Nick DeMarinis - Director, Enterprise Growth @WeWork (Formerly @LinkedIn, @Yahoo) - The Trusted Advisor Equation (Numerator, Denominator), The Mindset & Execution Tactics for Individual Recognition, Your Personal Board of Directors

Guest:

Nick DeMarinis - Director, Enterprise Growth @WeWork

(Formerly @LinkedIn, @Yahoo)

Guest Background:

Nick DeMarinis is Director, Enterprise Growth for WeWork based at their HQ in New York City. Previously he spent 13 years in the technology industry with Yahoo and LinkedIn. At LinkedIn, he held various leadership roles across both North America and Asia-Pacific while based in Hong Kong. 

Nick holds a Bachelor's Degree from Saint Leo University in Tampa, Florida and a Master’s Degree in International Business from St. John's University in Rome, Italy. 

On a personal note, he has identical twin boys that just turned one, and prays that one day the New York Knicks will be relevant again.

Guest Links:

LinkedIn | Twitter

Episode Summary:

In this episode, we cover:

- The Trusted Advisor Equation - The Numerator, The Denominator

- Recognition Mindset & Method - Gratitude, Strengths

- The Power of Storytelling

- Your Personal Board of Directors

- Nick's Go-to Coaching Framework - The GROW Model

Full Interview Transcript:

Naber:  Hello friends around the world. My name is Brandon Naber. Welcome to The Naberhood, where we have switched on, fun discussions with some of the most brilliant, successful, experienced, talented and highly skilled Sales and Marketing minds on the planet, from the world's fastest growing companies. Enjoy!

Naber:  Hey everybody. Today we've got Nick DeMarinis on the show. Nick is a Director of Enterprise growth for WeWork (a Pre-IPO Unicorn with a valuation of $47 billion). Nick is based at their headquarters in New York City. Previously he spent 13 years in the technology industry with Yahoo! (a $4.5 billion acquisition by Verizon) and LinkedIn (a $27 billion acquisition by Microsoft and they also IPO back in 2011). At LinkedIn, Nick held various leadership roles across both North America and Asia Pacific, while based in Hong Kong. Nick holds a bachelor's degree from Saint Leo University in Tampa, Florida and a Master's degree in International Business from St John's University in Rome, Italy. On a personal note, he has identical twin boys that just turned one, and he prays that one day the New York Knicks will be relevant again. Here we go.

Naber:  Mr Nick D, in the house. Good to have you on the show, man. Thanks so much for coming.

Naber:  Naber, anything for you my man. Wow, anything, I like that. Don't. Tempt. Me. So, I am so excited to have you on. You're a world-class dude. So many people in my inter and outer circle know who you are, have crossed paths with you, have worked with you, have worked for you, you've worked for, or just some sort of combination thereof, and there's just not enough nice things to say about you as a dude, let alone, as a professional. So, I'm excited to have you on. So one of the things I want to do is, we're going to jump through some of your personal life, a little bit about where you grew up, how you grew up, what you were like, all the way through school. And then what we'll hop into is, the bulk of what we'll talk about today, which is your professional experience. And both the strengths and learnings you've gained along the way, but some of your superpowers that you are just top 1% in the world at, and talk about some of the frameworks and principles that you think about. And then we'llget into some of the methods as well, and some of the process and examples. Sound okay?

Nick DeMarinis: That sounds great. Excited to be here.

Naber:  Awesome man. So basketball player, ice hockey, soccer, Jesuit high school, Tampa, Saint Leo, St John's in Rome. Hong Kong, New York, identical twin boys. We'll talk about all of it. What I want to hear as we go through that is, let's first talk about maybe four or five minutes on how you grew up. What was the life of Nick D as a kid? What were you like? Tell me about some of your interests, go through school a little bit, and tell me about some of your hobbies. And I'll interrupt you, hopefully not too rudely, to ask you maybe a little bit more detail.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, totally. Well, before we kick off, thanks again for inviting me. The minute I got your email, I was excited to see what was in there and to reconnect. I know we've always stayed in touch, but it's been awhile since we able to connect, and really talk through what's been going on in life. And as you mentioned, you're putting this together to pay forward all of the learnings, and the coaching you've had, and I'm excited to do that as well. And every day I learn more and more, and it's just exciting to share all of my experiences and people that helped me along the way. And as you said, it starts for me at a very young age, right? Where and how I grew up. My parents grew up in New York. They met when they were 15, got married and they were 19, had their first kid at 20, and then had six children. Fast track six children. Irish, Italian family. We drink with one hand, we talk with the other. And you know, my dad was in Sales his whole career, right? My Dad was Sales his whole career. And he always valued relationships, and he was very successful, end to end and his career on the basis of relationships. Me being one of six kids, growing up, we're always very competitive. Who's the first one to get to the bathroom in the morning, take a shower? I was also a middle child, so I had to be pretty diplomatic in my approach, right? I couldn't be this authority as the oldest, and I couldn't be like, Hey, I can get away with anything. I was a baby. I kind of had to play both ends of the spectrum. So I learned that early on of how to manage relationships up, and down, and sideways. We just love sports. We love being competitive, all of us. And I never really got too deep in a single sport because I just loved the ideas of other sports, and trying those out, and getting good at those. And in particular I just love team sports, right? I think individual sports were fun, but I loved the idea of going into battle with others, with the team behind you. And you know, although I grew up in Florida, unfortunately my father raised me a New York sports fan. So I had to adopt the New York Knicks and the New York jets, which are horrible sports teams.

Naber:  I saw Stephen A. Smith's video of his, basically a nervous breakdown, or his breakdown he had on TV. And I thought of you immediately. I felt miserable for you in that moment.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah. Yeah, it's been bad. But you know what it's taught me...and through my dad's professional career, through their marriage of over 50 years, through being in New York Knicks fan, as hilarious as it is this idea of loyalty. There's been a lot of lessons around loyalty through...and it might be tough times for a very long time, and there's gonna be ups and downs. But, that's what I learned a lot about growing up. It's just the value of family relationships, and loyalty, as much as it can hurt some times.

Naber:  That's an amazing lesson to learn. I mean, it give back to you so much over time as well, loyalty over time.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

Naber:  Cool. So, what was the first thing you did to make money?

Nick DeMarinis: First thing I did to make money. I sorted through a bunch of baseball cards that I inherited from my older brothers, and I went through the Beckett magazines that showed how much these cards were worth. And I tallied all that up, and I thought I was going to make thousands of dollars off these cards. But I was kind of talked out of it to hold onto those as an investment for later in life. So that's not how I made money. I thought that that's how I was going to become rich. First way I made money, it was really concession stand at at the little league field. Spent a lot of time as a young kid playing baseball, and then once it got to that certain age, I think it was 13, which is when they allowed you to actually work the concession stand, and sell M&M's, making whatever the minimum wage was, that was it. So yeah, it was a very efficient way to make money because as soon as my shift was over, it's back to the field, back to playing ball.

Naber:  Nice. Love it. Love it. So your middle child, you're going through school, you're selling M&Ms, and you're playing a ton of sports, competing on first to the shower, first to the bathroom, first to the dinner table, first inside if everyone's outside playing, totally get it. One of five kids myself, so that rings a bell for me. So when you were in high school, tell me a little bit about some of the things you're interested in outside of sports, and then we can get into why you went to Saint Leo, and what that transition was like.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, I mean, it's funny, it was really all about sports in high school for me. A funny enough, it's funny to say, but I went to an all boys, Jesuit high school, right? So I was also really interested in girls. There was a sister school nearby, but we just didn't have a lot of interaction. So it was like, you're at that age of adolescence throughout your teenager years, and it's this fascination around your first date, and what does prom look, and all that fun stuff. But outside of that, what I was really interested in is the world outside of where I grew up. And I was really fascinated about New York, about where my parents grew up and I didn't, I grew up in Florida and I visited. I was really fascinated about where my grandparents came from in Italy. I was really fascinated about like, what's outside this world of Florida, of Tampa where I grew up. And I know that's kind of the case for a lot of people. So, throughout high school I really started to think about that, using sports as a way to be able to maybe travel, or get to another state, another country, and then think about that as I get into college. I made the decision to stay in school in Florida, nearby for a variety of personal and professional reasons. But then, as I've gone through University, that's where I decided to make the leap to study abroad in Italy, which really eye opening for me see the rest of the world outside of where I grew up.

Naber:  Cool. Love it. That's a great transition. You make the jump to St Leo. Why Saint Leo? Tell us what it was like, maybe a couple of minutes about what life was for you in school in Uni.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, totally. I don't have the greatest story actually about Saint Leo. I was a hockey player in Florida, and I was pretty good, in the state of Florida. You compare me against kids that grew up in Michigan, and I was definitely below average. But I wanted to play college hockey, and we we're on a few recruiting trips, and we decided that really the cost of schooling at some of these Northeastern schools versus the in-state tuition in Florida...I had to make a call whether I want to enjoy university and the life that comes with being a student versus playing a college sport, and struggling with tuition costs, and being at the mercy of 5AM practices. And I made a call there. And Saint Leo was a nice balance. Had smaller classroom sizes, it wasn't University of Florida or FSU, which you're in an auditorium. I wanted a smaller, more intimate environment where I could just get to know my professors, get pretty hands on with the curriculum, and that's how I went to Saint Leo, and enjoyed every minute of it.

Naber:  Nice. Awesome. So, you had a life changing experience when you studied over in Rome. It's obviously kicked off your, not just to quench your appetite, but really over time when you live enough places you turn adventure into lifestyle, and then you just kinda never go back. But I'm guessing that was the start and the first step of that for you. So tell us about heading over to Rome to study there, and then we'll hop into your first role after school.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, I mean, I couldn't have said it any better. That absolutely was a turning point in my life where I turned adventure into a lifestyle. And that adventure and overcoming it, as tough as it felt in the moment, has been the foundation of how I think about all future challenges and future adventures, as small and big as they are. Because for a lot of us growing up in the US, or anywhere in the world, for you to branch outside of your comfort zone, into a new world, with this new language, it can be really scary in the moment. But I decided, it was my senior year of college, and there was no time better than to make that leap. And I had roots in Italy, right? It's where family came from. So, there was a lot of self interest, and what I wanted to accomplish and get out of that experience, so that's what I did. So I made the move there. Funny enough, on day one, I met a girl there who was all studying in the same program, who's now my wife.

Naber:  Whoa. That's how you guys met? Awesome.

Nick DeMarinis: That's how we met. There was another girl that went to the same school and I asked her how's your living situation? I'm living with five girls. She said, I'll be there in two minutes. And when I got there I was introduced to Diana, and that was my future wife. So that was the best part of that experience. But I think outside of that as well, it was just, just opened up my eyes to, there's another world out, there's other cultures, there's another way of living life and doing business. And I enjoyed it so much in that study abroad program, which was one semester, I basically stayed there, and then applied to graduate school. Saint John's had a program there. Ended up staying in Italy for almost two years. I really just wanted to learn more business. I wanted to learn a language. I wanted to not just have this four month point in life. I wanted to embed myself. So it it was a great journey, expensive journey, but a great one.

Naber:  Yeah. I mean, the Euro's not friendly to the USD at that point either. Great story about how you got how you and Diana met, and obviously now you have two beautiful identical twin boys, Luca and Max - is that right? We'll get into that a little bit later. I don't want to get you on a tangent here because you're going to turn into #prouddad. So you come back from Rome, walk us through your first couple of roles up through the point where you're going to make a jump to LinkedIn, and we'll pause there and ask you a couple of questions. But you had some really interesting, good, significant learning experiences before you got to LinkedIn. Let's walk through those.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So, what's not on my profile is I did work on Wall Street for two days. Actually it was a day and a half I think. When I was going through college, a little bit of a direction from my father was get into finance. You're going to make a good living, it's going to be stable. That should be your path, and you're pretty good at it. And that's what I studied, and I wasn't really sure if that was my path, it's hard to really understand until you get into the professional workforce. So I moved to New York, I worked on Wall Street. It was a small commodities broker. And I don't know how I realized this, but I realized pretty quickly it was not for me. Maybe it was this specific company, maybe it was the environment, it. I just got an idea that I don't think this is right, and my gut tells me that. I remember quitting. I called my father and I said, you're going to be really disappointed with me, but I just don't think this is the industry for me, I don't think this is the path, I need to do some searching here. And he was so supportive. He was like, I'm so proud that you've figured this out so quickly - to fail quickly is this thing that is really hard to do. So I did that, and went back to the drawing board. This is the first idea that I had around really building this personal Board of Directors. I started to think through, okay, who can help me figure out what is the industry I should be in? What is the job? What function should I be looking for? And I got some really good advice from some people in my corner. And I landed a job at a place called University Sports Publications. It married two things that I thought I'd be really passionate about, which is Sales and speaking to people, and sports, right? So, that was a good experience. It was kind of a boiler room setting. It was a lot of phone calls. It was a lot of rejection, you're selling advertising and it was Game Day sports programs to contractors and subcontractors. So it wasn't as glorious as the job description sounded, but what it taught me was resilience, right? This idea of following the Sales structure, of overcoming objectives, of the value of sharing peers and name dropping others in the industry that are using that. So it taught me a lot about the frameworks of a Sales process, and how to be resilient in that, if you have the right solution. So kind of sucked in the moment, but it taught me, taught me a lot there. Again, the culture wasn't something I was really looking for. It was very, very results driven, very cut throat. And I got a referral to get an interview at Yahoo!. And had a few interviews there, and really felt that was a company that more aligned what I was looking for in the technology space. And Yahoo!, the culture at the time, was way more accommodating to my type of personality. And yeah, joined Yahoo! in 2007.

Naber:  Awesome. Walk us through the roles you had at Yahoo!. You were there for about four years. So walk us through a couple of those roles, and then I've got a few questions on some of the things that you learned while you were there.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, so the roles at Yahoo!, it was primarily different Sales roles. So I was either selling recruitment advertising to recruitment agencies or to corporates. There was a little bit of an Account Executive, so selling to first time customers, bringing them on board, a lot of prospecting, a lot of Sales Development, a lot of cold outreach. And then later on in my career, Yahoo! was more around relationship management, and how do we help them, and make sure they're having success using our solutions, and make sure they're happy customers, and we're leveraging that to the best of it's ability. So that that was mostly the crux of my time in the four years at Yahoo!.

Naber:  Nice. And what do you think was the number one thing that you think you've learned at Yahoo!?

Nick DeMarinis: The number one thing I learned at Yahoo! would probably be, it's the value of your boss. I had some really great bosses at Yahoo!. I think, before that, my bosses were this dictator type figures. and the bosses I had at Yahoo! were very much more around my leadership philosophy, which is way more democratic, right? Anytime we were making decisions, we're thinking about a way to approach the business, or approach our customers, it was very much involving everybody. And there was always a sense of authority when they needed to have it, right? If we had a healthy the debate around something, that person also also knew when to come in and say, great, I value all the feedback, and this is where this is how we're going to move forward. But, really took the time to value everyone's opinion, and have it a team approach in terms of how we solve any types of questions, any types of problems.

Naber:  Nice one. Good. Okay, let's hop into LinkedIn. I think actually, I'm going to save my other question for after you get through this. So walk us through the journey you had at LinkedIn over the next few minutes on, the roles that you had, the jumps that you made, and what you were responsible for in each one. Maybe three or four minutes.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, absolutely. So jump to LinkedIn, right place, right time. Yahoo! HotJobs, which is the property I was working for, was bought by Monster that was going through a transition I wasn't incredibly happy about, and LinkedIn was opening up a new office on the east coast. I got introduced to James Volpentest and Scott Nelson. And we had dinner, and they were looking to build, a Sales team in New York. So I was part of the first Sales team in New York. There was about 12 or 15 of us in a serviced office. And and that was an incredible journey. At a tim, LinkedIn had about 80 million members. And we were really bringing on our earliest customers in terms of using this professional network as a platform to find passive talent. So that was a Sales role, pure hunter, selling the dream about what this professional platform was going to become, and how it can help companies solve a lot of their hiring needs. So the biggest jump from there moving to Hong Kong. So, you want me to go ahead and take you into that decision as well? Yeah, totally. So, I realized pretty quickly on at LinkedIn, this is going to be a global platform, no doubt about it. It's going to global network that a lot of people in professionals would really benefit from around creating economic opportunity. And we started to think about opening offices, and as you know as well, opening offices all around the world, in Asia, and Europe and going back to that adventure of living in Italy, I thought, how can I parlay that into an adventure somewhere else? Maybe a bit more of an intelligent risk for me. And I was thinking about different offices. There's Dublin, there's Sydney, and I wanted something a little bit more of a challenge. So we started talking internally about Hong Kong. And it was a very strategic market for us, as a gateway into China. And we wanted to be that first professional network into China. So, I spoke to my Manager time, I said, what does it take? We need people there. And this is about a year before that. And his advice was, just be great at your job right now, and then when the time is right, we can discuss that opportunity. So, that's what I did. I just put my head down. I tried to master the role I was currently in. I wanted to be very, very clear about, what value am I going to bring to a new market in terms of bringing that LinkedIn headquarters culture and DNA, and making sure that that's being spread through new markets and new cultures. And made the jump to Hong Kong in 2013.

Naber:  Awesome, man. That's great. And tell us what you're responsible for in Hong Kong, and and how your role grew a little bit.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah. So initially a little bit of everything. I think of the role as, you're helping hire for the team, you're helping bring on your early customers, you're helping define your early culture. You're doing a little bit everything. And we were all doing it together. It wasn't a figurehead of the office, it a few of us that come together to drive that. So, I help bring on some of our earlier customers, help make a lot of decisions around our hiring and building out the team, setting some of the traditions around our office such as new hire introductions, and special talents, and costumes. Just things that lightened the mood that are consistent with the way LinkedIn does things. And of course as the business grew and the team grew, that evolved into a leadership position. And I was raised my hand of, hey, I'm ready to be a utility player in leadership of where you need help. So, at that time we were thinking about growing our teams in Southeast Asia. So I started to manage Account Executives in Singapore, and Japan, and start to build our business and build our customer base in those markets. Which was a great experience for me. Just being able to manage the remote teams, and all the challenges that comes with that, as well as managing multiple cultures. In Japan specifically, managing teams that hardly speak the same language, right? And it's really hard to be able to add a lot of value, even when I go on customer engagements, when it's speaking a different language as well. So I had to really think about where's the areas I'm going to be able to add value? A lot of that for me was like, removing a lot of internal barriers for them. I can't help them in how they're speaking to their customer, but I can help remove the process, and remove some of the friction that's helping them get their job done. So that was a lot of my learnings in terms of like, I gotta be really clear about where I'm going to be able to add value, and where I'm not right, when you're managing different teams and different cultures. And then, towards the end of my time there, it was managing more of a holistic team across the Hong Kong office. So, end to end from Sales Development, to Global Accounts, and how I brought those teams together, and I just went really deep within the Hong Kong market specifically, across different teams in different segments.

Naber:  Awesome. It's it is an amazing journey, and you were doing it so early in the life cycle of people moving to international offices from one or another us hub. So from San Francisco, from Chicago, from New York, and you did early in that time, where you didn't necessarily see or have a playbook in order to be able to do that. It's kind of like, figure it out as you go and learn with other people as they go around setting up some of these offices, especially, in Asia. You've sold for a long time, and helped sell for a long time. I know from hearing from other people how hands on and close to the frontline you are with being able to help out with your Sales reps, and teaching and coaching them on how to sell, best practices, etc. And one of the things that I've heard both from you, and from other people, is this concept of becoming a trusted advisor. So when you're talking to your sales team, both at WeWork and LinkedIn, and you're giving advice, tell us a little bit about the concept of being a trusted advisor, and how you explain that to people.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, absolutely. I couldn't be more passionate about the equation that comes with being a trusted advisor. And I think some people snooze off as soon as I start to give them an equation. But hear me out, hear me out. This idea of trusted advisor, it gets thrown around quite a bit, right? And there's different definitions, but I think this one I really subscribed to, and I really hammer it home as I think about our relationships, our Sales process, qualifying deals, qualifying our Accounts. And I think it's really telling as we break down the different parts. So, if you think about a trusted advisor, there's a numerator, and there's a denominator. Now in the numerator, there's really three parts to how you become a trusted advisor to your client. And that can be a client that you've worked with forever, or a client that you just met yesterday, right? And the first is credibility. Are you credible in what you're speaking about? The industry, your product, how it's going to perform, right? Like, you need to be able to get to be a subject matter expert on what you're sharing to your client. And this goes with sharing to candidates as well, and hiring, there's a lot of ways to apply this. So credibility is one. I think, on reflection for me and we work, I've been here four and a half months, that's an area of development for me. I'm in a new industry in real estate. There's a lot going on. We're transforming the industry. I'm not as credible as I want to be yet, and I'm taking a lot of steps to be able to build that. The second part of the equation is around reliability. So you know that's as simple as, are you following through with what you say you're going to do? Are you delivering on your solutions? Are you saying, Hey, I can get you that proposal by Friday at 5:00 PM - are you doing that? For me personally as well, if people do what they say they're going to do, then, you know that shows reliability, right? And the minute people start saying, we're going to do this, we're gonna do that, and they don't follow through with that, you start to lose not only your credibility, you lose your trust and becoming a reliable individual. Lastly...so we have credibility and knowing your subject, we have reliability, which is you're going to do what you say you're going to do. And last is around intimacy. I think this is the most important. I couldn't be more passionate about the idea that people buy from people, right? I do it all the time, and there's a lot of value and things that I buy, but I really like to know who I'm buying from, and why I'm buying from an individual, and getting to know that side of things. So I think a lot about intimacy, and how we approach our customers, right? How well do we know them? How well do we know how this is going to impact their personal lives. Do we know their dog's name? The more we can get to know, and get to intimate with our customers, and whether that's someone that's buying from us, or we're going to be hiring them, there's just that much stronger of a bond, that much stronger of a relationship there. And you can even ask for favors sometimes, right, as you get stuck in certain areas based upon that relationship.

Naber:  Nick , let me ask as a question. Do you have go to categories that are attached to people's hearts, so that you can get closer to them, or more intimate with them more quickly? Do you have certain categories that you go after where you're like, ask questions about this, this, this, this, and this?

Nick DeMarinis: A lot of it comes down a lot of it comes to research, right? Looking at whether it's there LinkedIn profiles, or checking them in the news, just finding out what they care about, right? And making sure that I can align that with the intimacy factor, right? If someone cares about wolf conservation, I've adopted rescue dogs from Hong Kong. There's maybe some parallels there. And just trying to get to know why they care about that. Family is an easy one, right? Me having twin boys. We did an Executive event last week in Chicago at the Rolling Stones Concert, and a lot of them had families, right? And I just wanted to really get to know about their families, their kids, the schools that they're looking to attend, and just really got to know them on an intimate level around their families. And I was able to share my own experience right now as my kids are very young and growing up. So there's not really specific categories. I just try to do a lot of research and understand their personal lives, what's going on, what do they care about?

Naber:  No, that's good. That's good. All right. Sorry. Keep going.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah. So on top of all of that, in terms of trusted advisor, there's the denominator which is self orientation. So I think people can be very credible, they can be super reliable, and you can be very intimate, and really getting to know your customers. But the minute that self orientation is showing really high, that there's a lot more in it for me that I'm trying to gain out of it. That starts to ruin a bit of the trusted advisor type of relationship that you have with the customer. So, I think a lot of people try to focus too much on on the top, and then they don't think enough about self orientation and what's in it for them. And that's sometimes starts to shine at certain moments, which can really ruin the equation there. So I think that that's really important - taking self orientation out of the equation. If you're solving the right thing for your client, if you're incredibly reliable and intimate, they should be able to want to move forward regardless of what you're wanting to gain out of that.

Naber:  I love the equation. Anytime someone breaks down something into an equation, or a framework, or a data driven approach, or something along those lines, I think people's ears perk up because it's repeatable, and you can also pass it on a more easily as well. So you've managed a lot of Sales teams. You've hired a lot of people. One of the things that I've heard about you from a lot of other people as well, is the power of coaching. And I know that you've gone through certification with Marshall Goldsmith, and I'd love to learn a little bit about, and have the audience to learn a little bit about some of the top learnings and the top takeaways you had from that Marshall Goldsmith training and learning process. And also how you apply those, maybe with some examples that you use across your teams.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, absolutely. So yeah, Marshall Goldsmith was just an incredible investment that I was fortunate to be able to go through, go through that workshop, a world renowned coach. And there's a couple things that I've learned from that Executive course. And Marshall Goldsmith, his coaching framework is really centered around stakeholders, right? I think of coaching in two ways...there's firsthand observations, objective observations, and being able to coach that way about what's observed. Not about how I feel that person did, but I observed this, and I'll talk about that a little bit later. Marshall Goldsmith is really around, perception is reality. Let's find out what do your your stakeholders think about what you can do to improve, and perception is reality there. And let's use feed forward to be able to help an individual improve on that. `So here's how he breaks it down. I think, first around coaching is, making sure that that individual picks the one or two growth areas that they want to focus on, put that in their court, right? What do you want to focus on to get better at that is important to both, you, but also aligns with your organization, right? So let's say for example, it's managing through change, right? That's important for me. It's also important for our organization. This place is changing every three minutes. The next is, next is to lead the change and the coaching through stakeholders. So really involving your directs, your peers, your bosses. There's this idea of Marshall Goldsmith, which is, capturing feed forward rather than feedback. So, if I'm asking you to give me some feed forward on managing through change, I wouldn't say Brandon give me some feedback on how I've managed change in the past. We don't care about the past right now. I would say, Brandon, give me some suggestions on how I can get better at managing change moving forward. And it's a really cool, powerful tool around feed forward, which is like, you're we're not reflecting on what's happened, you're reflecting on what could be beneficial to us moving forward? And that's really the crux of it. The individual that's being coached then takes that, they've identified they want to get better at, they're getting feed forward from the people around them that they care about. And again, it's this idea of perception is reality. Whether they're right or wrong, these are people that have suggestions for someone to get better. Perception is reality. Let's take that. Let's put an action plan together. And then part of the Goldsmith plan as well, is to regularly check in to see how that person's performing moving forward.

Naber: How do you build in the importance of recognition? And how do you think about recognizing others when you know it's both one the right thing to do, but two you may not want to do too much. Because a lot of Managers, they put a premium on recognition so they don't do it maybe as often as they should, or if they just don't do it that often at all. So how do you think about recognition? Because I've heard a lot of people both on your team, as well mentees of yours in the past, say I learned a lot about recognition from Nick. How do you think about it? What's your framework?

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, I'm probably in the camp that there is no such thing as too much recognition. I think that there's so much success that individuals and teams have because of the confidence that they're getting from other individuals. And whether it's a small task or a large task, if they're hearing that people are grateful for what they did, or they're proud of what they did, I think confidence is really what drives people forward, and creating that type of environment. So I try to build in recognition in so many facets, right? Whether in the way people lead, in the way they deliver results, in the short interactions that they have with individuals... I try to bake it into to my daily life. And whether that's a quick email, or over Slack, or whether it's a phone call...There's something that that I do every Friday, which is a 6:00 PM recurring calendar invite, which is actually more centered around gratitude. So it's more around, rather than recognizing an individual for what they've done. I try to do that as I go throughout my day, and it spurs at different moments. I don't really have a framework around that. But I do have a framework around making sure that I thank at least one or two people every Friday at the end of the week for what they've done. So whether that's an individual that had handled it difficult customer call, and I want to thank them for at least stepping up and showing leadership. Or for example, last Friday, I sent a note to a peer of mine who was really instrumental in helping me ramp here at the company, was really selfless in his time and walking me through the internal relationships, and how to think about now they gave him the company. And without that I probably would continue to be lost here at WeWork. So that's a few ways I think about it. I think recognition, it's never too much. I think that we should be recognizing small things, little things as much as possible. In my mind, I feel that just continues to build confidence in individuals, for them to continue to push themselves forward. And then I think about, gratitude as really powerful recognition. Not just for those that are making an impact to me and to the team, but also it feels good for my side to really be able to show that the impact that they're having on me, it's really meaningful.

Naber:  Yeah. Love it. And two questions on that one. One, how are you doing this? Is it email? Is it verbally? Is it walking over to their desk? Is it a one on one? Is it closed door conversation? Is it in front of the team? There's so many different ways to do this. How do you think about that, and how are you doing this? What's your strategy around it?

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, so mostly around a recommendation, right?

Naber:  Yeah, exactly.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah. So I try, I try to 100% of the time to do it in person. I'm a big believer in, I think this goes with every type of interaction, I try to be very, very conscious and mindful of the setting and the atmosphere, right? So around recognition, I try to make sure, whether it's in a walking meeting, or outside, or try to have it over...it's gotta be in person, for me. And it could be just hey, let's take a walk to the lobby of our office. I try to have it in some type of a warm, casual type type of environment. So mostly the recognition is always in person. I feel like it's easy for us to be able to use online platforms, and texts, and whatnot. But be able to look somebody in the eyes, and be able to tell them wholeheartedly...to be able to speak to them and really have that moment where, hey, you, you've made a difference, you made an impact. Whether it's small or large, it's important that we share this in person, and I thank you for that. That, 100% of the time in my mind, needs to happen in person. It's really easy for us to be able to use so many different communication platforms, and ways to connect. Being able to do that in person is for me is really powerful.

Naber:  Nice. Good one. And my follow-up to that is, what have you seen is the pull through of that? What happens when you do that right? What are the next couple of actions, or what have you seen as some of the results from the people that you're saying thank you to, and your being grateful towards verbally, out loud? What does that do for both, them, for the team? What's the environment that it creates? So that people, that are going to be more conscious in the audience of doing this, like you mentioned it, what can they expect to be the output?

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, absolutely. That's a great question. One of my superpowers is positivity, right? So, I'm always trying to index on bringing in a positive atmosphere, positive feedback, as much as possible. And I'm also a big believer in focusing on strengths, not weaknesses. There was a Harvard Business Review podcast around constructive feedback is kind of pointless, and that we should be focusing on what people do great, and focused on their strengths. So, when I think about recognition, for example, there was an individual a couple weeks ago that really managed this Sales process in a short time frame really, really well. It was really tight around the beginning of discovery, understanding what the client wants to achieve, to understanding the deal leverage that we had in order to be able to accomplish it in a short period. And I recognized that individual, and what I'm hoping that the pull through that I'm hoping to get out of that is, I asked the individual to share that forward. Like, this is a strength of yours. I want to recognize you because you did a great job at that. How do we scale this goodness? How do you take that and share this experience? Share your deal review with other members around you. There's so much that people can learn from you. And what I hope to get out of that, which happens a lot of times, is that person is then...there's a ripple effect around the benefits of what that person accomplished, and they're getting so much confidence from that. They're like, wow, I did something really well. I'm able to share a lot of individuals.; And they're going to take that forward into their next actions, their next couple of days of work, with so much confidence around, I did something great, I was able to share that with other individuals, and I know how to bring this forward to the rest of my week. So those are a couple of things that I think about in terms of recognition is like, let's focus on the strengths. How do we take whatever you did really good at, how do we share that? How do we scale that across others? And recognition for me, and I think it's always to inject this amount of confidence in individuals that they can then just continue to find success in whatever they're doing, moving forward.

Naber:  Love it. Love it. Good example too of the pull through. Thank you for that. And you alluded to this already...When you're thinking about developing others and also developing yourself in navigating your own professional development, you talk about focusing on strengths. Explain your mindset on that. How do you think about focusing on strengths? And how do you make sure that when you're talking to and giving advice to people around their professional development, their career development, how should they think about the strengths?...Sorry, How should they think about focusing on strengths as a strategy for moving forward?

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah. So, there's a couple parts to that. I think there's a lot of different tests out there to figure out what your strengths are, and how does that compare to some of your weaknesses, and how do you think about the two of those? There's Clifton Strengths Finder, which I think is a really cool one that I to use with my team sometimes. There's also, Travis Carson runs Marketforce, and it really helps you understand your style, your style indicator. So for example, for me and my market force style, I'm pretty balanced, but I'm moreso power. And the strengths in that for business for me are sustaining relationships over time, and very focused on tangible results. So, whatever platform someone wants to use to figure out what their strengths are, I think they should harness that and figure out how they bring that to life in their daily environment. When it comes to weaknesses, I think that's just how you compliment each other, right? If I'm strong in certain ares, but...I'm probably not that good in terms of process, and driving process across a Sales team or a sales org, I look to be able to buddy up with somebody that's really good at that, right? So that's how I think about the two. I'm working on that right now, and there's a few individuals that I work with in my leadership group that are really good at thinking about structuring a Sales process, and thinking about daily inputs, and pipeline, and what that means. I'm just not good at that right now. So I try to learn as much from that individual, but continue to focus on my strengths, which is building connections, and building meaningful relationships, and being able to be deep and intimate with my team, and in what they care about, and how they want to develop. And that's how about that, the two compliment each other.

Naber:  Awesome, man. That's great. All right, let's make a jump into WeWork. Talk about, when you left LinkedIn, how and why you made that jump, what you're responsible for right now, and then I've got a few more questions around some of the things that you, one took from LinkedIn into WeWork, and two how you're applying some of the things that I'm going to ask about at WeWork as well.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, absolutely. So it's funny, it was about 14 months ago, two weeks before my kids were born. And a friend of mine from Yahoo!, he messaged me, he was now WeWork, and he said, we're growing crazy. We're looking for great Sales leaders in Asia. And I said, absolutely not not the right time, about to have twin boys. And I love what I do. I'm at LinkedIn. I love what I do right now. He was like, I think you should have a chat. So had a chat with them. His name is Nick W. and just absolutely loved the conversation. I said, okay, well let's speak to some more people that WeWork, had a few more conversations. And that was the crux at how this began, was that there was just some really talented, really thoughtful, really ambitious people that I kept speaking to. And that was number one reason of why I thought to move forward with this path to WeWork, was the talent. The second was really around the mission of the company. And as you know as well being at LinkedIn, super powerful, true north mission of connecting professionals to create opportunity. And we saw that manifest itself in so many stories, which is incredible. So I always told myself, if I'm going to to go to another company, it's going to be with one of the mission that I truly care about. And what I saw there was that LinkedIn was really good at connecting professionals online for them to make an impact in their career and their lives. And WeWork was really looking to do that offline, in physical space and physical environments. And I was like, that's really cool. It's almost like, it's almost going back in time. That should have happened first. But WeWorks actually bringing more of that personal touch and element back to networks, which LinkedIn did really good at scaling that digitally. And WeWork's mission of helping people create a life, not just the living. To be able to work in beautiful spaces, and accomplish great things. And when I when I was at LinkedIn in Hong Kong, we had a beautiful space, right? And we took it for granted. People would come in, and we bring clients, and groups, and students, all kinds of people. We turn them around, and 10 times out of 10 people would say, I would love to work in an environment this. And I started to think, man, everyone should be able to work in a beautiful environment. Everyone should be able to really enjoy the environment that they're working in. Not that's just aesthetically pleasing, but also has a community that brings it to life. So that that was a really big part of how I thought about WeWork. Lastly is the growth story, right? I think about transformation and the adventure of going to Italy. I just thought about how do I continue to learn and transform myself? And this is an opportunity to go back in time to a company, that still trying to figure out a lot of things, that has a really great growth trajectory. And I wanted to be a part of that, and take a lot of what I've learned, to apply it to this to the story.

Naber:  Awesome. That's great dude. so, I have three questions about this, and then we'll wrap. First one is, you've been at a few different businesses that are known for having kick ass cultures, really good cultures. And that has gotta be ingrained into the fabric of what people do at all times in order for it to actually sustain and persist over time. What have you noticed as the common themes...and it's still the honeymoon period right now for WeWork, but at the same time, when you know what a movie looks and you've seen the movie before, it can be a little bit different, but you know that you it and you recognize the things that you seen in the other movies that you like. Right? So when you think about LinkedIn, think about the things you really to Yahoo!, what you're seeing right now at WeWork, what are some commonalities between those businesses, that they have in their cultures, that every business should subscribe to, and try to do really well? Because it makes all the difference.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, absolutely. So I think, the first thing that comes to mind, which I think is probably most powerful is this idea of collaboration, right? This idea, at WeWork we we call it, "We over Me". There was such a team type of mentality, even though you were in individual Sales sometimes, at Yahoo!. And then at LinkedIn we talked so much about building connective tissue across our teams, and building collaborative cultures, and a lot of that manifests in the way we went to market, right? And a lot of the way we conducted our business. And it's our first value at WeWork as well, is "We over Me". Which is, there's no individual that can come in and try to accomplish great things themselves, right? The minute we can come together, and think about how to tackle big challenges, big problems, difficult clients, complex situations, collectively, that's how we're going to be successful. And that manifests in our products as well at WeWork, right? These beautiful spaces that we're delivering, we try to have this idea of community, where people can at some point come together and collaborate, and innovate, and discuss, and drive their businesses forward. And that's been the common thread, I think, across all these companies. There's no type of type of me or individual attitude, it's we're going to win and fail together, and that's going to be our mentality.

Naber:  That's great man. Thanks. That's a good example. And when you're...This is specifically a WeWork question. When you think about the power of a workspace, the power of an office space, for those that are either doubters or neutral on the value of that to a team, from an engagement, performance, happiness, etc perspective, can you give us a couple passion points, or reasons why, or maybe points that would turn their mindset around? Or something that would say this is really important to think about, and this is why you should be thinking about it for your teams?

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, absolutely. So I'll give you, I'll give you two examples for me, personal first hand, around the two different space environments that I was a part of, at LinkedIn in Hong Kong, and now here at WeWork, at Chelsea HQ. Which is kind of a sandbox for a lot of our products. It's not what we advise for clients because it's absolute chaos...It's eclectic for sure. When I think about workspace, I don't think it is much as what it looks, and the feel. I mean that's really important, and having different types of areas for different groups or different cohorts - whether that's focused work, whether that's collaborative areas. I think more around the energy and the activation side of it. At LinkedIn in Hong Kong for example, we had about 14,000 square feet and about 50 employees. And it was really hard to drum up the right amount of energy because it was just too much space that we weren't utilizing. So put aside the financial aspect of like, I think we have too much space based upon our employee count. It was just really hard to get a lot of energy from that. So a lot of what we think about it WeWork is how do we create those right density levels that you're not on top of each other, but you're creating the right amount of energy. And we have so much data on so many companies that we're working with, especially our Enterprise customers which now makes up more than 40% of our customer base. We're able to design really cool spaces that activates, and creates the right amount of energy, at the right density levels for organizations. Corridors, we consciously put them in in a certain type of depth or whatever the metrics you want to use, so that people you have collision zones. And you might be able to say, hey, good to see you, haven't seen each other in awhile. And you create these interactions through how we design spaces. At WeWork, in HQ here, we've really pushed the envelope in terms of density levels, and there's a lot of individuals working in different types of environments. And what that's done is it's created an energy level that's infectious, right? That there's just a lot of excitement, a lot of excitement about what you do. There's constant interactions happening every single day because of how the space is designed. So, I think the takeaway for me in that, is really thinking about space in terms of what type of energy are you looking to have? What type of activation do you want to have from your employees? And being able to build beautiful spaces around that.

Naber:  Nice. Those are some good little tips and tactics for how space can create, almost, not accidental, because it's purposeful, but a meaningful interactions between individuals between work, as well as while they work. That's really interesting. Okay, I've got one more for you, and then we'll wrap. So the last one I want to talk about is something that you pulled from, my guess, both your time at Yahoo! and your time at LinkedIn. And I want to know how you're applying it, at WeWork. So, you've talked about, and I know people on your team were big on...you've also gone through some training on this, is my guess...is the power of storytelling. And using that as a vehicle to inspire - inspire customers, inspire teams, etc. So how do you think about the power of storytelling? What's a framework that you use? And how are you bringing that to life at WeWork, maybe with a couple of examples, that you've applied since you've been there? Or just generally how you're applying it.

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So I think storytelling is such a powerful mechanism to inspire, and to motivate, and to bring ideas and experiences to life. I learned a lot about the power of storytelling through when I was running the transformation theme for LinkedIn a couple of years ago. So every year we focused on one culture or value and we tried to drive that home across our global Sales organization. A couple of years ago, it was the idea of transformation. And we thought early on, how do we bring this idea of transformation to life? We're gonna bring it to life through storytelling. So we're going to create a framework for transformation, and then we're going to share that through stories throughout the entire year. The culture of transformation at LinkedIn, we talk about it as transformation of self, company and world. There was a particular story of transformation that was really powerful. This woman in Australia, she really struggled early on in her role. And she also struggled at home. Her son was very sick. And she had to overcome both of those challenges. And she was able to do that through the people that she worked with, and her leader, And through the support of the people that she worked with. And she told this fascinating story that ended up with her son becoming very healthy through support, as well as her becoming very successful in her role. And through through that story, people read and were able to understand how people's lives can be transformed both personally and professionally. And one way I'm bringing that to WeWork, is right now in the moment we feel like there's a lot on our shoulders. We're at a stage of the company, where there's a lot going on...

Naber:  Massive compounding growth, $47 billion valuation, Pre IPO, rapido with employees, tons of stuff on your shoulders, lots of spotlight as well. I totally get that. Makes Sense.

Nick DeMarinis: Exactly. So among all of that, it's hard to keep your eye on the future, right? And I try to always think about that. I think about the story that we're going to go tell a year, two, five years from now. And there's an exercise that I to do that I'm going to be doing with my leadership team coming up, which is, I might be getting the name wrong, but I think it's called "doom or boom" storytelling, right? So what we want to do is like, we're each going to tell a story around two paths. Let's tell a story about, let's just say this gets screwed, right? Where this is going to be a doom, what goes wrong? Okay, we're, going to hire the wrong people, we're going to miss all of our Sales targets, we're going to lose our culture. And I think I want to hear those stories of where things go wrong. And then the story of where things go really well, right? If we're going to be really successful in the next year or two, what has to go right? Well, we brought great people on board. We were selling some of the biggest contracts ever. Whatever it is. And what that does is it helps us really illustrating and picture what those stories could look like. More importantly, I think it helps us identify the trends. Trends in the bad story that we want to make sure we get ahead of now. So there's always a common trends you start to see in these really bad stories. It's like, cool, what can we do to resource and get ahead of these right now so this doesn't happen. Cool, let's do that. And then the story that goes really well, focusing on strengths, right? Let's make sure we double down on those efforts. Whatever's going really well, how do we invest more time and resources in that? So I think the power of storytelling is really important to bringing experiences to life as well as thinking ahead of what you want your stories to be. Let's think about those on two different tracks, and let's learn from both of those.

Naber:  Love it, man. That's great. All right. You've been super generous with your time. I really appreciate it. And I've got two rapid fire questions for you, and then we'll break. Okay. First one, you've been in some really high stress jobs. You've been in some time intensive jobs. what are your best two or three tips on work-life balance?

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah, I got two that I feel pretty strong about. One is, I make this place work for me, not work for this place, right? So I don't let a company or role dictate how I need to think about my family, my wellness. I make sure that I integrate that in, and I'm very vocal about that. That leads into the second part of it. Second part is just work life balance is to communicate it. I don't think there's really such thing as work life balance. I think it's harmony. Our lives are just way more connected than we possibly think. But a lot of us are afraid to talk about what we care about and what's matters to us outside of work. Whether that's my kids and dogs, whether that's someone that loves to go to to concerts or they have, they're really passionate about wellness. My biggest tip on that is just let's talk about it. Let's let's share with our peers, and our bosses, and those around us, what we do, what we care about and how do we can integrate that. Let's set expectations around how we work, and how we communicate, what's off limits, what are our pet peeves. And I think that's probably the two things that are more most passionate me. I don't try to find that balance. I try to find harmony in the two, and I figure out ways to make that work. And the second is, I over communicate. Everyone here knows that I try to get home for bath time by seven, because I really care about that with my kids. But I wake up at six, and I'm more than happy to take a phone call at six in the morning, right? Everyone's different. I want to get to know on my team, what they care about, how they to work. I think too many times we think about work life and we try to figure it out ourselves. I think we just need to get it out there, and let's talk about that with our team, let's talk about how we solve that. And it can be a really, really healthy conversation.

Naber:  Nice, love it. Last question, it's got two parts. Because I want to talk about your twins for a second...and that'll be the second part. First one is - and my audience knows this, but I'm going to explain for the guests, I asked this question on people's birthdays every single year - what is the most important learning or lesson you've acquired in the last 12 months, professionally?

Nick DeMarinis: Most important learning or lesson that I've acquired in the past 12 months professionally. That's a really great, that's a really great question. I would say it's gotta be around this idea of being vulnerable, and there's no such thing as a dumb question, something around that. I don't know the best way to frame it. But I think, for me, life and your career, you never have it figured out. There's never a role, or a company, or a function, where you're like, I've got it figured out. My biggest learning is to have just a really high sense of curiosity. To always be able to ask the questions, figure out how and why things work. Be very vulnerable to say, I don't know, I don't know the answer, or I don't know this yet. Can you help walk me through that? More so in the past four and a half months from WeWork than the previous...at LinkedIn I felt like I had a lot of it figured out. Where here I'm in this really uncomfortable situation where I'm trying to still figure a lot of it out. So being very vulnerable, and being able to be like, hey, I don't have it figured out. I have a lot of questions. Help me, walk me through this. That's the biggest lesson that I've learned in the last few months.

Naber:  Good one. I like it. Part B is, you are a fresh, little over one year dad of twinsies - twin boys, identical twin boys. I read a statistic the other day that between 88 and 90% of the human population reproduces. So the odds of someone listening on this podcast, are that they have kids, will have kids, or at least they know someone very close to them. So, what is the most important learning or your lesson you've acquired in the last 12 months, being the father of one year old twin boys?

Nick DeMarinis: Yeah. Good question. There's a lot. Can we extend this an hour?

Naber:  Yeah, sure. Go for it. Get out your calendar, get ready audience, here we go.

Nick DeMarinis: For me, I think the biggest parallel of being father and a leader is, is around sacrifice, right? I think I've always loved seeing others succeed, and be able to sacrifice my time to help others be successful, or trying my best at that. Becoming a father of the last year, you just realize how much you have to sacrifice to be able to support these tiny humans as they go through these different stages of development. And there's so many parallels there. And you do have to sacrifice a lot. Me and my wife, we've really had work together around what the sacrifice looks like, and how do we do the best for our kids. It's helped me realize the bigger picture, that the day to day of our lives and of work is trivial compared to the bigger picture of why we are here on this earth. Raising kids, and just getting so excited about each stage of development, and what their life is going to be like years from now. I think that same way around my team here, and what they're learning now, and what they're going through is really challenging. But they're going to get through it, it's transformation. And I can't wait to see what they grow up to be in their personal professional lives years from now. So I think, there's a couple things to unpack there. I think the amount of sacrifice that you have to to help yourself and to help others really starts to become apparent when you're a parent. This idea of just really looking at the big picture of development, and the story of of your children growing up, as well as the teams that you're working with, and what their careers could look like. It gets you to start thinking way further ahead than just the day-to-day in front of you.

Naber:  Hey everybody, thanks so much for listening. If you appreciated and enjoyed the episode, go ahead and make a comment on the post for the episode on LinkedIn. If you love The Naberhood Podcast, we'd love for you to subscribe, rate, and give us a five star review on iTunes. Until next time - go get it.