460 How a Refounder turned a Failing Business into a Massive Success w/ Patrick Colletti (Net Health)

Patrick Colletti is the founder of Net Health a $100M+ cloud-based provider of specialized software that serves specialized medical facilities like wound centers, senior care, and occupational therapy.

When Patrick began his tenure as company president in 2001, Net Health was experiencing significant financial turmoil resulting in laying off all but 2 employees. 

By utilizing a Refounder mindset as a framework for success, Patrick was able to spur rapid business growth and cultivate a flourishing corporate culture. He has spent two decades serving in multiple leader positions at Net Health, including the president, chief revenue officer, and
chief operating officer. 

Now he wants to share what he has learned.

In this episode, Patrick and Aaron discuss selling to private equity, building a company culture, and scaling the company.

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Patrick Colletti’s Challenge; Regardless of your experience or seniority, recognize that you can be the change that you want to see in your organization.

Connect with Patrick Colletti

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Refounder.com
NetHealth.com

Book Referenced
4 Disciplines of Execution by Jim Huling Chris McChesney, and Sean Covey 


If you liked this interview, check out our interview with Dr. Chris Howard where we discuss leadership and the role of universities.

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Watson: To start things off, let's just take people through what Net Health is. So, my understanding, and you can correct or add to, or men, whatever I say here, it's a saas company and the software that you guys sell helps with the operation of specialized medical service providers. So, a senior living center, an occupational therapy center, a wound care facility probably has a different model or way of operating than maybe kind of a conventional, a practice or a large hospital. And your solution is kind of tailored to the needs of those types of facilities.
Colletti: Yeah. That's a good way to think of it. So, you know, imagine that 20 years ago you went to your doctor's office, and they had a, you know, they had a paper record, and they may still actually, and they went through it and they filled out the information and it wasted your time and it wasted their time. And that the data was essentially valueless because there was no way to report or trend on it. And so what, what we did was find these really specialized markets where the largest vendors weren't paying attention to because they were focused on how do we just get prescriptions digitized. And we found quite a few of them, unfortunately, or for good, for good purpose. And we focused there and the idea was to find these areas where specialized care was, was needed, where outcomes actually measured. So, what I mean by outcomes would be, for example, if you have a chronic wound, it's going to be 12 or 15 visits until that wound is healed, or, more likely, if you don't get the proper attention you're going to end with an amputation.
So, it's meaningful to see in between visits, how much of the wound is healed or, or wound velocity or healing velocity. Those kinds of areas are the ones that are ripest for big data and for artificial intelligence. And of course, we weren't doing that back then. We are today. Those are the areas we focused on.
Watson: And to some degree, what you're also saying there is somewhat constrained, right? Like if I had those 12 visits, we know that I'm coming there to have the wound be addressed. And so therefore, we kind of know the limited scope of the data that we might be collecting. Versus if I have 12 general practitioner visits today, I have a cough tomorrow, I have a twisted ankle, the next time it's a receding hairline or whatever the thing may be.
Colletti: Precisely. So, we're very intentional about finding these markets that were underserved and they were complex and through the enablement of technology could be improved. And so that was really our focus. So, a specialized approach towards the healthcare problem.
Watson: And so the company is about 25 years old and you joined it back in your twenties. That's correct?
Colletti: So the company, yea you could say it's 25 years old. I think we got serious right around, 9/11. So, you know, it's about 20 years old from what we would consider the turnaround. So those earliest days where everybody was laid off and there were just two of us, that was the week of September 11th, 2001.
Watson: Wow. So, there's a lot there. And for someone my age, it's hard to necessarily have the visceral memories of everything that was going on. But if you know your business history, you know that the .com bubble, the .com bust, 9/11, there was a kind of very short window of time in which a lot of these things occurred. And so, can you maybe paint a little bit of a picture for where Net Health was at that point in time that led to you having to lay off a bunch of people and really, you know, re-ignite the company from the ground up.
Colletti: Yeah, so in many ways it was a typical .com startup. So, three folks had an idea, a doctor, a lawyer, and a computer scientist, and they wanted to build a company. And so that's, that's the way a lot of these things got started. Investors came in, debts were created, and we were attempting to pick a direction. I came in a few years after, you know, that part, and with a small group of people tried to try to pick a lane, but as many people in startups know it's difficult, you know, sometimes you tick and you tack until you find a customer or a problem.
And so, you know, this business, then known as Synaptic, it was no different. And so, after September 11th, I think a combination of a bunch of facts burning too much cash investors were nervous. People didn't want to put more cash into the business. We hadn't really hit a groove. I got a phone call from a fellow who was just appointed to be the chairman, and said, 'here's the deal. Everybody's laid off. We will give an opportunity to you and to Chris, who is today CTO, and we'll give you 90 days, we'll fund payroll for three months. And if you can figure out a path, get it to break even or flourishing within 90 days, you can go ahead and run it. And if not, we're going to close it down.'
Watson: And so just to paint a lot more clarity there, the burn rate was high. And that's very common with startups, right? You take investment in saying we're not going to make money now, but we're building something that will spit off cash in the future. Was there any revenue coming in? Was it just kind of disjointed and going into many different directions? Like what was the state of the union?
Colletti: Yeah, so there was a trickle of revenue, so that at the time, the company had a couple of product ideas but a very small trickle of revenue in the business. And obviously it was overwhelmed by the expenses.
Watson: Gotcha. And so, what path specifically did you choose? And, and frankly, like what were those 90 days like? Because that's that's about as in the eye of the storm, as you can get.
Colletti: Yeah. No doubt. Well, I relived them in the writing of the book Refounder. And so recently I've been thinking about them, but it was, it was a combination of, you know, horrific thinking about if this doesn't work I'm going to have to go look for a job. And I was young, I was 27 years old. I had just gotten married and I was not in the mood to go look for a job right after September 11th, 2001, which in many ways, looking back, felt a little bit like when COVID hit in March, you know, the world shut down, people reprioritized and reconsidered.
And so, Chris and I took a hard look at what needed to be done. We literally did things like enter bills into QuickBooks because there were a hundred or more bills that hadn't been opened. And so we had to get to the bottom of what was the problem and how big was it?  So we did some basic things like that. We also looked at who was interested in the products that we had, and we had three or four product ideas at that point. Where was the momentum. And we ultimately picked a lane in chronic wound care, but pivoted from a couple of the other product ideas and candidly said that the market, we thought the skilled nursing market was going to be the market.
It turned out there was a very, very small, but growing business in outpatient wound clinics. There were about 300 of them at that time, difficult to find, today there's well over 2000 and we thought, you know, 'what if we've got some software that can track wounds? Let's go right to the place that deals with wound care, as opposed to places where wounds are one of 10 things that they deal with.'
So we picked a lane and then the third thing we had to do was get serious with the debt and avoid bankruptcy. And so at that point we had 27 vendors that the company owed a half a million dollars to in total, and so any three of them could force us into bankruptcy. And so we had to be transparent and candid rapidly with them.
And then we had to deal with the shareholders.  Shareholders were skittish and concerned about the business, rightfully so. Didn't want to put more money in and  didn't see a vision for the future necessarily. So we had to, we had to do those steps wise.
Watson: And so one thing that you'll often hear with companies in these types of situations is talking about recapitalizing the company, which means if you are going to go and get some sort of outside funding in some way, shape or form, that means that equity shares change. That means that there's a lot of sales that have to happen. But frankly, just kind of like political management of all these different stakeholders with their different objectives, because this investment firm might have to, you know, show a return or liquidity in a short window of time. This other one might be, you know, a friend or a family that, you know, maybe back to you and had this kind of personal relationship and belief, like what was, what was that like?
Colletti: The politics early on were very simple. The company was about to die. And so at that point it was can we, can we be a going concern? Can you make it two more months or three more months or four more months? And so at that point there wasn't a lot of jockeying for position or for more equity. It was, 'can you resuscitate this thing? Can you breathe new life into the business?' So I'd say for the first year or so there was none of that. It was just, 'can we survive?'
Watson: Gotcha. And then did that change down the road?
Colletti: All things change. You know, we've been through four sets of shareholders at this point over 20 years. So we've had lots of different investors and, you know, as any organization goes from small, you know, when we, when we took over, it was a, it was about a quarter million in revenue.  And today it's obviously much, much larger than that. And so there are cycles with investors and there's a duty that management has to provide a great return for investors. And for their teammates. So all those things are really part of the equation. They all have different levels of drama and enthusiasm and highs and lows. And I think that's just all part of it.
Watson: Of course. So, another thing that as I was kind of looking at the timeline and my understanding of some of the things that net Net Health has gone through, there was, you know, get back to break even, you know, address this wound care market. And then you benefit to some degree from just having that focus. And then the secular tailwind, I forget the original number, but the increase in general wound care facilities. If you're the preeminent provider there, that's a kind of a wind at your back, so to speak. And then as you start to see more money come into the bank account, see that growth happening potentially have a better case to solicit that future fundraising, you are on an acquisition spree. You acquired one, two, three, four, five companies over the last decade. Can you talk about the decisions, or basically more like the window when you realized, okay we're no longer in survival mode. We're no longer and just like, keep this thing running and now we're in strategic growth, pick a direction and go execute it.
Colletti: Yeah there was a time, you  know, when we crested three, four, five million dollars in recurring revenue that we felt off to the races and we had been growing 50% a year since, you know, essentially the turnaround, and we had grown with margin as well. So we weren't losing money. You know, we had kept a 20 or more percent margin from that point forward. So we were actually saving money and thinking about what we wanted to do with it. And that was part of it. You know, it gave us the ability to be more strategic, but job one really was to do the absolute best we can in this initial market where we've planted a flag, and let's actually make a difference in the lives of these patients who have chronic wounds. And part of it was the sobriety of seeing patients who have diabetes, 15% of them are going to get a lower extremity wound. And then about 15% of them are going to lose one of their legs. It was getting acquainted with those kinds of statistics and seeing a patient, meeting a patient and recognizing that we were creating patient engagement through the tools that we developed.
And we were making the caregivers that treat them, we were making their lives a little bit better and easier to do their job. It was getting really focused and excited about the problem. It wasn't so much that we thought we had the killer product or the killer app. It was going a few layers deeper in the problem and actually becoming a part of the ecosystem.
And so doctors and nurses and associations, they wanted to be associated with us because we were really solving a problem in the healthcare industry. So I think step one was really going there. Doing it well, not taking your eye off the ball too early, because you're focused on growing to a hundred million or 200 million in revenue.
Watson: And it's so easy to do that, too. As soon as you get any sort of success like, 'Oh, and this and that and the other thing.'
Colletti: Sadly, it's typical. And so a lot of companies are destroyed and value is destroyed in those early stages by anxious investors and sometimes anxious managers who say, 'okay, great, we're at two, three, four, five, $10 million in revenue. We've got to pick the next five things.' But I think we really, we went deep, and we got right recognized for that in that particular business. And then once we crested 10 million in recurring revenue, about 3 million in EBITDA, that's when we started working with private equity businesses and, you know, they have a particular thesis that's, you know, it's, it's clear. They'd like to double, triple, quadruple or more their money in five to seven years. That's pretty standard. But the benefit, first of all, as you get to work with some amazing people, you have access to capital, both equity capital that they can provide, and debt facilities.
And so it's there that you become a platform. And the difference is a lot of companies have one product. And yes, you can argue that that's a company, but a company tends to have multiple services and multiple products. And so taking that leap from a very successful company, with one product, to a company, with multiple products that provides a diversity of things to a, to a constituency. That's the leap.
And so getting involved with private equity, for us, really represented that, and working with my partner Anthony represented that. So, that was the difference between, you know, Turnaround status, worrying about dying, really going to flourishing in a particular industry, and then multiplying.
Watson: And can you give us just a picture of, of timeline? So you said late 2001 was when the big layoff occurred and you had that 90 day window. And then how long from there until you started to in any way, shape or form engage private equity and start to go in this other direction?
Colletti: Yeah, so it was a little more than a decade later, so 10 years, and had grown by 50% a year, every single year. So we're doubling every 15, 16 months, so it was as we crested 10 plus million in recurring revenue, about 3 million in EBITDA, is when we engage with private equity.
Watson: And, and that's disciplined too. Like it's very easy, like we're approaching three years and I'm starting to get excited and bring my head up a little bit. And, but it's true that there's a lot of work yet to be done on the kind of core problem that you're addressing before you can start to go in this other way.
Colletti: Yeah. And developing some, some roots, both in terms of a business, what kind of company do we want to have? You know, what do, what do we want it to mean? If you come and work here, how do we live in community with each other? Like getting those fundamentals right while growing rapidly,  it's tough but it's worth it.
Watson:  And I would also imagine though, if you've had folks that maybe they weren't there from like the absolute first minute of that 10 year cycle, but the ones that came on in the second, the third, the fourth around 10 years, roughly, there's also a degree to which maybe the executive lineup for this company in particular is full or nearly full and there's rising stars or there's talent that you want to continue to provide an upward trajectory for otherwise they might leave. And in which case then diversifying into those different products helps you do that.
Colletti: Absolutely, yeah, that growth while scary to start is just an opportunity for other great people that have come up. You know what, in the early days I would cringe when one of those, you know, up and comers, what I would call Net Health Next, would leave. And then after a little while I recognized that we gave them an opportunity. They had a platform to learn and grow and they're going to do something great. I mean, our responsibility ultimately is not to retain them, it's to grow them and help them flourish. And so if they do that at your organization, fantastic. And if they go somewhere else as well, it's part of their journey. So I think there's a scarcity and abundance mentality. You can have there and don't get me wrong. I mean, you need to retain employees. They have to want to be there, but in the bigger picture, there's something beautiful about knowing they learned some things at your organization and they went out and did them elsewhere.
Watson: And if you have a kind of karmic point of view, there's also a degree to which if you did right by the people that worked with you and you maybe taught them a lot of skills, but also maybe like a specific industry, then they're probably gonna populate that same industry and other entities that can end up being business partners and customers and clients in the like.
Colletti: Indeed. And I've seen it happen through just about a generation and a half now where some people who early on at Net Health have gone on to do some really amazing things. It's great. I mean, in a way it's kind of like the right of  a grandparent, you know, to see people grow and flourish, come back and visit you. Enjoy those moments that you had together, particularly if you had a good culture and they want to remember those things.  It's one of the joys, I think, of being in an organization.
Watson: Now you've ended up in this interview and I've heard it in some of the other interviews that you've done, culture is a big deal, and that is part of the sustainability and the growth. And we've covered it so many, like, literally, maybe the number one thing we've heard from effective leaders on this show is that centricity on the culture that they build. And the culture, when you make these different acquisitions, Integris solutions, redox software, Optima healthcare, tissue, analytics that just occurred in may of last year, how do you manage that? Because you maybe, you have to set this standard and it's like, you know,  it's like when someone comes and visits your family from out of town, it's like, we have a way that we like to move around this house. And then there's this other person, you know, banging around, making coffee at five in the morning or something.
Colletti: Well, one of the decisions that helped us to take on private equity investors was we believe we had developed a culture that really was pretty special. And when we'd gotten some outside validation aside from just best places to work, we've got the outside validation. And so part of it was we'd like to double down and see, can you grow this to an organization of a thousand people or 10,000 people? Is that really possible?
And so, as we acquired our first few businesses, we made lots of mistakes, just like everybody does, but we knew as we welcome new people to the enterprise, we actually had something beautiful to offer them. And the majority of people I know have worked in some pretty awful environments and they come beaten, battered, bruised from rough managers, bad cultures, toxic environments- the lot of it. And so I knew early on we had something special, so it was easy for me to greet them and smile and say, 'this is a good thing you're about to experience.' What's interesting is not everybody is open to accepting a gift. And sometimes even if you have something amazing to give someone, they don't want to receive it, or they've been too beaten up and battered to receive it that day.
Now over time, they'll see, taste and enjoy and understand that there's something better there, but it takes time. So that's one reflection I have on,  in terms of culture and acquisitions and the nature of imperialism, so to speak. Another one is that although we had, we thought killer programs, and people practices and things like connecting where we brought everybody together, and net talks, which is our version of Ted talks, you know, we had these things that we thought were beautiful and wonderful. They had expressions that were important to them as well. And so if you're not paying attention to the cultural expression of that organization and maybe one or two things they did really well that they want to keep doing, then you're full.
And so you've got to pay enough attention to what they've done and what they do to recognize culture's big enough to absorb more things. And so you can bring those things in as well. So looking very carefully at  some of the rituals and some of the things they did as an organization that are worthwhile and important to keep doing, embrace them as well, and bring them in.
Watson: So, you referenced the pandemic. And I would say, I wouldn't say, most people would say that the 2008 financial crisis was another kind of macro economic hurdle to try to overcome while you're holding the reins of a business. So can you maybe paint some similarities and comparisons and differences to, you know, 2001, really being kind of like the eye of the storm or rebuilding, re foundering this thing from the ground up? And then these subsequent two were not necessarily that you were maybe able to predict them precisely, but having been through one storm, how did that steal you? Or how did that prepare you to deal with it a second and a third time?
Colletti: [ Indeed. And I want to touch on something you just mentioned, which is every organization needs refounders. And many people don't recognize that they need it. But once people start to develop some success, it always happens. They get fat and happy. It's just a norm. People lose their level of competitiveness. They, as the revenues go up and the earnings get higher and you potentially put a flag in the ground and you're the leader.
Entropy occurs and it seems like it's inevitable, and that's why every stage along the way, companies need refounders. And so whether that's your next gen, whether that's people that have been there quite a long time, they need these challengers to shake things up in the organization. So to answer your question, you know, early on, it was easy, it was change or die. And so the refounder moment was black and white. It was the debt is going to kill you, you got to pick a product, you gotta make it happen. And that was just survival mode. Around 2008, when the next financial crisis occurred, it was batten down the hatches, and aren't you glad you saved some pennies?
Let's be really smart, that expense follows revenue. And that was a good lesson we learned early on. Which is, we're not going to live with a massive burn. We are going to go through this entire thing with some margin. And that's very unpopular. And there's times where it's important to not have margin, particularly when you take on a new market, you're growing quickly, you're getting market share. I get that, but for us it has been a discipline and helpful. And then in that next phase, it was how do you reinvent a business that has two, three, four, five product lines to have service bureaus and really be able to support multiple lines of business and get the leverage that you need out of it? Because you don't essentially just want to have five companies there.
You know, you want to get the leverage in the balance and the flywheel effect from it. And so it was, you needed refounders who had essentially been there and done that, or were willing to seek that new ground and take it.
Watson: So in 2017, the company was acquired by some really substantial private equity partners. The Carlisle group for the folks that don't know is one of the biggest in the whole game. And I would imagine that they, you know, to some degree, it's very hard to maybe wrap your head around this, but money is fungible, right? Like when you were big enough, when you are successful enough, there are multiple entities where you can potentially get capital from. And one of the, I would imagine, sales pitches from a group like that is that there is that we've been there, we've seen it, we've done it before. And this may be your time, Patrick's first time creating that flywheel, integrating these different business units, but we've helped umpteen dozen companies do the same. So is that part of the equation or where did you go to find the expertise in those rebounders that you needed for that period of time?
Colletti: Yeah. Yep. And prior to the Carlisle group and, and also in this round, we've got level equity and silver Smith as well, so just great, great partners.
Prior to them, we had Spectrum. So we went through an entire six year phase with just a terrific group of people at Spectrum with great resources, brilliant people, and a lot of the lessons that you learn along the way. So to answer your question though, how do we find those refounders, it's really two or three areas. So the first one is outside expertise. I'm a big fan of mentoring and being mentored. And, you know, you should have a personal board of directors. It's very uncomfortable for some people. And, you know, I just saw Simon Sinek posted about this the other day, saying that when you seek a mentor, you don't just walk up to some random person on the street. You have to have a relationship. And so it really does start from a relationship and it's a two-way street. And so, you know, the first part of the answer is you find refounders from people who have outside experience that can apply an analog to what you're doing and can teach you. And so that's, that's the first one.
And that comes in the form of independent board directors, comes in the form of advisors, investors, you seeking externally other people who have ideas and can apply those ideas to your business. But that takes humility. And so where I can point out how you find founders at each step, along the way, it's going to require some humility.
So that's one way. Another is that it's right underneath your nose. And there are what we would call Net Health Next. There is a next level group of people. It doesn't imply that they're young, either that have experience and have ideas. And in many cases already know how to solve the problems. One of the examples I tell in the book is, you know, a young post intern employee challenged a group of us to read a book, and we had this late night email and I'm thinking, ah, what. What's wrong? This isn't good. You know, a 2:00 AM email isn't a good thing. And he challenged the executive leadership team to read a book, and it turned out he was right. We needed a gut check on a few areas. And we did. And so sometimes those refunders are, are right there in your midst. And you just need to really be able to listen to them.
Watson: What was the book?
Colletti: It was The Four Disciplines of Execution for DX. And really the main teaching of the book is the difference between lead and lag measures. And most businesses say they follow lead indicators, but they really just track lag indicators.
And so most strategic plans have a lot of lag indicators, not lead indicators. And so for us, it was a good reminder. And in some ways, a wake up call that you gotta be tracking the right thing.
Watson: Amen to that. Well, one of the characters in the book I believe is Dr. Chris Howard from RMU.
Colletti: Indeed. Yep. Dr. Howard comes towards the end of the book and he talks a lot about his VU car, world ideas.
Watson: So he is one of the most popular episodes that we've ever done of this show. He like, you know, people would talk about listening to the conversation that we had with him multiple times, because of just maybe just the bare tone of his voice, but also the deep wisdom that he has.
Colletti: So you're laying down the gauntlet right now.
Watson: Well, I'm just curious, like, you know, I'm sure that you spent much time outside of just, what was, you know, captured in the book that people will eventually read and hear. But like, what's your favorite Dr. Chris Howard experience or conversation or takeaway?
Colletti: Well, not as it relates to the book, but I'll tell you one of my favorite experiences with him. Maybe two years ago, my oldest son launched something called Free the Music PGH, and the idea was born out of seeing a publicly played piano. And he said, 'Hey, Hey dad, why don't we bring that to Pittsburgh? Like, why isn't that a thing?' And so we, we developed this plan. We got lots of people to donate pianos. We found lots of local artists, they painted the pianos. And I mentioned  this to Chris early on, and wouldn't, you know it, at the launch party he was front and center with his wife and children, you know, showed up early, kind of stayed late and was part of this thing that was really my son's event. And at that point I had only known him maybe six or 12 months. So that's a story you won't hear from anybody besides me, but it talks about the character of this guy, Dr. Howard
Watson:And It tells you a lot about what is resonant to people, which is showing up not necessarily when you're called explicitly. Like that's, that's what creates memories for people.
Colletti: Absolutely.
Watson: Amen. Well, Patrick, I want people to make sure that they both check out the book, check out Net Health, check out the stuff that you're up to. Before we give people the digital coordinates that they can go to, to follow that stuff, anything else you were hoping to share today that I just didn't give you the chance to?
Colletti: Yeah. So the book is really an encouragement for people to rethink the places that they live, work and play. So yes, absolutely, it's a business book and many of the stories we tell are business books as well, but it's broader than that. And so there are people that need help in their relationships, and there are people who want to revive their neighborhood. We have stories in the book as well about that.
Watson: And often I would imagine if there's good bones in place or any sort of bones in place, you're actually at a head start relative to starting from a dead stop.
Colletti:  Absolutely.
Watson: Right on. So for people that wanna check it out, they want to learn more about all the stuff that you're working on, what digital coordinates can we provide people?
Colletti: So for more information about the book Refounder, you can find it at www.Refounder.com. You're welcome to connect with me or follow me on LinkedIn, Patrick Coletti. And I think that's it.
Watson: Beautiful. We're going to link that all in the show notes, GoingDeepwithAaron.com/podcast or in the app where you're probably listening to this right now. Is 'refounder,' was that a word that you had already seen out there or is that like an original you've got like the rights to the term refounder?
Colletti: Yeah. So I've used that word off and on for about 10 years and it was crystallized for me, right around 2017, when I was meeting with one of our current board directors, Donna Maria. And she would always introduce me as the founder of Net Health, and I would say, well, I'm actually not the founder of Net Health, I'm really a refounder and it would give me the opportunity to share that. So I've used it in common conversation since around 2016. It's, you know, if you Google it, you'll find a couple of other people out there. I quoted one person in the book who wrote an article in 2017 but I think it's more common than people may think.
Watson: Gotcha. Well, it's a good corner to plant your flag on.
Colletti: Yeah.
Watson: Like I said, we'll link that to everyone and they'll be able to check it out, but before we let you go, Patrick, I want to give you the mic one final time to issue an actionable personal challenge to the audience.
Colletti: So if you're in college, I want to give you an encouragement that there are amazing organizations out there that are trying to create a better future. If you're a young professional and you're getting cynical because of the organization you work in, part of the challenge is that you are the change and there's a way to do that.
And there's a stepwise process, there's an assessment profile that you may fit into, but it is doable. And so for those of you who are middle managers, or culture gurus in an organization, you feel like nobody's listening, or for CEO's who know something needs to change, there's absolutely a way you need refounders in your organization.
Watson: So it sounds like, you know, the important part is after just even recognizing that there might be something wrong is the belief that it is even possible, like understate, like believing that that change can occur.
Colletti: Yeah. So there's these four areas we think about in the book. And the first one is that you have to take a sober look at hard realities. And that's hard because a lot of people don't like to take sober looks and a lot of people don't like to look at hard things. And so combining those two things together as a big deal. Next is, to borrow a phrase, you've got to kill your darlings. And so this is a fancy way of saying selectively focus. We all have lots of opportunities and lots of things we could do, but there's really one or two things we need to do. And then the third is you have to imagine new possibilities just because you've taken a sober look at hard realities, and you've been able to focus, now you actually need to imagine how it could be much better and that creativity is key. And if you don't have it, it's your, the refounding that you're working on, won't ultimately survive. But the last and possibly the most important is execution. But, execution is an overused phrase, executing on the notion that you're creating better realities for people is the reason why there always has to be a just cause and a bigger purpose. And so just executing for executing sake will eventually fall flat. You got to do it for a bigger purpose.
Watson: Beautiful. What a powerful note to wrap up on.
Colletti: Thank you.
Watson: Patrick, thanks so much for coming on the podcast.
Colletti: Thanks.