Behind the Brands: How a COO Builds the Machine Powering Inc. and Fast Company

0:00:09.2 Kailey Raymond: Welcome to Builders Wanted, the podcast for people shaping what's next in customer engagement. Today's guest operates at the beating heart of two of the most iconic business media brands, Inc. and Fast Company. As Chief Operating Officer, Anne Marie O'Keefe is the architect behind the systems that keep storytelling sharp, revenue flowing, and teams moving fast in a media landscape that's anything but static. Anne Marie has built her career scaling businesses that sit at the intersection of creativity and operations. From digital transformation to audience development, she's responsible for aligning strategy, structure, and day-to-day execution so that visionary journalism can thrive. In this conversation, we'll explore how great operators empower brands, how she's modernizing Inc. and Fast Company from the inside out, and what it takes to build a media business that leads not just in readership, but in relevance. Let's get into it.

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0:01:49.9 Kailey Raymond: Anne Marie, welcome to the show. I'm so excited to have you here.

0:01:54.0 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Thank you so much, Kailey. It's so nice to be here.

0:01:57.4 Kailey Raymond: This should be really fun. And I wanted to start off and orient folks towards your role. So, you know, we know that you're behind two of the most well-known brands in business journalism, but you're not necessarily the one that's writing the stories. So how would you describe what you build?

0:02:17.1 Anne Marie O'Keefe: So this is a cliche, but it's because it's true. The only constant in media is change. Audience habits shift. We have platforms that once drove a lot of growth for us are stalling and some of them are even collapsing. And, you know, AI is starting to have big impact in the way content is created and the way content is consumed. And so in this environment, to thrive, creativity is really required from every department, from every team. And so where we're being creative about what we're building is we're taking a lot of legacy products and experiences and infrastructure and we're building on them for that future. Part of my role is really to help chart that course, figuring out which parts of the business model we need to reimagine and how, and then building and rebuilding and building again all of the pieces we need for that growth.

0:03:13.5 Kailey Raymond: .I know how that feels. Absolutely. And I love that you're calling this out, which is that creativity can be applied really in any department. It doesn't mean that your title necessarily needs to have journalist or brand or something, you know, in the title to make it associated with creativity. The way that you problem solve, the way that you approach problems can also be creative and drive innovation for the company. I'm wondering what a typical day looks like. You're kind of like the voice of this audience that sits between editorial and revenue and product and audience. How do you bring it all together? What do your days look like?

0:03:49.6 Anne Marie O'Keefe: The audience is the connection between all of the departments. And I kind of view myself as our chief audience advocate. And so a typical day is me really advocating for them to be the center of every decision we make, which means that I spend a lot of time visiting with my counterparts and other divisions, spend a lot of time with my editors in chief and with the revenue team, the sales team. And it is really about trying to align all of those pieces so that no matter what it is we're doing, no matter where anybody's encountering our brands, they really are feeling that connection right away, that we understand them, that we're here to serve them. Sometimes my days are creating a lot of chaos across the organization, and sometimes my days are clearing up the chaos that's in the organization. It could be either on any given day.

0:04:39.6 Kailey Raymond: But no matter what, there's chaos involved.

0:04:43.0 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Yes, absolutely. I couldn't come in if there wasn't.

0:04:47.2 Kailey Raymond: Nice. Nice. That is the role of an operator is to is to kind of get to the center of it. I like that you're centering audience in the very middle of this. I think that it's a principle that everybody says that they hold, and it's harder to do in practice sometimes. So having your audience, the customer, the consumer, helping you make the decisions to be your North Star and Orient is probably going to have you make better decisions and better products for them. I think of Inc. and Fast Company as cultural institutions. They're these kind of pillars that have existed for a really long time that are great reference points for folks. I think you see them a little bit differently, maybe like an ecosystem of all these kind of products that you have. How do you keep this machine running and evolving?

0:05:36.6 Anne Marie O'Keefe: The brands do have this really rich legacy to them. And it's really important for us to remember that they really are living things that are constantly evolving. And so always really careful not to try and have this fossilized sense of what either one is. So I really like to think about it as we're ensuring a really healthy ecosystem so that we can keep the brands growing and evolving. And so that means creating new touch points for people that are already inside the ecosystem, new membership benefits, or expanding our digital products, or creating new in-person events, and then also adding new entry points for people who don't know us yet, which is obviously critical to the health of the ecosystem, and really trying to make sure that they can find value or connection immediately upon entering. And so the focus for me has to go beyond maintenance of the machine, which I could see easily falling into the trap that that's what I was going to do. It has to really be much more a constant ask. How are we deepening our relevance? How are we opening the door to the next generation of business leaders or entrepreneurs?

0:06:50.3 Anne Marie O'Keefe: What kind of digital products do we need to serve them? 

0:06:55.0 Kailey Raymond: 100%. And you mentioned a couple of those massive step changes that are happening in the industry that might lead you to some of these changes earlier on in this conversation. And your brands themselves, they report on innovation. That's a lot of the central content that exists within an incandefast company. But you, as an operator, are also living in it every single day. You're seeing these big operational shifts that are happening that are changing the machinery. There's something that you need to stay abreast of. So what are some of those operational shifts that have made you keep pace with how people are consuming media today?

0:07:35.2 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Yeah, so I think the first and foremost biggest shift, and it was extremely painful, but we've really simplified. And so our first very large transformation project was we got ourselves off of a homegrown content management system and this patchwork of audience tooling. And it really was a huge lift to make this happen. But once we were over, it freed up our product, technology, UX teams to actually make new products for our end users. We went from having a technology division that was really about supporting an internal system to one that is now really focused on meeting the needs of the external user. That was big. And they did a great job on it, but it was hard. But simplification is transformative. I think a lot of times we read these amazing stories in Fast Company about innovators and we think, oh, they took this really complicated problem and they solved it. And that leads us to believe that we need a lot of complexity in what we do. And I think stripping that complexity away really lets the team be creative and innovative where it matters most, where they can build something that has impact for the audience.

0:08:56.9 Kailey Raymond: Yeah. Instead of managing bespoke data pipelines, you are outsourcing it to vendors who do this full time and opening up the team's probably innovation too and creativity to solve the problems that really matter for your business. Totally. Yeah. I mean, that makes perfect sense. We hear that all the time. And I think there's a massive trend across the industry to do exactly that. You know, there was a lot of these bespoke point system solutions for a while. And I do think that a lot of companies are kind of moving towards more of this consolidated approach because data also becomes such an important part of your infrastructure in the world of AI that being able to get that to a place that you feel really confident also matters a whole lot more today than it did even two, three, four or five years ago.

0:09:50.1 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Absolutely. 

0:09:52.3 Kailey Raymond: You know, you also have a ton of different kind of products that sit under these two brands, newsletters, events, subscription strategy. Like you talked about deciding how to build a customer journey, how to get somebody to see one, then the next. And if you need more subscribers, like what are you doing? So how do you decide where to invest next?

0:10:09.7 Anne Marie O'Keefe: We always start with the audience. Where are they spending their time? What problems do they need to solve? What's going to create opportunity for them? I'm working with business people, right? Like that is who's coming to our publications. And so what do they need for their personal growth, their career growth, the growth of their business? And then you balance that with what we need to move our business forward. So sometimes that's doubling down on something established like newsletter about a specific topic, even if it's a limited run. Other times it means making a bigger bet, like reimagining a temple event or adding a brand new membership, adding community features. But at the end of the day, where we have to be most careful is that we're not chasing what's trendy in media and that we're not experiencing FOMO when we look at what another publisher has, because we have to ensure that every investment we're making goes to strengthening that connection. And just because a different media company is making a different bet or doing it in a different way, and they got a huge article in the Times does not mean we've done something wrong or that's the bet that we should be making.

0:11:22.3 Anne Marie O'Keefe: And I think that's where it can be really hard. And we've seen time and time again just here. Once we start reaching too far outside the audience needs, that ends up proving really unsustainable for our businesses.

0:11:38.8 Kailey Raymond: That's really interesting and it kind of goes to like focus. Being able to drive focus on your teams can be one of the most important levers that you have to pull and, you know, making sure that that focus ties back to your consumers, your audience, the people that are paying the bills ultimately. Can you share an example of a moment where an operational innovation, something that folks might not necessarily see, made a visible difference in either your audience growth or your revenue growth?

0:12:12.1 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Really invisible. We redid all of the infrastructure underpinning the Inc. 5000, which is Inc.'s annual list of the 5,000 fastest growing companies in the United States. It's this incredibly important list. Inc. has been putting it together since the early '80s, and we've really reimagined it as more than just an annualized list. We've layered in different digital experiences. We have a community for founders. We have a premium membership opportunity tied to it. We have a flagship event and then events that happen all year round. And we've really looked at it as a way to drive deeper engagement and meaningful revenue growth across the organization. It really started with that really invisible work of unlocking this data from pages and stages that the editorial teams maintaining into something that's much more of a operational, functional data center.

0:13:20.2 Kailey Raymond: It probably allows you to do just like much more interesting visualizations and filtering and all of that as well. As a reader of this every single year, I'm wondering if you have any insights that you could share around the pace of the growth. And by that, I mean hypothesis that companies founded 2020 and after are growing way faster than companies founded in the '80s or something. I feel like those hockey stick curves have reached $100 million in revenue within 18 months or whatever. You see those all the time now. And it used to be like took us 25 years. Any insights that you found that were interesting from that?

0:14:02.9 Anne Marie O'Keefe: I would say that one of the things I think is most interesting is how not special different times have been compared to other times.

0:14:12.7 Kailey Raymond: I love it.

0:14:13.8 Anne Marie O'Keefe: There was a time where there was a tech bubble and those companies were growing 200,000 %. And then we saw those industries sort of ebb and we came into a more steady growth. And then we saw the spike certainly after the pandemic, after 2020 with insane growth rates at the top again. I love looking at the history of the Inc. 5000 for that reason. And I really love some things just like never change. So the average age of a first time Inc. 5000 applicant, that company is seven years old. And I really love that. And our multi-year winners, some of those companies are in business 25, 35, 50 years. And they're having peak moments where they're back on the 5000 for the 10th time, the 12th time. I love that longevity. And there are just people in the world who are so intelligent in the way that they study these entrepreneurs and founders and leadership teams can clean all the insights. But I just love that it's across industry, across geography. There are just sort of these tried and true pieces. And then, of course, there is the crazy anomaly. All of a sudden AI is the hockey stick and logistics is coming down. Or you can really see those shifts that are much more tied to the current modern moment.

0:15:38.5 Kailey Raymond: That is so insightful and interesting. I would have bet that it was completely different, but it's good to remember like, yeah, dot bomb happened. This is cyclical and the hockey sticks may change, but yeah. 

0:15:52.0 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Correct. When you zoom out on the Inc. 5000, you realize like American ingenuity has just always been incredible.

0:16:00.6 Kailey Raymond: Very, very cool. I love it. I'm a reader of this. There are emotional connections that folks have to these brands like Inc. and Fast Company, but there's also obviously this pressure to continue to transform them. I know we kind of talked about like North Star's audience. Audiences are always evolving. There is kind of this thing where you have to continue to push the needle, but you're also preserving a legacy. These are foundations. And so how do you think about that balance of preserving the legacy of these brands that are known and loved and building what's next?

0:16:40.1 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Yeah, brands with rich legacy like this carry a lot of emotional weight, and people really trust them and feel connected to them, and preserving that trust is non-negotiable. That's table stakes for what we build in the future. One of the ways we do that, we're really interesting, set up this way, editorial integrity comes first in everything that we do. Our CEO shares the title CEO and Chief Content Officer, and I really love that and I love the opportunity to work in a place that makes it clear from the top that this is a non-negotiable for us, that journalism and trust are the center of everything that we do. Otherwise, we really will lose that audience. At the same time, preserving that legacy does not mean that we can stand still. We can't do things the way we did in the '80s when Dell was the top of the Inc. 5000, right? We have to innovate around that core, and the balance is really about staying true to the mission while also being really open and refreshing the way in which we deliver on it.

0:17:49.4 Kailey Raymond: I'm wondering what data insights you look for to identify those sorts of trends to make those sorts of decisions.

0:17:56.2 Anne Marie O'Keefe: One of the great things about having brands that work with entrepreneurs is that they tell you. They're like, I don't have time to read this. You need audio on your site. I don't have time for this. And you're like, okay, getting the audio on the site. Gotta get that done. That is one way that we are able to do that. We have very vocal super fans. That's always really helpful. And we just have really smart editorial, really smart product people that are always just sort of game. They just always want to try something new, which I love.

0:18:31.2 Kailey Raymond: Love listening to the customers, though. And the fact that you have a community of customers that are willing to be like, hey, make it audio. Come on. I got things to do.

0:18:39.8 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Exactly.

0:18:40.5 Kailey Raymond: I gotta be doing two things at once right now. Okay? You know, we talked about this briefly, but you said editorial independence. And I think that media companies, there's this really fine line between that and honestly like financial sustainability. So how do you like structure for that balance without stifling the creativity of what you do?

0:19:01.7 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Yeah, it is absolutely a balancing act. The best way I can do that in my role is to try and make sure the worlds connect without compromise of our editorial principles. When we create new products or partnerships, we need to design them so they create genuine value for our readers and real opportunity for our business lines without ever blurring the line with our editors. It can get really tricky. It is about having empowered leadership who can say, I'm not super comfortable with that. Or, you know, Anne Marie, here's a link to a pointer institute piece about why this is not okay. And we have to have that trust and commitment to one another as leadership team that will say things to each other that are hard like that. And so it's not easy. And I don't mean to be flippant when I say it, but both sides really do understand the mission, both our business and editorial sides. And so it is about finding ways to amplify the things we're doing to serve that mission that are things that everybody can sign off on and feel comfortable with. Stakeholder honesty, like that is the answer to that.

0:20:23.1 Kailey Raymond: 100%, which takes a lot, honestly, to find teams that have the trust and safety to be able to disagree and commit sometimes or make sure that there is one single focus. And maybe this year it's not the thing that they own, but it is the thing that's most important for the company. And bringing that together is really no small feat.

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0:21:38.1 Kailey Raymond: You've corrected some of the assumptions that I've already been making about media and some of these trends. And I'm wondering, what's something like the outside world might get wrong about what it takes to run a media company in 2025?

0:21:52.5 Anne Marie O'Keefe: I would say that I think the number one thing everybody gets wrong is that we're on our deathbed. I think the whole world just thinks media's on its deathbed.

0:22:01.8 Kailey Raymond: I don't know about them.

0:22:03.6 Anne Marie O'Keefe: And I always think about it like this. When I was a kid growing up, money could be a little tight, and we kids might ask my mom for something, and she would say, oh, you guys, I'm on my last $20. I'm down to my last $20. And I think about that all the time because media has been on their last $20 for the last 25 years, you know? And just to be honest, I think my mom still has that crumpled bill in her wallet, so she still has it too. I think now, this year, the 2025 penny-penny moment is that AI is going to replace journalism. The reality is just so much more nuanced. AI is certainly going to reshape how content's created, how content's discovered, how it's consumed, absolutely. But there's challenge and opportunity in that, and I think it is not the final gasp of air for the industry or something. I just don't buy into that. And the truth is, success today comes from the same place it did when Inc. and Fast Company were founded, our credibility and our connection. And, you know, we doubled down on that, and I think we'll still be here next year.

0:23:08.7 Kailey Raymond: Yeah. I think about this a lot with media companies and AI, and my thought is, like, there's so much content that AI can write that's so deeply boring and has, like, no interesting, you know? It's just so redundant, and sometimes it's great. I mean, that's what you need. You need a recap article or whatever. Great. Use AI, edit it a little bit. But, like, the things that only you know, the things that are uniquely valuable that you're putting out into the world are initiated by humans still. Like, that innovation, that creativity, that boldness is a totally different type of content that I don't have fears around AI taking that away. 

0:23:51.3 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Yeah, same.

0:23:53.6 Kailey Raymond: I'm wondering if you would be able to share a cross-functional effort recently. An event, a partnership, a new workflow, whatever it may be that helped you operate across the company a little bit smarter?

0:24:05.2 Anne Marie O'Keefe: I think it was that content management system was probably the largest cross-functional transformation effort we've undertaken. We had little Dutch boys all over the organization and every team with fingers and holes, you know, editors doing it, engineers doing it, designers doing it, product people doing it. And that migration forced every single person to work together and to work in brand new workflows. It really broke our system. It was not like, oh, here's a new tool. It was, here's the new way we're thinking about all of this. Here's the new mindset. I think once that system was in place, our energy shifted. There was like this just seismic sense of relief. And all of the teams I've noticed in the last 11 months really wanted to talk about what are the new meaningful, thoughtful, impactful digital experiences. And so I think about that a lot as it really transformed that internal culture from this mindset of survival to this like mindset of creation. And so it's something that I'm really proud that we did. People had been talking about doing it for 15 years before we did it. And I'm just really glad that we're here now on the other side of it.

0:25:25.6 Kailey Raymond: Totally. And yeah, sometimes going into those decisions, it can feel like, are we really going to do this? Like, this is going to take such a long time. There's so much tech debt. There's so much involved here. But I find that oftentimes with those, they're also the stories that you tell when you're getting your next job or like they're the big moments of your career. And to your point, like they free up creativity and innovation on the back end because you're not, to quote you, in a mode of survival, you know? And so it just like completely shifts what you can do and the way that you can work every day.

0:26:00.6 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Yeah, absolutely.

0:26:03.0 Kailey Raymond: I'm wondering, you know, maybe it's that because that's kind of really foundational, but is there a moment or a lesson that changed how you lead as a COO?

0:26:13.9 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Definitely. So prior to being the COO, I was our VP of Consumer Marketing. And I loved, truly loved running that team. We were a band of pirates and we colored outside the lines and we were always excited and thrilled by the win of these like growing consumer dollars. And I really enjoyed how much we pushed the boundaries over those years to get that kind of revenue growth. And then when I stepped into this role, I became someone who was also managing product, engineering, digital design teams, data operations team. And it's a completely different dynamic. Those teams thrive on clarity and structure and technical rigor. And so I think when I first stepped into the role, it really pushed everybody the way that I pushed, like consumer marketing team didn't realize how misaligned motivation was by trying to lead everyone the way I had always led. And it took really, I mean, people leaving and hearing some hard exit interviews and then being really hands-on and involved in the rehiring process that it really changed my view on how you manage teams. And I understand and empathize now that great talent in different functional roles requires different management and different motivation.

0:27:43.1 Anne Marie O'Keefe: And so I'm still obviously not perfect. The whole team would attest to that. I am a work in progress all the time. And that growth was incredibly painful for me and all those people around me. But it's a lesson I'm so glad I learned. I'm like, but this is so fun. And you have people to actually build the technology looking at me like, is this woman sad? I'm like, is she making a big mess? And so that was really important. I think it's something that new leaders need to hear. There's all this leadership coaching. We've had a gentleman and one of his lines is always, what got you here won't get you there. And this was definitely one of those moments for me.

0:28:22.8 Kailey Raymond: Wow, I love that story. It's so humbling in so many ways. Incredible, though, because now you're like a Swiss army knife and you have the ability to understand how to lead across functions and how those two teams work together. It's a really valuable lesson to have learned. Were there any things that you implemented that were quite different across the teams, just so that I understand?

0:28:53.6 Anne Marie O'Keefe: I think in the first year, we use our objective and key results to organize our people and resources and work. And I think I came in with this really heavy tilt on revenue. And without giving the critical context of how someone may be in a more operational or behind the scenes role, how their work really ties to that big number we're aiming for. And I think because the marketers understand so meaningfully, they touch it in such a meaningful way. I never had to do context before, right? I was like, it's your bonus. They're like, great, thanks. This is different than that. And then being able to find the thing that sparks the joy and the motivation for the other teams. And then by year three, our OKRs are really written in a much richer way and have a lot more context for the individual teams contributing to them. And I think that's just so important.

0:29:58.3 Kailey Raymond: 100%. And I can say that we're going through something similar right now, which is like, to your point, I think that oftentimes we might over goal ourselves on the end result. That's how you get there is also really important. And how you get there sometimes or like honestly just running the business sometimes, that takes a lot of people with a lot of incredibly deep knowledge and a lot of hours and time to be able to execute on that. So how do you goal on show all of the incredible work that needs to go into building the thing that got you to the growth or whatever, you know? And it's a much different mindset to understand that that contribution looks and feels different.

0:30:42.1 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Absolutely. But it is just as important, just as critical and really understanding that we're an orchestra and everybody has an instrument to play and making sure that we're not over indexing just to say the editors are the most important or the revenue teams are the most important. Every single person is just as important to make that music. It's been a long learning road, but I think it's everything. 

0:31:10.5 Kailey Raymond: 100%. I mean, that story just it was illuminated something for me because I'm sure so many people listening are like, oh, yeah, that's actually the problem is these people are the ones that are building the thing that actually gets to this. And we're only going on the end. It's such an interesting shift in thinking and insight. So thank you for sharing that story. I really appreciate it. I want to stay on team culture for a second is how do you think about it? Team culture generally in a media environment where urgency is really high, but also like burnouts really high. Is there anything that's unique that you've seen how you think about team culture?

0:31:49.7 Anne Marie O'Keefe: So team culture is something that our brands cover a lot. And there's this great truth that Brene Brown says, which are people are not okay right now. And in truth, workplaces are just not robust enough to meaningfully change that. And so I always think about in my small ways, what I can offer and whenever I can offer it. And so I really do try to create opportunities for people to feel like they're doing great work toward this shared mission. And I can make strategy and goals clear. I can move obstacles. That's actually a big part of how I spend my day to set people up for success. And I can take moments to celebrate even when it's a smaller milestone, because I think that's something we forget to do, too. We're always marching toward the big thing, and we forget to celebrate the little milestones that get you there. And so I've been trying to be better about being able to do that. But I also can make sure people are taking their vacation time and that they have flexibility in their work hours or work situation to have rich community lives outside of the workplace.

0:33:04.0 Anne Marie O'Keefe: So I think that's really important. And I try to avoid like perks or slogans or the motivational poster memes whenever I can, because I think at the end of the day, the best thing I can really provide is just a place for people to come and light up with a new challenge, right? Light their minds up and be able to contribute in the smart ways that they can. But it is a hard time for workplace culture, and it's just a hard time in the world.

0:33:36.0 Kailey Raymond: Yes. Yeah. Being authentic and vulnerable and supportive and still finding the hours in the day to do the things that we need to do to move the business forward, like all of it takes an incredible capacity and emotional intelligence for leaders and managers today. So fully hear you. It's a lot to take on. In building the structure, I think that part of what you're saying in this and in your story too is like celebrating the small wins. Yeah, maybe it's some of those like little operational things that used to go unseen, unheard, invisible. I've heard invisible a couple of times, you know, in this conversation, making them visible. Making work feel important. Okay, we have a couple of questions to kind of wrap it up. A little lightning round, if you will. I want to get your opinions on some folks that you admire and things you're seeing in the industry. So I'm wondering, is there a business or a media trend that you're watching closely right now?

0:34:40.5 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Yes. I'm looking for any signal, any kind of shift at all from creator economy to curator. I think there is this overwhelm by endless content. And I think that there is going to be a breakthrough at some point as people need to filter and make sense of it and to fact check it. And so that's something that I watch very carefully. And I think especially for new founders, new entrepreneurs, new innovators, there is going to be some kind of breaking point.

0:35:17.1 Kailey Raymond: Yes, there is way too much to possibly consume as a human today in the world. If you find that filter, Anne Marie, let me know. I'd love to know.

0:35:27.3 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Hopefully we'll build it.

0:35:30.5 Kailey Raymond: Okay, you all heard it here first. Love it. Is there a brand outside of Inc. and Fast Company that you admire for how they run their shop?

0:35:39.7 Anne Marie O'Keefe: The big legacy ones, the New York Times and the Atlantic, I think just gold standard. I think they reinvent themselves all the time, but stay true to mission. I have a deep respect and long subscription history with both. On the startup front, I love Puck is kind of inside media, but I love what they've done pairing their journalists with verticals and they really are some of the first places I go to get a take. I love it. And then Lenny's newsletter on Substack, I think is such a brilliant masterclass in building community across newsletter, podcast, a living library to serve this like highly specialized audience. And I just, I really love what he's done there.

0:36:19.9 Kailey Raymond: I love that. It's amazing when you can see somebody that's found a niche, you know, and they can really carve into these like micro communities and provide so much value to folks. Really cool. What's one thing every operator should stop doing right now? And one thing they should start.

0:36:39.4 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Stop chasing the shiny object without alignment. We did that for a lot of years. It does not work. It is not sustainable. And start simplifying systems, simplify workflow, free people to really focus on what's going to move the business forward.

0:36:56.2 Kailey Raymond: I love it. This reducing complexity seems to be a theme that we're honing in on today. Simplify, simplify. Last question for you today. What's your advice to somebody that might be stepping into like a COO type role for the first time?

0:37:13.5 Anne Marie O'Keefe: I would say don't try to be everywhere and everything all at once. Your job is to chart the course, absolutely. But it's also to create conditions for your teams to do their best work. And I think you have to empower your teams. You can't be in every meeting. You can't be in every JIRA ticket. You can't be in every project. You really have to make sure that you're setting the environment and then letting extremely talented people do their thing.

0:37:43.0 Kailey Raymond: Good advice to any leader. Absolutely. Delegate, hire great people, and hopefully you'll head in a good direction. Anne Marie, thank you so much for being here today. It was really great to chat with you. I learned a bunch of things, had a couple of nice little unlocks for myself, so I really appreciate it.

0:38:01.3 Anne Marie O'Keefe: Thank you very much. It was very nice to be here.