IAM1109- Founder Drives Engagement Within Teams

Lauren Fitzpatrick Shanks Founder and CEO of KeepWOL has over a decade of experience in entrepreneurship, product creation, software program management, staffing management, and engineering. She’s worked at 5 different Fortune 500 companies and is no stranger to being the “first” or “only.”

She’s the first Black woman to graduate from The University of Kansas’ Aerospace Engineering Department and the first Black woman to win the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) international design competition. She’s a recipient of the Women in Technology Rising Star Award, and she has an MBA in Operations Management.

Though she’s an engineer by trade, at her core, she's a curious, and at times overly transparent, conversationalist with a superpower of getting others to break down their fear of vulnerability and feel comfortable sharing as well.

• CEO Hack: Two books Essentialism and Atomic Habits
• CEO Nugget: Ask for help, don't think you need a co-founder or to know it all
• CEO Defined: Making a way out of no-way

Website: https://www.keepwol.com/

Lauren's social links:
http://www.linkedin.com/in/lauren-fitzpatrick-shanks-pmp-csm-mba
https://www.instagram.com/laurenriochelle/
https://twitter.com/LaurenRiochelle

KeepWOL's social links:
https://www.linkedin.com/company/keepwol-llc
https://www.instagram.com/playkeepwol/

https://www.facebook.com/PlayKeepWOL/
https://twitter.com/PlayKeepWOL

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Transcription

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00:15 – Intro

Are you ready to hear business stories and learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and level up your business from awesome CEOs, entrepreneurs, and founders without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, you've come to the right place. Gresh values your time and is ready to share with you the valuable info you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO podcast.

00:43 – Gresham Harkless

Hello, hello, hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO podcast, and I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Lauren Fitzpatrick, Shanks of Keep Wol. Lauren, it's great to have you on the show.

00:53 – Lauren Fitzpatrick

Thank you for having me. Happy to be here.

00:55 – Gresham Harkless

Super excited to have you on as well. And before we jump into the interview, I want to read a little bit more about Lauren so you can hear about all the awesome things that she's doing. And Lauren is the founder and CEO of Keep Wall, Wondering it Out Loud. She has over a decade of experience in entrepreneurship, product creation, software program management, staffing management, and engineering. She's worked at 5 different Fortune 500 companies and is no stranger to being the first or the only.

She's the first Black woman to graduate from the University of Kansas Aerospace Engineering Department and the first Black woman to win the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics International Design competition. She's a recipient of the Women in Tech Rising Star Award. She has an MBA in operations management and so she's an engineer by trade. At her core, she's a curious and at times overly transparent conversationalist with a superpower of getting others to break down their fear of vulnerability and feel comfortable sharing as well. Lauren, great to have you on the show. Are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

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01:54 – Lauren Fitzpatrick

Yes, I am ready.

01:57 – Gresham Harkless

Yes, well, I definitely can echo the conversation in this part. We've had some phenomenal conversations. So super excited now that we get to hit the record button to hear a lot more from you. But to start it out, I wanted to rewind the clock a little bit and hear a little bit more about how you got started, what I call your CEO story.

02:13 – Lauren Fitzpatrick

Yes, so my CEO story is quite interesting. You heard from my background that I have a lot. I've done a lot of breadth of things started in aerospace engineering and have always been a challenge seeker. I like winning. I'm very competitive. But once I got into corporate America, I always was chasing something but not knowing where I was trying to end up, you're climbing that corporate ladder and stuff, but to what extent, to what end, where do you want to go? And for me, I recognize that I wasn't so much happy with the day-to-day of what I was doing, but more so with relating to the people. And as you mentioned in my bio, I've been used to being an only or first in like an other always that outsiderness feeling.

What always got me through that feeling was the fact that I was able to be that conversationalist and to find commonalities with other people who didn't so much look like me or didn't seem like we would have similarities based on just outside looking in. So when I was on a long hour and 15 hours and 30-minute commute to a job that I just couldn't stand at that instance, there were just a lot of things about it that weren't my favorite. I had been talking on the phone with friends during that commute every day, every single day. And that was my greatest pastime. People would say, what do you enjoy doing?

And I liked talking on the phone to people, which I know right now it's like, what? That's absurd because we're all in this text message day and age and everything. It's like, what? Talking on the phone, you're ancient, right? But that was something I loved doing. And I don't mind doing Zoom calls and everything even nowadays because I like talking to people, especially one-on-one. And so when I was on that commute, I was talking to people and I was just like, oh, I wish I could like do something where this would be my job. I would just love to talk to people all the time.

And for the longest time, I thought I would go back to school and become a psychologist and become a therapist and talk to people day in and day out. But I felt like a lot of what happens with that isn't always about your happy moments and stuff. So could I carry all that weight? So that's the realm I was in during this 1 day for a commute where I came and I was like, what if I just created something that was focused around connection and relationship building and conversation?

And I came up with the name, KEEPWOL, which stands for Keep Wondering Out Loud, before I developed what the product would be. I was like, this would be the name of something. Like I want people to keep wondering out loud, and have conversations. And that's kind of what started me on this journey. That was the start of things.

05:00 – Gresham Harkless

I love that. And I appreciate you telling the story because I think so many times people might go to the site and they just see that all the successes you've had just happened on day 1. But hearing the progression of everything you've been able to do, but also hearing how you were able to take the lean startup models to some degree, it sounds like, and be able to test out those ideas, those hypotheses, see if they worked or you can run with them or see if maybe you needed to pivot and how you come to build all the awesomeness that you've been able to do today is phenomenal.

05:27 – Lauren Fitzpatrick

Yes, it's been, it's been a journey, and I am an agile enthusiast I was a scrum master and an agile coach and loved all things agile. So that was something that I had to embody. Like, hey, you've got to roll with the punches. If something's, a path leading you in 1 direction, you have to be able to adapt, reprioritize, and understand what are the needs of the customer, because that's what makes a successful business, not what you envision something to be, but what is the problem you're solving for the customers and what do they want from you?

06:02 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, it's so huge. And I think that a lot of times people that are entrepreneurs or CEOs or business owners, whatever side we might get, we fall in love with what we're creating and we have to be able to divorce ourselves from that so that we can look at things to make sure that they are serving the clients. They all are something that has that opportunity. So absolutely appreciate that. And so I know you touched a little bit upon everything that you're doing and how you're serving the clients. Is there anything more you want to add on there? And I want to ask you as well about your secret sauce, the thing you feel sets you apart and makes you unique. Is it that let agile leadership piece that you feel also sets you apart?

06:39 – Lauren Fitzpatrick

I feel like there are a lot of things that set me apart because I don't think I am what 1 would think is your typical engineer. So engineers aren't about the fluff, they aren't about really necessarily having the conversations and doing that deep introspective work of how do we create these good relationships, how do we make sure that we have good communication skills? How do we express ourselves? And I think that I'm different with that respect, but I also think that that's what people said, hey, let's bring her in, let's have her help. She has a background in engineering, but she also has an outgoing, more extroverted personality.

And then she's able to make people feel comfortable in sharing things that they typically wouldn't. And so I feel like my outsider-ness and like my different-ness was also, it helped me to be able to relate with so many different people as well from different backgrounds and expertise, and I was able to kind of be a chameleon of sorts and get into those different places and have places and have these conversations and get people to open their minds up to different ways of thinking. And so I think that's what is my special sauce.

But with regards to what people are now because I talked about it being a card game and what it is now, we've created an on-demand virtual game software and communication methodology. And so I think that's key because we talk about communication being a skill and we call it a soft skill, but it's a hard skill. It's the skill that's required for any relationship that you ever have in life and how good you are at it with the different people you're trying to have a relationship with is foundational. Like, you've got to be good at communicating to be successful in any relationship in any business that you're trying to pursue.

So we created that communicate like this software game plus communication methodology that utilizes not only last year but it builds in this empathy and then structured communal sharing to help teams and employees and just people build and just people build trust, deepen their professional connections, and then maximize their cultural intelligence. Because we talk about, diversity is a huge buzzword right now, but also inclusion and belonging. And we talk about those things, but all of those things encompass having heightened cultural intelligence. We talk about emotional intelligence and we talk about just having logical intelligence, but that cultural intelligence to be able to connect with other individuals is vital for communication.

09:19 – Gresham Harkless

Appreciate that. And I wanted to switch gears a little bit and I want to ask you for what I call a CEO hack. So this could be like an Apple book or a habit that you have, what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?

09:32 – Lauren Fitzpatrick

Number 1 and 2 are 2 books that I read and I read these books kind of back to back and 1 was essentialism and one's atomic habits. And have you read those?

09:42 – Gresham Harkless

I have essentialism. I haven't read atomic habits, but I know everybody swears by it. So I have to.

09:46 – Lauren Fitzpatrick

Yes. So read both of those. And with essentialism, the biggest thing that I took from that was because I'm the type of person that's like, oh, I feel like I'm most productive if I've completed everything on the to-do list. And what I learned from essentialism is, is that necessary? So ask yourself the question, if I complete this, how will I feel, is it still necessary 5 minutes from now, 5 hours from now, 5 months from now? And there were a lot of things on my to-do list that I would do.

And then 5 months later, it was like, well, I wasted a whole day doing that thing that's now very irrelevant here. But if I would have asked myself the question, 5 months from now, is this going to be dire? Very, very important. And the answer was no. Should it then be there? Or is it just something like, hey, think about that? Let's see what happens. It's crazy for me to be saying this because I am so agile, but when it comes to my business, it was a little harder. So that was 1 just key thing that I got from that. Ask yourself the question, 5 minutes, 5 hours, 5 months.

10:48 – Gresham Harkless

And so what would you consider to be what I like to call a CEO nugget? So this is a word of wisdom or a piece of advice. It might be something if you were to hop into a time machine, you would tell your younger business self.

11:00 – Lauren Fitzpatrick

I would say ask for help. Don't think you need to know it all. I think that that is the biggest thing, especially. And then I also would say, don't think you always need a co-founder to make that happen. So there were 2 things with that. Lots of people, like when I was looking to raise and like get investment money and stuff, I kept hearing like, oh, co-founder, co-founder. And I was trying to force like the force of co-founder relationship, which I'm all about relationships and connections and stuff.

But it was trying to force it when I've already had this company for 2 years, 2 and a half years, and now I'm supposed to bring in a co-founder who didn't see the vision from the beginning, doesn't know all of the information that I've brought, like wasn't there to create the product and stuff, but now I'm supposed to give them this big chunk of my company. Why? And so that was 1 thing, but also recognizing that you can ask for help and you can have a founding team and not have to give like 50% or 30% of your company to have this founding team.

So I think it's like reframing what people tell you because the real thing for investing in anything like that is they just wanna know that you're not in this alone, that it's not like, okay, if Lauren stops then everything stops, but that you have a team that you have support that you have back up there. And that doesn't have to be in the sense of a co-founder but can be a co-founding team or advisors, mentors, just that support system that's there. So I would say reframing what help looks like and then being able to say, I don't know everything and I can ask for help without you feeling like people are gonna judge you or think less of you for that.

12:46 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome. And so I wanted to ask you now my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. And we're hoping to have different quote-unquote CEOs on this show. So Lauren, what does being a CEO mean to you?

12:58 – Lauren Fitzpatrick

So yeah, that's a great question. And I know for a long time, it was like, Oh, I can't like I want to be the CEO. So I won't have a boss or no 1 be the boss of me. And that's the whole fairy tale, I feel like, Cinderella story of what you want to CEO to be. But I feel like being a CEO means making a way out of no way. I feel like that is a big deal. And knowing how to build the right support team, like I was saying before, to make things happen.

So I feel like you go from just being that founder or entrepreneur to a CEO once you realize you no longer solely own the company's vision. So if your company is successful, then the customers and that team that you employ co-own this vision with you and you have to be willing to be open to what they're bringing to the table. I think that's when you transform into that CEO when you understand that you're in service to others, you're not the boss.

14:01 – Gresham Harkless

Lauren, truly appreciate that definition. And I appreciate your time even more. What I wanted to do is just pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional that you can let our readers and listeners know, and of course, how best they can get a hold of you and find out about all the awesome things you're working on.

14:15 – Lauren Fitzpatrick

Yes, so the final thing that I'd let the listeners know is to keep going. You never know what direction something might take you in and I'm always I even tell my husband this all the time about opportunities like do not shut the door on an opportunity you don't know where that opportunity might take you. So take that meeting that you're hesitant to talk to that person that you didn't think that you wanted to talk to, go outside of the sector in the industry that you're in and see what's going on there, talk to somebody outside because you just never know.

As for me, I shifted to B2B from B2C and I had no idea and completely still learning this new universe that I have landed in. But there are people there every single step of the way, willing and eager to help. And so like ask for help. So those, that would be the final thing I'd want to leave. And then you can get in touch with me if you're looking to do, we do complimentary sessions for people to understand that KeepWol. It's very experiential. And so we love to like have people experience it before they buy.

So please feel free to set up a demo consultation with us at keepwol.com. Or you can follow us on LinkedIn. It's Keep Wool and then in parentheses, keep wandering out loud on LinkedIn. And on Instagram, we are Play Keep Wool. So we're at Play Keep Wool on Instagram. And then if you just want to contact me, contact me at Laurenatkeepwol.com.

15:49 – Gresham Harkless

Awesome, awesome, awesome. Well, thank you so much again, Lauren. We will have the links and information in the show notes. I love that last reminder. And so many times we don't realize the path of success is not a straight line as we kind of talked about before. Sometimes it's very windy, but the people who do succeed are the ones who keep going. And sometimes they go through doors that lead them to places they never would have thought possible. So I love that last reminder because it kind of captures that and reminds us of that. And of course, appreciate your time and the work that you do. And I hope you have a great rest of the day.

16:30 –  Outro