01:11:07.440 --> 01:11:08.880\nbe a CEO of a\n\n1441\n01:11:08.880 --> 01:11:12.550\nbigger company but she just she knew that she wanted to be an entrepreneur she\n\n1442\n01:11:12.550 --> 01:11:13.200\n's a born\n\n1443\n01:11:13.760 --> 01:11:19.840\nentrepreneur she wants to be in control of her thinking she wants to benefit\n\n1444\n01:11:19.840 --> 01:11:20.640\nfrom her thinking\n\n1445\n01:11:20.640 --> 01:11:25.550\nI mean if she's going to come up with the idea she'd like to you know maximize\n\n1446\n01:11:25.550 --> 01:11:25.600\nthe\n\n1447\n01:11:25.600 --> 01:11:29.530\nfinancial return from that as well I mean you know I think she gets a lot of\n\n1448\n01:11:29.530 --> 01:11:31.280\nemotional benefit and\n\n1449\n01:11:31.280 --> 01:11:35.730\nhopefully financial reward from from this approach that is more right for what\n\n1450\n01:11:35.730 --> 01:11:37.360\nshe she wants to do\n\n1451\n01:11:38.320 --> 01:11:43.920\nbut I think it said a lot about her when I asked the question is what's the one\n\n1452\n01:11:43.920 --> 01:11:44.720\nthing one bit of\n\n1453\n01:11:44.720 --> 01:11:49.840\nadvice you'd give to every leader and and and she talked about the importance\n\n1454\n01:11:49.840 --> 01:11:51.120\nof getting great\n\n1455\n01:11:51.120 --> 01:11:56.020\nfeedback you know really learning from people the truth about what you need to\n\n1456\n01:11:56.020 --> 01:11:56.880\ndo to get better\n\n1457\n01:11:56.880 --> 01:12:03.080\nand because she wants to know herself and know how she's impacting others and\n\n1458\n01:12:03.080 --> 01:12:04.400\nthen you know that\n\n1459\n01:12:04.400 --> 01:12:09.600\nshe knows will will help drive her success so you know I love the idea of\n\n1460\n01:12:09.600 --> 01:12:10.560\nknowing yourself and\n\n1461\n01:12:10.560 --> 01:12:14.170\ngrowing yourself I think that's what she's all about she knows herself she\n\n1462\n01:12:14.170 --> 01:12:15.360\nknows she wants to grow\n\n1463\n01:12:15.360 --> 01:12:19.350\nbusiness she knows herself she knows she wants to grow herself and and I I\n\n1464\n01:12:19.350 --> 01:12:20.800\nthink that's that's\n\n1465\n01:12:20.800 --> 01:12:25.090\nreally powerful that's so true David and I think that you know knowing yourself\n\n1466\n01:12:25.090 --> 01:12:26.160\nkind of feeds into\n\n1467\n01:12:26.160 --> 01:12:29.530\nboth of the themes that we talked about the first one going for it you know you\n\n1468\n01:12:29.530 --> 01:12:30.560\nhave to have that\n\n1469\n01:12:30.560 --> 01:12:35.600\nsense of confidence and and self-awareness to go into those situations and know\n\n1470\n01:12:35.600 --> 01:12:35.760\nthat\n\n1471\n01:12:35.760 --> 01:12:39.260\nyou can get the thing that you really want out of that conversation or\n\n1472\n01:12:39.260 --> 01:12:40.480\nsituation and then you also\n\n1473\n01:12:40.480 --> 01:12:43.170\nhave to know yourself to figure out what you like I mean Julie said in the\n\n1474\n01:12:43.170 --> 01:12:44.480\nepisode one of the hardest\n\n1475\n01:12:44.480 --> 01:12:48.640\nthings that young people have to do is they have to figure out what they want\n\n1476\n01:12:48.640 --> 01:12:50.320\nand so I just love\n\n1477\n01:12:50.320 --> 01:12:54.770\nthat this kind of main theme of like getting really clear not only on who you\n\n1478\n01:12:54.770 --> 01:12:55.600\nare but what you\n\n1479\n01:12:55.600 --> 01:12:59.220\nreally want and what you're passionate about is an impactful and effective way\n\n1480\n01:12:59.220 --> 01:13:00.640\nto show up as a leader\n\n1481\n01:13:00.640 --> 01:13:05.550\nyeah I would say the big big takeaway for me is just know yourself grow\n\n1482\n01:13:05.550 --> 01:13:06.560\nyourself she's a great\n\n1483\n01:13:06.560 --> 01:13:12.080\nexample of someone that's done that go for what you want and do it with passion\n\n1484\n01:13:12.080 --> 01:13:13.200\nand you know enjoy\n\n1485\n01:13:13.200 --> 01:13:16.940\nthe hell out of life I love it well it certainly seems like Julie is enjoying\n\n1486\n01:13:16.940 --> 01:13:18.000\nthe hell out of her\n\n1487\n01:13:18.000 --> 01:13:22.910\ncareer and it was an excellent conversation David so thank you so much and\n\n1488\n01:13:22.910 --> 01:13:24.240\nthank you to Julie for\n\n1489\n01:13:24.240 --> 01:13:28.480\njoining us for this show and of course thank you to our listeners for tuning in\n\n1490\n01:13:28.480 --> 01:13:29.040\nto another\n\n1491\n01:13:29.040 --> 01:13:35.040\nepisode of how leaders lead come back next Thursday and we'll see you soon\n","pinned_at","featured_at","published_date","2026-07-23","itunes_episode_id",301,"2026-08-19T21:45:19.000000Z","Listen to this leadership podcast with Julie Bornstein, Founder and CEO of Daydream, and discover why people skills matter even more in the era of technology.",{"_60":226,"_109":230,"_19":228,"_111":201,"_112":232,"_113":240,"_114":-5,"_115":234,"_116":235,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":296},[294],{"_60":75,"_109":118,"_19":59,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":77,"_109":110,"_19":86,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":295},{"_122":61,"_89":90},{"_122":61,"_89":90},3409,"To spot patterns, focus outside your world","WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.000\nthat the best way that I am able to detect patterns\n\n2\n00:00:04.000 --> 00:00:07.360\nas a leader is actually by making sure\n\n3\n00:00:07.360 --> 00:00:11.000\nI'm not like sort of only focused on my own thing.\n\n4\n00:00:11.000 --> 00:00:14.840\nSo getting out there, talking to other people\n\n5\n00:00:14.840 --> 00:00:18.840\nboth in your industry and even in other industries\n\n6\n00:00:18.840 --> 00:00:23.840\nand talking to customers and like reading things,\n\n7\n00:00:23.840 --> 00:00:27.720\nit's these moments where you kind of start to see things\n\n8\n00:00:27.720 --> 00:00:31.060\nthat you then can realize the patterns.\n\n9\n00:00:31.060 --> 00:00:34.760\nAnd I think being someone who sees patterns\n\n10\n00:00:34.760 --> 00:00:38.280\nand recognizes them, that's probably more of an innate skill\n\n11\n00:00:38.280 --> 00:00:41.040\nand most strong leaders probably have that\n\n12\n00:00:41.040 --> 00:00:42.920\nbecause it's such an important skill\n\n13\n00:00:42.920 --> 00:00:46.360\nin growing in your business and rising the ranks.\n\n14\n00:00:46.360 --> 00:00:50.080\nBut I do think that you're not gonna see the ideas\n\n15\n00:00:50.080 --> 00:00:53.440\nthat then lead to patterns if you're not actually out there\n\n16\n00:00:53.440 --> 00:00:56.280\npaying attention to things that are happening outside\n\n17\n00:00:56.280 --> 00:00:56.960\nyour world.\n",2901429,2958459,"Pattern recognition, patterns, curiosity","to-spot-patterns-focus-outside-your-world","7ONGcwSRJPWpnN01HLx00Kt10102MXqkGr7tYbHA8900kdD8","PuDgsAe3NsyHM1uB6j600tTwhzgZxY01NzFClBD023GrGw","2026-07-23T18:03:42.000000Z","https://www.howleaderslead.com/clips/3409/to-spot-patterns-focus-outside-your-world",{"_60":61,"_62":63,"_64":65,"_66":28,"_67":68,"_69":70,"_71":72,"_73":72,"_74":75,"_76":77,"_78":79,"_80":-5,"_81":-5,"_82":-5,"_83":-5,"_84":59,"_85":86,"_87":88,"_89":90,"_91":311,"_93":-5,"_94":312,"_104":313,"_106":314,"_108":-5},{"_60":157,"_125":219,"_147":220,"_261":277,"_278":279,"_144":280,"_146":-5,"_73":159,"_281":-5,"_71":159,"_282":-5,"_223":224,"_225":226,"_153":-5,"_76":-5,"_283":284,"_285":286,"_221":222,"_122":61,"_78":287,"_81":-5,"_82":288,"_83":-5,"_227":228,"_229":230,"_231":232,"_233":234,"_171":-5,"_175":-5,"_116":235,"_236":237,"_85":-5,"_93":-5,"_238":310,"_195":-5,"_106":-5,"_108":-5},{"_60":226,"_109":230,"_19":228,"_111":201,"_112":232,"_113":240,"_114":-5,"_115":234,"_116":235,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":317},[315],{"_60":75,"_109":118,"_19":59,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":77,"_109":110,"_19":86,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":316},{"_122":61,"_89":90},{"_122":61,"_89":90},3408,"WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:07.280\nunderstanding how to work with people, communicate, hire, fire, motivate, those\n\n2\n00:00:07.280 --> 00:00:08.640\nthings are always\n\n3\n00:00:08.640 --> 00:00:11.590\ngoing to be the most important because no matter what you're working on, you're\n\n4\n00:00:11.590 --> 00:00:12.400\nworking with a team.\n\n5\n00:00:12.400 --> 00:00:20.040\nOne quick story from the past, when I was at Nordstrom and I was a young, very\n\n6\n00:00:20.040 --> 00:00:21.680\neager beaver,\n\n7\n00:00:21.680 --> 00:00:25.720\nI got pulled aside by some senior people and said, \"You are stepping on people\n\n8\n00:00:25.720 --> 00:00:26.080\n's toes and\n\n9\n00:00:26.080 --> 00:00:30.760\nyou're pissing people off. And if you don't figure out how to work better with\n\n10\n00:00:30.760 --> 00:00:31.520\nyour peers,\n\n11\n00:00:31.520 --> 00:00:35.090\nyou're not going to be here.\" And it was the most embarrassing thing I had ever\n\n12\n00:00:35.090 --> 00:00:36.080\nexperienced in my\n\n13\n00:00:36.080 --> 00:00:41.540\nlife. I was mortified and I was so ashamed. And I realized in that moment that\n\n14\n00:00:41.540 --> 00:00:43.200\nlearning to work\n\n15\n00:00:43.200 --> 00:00:48.570\nwith people who worked for me, who I worked for, and most importantly, who I\n\n16\n00:00:48.570 --> 00:00:50.640\nworked with was so critical.\n",2727029,2777828,"Development, communication, soft skills, emotional IQ, nordstrom","YARLHY5GXRuI8XJiItrPXZX500srDEoE024Qdqca8pDao","2vE6cpYMpMCar02jXB9zDZ43OX993EYZ2D33jSjUZZG4","2026-07-23T18:08:20.000000Z","https://www.howleaderslead.com/clips/3408/people-skills-matter-most",{"_60":61,"_62":63,"_64":65,"_66":28,"_67":68,"_69":70,"_71":72,"_73":72,"_74":75,"_76":77,"_78":79,"_80":-5,"_81":-5,"_82":-5,"_83":-5,"_84":59,"_85":86,"_87":88,"_89":90,"_91":330,"_93":-5,"_94":331,"_104":332,"_106":333,"_108":-5},{"_60":157,"_125":219,"_147":220,"_261":277,"_278":279,"_144":280,"_146":-5,"_73":159,"_281":-5,"_71":159,"_282":-5,"_223":224,"_225":226,"_153":-5,"_76":-5,"_283":284,"_285":286,"_221":222,"_122":61,"_78":287,"_81":-5,"_82":288,"_83":-5,"_227":228,"_229":230,"_231":232,"_233":234,"_171":-5,"_175":-5,"_116":235,"_236":237,"_85":-5,"_93":-5,"_238":329,"_195":-5,"_106":-5,"_108":-5},{"_60":226,"_109":230,"_19":228,"_111":201,"_112":232,"_113":240,"_114":-5,"_115":234,"_116":235,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":336},[334],{"_60":75,"_109":118,"_19":59,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":77,"_109":110,"_19":86,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":335},{"_122":61,"_89":90},{"_122":61,"_89":90},3407,"If you're building around AI, be ready for constant change","WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.160\nit's very hard to predict what's going to happen, especially in today's world\n\n2\n00:00:04.160 --> 00:00:05.520\nwith AI. It is changing\n\n3\n00:00:05.520 --> 00:00:10.110\nso quickly. One of the things that's really interested about working with an LL\n\n4\n00:00:10.110 --> 00:00:11.680\nM, a large language model,\n\n5\n00:00:11.680 --> 00:00:16.220\nand you relying on that to sort of power what you're doing, is that it's non-d\n\n6\n00:00:16.220 --> 00:00:17.840\neterministic. And so,\n\n7\n00:00:17.840 --> 00:00:22.160\nyou can type the same thing two times and get different answers, which makes\n\n8\n00:00:22.160 --> 00:00:22.960\nfor building a\n\n9\n00:00:22.960 --> 00:00:26.710\nconsumer experience really hard. And so, you know, there are a lot of\n\n10\n00:00:26.710 --> 00:00:28.000\nparameters you have to build\n\n11\n00:00:28.000 --> 00:00:31.600\naround it. And so, building the technology for this product has been so much\n\n12\n00:00:31.600 --> 00:00:33.040\nharder than I expected.\n\n13\n00:00:33.040 --> 00:00:36.890\nAnd I've really talented engineers and machine learning people working on the\n\n14\n00:00:36.890 --> 00:00:37.840\nteam. So, I think\n\n15\n00:00:37.840 --> 00:00:42.130\nthat has been very humbling is just how hard it is to build a consumer\n\n16\n00:00:42.130 --> 00:00:43.840\nexperience on top of a new\n\n17\n00:00:43.840 --> 00:00:48.400\ntechnology that is still being understood and improving and changing every day.\n",2439529,2488099,"AI, change, technology, innovation, customer experience","if-youre-building-around-ai-be-ready-for-constant-change","u6aI00a54uxzPGjs01nPtZvMQElw7ysiKatpdVuYlWWTk","8DEZe2TS3PUtzZO8v91eszVYOWjrKnqhnnWeiOn9r01A","2026-07-23T18:01:03.000000Z","https://www.howleaderslead.com/clips/3407/if-youre-building-around-ai-be-ready-for-constant-change",{"_60":61,"_62":63,"_64":65,"_66":28,"_67":68,"_69":70,"_71":72,"_73":72,"_74":75,"_76":77,"_78":79,"_80":-5,"_81":-5,"_82":-5,"_83":-5,"_84":59,"_85":86,"_87":88,"_89":90,"_91":351,"_93":-5,"_94":352,"_104":353,"_106":354,"_108":-5},{"_60":157,"_125":219,"_147":220,"_261":277,"_278":279,"_144":280,"_146":-5,"_73":159,"_281":-5,"_71":159,"_282":-5,"_223":224,"_225":226,"_153":-5,"_76":-5,"_283":284,"_285":286,"_221":222,"_122":61,"_78":287,"_81":-5,"_82":288,"_83":-5,"_227":228,"_229":230,"_231":232,"_233":234,"_171":-5,"_175":-5,"_116":235,"_236":237,"_85":-5,"_93":-5,"_238":350,"_195":-5,"_106":-5,"_108":-5},{"_60":226,"_109":230,"_19":228,"_111":201,"_112":232,"_113":240,"_114":-5,"_115":234,"_116":235,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":357},[355],{"_60":75,"_109":118,"_19":59,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":77,"_109":110,"_19":86,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":356},{"_122":61,"_89":90},{"_122":61,"_89":90},3406,"Entrepreneurship takes vulnerability","WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.360\nit was scary. I mean, I was 47 when I started the Yes, and I felt like, am I\n\n2\n00:00:04.360 --> 00:00:05.440\ntoo old? People said,\n\n3\n00:00:05.440 --> 00:00:10.050\nyou know, you shouldn't start a company if you're not young, and you just don't\n\n4\n00:00:10.050 --> 00:00:11.040\nunderstand, like,\n\n5\n00:00:11.040 --> 00:00:15.520\nyou know, the thinking. And so I got some skeptical people, although the main\n\n6\n00:00:15.520 --> 00:00:16.240\nperson that told me\n\n7\n00:00:16.240 --> 00:00:19.280\nthat ended up investing in my company. So, you know, at the end of the day, I'm\n\n8\n00:00:19.280 --> 00:00:20.160\nnot sure he believed\n\n9\n00:00:20.160 --> 00:00:23.540\nit, but he was sort of saying it as a challenge. And, you know, you're putting,\n\n10\n00:00:23.540 --> 00:00:24.160\nyou're exposing\n\n11\n00:00:24.160 --> 00:00:28.640\nyourself like any artist, you know, who goes out there and writes a song and,\n\n12\n00:00:28.640 --> 00:00:29.600\nor writes a book or\n\n13\n00:00:29.600 --> 00:00:33.070\ncreates a podcast like you, you put yourself out there in a way that's very\n\n14\n00:00:33.070 --> 00:00:34.880\ndifferent. And so,\n\n15\n00:00:34.880 --> 00:00:37.940\nyou know, you're like, are people going to like this? Am I going to be able to\n\n16\n00:00:37.940 --> 00:00:38.160\nget\n\n17\n00:00:38.160 --> 00:00:42.420\nhigher people to work with me? There's so many questions, and it really was\n\n18\n00:00:42.420 --> 00:00:44.080\nincredibly nerve-wracking,\n\n19\n00:00:44.080 --> 00:00:45.440\nbut I'm so glad I did it.\n",1727079,1772599,"Entrepreneurship, vulnerability, creativity","entrepreneurship-takes-vulnerability","vQlEdsPiaaUZ00OFTnHfpZilqRN9jqtGURx38b900dOXI","zLLagb3MYB8p02U00QkWUVUcp54WymG3VdqyjCj01GCK7U","2026-07-23T17:59:49.000000Z","https://www.howleaderslead.com/clips/3406/entrepreneurship-takes-vulnerability",{"_60":61,"_62":63,"_64":65,"_66":28,"_67":68,"_69":70,"_71":72,"_73":72,"_74":75,"_76":77,"_78":79,"_80":-5,"_81":-5,"_82":-5,"_83":-5,"_84":59,"_85":86,"_87":88,"_89":90,"_91":372,"_93":-5,"_94":373,"_104":374,"_106":375,"_108":-5},{"_60":157,"_125":219,"_147":220,"_261":277,"_278":279,"_144":280,"_146":-5,"_73":159,"_281":-5,"_71":159,"_282":-5,"_223":224,"_225":226,"_153":-5,"_76":-5,"_283":284,"_285":286,"_221":222,"_122":61,"_78":287,"_81":-5,"_82":288,"_83":-5,"_227":228,"_229":230,"_231":232,"_233":234,"_171":-5,"_175":-5,"_116":235,"_236":237,"_85":-5,"_93":-5,"_238":371,"_195":-5,"_106":-5,"_108":-5},{"_60":226,"_109":230,"_19":228,"_111":201,"_112":232,"_113":240,"_114":-5,"_115":234,"_116":235,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":378},[376],{"_60":75,"_109":118,"_19":59,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":77,"_109":110,"_19":86,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":377},{"_122":61,"_89":90},{"_122":61,"_89":90},3405,"WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.080\nI also got approached by a couple of big companies for the CEO role and some\n\n2\n00:00:04.080 --> 00:00:07.000\ncompanies that would have been, you know, a dream to run those companies.\n\n3\n00:00:07.000 --> 00:00:11.000\nSo I spent some time as I was thinking of starting up, do I want to go do that?\n\n4\n00:00:11.000 --> 00:00:13.000\nI'd always wanted to be the CEO of a big company.\n\n5\n00:00:13.000 --> 00:00:16.000\nAnd so that would have been a real checkbox of my dream.\n\n6\n00:00:16.000 --> 00:00:20.000\nBut what I realized over the years was that that actually wasn't my dream.\n\n7\n00:00:20.000 --> 00:00:22.000\nMy dream was to start a company.\n\n8\n00:00:22.000 --> 00:00:25.000\nI just didn't really know that until this point.\n\n9\n00:00:25.000 --> 00:00:29.000\nAnd so that was a great opportunity to test out, you know, which direction I\n\n10\n00:00:29.000 --> 00:00:29.000\nwanted to go.\n\n11\n00:00:29.000 --> 00:00:30.000\nSuch different directions.\n\n12\n00:00:30.000 --> 00:00:34.050\nBut what I realized in going to these larger companies was that they had so\n\n13\n00:00:34.050 --> 00:00:35.000\nmany headwinds.\n\n14\n00:00:35.000 --> 00:00:39.540\nAnd there were the focus of what I would be doing was, you know, to some degree\n\n15\n00:00:39.540 --> 00:00:43.120\n, managing decay and other, you know, another ways trying to figure out how to\n\n16\n00:00:43.120 --> 00:00:44.000\ntransform.\n\n17\n00:00:44.000 --> 00:00:48.020\nBut it would not be leaning into the things that I love to do most and that I\n\n18\n00:00:48.020 --> 00:00:49.000\nwas best at.\n",1573218,1622079,"Career, career path, passion, CEO, startup, entrepreneur","AKx5h00cDf9XX2l02ZpVSaIScbx5Ox004bK0002mZ8Oddx7I","EAtXEoxlcTL69301B3MJzbprR7fEKglptEz802QhdHnkA","2026-07-23T18:06:22.000000Z","https://www.howleaderslead.com/clips/3405/let-your-career-dreams-evolve-as-you-learn-what-you-love",{"_60":61,"_62":63,"_64":65,"_66":28,"_67":68,"_69":70,"_71":72,"_73":72,"_74":75,"_76":77,"_78":79,"_80":-5,"_81":-5,"_82":-5,"_83":-5,"_84":59,"_85":86,"_87":88,"_89":90,"_91":391,"_93":-5,"_94":392,"_104":393,"_106":394,"_108":-5},{"_60":157,"_125":219,"_147":220,"_261":277,"_278":279,"_144":280,"_146":-5,"_73":159,"_281":-5,"_71":159,"_282":-5,"_223":224,"_225":226,"_153":-5,"_76":-5,"_283":284,"_285":286,"_221":222,"_122":61,"_78":287,"_81":-5,"_82":288,"_83":-5,"_227":228,"_229":230,"_231":232,"_233":234,"_171":-5,"_175":-5,"_116":235,"_236":237,"_85":-5,"_93":-5,"_238":390,"_195":-5,"_106":-5,"_108":-5},{"_60":226,"_109":230,"_19":228,"_111":201,"_112":232,"_113":240,"_114":-5,"_115":234,"_116":235,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":397},[395],{"_60":75,"_109":118,"_19":59,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":77,"_109":110,"_19":86,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":396},{"_122":61,"_89":90},{"_122":61,"_89":90},3404,"When times are tough, clarity is key","WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:10.720\nIt was the year 2009 and the market was really in the doldrums. So this was,\n\n2\n00:00:10.720 --> 00:00:12.560\nyou know, the recession\n\n3\n00:00:12.560 --> 00:00:17.210\nand basically the housing crisis, which led to consumer confidence and consumer\n\n4\n00:00:17.210 --> 00:00:18.080\nspending way\n\n5\n00:00:18.080 --> 00:00:23.700\ndown. And every single company was rethinking how they were going to keep their\n\n6\n00:00:23.700 --> 00:00:24.880\nbusiness alive.\n\n7\n00:00:24.880 --> 00:00:31.200\nAnd David basically pulled the entire company together and came up with seven\n\n8\n00:00:31.200 --> 00:00:32.800\nthings that we\n\n9\n00:00:32.800 --> 00:00:38.470\nwere going to do that year that was going to help the company survive this\n\n10\n00:00:38.470 --> 00:00:40.560\ndecrease in overall business.\n\n11\n00:00:40.560 --> 00:00:47.600\nAnd they were so clear. They were simple. And he used metaphors and stories to\n\n12\n00:00:47.600 --> 00:00:48.240\nmake each of\n\n13\n00:00:48.240 --> 00:00:52.790\nthose points so important. They were all resonant across the business, whether\n\n14\n00:00:52.790 --> 00:00:53.840\nyou're in the store,\n\n15\n00:00:53.840 --> 00:00:58.390\nin corporate headquarters, running the e-commerce side of the business. And it\n\n16\n00:00:58.390 --> 00:00:58.800\nreally helped the\n\n17\n00:00:58.800 --> 00:01:05.600\nwhole company rally around what we were going to do to basically survive this\n\n18\n00:01:05.600 --> 00:01:06.640\nchallenging time\n\n19\n00:01:06.640 --> 00:01:11.680\nin retail. And it was so clear. And then every month we would get together and\n\n20\n00:01:11.680 --> 00:01:12.800\nwe would revisit\n\n21\n00:01:12.800 --> 00:01:17.540\nthe seven principles. And we would talk about examples that basically helped\n\n22\n00:01:17.540 --> 00:01:18.560\nthe business to do\n\n23\n00:01:18.560 --> 00:01:23.220\nthese. And it was really just an experience for me of when times are tough, you\n\n24\n00:01:23.220 --> 00:01:23.440\nknow,\n\n25\n00:01:23.440 --> 00:01:29.120\nit's the best time to actually pull the team together and focus and stop a lot\n\n26\n00:01:29.120 --> 00:01:29.600\nof the things\n\n27\n00:01:29.600 --> 00:01:34.150\nthat didn't matter and feel really empowered and excited by the things that we\n\n28\n00:01:34.150 --> 00:01:35.120\ncould control.\n",860339,955219,"Crisis management, clarity, communication, focus, Sephora, recession, empowerment","when-times-are-tough-clarity-is-key","pX601zzp00KKkv43wVAWvqUB9eJIWVVt6BTgEZkmHtxxE","taj6IkMRmDjbg02z00upf8jt00ql3H00vkbfVoMR6Tfx5C8","2026-07-23T17:57:15.000000Z","https://www.howleaderslead.com/clips/3404/when-times-are-tough-clarity-is-key",{"_60":61,"_62":63,"_64":65,"_66":28,"_67":68,"_69":70,"_71":72,"_73":72,"_74":75,"_76":77,"_78":79,"_80":-5,"_81":-5,"_82":-5,"_83":-5,"_84":59,"_85":86,"_87":88,"_89":90,"_91":412,"_93":-5,"_94":413,"_104":414,"_106":415,"_108":-5},{"_60":157,"_125":219,"_147":220,"_261":277,"_278":279,"_144":280,"_146":-5,"_73":159,"_281":-5,"_71":159,"_282":-5,"_223":224,"_225":226,"_153":-5,"_76":-5,"_283":284,"_285":286,"_221":222,"_122":61,"_78":287,"_81":-5,"_82":288,"_83":-5,"_227":228,"_229":230,"_231":232,"_233":234,"_171":-5,"_175":-5,"_116":235,"_236":237,"_85":-5,"_93":-5,"_238":411,"_195":-5,"_106":-5,"_108":-5},{"_60":226,"_109":230,"_19":228,"_111":201,"_112":232,"_113":240,"_114":-5,"_115":234,"_116":235,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":418},[416],{"_60":75,"_109":118,"_19":59,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":77,"_109":110,"_19":86,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":417},{"_122":61,"_89":90},{"_122":61,"_89":90},3403,"Being your own customer is a huge competitive advantage","WEBVTT\n\n1\n00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.560\nand you know what the customer wants.\n\n2\n00:00:03.560 --> 00:00:05.280\nIt gives you such an advantage\n\n3\n00:00:05.280 --> 00:00:06.720\nin building an experience.\n\n4\n00:00:06.720 --> 00:00:09.880\nSo I was so the customer that we were targeting\n\n5\n00:00:09.880 --> 00:00:12.760\nand I had so many specific ideas\n\n6\n00:00:12.760 --> 00:00:16.400\nof how I wanted the website experience to work\n\n7\n00:00:16.400 --> 00:00:18.640\nand what I needed to be able to buy online.\n\n8\n00:00:18.640 --> 00:00:22.800\nAnd I was able to firsthand really sort of translate\n\n9\n00:00:22.800 --> 00:00:25.840\nthat experience to the product team,\n\n10\n00:00:25.840 --> 00:00:27.960\nto the engineering team, to the creative team.\n\n11\n00:00:27.960 --> 00:00:31.800\nI hired other people who also really understood innately\n\n12\n00:00:31.800 --> 00:00:33.880\nwhat the experience was they wanted.\n\n13\n00:00:33.880 --> 00:00:36.800\nAnd so we were really able to build something\n\n14\n00:00:36.800 --> 00:00:40.840\nthat we knew was needed in order to get people comfortable\n\n15\n00:00:40.840 --> 00:00:43.640\nwith buying online 'cause we were still back in those days.\n\n16\n00:00:43.640 --> 00:00:47.920\nI also needed to be able to go to all of the vendors\n\n17\n00:00:47.920 --> 00:00:50.520\nthat sell the brands that sell to Nordstrom\n\n18\n00:00:50.520 --> 00:00:52.360\nbecause we were a separate division\n\n19\n00:00:52.360 --> 00:00:54.680\nand Nordstrom Inc didn't want anything to do\n\n20\n00:00:54.680 --> 00:00:58.560\nwith this sort of like little fledgling division of the.com\n\n21\n00:00:58.560 --> 00:01:02.000\nand convince the brands to sell to us online too.\n\n22\n00:01:02.000 --> 00:01:04.840\nAnd so that was kind of being able to paint a picture\n\n23\n00:01:04.840 --> 00:01:06.440\nof what the future was gonna look like,\n\n24\n00:01:06.440 --> 00:01:09.520\nwhich I had a very clear sense of as a consumer\n\n25\n00:01:09.520 --> 00:01:10.640\nwith what I wanted.\n\n26\n00:01:10.640 --> 00:01:13.080\nAnd I would say, you know, both of those experiences\n\n27\n00:01:13.080 --> 00:01:16.440\nreally underscored for me the ability\n\n28\n00:01:16.440 --> 00:01:18.280\nto really understand your customer\n\n29\n00:01:18.280 --> 00:01:20.240\nand be able to express that in a way\n\n30\n00:01:20.240 --> 00:01:21.480\nthat's compelling to others.\n\n31\n00:01:21.480 --> 00:01:25.280\nAnd whether it's to convince Nordstrom Inc\n\n32\n00:01:25.280 --> 00:01:26.680\nto give us the money we needed\n\n33\n00:01:26.680 --> 00:01:29.440\nor is to convince the brands to sell to us,\n\n34\n00:01:29.440 --> 00:01:31.480\nall of that was really helpful\n\n35\n00:01:31.480 --> 00:01:32.640\nto be able to paint the picture\n\n36\n00:01:32.640 --> 00:01:35.240\nto these different constituents.\n\n37\n00:01:35.240 --> 00:01:36.080\n- And that's all.\n",725979,822829,"Customer experience, nordstrom, consumer","being-your-own-customer-is-a-huge-competitive-advantage","sXDoqEdyiXg9pfjDCdN3tKJsBa400ZV01BOIqsi5zO3t4","CZRIhkUhJN5iuIiTe43MMK02iA3QUrCFUNxue8fSdPjw","2026-07-23T17:55:50.000000Z","https://www.howleaderslead.com/clips/3403/being-your-own-customer-is-a-huge-competitive-advantage",{"_60":61,"_62":63,"_64":65,"_66":28,"_67":68,"_69":70,"_71":72,"_73":72,"_74":75,"_76":77,"_78":79,"_80":-5,"_81":-5,"_82":-5,"_83":-5,"_84":59,"_85":86,"_87":88,"_89":90,"_91":433,"_93":-5,"_94":434,"_104":435,"_106":436,"_108":-5},{"_60":157,"_125":219,"_147":220,"_261":277,"_278":279,"_144":280,"_146":-5,"_73":159,"_281":-5,"_71":159,"_282":-5,"_223":224,"_225":226,"_153":-5,"_76":-5,"_283":284,"_285":286,"_221":222,"_122":61,"_78":287,"_81":-5,"_82":288,"_83":-5,"_227":228,"_229":230,"_231":232,"_233":234,"_171":-5,"_175":-5,"_116":235,"_236":237,"_85":-5,"_93":-5,"_238":432,"_195":-5,"_106":-5,"_108":-5},{"_60":226,"_109":230,"_19":228,"_111":201,"_112":232,"_113":240,"_114":-5,"_115":234,"_116":235,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":439},[437],{"_60":75,"_109":118,"_19":59,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":77,"_109":110,"_19":86,"_111":-5,"_112":-5,"_113":-5,"_114":-5,"_115":-5,"_116":-5,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":438},{"_122":61,"_89":90},{"_122":61,"_89":90},{"_60":157,"_125":219,"_147":220,"_261":277,"_278":279,"_144":280,"_146":-5,"_73":159,"_281":-5,"_71":159,"_282":-5,"_223":224,"_225":226,"_153":-5,"_76":-5,"_283":284,"_285":286,"_221":222,"_122":61,"_78":287,"_81":-5,"_82":288,"_83":-5,"_227":228,"_229":230,"_231":232,"_233":234,"_171":-5,"_175":-5,"_116":235,"_236":237,"_85":-5,"_93":-5,"_238":441,"_195":-5,"_106":-5,"_108":-5},{"_60":226,"_109":230,"_19":228,"_111":201,"_112":232,"_113":240,"_114":-5,"_115":234,"_116":235,"_117":-5},{"_60":90,"_21":215,"_216":443},{"_122":61,"_89":90},{"_122":61,"_89":90},"user","token","favorites",[],"collections",[],"env",{"_453":454,"_455":456,"_457":458,"_459":460,"_461":462},"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",""]

Julie Bornstein

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