In “CEO Steve Joanis, Getting Noticed for C-Level & by VCs,” Steve Joanis, the CEO of PlanetIQ (at time of recording, now a PE Managing Director), shares lessons from 25+ years in management consulting, venture capital, and executive leadership. A West Point graduate, decorated Army aviator, and Wharton MBA, Steve has served as CFO, President, board member, and investor across more than 20 companies with multiple successful exits. In this episode of CXO Conversations, he explains how to stand out to venture capitalists, what personality traits the most successful C-suite candidates share, and how military leadership shaped his approach to business. For aspiring executives, his insights provide a clear roadmap to attracting investors and advancing to the CEO role.
For the full interview: https://ocns.co/ceo-steve-joanis-getting-noticed-for-c-level-by-vcs/
10 Min Clip Transcript
Michael Mitchel: [00:00:00] Hello, this is Michael Mitchell. I launched the podcast Exploring Talent in 2019. In 2021. I renamed it CXO Conversations. Hope you enjoy this episode and will subscribe to CXO conversations. For more great interviews, visit oc national search.com or your favorite podcast platform and subscribe. Enjoy.
Steve Joanis : All right.
I’m gonna kick it.
Michael Mitchel: Whew, welcome to Exploring Talent, where you hear directly from those at the top of their profession to learn from their experiences, insight, and advice, and how to apply them to your career. I’m Michael Mitchell, owner of OC National Search. For over 20 years, I’ve been interviewing leaders in their field.
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I’m with Steve Jonas, CEO of Planet iq. Steve is a seasoned executive having served as a CFO President, CEO Board member and partners, uh, with different investment firms. Steve and I will discuss his thoughts on being, uh, on the investment side. How it influenced and prepared them for running companies.
And what likes about being a CEO of a company after graduating from West Point and serving five years in the army. Having, uh, [00:02:00] flown Hilos, including the AP Apaches and being in Desert Storm, Steve earned his MBA from Morton held stints with Roser Ventures, Wolf Ventures, hard Point Capital was a CFO for in, in Inia Technologies president and board member for T three Media president of Parky, and now he runs Planet iq.
Welcome to the conversation. Steve. Please tell us about Planet IQ and what you’re doing over there.
Steve Joanis : Yeah, it’s nice to talk to you, Michael. Um, so Planet IQ is a. Weather prediction company via satellite. So we’re, we’re a big data company with a constellation of small satellites that help us predict the weather.
And our goal is to basically take the accuracy of the current one day forecast out up to seven days. And the re and the way that we do that is very novel. Um, nearly all technologies that are used for weather prediction look at. Information from above. For example, satellite or radar. It looks from the top down, but our technology looks side to side across the [00:03:00] atmosphere, and therefore we get information about, uh, atmosphere, conditions at all elevations above the surface of the earth similar to what a weather balloon would generate.
Only we’re a tiny, tiny fraction of the cost. So that’s the business that I’m currently in. So very different from the other businesses that you mentioned in my background.
Michael Mitchel: Yeah, but still it seems like you enjoy the science aspect of companies because, um, wasn’t, uh, one of your previous companies more on the, on the medical side.
Bio side.
Steve Joanis : Yeah. So it’s interesting that you bring that up. My background is, uh, I, I view myself as a generalist because when you look at the companies that I’ve been involved with, they’re everything from, uh, from real estate to new media. To IOT slash New City space to, um, other big data analytics companies, um, all the way to healthcare, like you mentioned a medical diagnostic company and now this is a space, is a space weather [00:04:00] company.
So I, I guess the, from my perspective. I’m a generalist or I’m, or I get very specific with things that are very different from one another. Um, and again, I think that it ties into some of the questions we’re probably gonna get to in this interview, but, um, but a lot of my background has really just been on the tech side, but, but tech more generically, I haven’t specialized in any one area.
Michael Mitchel: So what, um, what is it about the, I mean, because they’re so different, I guess that’s what makes them common for you. What attracts you to specific companies?
Steve Joanis : Well, that’s a really good question. My, my take on, uh. Investing when I was a venture capitalist or in the private equity world, um, or as being an entrepreneur, um, is really about looking at the fundamentals of the business, not necessarily about the technology itself.
I think as we all know, there are many, many examples of excellent technologies that didn’t win the marketplace, and there’s equally, if not more scenarios where you had [00:05:00] very average technologies that won the day because they had a better, better management team or a better approach. So my take on it is, uh, you really have to look at a, a few key areas, uh, for, you know, some of ’em are very easy to understand, um, but other than others are not.
And so, um, the way that I look at it is you gotta have a sufficient market size. Obviously you have to have technology that’s protectable, um, that doesn’t need to always be through patents, but it needs to be protectable in some way. You have to have high margins because everybody makes mistakes that impact their margin.
And so if you start with low margins, you end up, might end up with negative margins. So you have to start with very high margins, specifically high gross margins. You have to have the right team in place, uh, preferably a team that’s done it before. And so. So there’s kind of a checklist that I look at when I select either investments in my past or select companies that I wanna work with.
Um, but that’s why they end up being very different because I didn’t, I didn’t say anything specific to [00:06:00] any technology sector. In other words, I’m more than willing to look at almost any sector as long as they fit the broader categories that make most of these companies successful. And so I’ve kind of looked up things that are.
Um, that are all over the map, really, um, like I mentioned. So, um, so that’s kind of my, my take on this. Um, but the team, and almost everyone will tell you this, who’s been in the venture industry, the team is the most important part because if you have a a plus team, uh, you can make even an average idea, uh, do well.
And if you, and almost every great idea ends up being kind of average as you start to work it. And so that team becomes more and more important.
Michael Mitchel: So what was it about Plum iq? Was it the team, was it the technology, the, the mission?
Steve Joanis : It was all of the above. Um, but it was the team. When it came right down to it, it was the team.
What we have here, our two founders, um, uh, are one of ’em, his name’s Chris McCormick. He, uh, he’s on the Virginia Tech [00:07:00] Space Hall of Fame. And then the other guy is a weather scientist named Rob Krasinski. Who used to be a, a department head, uh, of Meteor Meteorology at, uh, at Arizona, at University of Arizona, but also he’s a world class scientist, um, who’s kind of the father of the technology that we are using here.
And so. Between the science side with Rob and the, and the engineering side with Chris. Um, they kind of had everything you needed, uh, for a startup, uh, except for kind of that third leg of the stool, which is the operations slash finance slash venture experience. And so, mm-hmm. When I joined the team, we kind of completed, uh, the management team.
That was, that was pretty sound. But those two guys are the reason why we raised the money. Like I was the one who could go out and expose the investors to the opportunity and sell the opportunity to them. But the reason why people did the deal was because of, of the, of the [00:08:00] world class, you know, uh, technology people that we have here.
And not only that, but most of the rest of our 20 person team, um, have worked with Robin, Chris. In prior companies going back 20 something years. So we really have what I call an artisan type team in an industry that is very early in it’s a developmental stage with a technology that’s far superior to anything else and a very large market.
So, um, all those things together, uh, made this the right opportunity for me. And I, and I didn’t work for six years, almost six years prior to joining. Uh. Uh, this company planted iq and the reason why is because I was spending that time looking for the right opportunity and, and this one had all the elements that made it exciting for me and it was a good fit as well, personality wise.
And so that’s why I joined the team.
Michael Mitchel: Well, I think that from their perspective, and I’m not saying about those two individuals, uh, specifically, but scientists can, I think, tend to. Get excited about [00:09:00] the science and they talk very in scientific language to, to folks. So when you’re trying to go out there and get, you know, raise, raise money, um, investment funds, that might be a little hard sell with the VC community.
So, but you, you speak vc so imagine now was kind of a, a good melding of, of skillsets for the organization.
Steve Joanis : Yeah, it’s a very good point. I mean, I, if I look back at the companies that I’ve been involved with. Either as an entrepreneur or as an investor. Um, I’ve gravitated to the very high tech, um, in almost every case, uh, side of things.
In other words, um, you know, I never really did a lot in things like software, you know, software specifically, uh, for enterprise software because, um, that’s relatively low tech on the high tech scale of things. I’ve kind of, I’ve kind of always pursued the kind of harder science aspect of things. For example, um, the medical diagnostic company [00:10:00] that we, we talked about previously, that, that company, again, it was mostly PhDs.
This company is almost all PhDs. As a matter of fact, with a Wharton MBA I’m the, I’m the, I think I’m the least educated person here. So, um, uh, it’s, I’ve sort of gravitated towards that, that, that very high tech side of things. Um. Mostly because it’s very difficult to replicate those. Um, mm-hmm. As a matter of fact, the, the IP part of our business is very unique.
For example, we don’t patent anything because what we do is so difficult to replicate that we don’t want to tell anybody how we do it by putting in a patent application. So we simply use. You know, uh, you know, secret sauce as our protection aspect because you can’t pull our satellite outta the sky and reverse engineer it.
So we’re, we’re we, we, we kind of use, you know, the secret sauce, uh, view of, of, of protection for ourselves.
Michael Mitchel: So how would you say that being on, on the investment side has influenced you as an, [00:11:00] as a CEO?
Steve Joanis : You know, that’s a good question. My, uh, I, I sometimes. And I’d say often, but uh, but times have been pretty busy with, uh, with this current company.
But, um, I’ve, uh, I’ve done a, a lot of lecturing at the business schools in Colorado and other places, um, in my past. And one of the things that I always talk about, or one of the first things that I always talk about is that there’s two kinds of startups in the world, those that get funded and those that don’t.
Because if you think about, uh, your average day of a venture capitalist, um, they probably see. 20 businesses a day, they probably sit down with one entrepreneurial group on average per day during the course of a year. Um, they probably do diligence on maybe 20 companies. They get advanced diligence on five or six and they invest in one or two.
So if you do that math, it’s only a tiny, tiny fraction of of startup companies that actually get funded by any particular venture group. And so. These [00:12:00] entrepreneurial companies have to go and, and talk to many, many venture funds with a hope of, of, of getting lucky and closing a deal. So my, my experience as an investor specifically allowed me to learn what it was precisely that the venture capitalists were looking for in selecting a deal to invest in.
And I have a very unique, uh. Perception of what is required, because I used to do that job like, like you mentioned, in, in, in three different firms. So, um, it’s, uh, it’s, I, I would, I would say that that is dramatically, uh, affected my ability to get deals done. Um, I, I told somebody the other day that of all the different financing rounds and all the different companies that I’ve been associated with.
100% of those financing rounds have closed. And why is that? It’s not. It’s not because the companies are better, it’s because the approach to fundraising is different, and the fund approach to [00:13:00] fundraising is different because I used to be on the other side of the table, so I understand what people are looking for.
Michael Mitchel: Do you ever one day see yourself going back to that side of the table? You know, it’s funny because that,
Steve Joanis : that’s come up, uh, a lot in the last, uh, five or six years. And I, I wouldn’t say that I’d rule it out, but every time I consider doing it, I look back at why I became an entrepreneur in the first place by joining a portfolio company.
And the reason why I did it was because as an investor. You have three jobs that you have to do simultaneously. Usually three jobs you have to do simultaneously, and that’s fundraising. Um, that’s, that’s dealing with your limited partners, you know, fundraising or dealing with your limited partners is one.
The second one is diligence on new deals and the third one, and, and sourcing new deals. And the third one is working with your portfolio companies. And when I look back at my time in the venture community, the thing I hated was raising money. The thing that I was. That I, that I liked a lot was [00:14:00] talking to entrepreneurial companies about potential investments.
But the thing I loved was working with my portfolio companies. So every time I consider going back into that world, um, I always come back to why would I now, in an entrepreneurial world, the thing that you spend a lot of your time as, especially in C-level roles. Is fundraising as well. However, you only do that every 18 to 24 months.
So, um, so in both jobs, fundraising is my least favorite part of it, but you do a lot less of it in the entrepreneurial side than you do in the venture side. And then the last thing is, as an investor, you might have inside of your partnership, you know, 15 to 20 active deals, maybe, maybe a few more, maybe a few less, depending on the, the life cycle of your fund.
But as, and say you’re, and say you’re the average partnership of three or four people, three or four partners. That means you have, you know, 3, 4, 5, 6 [00:15:00] companies that you have to work on simultaneously on top of everything else that you do. So you’re never completely up to speed on what’s going on in any of your companies.
The CEO always knows a lot more than you do about your company. And so it’s, um, so you’re always at this, uh, information disadvantage. So as an entrepreneur though, you have one company that you spend a hundred percent of your time on. Even when you’re sleeping, you’re dreaming about your company and what needs to happen.
Believe me. Um, and so you know, everything that you need to know and your VCs don’t, which puts you at an information advantage. And that is very helpful when dealing with a board of, of, of directors that’s made up of 5, 6, 7 VCs and you. So, um, you know, there’s a lot of reasons why I, I prefer the, um, the, the entrepreneurial side.
Um, but a lot of it is just that you get to focus. And you don’t get a chance to do that as a VC because you’re, you’re spread so thin on all the things that you have to do to be successful.
Michael Mitchel: So [00:16:00] when did you decide that you wanted to be A CEO? I mean, was there a moment you’re like, that it’s my goal, or we did it, you just kind of happen or?
Steve Joanis : Well, um, I think this comes back to being in the military. Um. I, I think that most veterans at a very young age, I mean, I was a, I was a troop commander, um, during wartime when I was 25 years old, or 24 years old as a first lieutenant. So, um, so I was so, I, so I was used to having the responsibility to make, you know, life determining decisions as a, as a 20, as an early 20-year-old, there’s no other place I don’t think.
In the, in the world other than military, where you could get that type of responsibility, uh, especially on the leadership side at such a young age. At that age, yeah. Yeah. Especially at that age. Right. Um, and so then I went to business school and, you know, as a, [00:17:00] as a, as a graduate of an engineering school.
Um, business school was pretty easy compared to what I had been through, and so then I went into management consulting and I was working, you know, long hours. But the work I didn’t find to be that challenging because. It was, um, it was again, I mean it was, uh, it was project based and, and you didn’t really have, you know, it was average engagement three to six months, something like that.
Um, and so then I was like, well, this isn’t for me, but the entrepreneurial side would be, the venture world would be a great place to be. So that’s why I got into the venture business, um, in the early nineties and the height of the internet boom. And so my, uh. Um, so I, I, I just kept looking for, for kind of more responsibility or to have, have an impact like I, like I was able to do in the military.
And, and I wasn’t finding that as a, as a board member because again, you have such a small impact, um, on your entrepreneurial companies because you’re spread so thin. And so what I started to [00:18:00] do is, um, spend a lot of time. A lot more time than other venture capitalists did because I wanted to spend more time with my portfolio companies.
The next thing I know, I’m working days and nights and weekends trying to, because I’m, because I really wanna make an impact on these companies. And, but I, but I was spread too thin, and so I joined one of those portfolio companies as a CFO because we were getting ready to sell it. And it was a company that was filled with, uh, with PhDs that weren’t necessarily the best business people.
Um, to answer your question specifically, I never, I never really thought about wa, you know, being the CEO, but what I wanted was the, the responsibility and accountability that comes with the role, because that’s what I had in the military, even at a young age. And I felt like I could do it given my academic background and my leadership, uh, skills developed as a, as a military officer.
And so, um, so it was quite easy to kind of. Move into a CFO role and then move into a COO role and then move into a president role. And then, you know, when I was in a president role, it was always with a founder who was [00:19:00] much younger than me and much less experienced in business. But I’m, but technically skilled.
And so, uh, so eventually it just, it was, you know, there’s no difference between what I’m doing with the title of CEO or what I was doing in my last two jobs with the title of president, except for. The, uh, the roles are not different, just the titles are different. Um, and so it’s more about the leadership, uh, of the, you know, the leadership and decision making and all that, that, again, stems directly from my time in the military that, that made me wanna pursue those type of roles.
Michael Mitchel: I think most people, going back to military days, ’cause you also, as I recall, you ran a a, a flight school for, for Hilos, right. Um. Most people would be surprised to learn that the pilots in this, like, you know, uh, jet fighters in the Navy, that’s my my reference point, early twenties. By the time they become a skipper of a squadron, they’re probably late twenties, early thirties.
By the time you, you’re the skipper of a carrier, [00:20:00] which is, you know, a huge responsibility, you’re in your forties. I mean, you get a lot of responsibilities very early, um, uh, age-wise, and that you don’t get that kinda responsibility, I think on the, in the civilian sector. Same token, you know, as a civilian CEO, you’re not ordering people in the battle.
You can’t put people in the bri, although I’m sure there’s some CEOs that would love to be able to have that option to put their VP of sales in the, in the stockade for a timeout period for missing their numbers. Um. Yeah. So do, do you feel that, um, your military days probably had a lot of impact on your leadership style or, um, I mean, obviously from running a company knowledge perspective, I’m sure the, the MBA and your time on the, on the investor side helped.
But from a leadership perspective, what influenced you more today? Is it military experience or is it the experience from being on the, on the investor side? I guess there is no one answer. Yeah,
Steve Joanis : for me, I would say that [00:21:00] interestingly enough, I would say that it was the mil, the mil, the military, and maybe the West Point education too.
Um, because all the constraints you have in terms of time and requirements, um, but just like, uh, like how to manage time and how to manage people, um, is. What really came and, and, and not just manage people, but, but true leadership. Like I have to look at the motivations of people in order to maximize their throughput.
I don’t think that most business people think of the world in that, in those terms. We definitely do in the military think in those terms, right? You, you don’t get to pick the people that work for you in the military. You play with the cards you’re dealt because you show up at a unit as you know, my case, a second lieutenant or a captain, and you, um, uh, and the people that are in your unit are the people that are in your unit and you have to figure out how to outperform.
People you didn’t get to pick. And so how do you do that? Well, the only way to do that is through [00:22:00] understanding the individuals that you work with. Um, trying to, trying to understand what makes ’em tick and how, how to motivate them. And then, and then figuring out what you need to do and over time to, to, to, to make them get better at their job and get better at their careers and be happier in their life.
And by doing that, you end up optimizing your unit in the military. Well, it’s the same exact thing in the business world. You have to understand all of those things in order to maximize the throughput or the output of your company. And so, um, so my, I I’m here to say that my experience in the military for me was invaluable in my ability, um, to be successful in the roles that I’ve had, um, coupled that with the experiences, you know, the academic training and the experiences in the business world.
But I will also say that I cheat. Um, I, uh, I tend to hire, whenever I hire people, I tend to hire mil military people as much as I can. And the reason why military veterans as much as I can, the reason why I say that is because, um, [00:23:00] I’ve had very, I’ve had great experience with that. I can trust the work that they’re gonna do.
I know their work ethic is gonna be strong, and I know that they think about the world in the same way that I do. For example, at T three Media, out of our nine VPs, uh, seven of them were veterans. Actually all seven of those guys, including me, um, were, uh, were veterans of foreign wars and were, um, and were military academy graduates.
They were all Navy except for two Army people. Uh, we tried to hire an Air Force guy once and he didn’t take the job. But my point is that I, I look for that in, in hiring, uh, as much as I possibly can here at, um, at Planet iq. Although we haven’t done a lot of hiring because the company was only funded a year ago.
Uh, the, we, we do have, uh, preponderance of veterans, um, and we have, uh, a lot of children of veterans. And so, um, many of those I didn’t hire, just turned out to be that way. So, um, so [00:24:00] I can’t think of a, um. You know, yeah, I, I probably sound like a homer here, Michael, but my, my take on it is that you cannot replicate that experience that you get at a young age in the military, and it translates very well into the business world in my experience.
Michael Mitchel: You know, union Pacific will hire a veteran for a role that they have, they have no experience for, but they’ll train ’em for it. You know, diesel electrician, uh, track maintenance. ’cause they know that that person’s got, like the things you just talked about. They’re disciplined. They know they’re gonna show up.
They can take the responsibility, they can delegate, uh, both, you know, receive the, receive, receive duties and orders, and carry ’em out and delegate. Um, they’ll hire, uh, you know, up here in, we’re in, we’re in Denver. You know, they need to sign two people up to Moffa Tunnel in the high country to work on track maintenance.
They’ll send two vets up. ’cause they know they’re gonna, they’re not gonna skylark, they’re gonna get the job done. Right. Um, you know, we, you and I first met years ago when we were doing [00:25:00] interviews for kids that, for high school students that are trying to, you know. Interviewed to get into the military service academies.
And when I interview these, these kids, I, one, I’m in awe, when you look at their, their everything, they do their, their, their afterschool activities, their grades. And sometimes I ask ’em like, you know, what do you when you have time to be a kid? But I always often wonder, am I talking to a future, you know, uh, chief of staff of the Army?
Am I talking to a future CEO? Where are they gonna take the, you know, where are they gonna go from here? You just never know. And I think that even though they, when they don’t do a full career in the military, um, they do a few years and they get out, they’re still contributing to our community at large.
So,
Steve Joanis : yeah. No, no, I think that’s right. I mean, I, I, I was, I had the privilege of going to my 35th, uh, class reunion at West Point, this past summer. Um, and it’s amazing to me how everybody there is successful in their own way. Um. And they all, everybody says the same [00:26:00] thing. Of course, you’re at a reunion for that school, but everybody gives the credit of where they, whatever they were able to achieve in life, which is usually quite, um, you know, a high level.
Um, they all give credit back to military as their, um, as what set them up for success in their life. And the second thing I’ll say is that probably 75% of my classmates are now civilians. Um. And most of those got out pretty early on. Um, but nearly all of them to a man or woman will say that they, they all wish they would’ve stayed in the service longer.
Which is really interesting, right? Like they, they all look back as that, as, as one of the best times in their lives where they learn the most and it was the most impactful on, on, on them as a person. And so, you know, I, I just can’t really, uh, I share your same experiences in talking to people that want to go to those service academies as being, you know, the future of this com, this country.
And they are, um, and they, and they will be successful because they [00:27:00] choose to go that military path.
Michael Mitchel: Yeah. For me, I wish I spent more time at sea. Right. Um. Yeah, I did a couple westpacs and then I got rotated to a shore billet and yeah, uh, in state side I went from being ho my, uh, I was on the Midway Homeport in Japan and we did, like I said, two or three westpacs and then I rotated back to, back then it was Moffitt Field, middle Air Station, you know, those big, big historic Blum hangers.
Um, it’s now been the base of decommission at the tech tech park now, but, um, I miss being at sea and I wish I spent more, I did more time. Just, you know, I get looks when I say when, when I, when people hear me say that, but you know, I, I think it’s also the comradery. People miss that comradery.
Steve Joanis : Yeah. I think you’re exactly right.
I mean, I, I can’t, um. You know, of course when you were at sea you were probably wanting to get home and, and,
Michael Mitchel: and self. No. Oh no. I loved it. I did. See, I, I mean, ’cause we were in the Indian Ocean most of the time, and I would, you know, we worked 12 on, 12 off, 12 hours on, 12 hours off for flight ops. And I [00:28:00] would just, in, in between sorties, I’d sit there and just watch the waves go by.
I, I, for me it was just endless. It was, it was the best. I love being a sea. Well, that’s cool. Again, I, I, I get looks,
Steve Joanis : I just, uh, yeah, I’ve got, I, like I said before, I, I, and for some reason, Colorado, which is where we are, um, has a lot of Navy people. Why is that? We’re, we’re so far from any ocean, but yet I know it seems like, I find so many, uh, naval, you know, ex-Navy people here.
Um, and you don’t find as many Air Force people, even though we’ve got, you know, uh, the Air Force right down the road. Right down the road, right. So it’s just always been strange to me how many naval you go to the Army, navy, uh, game, uh, at a bar in Denver and all the Army and Navy people get together for that game.
And it’s basically. Four to one Navy people to army people, which always shocks me because we have Fort Carson here and no oceans within a very long, you know, 1500 miles or whatever. And uh, but it seems to be a great place for the NA Navy people to end up.
Michael Mitchel: I kind of, um, when I moved here [00:29:00] from, from the northwest, I, I grew up in northwest.
I grew up sailing, right? So moving here, um, I was kind of a little adri, pardon the pun, a little adrift not being near a large body of water until I discovered these little hills to the west of us. So I think that’s what made up for it. Um, but I mean, going back to going back to your, your CEO days, I mean, was there a moment where.
Like a specific project or you know, a pivotal moment in your career where that kind of cemented you on running a company and you can say, yeah, it’s, ’cause I did that project, or, you know, this opportunity popped up. Kinda bringing it back around, you know, for people who one day want to be a CEO, you know, that’s kind, we’re trying to show them how that can happen.
Steve Joanis : Yeah. So, uh, for me, I mentioned the fact that, uh, being in a venture, uh, being in a venture C community was a little bit too, um. Not restrictive, but, but, uh, but you didn’t have a chance to focus on any of your individual companies to the extent [00:30:00] that you could make a, as, as big of a contribution as you’d be able to do.
And so when I, when I joined, uh, the medical diagnostic company as the CFO, it was specifically, I took a sabbatical from my venture fund specifically to sell the company because again, we didn’t necessarily have a ton of business people in the company. And so it made sense, uh, for me to do that. But as soon as I got into that company, I knew there was no way I was going back to the venture community anytime soon.
So my sabbatical never, I never, it never ended. And here I am, you know, a whole bunch of years later. So, um, so, but once I got into the CFO, I realized, well, gosh, you know, what am I really doing here? I’m really operating like the COO because I was doing all kinds of operational aspects of the business that didn’t have anything to do with the financial aspects of the business.
And so. Um, I might have actually that had that title at the end of my days at Ischemia Technologies. I don’t remember. Um, but that’s what I was doing. And so then in my next job, they, they were trying to hire A CFO. [00:31:00] Um, I got introduced to the, to the group from some of the VCs in town in Denver here. Uh, I went and talked to the founder and I said, he’s like, yeah, we need a CFO.
And I’m like, well, actually, you need a COO who can also do the CFO job. Because that’s what’s gonna help you the most. And I’m like, so I’ll, I’ll join as a COO. Of course, then I got promoted to president. Um, and, uh, and then he and I worked very closely together as, as being, you know, almost co-CEOs in that we both managed the company.
And so for me it wasn’t a single event, Michael, which is what you asked. It was, it was just a, it was a, it was, it was, I was always looking for, for more responsibility, I guess. And it wasn’t for responsibility’s sake, it was because I actually felt like I could make a contribution at the next level. And having been on boards of companies before I was a CEO of a company, um, I think, [00:32:00] I think I could see what the CEO needed to do because.
I had been on the other side working very closely with CEOs for many, many years. And so it wasn’t specifically for me at an event, it was just a kind of a seek for more responsibility because I thought that I could do a good job with it. And so, um, uh, and so that’s kind of how it played out for me. And I know that’s, that’s different than other people because, um, I know I have a lot of friends that are CEOs of startup companies.
That’s all they ever wanted to do since the time they were a little kid. For me, it wasn’t really that, it was more of a, it was more of where, where can I make the biggest impact? And, and it seems like in the C-suite, you know, whether you’re a CFO or a COO or a chief scientist or a chief, you know, chief sales officer or whatever, that’s where the responsibilities.
Lie, and that’s where the leadership is required. And for me, um, it was either to be the CEO or the CFO, because those were kind of my skill sets. Um, but being a CFO to me was a little limiting, and that’s why I [00:33:00] ended up in the CEO seat.
Michael Mitchel: Well, what advice would you give to, to a VP who, who wants to one day become a CEO?
Steve Joanis : Well, I, okay, so that’s a very good question. Um, if you look at where CEOs come from in startup companies in the entrepreneurial world, which I, I’m assuming is. A pretty big, uh, uh, segment of your, uh, of, of your listenership. But, um, for, if you look at where in the early stage companies, especially venture backed, high tech startups, where, where the CEOs come from, nearly all of them, maybe not nearly all, but most of them come out of sales or.
They come out of technology, and it depends on which stage you’re talking about. So where do the, where do the series A or the very early stage CEOs come from? Almost all come out from technology because we’re product development because they’re, they, they’re tech people who came up with an idea. But if you look at, once you get past, say, your series B round, [00:34:00] um, usually those founders are no longer the CEOs of the companies.
Um, they’ve become the CTO or taken a, taken a different role maybe on the board. And usually the CEO is what, what we, you know, what we call in the venture community, a professional CEO, somebody who’s actually, um, been A-C-A-C-E-O before. Scores or comes out of the business world and not the technology side of things.
And so, so it depends on which stage you’re talking about. And so if you, my advice is if you want to be the CEO of a company, the smartest thing for you to do if you’re a technology person, the smartest thing for you to do is found your own company. Come up with a great idea and then do yourself a favor and couple yourself with a business person.
Who has done this before? Somebody that has a background that looks a lot like mine. Find a, find a veteran in the industry that can actually help you get funded and can help you keep your job as a CEO. Most of us don’t care what our job titles are. Like I said, um, I’ve played the same role in the [00:35:00] last three companies.
Only one of those companies that I have, the CEO title, the other companies, I had this, the president title because the founder, who was a technologist, desired to keep that CEO job. Title and I didn’t care. All I, all I really cared about was could the company be successful and could we make money for our investors and ourselves?
So if you’re a technology person, couple yourself with somebody like me, a generalist business person who’s done this before. If you are a, if you are, if you’re not, um, and you want to be a CEO, then the best thing to do is join a really great company and then aim to move up in the world. Uh, in your role.
So if you join as a vp, if you join as a director, try to be a vp. If you join as a vp, try to join that C-suite and get as close to the CEO as you can learn from them, and then make the case to some. Uh, to some young entrepreneur who’s got a technology idea that you can help them be successful and raise money and turn that invested capital into a return on [00:36:00] investment for everyone, including himself.
And that’s, those are the two paths that I see to becoming a CEO of a company.
Michael Mitchel: What do you feel VCs look for, investors look for in, in a, in a CXO candidate, successful candidate? Personality wise, not experience wise.
Steve Joanis : Well, I think it’s, um, I think it, it’s really. It depends on who the investor is, obviously, which is a, which is a bad answer, but it’s true.
Um, the rela it almost always comes, if you look at who becomes CEOs of venture backed startups, you can find a direct correlation with, with experience with between the, the C-level employee, um, and the, uh, and the venture, uh, the venture firms that invest in those companies. And so the relationships are the most important thing.
Um, I’ve said this to many people before. Um, if you as a entrepreneur, uh, think you need to be funded in two or three years, uh, or want to be [00:37:00] funded, uh, sooner than that, the smartest thing you can do is start talking to the venture community as early as possible. Developer, even if you’re not raising money yet, um, make a point to network with the venture community.
Um, get an introduction from somebody that, that, you know, that knows the venture community well. Start being exposed to them. Let them know that you can even say, Hey, you know, I don’t, I’m not raising money right now, but this is what we do. I want to get on your radar so that six or nine or 12 or two years from now when we are raising money that, um, that when I come back to you, you’ll already have a head start that gives the, the venture capitalist.
A leg up on their competition, which is other venture capitalists, but it also gives you a leg up because when you go to raise the money, you’ve, uh, you, you have a bunch of contacts that you’re tight with. And so, so, so really what the entrepreneurial, uh, sorry, what the, what the venture community is looking for, um, is, is number one people that they know.
Number two people that have a good [00:38:00] track record. And that doesn’t necessarily have to be as a founder of a tech company, but you have a great track record in companies that you worked with or for. Um, they also look for fit, um, which is, they don’t, you know, arrogance is not something that they want, you know, they want you to be confident, but they want you to be approachable.
They want you to have leadership skills. They wanna be, they, they look at it as, do I wanna work with that person? When times get tough, because everybody’s great to work with when times are easy, but every startup goes through those rocky patches. And so, um, you know, fit is, fit is as important as anything else.
And so it really just comes down to the basics. I mean, you gotta be good at your job. You have to network with the right people. You have to plan ahead and be in front of those people well before you need the money. You have to, um, you have to. You know, generally be, you know, if you’ve gotten to where a point in life where you’re gonna be a C-level employee of a venture-backed startup or any kind of startup, [00:39:00] chances are you’re pretty good with people, but you wanna showcase that.
Um, and so, uh, the, what the investors look for in C-Suite employees are all of those things.
Michael Mitchel: Is, is, was there ever, um, a piece of advice that someone gave you that you still use today? Um, as a leader? As a leader?
Steve Joanis : Um. That’s a question executive
Michael Mitchel: in general.
Steve Joanis : In
Michael Mitchel: general,
Steve Joanis : I would say that, uh, there’s, there’s kind of two pieces of advice that I got, um, very early on when I got into the entrepreneurial business.
Um, and it’s, and it’s, and it’s also advice that I continue to give to people today, 20 something years later. And that is, there’s two very important things, um, that are required of. Uh, of a early stage company in order to get funded and be successful in their business. Um, those two things are, um, you have to have a presentation that is stellar.
In other words, [00:40:00] you need to be able to present your business to anyone and in a very short period of time, uh, with a very tight presentation that anybody can understand, even those that are not technical, that that makes the case. That’s step one because that’s your, that’s your TV commercial, right?
That’s your, your elevator pitch or whatever. You go and sit down with a venture group, you’re gonna get a half an hour to make your case, and you need to be very, very good at making your own pitch. That’s number one. Number two is as soon as they like your pitch, they say, they say, okay, tell me more. And if you have not done a fantastic.
And well thought through financial model and operating model of your business that tells that, that you have thought through everything about your business. From now for the next five years, you’ve looked at every assumption. You’ve trouble shot every single aspect of your business, and you truly know what drives your business and your business financials.
If you [00:41:00] can’t answer those questions in meeting number two, you’ll get kicked out. So a lot of people say, ah, I need to be a big picture person to be successful in this entrepreneurial world. And a lot of other people say, oh, it’s really about the details in reality, and this is the advice that I got. It’s about both you as the person who’s trying to.
Run or start or sell a early stage technology company, or even if it’s not a technology company, you need to know all aspects of your business. What, and you need to be able to answer every question about it, but you also need to be big picture and able to describe it. In as few words as possible and as clearly as possible, and highlight all the best aspects of your business in a very short, lucid conversation without having to refer to notes or presentations or any of that.
You need to be able to give that presentation out of the outta your head in real time and be credible. And when anybody asks a question, you need to be able to have all of that backup available in your [00:42:00] head to answer any question that anybody asks you if you can do that, that those two things. You’re 95 or more percent of the way there as an entrepreneur, and you’re better than 95% of your competition and you can win over the venture community.
That, that’s, that’s advice I got early on. I’ve taken it and I stick to that and I tell people that myself.
Michael Mitchel: You know, one thing, um, Ben Deida iss a, a previous guest, and he said that when he went through a program that, uh, from a previous company. They’re practicing their presentations and one of the feedback he got was, don’t be too rehearsed, don’t be too, too practice.
Because you wanna come across as authentic, not just reg, not a robot up there on the stage, would you Yeah. That agree with that?
Steve Joanis : That’s absolutely right. As a matter of fact, um, I, uh, you know, I generally have maybe a 15 slide PowerPoint presentation when I go to talk to a group of investors. Um, I don’t have more than that.
I don’t have less than that. Um, [00:43:00] I, I almost never go through it sequentially. Um, I walk into the meeting, uh, ahead of time. I, I usually have had a conversation on the phone or in person, um, or know the investors I’m gonna talk to, uh, but. First thing I ask ’em in the meeting is, what do you guys want to get outta this meeting?
You know, what, what do you, what do you need to know? Or what do you wanna know about our business? They’ll ma, they’ll usually say, well, why don’t you just go through your presenta? Well, they usually will say, here are three things that we care about. Why don’t you go through your presentation? You start to go through your presentation, and immediately they ask four questions that are on page 12 Now.
90% of entrepreneurs get thrown off by that. What you need to do is you need to listen to what they say, and then if somebody says, well, what we really care about is the market, then don’t start off talking about slide one of your, you know, with your opening slide and then go into, go into the market size, and then go into the technology, you know, immediately say, okay, we’ll come back to.
Exactly how we solve this problem. But what you care about is the size of the market and the market [00:44:00] growth and how we’re gonna position ourselves within that. So let’s go there. And then you start there and then you work your way around and you try to hit all your slides, but it can be in any order that the, the investors want you to drive down.
The one thing investors hate. As if they fluster a person because they ask ’em a question on slide one and they say it’s in, it’s on slide 13. Just wait for it. And then they just kind of roll their eyes and go, okay, this guy’s never gonna get funded by anybody. I mean, and they’re checking
Michael Mitchel: their, they’re checking their email on their phone.
Steve Joanis : Yeah. And then, and it, and the old joke used to be, uh, you know, you have an hour meeting with a entrepreneurial group as a vc, and 15 minutes into it, somebody looks at their watch and says, oh, I have a meeting at Boulder. And they walk outta the meeting. And so you start with two or three partners, or two or three investment professionals.
You know, it’s going badly if two of them leave in the first 15 minutes and you’re left with the guy who has to stay because he set the meeting up. I mean, that’s the, that’s how you know. So you really have to engage people and not just, it’s not about you or what you want, it’s about them and making their case, making the case, and [00:45:00] answering the question they want answered.
So the smartest thing to do is ask, you know, walk into the meeting, ask people, what do you wanna know? What, what, what do you wanna know about us to make a decision to go to the next step? And that’s, and that’s, that’s, that’s really good advice. And that’s a good, you know, that’s a good point that you bring up for sure.
Michael Mitchel: So what’s the best, worst job you’ve ever had, and what, uh, influence did it have on you throughout your career? I mean, this could be a high school job, a college job, well, even not a college job, but you know. Not a career, not a professional career, any job that was the worst job you had, but had the, you’d learned so much from it.
Steve Joanis : Uh, so when I was a kid, the worst job that I’ve ever had in my life, um, was being a dairy farmer. So, uh, I, uh. I lived in North, well, I lived in northern Wisconsin when I was a, when I was a kid until I was 16. We moved to Colorado when I was 16. Um, and when I was 15 I got a job at a dairy farm and I thought, you know, that, that that will be a very enjoyable job being around animals, being outside.
Well, what I didn’t [00:46:00] realize was that on a dairy farm, you have to, you have to, uh, you gotta milk the cows three times a day. Seven days a week, the cows don’t not produce milk on the weekends. So seven days a week, you’re milking cows three times a day. It doesn’t matter. It’s 95 degrees and 90% humidity in the summertime.
Or if it’s 20 below zero with blowing snow at night on a Sunday, those cows have to be milked. And so what I learned was the, is that hard work? It’s very critical to most things in life. And I, and I think that helped me realize two things. One, that education needed to be in my future because I didn’t wanna be a dairy farmer.
Number two was that if you work really hard, I mean, I was a kid and I felt like, and I was working days, nights, weekends, I was working really hard and I was making good money playing sports and you know, doing all the things you do as a kid. Um, and I could work and I could do all of that and, and still be happy [00:47:00] in life.
And so hard work is not, is not, does not force you to not have a good life. A lot of people say, oh, you either have to work hard or you have to be well-rounded or whatever. I look at it as, for me, I learn that I could do all of those things. I could work hard and I could have a good life and be happy, and, and, and so it really taught me kind of the work ethic thing, which played out for me.
You know, going to a military academy, I, I had to work. Very hard there, but I was accustomed to it ’cause I did it as a kid. And then I got out of the, I got into the military and I was work used to working really hard at West Point, so I did okay there. And then I got onto the business world. And because of my military experiences, hard work was just part of my DNA.
So anyway, that, that was the worst job I ever had, but it did teach me a lot.
Michael Mitchel: That’s great. I really appreciate it. Well, that’s it. That wasn’t so, so, so painless. Um, wasn’t so painless. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I wanna make sure I didn’t get tongue tied there. Well, Steve, I really appreciate your time. It’s been a great conversation.
I, I think I, we [00:48:00] could have gone for another 45 minutes easily, but, uh, I thank you so much for your time and being part, part of the Exploring Talent Podcast. Well, thanks a
Steve Joanis : lot, Michael. I appreciate the opportunity.
Michael Mitchel: You have a good one. Cheers. I hope you enjoyed the conversation and took away something that you can apply to your career.
Please leave us five stars and a review on iTunes, so that’s the only way we can improve and ask the questions that you want to hear. Also, subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. I’d like to thank Jolan Crossland and an award-winning banjo and bluegrass artists from the Bighorn Mountains in Wyoming for providing his music to exploring talent.
When I think of talent, I always think of jolan. Please visit jolan crossland.com, US on LinkedIn under Exploring Talent, and my LinkedIn is Michael Mitchell with one L. Share our show and please drop me a note.
