Ep 74- Reinventing Corporate Culture with Mike Snavely

Transcript

Transcripts are generated by machine learning, so typos may be present.

BTB (00:00):

Welcome to the Building Texas Business Podcast, interviews with thought leaders and organizational visionaries from across industry. Join us as we talk about the latest trends, challenges, and growth opportunities to take your business to the next level. The Building Texas Business Podcast is brought to you by BoyarMiller, providing counsel beyond expectations. Find out how we can make a meaningful difference to your business at boyarmiller.com and by your podcast team where having your own podcast is as easy as being a guest on ours. Discover more at yourpodcast.team. Now. Here’s your host, Chris Hanslik.

Chris (00:42):

In today’s episode, you will meet Mike Snavely, CEO of Funware in building and maintaining key relationships with your stakeholders. Mike shares his opinions on why there is no substitute for being in person to engage on a human level. Mike, I want to welcome you to Building Texas Business, and thank you for taking time to come on the show with me.

Mike (01:05):

Glad to be here. Thanks for the invitation.

Chris (01:08):

So as the CEO of FundWare, let’s start by just orienting the listeners to what is FundWare? Tell us what the company’s known for.

Mike (01:18):

Sure. So FundWare is a 15-year-old publicly traded company based in Austin, Texas. We build mobile experiences that help hotels and healthcare institutions engage their guests and patients while they’re on premises in ways that drive satisfaction and monetization.

Chris (01:37):

Very interesting. So you said the company started, I guess in the early two thousands then

Mike (01:42):

It would’ve been in 2009. The company started, it was private for the first 11 or so years of ex existence, and then we went public via SPAC transaction in 2000, I believe it was 20.

Chris (01:54):

Okay. And it sounds like a fairly niched focus for the company. How did it come to be that the company, I guess, was so focused on those two industries and providing that type of, I guess, service to those customers?

Mike (02:09):

Well, originally it wasn’t. So over 15 years, as you might imagine, there’s been an evolution in the focus of the company. And so the company in 2009 was really more of a mobile solution development agency. So some of the biggest brands in the world really selected FundWare back in that timeframe to build some of their first mobile apps in the app store. So companies like Fox, the NFL, the Sochi Olympics, WWE, a number of airports and so on, were spending a lot of money to build their first mobile application and then to develop their first mobile audience for lots of reasons. And that was two years after the iPhone was introduced. It was actually before the iPad was introduced. And so obviously there’s a lot of evolution of consumer expectations when it comes to engaging on mobile. And those brands were spending a lot of money in the early days to build their first mobile presences.

Mike (03:12):

But that’s evolved over time. And so agencies are really not, they really don’t drive the valuation that a SaaS company does. And so we’ve over time evolved into becoming a SaaS company. So we license our technologies, we’ll essentially build an app, configuring it for the customer, launch it into the app store, and then generate license fees off that app as it exists and is available for download. That’s a much better valuation model because typically when our customers get involved with us, they stick around, our retention rate is very high because we drive a positive ROI. So we’ve kind of followed the evolution of mobile from really high investment work for hire boutique agency like development all the way through today where we charge between 50 and $150,000 a year for a given property, whether it’s a hotel or a hospital, to have their own mobile app in the app store to have their own brand in front of their users or guests. And then ultimately to develop that one-on-one relationship with that guest or patient in a way that drives repeat business satisfaction and additional monetization.

Chris (04:28):

That’s fascinating. Now you mentioned retention rate, which obviously is very important for success of a company especially like yours. What do you attribute that successful retention rate to?

Mike (04:40):

Well, we do good work, and I can make available to you a list, and you could even put it in the podcast if you’d like, of the apps that we’ve built or some of the apps that we built. They’re beautiful apps. So number one, we do really high quality work that all of our customers are proud to have their name on. And then number two, we drive ROI, plain and simple for a dollar they put into our solutions, they get between five and 50 back depending on who they are and the specifics of their business. And if I could give you a machine that would you put a dollar bill in, you get a five or a 50 back out, you would say, how many dollar bills can I put in there?

Chris (05:17):

Yeah, no kidding. Right. Well mean, but fundamentally you mentioned at least two fundamental things that is key to customer retention. That’s one, provide good service if you’re in the service industry. It starts with providing good service, and I think an outcome of that is your customer sees a valuable return on the investment for your service. Exactly. Those are not unique to software, but for any kind of service type business. Right,

Mike (05:45):

Exactly. That’s right.

Chris (05:46):

Let’s talk a little bit about, so you’re the CEO, the company was founded by others than yourself. How did you come, I guess, to work at FundWare? And I know just a little bit that this is your second stint there, but give us a little background on your connection to the company and how it was you became the CEO.

Mike (06:07):

Yeah, sure enough. So I’ve really made a career of pursuing technology trends. So I’m kind of an old guy, so I’ve been in business for a long time, but I started off in offline marketing technologies, sending out snail mail and running telephone centers. And then I evolved into social marketing with a startup in Austin, Texas. I then got into mobile, and I’ve been in mobile really kind of on and off ever since. Mobile’s a big deal because you’ve got a device that knows who you are and knows where you are. You tell it all your secrets, it really is an indispensable or it’s become an indispensable tool. And so I’ve really made kind of a career over the last shoot 15 years at this point in mobile. And so I was originally with, my first stint in mobile was with a little mobile application development boutique in Austin called Mutual Mobile.

(06:58):

That was 2008, 9, 10, 11 timeframe did something else. And then I was recruited to come to FundWare by somebody who had worked for me at Mutual Mobile, and I said, look, we’re building out this platform company. We’re very interested in having somebody who can really help to drive revenues. Would you be interested in joining? So that in 14, I joined FundWare for the first time and I came to run the software business. So I was responsible for all revenues for the software business of FundWare from 14 through 16 or so. Got to know the company, got to really understand the technologies. Actually a number of the people who were there then are still with the company. Then I went off, worked at a Silicon Valley startup and did a couple of other things. And then when the founding CEO left in 23, they hired a guy that I had worked with at Mutual Mobile back in the day as the new CEO, and he said, look, Mike, I know that you’re great at building businesses on the revenue side, would you like to come and be my CRO as I’m CEO of FundWare?

(08:02):

And he said, I’ll make it worth through while. So I said no a couple of times and then eventually I said yes. Well, this was September of last year that I rejoined the company, and 30 days in the board said, look, what we really need is somebody with sales DNA at the CEO in the, let’s try that again. Easy for me to say CEO role. So Mike, would you like to step in as CEO? Actually, I had a buddy who brought me back to be his CRO and then wound up taking his job. And I are still friends. We still talk all the time, and he was very supportive of that move. But a long story short, I think that the company for a time kind of lost its way and the simple fact of selling servicing accounts and driving revenues. And that’s something I’ve had the good fortune to develop pretty good skill at. And so now I’m the CEO and I got to tell you, I think the ECEO stands for extra. Everything about it is extra, but it really is the best job I’ve ever had and I’m really enjoying it. I still spend a lot of time working with customers, selling, identifying strategic partnerships and that kind of thing because I enjoy it. I feel like I’m good at it, and it’s absolutely critical to positioning the company for growth and valuation, which is exactly my job.

Chris (09:20):

There you go. So let’s talk a little bit about that. What are some of the things that you do to build and maintain relationships with those partners, customers, strategic relationships that you think someone listening might learn from?

Mike (09:37):

Well, it’s funny. There’s been a real trend away from in-person. And so you and I are meeting today on Zoom. Our business Funware is essentially a hundred percent virtual at this point. And what I find is there’s no substitute for hopping on a plane and going to see somebody breaking bread with them, getting to know them as a person, understanding what it is they’re trying to accomplish, what their hopes and dreams are, what their fears are once you get to that point, and really just kind of understanding them as a person and then exposing yourself as a person and say, look, this is what I’m trying to accomplish, Mr. And miss partner or prospect, and really kind of engaging on a human level, which is a whole lot easier for sitting across the desk with somebody. And that to me is where I spend a lot of my time. I do invest a lot of time in in-person spending time with customers, prospects, partners, and the rest of it. And I really just don’t think there’s much of a substitute for that.

Chris (10:36):

Couldn’t agree more. I think that’s how really, until the pandemic, it is how business got done in person. I don’t think anything’s changed here. I think especially these days, I think it says so much more that you take the time to do that when you could otherwise do a teams or Zoom call or whatever. And just that the human interaction, I mean as humans, I think we’re meant to be together and interact and I think that just fosters the relationships. So great advice there. Keeping on that kind of theme, you’ve come back in not in an easy economic time. Let’s talk a little bit about managing through some economic uncertain rising interest rates and all the stuff that’s out there in the news. Let’s talk about what are some of the things you’ve done to stay focused and keep your people focused on driving the business forward?

Mike (11:33):

Sure enough, well, there are some benefits and some drawbacks to being a publicly trading company. Of course. One is access to the capital markets. That’s a benefit. And we certainly have the ability to draw capital out of the markets in ways that don’t require us to be as susceptible to, excuse me, the interest rate environment. But that doesn’t mean that our customers aren’t susceptible to that environment. And so we’ve had to do some things selling into hospitality and healthcare. I mean, we’re typically selling into pretty big organizations and they have a little bit of a buffer, I suppose, from the ebbs and flows of the economy, particularly when you look at luxury hospitality, ity, I mean, covid aside, the luxury hospitality has really been on a growth tear because of the generation of a lot of wealth, part of a lot of people. And they’re wanting to suspend it on high quality experiences, but that doesn’t mean that we don’t have to be creative from time to time when it comes to pricing a deal or generating terms that are acceptable to the customer.

(12:34):

They can digest, they can maybe capitalize the expense as opposed to turning into an opex expense and that kind of thing. And certainly we’ve had to be creative there. When I first took on the CEO role, the company was having a little bit of financial trouble, and you could read in our public filings all about it, but long story short, we were having problems with access to capital and I had to work with my CFO and others capital partners to really inject some capital into the company from the market in ways that allowed us the ability to move forward without paying a lot of interest, frankly. So we were able to reshape the balance sheet in a way that puts us in a great spot for growth today. Smaller companies, I can only imagine what it must be like if you’re dealing with, but debt financing distinct from capital financing and what some of the challenges there must be.

(13:28):

We had to make some hard decisions in connection with the recapitalization of the company that had to do with people in large part because that’s our number one expense, and those are hard things to do. And I spent many a sleepless night because I had to do some of those things. But the fact of the matter is that most companies don’t cut fast enough and they don’t cut deep enough because of those reasons and it feels terrible. But preserving the company and giving ourselves the ability to go forward and thrive is really kind of the job for the shareholders.

Chris (14:02):

Shareholders. And I agree. I think regardless of the size of the company making those people decisions are extremely difficult because again, we went back to about in person and it’s human, and these people have been with you typically, but what they say, right, is when you have to make the hard cuts, you usually have to cut muscle, and those can be challenging decisions. On the flip side of that, I’m sure as you’ve come into the CEO role, you are either have or still in the process of kind of building your team. What are some of the things that you do, processes maybe you’ve created to help you identify the right people to surround yourself with to further the mission and strategies of the company?

Mike (14:48):

Well, there are two nondelegable duties that the CEO has in my belief. Number one, it’s setting the strategy of the company. So we’re going to be a SaaS company serving these markets. We’re going to drive toward these margins, we’re going to deliver in this way, and these are the things that are important for the strategy of the business. Number two is the culture of the business. And so I can’t hire somebody to give me a culture. I’ve got to work with the company to create the culture that we want. And so I’ll give you a little bit of a story there. So I have a lot of respect for the fellows who founded the company, a lot of respect for them because they built something that I now have the good fortune to run and take to the next level. But they were literally army guys and there was a lot of army DNA in the company. Now, there’s nothing wrong with that. There’s nothing at all wrong with that. And the company was successful for a number of years, but the culture that was built was one of command and control because that’s what the army is, right?

Chris (15:52):

Well, not to interrupt, but that’s also not atypical of kind of startup mentality

Mike (15:59):

Is

Chris (16:00):

Dominant kind of leadership. Got to get it done, got to get this off the ground.

Mike (16:04):

Yep. Dominant leadership plus the military background equaled very much a command and control structure. A bit of a call to personality around the founding CEO and all of that paid great dividends for a long time. I could not be any more different from the founding CEO. I’m not an army guy. And so one of the first things I did when I took on the job is I said, look, if you are the vice president of sales or you’re the vice president of product or delivery or deployments or whatever it is, you’re the CEO of your own business. And I’m not going to tell you what to do. I’m going to give you an objective and I’m going to give you the flexibility and the support to go and achieve that objective. You need people, you get people, you need investment, you get investment, but your accountability is to go and run your portion of the business as if you are the CEO.

(17:00):

I’m not going to micromanage the decisions at all. I’m going to empower you to do the right thing, number one for the customer because then that ultimately becomes the right thing for the company over many observations. And so that was a transition that some people are still working through, frankly, in leadership roles within the company. It’s sometimes people get comfortable being told what to do, and we don’t do that anymore. And a couple of people have left as a result of that. They did not have that comfort, and that’s okay because it’s not the right job for them anymore. But most people have really embraced the opportunity of agency and empowerment and the ability to run their own part of the business.

Chris (17:45):

Hello friends, this is Chris Hanzlik, your building Texas business host. Did you know that Boyer Miller, the producer of this podcast is a business law firm that works with entrepreneurs, corporations, and business leaders. Our team of attorneys serve as strategic partners to businesses by providing legal guidance to organizations of all sizes. All get to know the firm@boyermiller.com and thanks for listening to the show.

(18:15):

Yeah, I mean there’s a lot to unpack there, but clearly what you’re talking about in my terms are giving people autonomy, but with the accountability, which I think is the right way to go. However, organizations evolve over time just like people. So I think we talked about command and control in the early days that for most companies may make sense, but where this company is now and its size and scale, you couldn’t do that too much going on. And you have to then hire the right people. And the people that work for the company in the first few years may not work 10 years, 15 years later because different skill sets needed. So it sounds like you’ve got your hands around that pretty well.

Mike (19:00):

Well, it’s always a work in progress. So one of the accelerants to adopting a new cultural tone is bringing in people. So I brought in a couple of guys, and they are both guys I’m afraid, who I had worked with a number of times in the past who I knew kind of got the way that we wanted to run the railroad and who are the kind of guys who just roll up their sleeves every day and make the most of the day. And those guys are not only in leadership roles within the company, but they’re also setting a tone for the others they work with most closely day to day. And I absolutely think it’s working.

Chris (19:38):

That’s great. So kind of sum that conversation up for us. How would you define the culture of FundWare today?

Mike (19:46):

I’d say that we’re kind of a restart, but with all the good elements of a startup. And what I mean by that is that we had a revenue profile, that group grew and then it kind of dropped off for some reason I wasn’t here. And we’re in the process of growing back up and we’re getting in the right people who are interested in not only doing great work and serving the customers really well and building a terrific product, but also ones who are embracing the autonomy and the accountability that we’re providing to them. And I couldn’t be any more pleased with the reception that I’m getting.

Chris (20:24):

Anything special that you’ve kind of put in place to kind of help foster that type of culture so that you can perpetuate it and see it grow?

Mike (20:33):

Well, we tend to recognize the behaviors that we’re looking for. And here’s what I mean by that. Somebody will just do a thing and they’ll do it. They’ll achieve an accomplishment, whatever that accomplishment may be. And we’ll talk. We’ve got a slack. Slack is a tool we use all day long every day, and we have a Slack channel called Momentum. And the Momentum Channel is really about recognizing the contributions that a person makes. And the deal is that if you put something in momentum, you got to recognize somebody else. So you say, Hey, a great thing happened and I want to thank Bob over here for his contribution to the thing because Bob contributed in a way that if he hadn’t done that, we might not have gotten the outcome that we’re looking for. That’s something that you see traffic in every single day.

Chris (21:24):

That’s great. Say I can relate to that. We do something similar here at the firm, not necessarily on a specific channel, but it is kind of become part of our culture to, we call ’em core value kudos, and it’s about recognizing other people, not yourself, obviously, in efforts that they made and tying them to our mission and values so that the behaviors and the values marry up. And then people, it makes it tangible that I want to thank or congratulate someone for doing X, Y, and Z, which demonstrated this value in action.

Mike (22:01):

That’s terrific. Yeah, I’ve been at companies that have done that. I think that’s something that I may need to reincorporate into my bag of tricks there for sure.

Chris (22:08):

So along those lines, you’re software company, I always am interested to know what are you doing to promote or foster creativity and innovation within the company?

Mike (22:20):

Well, some the things that, it’s interesting, I’ll give you maybe a little bit longer answer you might be looking for, but there is, and it’s really important to kind separate the day-to-day from the long-term vision. And what I mean by that is that I’m say a developer today, I have to fix a bug and I just have to fix the bug because the bug exists and it’s in the way of something happening. And it’s not my favorite part of the job. I’m quite confident of that, not my favorite part of the job to fix a bug, but there is some long range stuff that I’m really excited about. A big part of what we do is indoor way finding and hyper-local marketing offers. And there are lots and lots of innovations that we’re looking at right now. And so we identify people who are interested in innovation and we put together both formal processes for them to say, okay, you’re on the r and d team and you’re going to be doing this work.

(23:18):

But we also give them informal opportunities. Hey, look, I want you to go to Denver to our customer with Gaylord Rockies, and I want you to actually go into the physical space that we’re trying to map, and I want you to help me figure out a better way to do it. And so that’s two things. It’s number one, solving a strategic problem for the business, but it’s also kind of getting them out of their, oh, since we’re all virtual, it’s getting them out of their home office, sending them to Denver, take an extra day, engage the customer, do great work, but also enjoy yourself a little bit. So we try to give people an opportunity to get out of the context within which they’re working, sitting in my home office, squashing bugs, and get out into the real world where they solutions are deployed in ways that are not only sort of fun, but also problem solving.

Chris (24:10):

So you’ve been me, you’ve been in some leadership roles throughout your career, obviously the CEO now, how would you describe your leadership style and how do you think it’s evolved over the last few years?

Mike (24:22):

Well, I try to work with people. I try to work with people I know as best I can. You can’t always do that, right? But you can absolutely make the investment of time to get to know them. And so I walk into this job. I’ve got a CFO that I had just met very recently, and I had a chief legal officer that I met just recently, and I had a chief operating officer that I had known actually for some time. And one of those guys wound up leaving. But the other two guys that I had just met, I made a real point of going to where they were sitting down with them, breaking bread, understanding who they are, what they were trying to accomplish, why they were at the company in the first place and all the rest of it. Because it was important for me to understand whether I could trust and whether it was appropriate to invest in these guys.

(25:11):

And absolutely it was, by the way, I had a couple of gaps in my leadership team. And what I did was find people that I’d worked with in the past and I said, look, are you willing to come and work for me again? And the answer in every case was, absolutely. And that’s not because I’m the greatest guy in the world or because I gave him a zillion dollars or anything like that. It’s because we have over the years, established a working cadence that’s founded on this idea of trust and accountability, autonomy of action, and really candor of discussion. There’s nothing that the leadership team and I don’t discuss in detail. And with candor, we’re not afraid to tell our truths to each other. We’ve created what I think is a safe space for us to really talk about what’s on our mind and what concerns or challenges we have, or if somebody is all wet. And that kind of culture around the executive table I think filters down to the rest of the business in ways that help support the culture we’re trying to build.

Chris (26:18):

Yeah, I was going to say, it sounds like it’s a culture of safety to have the hard conversations, but that those conversations are done in a respectful way. I don’t know if there’s no better way to do it. Right.

Mike (26:32):

And it’s okay to fail. And I got to tell you, I used to race cars a long time ago, and if you don’t crash, you’re not driving fast enough. And so it’s okay. It’s okay to crash every once in a while because that means you’re pushing the envelope, you’re trying to get to the edge of the performance envelope, and then that’s positive.

Chris (26:53):

Yeah, no, let’s talk about that because there’s always learning. And so I think when you have setbacks or failures, you can learn from them and it can make you better. Don’t let it define you. So can you give us an example of more the, not the car racing, because crashing is easy to understand is a failure, but in the business world as a leader, something that you felt a failure of yours, a bad decision, a setback that you absolutely grew from and it’s made you better today?

Mike (27:24):

Yeah, sure enough, I think that my greatest learnings are not being decisive enough and not acting quickly enough. And so let’s say for example, I’ll give you an example of last company I worked for before. Well, yes, I’ll give you that example. So I was working at an AI video startup in Madison, Wisconsin. It was essentially a unit of a publicly traded company that I won’t name, but your viewers can certainly look it up. And long story short, that company is now bankrupt. And I don’t fault any of the, I don’t fault the CEO of that company, which was not me by the way in that, but I fault myself. Yeah, exactly. It wasn’t me. I didn’t bankrupt the company. This was a guy I had worked with before. I like and trust, I consider him a personal friend. I don’t think I told him the truth about the business that I was running early enough.

(28:16):

And what I mean by that is that I was overly optimistic about our ability to deliver a differentiated AI solution for video processing that turned out was just not feasible given the investment levels that we had, which quite frankly were pretty small. And so what I said was, I need this much to make this happen. I was given about half that much, and I didn’t adequately reset the expectations on how long it was going to take to get that thing done slash I should have had probably more pointed discussion about is this worth doing it all? And I didn’t do that. And the long story short is that company is now bankrupt for lots of reasons. But the thing that my not being as aggressive as I felt like I should have been was a contributor to that. I think it was a small contributor. But all that to say that it didn’t help the learning that

Chris (29:16):

Is, I’m say the learning for you is having the hard conversations faster,

Mike (29:21):

And that’s the kind of culture that’s terrifically for me. So that informs the culture I’m building at FundWare, which is, if this ain’t going to work, I need you to tell me. And I might disagree, and I might argue with you, but I will absolutely hear you. It’s going to be super important for us to just trust each other enough to be able to have the discussion about without fear, I guess is where I’m coming from.

Chris (29:49):

I understand that. So let’s talk a little bit about these are important jobs that you’ve held over the last few years and as is the current one. I don’t like using the term work life balance, but how do you manage work and personal life to try to keep them both going in a positive direction?

Mike (30:09):

Well, I spend a lot of time with my kids. Yeah, my daughter. So I’m here in Ohio spending time with my father and mother, but my daughter came along, my older daughter came along because she’s out of school already. I’m going to go next week, pick up my younger daughter in boarding school in Colorado, drive her down to Big Ben where she has never been, and then spend time with her over the summer. So I mean, it’s really about being deliberate about that and working from anywhere candidly in my opinion, helps. There’s no expectation that I’m going to the office. I’m going to be there during the business day on Monday through Friday. And what I kind of joke is that, I mean, I work a lot, no question about it, but I work around my life as opposed to work, as opposed to planning my life around my work. So I might work 60 hours a week, but that’s not going to be five times 12, that’s going to be kind of eight-ish times seven. I’ll work every day a little bit, but I’m certainly going to put my kids first. And it’s just the way,

Chris (31:14):

Well, I can identify with that. And I think everyone has to find their own way, and each job and role requires different things and different stages of life require different things. So I think that’s what people should stay focused on individually as well as the companies to try to make sure, because if you have good people, you don’t want to lose them for those types of reasons. Well, Mike, this has been a great conversation. Before we wrap up, I just wanted to get a little bit more or a little less serious about things. Tell us what was your first job as a kid?

Mike (31:50):

Funny you should ask. So I’m back in rural Ohio where I grew up right now at my parents’ house, as I mentioned earlier, my first job was, am I allowed to say SHIT on your podcast? Of course, the Texas podcast. My first job was shoveling hog shit, Evelyn Hog shit for minimum wage. And I was nothing

Chris (32:09):

That wants to make you go to college and get a degree than that. Right.

Mike (32:14):

Well, the funny thing is that I wound up raising hogs to pay for college. So it was fine to shovel the hog shit, but I was like, if I’m going to shovel the hog shit, I’m going to do it for more than 3 35 an hour. I’m going to do it in exchange for a college education. So that’s not exactly that way, but that’s a big part of how I kind of got off the farm and moving ahead.

Chris (32:33):

I love that. Okay. Well, yeah, obviously as we now know, you’re from Ohio, but you spent enough time in Texas for me to ask you this question. Do you prefer Tex-Mex or barbecue?

Mike (32:43):

I love Tex-Mex. I would eat Tex-Mex every day of the week. Alright. And sometimes I do. I do love barbecue, but the thing is that the best barbecue is something I don’t want to wait in line for and I don’t want to drive a long ways. If I happen to be buying a barbecue or Franklin’s their great barbecue a little bit over hyped, or if I want a great barbecue, I’ll just treat it as a destination thing. I’ll go down to Lockhart or something like that, but I can get absolutely terrific Tex-Mex around the corner from my house every day of the week.

Chris (33:20):

Yes. Well, it’s one good thing. I think living in Texas both are abundant, right? But you’re right, indeed. The marquee barbecue is tucked away in some places. Alright, so Mike, last thing is, if you could do a 30 day sabbatical, where would you go? What would you do?

Mike (33:38):

Well, I’ve got a bunch of customers who have really beautiful beach resorts, so I might go to one of those.

Chris (33:44):

You might go break bread with them there,

Mike (33:47):

Break bread with the customers at most beautiful resorts in the world. That would be one thing I might do. There are a lot of places around the world that I’d love to see. So I’ve got a Google Maps layer that has little flags. There are probably 800 flags on that map, and I add some every week places that I like to go around the world. Sometimes there are restaurants that I read about sometimes there, they’re beautiful, natural features like mountain ranges, the Painted mountains in the Andes or Beautiful lake. I’ve never been to Crater Lake, things like that. So what I probably do is find 30 days worth of those pins in an area that I could consume within that 30 day period, and I just go knock it out.

Chris (34:31):

I love that. I like the concept of keeping track of the pins

Mike (34:36):

And there’s too many on the map that I’ll be dead and gone before I get to see all of them. But it is, it’s a memory bank for things that have caught my interest and that I do want to experience at some point if I could pull it off.

Chris (34:50):

Love it, love it. Well, Mike, thanks so much for taking the time to be a guest on the show. Really enjoyed hearing your story and the things y’all are doing at Funware Sound really fun, exciting, and innovative.

Mike (35:02):

Thanks a lot. I appreciate your time.

Chris (35:06):

And there we have it. Another great episode. Don’t forget to check out the show notes at boyarmiller.com/podcast and you can find out more about all the ways our firm can help you at boyarmiller.com. That’s it for this episode. Have a great week and we’ll talk to you next time.