The Exchanges

Q Well, I do want to start today on a little bit about you though. So tell me, how did you make your way into the world of startups and come to kind of reinvent the world of mental health as you are today with modern health?

A So I grew up exposed to the medical environment. My parents are physicians. And so I thought I wanted to be a doctor. So I went to Johns Hopkins for my undergrad, and I think as I got older and maybe started to understand the economics behind med school, I realized I wanted to find a different way to make an impact in the healthcare space, and so I ended up working in healthcare consulting for a while after college in Washington, D.C., and I had always wanted to start a company. I think it's something that had been in my DNA since I was a little kid, and I was told I had to move to this place called Silicon Valley, which I, of course, knew very little about. So I said, okay, I'm gonna move out there, I'll come up with some idea, I'll start a company, I'll raise money, and I'll move back because, of course, my whole family and friends were on the East Coast. So I booked a one-way ticket about six years ago to San Francisco, and it was a complete disaster. I showed up, and within two weeks of arriving, the apartment that I moved into that I spent every dollar I had on a security deposit, because we all know San Francisco is crazy expensive, flooded, so I literally had nowhere to live. The whole building had to move out. All my furniture that I spent every dollar I had on got ruined. Me and my team got laid off, and then my boyfriend at the time broke up with me. So it was kind of…

AI assessment note: “I was told I had to move to this place called Silicon Valley”

Q that he says as gospel, because he is just such an incredible figure and influence in this industry. I guess, how do you kind of temper the weight of his words, and not just do what He says, do you know what I mean? Like you have to measure the weight of his words and, but still have your own mind. How do you think about that as a founder?

A So I think John Doerr is one of the best, if not the best salesperson I've ever met. He has actually come to some of our sales pitches with me, and it's just incredible to see him in action. I mean, the guy hasn't missed a beat. It's just so amazing to watch and can learn so much from that. I think that's where we really let him play to his strengths and where we learn from him. So that's where we're asking him for help and feedback and advice. Whereas maybe on something specific to setting up our sales team quota or our operations or product development team, we're going to reach out and lean on other advisors for that. So I'd say in accepting everything he says as gospel, we push back and we brainstorm. And I think it really comes down to letting him play to his strengths and then taking any advice or feedback or guidance he has and making it our own and taking what serves us and leaving what doesn't.

AI assessment note: “we push back and we brainstorm... taking what serves us and leaving what doesn't.”

Q No, I love that. And my mother drives a lot of what I do. So I don't think it's corny. I think that's really nice. Tell me the most impactful angel to modern health and what did they do?

A So I would say the most impactful angel in modern health is Jared Leto. He's actually been incredibly helpful and has given me a lot of guidance and support over the last couple years, and of course, has an amazing and incredible network, but he's actually how I met Mamoon. So Jared Leto ended up investing, and he invited me to come to one of his concerts, and Mamoon was there, and that's how I met Mamoon, and arguably creating that relationship and connecting us is really what ultimately led to us doing our Series A with Kleiner, and then longer-term success, working with Kleiner, and setting up Modern Health for success as well. So he's just had such a huge impact In our overall trajectory.

AI assessment note: “the most impactful angel in modern health is Jared Leto. He's actually been incredibly helpful”

Q kind of John Hopkins there. You were at Collective Health before. One thing that's striking is your element of not being a technical founder, because I think there's this kind of haloed mythology around the technical founders. I'd love to hear, how do you think about the advice that you give to non-technical founders in really getting started, especially when it comes to kind of founding your own tech company?

A So we went through Y Combinator, the accelerator program, and typically when you're going through a Combinator, they're looking for strong technical founders. And it's interesting because actually, as we know, most women are not technical. A majority of engineers are men. And so right away, that's to some extent would be saying that, okay, for women, you have to be Strong on the technical side in order to found companies. But think about some of the best female leaders and founders out there. They actually are not technical by background. They might be strong in sales or operations or marketing. And so I think one of the most important things in starting a company is actually playing to your strengths. So if you're an amazing salesperson, or if you're an amazing marketer, and especially as a woman who tends to not fall into the group of being technical or an engineer, that's totally okay. If you're really strong in one of those areas, playing to that strength will really set yourself up for success. And the reality is in today's world, we can get access to development all around the world, right? So you can have someone help build the MVP of your app. You don't need to be technical yourself. Actually, what's more important is figuring out product market fit. It's iterating on your product. It's speaking to your customers, your potential customers. It's learning from them and le…

AI assessment note: “one of the most important things in starting a company is actually playing to your strengths”

Q the nuanced approach that. I do want to ask also, in terms of the ambassadors that you chose to work with, you know, you've got Founders Fund, you've got Kleiner, you've got John Doar. Got some amazing people on the cap table. How did you think about approaching the investor selection process? And I guess what advice would you have for founders in terms of building their early cap tables?

A Yeah, it's a good question. I think the most important thing is making sure that you're finding people that you're bringing around the table that you'd be excited to work with. I think where founders go wrong is where they might optimize for valuation over who's actually going to roll up their sleeves and work with them and support them. At the end of the day, look, we're all human and we're all going to make mistakes and startups are For sure, a full emotional rollercoaster. For every high, no matter how high it is, there's always, always a low to match it. And so do you want someone on the other side of that table who's going to see you as a human, who's going to help you through that time, who's going to help coach you, going to set you up for success, help you get access to the resources you need, or who simply is just looking at you as, you know, potential return to their fund? For me, it's certainly the former, right? And so that's how we picked every person that we brought onto our cap tables, making sure that we felt that we could really lean on them when we needed to and be honest and vulnerable in front of them. We wanted to work with people who believed in our mission, and I think that's really not only made an impact in the business, but just on the whole experience. It makes it exciting to go to board meetings. I've heard from other founders who dread their board m…

AI assessment note: “that's how we picked every person that we brought onto our cap tables”

Q No, I totally agree. I think it's kind of cool to what I sometimes try and do with the show in terms of bringing out that vulnerability. Very much aligned to that. Final one, tell me, what do the next five years hold for you and for Modern Health? And paint that picture and vision for us.

A It's interesting, you know, I think we're in the first inning of mental health as an industry and where it can go. We're at really, like, V-one of the things that we can do to help people with their mental health, both take a more proactive and preventative measure, but also help treat people who are struggling with things like depression, anxiety, and so forth. And what we're doing at Modern Health is really, as we're getting more and more people on our platform, It's getting more data to be able to iterate our product to make it more personalized and make it a better solution for every single individual. And so we believe that in five years from now, mental health will be the fourth pillar that every employee should have access to. So you've got medical, dental, vision. We believe mental health is that fourth pillar. And so we believe modern health will become that fourth pillar for every employee across the board. And we're on track as arguably the fastest growing mental health startup out there. And so we believe in five years that modern health will be interchangeable with the words mental health, and it'll be something that everyone has access to.

AI assessment note: “we believe that in five years from now, mental health will be the fourth pillar”

Q a bit of an interesting one, and it's like, when you think about kind of sales efficiency and really sales team's Performing at their highest levels. You set quota, and it always has to be ambitious and a stretch. Do you ever worry about setting quota too high, and what that does to mental health, and how do you think about sales quota and mental health? Are they at odds?

A I think it comes from being really open and honest and transparent with your team, and especially the leaders on your sales team, and being open with them. It's actually interesting that you brought this up because this came up this year where we have a very, very aggressive goal, and I actually raised to Hannah, I said, is this too aggressive of a goal? Like, I don't want you guys We're in this for the long haul. This is a marathon, and so we need to go just as hard, if not harder, next year, and the year after that, so we can't go all out in one year if it means that everyone gets burnt out, and we actually had that conversation, and she said, oh, no, no, we're good. We can go after this goal, so I think what that means is actually finding the right people on the team who can set themselves up for success and who have that self-awareness of knowing what's something that's a stretch that they can push themselves to reach, but that's not such an impossible reach that they'd be really burning themselves out and getting there and unable to rip And so that's what makes a really successful sales team is let's set a goal. That's really a stretch for us, but we know that if we push it hard, we can get there, but we also know that we're going to be able to keep pushing it hard for the years after that.

AI assessment note: “can't go all out in one year if it means that everyone gets burnt out”

Q No, I love that. And my mother drives a lot of what I do. So I don't think it's corny. I think that's really nice. Tell me the most impactful angel to modern health and what did they do?

A So I would say the most impactful angel in modern health is Jared Leto. He's actually been incredibly helpful and has given me a lot of guidance and support over the last couple years, and of course, has an amazing and incredible network, but he's actually how I met Mamoon. So Jared Leto ended up investing, and he invited me to come to one of his concerts, and Mamoon was there, and that's how I met Mamoon, and arguably creating that relationship and connecting us is really what ultimately led to us doing our Series A with Kleiner, and then longer-term success, working with Kleiner, and setting up Modern Health for success as well. So he's just had such a huge impact In our overall trajectory.

AI assessment note: “So I would say the most impactful angel in modern health is Jared Leto.”

Q Can I ask what's been the most challenging element of putting those pieces together? Is it figuring out the timing on your first head of sales? Is it setting quota? What do you think in terms of the biggest challenge in aligning those

A Honestly, I think in the early days, the biggest challenge is you're getting feedback from your customers or potential customers, and you're hearing different things, and you almost feel like you want to chase the shiny object. So you have this idea, and it's easy to get distracted and want to veer off course when you hear from one person, oh, they'd love for this thing to be built, or you hear from another, oh, they'd love if this other type of feature or product existed. And so really taking that feedback and synthesizing it in a way that allows you to still stay on course, I think was one of the most difficult parts. Because in the early days, when you only have a couple customers, if someone's saying, hey, I want X, and you don't have that thing built, you're like, okay, we should go build it, right? We'd get that customer. But it's really about making sure you're pattern matching and getting as much data and information from your potential customers before you do that. And so I think that's one of the hardest parts. And then after that, I think it's about being really diligent with each stage in the sales cycle. So really the way that I think about it is we've got different stages and it's almost like, okay, don't pass go until you check these boxes. You can get excited when a customer is interested and showing signs of being interested in your product, but you really need…

AI assessment note: “Honestly, I think in the early days, the biggest challenge is you're getting feedback”

Q the nuanced approach that. I do want to ask also, in terms of the ambassadors that you chose to work with, you know, you've got Founders Fund, you've got Kleiner, you've got John Doar. Got some amazing people on the cap table. How did you think about approaching the investor selection process? And I guess what advice would you have for founders in terms of building their early cap tables?

A Yeah, it's a good question. I think the most important thing is making sure that you're finding people that you're bringing around the table that you'd be excited to work with. I think where founders go wrong is where they might optimize for valuation over who's actually going to roll up their sleeves and work with them and support them. At the end of the day, look, we're all human and we're all going to make mistakes and startups are For sure, a full emotional rollercoaster. For every high, no matter how high it is, there's always, always a low to match it. And so do you want someone on the other side of that table who's going to see you as a human, who's going to help you through that time, who's going to help coach you, going to set you up for success, help you get access to the resources you need, or who simply is just looking at you as, you know, potential return to their fund? For me, it's certainly the former, right? And so that's how we picked every person that we brought onto our cap tables, making sure that we felt that we could really lean on them when we needed to and be honest and vulnerable in front of them. We wanted to work with people who believed in our mission, and I think that's really not only made an impact in the business, but just on the whole experience. It makes it exciting to go to board meetings. I've heard from other founders who dread their board m…

AI assessment note: “that's been the litmus test for every investor I've evaluated”

Q kind of John Hopkins there. You were at Collective Health before. One thing that's striking is your element of not being a technical founder, because I think there's this kind of haloed mythology around the technical founders. I'd love to hear, how do you think about the advice that you give to non-technical founders in really getting started, especially when it comes to kind of founding your own tech company?

A So we went through Y Combinator, the accelerator program, and typically when you're going through a Combinator, they're looking for strong technical founders. And it's interesting because actually, as we know, most women are not technical. A majority of engineers are men. And so right away, that's to some extent would be saying that, okay, for women, you have to be Strong on the technical side in order to found companies. But think about some of the best female leaders and founders out there. They actually are not technical by background. They might be strong in sales or operations or marketing. And so I think one of the most important things in starting a company is actually playing to your strengths. So if you're an amazing salesperson, or if you're an amazing marketer, and especially as a woman who tends to not fall into the group of being technical or an engineer, that's totally okay. If you're really strong in one of those areas, playing to that strength will really set yourself up for success. And the reality is in today's world, we can get access to development all around the world, right? So you can have someone help build the MVP of your app. You don't need to be technical yourself. Actually, what's more important is figuring out product market fit. It's iterating on your product. It's speaking to your customers, your potential customers. It's learning from them and le…

AI assessment note: “one of the most important things in starting a company is actually playing to your strengths”

Q a bit of an interesting one, and it's like, when you think about kind of sales efficiency and really sales team's Performing at their highest levels. You set quota, and it always has to be ambitious and a stretch. Do you ever worry about setting quota too high, and what that does to mental health, and how do you think about sales quota and mental health? Are they at odds?

A I think it comes from being really open and honest and transparent with your team, and especially the leaders on your sales team, and being open with them. It's actually interesting that you brought this up because this came up this year where we have a very, very aggressive goal, and I actually raised to Hannah, I said, is this too aggressive of a goal? Like, I don't want you guys We're in this for the long haul. This is a marathon, and so we need to go just as hard, if not harder, next year, and the year after that, so we can't go all out in one year if it means that everyone gets burnt out, and we actually had that conversation, and she said, oh, no, no, we're good. We can go after this goal, so I think what that means is actually finding the right people on the team who can set themselves up for success and who have that self-awareness of knowing what's something that's a stretch that they can push themselves to reach, but that's not such an impossible reach that they'd be really burning themselves out and getting there and unable to rip And so that's what makes a really successful sales team is let's set a goal. That's really a stretch for us, but we know that if we push it hard, we can get there, but we also know that we're going to be able to keep pushing it hard for the years after that.

AI assessment note: “we can't go all out in one year if it means that everyone gets burnt out”

Q No, I think that is really special. Okay. So that's the wonderful side. What's the cons?

A No, I mean, the biggest thing is just turning off, right? Especially someone who's running a mental health company. I think we both wake up in the morning and are like, oh my gosh, I thought of this thing, or maybe, you know, we should change our strategy to this or that. I mean, it's just very difficult to turn off when we're both so entrenched in what we're doing, and it can be consuming. Running companies is not just a job, it's your life, and so it's a huge part of both of our lives, and so I think the biggest drawback to it is just being able to turn off. We might be in the most beautiful place in the world, or getting married and still checking our email. We're just so entrenched in what we're doing. I think that's probably the biggest drawback.

AI assessment note: “the biggest thing is just turning off, right?”

Q No, I think that is really special. Okay. So that's the wonderful side. What's the cons?

A No, I mean, the biggest thing is just turning off, right? Especially someone who's running a mental health company. I think we both wake up in the morning and are like, oh my gosh, I thought of this thing, or maybe, you know, we should change our strategy to this or that. I mean, it's just very difficult to turn off when we're both so entrenched in what we're doing, and it can be consuming. Running companies is not just a job, it's your life, and so it's a huge part of both of our lives, and so I think the biggest drawback to it is just being able to turn off. We might be in the most beautiful place in the world, or getting married and still checking our email. We're just so entrenched in what we're doing. I think that's probably the biggest drawback.

AI assessment note: “the biggest thing is just turning off, right?”

Q I very kindly emailed you on, and I'm so sorry again for that. But you married Matt, founder and CEO at Origin. So my question to you is like, first, what are the benefits of marrying another startup CEO?

A There's a lot of pros and cons here. I definitely think the pros outweigh the cons. Some of the benefits are, well, first and foremost, I think we're the first married couple in founders fund portfolios. So that's, you know, high, high up on the benefit list. But no, I think honestly, it's really about having someone along for the ride with you. Startups are roller coasters. And, you know, as I said before, they're really for every low, for every high, there's a low to match it or high to match it. And so having someone by your side who can really appreciate and empathize that. So celebrate your wins and help you through your losses is incredibly valuable. And it's almost like if you think about if you're going through something and you have a friend say, oh, you know, do it this way. Or, you know, I get it. I've been there before. And you're like, no, you haven't. You haven't done it. You haven't been there. Having someone next to you who really has and really gets it, it's almost like a comfort zone, right? It feels good to be around someone who, when, who, when shit hits the fan can say, you know, I get it and it's really tough and I'm here for you. And so I think that that's probably the biggest benefit is really, it's almost like we have each other as co-founders to support each other through running a company.

AI assessment note: “having someone by your side who can really appreciate and empathize that”

Q Well, I do want to start today on a little bit about you though. So tell me, how did you make your way into the world of startups and come to kind of reinvent the world of mental health as you are today with modern health?

A So I grew up exposed to the medical environment. My parents are physicians. And so I thought I wanted to be a doctor. So I went to Johns Hopkins for my undergrad, and I think as I got older and maybe started to understand the economics behind med school, I realized I wanted to find a different way to make an impact in the healthcare space, and so I ended up working in healthcare consulting for a while after college in Washington, D.C., and I had always wanted to start a company. I think it's something that had been in my DNA since I was a little kid, and I was told I had to move to this place called Silicon Valley, which I, of course, knew very little about. So I said, okay, I'm gonna move out there, I'll come up with some idea, I'll start a company, I'll raise money, and I'll move back because, of course, my whole family and friends were on the East Coast. So I booked a one-way ticket about six years ago to San Francisco, and it was a complete disaster. I showed up, and within two weeks of arriving, the apartment that I moved into that I spent every dollar I had on a security deposit, because we all know San Francisco is crazy expensive, flooded, so I literally had nowhere to live. The whole building had to move out. All my furniture that I spent every dollar I had on got ruined. Me and my team got laid off, and then my boyfriend at the time broke up with me. So it was kind of…

AI assessment note: “I wanted to find a different way to make an impact in the healthcare space”

Q that he says as gospel, because he is just such an incredible figure and influence in this industry. I guess, how do you kind of temper the weight of his words, and not just do what He says, do you know what I mean? Like you have to measure the weight of his words and, but still have your own mind. How do you think about that as a founder?

A So I think John Doerr is one of the best, if not the best salesperson I've ever met. He has actually come to some of our sales pitches with me, and it's just incredible to see him in action. I mean, the guy hasn't missed a beat. It's just so amazing to watch and can learn so much from that. I think that's where we really let him play to his strengths and where we learn from him. So that's where we're asking him for help and feedback and advice. Whereas maybe on something specific to setting up our sales team quota or our operations or product development team, we're going to reach out and lean on other advisors for that. So I'd say in accepting everything he says as gospel, we push back and we brainstorm. And I think it really comes down to letting him play to his strengths and then taking any advice or feedback or guidance he has and making it our own and taking what serves us and leaving what doesn't.

AI assessment note: “we push back and we brainstorm. And I think it really comes down to”

Q And you mentioned Hannah there, and I spoke to Mamoun at Kleiner before the show, and he said, Alison is one of the most exceptional recruiters that I know and have backed. So when you think about recruiting the very best talent in such competitive talent market, what have been your biggest lessons in what it takes to really acquire the very best talent and what works and what doesn't?

A So I think the first thing is being yourself, like being authentic and being vulnerable about who you are and what your values are. I think from me, one of the things that I often talk about with my team, and it's one of our values at Modern Health, but it's about having gratitude and embracing the journey. Look, we live in a bubble. Not everyone in the rest of the world lives like we do here in Silicon Valley. I mean, we get catered lunch when we're in the office. We have kombucha on tap. I mean, we all know the rest of the world does not live like this. And it's about finding people who haven't lost sight of that. So they come to the office and To the extent that we're in the office or remote or they show up at work, and they're so excited and grateful for the opportunity to get to work on something that can make a positive impact in someone's life while getting paid well, while getting to work with some amazing people, and that is one of the biggest things that I look for, and when I find people who value that, they're immediately attracted to modern health because that's everything that we stand for, whereas if someone else is like, no, I just want to work at a startup because I think there's big upside or XYZ reason, those people are not good fits for modern health. People who are good fit for modern health Who are so excited to make a positive impact in the world, but als…

AI assessment note: “being yourself, like being authentic and being vulnerable about who you are”

Q I very kindly emailed you on, and I'm so sorry again for that. But you married Matt, founder and CEO at Origin. So my question to you is like, first, what are the benefits of marrying another startup CEO?

A There's a lot of pros and cons here. I definitely think the pros outweigh the cons. Some of the benefits are, well, first and foremost, I think we're the first married couple in founders fund portfolios. So that's, you know, high, high up on the benefit list. But no, I think honestly, it's really about having someone along for the ride with you. Startups are roller coasters. And, you know, as I said before, they're really for every low, for every high, there's a low to match it or high to match it. And so having someone by your side who can really appreciate and empathize that. So celebrate your wins and help you through your losses is incredibly valuable. And it's almost like if you think about if you're going through something and you have a friend say, oh, you know, do it this way. Or, you know, I get it. I've been there before. And you're like, no, you haven't. You haven't done it. You haven't been there. Having someone next to you who really has and really gets it, it's almost like a comfort zone, right? It feels good to be around someone who, when, who, when shit hits the fan can say, you know, I get it and it's really tough and I'm here for you. And so I think that that's probably the biggest benefit is really, it's almost like we have each other as co-founders to support each other through running a company.

AI assessment note: “having someone by your side who can really appreciate and empathize that”

Q Totally get you. Can I ask, where do you think people go wrong in terms of talent acquisition?

A What's hard, right, is when you think about looking for the cookie-cutter resume, certain backgrounds, and I think really focusing on diversity is, as we know, incredibly important to building successful teams and finding people from different I mean, I think where people can go wrong is when they get too focused on a certain skill set or a certain background, when really it's about figuring out, okay, what's the problem that we need to solve? And who are the best people that we need to get on that bus to help solve that problem? And I think that what's one of the most important things in the early days of building a business is getting the right people on the bus. And part of what we look for is just general athletes. So people who embody these certain values, maybe they don't have the skill set yet, but they are someone who is really strong on taking action. And so we know that they'll be able to To teach themselves, or they're a self-starter, or they're super efficient, right? There's these certain qualities that when you look for in kind of like a general athlete, if you will, by getting them on and bringing them on in the early days, they'll be able to help build a team around that and build that type of culture, and I think where people can go wrong is when they just look at someone's resume, and they're really just looking for this specific skill set, when really it's ab…

AI assessment note: “where people can go wrong is when they get too focused on a certain skill”

Q Can I ask, you mentioned the resilience there, and I'm really intrigued, you know, there's always kind of this underlying driving force of proving something with the resilience. So I guess my question to you is, like, what was your underlying driver? If mine is, like, Proving to myself that I'm good enough. What was your underlying driver that made you so resilient in these really shit times?

A It's an interesting question, and it's part of what Modern Health's mission is and vision is overall, which is really about reaching your potential. And everyone reaches their potential in different ways. It's not measured by how much money you make or what school you go to, but it's are you reaching your potential, and is that allowing you to be fulfilled? And one thing that I think I've learned from playing sports, I played lacrosse at Johns Hopkins as a Division I athlete on a scholarship, learning how to To balance getting up at 5:30 in the morning and having a four hour practice and school and class and studying for tests and what you endure from a physical perspective, it's difficult. And so that helped build a lot of resilience for me and also learning to be on a team. Might be in high school that you're the best player on your team and then you get to college and you might be the best player on the bench. You have to learn these different roles and also put the team first and learn that it's not always about you as an individual, but it's about reaching your potential and that might be how to be the best teammate and that might be how do you support your team in a way that you haven't before. So I think for me, when I think about resilience, it's how do you build the resilience that ultimately allows you to reach your potential and whatever it is that you're wanting to …

AI assessment note: “which is really about reaching your potential and is that allowing you to be fulfilled”

Q strengths there, I spoke to Hannah on your team before, and she said just what a sales machine that you are. And she also said about kind of actually, and most importantly, how much time you've personally invested in kind of building that kind of sales machine like process. Can I ask, where did you invest the time here and what paid off and where did it not pay off?

A So my background's in operations, really. I knew very little about sales. I think in the early days, what was easy for me is because when you believe in something so badly and you have so much conviction in it, it just comes through, right? It's almost like you don't have to sell. You're just sharing your story and you're so passionate about what you're saying. You won't take no for an answer. And so I think that in the early days that helps when you're selling and pitching to VCs to your initial customers. But then one thing that I learned with sales that I think was incredibly helpful in setting a strong foundation is actually that sales is just like operations and setting up a good foundation from an operational perspective. Can allow you to scale a strong sales force. And so I was actually lucky enough to, in the early days during our seed round, Mashmire Group Ventures, Mark invested in Modern Health, and he brought me in and said, okay, we're doing a five hour sales bootcamp. And we showed up, he said, shut your computer and now pitch me on Modern Health. And then he had us do it again. And each time we had like a little bit of a different version of it. And he was like, you need to make sure that this is completely crisp, that there's no margin for error, and really build an operations around how you're pitching And growing and selling modern health. And that was just in…

AI assessment note: “five hour sales bootcamp. And we showed up, he said, shut your computer”

Q strengths there, I spoke to Hannah on your team before, and she said just what a sales machine that you are. And she also said about kind of actually, and most importantly, how much time you've personally invested in kind of building that kind of sales machine like process. Can I ask, where did you invest the time here and what paid off and where did it not pay off?

A So my background's in operations, really. I knew very little about sales. I think in the early days, what was easy for me is because when you believe in something so badly and you have so much conviction in it, it just comes through, right? It's almost like you don't have to sell. You're just sharing your story and you're so passionate about what you're saying. You won't take no for an answer. And so I think that in the early days that helps when you're selling and pitching to VCs to your initial customers. But then one thing that I learned with sales that I think was incredibly helpful in setting a strong foundation is actually that sales is just like operations and setting up a good foundation from an operational perspective. Can allow you to scale a strong sales force. And so I was actually lucky enough to, in the early days during our seed round, Mashmire Group Ventures, Mark invested in Modern Health, and he brought me in and said, okay, we're doing a five hour sales bootcamp. And we showed up, he said, shut your computer and now pitch me on Modern Health. And then he had us do it again. And each time we had like a little bit of a different version of it. And he was like, you need to make sure that this is completely crisp, that there's no margin for error, and really build an operations around how you're pitching And growing and selling modern health. And that was just in…

AI assessment note: “doing a five hour sales bootcamp... build an operations around how you're pitching”

Q Can I ask, you mentioned the resilience there, and I'm really intrigued, you know, there's always kind of this underlying driving force of proving something with the resilience. So I guess my question to you is, like, what was your underlying driver? If mine is, like, Proving to myself that I'm good enough. What was your underlying driver that made you so resilient in these really shit times?

A It's an interesting question, and it's part of what Modern Health's mission is and vision is overall, which is really about reaching your potential. And everyone reaches their potential in different ways. It's not measured by how much money you make or what school you go to, but it's are you reaching your potential, and is that allowing you to be fulfilled? And one thing that I think I've learned from playing sports, I played lacrosse at Johns Hopkins as a Division I athlete on a scholarship, learning how to To balance getting up at 5:30 in the morning and having a four hour practice and school and class and studying for tests and what you endure from a physical perspective, it's difficult. And so that helped build a lot of resilience for me and also learning to be on a team. Might be in high school that you're the best player on your team and then you get to college and you might be the best player on the bench. You have to learn these different roles and also put the team first and learn that it's not always about you as an individual, but it's about reaching your potential and that might be how to be the best teammate and that might be how do you support your team in a way that you haven't before. So I think for me, when I think about resilience, it's how do you build the resilience that ultimately allows you to reach your potential and whatever it is that you're wanting to …

AI assessment note: “It's an interesting question, and it's part of what Modern Health's mission is”

Q because like, are you really going to do my next round if you hear me say this? How do you advise and think about that openness that founders can have? Because I would feel the same being a fund manager. I can't be that open and have LPs hear me be that open and vulnerable. How do you think about that and kind of the different vulnerabilities in the industry?

A Yeah, it's a really interesting question. I think it stems from the idea that when we think about mental health, we think about people in crisis mode. We think about people who are struggling with depression, who might not be able to work, We think about people who get to that point where it's the flashing red light and they're in a crisis. But really, and this stems from what we believe at Modern Health, mental health is this full spectrum. Everything from green, yellow, and red. So think about your mental health and that it ebbs and flows to different points in your life. And what's really interesting about that is that mental health doesn't necessarily just mean you're in the red. It doesn't mean you're in crisis mode. You can have great mental health, but because for years, for decades, we've always thought about mental health just means people in the red, it's been associated with a sign of weakness. And it's been pretty fascinating to see that over the last several years, over the last decade, really, there was an inflection point with the celebrity suicides, Anthony Bourdain and Kate Spade, because people thought, wait a second, these people who are seemingly very successful in the eyes of the public clearly were struggling, right, and in a lot of pain. And I think it made people start to question, wow, there can be people in the eyes of the public who are seemingly very…

AI assessment note: “I think it stems from the idea that when we think about mental health”