Chad is joined by Diana Bald, the new CEO of thoughtbot, to discuss her background, the organizational changes to the leadership of the company, and the reasoning behind them.
Diana on Twitter (https://twitter.com/dianabald)
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Transcript:
CHAD PYTEL: This is the Giant Robots Smashing Into Other Giant Robots podcast, where we explore the design, development, and business of great products. I'm your host, Chad Pytel. And today, I'm joined by the new CEO of thoughtbot, Diana Bald. Thanks for joining me, Diana.
DIANA BALD: Hi, Chad. This is so fun. This is so exciting. I've only done one podcast before this, so I'm excited.
CHAD: Well, don't worry. You can still be CEO of thoughtbot even if you're not a podcaster. [laughter]
DIANA: Okay, that's great to know.
CHAD: So it's been several months now. So I want to go back and talk about how we arrived here. But I'm curious, how are you feeling now? What does it feel like?
DIANA: It feels great. I think I'm getting more and more comfortable every day, which is amazing. And I think the year has gotten off to a great start, so that's helping me feel more comfortable as well. So far, so good.
CHAD: So for folks who are listening, I'm sure they're wondering who are you? [chuckles] Let's give the audience a little peek into your background and how you arrived at thoughtbot, and the role you originally had.
DIANA: Great. How far back do you want me to go?
CHAD: As far as back as you're comfortable.
DIANA: Okay. I actually was really interested in technology at a younger age. I put myself through undergrad and grad school while I was doing tech roles. I trained lawyers on how to move from the analog world into the digital world. That was one of my very first jobs at a law firm. And then, shortly after that, I did webmaster work when I was putting myself through MBA school. It was a very different world than it is now. This is way back when the internet was really just kicking off; it was 1998 to 2001, around that time. When I graduated from MBA school, I was recruited into Univision into their leadership pipeline, which was very much focused on business development. But my very first project there was web integration, integrating the univision.com with their TV and radio. That was when I started to move away from technology. I was there for ten years. I had a variety of different roles, a really fun job. I got to experience a lot of different roles, lived in a lot of different cities. I spent a lot of time in Philadelphia, where I actually launched a television station in Spanish, which was really fun. And then I came to New York.
After Univision, I spent four years in the advertising and marketing world. I spent two years with IPG at ID Media, which was a direct marketing agency. And then two years at MDC Partners at an agency called TargetCast, which later became Assembly, which was more media buying and planning. And then, when I left there, I went to Liberty Mutual for three years. And at Liberty Mutual, I fell back in love with technology. I missed it. I was doing a lot of strategic partnership opportunities with really interesting companies that were doing brand new business models and disrupting insurance, and there was a lot of exposure to telematics and IoT. And it was just calling me back, and I was like, I got to get back to tech. And somehow, I don't recall exactly how, but I found you. You and I chatted, and then I fell in love with thoughtbot [chuckles], and then after that, the rest is history.
CHAD: You joined us as the Managing Director of the New York City studio. I want to say that was a position we were advertising for, and you applied to it.
DIANA: Yeah.
CHAD: And one of the things that really stood out when I first met you and as we've got to know each other and work together is the variety of experience that you had because I've only ever done what I do, which has its own strengths. So the fact that I