YouSaid · the spoken record

Sarah Jones Simmer

lines on the record: 69
first: 2022-04-19
most recent: 2022-04-19
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“That's honestly all that matters to me right now. And I try to reflect at the end of every day, probably in part because I had the zaneurism I had cancer. Like, you never know when you're going to go, right? Which is kind of a weird place to be. So a lot of times at the end of the day, I'll reflect and be like, so was it a good day? Like if I go tonight, what happens? And I can genuinely say that practice of reflecting on that and of like identifying those moments during the day when I found joy and when I did know love like it's an unbelievable way to live and it makes me far less focused on things like external success or the number of zeros in my bank account or the titles or whatever like I care about how I make people feel I care about the things that bring me joy in life and if I can focus on those then hopefully that means I'm doing things right”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“There was probably a time in my life when I would have been like two and a half kids and a mortgage and whatever. For me, success now is finding joy and knowing love. Truly, as Pollyanna as that may sound, like, how do I find joy in my life? How do I find joy in the set of activities that I do in the time that I spend with my kids? Like joy is the word that is emblazoned on my brain. And how do I know love? And I think knowing love is different than... Finding love and giving love and taking love. It's like if you really know and understand love, it means it's coming at you from all directions, right? You're receiving it, you're giving it. You deeply understand it.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Safe spaces in all of your lives, right? Like investing in friendships, investing in sibling relationships. Our relationships are what make us human and they gave our life so much quality. And I hope that we can all find safe spaces somewhere in our lives to like really say things out loud and reflect on who we are, reflect on what we're challenged by, be able to do it in a way that doesn't create fear or mistrust. I think it comes back to this idea of just being really authentic and intentional around it.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“An interesting statement. Maybe some of this even comes back actually to the conversation around attention span and how much is fighting for our attention. And I think sometimes as a result of that, even things online like tend to a place of vitriol or like can get ugly quickly, you know Whitney talked a lot about that in her origin story of Bumble and how the experience that she lived with on things that were said to her online like really shaped her vision for what Bumble could be and so I think maybe that's a part of it is like we the internet allows us to feel like we have a mask on and people won't know our true selves we may say things that we wouldn't say in person to folks I think that these are all somewhat interrelated ideas and that's where I also think there's no replacement for like true quality relationships and finding finding those”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“My professional coach is the same way. He doesn't let me off the hook when I feel like I don't know how to do something or think about it, but he comes back to me with a different framework of thinking about it. And he's giving me tools that I wouldn't have had otherwise. And so sure, could I have developed those tools through experience? Probably. Can I get there faster if he helps me think this through and understand it? Definitely. So like, why wouldn't I want every advantage I can have as a leader to really operate up my best?”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Lack of trust, even if you sometimes Sideways, like you don't, you know, when you have peers across the business, like, yes, you should be able to build relationships, but really you should be venting up. You should talk to your manager about things. My manager is the board right now. And I have a great relationship with each of my board members, but I also sometimes just need a safe space to think out loud about something. And I think that it coaches a wonderful resource for that. And in the same way that I talked about strength training and how My coach there pushes me to lift heavier things than I would probably ever push myself to and comes at you with the best amount of tough love, right? It's tough love that comes from a place of believing you can do it.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“No, I agree. But there is a perception. I don't think there should be stigma, right? And I think I try to be candid where I can because I do want to see more women, especially but more people in general step into their potential as leaders. I love working with a coach. I feel like none of us has all the answers. The coach doesn't have all the answers either, by the way. They're there to provide frameworks and to help you arrive at decisions and to think about things through a different perspective. And so I feel really lucky to have found someone that I, and I've actually had two coaches now and they've both been amazing for different chapters of my professional career. It's also a safe space to go sometimes. There's sort of a rule in operating, right? Like you can only vent upwards. Like if you vent down, you can build”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I mean, I think first and foremost, like, I think I run that stigma, right? Like, dating online was stigmatized 10 years ago. Totally. Things about weight care are stigmatized. Like, I'm sitting here telling you about stage three cancer.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I do have that ultimate accountability for decision making, but I hate to sound like a broken record, but I do think it comes back to like finding great people, building trust with them, and then doing the best you can with the information that you have at the time, you know, and coming to the right level of intellectual rigor, which I think does vary problem to problem. But having those people you trust get you there is a key part of agility and being able to move fast enough to actually grow and scale the business.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Being able to trust that they've done the exhaustive work and that they can give you their highlights and their best recommendations and then the right amount of data points to support that. And you trust that there's like a iceberg worth of data underneath it. I think that's how I get comfortable moving a little more quickly. I think the times that I take a bit longer when there's a decision where two people I trust have really conflicting points of view on something and I am probably still trying to build the muscle around helping them come to agreement in the most effective way so that it really shouldn't feel like an either or situation but a best of. And candidly that's a muscle that I'm still building. I am new in the CEO seat. I've been doing this job for three and a half months now. And that is a difference that I've noticed versus sitting in the COO or Chief Strategy Officer seat previously is that like”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I don't know that I always get that right, if I'm honest. You know, I started my career at a hedge fund and I think in that role, like you do such a level of analysis that there's sometimes when I have that muscle memory of like, let's go a layer deeper deeper deeper debt. Let's go a layer deeper. Let's go a layer deeper. But I don't have the time to do that, to be honest. If I did that for every decision, like the business would never get to move forward. And so I think it depends on the decision. I think this is also a place where bringing on great leaders and”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And for me, at least, I have found that I'm more effective if I can make a decision with conviction and then move on and not come back and revisit it. Now, I've worked with some great leaders that make decisions early and are really comfortable like changing their mind. And I think that works for them. But for me, what I have found is this little bit slower bias for listening first is how I get comfortable.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Even if I'm still feeling my way around the problem, but I say, have we thought about it XYZ? I find that people start gravitating towards your opinion and telling you more what they think you want to hear as opposed to their actual best conviction, their best understanding of the problem. And so I think it's my job to help frame the problem we're trying to solve. But for me at least, I then sit back and really try to listen and gather information until I have at least an 80%. Understanding of the problem. What has been some interesting to me in some ways in this new adventure is like there are”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I turned towards slower decision making with conviction. And look, I think there are great leaders who have bias for action and they can make decisions really quickly. I have found that I really need to listen and gather an adequate amount of information before I can come to a decision. And one of the things that I noticed from a more tactical perspective is if I throw out an opinion too soon.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And I think that each of us as we figure out what it means to operate in a remote first context is we figure out how to lead in a world that's fighting for our attention, we have to find the space to actually do our best, most effective thinking because you're not brought on as a leader to just manage management manage. You have to lead and you have to think, you have to have ideas for where the future is going to go and you've got to give yourself real space to do that. And if you don't carve that out with intention, it's like impossible to get it.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Is a time and place for that kind of guacamole, and there really is. I'm not saying we can eliminate it, but I got so much juice from these longer thoughts. And I just felt like I was doing some of the deepest introspection that I had done, but I was also able to just think much more creatively. And now I try to engineer those moments for myself. There are days. We have a practice around flow Wednesdays where we try to hold no meetings or at least no recurring meetings. There can be brainstorms, there can be off sites. I walk every Wednesday for a while and I just try to use that time ideally in nature, not with cars whizzing by with a cup of coffee in my hand to try to get to that long thinking again. And these just like, as I said, I can't come up with the best word for it, but I just visualize these like longer ellipses as opposed to this like pointalism that happens to us all day.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Sitting in a different room because I think you can eliminate some of those distractions. I remember there was a phase in my treatment where I spent a lot of time in Houston. Typically I really like to run, but I wasn't feeling strong enough to run at that point. So I went on very, very, very long walks, like four or five hours a day. Sometimes this was during a period of medical leave. I could physically feel my thoughts getting longer. I just lack the ability to really describe this adequately, but I could think about the same thing for much longer. I think we've gotten to a place where I've heard anecdotes of like attention spans are three seconds long now. Like we switch so quickly. And when we sit in front of our computers, there's so many things that are just fighting for our attention. You're never going to do your best thinking when you're just switching from one thing to the next.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“But it shouldn't be like the ongoing day to day engine that SOC is the water cooler in our case. Both the water cooler and I think the like general workflow management, text for urgent stuff, phone calls more than you think. I feel like we've gotten away from picking up the phone and talking to someone. And I don't know about you, but I've been in so many situations where you're like, you know what, the shortcut to this is, I'm just going to call them. Like something is being lost in translation. And I think that comes back to the trust piece again. Like voice on voice does build trust more than slack to slack does. So trying to be intentional about that. The other thing that I have found personally is that I do not do my best thinking in front of a screen where it is like this ping and this ping and like all of these different things popping up and distracting you. I do my best thinking walking and walking even more so than like”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I would not say we've perfected this, but we are trying. I think being clear about what happens on what channels, right? So SAC is our primary form of communication. We try to reserve email for things that require a lot of context or involve external parties.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Oh, sorry, I was just gonna say, you know, I think that's right, and I think that's where some periodic in-person engagement is necessary. I do also think that's where As a leader demonstrating vulnerability and authenticity and sharing something about who you are outside of your work life or something that matters to you or like sometimes I'll share an embarrassing story or something that I feel like I learned the hard way as a way to kind of engender that vulnerability, right? Like I'm going to share something with you that feels awkward to me. And I hope that gives you permission to know that like I'm a real human. We're all figuring this out as we go and that you can be equally vulnerable to me because I think I do think vulnerability helps engender trust. And I think we just have to find ways of engineering that, as I said, in the absence of the stuff that would happen so organically if you were in the same place.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“In the middle of the day, or what have you, but you have to demonstrate even more intentionality around building trust. And that may mean getting together in person with some frequency. I think it does mean going out of your way to find other opportunities for building trust, like Zoom calls or talks on the phone while you're both walking three miles or some version of like those conversations that used to happen on the margin or waiting in line for the restroom. That's where a lot of trust is built because they can authentically understand you as a human.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Giving people that sense of stability. And some of that is being reliable as a leader. And like, again, creating that foundation. Some of it comes back to trust like we were talking about before, knowing someone as a human, being clear that you care about them as a human, being kind, and then again giving them a firm foundation to stand on. To me, those are the elements that create enough psychological safety that can empower honesty. I think it takes a lot of intention to get there. I have found doing it remotely is hard. I didn't, if you'd asked me pre-pandemic if I would want to operate in a remote first context, I probably would have said no. And now there are reasons where I think it's absolutely the right thing for our business. We can find talent anywhere. We can find the work-life integration that works best for our team and give people more flexibility to wait.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I think if people are always worried about their job security or saying the right thing or feeling like they're questioning their worth in a conversation or in a meeting or in a role, you're not going to get the best work out of them. And each of our jobs as leaders, right, is to create the conditions where people can do the best work of their career. And so how do you make sure that they are standing on solid ground so that they're expending their intellectual energy on doing the best work of their career as opposed to expending that same mental energy on trying to tell you what you want to hear or worrying about if someone else is docking for their job or going around them? And so I think this idea of like how do I give you solid ground to stand on is something that I do try to think about as a leader and that I coach and other leaders that I get to work with.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I feel like the spinach and the lipstick one are the easy tactical examples. I think the way that it plays out in the workforce is especially in a relationship where potentially you disagree with your manager about something. Often the nice thing to do is be like, okay, sure, good idea. That sounds good. But the kind thing to do would be to push them on their thinking and to feel empowered enough to come forward and share how that idea could be sharpened. I think it's also on the leader in that situation to create enough psychological safety that people are not afraid to tell you you have spinach in your teeth or not afraid to tell you that you're idea is not strong enough or could be sharpened in some way. And so I think just creating the dynamic where kindness can show through because it's mutual is really important.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Is on skill fit, but being clear about what your culture is and what your values are and how people show up and live those values, I think gives you the rubric that you need to understand that people are values and missions fit. And that's really important.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Current COO found she was in the business before I was. I swear I didn't do this on purpose, but the very first meeting I had lipstick on my teeth and she told me right away and I was like, this is it. Like I know I want to work with this woman because I want us to be in a place where we sharpen each other and want each other to be our best. And that tiny thing was just such a good example of like setting me up well for the rest of the meeting. And maybe there was this like momentary discomfort, but not really, right? Like it was a simple easy mistake. I wiped it off. We both had a better day as a result of it. But I think these examples of like how you live out your values in your day to day and the little things that you do as a result, like I noticed those as someone who's doing hiring or assessing fit with folks and I think you should tune in to cues like that. So much emphasis obviously and rightly so.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I mean, some of it is like how do they deal with the ambiguity of the situation? Like, how do they react if there's a super long line or if they couldn't find the place or if they're running late? Like, it's just little cues like that that I think give you a sense of this person and how they operate. There's another one this is not an intentional interview question necessarily, but another thing that's very important to me is kindness and kindness over niceness. And one of the things that the easiest example I can give is that a kind person will tell you you have spinach in your teeth and a nice person won't because it's uncomfortable, right? But the kind person is going to set you up for a much better rest of your day because you're not running around with spinach in your teeth. And the moment I met the woman who is my”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I don't think I've ever had a job description. And now she's like a rock star at Nike and like she's back in this environment where she's really thriving and has had an unbelievable amount of promotions very, very quickly. And that's where she thrives. Like she wants that structure and that understanding. I love ambiguity. I love shaping things and doing a lot for the first time and kind of figuring it out as we go. And we can both have these really energizing career paths. But we know what our sweet spots are. And I think that takes a level of reflection and self-awareness. And what I love is finding leaders, especially in those early stages that are similarly curious, that thrive in ambiguity, that are excited to build the plane while we're flying. I recognize that's not for everyone. And I think there's certain ways that I've developed over time to just kind of test for some of those things.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“An instinct toward stay in my lane, that's great at a certain stage of company. That's not always the most effective when you're in a really high growth phase. I'll tell a story and then I should ask her permission if I can tell it, but I'm very close with my sister. I have two sisters and a brother. But the one that's right under me, we have had similar career paths. I think we're both very ambitious, but we have different instincts about the phase of growth that works best for us. And she said this amazing career she started at Merrill Lynch and then she went to Ralph Lauren working in corporate finance and she went to ABMB for a little while and then she went to a startup and I remember her calling me a couple times and saying you know there's just there's all these things that I have to do and they're asking me to do this and it's not even in my job description and and I looked at her and was like you have a job description”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“She sort of waited until she waited until it was an appropriate moment in the conversation. It wasn't sort of like, hey, can I buy you a latte? And here's my list. But it came up really organically and she had really detailed thoughts about it. And I also appreciated that she had spent so much time in the onboarding flow. She had actually responded to one of the emails that you get from our team. It's like, hey, I'm here to answer any questions. And she did. She asked a bunch of questions and she asked the person to get on the phone. And I think that comes back to this idea of commitment to the mission. It's a problem. She cares about solving and it resonates deeply with her. And obviously there's a bunch of kind of technical and skill assessment stuff that we will always need to go through. But I think looking for that passion and looking for leaders, as I said before, with a lot of versatility, especially in the early days, if there is”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“For a rollout found. And she came with a bulleted list of everything that she felt like we needed to change in the onboarding experience. And it was amazing, right? I just loved the enthusiasm that she had. And it wasn't from a place of like you're getting this, this, this, this, this wrong. It was like, here are the things. This is what I would do in my first week. Like here's the things that I want to help unlock for the business. I love that level of intellectual curiosity.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, that's a great question. You know, I think first and foremost, it's commitment to the mission. And I've had the privilege of working at purpose-built mission-driven companies. You know, if all of the hard skills are there, but someone doesn't actually believe in what you're trying to do, that's a deal breaker, right? There needs to be this belief in what you're trying to build. And I don't think that becomes an excuse for things like overwork or underpay. I think it becomes a unifying factor that helps people remember what their North Star is. So I do look for that first and foremost. Look for a lot of curiosity. One of the things that we would often ask in bumble interviews is for feedback on the product. And we were expecting that people had engaged with the product in some way, shape, or form. And luckily, Bumblehead, you know, obviously it's a dating platform, but also has friend fighting tools, it has business networking tools. There's something for everyone there. And I think it's important that people had enough intellectual curiosity that they wanted to play with it, that they had ideas for improvement, et cetera. I interviewed a woman the other day.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Orientation, all of these things, the more that we can bring a diverse set of perspectives to the table, the better we can understand the problem we're trying to solve.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Valuable to business. I think that's why the research on board diversity and executive team diversity bears out that businesses generate higher returns when they have more voices at the table. It's not about women versus men. It's about how do we bring the best of everyone's lived experience together to drive the best outcomes for this business because it enhances our perspectives. We actually have a stated value at found of build a bigger table. And that's what this is getting at. It's like instead of saying there's only one seat at the table for so-and-so or one for the other, let's just build a bigger table and how do we do that in the way that we've built the platform, right? It's bringing the clinician to the table. It's bringing the stress expert to the table, bringing the sleep expert to the table in addition to design and exercise. But in the way that we run our business internally, it's about diverse perspectives and diversity through every lens, through those lived experiences, race, ethnicity, gender.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Sure, yeah, working with, and it's funny. I actually always really reinforce that myself, folks will say, like, I work for you. I'm like, we work together. You work with me. I think it's all about working with great leaders, whether they're men or women, regardless of gender, right? I think there are some really amazing things about working with women, though, that I have been able to cherish at Bumble, now at Found, and at other places in my career. I think there's often a bias towards collaboration and having voices be heard and that really mattered to me. And I think it mattered to a lot of the women and men around me in these conversations. I think there was also bias towards listening and information gathering. And there, again, not to lean into gendered stereotypes, but I think there are wonderful qualities of the way that women operate that can be really”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I didn't feel like that held me back and I realized what a privilege that is, especially as a woman. Like it is so discouraging to me that there are still so little capital that flows to women's CEOs and women founders. And I've tried to do my partisan individual on that front. We did so much up on both to try to invest in women leaders, but we all really need to continue to stay focused on that and on the calibration that's necessary there. And I just hope that I can use this experience and prove to our investors and build a really high growth amazing company that continues to like bust those stereotypes and open doors for other women.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Oh gosh, I mean, fundraising is always interesting and eye-opening. It was candidly a little bit of a worry for me early on of, you know, I have actually tried to raise funds before while pregnant and that was challenging. And so I'm taking some of those learnings and thinking, gosh, now how are people going to react and I'm trying to raise money? And they know that I've like publicly been on this health journey, you know, what kind of questions am I going to get? Are they going to worry that I might die before we spend all of the money and give them their return? And I would actually say that I was pleasantly surprised by just how much investors bought in to what we were building, the problem we were trying to solve. My ability to help solve it because of the health challenges that I faced. It gives me deeper understanding of the problem.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And then I think we've assembled an amazing and inspiring team, and I'm so proud of the colleagues that I had the privilege of being able to join. And I think folks were excited to back that. So yeah, we just recently closed our series B and announced that. And we have really, really big ambitions for 2022 as a result.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Raise this series B, we were meaningfully oversubscribed, we weren't even planning to raise, but I think investors understood the size of this market. This is a challenging problem. 70% of Americans are overweight or obese. And by the way, the average American gained thirty pounds during the pandemic. So there's an urgency to this. And think about it. It's for all those multifactorial reasons we just talked about. We were stressed. We were tired. We were sitting too much. We were eating too much. We were drinking too much. It's multifactorial and the pandemic just like heaped on top of that. So I think these investors.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“So much of the narrative is focused downstream on diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, cancer, and the root causes of many of these things tie back to weight. And so how are we equipping Americans with better tools to take care of their weight? And how do we do it in the context of self-acceptance and empowerment and body positivity, right? We're not a culture of shame found. We're really focused on helping people and equipping them with the tools to drive towards the things that are going to give them the quality of life that they want. And I'm just so proud to be a part of that. And I think we each have an experience with weight or someone we love who's had challenges with weight and their self-image or their reflections on themselves and their self-worth has been dictated by their size. And we want to be a tool that helps to really shift that narrative. And I think what's been exciting is that's resonating with investors. I think, as you said, we did.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“That for many people who struggle with weight, the challenge is that it's so much more multifactorial than the weight loss industry would have you believe, right? There's this culture around calories in, calories out, or eat less exercise more. And if you don't have the willpower to do that, then maybe you don't deserve a body you love. And candidly, that's just wrong. The science shows that that's wrong. There are things like biology that have a significant effect on that. It's your hormones, it's your genes, it's your lived experiences, it's many social determinants of health. There is no way that we can actually bend the obesity curve in this country by only focusing on calorsin and calories out. And so what we're trying to do is take this platform approach to solving this really thorny problem, which I would argue is the biggest problem facing public health today. I started to dig into the ecosystem, there's so much funding. There's so many businesses.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah. So the company I'm with now is called Found, which takes its name from the idea of it's not about what you've lost. It's about what you found. So yes, we are helping people with weight care and weight loss, but it's really about driving them towards the healthier outcomes, the joy that they want to find in their body. We get the most amazing stories from people who can now run a 5K or keep up with their kids on the playground or go for a walk around the block with a colleague and not be out of breath. It's life-changing stuff. It really does improve the quality of life for them. So we're building a platform that brings together coaching one-on-one as well as a community and a mobile app. And the big unlock and the differentiator from other things in market is it brings medication to the table. We have a clinician that engages with each of our members and if indicated that person can prescribe FDA approved medication. And the reality is”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I knew that doing it with my partner, for example, would hold me more accountable. And so he and I do it together twice a week. And we have so much fun doing it. But you almost have to like hack your own behavior changes and figure out what it is that's going to make it possible for you and give yourself permission to do that. I take two hours out of my workday to lift weights so that I don't have osteoporosis. And you know what? It makes me a sharper thinker every time I jump into a call after that. I'm super sweaty, but I'm much sharper and I've then had the chance to like pull back from my inbox, pull back from the Zoom screen, and get perspective again, even if in just some small way. And I think we've got to like give ourselves permission to do those kinds of things and prioritize that behavior change that really is going to drive towards healthier outcomes.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Finding a cohort, finding other people who are going to hold you accountable, who are doing it alongside you. One of the gifts I had during my cancer journey was connecting with other women who'd been through this, who like me were really still chasing their dreams professionally, who had small children at home, the ability to share and experience with someone matters so much. And I think that's also part of what I've tried to put in place for the behavior changes that I need to reinforce. So like coming back to that conversation about strength training, I'm at a super high risk for osteoporosis now. That's why I lived.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I think on the other behavior change is hard. We know this from the work that I do in my day job as well, which is around weight and driving healthier long-term outcomes, you know, things like changing your diet, things like changing your movement routine, it's hard. There's ways that we can reinforce behavior change. This is where technology can be leveraged to amazing effect, right? There's a lot of maybe negative behaviors that tech has introduced things that distract us, but there's other ways that technology can be a driver towards great behavior. You know, streaks, meaning you do something day in and day out, right? Like streaks mean one thing on something like Snapchat, but streaks when it comes to something like remembering to take a pill every day and remembering to move and remembering to your point to get up from your seat and walk around the block, these can be great things that tech, I think, can help us reinforce, but behavior change is hard, and that's where I think”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, that's fascinating. And you're right, on the one hand, gosh, we've got to celebrate the advancements in modern medicine that make this possible. And hopefully that's creating more access to surgery, earlier intervention.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Move into a different phase of my day, right? And go spend time with my kids or exercise or landscape, whatever the case may be. But that clarity of sort of giving myself permission and guardrails to prioritize all of the things that bring me joy and like I by no means have it all in balance. No one does. That's a lie. But it gives me permission to reflect. And I think I do just spend much more time on reflection and thinking about how I feel, how I made other people feel, and ensuring that that's a priority for me.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And the good news in my case is, you know, we all think I have more than five years now. I'm doing well with treatment. There's amazing drugs for the kind of cancer I have, and I'm doing well with them. So I don't have to have that five-year timeframe in a literal sense, but I do try to think about it in a figurative sense. And the other related point I would make there is it gives me permission, I think, to prioritize things that I might not have before. So one of the rhythms that I've tried to develop for myself, especially because I now work in a remote first context, is how do I give myself permission to lean into work when I want to and then permission to lean out when I also want to. And I do this exercise in the evenings where I try to ask myself, what am I blocking? What am I advancing? How did I make people feel? When I can answer those questions, just even knowing the answers will give me permission to then.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Enjoyed, and in my case, that meant the answer was going back and building again, and going back to that infrastructure development phase, really getting to build and scale a team, wanting to make that bet on myself as CEO, I had this moment in our treatment journey where the doctor was worried about metastasis and she said, look, worst case, I can get you five years. There's something very special about that five-year timeframe. You know, if you had 30 days, you would change everything. And on the other end of the spectrum, all of us live right now, like we've got infinity in front of us. But what if you had five years? What would you do differently? You do a lot more changing on the margin. And the reality is we should all be thinking that way every day. You know, what are the things that I would drop if I actually only had five years? Would I be so disappointed that I didn't do if I only had five years?”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You know, on the one hand, it's freeing because my daughter and I talk a little bit about big deals and little deals, you know, and we'll have like little deals like being late for school, right? Which like before might have given me so much anxiety. And now I'm like, well, the big deal was surviving a year and a half of cancer treatment, a lot of these other things, it helps us to put them into perspective. But I think for me, it was super clarifying professionally as well. As I said before, I love work. I really do think part of what brings me joy and energy in my existence is the outpouring of things that I can build into the teams that I get to be a part of and the amazing products that we make that change the world. And I think some people will go through a health experience like this. And for them, like that may change the way they think about work and they may deprioritize it. For me, it made me be crystal clear about what it was in work that I truly cherished.”
2022-04-19 · The Knowledge Project with Shane Parrish · Sarah Jones Simmer: The Foundation of Trust · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT