Predicting The Turn W/ Dave Knox

If you’re an entrepreneur, time is on your side.  That’s probably not something you’ve heard before, but here’s what I love about legendary entrepreneurs: Everyone else sees obstacles, and they only see opportunity. Scott Dorsey is one of those legends, and he see the constraint of time as a powerful ally That’s just one of the many topics we discussed on this episode Scott lets us come behind the scenes of High Alpha, his latest venture since ExactTarget sold to Salesforce for $2.5B. He dives into how BigCo can adapt to the disruptive marketplace, and use size and strength to complement agility and speed of smaller outfits.

Venture capital is all about investing in disruption. How come the industry itself hasn’t been disrupted? n the venture industry, 9 out of 10 investors are trying to look better, sound better, and know more than the others, and 1 out 10 are actually trying to do something different. How come in an industry so intently focused on funding disruption, the vast number of people all do it the very same way? There’s no one more equipped to handle that question than Paul Martino, founder of Bullpen Capital. Bullpen Capital is an early-stage, post-seed venture fund investing in technology companies that have been funded by super-angels and institutional seed funds. What sets Bullpen apart from other firms are a few strategies they use to maximize their portfolio value and find the companies no one else is paying attention to but should be.

In the tightest labor market ever, people have a ton of options. If you’re not rolling out the red carpet, the talented won’t join. Getting the right talent that knows how to keep pace with the changes in today’s world should be top of mind for every company. Few understand this better than Nick Comydas of Hunt Club, a recruiting firm that uses crowdsourcing technology to find companies the best passive talent. On this episode of Predicting the Turn, Nick outlines how companies can acquire the right talent in this tight labor market and how blue-chip companies need to evolve if they want to keep their talent. He also lends his insight on a few interesting things big companies are doing to adapt, some big trends that are happening in both big companies and the startup world, and finally what individuals can do to prepare themselves with the necessary skills of today.

Every major industry has been forced to focus on innovation. You can’t ignore it, and it’s not just because someone might come by and take some of your business, but you have the potential to be massively disrupted in a very short period of time. Our guest on today’s episode of Predicting The Turn is Joe Medved, a venture partner at Lerer Hippeau. As an expert in innovation and investment banking, he sat down with us to talk about what’s changing in digital media and innovation and how he identifies entrepreneurs worth taking a risk on. It’s almost like identifying an emerging artist; risky but rewarding when your instinct turns out to be right. Because a successful company is about more than just a high quality product, Joe won’t work with a company unless the founder meets a certain criteria.

What does a journalist who spends every single day with CMOs think about how today's marketing leadership can help define the future of business? I grabbed a quick interview with Jenny Rooney, editor at CMO Forbes, while at Cradle Marketers, an event about shaping the future of marketing held at Miami University.

“How necessary is playing in the sandbox?”. “It’s the price of entry to compete as a business professional.” Nimble, digital-first companies are the ones that succeed. Pete Blackshaw has a very unique blend of big company, small company, and public policy experience. He’s been a digital change agent at large companies, a founder of startups, and he’s even worked in the California legislature. On this episode of Predicting the Turn, I sat down to chat with Pete about internal social networks, digital Accountability, the success of CES, the potential future of Cincinnati as a startup hub, and Pete’s experiences of personal growth and development.

Kyle Schlegel gets asked every day what Roger Federer is like, or real, when the camera’s not on him. The truth: he’s exactly the way he is on camera. That’s a powerful level of authenticity and it’s a growing trend. It’s also just one of the big ways technology has changed the landscape for marketing leaders of sporting goods companies. At Brandemonium, I got to sit down with an expert on this topic, my friend Kyle Schlegel, the Global Marketing Director of Racquet Sports at Wilson. He outlined 5 challenges that face large sporting goods brands today, and the 2 practices marketing leaders should be engaged in to become better assets to the brands they represent.

How do you hold on to an entrepreneurial mindset in an industry as established as food, beverages, and hospitality is? To find out, we invited Kevin Burke, Senior Director of Global Marketing - Innovation at Beam Suntory, to join the Predicting the Turn podcast.

Everyone’s trying to predict disruption. Big brands, venture, and startups. How do each of these perspectives think differently about the issue? More importantly, how can a show with these 3 perspectives help listeners predict the turns in their industries? Dave Knox’s background is at the intersection of the worlds of big brands and startups. He started his career at Proctor and Gamble as the Founder of Corporate Digital Strategy right around the time where web2.0 was emerging. Dave then spent the last seven years as the Chief Marketing Officer for a fast-growing digital innovation agency called Rockfish which he helped sell to WPP.  On the nights and weekends, he spent his time as an advisor to a few different venture capital funds and also was the Cofounder of Brandery, one of the top 15 startup accelerators in the country. Predicting the Turn is based on Dave’s experience spending time with companies like P and G, Kroger, and Ford, but then working on nights and weekends with startups that were challengin

CPG companies are being disrupted left and right. Where they struggle, brands like Inspire & Arby’s have figured it out. Technology innovation is causing massive disruption in many fields, especially CPG. Companies are too slow, encumbered by corporate bureaucracy. Instead, they need to leverage their resources in a streamlined way toward proactivity, higher order thinking, and how to add holistic value to their customers. Where they struggle, marketing leaders in the foodservice industry like Jason Leohr and Jim Taylor are winning. Jim is the Chief Marketing Officer of Arby’s and Jason is the VP of Media for Inspire Brands, Arby’s parent company. I got to chat with them right before their speech at Brandemonium.