Leveraging Leadership

The Realities of Wearing a Million Hats at Work

• Emily Sander • Season 1 • Episode 177

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Martin Dowling shares his journey from studying engineering and psychology in Germany and the US to becoming Chief of Staff at a manufacturing company in Munich. He talks about building trust as the new Chief of Staff, the value of tackling small wins like improving office cleanliness and streamlining software tasks, and why being a generalist helps him solve problems across different industries. Martin also explains the difference between the German executive assistant role and the Chief of Staff, and gives advice on choosing and succeeding in the Chief of Staff position.

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Who Am I?

If we haven’t yet before - Hi👋 I’m Emily, Chief of Staff turned Executive Leadership Coach. After a thrilling ride up the corporate ladder, I’m focusing on what I love - working with people to realize their professional and personal goals. Through my videos here on this channel, books, podcast guest spots, and newsletter, I share new ideas and practical and tactical tools to help you be more productive and build the career and life you want. 

 

Time Stamps:

01:47 Career Beginnings and Shift to Psychology
03:02 Consulting and HR IT Solutions
06:48 Role as COO and Lighting Company
08:00 Challenges in Job Market and Chief of Staff Role
12:20 Responsibilities and Impact as Chief of Staff
19:28 Implementing Change and Overcoming Resistance
30:28 Advice for Aspiring Chiefs of Staff
40:06 Conclusion and Lighting Product Discussion

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

My guest today is Martin Dowling. Martin, how are you doing?

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

I'm great. Thank you so much.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Thank you so much for being on leveraging leadership. You have a kind of an interesting backstory. So maybe you can fill us in. I know you have a background in the U. S. Your mom is from here and you live in Germany now. So maybe just give us the backstory on that.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

Exactly. So a dual citizen of the US and of Germany, in Athens, Georgia, but spend most of my time in Regensburg, Germany. And currently I'm in Munich, Germany, which is about an hour South. And, um, the, the reason professorship tenure. In Regensburg, and, uh, that just worked out perfectly, uh, for us as a family. as you can hear, uh, it never, the, the American sound never quite left, and, uh, I've been a child of both worlds, so to speak.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Definitely. Definitely. The first time we met, I was like, okay, you're from Germany, but you sound American. So what's up with that? Cause you don't have a German accent. Um, but very cool. So that's the backdrop there. And then you're chief of staff at IBO in Germany, but you've had kind of a, um, an illustrious winding career up to that point. So can you fill us in on how you got to be chief of staff?

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

Sure, so, um, it all started with, uh, finishing high school in Germany and not exactly knowing what I wanted to do. I guess that's the common, uh, or the, the, the starting point. So I having a precise vision, I needed to kind of figure out where I want, where I wanted to go and be aware that I will be taking turns and some things wouldn't be working out and others would be working out. And so I actually started as an engineer college, but after three semesters of doing that, I figured it's not exactly what I want to do. Um, I'm going to switch to psychology, which of course ends 180 degrees in terms of content. um, within that world, I was, uh, surprised to, to see how much the, um, at least in Germany if you, if you do psychology, it's not necessarily fully clinical psychology, but you end up doing a lot of, data analysis, process thinking, coming from models, how does the world work in a model, and trying to map that onto Typically human behavior, regardless if it's then in a clinical setting or in an organizational setting. But that's where I found my place, um, having emphasis on leadership psychology, data analysis, and so forth. So after finishing my masters, I ended up working as a consultant in HR consulting, where the main goal of the job was helping organizations, um, finding a way to implement new HR IT solutions. And, um, that's where that experiences even converged at that point already, because you have this issue where, um, the classic we've been doing things the same way for the last 20 years. Why should we change now? Then you have the classic pitfall of wanting to do exactly what you did in an analog world, in a digital world, but realizing, oh no, I have to change the way I work and maybe there's some risk or downside to this. and the conversation is always kind of the same. You're trying to look for what's the value of change, what's the resistance to this change, and what can we do, how can I help. I'm not even trying to be the smartest person in the room as at the time, as a 27 year old. Uh, with basically zero working experience, but you learn to move into such a coaching space, if you will, asking questions and trying to move things forward. But, um, after doing that for a while, I had an opportunity to go back to my hometown and work for a startup. And the goal was, um, to scale the business. It had been in existence for approximately five years at the time. But the founder decided to change or realign the product strategy that he had in order to scale was doing because it started as a one man giving, uh, workshops format business, and he wanted to move into the e learning world. all of that under the, uh, umbrella of what is industry 4. 0 and digital, digitalization. So there were parallels to what I was doing in this HR field of things. And now the scope just broadened. And from a content perspective, we were looking at, well, what does it mean if, The production of some BMW site decides to add a AI driven camera to their production line. What effect might this have? And you can imagine it goes from everything from we're not entirely sure what the value add is to everybody is showing resistance to this change, right? that was, um, from a content perspective what this company did, but I, um, had managed to kind of become the right hand man to the founder. And we decided at the time to give me the title of a COO, uh, because we wanted to project more, uh, relevant positions in the business to make it seem, you know, fake it till you make it, to make it seem much larger than it actually was. Um, and the, uh, the, the, what happened, I guess the effect is, regardless of what the title is, this, this idea of working as the right hand man to the, to the CEO, CEO. There's a certain palette of tasks that awaits you from doing things the person doesn't want to do to doing things Somebody else is not might not be very good at and might not technically be your strong suit But you try to take on the task at least to the point where you can hire someone to fully do it in the in a better kind of way so starting to juggle many different balls and Moving moving the business forward with your with your own own ideas while at the same time You becoming a classic employee, but a sounding board, somebody who has the freedom to criticize, somebody who has the freedom to also maybe enact own ideas without necessarily telling someone in the first place, but then you

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Never.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

up with the results, right? So, um, we did that together for about three years. after which I was hired in a lighting company as, as the COO, um, in this case, it was a private equity backed, uh, investment where three founder run businesses had been put into a group. And in this case, it was more about transformation and scaling, but at first the classic, well, you know, they've had the same boss for 30 years. person had his, um, strong suits and, and, and, um, you know, things that he just didn't care too much about. So in this specific case, it was also about the implementation of um, analyzing inventory, truly understanding where does it fit, where does his efficiencies lie and so forth. and, uh, after, uh, uh, a stint there, I, uh, this was basically a project came to an end and. And I decided to try and found my own lighting business because at the time I had spent so much time trying to figure out, uh, what is there to change in the lighting industry. and after that, I managed to get it to a prototype stage. You can actually see it behind me and it's, it's, it's glowing at me at the same time. Um, but I had to go back and get a job and it was interesting because, Despite, you know, kind of giving myself this persona of a COO and then actually moving on to a job where I was fully hired for this role, after not being in the role for a while, I faced quite the, uh, uphill battle, uh, that, you know, people would say I'm too young and, uh, I don't have the experience and a bunch of, we're not sure if you'll be good at this job or not, and since you don't have the long list of things in your CV. Where, um, I, I, this other, uh, former colleague of mine who was also looking for a job at the time, we had this realization, everybody was looking for sort of the perfect candidate who brings everything, has a, you know, is not too old, but also not too young, has all the experience in the world. um, of course, very difficult to, to tick all the boxes, but what happened and that kind of gets to why we're talking today is I realized, um, I need to maybe back down from the title per se not apply to COO positions, which of course are fundamentally different if it's a small business with. 50 employees versus the BMWs of the world. Right? not aiming for these companies in the first place, but still, um, and I realized maybe I could have more success if I start looking for a position called chief of staff despite this being somewhat new, there is a German equivalent. the job, which in its nature is slightly different. I can get into the details, but that was basically what I did because I told myself how I was living the CEO role of being a generalist supporting the CEO. Um, I could do equally do the same. Same content as a chief of staff and I worked out and I'm now working at a firm here in Munich. They produce components that end up in bearings and these bearings are then sold into the aerospace and defense markets. So also very interesting markets to be working in as well and fundamentally different from lighting. So that's been also a

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Yes, definitely. Different industries, but it seems like ever since your psychology and engineering degree and studies, it's your career is just built on itself in these different layers. Um, the term that has stood out to me that I'll remember is palette of tasks, the palette of tasks before me, I'm going to use that. Um, but I'm interested. How do you, how did you take your startup experience and your consulting experience and your private equity experience and incorporate those into your approach as chief of staff?

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

So, um, I would say that, and this is something that kind of started, um, in my psychology degree is you can always try to put the world into a model. the model itself will always have flaws and never fully describe every possible outcome. And you can now be in possession of 28 different models, but even if they overlap, there's always this one final component you have no control over, which you can only work on. You have to have a taste for risk. You have to try things. You have to say, Two out of three times I might even fail, but the third time will be so good that, you know, it'll, it'll work out for the other two tries. Um, and I think that is essentially how these career steps have actually built on each other. So learnings from this, you know, does it translate from trying to digitalize an HR department to trying to digitalize a production line, the, the words are different. But the effect is the

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Yes.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

and the resistance is the same and you, you re, uh, you come across the same, you know, challenges and, and, and, and things that need to be worked on. So over time you get quite versed in, know, walking in this world.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Yes. I'm curious. What were you brought in to do? What was your, the motivation behind hiring a chief of staff or what was the mandate when you first came in?

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

So I would say that was, um, probably two to three different perspectives that you could really put a finger on. The first one was that IBO in the past, it was originally founded 30 years ago by the father of two of the co, three co owners now. it was originally an import export business. And in, it was about, I want to say 20. approximately is where they started their own in house production in Munich

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Oh, wow.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

uh, uh, gaining different types of, uh, customers. And effectively now, seven years later, eight years later, they've kind of achieved this proof of concept point where there are customers that trust and understand the quality that they can do. So these things just. Took, took a while longer. You can imagine aerospace and defense. This is not your, your, your average, um, journey that you're on. And now is the moment where they want to scale. They want to get in, uh, you know, a, a second and third machine, invest money. But then you have to find people. You have to work on your processes internally. You have to, you know, every individual level has to now rethink, well, what would we as a team look like? A couple years down the line, um, when it's not just the 20 of us that it is today, where things just work by talking to people or you make a note on a piece of paper and give it to someone, whatever, but you have to come together in many different ways. So that was great. One aspect where I think the, the, the two guys that hired me were hoping to basically buy some experience and bring that input in. And, um, the, the other is not only this, this DNA change, but truly the behavior change that you need to achieve. you have to also. Not only, it doesn't help if only the, the CEO or the CTO is very excited to get, you know, the new machine, but you want to translate this excitement to everybody else. Um, so those, those were the, where I would say the two very, the main topics we spoke about during the hiring process, um, uh, mostly. um, after having joined, I've been with the firm for about half a year now. um, you know, you, you, you start to look behind the curtain and kind of see the nitty gritty and a bunch of different, you know, you have options to, to work on. So

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Yes. It's kind of like it reminds me. you pull back the curtain. It's like, okay, now we have the levers and the things to push and pull. So it sounds like you were brought in with a couple of different things in mind. One is, um, the inflection point of the company and then scaling it to future growth. Um, there's a, there's change in a mindset. culture change needed within the organization. Um, so spreading that excitement from leadership to the rest of the organization, very important step. I want listeners to connect with that because you can have all the buy in and all the excitement in the world at your leadership team, if that isn't communicated, And yeah, if it doesn't translate the rest, you're, you're lost. It's kind of like one of those cartoons where someone takes off and the other character is like left in the dust, um, so to speak. So that was the second aspect, um, and uh, and there's a third aspect. Oh, go ahead.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

Yeah, so the, the third one is, um. Is one of these models that I learned years ago as a HR consultant where the partner at the time would draw a triangle on a, on a slide and basically have uh, layers to it, which he would then call strategic tasks, tactical tasks, and operational tasks. And then he would say you can effectively, if you use digital tools. just faster processes, but then also automated processes, you effectively can cut you know, smaller triangles off the

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Oh yeah.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

portion. then the time that you gain by doing that is moved into the tactical or strategic, um, task space. So in the end, you know, you had this great slide where it goes from a triangle to more of a diamond shape. And that model came to me and resonated again from the past because, uh, after a couple weeks in, I realized that struggle that the leadership team had in this smaller team that had a long history that They truly wanted to focus on strategic topics, but were being pulled into the day to day operational world all the time. From, you know, we joke and say that the CTO, he, he actually should have a, one of those machines where you pull a number because people will just walk into his office because, you know, you have an open door policy on the one hand, but then on

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Yeah,

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

feels

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

walk through that door.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

has patients coming in every 15 minutes. Um, so, so. By putting me into the team and specifically saying I'm now for sort of tactical tasks, how do we want to work? Not the why and not the what, but how do we want to work? There's a buffer zone and, um, it's, it's been, uh, taking on speed more and more. Obviously this doesn't happen on day one, but where instead of walking to the CTO or CEO, colleagues will come to me first. And, um, that allows for a better split and better focus throughout the organization so that persons within their position actually do what they were hired to do in the first place, or what they, you know, inherently as a C level employee or co owner should be doing. And that was sort of the third, the third aspect.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

And I've seen that happen so many times where, you know, the CEO, the founder, the original executives have the best intentions, but they just, you know, get bogged down in the day to day or fire drills and there they need to be in the strategic. They need to be, um, the visionaries. They need to have their head, you know, not, not down and in the rabbit hole, but looking at the horizon as a whole and a chief of staff is a great way to do that. I'm really curious. Sometimes when. Other executives or other team members have that new chief of staff who is their go to person, that's the change for them. And so you've talked a lot about, um, how to, you know, foster change and the resistance to change. So I'm wondering where that model, so to speak of change came into play when, when you were in this new chief of staff role and it might've changed some of the dynamics amongst the team.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

So, um, it was, it was, it was truly funny because, um, at first when I joined, regarding IT permission structures and so forth, I needed to have access to certain data points. So you know, I get put into the structure as like a manager, but since I was the new guy, nobody quite knew what chief of staff is.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Yep.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

And instead there was this wave of, wait a minute, why is he suddenly, who, who is this, why is he a manager and, and, and whatnot. But, um, at the same time, within the first couple months, I dedicated time specifically to try and to people and get a lay of the land and kind of, I want to say, you know, tease out the things that they've been maybe not so happy with in the last couple of years or they've desperately wanted to change themselves but never had the, uh, the teammates or somebody who had their back. And now, uh, listening, hearing what they say, and then throwing myself into the same conflicts. And just sometimes even without getting any permission to change things, uh, you know, I've managed to become the, the, the, the confidant and the, oh, so this guy's actually here to do stuff for me,

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Mm hmm.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

is sort of the effect that you want to, want to have. I mean, silly, examples from ranging from. Some of the space hadn't been cleaned in forever because there's some issue with the cleaning people that come by and are like paid to do it, but they don't. And I was like, well, then I'll just do it. So literally, you know, just grabbed a bucket. And then it's one of these things you would have to do probably once a year. And if you don't mind, you just do it. But it can take on this life of its own and become just a point of conflict on the one hand. But on the other hand also. you, you stumble across these easy fixes. So you see that somebody is inputting data into Business Central, Microsoft Business Central. um, it became apparent that the team had not received adequate training whenever the software was, um, implemented. So I saw that somebody was choosing lot and serial numbers for components by hand. So.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Wow.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

you know, sometimes I was told this is then 400 components and it takes an hour to basically you click on the line and then you click and click and click and click and click um, the statement was this is how I was told to do it

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Oh,

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

allowed to question this. So, as chief of staff, I've always said, um. The, there's a great German word is re, which basically means the joker's freedom. and it's, I guess, I guess an English equivalent would be speaking truth to power, I suppose, in a way, but in a, in a, in a, not so serious, but more funny, funny fashion. But I just then sat down and it took me two days to figure out, you know, if this person does something else first. And then there's a button you can automatically assign these lot in serial numbers, right? So just the time And then coming up with a solution and then you can imagine What not only what shockwave this causes but then suddenly it's the the resistance falls and and I I had people, um, basically get onto my side of things because it's Such it's such a You know a day to day thing for these colleagues That the first emotion is, Oh, thank God, life just became significantly easier and I can focus on the things I want to do. And it's not some abstract, Oh, the computer is going to automate everything and I'm going to lose my job. No, no, no. It's like within the day to day, a problem was solved. And I think that's the way in for, for anyone listening who's considering becoming a chief of staff is truly try to find, um, what are the. the quick wins and in the correct dynamic between yourself

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

sure.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

you to try and collect goodwill, uh, amongst, amongst the team and slowly start to move things forward and make things change.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

I think sometimes finding those small, even tiny wins just gets you that toehold you need to build some traction and momentum. And when they, when you literally make someone's life better, like, Oh, the part of the office next to me is cleaner. And that's nicer. Every time I walk in or, Oh, I don't have to do 400 clicks anymore. I can do, you know, only five, you've literally made someone's life better and you're right. I can just. See people's guard and defense go down when it's like, okay, this guy's here to help. Like, let's, let's talk to him some more and see what else he can do.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

Yeah.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

that's a great, uh, great advice there. So you mentioned earlier, and I want to come back to that of there's like a equivalent role in Germany. That's kind of like the precursor to the chief of staff. I'm wondering if you could talk about that.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

So, what is the, how do I, how do I translate? So it's if, if you typically, uh, you have your, you have your CEO who might have office manager staff to help organize the day, the calendar, very administrative types of tasks. And then there's a role called. Referente Geschäftsleitung is the German, right? Somebody will listen and be like, Oh, I understand that word. But it's, it's effectively, it's effectively a, uh, what's the best translation it's more, it's an, it's like an executive assistant what the actual words are supposed to mean. So not, not just a administrative assistant, but somebody who can take on a project, for example. You say, Oh. Uh, and it can be anything from organize the next Christmas thing to we're trying to do a new, you know, I need somebody who understands better than I do, uh, please, you know, become the experts in this topic and then give me information and prepare slide decks and also so high level support, you will. And, uh, the main difference to a Americanized version of a chief of staff is that it is very clear this person is a direct report to the manager and doesn't have any powers, so to speak, within the remainder of the organization. Whereas a chief of staff can be. the free radical that is flying around and has no allegiance to anyone, but

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Love that.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

from the company, right? If you do it correctly, that's what it's supposed to be, as I would say, is you're, yes, you get hired by someone, you work for a specific person, but supposed to not have one to one allegiance. It should be a little bit unclear where in the chart is supposed to appear. Um, and a little bit unclear and shadowy what you're precisely working on, because that's just where I feel a great chief of staff would live and be most effective.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Okay. So this, I'm not even going to try to pronounce the German word, but the,

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

Yes.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

assistant to the executive.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

Yes.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

but like when you're assisting the executive or the executive assistant in that pure sense of the word, um, it's, it's a little bit more clear and defined and it's well known in Germany. And then there's chief of staff, which would you say that's. Um, confused with that previous role or like, nope, those two things are distinct and we have chiefs of staff as well.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

Um, I would say that. It is chief of staff currently is such an unknown position that most people who are not familiar with it will have a large question mark written across their forehead when they see your business card and be entirely unsure what

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

do you do? Who are you? Yeah.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

exactly is this? Is this supposed to be? Um, so, the the this kind of executive assistant role is a with people who Predetermined by some topic, by some project, some, there's something you can really put a pin on it and say, you know, this is specifically what I was hired to do. And as far as I've seen it, at least, there is never any, uh, um, you know, disciplinary, uh, leader, you know, you don't actually have direct reports yourself. You don't have any budgetary responsibilities.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Yeah.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

etc. So there's some content that is keeping you in a space, you were hired for.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Okay. I see.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

the chief of staff, As a, a new role I believe is, is, is gaining traction. It's funny because, we got in contact and since then there are two, two other people have approached me through LinkedIn, wanting to know what is it exactly that I do. Uh, because they heard about it vaguely and, uh, you know, would want to better understand, uh, the role and, If it suits them as well and so forth. So, um, it's a, it is a growing thing and I do believe uh, the hope is to resolve a sense of finally getting things done.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Hmm.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

may say that kind of direct and blunt, might be a little bit too, you know,

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Get stuff done. Yeah.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

but I think that's what, what the driving energy is. to have someone who's outside of any hierarchical, uh, politics and things, and can really focus on, you know, guys. I understand you've been doing this for so many years, but this is not efficient,

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Yeah.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

and you can have these conversations.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Yes. Yes. And on that, so if you're talking to an aspiring chief of staff or even a current chief of staff, um, and giving them some advice, maybe, you know, a challenge you overcame or, you know, Hey, this worked really well for me. Just what advice would you give a chief of staff?

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

So the first thing is to figure out whether or not you are comfortable with leaning into risk, into uncertainty. Um, as a, as an example, I've been working on our, um, uh, on, on improving our ERP system. Uh, and you know, sometimes it's a very silly example, but sometimes you just click a button to see what happens. And there's, there's always this tiny risk something might crash and explode, right? But, but, but as a, as a metaphor, right? It's you, you have to want to a bit of a maverick rebel, lean into these, um, these aspects. That's, that's one thing. The other aspect thing I would say is, um, try to be open towards or, or develop a skill to keep, to keep juggling multiple different tasks at the same time. So if someone prefers to go deep into a topic and really be an expert or, you know, some, maybe some data analyst who really loves digging into the tables, um, not be the chief of staff of the future. In a, in a normal or average fashion, I should say, um, because of the different types of topics that can come flying at you every day. And if you don't experience a little bit of joy, uh, doing that, then it won't take long to feel negative consequences.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

You have to feel a little joy in the, in the beautiful chaos that will surround you. Um, put it that way. That's very good advice. Um, I'm interested for principles. So if there is an executive thinking of bringing on a chief of staff to the organization for the first time or just backfilling a role, um, what advice would you give to a principal?

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

So, for starters, truly take the time to choose the person, the candidate yourself, and then take the time to get to know this person before you hire them.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Yes.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

Otherwise, it's a game of luck whether or not, a, a good relationship will develop or not. Um, it's not necessary to be best friends with your principal, not at all. you need a solid foundation of trust, a solid foundation of my case at this lighting company I worked for, we had a, um, we had a larger age, it was an age gap of almost 30 years and it, you know, it was kind of a thing, sort of the, he would always say, Oh, you're the digital native who always wants to do stuff digitally. And, you know, but here I am from the old world where people would just talk to each other and actually, you know. Visit each other for face-to-face meetings and so forth. And, um, you have to be able to talk about these things, have conversations, be willing. It's now from the perspective of, of a principal to learn the other person. Um, uh, I would, I would say for, so a chief of staff is not someone whom you push a pile of paper towards and say, you know, work on this because I don't feel like doing it, but. As we said earlier, the palette of tasks needs to be much wider. So that certainly would be, um, uh, this, this, the second thing. depending on what type of firm or market you're working in, um, I would also tell a principal at least, um, give it a try to hire someone who might not be a perfect fit. Thank you. In terms of previous experience, because technically what am I doing at a firm that produces parts for, you know, I have no experience in terms of, the product that is being made or the market that is, that is being made. All I could say, um, in, during my interview was, well, at the end of the day, every market is a model, and if you understand the levers and such, then it doesn't take very long to understand where you're moving. But certainly the fact that I am a psychologist, the fact that I actually came from lighting where you think of things much differently in terms of what is the box going to look like that I send to my client who is unboxing his light. And then, you know, I asked this question. I was like, whenever we send our bearings, mind you, they're huge, right? Like, has anyone ever taken a look at how long does it take to unpack this thing? Um, What are we doing so that the person who's actually touching the physical product becomes our fan? And you know that is something that you're I would argue average engineer who's very interested in the technological aspect of the final product maybe might not think of so there's a there's some value in trying to go for the

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Yes,

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

Slightly different candidates You To see, um, which impact that might have,

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

yes,

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

new

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

yes. And yes, absolutely. I love that you brought up that point because I get this question from principals all the time. Well, Emily, they don't have enough industry experience. And I'm like, no, no, no, hold on, hold on, hold on. That might be a huge advantage for you for all the reasons you just mentioned. Those were great examples, but they just see things differently that could help you. I mean,

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

Yeah.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

if you're like a, you know, a. Bearing manufacturer. You probably have expertise in the building about bearing manufacturing. You probably don't need one more of those. What you do need is a fresh perspective and someone who knows what the internal change process is supposed to look like and knows what the internal scaling process can and should look like. It is able to. Execute on that. So those are like the X factor things that you don't have and you need. So I love that point that you made.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

Yeah. The other, the other, um, deciding point, I suppose, for a principle is, Are you looking for an extension of yourself? Someone you see becoming you, or even surpassing you, because you need an heir to the throne, or whatever it might be, you know what I mean? or is it you need a, you need fresh input. You need a fresh perspective. These are two, you know, fundamentally different approaches to how to filling the role of a chief of staff. I would, I would say there's probably more paths to be honest, but, um, these two just, uh, come to mind. So, you know, and none of these paths is, is superior to the other. It's just, it's a problem. If you thought you hired. Your air, but the higher person turns out to be different and likes to approach from another direction, and that would then cause friction. So again, that brings you back to, know, go to dinner, get to know whoever you're trying to hire and figure this out before you sign any document.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Yes, please, please have at least like, I, I met, um, an interview, a company with an interview loop where the principal was last in the interview loop. Cause they wanted them to talk with all the other executives. Fine. But they had 30 minutes with the principal. And I was like, no, no, no, no, no, no. You must have an absolute minimum of at least one hour. You need to go to coffee with them. You need to talk with them on the phone. You'd have multiple conversations in different contexts. I love your analogy earlier where you're like, if you don't meet that person before you hire them, it's like, Uh, going to the slot machine. I got that visual. I was like, okay, I'm going to pull this lever and chances are the house is going to win. And I'm getting like lemon, lemon, lemon, um, maybe one banana or whatever is on there. But, uh, certainly please spend the time upfront is what I'm hearing from you. And what I've heard from others, um, spend the time upfront both ways. If you're a chief of staff or if you're a principal invest the time up front, because it'll help you In the long run.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

helps not only from a pure meeting of the minds kind of a way, can I, do I see myself becoming friends with this or having trust build, but you have to hope that within this initial phase, is able to very often a very lonely person, right? It's the classic, the trope, whoever's all the way up top is always alone. Um, so you get put into the situation where you, you made the first step, you're asking for help, you want somebody to have your back, but I've had conversations where then my conversation partner would fail to let the guard down and would fail to then admit to what I am not an IT person. I really don't know how this works. Can you help me with, or whatever it may be, right? But only if you have such a, it doesn't have to just go golfing and not say a word there, there, there should be a certain, you know, energy in the air, um,

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

yeah,

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

uh, agreed to hire someone.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

love it. Yes. Anyone listening, please, please, please don't skip over that part. I know you're pressed for time. I know you're busy and you might be in a somewhat desperate spot where you just feel like you need a warm body, but just please take the time to make that important hire, um, Martin, just to round us out, I would love to just know more about that light. I'm like personally curious because I have some lighting up here, but that looks really slick. So what does your, what does your light do that you invented? Yeah.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

um, if I lean off to the side. It's a light that consists of two luminaires, they speak to the nearest laptop's webcam, and it allows you to differentiate between your working, regular working illumination, then being in a web call session. And as you can see right now, I'm basically using the same lights, uh, here as well. Oh! And the, I guess the hook is supposed to be that you have near professional lighting, uh, without sacrificing your interior design. I, I'm imagining for you as a professional, you know, podcaster, you go for the full professional setup, but you know, five dollars that there's some, you know, uh, big screen

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

light up here. There's a ring light that's off right now. And then I have two things, but yours look like very, like very aesthetically pleasing. And like they could go with them, like kind of kind of modern minimalists, you know, set up, uh, and fit right in, but,

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

idea originated from this time working, uh, trying to transform and modernize, um, a lighting company that was producing its own luminaires and selling them into worldwide markets. And, uh, I got to spend a bunch of time analyzing the sales networks and, uh, What are the sourcing networks, et cetera, et cetera. And basically after my time there, I realized, uh, if you were to manage to have a purely digitally driven business, that does not have the historical baggage of, of these, you know, old school sales networks, you could have a, um, uh, DTC, a business model function, but then you obviously need to tap into. new, uh, group of people because who truly aside from streamers ever thinks of lighting in their house, it's you, you just say the cables coming from there. So I'll put some, right. And at my parents and grandparents house, there's a, there's a lamp next to the couch so I can read. So there's never much thought and put into it. So the idea was finding a sweet spot of offering, um, a very modern product that is hopefully aesthetically pleasing. for a core group of people, um, and get them interested. And, um, sort of the final, the final piece of the puzzle was to then say, well, it's one thing to put some lights up on a wall and illuminate some artwork and then say, doesn't this, doesn't my apartment look so great with these lights? Please buy my lights. I figured that's not as good as illuminating the person themselves to realize what effect you can achieve. With some thought into light, and that's where I then realized the desk lamp has actually not been changed innovatively in the last 120 years or so, because if you think if you if anyone listening asks themselves, what is what is the number one desk light that comes to mind? It's always the emerald light, the one with the green glass and the

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

well, yes, yes.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

you know, foot that is in every library in the world. And, um, it's one of those things now, from this moment on, you will constantly see it on TV when there's scenes in someone's office and so forth. I had this vision of saying, well, maybe, maybe, all, all of this goes well, then in the future, a light like this will be, uh, shown

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Oh, that's cool. Yes.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

the product that people use in, on every desk in the world.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

That's beautiful. Just quick question. So how many lights do you have? I see two behind you, I think. And then do you have some in front of you?

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

Yeah, so there's, there's two in front of me. Um, they're directed, they're set up in a way that they're directed towards, um, you know, there's basically two thirds of the light on this side, um, and one third over here, and I've just set these in the back to probably just a 10 percent setting to have, to not sit in the dark cave, so. And

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

you said that it, it like responds to your webcam or somehow your webcam knows, uh, the correct setting. So does that do that automatically or do you fiddle around and set them and then it knows, okay, do the 10 percent for the backlights, do two thirds over here and all the rest.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

you effectively set it up. Once

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Okay.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

find a way, like, what do, what do I like to look like? And, and have it set up once, and then it will, it will switch between the two options,

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Okay.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

automatically without, because it, it can, it can tell if your webcam is on or not.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Okay.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

so there's, you know, ease of use, I guess, uh, to back and forth.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

And this can be for anyone. I mean, I'm imagining it's like certainly for like streamers and professional, you know, people creating content or speakers. But also if you're just someone who's on like zoom calls a lot and you want your background and you want yourself to look professional. presentable and nice, then this might be a, be an option

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

Yeah, exactly. So I, I saw, um, you know, people who spend a lot of time in zoom calls, uh, people who also have a certain sense of, you know, I will buy a better microphone so that whoever I'm in a meeting with will hear what I'm trying to say. And the same argument goes for you should be seen when you're saying something. Um, and, um, you know, The next time you're in a larger Zoom call, just take a look at the illumination of, of everyone and, and I can tell you there's, you know, one person will have the light basically over their head, so they look like they're at some, you know, Halloween party, and the next person will be sitting with their back to a window, so you can't actually see them at all,

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

there.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

you know, the list, the list goes on, and it's a quick and easy fix, you don't need to go for the high end designer piece, you can also just spend You know, 20, 20 bucks at Ikea to get, you know, near to close effects. But if you then, you know, finally say, I want something that, that has a certain, you know, quality and it looks great when the light is off and the sun is shining and it's just something that I have, um, in my interior space, uh, then, you know, hopefully such a solution will speak to someone

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

That's actually what I need, because I have these, I have natural light. I have blinds over here. I might get blackout blinds because it makes it a more controlled, consistent environment. But I remember we had this guy, Andrew, who whenever he was on zoom calls, there was a window behind him, which When the weather was kind of overcast it looked really good like it was a nice beautiful background but when the sun was shining directly in it he looked like he was in the witness protection program and so we would be like Andrew like are you there we can't like do your little voice modulation I was blah blah blah with the FBI and then they came to storm the thing um but we used to make fun of him for that.

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

roommates fill in occasionally on meetings when he didn't want to

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Oh my gosh. Yeah, that was funny. But anyway, Martin, thank you for that. Yeah. If people want to know more about the light, I think it's called, uh, Aona light, A O N A. Um, but they can also contact you. Where is the best place for people to connect with you?

martin-dowling_1_11-15-2024_210623:

I would say LinkedIn. The easiest is LinkedIn. Just connect. And I'm always happy to have a chat. So if anyone listening would like to connect, feel free.

emily-sander_1_11-15-2024_120624:

Beautiful. We'll have that link in the show notes and thank you Martin for this illuminating conversation. We'll say it that way. Thank you so much.