The Content Crib Podcast
The Content Crib Podcast is where bold ideas meet real execution. Hosted by Eric Anderson and Chris Grosse, this show breaks down how to turn content into trust, attention into opportunity, and your story into strategy. No fluff. No filters. Just what works. Welcome to the Crib.
The Content Crib Podcast
How a Medtech CEO Builds Credibility Through Customer Focus And Personal Branding
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If you’ve ever wondered why some medtech leaders seem to accelerate deals, hiring, and credibility while others stay stuck behind a company logo, this conversation puts language to the difference. We sit down with Ted Bird, a longtime orthopedic and spine executive known for building teams, scaling commercial traction, and keeping a relentless customer-first lens. His core filter is simple and tough to fake: does it work in the hands of the customer, and does it make a difference for patients and surgeons?
We get practical about personal branding on LinkedIn and what “visible leadership” really means in the medical device industry. Ted breaks down why titles are secondary to impact, how trust is earned through listening, fast follow-up, and real delivery, and why the most effective posts are often the most human ones. We also talk about networking with intention, staying relevant instead of chasing follower counts, and how a strong digital brand identity can speed up diligence and decision-making when opportunities appear.
Then we pivot into AI in healthcare and AI in medtech commercialization. Ted shares where AI is genuinely useful today, where it becomes generic noise, and why clinical-facing claims like AI-driven preoperative planning must be validated by surgeons who understand the workflow not just sold by tech vendors. If you lead sales, marketing, or go-to-market strategy in medtech, you’ll leave with a clearer framework for building trust, using AI responsibly, and showing up with a point of view that actually helps people. Subscribe, share this with a colleague, and leave a review with your biggest takeaway.
Customer Reality Versus Tech Hype
SPEAKER_00To me, it it the important thing is how does it work in the hands of the customer? What the the AI solution for predicting pre-operative planning for surgery, the best way to do it, until I I wouldn't trust it until I could get a surgeon that I trust who understands it to tell me whether this is a difference maker or not. Otherwise, it's just sales buzz from the tech company.
SPEAKER_02Four decades in spine, a $3.7 billion exit. Companies taken from nothing to acquisition. And when you ask people in the industry about Ted Byrd, none of this is what they lead with. They lead with the fact his teams keep following him from company to company. Ted, the Kevin Bacon of Orthopedics and Spine, welcome to Content Crip Podcast.
SPEAKER_00Thank you, Chris. Thank you, Eric. Thanks for the invitation. Pleasure to be here and spend time with you to talk shop, uh, talk content crib shop, but also just uh a little bit about my background and history.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, well, thank you very much, Ted. You and I did a podcast way back in the day on another title of a podcast. So we're uh we're new and improved. I'm in a a hostage in a hotel room behind me, as you can see. My house is under construction, so I'm in a hotel room. And uh Chris is in his beautiful studio, but thank you for joining us. Appreciate it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. So you list yourself as founder, CEO, CCO, and chief marketing officer all at once. What does that combination teach you that a CEO hands-off marketing never really learns? You've done it all.
SPEAKER_00Great question. Thank thank you, Chris. Um, you know, I I've listed all of those titles and those positions because I've lived them. You know, I've uh held those roles. Um recruiters, you know, executive recruiters today at least are recommending if if you're looking for an opportunity to list positions specifically because that's what they look for on LinkedIn, versus um a profile that talks more about your focus or mission, uh, which I've I've tried both, you know, where you put in your talking logo that we talk about on InContent Crib. Uh, I think both are appropriate, uh, but uh um I today my profile lists all of
Wearing CEO And Marketing Hats
SPEAKER_00my positions, I've lived them. Um for a CEO uh who hands off marketing to someone else, um you know, that means that they're not really getting the perspective of the customer firsthand. You know, I I uh I got it raw. You know, I I I've served all the roles from from starting out as a sales rep in in orthopedics in the sports medicine field to being a CEO or a chairman, you know, board chairman of a startup. Um but I've lived from selling to creating the messaging to um doing the education and training to working with the um the key opinion leaders on on various strategic uh projects to being in the executive seat having to run the business. So I think that's uh a difference, I would say. And I from carrying the bag to writing the messaging to training the reps, um, you know, I understand it. It's different if you're in a turnaround to if you're in uh a growth stage company or a larger corporate stage company, but it's important to be able to lean on those experiences. And I think for creating a brand for yourself, which is what you guys are doing and helping individuals do that, it's important for people to understand what you've lived and what you know.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, let's unpack that a little bit because I you know the titles are important, right? And that's what we put on our you know, our LinkedIn page for you know a lot of us that are we know either work for a company or have a company, right? We kind of put our title a lot into our our identity day to day, right? And sometimes it can be too much, and you start to identify with your job more than actually who you are as a person. And now with personal branding, we try to teach you know, there's more to it than that, right? So titles come, you know, come a distant second to impact. What when did that belief really get tested for you in your career?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, no, I I I just feel fortunate and and and blessed. I think a lot of it is I just met the right people at the right time and embraced that and and and uh had some great mentors. So I enjoy paying that back or paying that forward today with others. But uh right right off the bat, in my 20s, in my first decade of my career, I had a great opportunity uh because of a mentor that got me into orthopedics uh to get into international, outside US commercial responsibilities. So after cutting my teeth in the US, in the sports medicine arthroscopy business uh in sales, I was given that opportunity. And what um my mentor did was a risk. And he said, Ted, this is either gonna be the greatest thing since sliced bread or canned beer, whichever way you look at it, or it's gonna be um a great learning experience for you. But uh he tapped me on the shoulder at 25 and said, I'm ready to have you help me lead our outside the US rest of the world international selling efforts. So to me, um I didn't necessarily have that uh that long experience. So I was introduced to these, and it was uh at that time Eric Richards Medical, so pre-Smith and Nephew. I was part of Dionics, and which merged him with Richards, subsequently became part of Smith and Nephew. But I was sent out into the world to be the international sales and marketing manager, that was my title, to all of these international Richards country managers or distributors. And what I learned is the title didn't matter, especially for a kid. They were looking at me saying, This is you know, they put a kid in to do a a boy in to do a man's job. And so I learned that earning their trust meant delivering, you know, listening to their problems, because international is always as it is in in many companies, the the red-headed stepchild, you know, gets the backseat to the US, listening to their problems and then solving them, coming in, getting back to them, communicating, responding, and then delivering solutions. The faster I could do that, and and uh the the faster I earn their trust. And that was just rolling up the sleeves and learning, um, and proving myself. And that's I've carried with me throughout my career. Doesn't matter what my title is, if it's a VP or a president or CEO. Um what's important is the impact and the ability to earn trust through action and also using your ears more than you use your mouth, listening to the problem. I actually created a kind of a slogan we had for a national sales meeting at one company: listen, respond, deliver. That's what we do. We actually had it printed and put on the wine bottles on every table at the at the meeting. But uh uh I believe that that's and I carry that with me today. Title uh does not matter so much, it's more about you know what kind of impact can you have. And that's my recommendation to to those that I I mentor, and and anybody who um wants to learn from from my experiences don't worry about the title, worry about the impact and what you can deliver uh and and the importance of earning trust early on.
SPEAKER_02So you you earned this this nickname, which I love because I you know A Few Good Men is one of my favorite movies of all time. So what Eric?
SPEAKER_01Go ahead, go ahead. No, no, you're on a roll. Keep going, man. I love your questions. Keep going.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I was gonna say, yeah, I was gonna say, you know, big fan of Kevin Bacon of Orthopedics and Spine. Orthopedics and Spine. Did that brand happen to you, or did you build that brand, or was it just you look like them, or how did that happen?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I don't play the guitar as well as Kevin Bacon does, but uh it it was a nickname that someone used for me. But but really uh it it's a it's a particular character trait of mine of building and nurturing my network, you know, from the and and uh and and making that a priority. So uh I I always would attempt, not attempt, but I would
Why Titles Never Earn Trust
SPEAKER_00always look to in order to remember someone is to think to learn something special about them. Uh you know, what's their birthday, what what's their what's their hobby, what what's you know, uh special anniversary, where did they go to school, where did they grow up? And that kind of permanently in my brain kind of connects that individual to something special, and it's easy for me to recall, and people say, Man, Ted, your memory is it's like an elephant. You're you know, you remember everybody, and it seems like you know everyone. So um I've always made the important um made it a priority to build relationships, to to network. And um, when someone later on, not that long ago, said Ted, you're like the Kevin Bacon of not just spine, but but but orthopedics, because you know, or people just say Ted knows everyone. And I don't know everyone, but guaranteed within orthopedics, musculoskeletal, particularly within the spine, where I've been for three decades out of out of my four, um if I don't know them, I will know someone that does and get get on the phone and and I can get a warm introduction to to make things happen. So um, you know, the message for me is networking relationships are very important. But I've always told this to people that work with me, you know, on the sales and marketing side. Go the extra mile. Learn something special about that individual, and they'll appreciate it when you recall that, or you might may well find you have a personal connection. A quick example is uh, you know, a well-respected, on-the-rise key opinion leader in in Spine was we were courting, you know, trying to get you know into our camp uh to in in an area of uh of surgery that we were getting into. And I think I brought up to him that uh I went to the same undergraduate school. I went to Brown um in uh Providence, Rhode Island, and turns out he went to Brown had a even though he went on to Harvard and med school and other places, he he connected with me that we both went to Brown. He kept bringing that up. So future meetings, I wore my Brown's hat. And um it's um you know, we we did ultimately connect on that, even though he was there at a different time than I was there, but um, just learning those little extra things and then you know keeping that network strong, and that's part of you know social media today and creating your brand is putting information out there about your own brand, but not just about your role as a vice president of sales and marketing or president, CEO, or regional sales manager. The fact that, yeah, I went to Brown, I played rugby, I grew up in England, little things. People are like, Oh, I didn't know that about Ted. Uh let's uh let's learn more, or people get a new thing. Well, I have to say you have a you know an a an amazing presence, especially you know, and and and inability to sing as well as he does.
SPEAKER_01Well, I was gonna say, you know, with Ted, we've gotten to know each other over the years, and I was gonna tell people um you're you're an Ivy League guy, you uh you you you were in the UK. What what made you think, you know what, I want to get into medical device? Well, what what what was the catalyst that started it all? I I know you've told me the story, but I don't I want everybody else to hear it because I don't I don't know if I remember either.
SPEAKER_00So well I I I was exposed to it growing up. My father was a physician, my mother was a nurse, and so and I have uh five siblings, so six kids. All of us are in some type of health care or or medicine, I think, because of that influence. Um but um yeah, I it was uh it was not by design at that stage where I was starting out my career. It was a um uh again, the network that I'm my senior year in college, I met this individual became fortunate for me, a mentor to me, who was the president of Dionyx, you know, the now Smith and Nephew endoscopy company up in Andover, Massachusetts. And he had spent years in Europe um running a division of Baxter, and that's why, you know, um I thanked my mother who pushed me in his direction uh after uh church, you know, one Sunday said, here, talk to him. Got my got myself an interview, a cup of coffee, you know, at his house. And he um he was quite a a character, you know. He he was a naval officer that had an MBA that then did very well in business and in medical devices, and his advice to me was was Ted, first of all, you need to go and become a uh go to Marine uh officer school in Quantico. You need to get in the Marines and learn about leadership. And after that, you need to get an MBA. You can only go to one of these five schools, it's got to be Stanford, Harvard, University of Chicago, Northwestern. You know, once you've done that, give me a call. I was like, thank you very much, Jerry. So sent him my covered letter note and my extensive one-page you know resume to say thank you very much. But he called me about four months later, right before I graduated, he says, Ted, I've been thinking about you. He liked the fact that I grew up in England. I speak French and German, and he tested my French right there in the interview. Um he called me back and he's the one that brought me into Dionic, but he's also the one that said, before you do anything outside the US, before you do anything in this business, you need to learn how to sell. So I'm gonna give you a territory. You need to learn the school of hard knocks, and um put you, you know, with a distributor in a territory in New England. At the right time, what I'm thinking about you for is helping me with my international business. So that's was I just feel fortunate to have that opportunity. I was gonna get into I think magazine and corporate reports sales in Manhattan for R. Donnelly until he called. I would have gone a completely different way. But uh never looked back from there. I just got that that uh opportunity, and it was all about the network and the relationships, and um uh so fortunate about uh the the opportunities that I've had, and and the he was the guy that said, This is gonna be the greatest thing for you, or you're gonna we're gonna we're both gonna learn a lot and you know we'll we'll try again in a different way. So I've learned to embrace opportunity when it comes your way and say yes,
Networking That Actually Works
SPEAKER_00you know, to the extent that sometimes I feel like Jim Carrey and and yes, man, the movie, and you're saying, What did I just do? But you learned a lot.
SPEAKER_02A lot of med-device CEOs and healthcare CEOs that uh you know we work with at ISG, they're pretty invisible, like they hide behind the company logo, they don't maybe network as much, maybe they attend the occasional dinner, they're not really sharing thought leadership online. Why did you decide to put your name and face out front, attend as many content cribs as you can, learn how to do all that? What what motivates outside of the networking, which is super powerful a content crib, right? We love that side of it, but we're there to learn to and learn from each other and help build our each other's voices. What made you decide to put your name and face out front?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, thank you, Chris. Great question. I I was a very early adopter of LinkedIn. I can't remember when LinkedIn started, but uh I I I kind of saw that opportunity, particularly from my network-building standpoint, said this is you know, I could see what Facebook was, and it said this is not professional. Um, you know, that this professional opportunity to connect and extend my network and as a a tool to be able to help me connect, but a CEO who who hides behind a a logo or a company who is invisible is interchangeable. So, you know, it doesn't allow the community, uh the industry you're in to understand you and and what makes you tick, or why you might be a good fit for an opportunity if you just hide behind a logo and you don't build a personal brand. So that's um that's a visible leader is someone that again it comes back to building trust, building trust online uh by sharing, and not just sharing vanilla because it's such a busy world of attention that you're you're competing with everyone if you if you change it up and you provide personal information. Some people it makes people nervous. I don't know if I want to talk about um you know when I'm when I'm having a tough week or a tough day or uh something tough, you know, bad I went through uh before it's good. Um but people then get a new perspective on you and how you relate as a leader in those circumstances. So I I believe that um um it's important to do that, and uh uh that's why I put my name out there uh Ted Bird, T Bird, you know. Uh there's a story behind T Bird as well, because my fraternity at Brown, Eric, you know, they were going around creating the nicknames, and I remember, of course, Animal Houses. I did not want to be called Tloud.
SPEAKER_02I have a client that looks just like Flounder. It's like uncanny. I can't even look at him. He's like one of the biggest clients in my space, too. It's it's hilarious.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so I think I would call you D-Day, Ted.
SPEAKER_02I love that movie because I was in a fraternity as well, so I love that movie.
SPEAKER_01Oh, I love the movie too.
SPEAKER_00So I can't I gave him a suggestion. It's a how about T-Bird? And he goes, That's a cool name. The fabulous Thunderbird. All right, T Bird, that's your nickname. It's a great mission accomplished. There you go. But but uh my own you know consulting business um is Bird Medical. I think that was one of your questions. Why do Bird Medical versus Ascension or you know, Ascension Summit, you know, uh equity or something? Yeah. Um and uh and and you know, I'm proud of proud of the bird family name. Uh I I like birds. Uh who doesn't like birds?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's a weird thing when you get older, you like them more. It's one of those things we don't really know the answer to.
SPEAKER_00But yeah. Yeah, why not? I mean, I in my marketing role, for example, at uh at uh at Orthofix, I got accused of uh uh all the new brand you know uh names were somehow bird related. So we had the Firebird, um, pedicle screw system, the next generation was gonna be the Thunderbird. That was gonna be my ultimate product. Uh Skyhawk, uh Phoenix. So people like, okay, we we know Ted had something to do with this.
SPEAKER_02So you know what what for what does a strong personal brand do for a CECO? Like do you have ex examples, deals, hiring, whether you've raised funds or you know, or you know, uh VC or some sort of connection. You probably it's happened probably so many times that you just filed it as normal, but does anything stick out to you in your past of like, oh wow, I shared my voice here and I met this person or you know, hire this person or sign this deal? I I have you know I started writing online personally, made it like a big commitment almost three years ago, and it's just people don't believe me when I tell them some of the things that have happened. Um I'm sure you have many stories like that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Chris, I I think another great question, thank you. Um what it does, what it's like. You go to the city. Right. Yeah, having that imposter syndrome. We've talked about a content crib, and many people are nervous about hitting that send button the first time. Um but what it does is it speeds up the process. You know, the process of uh of people, you know, whether it's closing a deal, hiring someone else, or getting hired, or getting an investor, uh, by having that brand out there already, it speeds up that process of of of whatever you're you're you're doing. Um they already know you. They can finish that diligence that much faster because uh you've got that brand created, or it's easy for them to understand it if they just go through your profile. So strong brand is is important today in this digital world that we have. Um, the importance of having the strength of brand. Um And the strength of the network as it grows to help your your business or whatever whatever you're doing at that time.
SPEAKER_02You know, th there's a line between, you know, personal branding and and self-promotion. And it you know, it can be cross, stepped over here and there. You know, I always say that, you know, personal brand is really it's not a vanity thing. I think a lot of people have a issue getting over that, or they don't they don't make that leap because of that thought. It's really a service to the people that you're trying to help, right? So where's that line between personal branding and self-promotion?
Becoming Visible On LinkedIn
SPEAKER_02How do you stay on the right side of it?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think um it's important to be humble, be genuine, you know, and lead with value in in your br in your brand and your messaging. If you're just using AI, which is easy, easier and easier today, and it's becomes obvious that it's it's it's pretty generic, you know, uh leadership material or or graphic, it just becomes noise. So humility, um uh being um being real, you know, but also providing value, real lessons learned. Uh again, sharing your your mistakes is just as important as sharing your successes. And uh we all learn that in in leadership is that the mistakes are almost more important than those successes because you know what you learn the key is that you learn from it, and so you don't make that mistake again or multiple times, uh, and and what the context of that is. So um there is that line between just straight self-promotion um and sharing everything. Um some people do that, and maybe that's better on the Instagram, TikTok, you know, Facebook, you know, type of channel. But I believe in the professional arena on LinkedIn, it's important to still share personal um perspectives on on your brand, your character, your story, but um link it to some value that other people in your network or on the channel on LinkedIn can take away from it and and say, hmm, I didn't that's an interesting perspective on that mistake of that learning that occurred through um through that process.
SPEAKER_0215,000 followers in a pretty you know niche field. When did it like how did you grow that and like when when did you realize like wow, I kind of understand now how this this works, whether that's sharing content or just networking in general? I think a lot of people I get the question all the time is like, how do I find ROI and posting online, right? Like, you know, there's brand deals out there once you have some sort of base or respect it as a copywriter that certainly exists, but really that there's a lot of work that goes in before that, and people want to measure that, which is not always the exact right frame of mind, but you know it must have clicked at some point, like, okay, I know how to grow this into a real following.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And there's a there's a there's a lesson l that I learned, Chris, great question, about the building numbers, because that could be the game in and of itself. And as I said earlier, I was an early adopter uh on LinkedIn. So I jumped on it, I started sharing, posting, um expanding my network, and then I started getting at a certain phase flooded with connection requests, and I accepted everybody. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. People that weren't even in my industry, a lot of a lot of uh website developers in India and and and uh other places, um nothing against website developers in India, but but uh it wasn't relevant. So then I learned is like just building numbers for numbers' sake is not the way to go, in my opinion, and and talking to others, like the team, the group at uh Content Crib is is make sure it's relevant, find your lane, find your category, and look to become leader, the leader or a leader in that category. And um, so I found that that didn't work, just trying to increase your numbers, and then I actually took some people off, you know, went down and said, I don't need these people, and then you start finding that many of those that are out to connect with you just are trying to sell you something. So you start getting a lot of you know solicitations uh about a service or or something that that that jams up your your messaging you know, inbox and and your time on LinkedIn. So my message there is um you know what didn't work is just trying to accept everybody. It got me up you know to a few thousand. But what I found is content that resonated, those we may talk about that later. I think that was one of your questions, is you know, what's your experience? Is what's worked is what hasn't on posts. And it's surprising, the more personal posts have gone up over 10, 20, 30,000 views and comments and and the hundreds of likes, is you know, family history. Example, I have a a a second cousin uh who died in in Dunkirk on the beach. He was in the British Army, was a surgeon, and um got off his boat and went back to the water to help some of his uh British Army comrades on the beach and got killed. And I found uh I found a whole write-up and I shared that around right after that movie, the the latest Dunkirk movie that came out a couple of years ago. And there's this picture of this dashing British officer with looks like you know uh Kerry Grant with the with the mustache, uh uh Colonel Dennis Byrd. People loved it. I mean, they just loved that whole connection thing. Um and uh not so much about my latest you know promotion or uh uh assignment, you know, into a a chairman position for a startup, but it's more the the personal things, uh the connection type things that that uh have probably at the top of my list on on um feedback.
SPEAKER_02So you know if you if another CEO in your space came up to you and said, I want you to consult for me, or you know, I'll hire you an hour or two a week for LinkedIn, what would you do for them, or how would you tell them to best spend it to start building their voice and their brand? If they had the time. Most CEOs don't. But if they Well, no, okay. Everybody has time for anything, it's how they decide, right? So most decide not to, right? So but how if they if they did, how would you tell them to spend it?
SPEAKER_00I would say call Eric Anderson and Chris Gross. Uh these guys are experts. Uh, but uh I would recommend to uh a CEO or leader that is is interested and sees the value of brand digital brand identity is spend an hour a week, you know, on on start with your profile, uh to really uh and you can get, you know, whether it's Chris and Eric or others or myself uh to help uh with ideas on that, who do that for a living. And that's not one of the primary things I do for a living, but there I I know people who do do that very well, is um so the audience, the channel, really understand what makes that person tick. Um so the profile is not as generic as every everybody else out there, and then um post a couple times a week, at least a couple times a week, your point of view on the company, on the market, the customer, uh your management philosophy, put some personal stuff in there. Um use video, more important now than ever,
Value-First Branding Without Ego
SPEAKER_00uh as is reinforced at Content Crib. Is get get a video platform, get comfortable with video, and um uh you know, and stick with it and continue that process with the with videos. And uh I think that's the formula, Chris uh and Eric, is start with the profile, uh provide personal kind of point of view on on different aspects that are gonna make sense to the audience, and then people are gonna start to recognize uh and and and build build uh a trust in your point of view and your experience, and um that will help. I think your company that'll help you uh individually, and um you know most CEOs uh don't realize the value of that, but many some of them do, and and have been very successful with it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, we're gonna pivot to you know uh from the branding talk and to AI somehow we became like part AI podcast of like what's going on in the space. I don't know how that happened. Probably all the probably the fear-mongering and to tell people it's not that bad and to seize the day. Uh, but we'll touch on some AI because I think it's important as you're probably getting hit with more products to vet and potentially, you know, add to your company, or depending on how the process goes for your procurement and whatnot. But where do you where does AI genuinely belong in your space and in med device commercialization right now? Where is it being oversold?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I I think AI is kind of like uh customer relationship management databases back in the day, CRM. You know, it's it's it's for for a sales team, you know, you hear it all the time from sales reps or sales managers, it's like or or leaders of sales departments, as well, if you put you know crap in, you get crap out, you know, or or you don't if it if it's hard to use and and your um your team doesn't actually use it, or it's just taking up their time and they're spending more time on spreadsheets than they are actually on sales calls and and out there you know doing the business, um it becomes frustrating very quickly if it doesn't deliver um uh results. So AI now um is similar in that how you prompt, in my experience, AI and how you you know direct AI, and I think it's getting better and better at this, but um if you just put some very general uh question or prompt and for AI, you're gonna get a pretty general scrub response. It's not gonna help you really differentiate yourself in um in what you're using it for. So the two places are obviously um in um content and and uh material and positioning uh on the marketing side and description, and it's even gotten better and better just even on the graphic side and on the on the presentation side. But for sales, it's it's about identifying customer, uh the appropriate customer, the perfect you know, fit for your product, your solution, or what you're selling, and and and using um AI to help uh that uh process to help identify your funnel, your sales funnel, uh is is an important aspect of it. So there's the kind of the promotional marketing, messaging, you know, aspect of it. And then there's the really the sales operations aspect of it, in my experience. On the this is in the commercial realm, is how AI is getting better and better. But um, you really need to have someone who understands it. Chris, I haven't finished your new book on on AI yet. I'm taking it on vacation with me next week. So I'm gonna ask you.
SPEAKER_02So it doesn't sound very relaxed, it's pretty dense on the sales stuff in the beginning, so feel free to skim over that. But it it gets better, I promise. Um yeah, give give that a roll.
SPEAKER_00But the theme is is how how uh how you ultimately you know you can use it to allow you to earn trust, you know, with with your your audience. Uh and uh again, that's a theme in business and in leadership and in relationship building is you know the Stephen Covey, you know, uh Jr. uh wrote about the speed of trust. You know, um is it's it's so important in in the sales process. But back to AI, I I think it's just you know, um don't use it generically, but but but look at uh the programs that that really can be refined and and tailored to your situation, your solution.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, so it's it's so well said, and and thank you for that. It's it's very wise and and refreshing because it is being abused beyond repair at some points, and it's um nice to hear a leader say that. So are you not seeing a ton of products integrating it into any sort of their you know devices or workflows or intake forms or testing or any of that?
SPEAKER_00Absolutely. I mean, just in in the spine world, uh enabling technologies, you know, whether it's robots or uh navigation.
SPEAKER_02I know from the tech space or even our space in customized medicine, who is vetting those? How do I mean there's no like roadmap or but people don't put budgets together, like understand if it's gonna work, and then they have to is it just like all the way to the top? Like you as a CEO have to make these decisions because there's really no to me.
SPEAKER_00It it the important thing is how does it work in the hands of the customer? So, you know, what the the AI solution for predicting preoperative planning for surgery, the best way to do it,
Where AI Helps And Gets Oversold
SPEAKER_00until I I wouldn't trust it until I could get a surgeon that I trust who understands it to tell me whether this is a difference maker or not. Otherwise, it's just sales buzz from the tech company, and you know, my my um my my true north is the customer. In the hands of the customer, actually working on a patient, um is this a difference maker? Uh not not hearing it from the software engineer or the tech company about why it's it's how great it is, it's it's really everything, and that's hopefully that's gonna be the same 50 years from now. You know, whoever's may maybe the humans aren't doing the surgeries anymore at that point, but uh you have your humanoid uh robot tell you whether it works, whether it's better or not, and um consult with the uh the trained physician who may be on the uh the spaceship golf course somewhere, calling in the shots.
SPEAKER_01It's funny because I I was gonna jump in here. I had a CEO tell me literally the other day, he said, I'm really wondering if AI is going to become the most overpriced.
SPEAKER_02Well, that's why I probably that's why I asked the question I did.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and I was like, whoa, that was I was that kind of kind of went across my bow, like, well, what do you mean? He just gave me all these different examples. Like, we're you know, hiring AI to do this $350,000 project, which I figured out we could have done it with 19 people for $200,000. You know, it's like it's like, wait a minute, this this wasn't the whole reason behind. Like, yeah, was the is the AI correct? Yeah, but so were the 19 people that did this project one time. So it's it's a weird paradigm because every other kind of big invention has really reduced cost, and the AI uh AI is not doing that right now because of all the VC monies that's been plowed into all this the AI technology. So it's interesting. I I it it's it's I I is it going to be a Chris has his theories on is the bubble going to pop or is it popped right now? I don't know. I don't know.
SPEAKER_00Well, I yeah, we'll see. I I think uh it's it's starting to enter into our lives, you know, very prevalently, you know, in conversations where people are just to me it's I wonder about the future, you know, just for the next generations and always again like try and be mentors and think about my kids and my grandkids now. You know, what what is it gonna be like for my grandkids that are between the ages of uh six months and six years old? What's college gonna be like for them? You know, is there do you need to go to college?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I mean, it's it's gonna be interesting. I mean, it's I I mean, I I love using Claude for sales reports analysis and giving like my sales reps the tools that say, you know, down accounts, why trends, giving it to inventory for projections based on you know, upper pars for production, like things of that nature that a lot of people don't have a lot of time for, don't know how to manipulate you know Claude or AI to utilize it and put it into reports that are easy to read. I mean, you know, custom sales playbooks for you know certain reps that want to identify certain opportunities. So there's a lot of cool ways to use it that keeps it really basic and uh and helpful for sure. I mean it's um you know, and the we haven't had a ton of like uh AI products in the pharmaceutical manufacturing side, however, there is one major one that they're producing some non-sterile production line device, which is interesting, but we'll pour you on that side of thing. But you know, you know, just to kind of wrap up our conversation today, because it's been so helpful, your perspective as a you know, med-device founder, you've seen it all. You've been in every, you know, I'm sure you could tell some stories of like the pre-cell phone days and like pagers all the way to AI. I mean, you your perspective is not to date, you know, a age you, sorry Ted, but you look pretty good for your age. But it's pretty cool to share that experience. And then now you you know you're being able to talk about AI and the impact you see. I mean, it's clear like your resume and your forward thinking and then personal brand building, it's it's quite impressive, and I think a lot of people are gonna take a lot from this this podcast.
SPEAKER_01And this podcast has definitely not been run by AI, it's been run by humans. Um, but I want to say thank you, Ted, for coming on. I pre we appreciate your your your wisdom and all the things that you've done. And if you would just tell people what what what's going on right now for you, what's next and the future and all that fun stuff.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, thank you. No, my my my message uh to those listening to the podcast is um change is happening as we would all agree, faster and faster. So, number one, embrace change. Uh, and that's what I've always done throughout my career, and even at this stage of my career, is I'm still looking to learn you know how AI would make sense for me, you know, in certain areas of uh of a new opportunity, of evaluating a new opportunity, or operating in a new opportunity. So you're never too old to be you know embracing that change and staying, you know, on the leading edge of that. Secondly, build your brand, um make it personal, uh to so people can earn that trust and understand who you are, what makes you tick, and that that's an important part of uh today's digital world and brand identity. Uh what I'm doing today is um I enjoy, as I recommended, embracing change. So I enjoy innovation. So in the last decade or so, I've really gravitated and moved towards um faster-moving, more innovative companies, generally smaller, but it might be a division of a company that's smaller, that has something new, and and today it's in the US market particularly, so hard to get access into the hospitals if you have a generic product category that doesn't really you know have a defining
Embrace Change And What’s Next
SPEAKER_00uh differentiated value proposition, it is extremely frustrating and hard. So that's the other reason I've kind of gravitated towards innovation, and then I've specialized, found myself specializing in helping companies figure out that go-to-market strategy or that uh commercial traction and growth strategy to uh help that innovation take hold in the marketplace and grow um as you as you get it into the marketplace. So my clients are are either uh companies that are looking for um a strategist, but also a Kevin Bacon, somebody who can introduce them to key customers, key networks that they uh don't have and and and haven't had the chance to hear that story. Uh in addition to um investors, you know, probably had a number of projects in the last couple of years with private equity groups looking to build business, and they find me through LinkedIn, no surprise, as an expert in the space to say, we want your opinion on where this market's going. If give us help us create a short list of what products we should buy, what companies we should buy, and then maybe help us integrate or get involved in in helping steer or or that company in the right direction. So I've really enjoyed that and uh continue to um you know build my network. I will be at the next content crib uh in October. I've booked my ticket uh and uh looking forward to that. Um you guys have just continued to evolve and and and bring that that um that experience you know to a different level. It's not just the same you know meeting every every six months. And so I'm really excited about this next one in Bentonville.
SPEAKER_01Well, thank you so much, Ted. Appreciate you coming on, appreciate you coming to Arkansas and look forward to seeing you in October.
SPEAKER_00Likewise.