The Two Mindsets Every Growth Team Needs
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Hi there - I’m a hands-on operating partner to founder-led companies and a fractional COO. Over 20+ years, I have applied my growth and operations experience to help dozens of startups (Axiom, Spartan, etc.), having begun my career as a business and technology lawyer in New York City. So far, I have helped build one high-impact startup to nearly $100M in revenue and a second to exceed that benchmark.
In my first business role after leaving my position as a Technology Transactions Associate at Morrison & Foerster, I worked at a New York City venture-backed startup—a firm client. It was an exciting time at this company, which was creating a new software and hardware product in the AdTech space backed by top dot-com-era companies and investors.
I had a business development role, which entailed using my transactional skills gained as an attorney (1) to pursue strategic relationships to grow the company, and (2) to negotiate critical technology partnerships underpinning the product. I interfaced directly with the engineering, sales, marketing and product teams. We were on a very tight schedule to launch for our first client, Virgin, and we successfully got everything in place on time for the 10,000+ people on the wait list. But it was tight.
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My teammates had MBAs from places like Darden, at the University of Virginia, and Wharton, at the University of Pennsylvania.
The company had also engaged the design consultancy IDEO to assist with product design.
I interacted with both groups, and that experience became the formative work experience I never expected.
Why?
The “MBA”-types had incredible strengths in deductive reasoning, quantitative abilities and big-picture, top-down insight generation.
The “design”-types excelled in their inductive reasoning skills, qualitative abilities and big-picture, bottom-up insights.
They each brought a valuable and necessary—but often different—perspective to problem-solving and decision-making.
Particular strengths of MBAs were discipline in working with data and a drive to make decisions. A particular strength of the designer, or "lean," mindset was the humility they demonstrated in acknowledging that one may not have all the answers, which fueled their curiosity to close those gaps. Both groups shared attention to detail and analytical rigor, as well as a focus on fact-gathering and assumption testing.
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The real magic happened where the two approaches overlapped: for example, a data-driven hypothesis was paired with a test with real people before we placed a big bet.
From those days on, I made a point of building and deepening my skills and experience in both domains. I didn’t want to be just one or the other but to embody both approaches, and I’m not alone anymore. It’s been exciting to see more people embrace this hybrid professional development model in the years since.
For founders of growth companies, the takeaway is straightforward: hire people and build a team that can do both. The best problem-solving happens where humility, analytical rigor, data and a bias to action meet.
Let’s connect to discuss how these ideas apply to your team.
Read about past projects that highlight the design thinking approach in my portfolio.