Derek Horn
Welcome back to In These Uncertain Times a podcast about creating and connecting in the midst of uncertainty., I’m your host, Derek Horn.
Before the holidays, I had a chance to speak with Rachel Renock, the co-founder and CEO of Wethos.
A former advertising creative working across big brands like Covergirl and Hershey, Rachel quit her agency job at 25 in pursuit of more meaningful work. She teamed up with her now co-founder Claire to build technology that helped them scale their own independent studio to $1.4M in revenue in just 18-months. They’ve since released their platform to empower the next generation of independents to team up and launch their own Virtual Studios, providing the financial infrastructure to simplify complexities from pricing projects to paying teammates. Since its founding in 2016, Renock has raised over $5M in VC funding and has been featured in Forbes, TechCrunch, Business Insider, and the New York Times in pursuit of her mission to put more money into the pockets of independents everywhere.
Since we recorded this in December, many of the products that Rachel described as launching soon are already out, so go check them out at wethos.co.
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Hi, Rachel. Welcome to In These Uncertain Times. How are you doing today?
Rachel Renock
I'm doing well. Thanks so much for having me, Derek. I'm excited to be on.
Derek Horn
Of course. So to get started, can you introduce yourself to our listeners in your own words?
Rachel Renock
Yeah, for sure. So I'm Rachel Renock. I'm the co founder and CEO of Wethos. We as a platform Actually, we just launched our product. It's called Virtual Studios and we enable independent creatives and strategists to price projects, team up, and split payments together. All in one place. I come from an agency background. So I actually used to be an art director, I used to shoot commercials. And I do a lot of social digital campaigns, I worked on big brands like CoverGirl, Hershey, I shot a commercial for KY once, which was as weird as it sounds. And actually left, I left that job back in 2016, with my co founder, Claire. And we ultimately actually started our own studio to begin with, so we left to find more meaningful work and we were working predominantly with nonprofit organizations. And the long-story-short of it really is that we realized through that process, how challenging this scale of creative business, and that's what led ultimately to the technology that we built and ran our own studio through which we grew to about 1.4 million in revenue, and deployed about 150 or so teams and over the course of about 18 or so months, and the whole, you know, plan was basically to release this product into the world to consumerize it so that anyone can form their own virtual studio and COVID obviously, impacted us and really, I would say accelerated that plan, which is why we ended up ultimately launching this year. And that's where we're at. So been a creative been in those shoes. And really, our whole goal is to make it as easy to pop up an online studio as it is to pop up an online store. We don't have Shopify as creative entrepreneurs, we don't have that. And we're hoping to be that for everybody. So that's the high level.
Derek Horn
That's awesome. So how would you say that COVID, in particular, forced you into this new direction? Or is this some place you're already headed in the first place?
Rachel Renock
Yeah, so this has always been sort of a longer-term vision and the path to how exactly this is executed has evolved. As with any business, you have to adapt to new information to new opportunities, so on and so forth. And so we were already working on the product, but we weren't actually intending to launch it until next year. And when COVID hit, I immediately sort of saw a few major trends happening that ultimately led to the decision to accelerate. One was the agency world. So I like to call this the great unbundling. We're already we were already seeing a lot of changes in the agency world, um, a lot of talent leaving, a lot of people starting their own shops, a lot of people feeling like that sort of operating model, especially with the big holding companies just wasn't really working anymore for the new digital environment and the way that we have to sort of be reactive now.
So when COVID hit, we saw this massive, massive exodus between layoffs, furloughs, of really incredible talent. And a lot of times, what people do when they get laid off is they hop on Twitter, and they're like, "I just got laid off, like, I guess I'm freelance now." And then people network, see that former clients see that so on and so forth, do a bunch of inbound. And then they're, you know, we had friends calling us being like, "yo, how do I set up an LLC?" Like, "what do I use for contract" and we realized that that was going to be dramatically accelerated as the year went on. And so we were really wanting to take the opportunity to basically be the place where people could go to start and scale their studio, now that they didn't have that agency and structure around them. So that was one big trend, which is like the rise in unemployment and self-employment ultimately. The other sort of major tailwind is something that we've been keeping our eyes on for a while, so we are creatives ourselves, which is this creator economy, the rise of the sort of creator economy. So you've got a whole new generation of people, whether that is on Twitch streaming or TikToking or influencer houses in LA, I'm the creator, the creative economy has been booming and is only getting bigger and bigger, especially as COVID hit and especially as all of us were driven to our screens, right? So with that same sort of situation, not a ton of tools out there for people who make things or create things or provide services. And we saw a major opportunity to really lean into that and to give creatives specifically the financial and operational structure, they needed to scale their businesses, which requires more people, and more people create more complexities.
The last and third trend that really pushed us over the edge is maybe the most obvious one, which is this rise in remote work. Our company's been around for actually about three years, and it's funny like until you live it. You don't really know what those nuances are right, like, and so for us, you know, in February of this year, about 5 million Americans were working from home, by the end of March, that number grew exponentially to around 316 million Americans, I think that's about 95% of the population was either working schooling or socializing from home, basically, there was this overnight kind of recognition that a lot of things can happen from home. Being trapped in your house, and being remote are two very different things. Like, I really miss my workspace, was really was missing my coffee shops, I really miss all that. But this sort of CO overnight cultural shift was a major, major impact on our business because suddenly the idea of a virtual studio didn't seem so crazy. Whereas once earlier, you know, in our own studio, we were getting questions around, you know, how do people work together like this? Like, are they all in one place? You know, why are they in an office like this sort of traditional agency life of, you know, being a creative in an office. So that was the other major thing that really pushed us over the edge. And, you know, we saw an opportunity to make a move very quickly. And luckily, we have investors that are really supportive and support us. And so we wound down our agency side of the business, and we wound up the new product, and I'm super proud of what we launched just recently.
Derek Horn
That's incredible. I know that, like you said, You y'all have been doing this for a few years now working remotely? What was it like taking on this new challenge of completely pivoting your business when you're all in your own little pockets? And how are you communicating with each other and stuff like that?
Rachel Renock
Yeah. Oh, man, this has been really challenging. It's funny, I was joking. Like, in February, everybody, like the general population, my parents, my friends, what are everybody was like, "you're a remote company?" like "they're playing Sims all day," you know? What does that mean? And then suddenly, like, a month later, I'm getting emails or calls as an expert on remote and I'm like, oh, boy, here we go. So it's just funny how perceptions can shift so quickly, when they need to.
In managing the team and sort of getting everybody on the same page. So we luckily had a lot of operating infrastructure in place, we have a predictable weekly schedule that doesn't change: all-hands on Mondays and Fridays, on Tuesdays one-on-ones, on Wednesdays, Thursdays are heads down. That's how we stay in communication. That's how we stay in the loop. And that's how we make sure everybody is continuing to be on the same page. That said, we also usually meet up in person, every six months, as a team, or every quarter, I meet up with my senior team to do planning and strategizing. And a lot of the initial acceleration required a lot of strategies, a lot of just like stuff that I would strongly prefer to do in person honestly. And that if I could have I would have. But luckily for us, because we already had that sort of cadence and schedule, our team wasn't too disrupted or didn't disrupt our day to day too much. But it certainly had a huge impact on morale, and work, you know, and output. And again, luckily, we already had a lot of policies in place to ensure that we were creating boundaries and not burning people out, and so on, and so forth. So, it's been a challenge. But I think the biggest challenge of remote is the shift in communication from this talking and seeing each other face to face. Right, you read a lot of reading and writing.
Derek Horn
Nice. So do you have any advice for people who may be reaching some sort of inflection point in their own personal career? Or be or even if they're leaders of a business or small business? And they're thinking about making that leap? And they don't necessarily have the courage to make it? Do you have any thoughts for them to either make that jump in the first place or to kind of make this big scary pivot that y'all did?
Rachel Renock
Yeah. So when it comes to pivoting, I think I have a general rule of thumb that I think a lot of entrepreneurs generally make this mistake. And so my general rule of thumb is I am not married to my ideas. I am married to the opportunity and wherever that opportunity is, and so when we first got started out, we saw a big opportunity with nonprofits, huge whitespace, not a lot of competition, the space they need a ton of help. We made a lot of money targeting specifically that client because we saw a big opportunity, great. Through seeing that opportunity, we also experienced pain of our own which was like, how do you meet this demand? How do you scale up quickly when you're running a creative business? I see that as a new opportunity. So now suddenly, I have to let go of my idea of we were putting together teams for nonprofits, and I have to shift gears into, there seems to be an amazing opportunity here, around software and technology that's really needed to do this. And so I think what a lot of the mistake that people make is that they get too attached to their ideas, and they get too attached to the idea of being right. And then they end up sort of blind to what the opportunities are, and where the shifts are happening in the market. Because they're unable to get past their own sort of perception of that. So that's my first thing, which is, don't get attached to your ideas, I tend to share my ideas early and often so that it hurts less toil away for six months or something, and then you put it on a roll that everybody hates it, that's gonna hurt way more than if you toil away for six days and put it into the world and everybody hates it or loves it. So I like to do that very much early and often.
And then folks who are either deciding to take the leap or maybe they have been pushed to the belief maybe not against their will or not by their choice, I think the number one thing is that you have to start small. And it can really feel overwhelming. How do you start a business? That sounds big. I have a running joke that everything in life starts with a deck. Honestly, start with a deck. And I think in doing that you can work through whatever kind of business it is, whether you're a freelancer, or whether you're CEO, whatever. Why am I here? What is the problem I'm trying to solve? Where do I provide value? I think a great sort of "pitch deck or storytelling deck kind of hits on these three main points of why this, why now, and why you. And I think if you can just sit down and dig into the research, figure out what the landscape looks like, and just get started, just get started small, and get a good idea of what your business might look like, as it evolves. That's the best place to do it. And the way that we got started, way back, when was a Squarespace splash page and a Facebook group. We're like, we're doing this thing, we want to match people with meaningful work. Here's the splash page, we posted that in a Facebook group for advertising people. We got like, 300 emails overnight. That's, boom, validation right there, right? Like nothing fancy, super scrappy, didn't cost anything took a day. And suddenly, we were like, Whoa, there's a demand . So I would say like, as much as you can start small and continue to sort of prove the demand for whatever it is that you're doing in those little ways.
Derek Horn
Yeah, I think that it's very easy, especially for creative people that are trained to go in their corner and toil away at making this little thing completely perfect, and make sure everything's just right before you share it with the world. And then when it's reached this moment, where you think it's done, then you share it with everybody. It's very easy to fall into that frame of thinking. But I do think that I mean, especially in situations like you were describing where, say, You're laid off for you actually, it's like this fight or flight moment, where you don't have any other choice. It's like, I do think there is such power and just starting somewhere and starting with what you have. I mean, granted, this isn't my livelihood. I'm not, I'm not making any money off this podcast, but that's kind of how I started this podcast.
Rachel Renock
Not yet...
Derek Horn
Yeah, yes, yes. Yes, that's a good way of thinking of it!
Rachel Renock
I'm sick. This is just how my brain is.
Derek Horn
But like you said, it's like I actually did start to flesh it out the concept and kind of all that stuff with a deck and kind of just like, that moment of, Okay, I'm gonna put this on paper. It's not might not be the prettiest thing in the world. But you do have to start somewhere. Because if you're too precious with that, then you're just going to drive yourself crazy and waste a lot of your time.
Rachel Renock
Yeah, and I think to your it, there's the danger of analysis paralysis, right? Like of just getting, you know, decision making fatigue or like, start over a month and then not being able to make a move or not being able to do anything and I think, yeah, starting small starting with a deck starting with writing down that a couple of sentences. What is the business do what do you do? What do you offer? What are the values like? That definitely helps if you, if there are people out there though, who like literally couldn't even get started on that. One of my favorite activities to do when I feel like analysis paralysis coming on is I basically brain-dump all my unknowns. What don't I know? What don't I know that is causing me to feel like I can't make a decision or I can't make a move? And by identifying, you don't know what you don't know, right, by identifying things that you don't know, starts to clarify a place of where to start.
Derek Horn
That's really great advice. This year has been stressful and a lot of unknowns for a whole spectrum of reasons, but have you personally faced any sort of mental health challenges this year? And if so, how have you coped with them?
Rachel Renock
Yeah, um, yes. So I'll just get personal with it. Honestly, my aunt died earlier this year, a very sudden. And it was actually from a heart attack. Um, and so, this obviously shook me up in a bunch of different ways. But I think on a deeper level than just like the loss of my aunt who I think about a lot, and it feels very weird to be on the planet and not have her be here. Um, but I think a lot about stress and work and balance. And I think this was sort of a triggering moment for me, because, you know, in navigating this transition with our business, in Q2, specifically, I did nothing but work, what else was there to do, I didn't do anything but work and I really pushed myself I think to a place where my stress and my anxiety and was manifesting physically, um, you know, I was getting, like, numb hands and feet, I wasn't sleeping well, my mind was racing all the time, it was literally physically manifesting in me. And it was a real sort of reckoning, that, you know, I just turned 30. So I'm not 22 anymore, I can't stay up all night and be fine the next day, like, I can't treat myself in my body, the way that I used to or have been really.
So in understanding that, I need to basically make a shift in how I view myself and how I take care of myself. I think I had a lot of reckoning that I had to do with my own like identity and how it's tied to my company and my work. And about how I was ultimately treating myself and the question of like, why? Why am I treating myself so badly when I depend so heavily on my body and my mind to be able to do the things that I do? And it's been a really hard year in that way. But I think I've had a lot of personal growth. And I think my number one lesson or takeaway, I think, from that experience, from this year, which is ongoing, is a lesson in patience. And it's, it's patience with others, sure. But more specifically, it's patience with myself, and how I work and what works for me and what doesn't, and how my brain is, and not constantly like beating myself up. Because why can't I just remember that one thing? Or why can't I just do that? I think it's just having that patience with myself and my limits and what I'm capable of, and, and being as patient with myself as I am with other people. So that's been a big lesson for me.
Derek Horn
That's great. I know, earlier, you mentioned that Wethos put some guardrails in place to prevent people from burning out, from a kind of like a policy perspective. How did you all arrive at those policies? And what is that journey been like with employees?
Rachel Renock
Yeah, for sure. So honestly, full credit to my co-founder, Claire, who's our Chief Operating Officer, because she really does an incredible job of being really thoughtful about our employees, our policies, and ensuring that that really does align with our values and it's reflected. You know, when I worked in advertising, I had a lot of bad experiences. I worked with a lot of people who I think are good people, but in a toxic environment, we all kind of leaned into some of the worst parts of ourselves. And I think, you know, we used to joke like, we're not saving lives. Then why are we here till midnight? So it was really important for Claire and I to begin with, that we set those boundaries in place, and that we really treat our employees as people as whole people that we trust to get their work done, and that we give them the space to understand what's coming up, what those deadlines are, and how realistic things are. Because a lot of this comes down to if you're working super late all the time, if you feel constantly behind, something structurally is wrong with how your company or the company you work for is being managed. And if these new deadlines that are insane, are constantly popping up and you're constantly reacting, that is fundamentally operationally broken. And so you had these issues when you were in the office, it will only be exacerbated in a remote environment. Running remote is not about picking the right tools. Being remote is a strategy, it's an operational strategy, and you have to treat it that way. So policies that we have, as examples.
So one is, we have unlimited vacation with a two-week minimum. I know that unlimited vacation tends to trick people into never taking a vacation, but people burn out, and then they suck at their jobs, and then they're unhappy. And that doesn't work for anybody. So we have a two week minimum on that. We also have one mandatory Mental Health Day, a quarter, which I believe this year, we up to two a month. And so you can take that at any time. We don't have rigid working hours. So we don't say you need to be online from 10 to 6, East Coast time, because my team is distributed across time zones. And that doesn't work for us. So that's why that's part of the reason why we have that predictable schedule. Everybody knows Monday at Noon, Eastern Time is the company-wide all hands. So we basically find sort of a gap in the day from like 12 to three East Coast time where the time zones overlap. And we expect that that's when people typically have like more company-wide meetings or team-wide meetings. In that regard, that means that everybody identifies their own working schedule. We have people who have kids who are done at three o'clock, but they start at six or seven. We have people who love to go for runs in the morning, so they don't pop online until maybe 10 or 11 their time. I don't care, we don't care because we set clear objectives and goals. And we let people manage their own time in their own schedule in a way that works best for them.
I like to say it's sort of this reversal of right now or in an office. Your life revolves around work, where you live is all about where you work, or your apartment, your fancy apartment, the location of that all about where your office is, like, your whole life revolves around this institution. Overnight, suddenly, everybody was like, "Whoa, work is not a physical institution anymore." And so we have to make the shift now from I don't say like work-life balance, like say, like work-life integration, your work should revolve around life, life should take precedence. And work should be flexible enough to fit into those things. And part of being able to be flexible is also that predictability. Because you know, what is and isn't going to occur at any given moment. And if you're constantly getting random, last-minute meeting invites for things, you got to take your kids to karate. It's just it's just impossible. So that's another big thing that was really important to us, which was like setting those working hours, setting those boundaries, and really respecting and being cognizant of people's time from a meeting perspective.
Derek Horn
That's really incredible. I know that there's probably there may be some business leaders out there listening to this and being thinking, "Okay, that all sounds great. But we have our kind of way of doing things that have worked for us so far." Um, do you have any advice for people that might want to reach that level that you have, while balancing what's worked for them in the past, maybe more traditional ways?
Rachel Renock
Yeah, I think that what this really, for me, what a lot of this comes down to is accountability and trust. There's a lot of conversation going on about Microsoft Teams’ new analytics dashboard, which is tracking employee productivity. And it's doing that through how many meetings are they taking a day? How long are they are like, how much are they collaborating and docs, like spyware to a certain extent? My opinion on this is if you work at a giant office building, and half your team is on one floor, and the other team is on another floor, and they're slacking each other all day, you're already remote. You're already remote. Like, if that is the majority of people's day to day being on two different floors, you could, you could effectively be in two different states at that point and the meeting time in and of itself, I mean, I have feelings about meetings clearly, but I think like a lot of that can be sort of switched or swapped out and you can get the same result. So I guess my advice would be to hone in on what the outcome is that you're looking for. If you're looking for something like accountability, or if you're looking for trust, then put new mechanisms in place to reach that that don't involve you having to see somebody sitting at their desk all day. Just because someone's sitting at their desk all day doesn't mean that they're actually doing any work, as I know.
So I think clearly setting those goals and then clearly having mechanisms for accountability, whether that's about due dates, whether that's about you know, time to review things, so on and so forth, I think clearly defining those initiatives and those outcomes that you're looking for will help you make that transition and not feel as nervous about, are people working all the time? What is their output? Are they doing the things they need to do? In a remote environment, in my opinion, it gets, it becomes pretty abundantly clear, like who is contributing and who isn't. And that gets obvious pretty quickly. So I would just try to sort of embrace it and think about it through the lens of focusing on the outcome you're looking for. And then structuring your policies and your procedures around that. And there's, I'm not one to be like, "remote forever, that's the future." I love a hybrid model. Like I said, we meet up in person, I think that there are a million different ways to do this. And I think that it's a really exciting opportunity for HR to find that for themselves. And also talk to your frickin employees. What has been working for you might not be working for your employees. So gut check that.
Derek Horn
Totally, yeah, I'm by no means am I any sort of accredited psychoanalyst, but I just get the sense that that type of surveillance state, a level of feeling that you're being watched all the time, I feel like, I know, for me, it's like I in that situation, I kind of probably would, if anything clam up and feel extra anxious, and if anything that would probably distract me and reduce my productivity, because I'm just thinking so much about it and making sure that I'm looking like I'm being busy all the time.
And I think that there definitely is power to recognizing that your team members are adults, and most likely they know themselves, and they know their ways of working. And I think that there's so much magic that can be unlocked when you just trust people, and let them do things the way that they know how to do them. Because at the end of the day, that's why you hired them is for their own intuition and creativity, and nobody knows it better than they do themselves.
Rachel Renock
I totally agree with that. I think trust is a huge thing. And I agree, like, you know, being watched, it's like that feeling where you're sitting at your desk, and you see your boss like in their office, and you're like, "Okay, I'm not gonna leave until they leave." It's like, I know that really well. It's stupid. It's so dumb. And it's such a waste of life. And time. And time is the only thing we can't get back. So it's super important, I think, to build up that trust to put mechanisms in place for accountability. And then like, your manager out there, start exploring your newfound freedom as a manager, that time back in your day where you're not trying to look busy. Or you're not trying to make sure that your employees look busy, you're letting them deliver things. And that frees up more time for you to explore new avenues and have new ideas and things like that.
Derek Horn
That's awesome. So, from your perspective, if somebody feels that they're in a toxic workplace, or maybe toxic is too dramatic, maybe in a workplace where they think things aren't running as well as they could be. Do you have any advice for people that might want to present new ideas or ways of thinking to their leadership and present that in a way that's kind of palatable to them?
Rachel Renock
Yeah, totally. So this is, oh, man, this is such a challenge. My general rule of thumb, with anything you're trying to get done, is to focus first on the problem you're trying to solve. And in this context, you're going to want to do that in a way that isn't finger pointy. And so it can be little things like you-versus-we, and saying, like, I feel, and also sort of spinning that problem into a more positive light. So there's, there's, you know, you could say negatively, "we're not being effective operationally, and I don't feel like I'm managing my time well," the flip side of that coin could be something to the effect of, "I feel like we have a lot of really great opportunity to maximize the amount of time that we have every day and all these meetings are hindering that. So, I have an idea." So I would say like, think about the problem, think about the framing of that problem. Want to make sure that you don't get people like immediately to become defensive, and to you know, be blamey about it.
And then, of course, you want to present solutions. And ideally, if you can, present solutions that are backed by data. So, if you can propose something, like for instance, we cut down on all of our Zoom meetings a while back by using a tool called Loom. And so any meeting that is one person presenting something to it group of people which most meetings could be done asynchronously Loom lets you basically record that presentation in your own face in the corner, you want to read through it. And then we spend the meaning time discussing. So ensuring that any time that we spend together is actually effective conversation and discussion, rather than passive sort of observation. So I would think about solutions, present those solutions. And then if you can pull statistics on things, "teams reduce meeting times by x, or have an output more of blah", like, really try to make it not your opinion, not your complaint, but build a case, treat it like I'm building a case. And I've identified a problem, and I'm gonna be able to solve. And here's how I think we can implement it. And here's why I think it'll improve. And tying that back to business metrics, or the ability for the business to grow or operate better, bla bla, bla bla, will always catch somebody's attention. And so that would be my advice I'm trying to advocate for a change in process to you know, upper management.
Derek Horn
Yeah, that's great advice. I would even say that the first, the very first part of that is super valuable as well, just kind of how you frame this discussion. Because I do think that like, even just the things you listed, it's like, framing it as, "Oh, I see this opportunity for us to maximize" that gets people excited that makes them want to see this better future and kind of putting themselves in that position to visualize that, versus this kind of doom and gloom. That's kind of like, "Oh, this is terrible. And this is why"
Rachel Renock
Yeah, "I hate this. You're screwing this up." Finger-pointing just doesn't get anyone anywhere it makes you will close down, you know?
Derek Horn
Yeah. Back to the creator economy. What do you think the biggest way that COVID has altered that economy? And how do you see that impacting it for the long term?
Rachel Renock
Great question. I guess the simple answer to my real logic here is the creator economy is growing, and it's predominantly growing from Gen Z, from the younger generation. Gen Z right now- talk about having your world turned upside down. COVID acted basically like a giant ripcord to all of these things about our lives that are very relying, like I said before, on these physical institutions, so college is another example of this. You talked to any Gen Z, or who's entering college or exiting college or in college or whatever, it's, it's a hot mess right now. And there, I don't have the statistics on my head. But there's a lot of data now to show that Gen Z is the most entrepreneurial generation yet. Um, they are, they are not going to college at a higher rate as well. And I think COVID, unfortunately, or fortunately, I think shined a pretty ugly light on why am I getting into an insane amount of debt, to take classes on Zoom? When I could probably be Googling that and learn it on YouTube. I think that that is a bit of the entrepreneurial mindset.
I think, of course, that there's a lot of value agents to institutional education. But the point of that is that I think this has really opened up an opportunity and opened up people's eyes to getting started on something new, trying something new, growing a following growing an audience. And I think it's encouraged a lot of people to start businesses on the side. And it's given them the flexibility and more time back to do that. So I think this is a huge influence on the creator economy. And from a tech perspective, I just see so many amazing new tools coming up, I see a lot of funding going into technology, around this space, helping influencers better manage their businesses, make more money, so on and so forth. And I think that they're, you know, will sort of be this shift from people who are building audiences on a platform to people themselves being the platform. And I think that that'll be a really interesting evolution over the next 10 years or so.
Derek Horn
Totally. What are some ways that people can better listen to their consumers and kind of partners the way that your team did when you decided to pivot?
Rachel Renock
Yeah, so I would say my number one quality is as a CEO is that I ask really good questions. I actually have a Post-It on my desk because I also talk too much, I have posted on my desk and it says talk less, listen more, ask questions, I think that we tend to make too many assumptions about what a problem is or how people feel about that problem. And we don't spend enough time trying to get to the root cause. And so an example in our context of that is, we built a pricing engine. No one explicitly was like, "I really wish I had a pricing engine," you know what I mean? Like sometimes, like, your users, your customer, whoever, and I'm just gonna come right out and say that the pain points, though, and the feelings that we heard around pricing is really pointing this direction. Um, you know, anxiety around like, how much should I be charging my clients? Like, how do I charge my clients for something like this? anxiety around, like, what needs to like, Oh, I just pitch my client a big idea. I'm an independent freelancer, I just push a big idea. And they're like, yes, now I'm like, Oh, shit, scrambling to figure out like, what was in that scope. And so it was all these little sort of paper cuts around it that ultimately led to that outcome. And so my job is to is not to implement the solutions, people suggest to me necessarily, my job is to thoroughly understand the problem, and then present an elegant solution to them. People have asked us for time tracking integrations and timelines and things like that, features we're dropping on Friday, do not have time tracking at all and backing through the whole thing out, um, and it's very much based on, you know, managing your talent and not your time, deliverable-based flat rates, things like that. And it's a much less complicated solution, then all the billing and time tracking that goes into all this normally. So I see that as the case and I think doing listening tours, drafting up those questions, and then shutting up. Yeah, the best way to get people to open up and just everybody wants to talk about themselves, everyone wants to talk about their problems. So it's really easy to get someone on the phone to do that.
Derek Horn
So I totally, I really admire that quality in a leader is that listening and kind of asking questions to try and get to the root of the problem. So as a leader, I know, it can probably be easy to get wrapped up in the needs of everybody else, and kind of what they're expecting of you and all that stuff. What are some ways that you stay present and true to yourself in the type of leadership position you're in?
Rachel Renock
Yeah, you know, I think I think that there is sort of an ongoing recognition for me that my greatest strengths can also be my greatest weaknesses, and it completely depends on the situation. So there are times where like, I'm a really intense person, my team has given me this feedback. I know this about myself. And I, I'm very reactive as well. And so if I see something, and it's presented to me in a way, where I am expected to react right away, I'm not gonna step take a step back and like sugarcoat it or, or, or think about my tone, or think about how I'm delivering this and I say, like, honesty is all about delivery. Um, so I have put mechanisms in place because I really know myself and I spent a lot of time reflecting on my own self and behavior, to prevent those types of situations. So my team knows if you're gonna throw an idea at me, or if you want to walk me through something, send me whatever it is ahead of time. Let me digest let me get my thoughts together. And then let's have a conversation about it. Otherwise, sometimes that whole I asked really good questions, can feel more like what you just described, which is like, but why is this way, but why that the why that and then people just feel like they're getting like, attacked and drilled and that's, that's not a good place to be. So I think staying grounded is really challenging.
A lot of days I can, I feel like I'm being pulled in a million directions. There are weeks where I get feedback over here that's like "you're being too nice" and feedback over here that's like "you're being too negative." Um, you're never going to make everybody happy. But therapy helps to be self-reflective, being self-aware and knowing when your strengths or weaknesses are best applied because that same intensity that doesn't work so well when I'm being reactive to something is the same intensity that I bring into investor meetings when I am trying to close that million dollar deal. And in that context, my intensity cranking that up is perfect for that like standing my ground saying this is you know how this is going to be this is a vision, so on and so forth. It's the same quality that I have, but those two different contexts are very different. So I tend to believe that all my qualities are blessings and curses. And I just, I just tried to be cognizant of that. And then we give people the mechanisms to provide that feedback each week, in ways that I can help to improve. And again, this comes down to patience. I'm not perfect. No one is. So when I do fuck up, I try to be patient with myself and treat it as a learning moment.
Derek Horn
That's great. So are there any misconceptions that you think people have about the work you do? Or people like you? And what are they getting wrong?
Rachel Renock
Yeah, I mean, I think the biggest thing that bothers me the most or has bothered me through the years is, there's a term for founders who aren't engineers in tech, and they're just straight-up labeled "non-technical" This drives me fucking crazy. And it drives me crazy, because being able to code or not code is, in my opinion, not what makes somebody technical or non-technical. The pricing engine that we built, is built on the first iteration of that, which was a spreadsheet. And so I and my co-founder and I, we basically like, took this whole database of deliverables, wrote everything out, priced everything, figured out what the data structure would be, okay, the roles are tied to this, this is tied to that, in a spreadsheet and hand it over to the engineer, walk them through it. And, you know, I tend to refer to myself now these days, when it comes to design as a systems designer, I'm systems and innovation, because that's what ultimately, we've done is we've signed a new system. And I think it really frustrates me when people assume, like I get questions from people all the time, like, "who built your product?" Like, as if I outsourced it to, to some and I'm like, "What do you mean, like in-house like, this is our product, we've lived and breathed this?" And so anyway, I think the assumption that I am non-technical or that I don't understand how the back end of our system works, or so on and so forth, is just a misconception. Yeah. And I think that it's super important as a creative to know what those constraints are, even if you can't code yourself.
Derek Horn
Right? Right, that that does sound endlessly frustrating. And, for one, I know that even in college, just like hearing these voices, being like, oh, "designers should know how to code" yada, yada, yada. And I decided a long time ago that it's like, just straight up something I don't have any interest in...
Rachel Renock
Good news for you, tons of no-code tools now.
Derek Horn
But it's like I think that some of the most successful technology in history has relied on this really emotional and human experience. And I think that there's this whole world of emotional intelligence that like, even if you didn't have any idea what was going on, on the back end, which is not true. But even if you didn't, it's like there's so much that you could be bringing to the table is just kind of understanding the ways people communicate and connect and experience things. And that that seems very unfair to that there's this seems to be this cohort that is critical on that way, just because that's kind of how they've been trained to be.
Rachel Renock
Yeah, and I think like, there's so much strength in having been a creative person as CEO, honestly, compared to my peers who met many of them are either coming from like an MBA background or an engineering background, the way that I've been trained to creatively problem solve, all I mean, all day, every day is all I do is create a problem-solving. Now, the way that I've been trained to connect business problems and user experiences and design outcomes, super, super helpful. Storytelling. Yeah, amazing. Love to make a pitch deck really good at that. And I think like communication and to your point, the empathy, the psychological thinking through things, not just what are the problems, but how do people feel about those problems? All those things are huge strengths. And honestly, some of the best companies out there were founded by designers. Airbnb, founded by a designer. I think that there's a lot of opportunities for creative people to start and build big companies, and I hope more people do it.
Derek Horn
Yeah. And I speaking on the kind of potential of creative people to solve some of the big wicked problems that we have facing our society right now, one of the biggest things that have been dominating the conversation this year is this reckoning with racial justice and how that filters through every aspect of American life. And I know that pretty much, probably at most companies in this country have had some sort of reflection and hopefully a moment where they're thinking about how they can do better in their future, the future. How do you see yourself or the industry's place in that conversation?
Rachel Renock
Yeah, so starting with myself, I mean, I like to say that I'm an everyday activist. What I mean by that is, there are a lot of things that I do, just behind closed doors that I'm really in my mind to impact these things on an individual level. So for instance, I'm a mentor for an accelerator called Get Shit Done. And this is predominantly women of color and women-owned businesses. I have spent a lot of time diversifying my own personal network, diversifying my news feeds, my Twitter feed, you know, seeing those different perspectives every day, has a huge impact on the way that I see the world because I'll never know, really what it's like to experience racism, I just won't, I just won't ever know that. But understanding how it's impacting others, and then just getting up the chain to listen to that through a Twitter feed is invaluable. So that's, that's definitely been a huge thing.
I as much as I can, and you'll see this in a lot of even the company's marketing and other efforts, we have diversity and inclusion benchmarks for everything from the internal staff, we have to literally the illustrations we use, in marketing in the product, to the photography we use, to the iconography, to the inclusive language. And later, when we start to get into more territory around like discovering new teammates, the bias around those things, and there are things like I think that this, this anti-racism, movement can be applied on a macro scale and on a micro-scale, and it's this idea of, if you're neutral if you think you're neutral, or you're what you're really doing is approving of what's happening. And that boils down in a design way too. If we're not explicitly building out features that will nudge people to diversify their network or meet somebody new or get outside of that, then we're just going to let the same thing sort of perpetuating in those circles. So you know, we actually use a tool called the Tarot Cards of Tech, which is awesome. And it's basically like an exercise in what if Doomsday happens? Like, what if you turn into the next Facebook? Or like, what's the worst headline that could possibly be written about your product? Or like, how would a base of your most passionate community act, and just having that reflection, like, as technologists, we build these products, we put them out into the world, Facebook has the reach of the population of China and India combined, billions of people, they are the biggest country on earth. And they control what we all see every day. That is unprecedented power, and to not actively reflect on that and acknowledge it. And then after the anti-racist and anti-abusive, anti-toxic, rather than just saying, like free speech is irresponsible. Frankly, it's extremely irresponsible, as we've seen. So I think that we have a huge role to play. And again, I frame this, I reframe this, because this is what I really believe we have a huge opportunity here. In the next 10 years, there has never been a better time to rebuild a new system. And with the old guard falling, and this new wave of diverse young entrepreneurs entering the workforce and entering the world, I think that we're gonna see a ton of innovation, and a ton of amazing and incredible ideas and opportunities, and potential that has been lost because we've been getting in the way.
I think racism is 100% my problem. As a white person, it's my problem. It's our problem in our community, we've got a problem in our community, we got to talk about it. And for, you know, Black women, Black people, people of color: they're just trying to succeed and a system that gets in their way, we're in the way. So we have a lot of work to do. And I think that there's a lot we can do on an individual level and on an institutional level. And as I gain more and more power, frankly, more access to funding more access to connections to people, whatever, I'm constantly trying to be cognizant of that. What is this power mean? How is it changing things? How can I use it? How can I acknowledge it, and ensure I'm not abusing it? And I think we just have to have a really big reckoning with that idea of power and what we do with it.
Derek Horn
Totally. Yeah, to your point about Facebook and the immense power that they wield in our society and our world. It's like thinking back on this here particularly things around like the election, for example, where a lot of the measures they are taking these, like labels and disclaimers and things like that it really just felt like way too little way too late. So, because it really just feels like the boulders rolling down the hill and like nobody's really able to stop it. And that's like, the stuff that they were doing just felt like Band-aids they were putting on this problem. So it really is inspiring to hear about Wethos and how you in the other leadership is like really integrating this from the bottom up. And just kind of baking that into your company right from the get-go. Just so it's not festering and becoming this really, really massive problem that is honestly, potentially too far gone at this point.
Rachel Renock
For sure, that's why I say like, it's an opportunity. And it's a privilege that I have to build something and put it into the world. And that deserves thoughtfulness. And yeah, it is too little too late. And you work, you know, you've worked in advertising to like, I entered advertising in 2013. And I saw the shit trending in this direction. Like I was like, What? Put the logo on the first three seconds like the video play, like the inflated metrics, like, you know, like something I've always just felt like, you just smell that smoke, and you're like, what's going on? Really here? I just think that there's a major opportunity to actually be cognizant of making a positive impact, you can change the world, that doesn't mean you're changing the world for the good. And that's a really important distinction. Impact requires intention.
Derek Horn
Mm-hmm. So is there anything is important to you that you think more people should be paying attention to?
Rachel Renock
You know, I think that there are a lot of these conversations going on. And I think, especially around like the anti-racism topics, there have been a lot of people that have come to me in the last year around, like, how do I talk about this? What do I say? I'm a CEO, how do I not just my team, how do I do X, Y, and Z? To me, I think this is like, I guess very specific, but I think like, as white people, particularly white women, I think that there's a lot of work that our community can do behind closed doors. And I usually correlate this to sexism as well. I always say, to men, if you're not defending us behind closed doors, when we're not in the room, you're not really doing anything, if I'm in the room to defend myself, if I'm not in the room, and things are being said, and people are making comments that are super sexist, like, then and you don't say anything, then you're not doing anything because you have access to the spaces and the pockets of those conversations that I want and don't have. And I think the conversation that we need to be having more with ourselves is, what are the things that we can do behind those closed doors when we have access to these spaces and pockets of only white people who in the comfort of other white people say, kind of racist stuff to start putting an end to that? And those are the hard, hard, hard things to do.
It's really hard to stand up to your friend who just made a racist comment about the cab driver with a turban, you know, like, those are tough conversations, you're not going to get fucking pats on the back, you're not gonna get retweets for it. It's not something to go out and brag about. It's truly, in my opinion, it's an obligation. Because we have designed and created and perpetuated a system that keeps other people down. So I think like, that's a conversation that we need to get more comfortable with. And we need to bring our walls down, stop being so defensive, recognize that if you grew up in America, your bias, point-blank, um, and then start talking about how to move forward and what those solutions are because we can't move to solutions until we can agree that there's a problem. And we still, for some reason, cannot agree that there's a problem.
Derek Horn
Right. Right. And I think that what you said about that instant validation that I think so much of our society revolves around right now and that kind of gratification of getting a like and having that as kind of seal of approval, what you're saying or what you're doing, think that that is it flies in the face of what we really need to be doing. Like you were saying it was a really difficult conversation and calling people in. That really, for lack of a better word, it really is kind of a shitty conversation to have. Yeah. But that's what it's going to take to really make the progress in the right direction. Because we can have as many rousing speeches by politicians, or ads from Nike, or any number of other things that people will hear and be like, "Oh, yeah, that's nice," but not necessarily see themselves or see their place on it. And it's like when you filter down to that micro-level of those person-to-person interactions that you have every single day and stop people in their tracks in those moments then they're not going to see themselves as a part of the problem.
Rachel Renock
Totally, yeah. And we have to, again, give our space, give ourselves, patience, and the space to learn in the space to mess up. And recognize that when we do mess up, it does impact other people. It's not avoidable, entirely, but it will impact other people. And so if you're going to screw up, I'd rather you screw up in front of me, so that I can sit down, have a conversation about it with you without hurting someone else, then going out into the world and saying some racist shit that you didn't realize was racist, straight to someone's face. Because that really deeply impacts them and they shouldn't, they shouldn't have to receive that. And so I want us to create better spaces for people to ask those questions and get more people, white people educated on how to respond to those things, and like what racism is and the history of it so that we can educate each other and take the burden off of everybody else.
Derek Horn
Totally. And I do think that, that maybe this is a bit of a tangent, but I do think a part of that as well has, so much of this has to do with shame, and how those conversations go and rather than, I know that the inclination is to jump down somebody's throat and be like, "how could you ever say something like that you racist piece of shit," or whatever. And that just makes people want to curl up and shut down. And I think even circling back to what we're talking about before is like, it's so much more powerful to frame it as an opportunity to be like, "Hey, I know you. I know you're not a bad person, I want you to know that you said this. It wasn't cool. And I don't want other I don't want you to say that in front of other people and have them think of you in this way that I know that you aren't." And I think that like, even if you have a perspective that they might not, it's like sharing that with them is an opportunity, rather than this kind of finger-wagging, berating and all that stuff that, like you said, just people shut down. And then if anything, they may be even more inclined to double down and lean into some of the darker forces and voices that might be whispering in their ear.
Rachel Renock
For sure. We end we have, you know, there's data to back up that people just dig their heels right in, right, I think my tactic, generally speaking, and I love the framing that you just gave because that is totally right. Sometimes some of these ideas go so deep into people's, identity, that you can't just, it's on it, it won't make a difference to just correct that one little thing, right. And so in those types of scenarios, I again, take a similar approach of asking questions. Why do you feel that way? what is it that makes you fear that because a lot of it comes from fear? Um, why do you think XY and Z is the case? and just sort of leading them to their own conclusions by asking thoughtful questions and forcing that reflection, I found is really, really effective.
It might not change your mind and sometimes, if you're in a situation where somebody is so damn racist, that, yeah, you're not gonna change their mind. But the point is, to make them feel bad for saying and thinking those things because sometimes that is the point of activism, it's yeah, actually to make it is actually to like, shut down and say, it's not okay to say those things. And I think there's a spectrum of people who are saying shit, willing to learn how to handle it differently, versus someone who's just really dug their heels in and there's not going to be any dismantling of that but you want to make sure that they know that if they say that in front of you, it's not going to fly. Um, otherwise we open up space for people to have those thoughts openly and like, "Oh, I shouldn't have to keep this opinion in my head" like, yeah, you should. You definitely should. So I think it's like, again, case by case context, and it just takes training and exercising that muscle of being able to adapt to those different scenarios.
Derek Horn
Totally. Wrapping things up, um, one day, hopefully this period will be behind us. And when you imagine that day, what are you personally most hopeful for?
Rachel Renock
Oh, man, you know, it's been so long, hope has been just stripped away from us. And it's, it's, it's returned like we I feel like I've had spores or like hopeless years this year in particular, the thing that crushed me the most was this lack of being able to see the future or every time I pictured the future, it was a dark one. We're really heading and trending in a very dark direction. And I don't by any means think that Joey Biden is going to fix all of our problems, but I have hope again, and I hope that we can at least reverse the course on these things. So for me, like, I'm really hopeful for us to be able to take what was a crisis this year, and take those outcomes and turn those outcomes into opportunities moving forward. The crisis hit, we all went remote overnight, what is our opportunity moving forward to give people better work-life balance, to give people more freedom and flexibility to let people pick the city they live in rather than following a job.
One of the things we can take away from this year that we can move forward with and create those opportunities, I think there's a big opportunity around that flexibility around work. I think there's a big opportunity, again, around the new generation of entrepreneurship and the sort of like, new system and new world. And I think like, for me, I'm really hopeful for pushing us in a direction in which we actually see real serious change. And that starts every day with ourselves. And it starts with the people we elect. And it starts with the policies that we enact. But I think that there's just going to be, there's sort of like a thought out there floating around out there about the next 10 years being like another roaring 20s. After the last recession, and the 1920s hit the roaring 20s. I think the 2020s could be another wave of that. And I'm really excited about what people sort of do with that opportunity. Because I think, yeah, we can we have a path forward and the future is whatever we make it right. So that's up to us.
Derek Horn
Totally. Yeah, I think that this year has kind of shaped shaken up what people their expectations for what the course of their life will be, potentially been forced them into other paths that they will never have ventured down on their own volition. And that is kind of exciting to think about what the seeds that were planted this year will potentially grow into in the years to come.
Rachel Renock
Yeah, yeah, I feel like it sort of took everybody off their hamster wheel, you know, like, all the things that you're like, I live in New York, I go to work every day, I haven't at work, I go to happy hour, I got it. And like you just go go go and then suddenly can't leave your house. And I think everybody did a lot of reflecting on that. And I'm obviously very lucky and privileged to be able to, to be able to work from home and not have to physically be in a place. But I think it's a good thing. I think we got I think ultimately, a lot of really, really good things will come out of this.
Derek Horn
Is there anything that you'd like to plug? Where can listeners find you online?
Rachel Renock
Yeah, sure. So um, definitely, if you're a creative entrepreneur, check out the product. It'll help you team up with your friends, and scale up your studio whenever you're ready to do that. So that at wethos.co. We are dropping new features this Friday, which I like to call the war on free work and scope creep. So definitely check that out. You can find me personally, I'm usually lurking on Twitter, unfortunately for me, I am @RachRen1. And then if there are any founders out there, I do founder office hours every other Friday morning. So you can email me at Rachel@Wethos.co. I love to talk through problems. I love to I'd love to chat. And I'm happy to help. If you're trying to get a business off the ground and you need advice. shoot me an email and I'll send you the link to book a time and we'll get it going.
Derek Horn
Awesome. Well, thank you again so much for joining today. And talk to you soon.
Rachel Renock
Awesome. Thanks so much. See you later.