The Remarkable Leadership Podcast

00:00:08:17 - 00:00:30:12
Kevin Eikenberry
Would you like to see into the future? Just a bit. If you could see the future a bit more clearly, you could make better decisions, have better predictions, and have a better perspective, and ultimately create greater success. That is part of our role as a leader, after all, is to create greater success. That's why I'm excited to introduce the work of our guests to you today.

00:00:30:14 - 00:00:56:21
Kevin Eikenberry
Welcome to another episode of the Remarkable Leadership Podcast, where we are helping leaders grow personally and professionally to lead more effectively and make a bigger, positive difference for their teams, organizations and the world. If you are listening to this podcast in the future, you can join us live. In this particular case, this went live on the live stream video version about two and a half months before you're getting the chance to see it on the podcast.

00:00:56:23 - 00:01:21:19
Kevin Eikenberry
So if you want to get in front of those things and have a chance to interact in a live way, you can do that. Learning more about when those are going to happen and how they happen by joining our Facebook or LinkedIn groups, just go to remarkable podcast.com/facebook or remarkable podcast.com/linkedin to do that. Today's episode is brought to you by the second edition of The Long Distance Leader Revised Rules for Remarkable Remote Leadership.

00:01:21:21 - 00:01:42:22
Kevin Eikenberry
Excuse me? Remote. Remarkable. Remote and hybrid leadership. If you lead a team that is distributed in any way, this book will give you new skills, insights, and the confidence to lead more effectively in the new world of work and more. Order your copy today at Remarkable podcast.com/l d l. And now I'm going to bring in my guests and yes, its guests.

00:01:43:00 - 00:02:11:11
Kevin Eikenberry
Today we have two guest coauthors of this book. I will tell you about them as they join us. And you see their smiling faces today I have with us, Rob Walcott and Carson Crippen. Dorf, Robert C Walker is the co-founder and chair of the World Innovation Network Twin Global. He is an adjunct professor of innovation at the Booth School of Business, University of Chicago, and an adjunct professor of executive education at the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University.

00:02:11:13 - 00:02:39:12
Kevin Eikenberry
His books include Grow from Within Mastering Corporate Entrepreneurship and Innovation, written with Michael J. Lipids. He is an active venture investor in nearly 30 companies, and Crippen Dorf is the founder of Out Thinker Networks, a global think tank and professional speaker. His books include Driving Innovation from Within, a guide for Internal Entrepreneurs. He's a former McKinsey consultant, a strategic advisor to numerous leading corporations.

00:02:39:14 - 00:02:58:17
Kevin Eikenberry
Why the two of them together? Well, because they've written together a new book called Proximity How Creating Breakthroughs in Just in Time, in just in time transform business, society, daily life. That's our focus today. That's why they're here. And I'm glad they're here. So guys welcome. Thanks for being us. Being with us.

00:02:58:17 - 00:02:59:19
Rob Wolcott
All right. Thanks for having Kevin.

00:03:00:00 - 00:03:01:02
Kaihan Krippendorff
Great to be here.

00:03:01:04 - 00:03:24:06
Kevin Eikenberry
So, Rob a little inside baseball, everybody. Rob's head. Kevin, what's the what's the first question going to be? I'm not going to ask you this if you don't already know the answer to, so I'm just going to start with one that is really simple. And it's something I ask often. And that's like, tell us a little bit about and Rob, I'll let you go first, but tell us a little bit about what led to the book.

00:03:24:06 - 00:03:32:09
Kevin Eikenberry
We'll talk about the book and the ideas in the book in a second. But like, what's the journey that brings the two of you to this place? And this book?

00:03:32:10 - 00:04:00:14
Rob Wolcott
Well, thanks again, Kevin, for having us. I love your work. It's, expansive and applied, and I love that. So where did this from? Where did this come? Well, ten years ago in 2014, I was at a tech event. And, Kevin, I'm sure you've been to tech events. I'm sure everybody else out there in TV land where they go to tech events and they I noticed that the second speaker sounded like the first, and the third speaker sounded like the second, and the fourth speaker sounded like that.

00:04:00:16 - 00:04:27:14
Rob Wolcott
And I started to say, well, holy cow, we've got to be able to do better to figure out where the world's going. And so that generated a question in my mind at that time, which is what is fundamentally different about all things digital compared to the industrial age? If we can discern what is fundamentally different about digital technologies compared to industrial edge technologies, we could do better jobs of predicting the future.

00:04:27:14 - 00:04:45:18
Rob Wolcott
And kind. And I do mean predicting this is a book about foresight, right? This is a book predictive of where every industry is going the rest of our careers. And, working on that for a while, I discovered something sort of obvious that led to a profound observation and that the obvious thing is that digital technologies of all sorts.

00:04:45:18 - 00:05:07:05
Rob Wolcott
So certainly we need AI and mobile apps, but we also mean 3D printing or rooftops, solar power or anything digitally enabled. Digital technologies allow us to compress capabilities into smaller and smaller packages and distribute them all over the economy, ever closer to each moment in time and space. That's something it's very hard to do with industrial edge technologies.

00:05:07:07 - 00:05:27:23
Rob Wolcott
And so therefore and this is proximity, this is the punch line, Kevin. Digital compels value creation ever closer to the moment of actual demand and time and space. And this is the direction of every industry, the rest of our careers. And then so I was working on this and Covid hit. And you might recall, Kevin, there's something called Covid.

00:05:27:23 - 00:05:28:14
Rob Wolcott
And all of a sudden.

00:05:28:18 - 00:05:34:15
Kevin Eikenberry
I do back Corona. Was beer still beer right. Yeah.

00:05:34:16 - 00:05:57:00
Rob Wolcott
Right. And so Keegan reached out to me. We'd known each other for a little while, thanks to our good friend Jill Hellman, and she had said, we're at Outthink Thinker Networks. We're going to have a 24 hour thought leadership session. Each speaker, one hour, 24 of those in a row was an amazing vision. They did it. I had a bunch of really fantastic speakers, myself notwithstanding.

00:05:57:00 - 00:06:05:10
Rob Wolcott
We had like Rita, Gunter, McGrath and Kagan. You can tell Kevin a little bit how that came together and why we ended up working together on proximity.

00:06:05:14 - 00:06:35:02
Kaihan Krippendorff
Yeah. You know, Covid hit and suddenly my speaking, schedule went to zero. Everything was canceled, postponed. And then I figured, hey, there are two things going on in the world. One is people need support, and two, there are all these great minds that are suddenly grounded. So could we raise money to support some nonprofits that are helping people that are dealing with Covid, get food to children, etc.?

00:06:35:04 - 00:07:03:14
Kaihan Krippendorff
And, and, and get these thought leaders involved. So we organized this 24 hour, 24 speakers over one day, event. And, Rob was one of those people. There was Amy Edmondson, there was Renee Morgan, the Blue Ocean strategy person. There was Gary Hamel, kind of like really the the best of the best. And, and Rob was one of those people and we did a, we worked with, you know, again, because there's so much talent available.

00:07:03:17 - 00:07:39:06
Kaihan Krippendorff
We had someone who is an expert in data visualization. He was available, so he just volunteered, and he was able to measure what were the frequency of different words that were spoken. And then re spoken and shared. And what was the most spoken and spoken word was Rob's concept of proximity. And so that led to this insight, like this idea clarifies for people a lot of stuff that seems to be disparate things going on, and it's a unifying concept.

00:07:39:06 - 00:07:48:22
Kaihan Krippendorff
So when Rob asked me if I would be willing to, contribute to the book and participate with him in writing the book, I jumped at the chance.

00:07:49:00 - 00:08:08:07
Kevin Eikenberry
So that is the title of the book, approximately. There's a subtitle, of course, too, but the proximity is the key word. It's the title of the book. And so, Rob, tell us a little bit more about I mean, you you hinted at it already, but what would you add to this sort of definition as the opening salvo of our conversation?

00:08:08:09 - 00:08:38:00
Rob Wolcott
Great. Well, in the book, Kevin, we look across different realms of life. You can think industries, but but we really kind and I thought about it more like about how we live and how it affects all of us. So how we work, how we eat, how we create and produce, how we prevent and cure, how we power, how we defend and the final chapter is, about the two horizons of the 21st century, the places humanity has not been before, but will this century space and virtual reality.

00:08:38:02 - 00:09:03:11
Rob Wolcott
And by the way, space and virtual reality are 100% proximate. We can come back to that, if that's of interest. But, in chapter two, we talk about a hypothetical concept that clarifies this proximity notion, and we call it p equals zero. P equals zero refers to proximity equals zero. In other words, the production of value or the and or the provision of value.

00:09:03:11 - 00:09:20:10
Rob Wolcott
And we separate those two because they operate differently at the moment of actual demand. So p equal zero is in some cases already true. Like for instance, if you think about video streaming, Kevin, you can watch as much of the Kardashians as you want any time, anywhere. Now, we're not saying that.

00:09:20:13 - 00:09:28:19
Kevin Eikenberry
Oh how much of that I'm going to watch. We can say people could watch us after we finish this. Yes. Anyway. Right.

00:09:28:20 - 00:09:51:16
Rob Wolcott
Exactly. That's that's great. But the point is, anybody could, with an ax have access to a device, can watch any video anytime, anywhere. But most of those videos have been produced months or even decades in advance. Now, here's the thing. The provision of all video content is already proximate. It's anywhere, anything, anytime. But the.

00:09:51:18 - 00:09:52:11
Kevin Eikenberry
New.

00:09:52:13 - 00:10:14:23
Rob Wolcott
Just like right now, right? Live. But a year from now, two years from now, God willing, they'll still be able to find this podcast anywhere and listen to it on any device. But here's a here's an illustrative of this predictive power of proximity production. A video content is not yet entirely proximate. It was probably created months ago, maybe decades ago.

00:10:15:01 - 00:10:46:17
Rob Wolcott
But here's the interesting thing with generative AI where are we right now? We're at the very beginning the knee of the curve for a future that is definitely coming. This is while I wonder if no, this is definitely coming where video content will be created on demand anywhere, anytime, and eventually for an audience of one. So we will figure out, boy, Kevin Eikenberry wants a story about X, Y, Z now and generative AI in five years, ten years, 20 years, imagine what it will be able to do.

00:10:46:17 - 00:10:53:00
Rob Wolcott
So this is again predictive of where we're going for the rest of our careers.

00:10:53:02 - 00:10:58:02
Kevin Eikenberry
Go ahead. And then you want to add to that before we add anything else you want to say about that? Yeah.

00:10:58:04 - 00:11:29:14
Kaihan Krippendorff
Maybe just like just like maybe two things that Rob said that I'll just kind of link that, maybe people haven't completely linked is you compress value into parts and then we have proximity and values created when the parts come together, when the soda meets the sirup for the Coca-Cola, for example. And so what we're saying is because these things get compressed and distributed, we can wait until we know there's demand and then combine them and create the value.

00:11:29:16 - 00:11:52:15
Rob Wolcott
Yeah, yeah that's great Kevin. Proximity is about procrastination, believe it or not. I remember when we were we were interviewing Dean Kamen, the famous inventor. Of the Segway, but many, many other things he said. He said the best way to make things is to wait as long as possible until there's a specific demand. And that's proximity.

00:11:52:15 - 00:12:07:16
Rob Wolcott
So we really mean to set up business models, technology platforms that encourage us to procrastinate until there's a specific need for a specific product or service or experience, and then produce and provide. And that's where every industry is going.

00:12:07:18 - 00:12:33:02
Kevin Eikenberry
So we'll get into some more of that in general before we're done. But you you laid this out a little bit about how the book is laid out, which is around some sort of specific parts of our lives. And I think once you tell us this idea of proximity, we all start to think of a few examples. But what you did, and I really love that you didn't do it in terms of industries, but really more about sort of on the on the user side, if you will.

00:12:33:04 - 00:12:53:07
Kevin Eikenberry
And, and you talked about a variety of these and we won't have time to get to all of them there in the book. But I do want to talk about, I think, the ones that are sort of the most, prescient. I'll continue to use words like, you guys, for all of us, as individuals, consumers and as leaders.

00:12:53:09 - 00:13:16:22
Kevin Eikenberry
And so like in the book, we'll start with the most of those, which is like, or how work is different, like how does proximity and work connect? What do you mean by that? I mean, I mean, obviously if my work involves using a 3D printer, okay. But fundamentally, what do you mean by this? Because this is probably where your, your thinking and the work we've done is the most interconnected.

00:13:16:22 - 00:13:21:10
Kevin Eikenberry
So talk let's talk about this a little bit first. And we'll go to a few of the others before we're done.

00:13:21:12 - 00:13:49:19
Rob Wolcott
Well I'll cover an obvious experience we've all had now that we didn't really have before. Very few of us had before Covid, and that is what we're doing right now. Zoom calls, stream cast, pod, podcast recording, for instance. And I remember early in Covid, I was on a zoom with a friend of mine remotely describing proximity, and he said, well, that sounds nice, but it feels like what we're doing right now on the screen is the opposite of proximity.

00:13:49:21 - 00:14:10:15
Rob Wolcott
And I said, no, no, no, no, no, no, it's entire it's exactly proximity. Why is that? Because he happened to be sitting in New York. I was in Evanston, Illinois at the time. I said, we're creating value right here on the screen. It has nothing to do with where your physical body is. So you can accomplish things, anything, anywhere, anytime.

00:14:10:17 - 00:14:27:08
Rob Wolcott
And so everybody's experience of being thrust into their home offices and having zoom in teams meetings, that's entirely proximity, because now it doesn't matter that you're in Michigan and I'm in New Jersey and, you know, maybe Keegan's in Miami, we can create value right here on the screen.

00:14:27:10 - 00:14:39:06
Kevin Eikenberry
It's interesting because I went to a movie yesterday and, and by the way, the movie that I went to, I'm like a movie theater. Like a movie theater, because the director of that movie is going to be on this show in two days. Oh.

00:14:39:06 - 00:14:39:22
Rob Wolcott
Wow. That's great.

00:14:40:00 - 00:15:02:07
Kevin Eikenberry
But but anyway, during the commercials, of course, of which there are now many, there was a commercial for the for, the meta quest headset of, of, Facebook's event. And the interesting thing is it's one of the things you just said, Rob, is one of the things that they or I talked about or, you know, the examples that they used of using this device.

00:15:02:09 - 00:15:23:06
Kevin Eikenberry
One of them was these two people who were in a relationship but were far apart, using those goggles for those but using those devices to play a game together, right. Even though they aren't physically proximate. Right. So it's another example of what you're talking about. That's it.

00:15:23:08 - 00:15:24:05
Rob Wolcott
Absolutely.

00:15:24:07 - 00:15:57:08
Kevin Eikenberry
So beyond beyond that thing that, you know, that thing called zoom that no one had heard of. And then it became a tool, and then it became a source of anxiety for people, in the course of about two years, somewhere in there as a verb, too. Right. But beyond that, sort of really obvious. And I'm glad that you shared it, that way, because it is one, I think, what are some other examples about how this, this how can we use the idea of proximity to further help us predict where we think the future of work is going?

00:15:57:10 - 00:16:17:07
Kaihan Krippendorff
Well, I think you could think of work as, supply and demand that there is a job that needs to be done, and then there's talent that can do the job. So what we're saying, if we imagine p equals zero is I need someone to fix my refrigerator and boom, that person is there. I need someone to write a report for a meeting that I have in five minutes.

00:16:17:07 - 00:16:39:18
Kaihan Krippendorff
And that person is there and they write the report. So all the barriers between today and and then so, you know, look at TaskRabbit, look at gig working. Look at the, shift from roles to OKRs, the fragmentation of jobs, that and what skills people have. Look at Upwork. It all of that allows us to find the talent that we need more quickly.

00:16:39:18 - 00:17:01:22
Kaihan Krippendorff
And then we add AI, which allows us to then scale the capabilities of someone, hey, I don't know how to write a report, but with I, I can either learn it or I don't need to learn it. But I could do it immediately because it is, you know, because, AI's guiding me. It allows us to kind of reduce that supply and demand gap down to zero.

00:17:02:00 - 00:17:37:09
Rob Wolcott
Yeah. Kevin, the AI point that Keon mentioned is absolutely essential because it's quintessential proximity with AI systems. You can compress this extraordinary capability, offer it anywhere. And and the system from the user's perspective sits there doing nothing. Nothing at all. Now we know there's a server in Iceland and there's lots of stuff going on behind, but from the user's perspective, when you jump on ChatGPT or Pi or any of these platforms, it's a blank screen, and then you throw a prompt in and seconds later it's created something.

00:17:37:09 - 00:18:00:23
Rob Wolcott
No, it may or may not be what you want. That's your job to figure out. But that capability is getting better and better, and it's distributing all over the place every moment of your day, every aspect of your job. And so our role as leaders is to help our people and ourselves figure out how to leverage these capabilities most effectively, often to do things we couldn't have done before.

00:18:01:01 - 00:18:02:08
Kaihan Krippendorff
Yeah. You know, if I.

00:18:02:09 - 00:18:04:07
Kevin Eikenberry
Could please, please,

00:18:04:09 - 00:18:31:09
Kaihan Krippendorff
Pull one thing that, one word that Rob used, he said, create something. And I think that's a very important point, because in a way, what we're saying is there is no reason to predict anymore because it is the user's input. They're not asking, can you search Google for content that was created before? That's relevant to me. Can you search Amazon for a product that was made before that is relevant?

00:18:31:11 - 00:18:55:22
Kaihan Krippendorff
You actually can initiate the creation of that thing. It's much more Etsy than Amazon. And so in a way that removes the need for prediction. Now we do say prediction, because the idea of p equals zero allows you to more accurately predict where the industry is going. But the industry that you're in the future is no prediction, because you're only producing when things are needed.

00:18:56:00 - 00:19:17:22
Kevin Eikenberry
Gotcha. So perhaps because I grew up on a farm and because I happened to be near that particular location as I'm doing this particular episode, the next chapter is probably the other one that we'll have the chance to really dive into the most. Yet. It is the idea of in the chapters titled proximity and How We Eat.

00:19:18:00 - 00:19:43:07
Kevin Eikenberry
And so what do you mean by that? Like, not everyone's got a garden, right? And and even if you have a garden, you have to grow it, right. You don't have it instantly. So what do you what do you guys. Because this might seem antithetical to people until they start to see your thinking. So, go tell us about what you mean here and what's what does this tell us about where we're headed?

00:19:43:09 - 00:20:03:16
Rob Wolcott
Yeah. Well, Karen, why don't you share briefly the the Domino's example? Because that's really tangible for people. And sure, the proximity is not just about making the pizza. It's about all the other things that wrap around it that add value for the consumer. And then I can talk about some crazy stuff I saw in the UAE and controlled environment, agriculture and stuff like that.

00:20:03:16 - 00:20:23:04
Kaihan Krippendorff
Right, right. That's great. Yeah. So we can yeah, I had a bad experience this weekend. I, my, my family was over and we ordered bad pizza and I got a lot of flack for it. I ended up, grilling pizza yesterday and making up for it. But the experience of getting the pizza isn't just getting the food in your mouth, right.

00:20:23:06 - 00:20:49:07
Kaihan Krippendorff
It is also knowing, did I get did I order the right thing or are they using the right ingredients? Is it properly, quality checked? Is it being. Is it on my way? Right. Is it going to arrive in time before the movie starts? Right. All of that is part of the value of ordering pizza. And what Domino's was able to do, because those that that part of the value proposition is digitally can be delivered digitally through their app.

00:20:49:09 - 00:21:08:00
Kaihan Krippendorff
And they had invested for other reasons in technology to kind of automate their production line. They now had all this information and they were able to deliver that part of the experience. I pull up my app and I can see it's being quality checked. It's being this being shipped. It's it's being sent in. What time is going to arrive?

00:21:08:02 - 00:21:31:00
Kaihan Krippendorff
All of that value got to me a little bit faster than Pizza Hut or other places. And for the time period that we analyzed, a ten year time period, Domino's stock price outperformed Google's and many high tech companies, and it was only due to proximity and not proximity of the physical product, the proximity of the digitally deliverable elements of the value proposition.

00:21:31:03 - 00:21:44:03
Kaihan Krippendorff
So we could already you could already, with a small advantage of proxy, already have the huge, business advantage a competitive advantage, and then now now maybe Rob, you can talk about actually the producing of the food for quickly.

00:21:44:03 - 00:22:04:11
Rob Wolcott
Yeah, sure. And I think I want to Kevin, underscore one thing that Kai on just said the certainly there are these big breakthrough concepts, but there are also lots of really kind of small steps. You just need a small advantage in proximity to be far more competitive than other companies. But I'll give you a little, a little bit of the the further out picture.

00:22:04:11 - 00:22:26:04
Rob Wolcott
So in late 2022, when I was doing some research for the book, I was speaking an event in the UAE, in Dubai, and I had the opportunity to go and visit, boost Sonica. So boost Sonica is the largest, vertical farm in operation in the world today. It's part of a larger frame called controlled environment agriculture.

00:22:26:04 - 00:22:47:16
Rob Wolcott
So you can think of, greenhouse as and all this and most vertical farms have not been economically viable yet. That's absolutely true. By the way, the key to vertical farming, the key to proximate agriculture is proximate power, proximate, sustainable, affordable power. So when we solve that problem, we've solved the proximity of any kind of agriculture. Set that aside.

00:22:47:16 - 00:23:05:20
Rob Wolcott
So I visit Boost Arnica. It's a partnership with Emirates Airlines. It's a few miles from the Dubai airport. First of all, the leafy greens and herbs grown there are as good as anything you get in the French farmers market. No offense to the French. I hope you know nobody's upset, but but this stuff was fantastic. But here's the exciting part.

00:23:05:22 - 00:23:32:11
Rob Wolcott
The next morning I got on my flight from Dubai back to New York City, and the lettuce in my salad was picked up at that plant the night before. Now they they use 98% less water. They grow only what they need when when they need it. Far less waste. Now, it is absolutely true that each head of lettuce grown there is far more expensive than growing heads of lettuce in Spain, I get it.

00:23:32:13 - 00:23:59:09
Rob Wolcott
But here's the thing that the people at Emirates told me they looked at the overall systemic cost and responsiveness of growing lettuce in Spain, harvesting it in advance, putting on a ship, sending it to a warehouse, hoping that some part of it is still good enough for the salad on my flight. And when they did the overall systemic cost, it was it was by far better to be producing right there in that vertical farm.

00:23:59:09 - 00:24:23:06
Rob Wolcott
And the punch line is Kevin. Since kind and I finished the document for the book, in February of this year, Emirates announced they were buying 100% of Boost Tonic, so they've acquired the entire company. So this stuff is starting slowly. It's just like all disruptive technologies. It doesn't work for most cases, but over time, people find the right applications that make money, that are value added.

00:24:23:06 - 00:24:31:23
Rob Wolcott
They get better and better. They run up the learning curve and and over the medium to long term, they change the game. And that's what's going on right now with proximity.

00:24:32:01 - 00:24:54:11
Kaihan Krippendorff
And the, and the controlled environment. Farming allows us to also reduce the incubation time or the growth time of, of food, so we can actually produce food more rapidly. And those spaces are getting smaller and smaller. Mila has a whole division that makes refrigerator sized or appliance sized vertical farms that you can put into your house.

00:24:54:13 - 00:24:56:16
Rob Wolcott
I saw one of those in Greece just. Oh you.

00:24:56:16 - 00:24:58:17
Kevin Eikenberry
Did? Oh, wow. Yeah, I've only seen.

00:24:58:17 - 00:25:04:21
Rob Wolcott
Events and I'm talking. And my host said, well, there's one of them right here.

00:25:04:23 - 00:25:06:05
Kaihan Krippendorff
I'm going to get one there.

00:25:06:05 - 00:25:23:03
Kevin Eikenberry
You had so we could and I knew this would be the case. Not only that, because of the depth of the book, but by having both authors with me today that that we would never get through everything, which is one of the reasons why I a copy of Proximity by Zoom. Rival cut in hand prep and door.

00:25:23:04 - 00:25:38:09
Kevin Eikenberry
Of course. And we'll have all the links to that in the show notes at the end, as well, you talk about a lot of the things you talk about preventions and cures. You talk about, you talk about power. You talk about a lot of other things. As you mentioned earlier, we don't have time to get there.

00:25:38:09 - 00:26:00:17
Kevin Eikenberry
I just want to spend a couple minutes because you've done a good job of giving people the the nugget of the idea. And we've talked about several examples. And so my question is where should we as leaders now not everyone who's listening here is a senior executive right? Or an entrepreneur or or leading a tech company. But like for any of us as leaders, what should we be doing now?

00:26:00:20 - 00:26:13:06
Kevin Eikenberry
Like, what would you recommend to any leader thinking about their organization, their career, their future? What what are the questions or things they should be thinking about and taking action on right now?

00:26:13:08 - 00:26:33:13
Kaihan Krippendorff
Maybe I could give. I give like a 32nd, a 32nd and answer real quick. Really four steps envision in your industry. Step two break down all the barriers that currently exists between current state and people. Zero. It costs this. It takes this long to grow it. Banana. It takes this long to ship it. It takes this long and it goes out.

00:26:33:18 - 00:26:51:17
Kaihan Krippendorff
Then we'll go through the proximity technology with this AI, 3D printing and the rest, and then map those up and identify the and prioritize the opportunities and just pick 1 or 2 opportunities, technology combined with a barrier, and then prioritize those to just get a little bit ahead of the competition.

00:26:51:19 - 00:27:10:05
Rob Wolcott
Yeah, I'd add to this, Kevin. And by the way, in our book, we have the Proximity Strategy Workbook, which is in the appendix. And obviously Keanu and I are always happy to engage with with readers and leaders who who'd like a little extra help, but you don't need us there to to to work with that workbook, go through it and see what it means.

00:27:10:05 - 00:27:34:03
Rob Wolcott
And your industry and for your customers and customers customers. But I'd add to that as an active investor. So I'm an active venture investor, but also public markets. I've been for a few years now looking for companies that are way ahead in terms of proximity. And I'll just I'll just give you a couple of publicly traded examples of people want to go take a look and see what this has meant.

00:27:34:05 - 00:27:57:10
Rob Wolcott
Look at, for instance, Axon Corporation, which is in public safety and security. So they invent they pioneered the Taser. We all know that. But then they added later on they added body cams, police body cams, and then they started collecting data from all these body cams and doing analytics. And then earlier this year they introduced a generative AI capability so the officer can push a button.

00:27:57:12 - 00:28:13:17
Rob Wolcott
And using the body cam data, populate the police report instantaneously. Now of course, we all know police officers love writing police reports, so I'm sure that they wouldn't want to do this. But can you imagine eliminating the need to fill out that police report and how much more time.

00:28:13:17 - 00:28:16:08
Kevin Eikenberry
For getting it? 80%. They're right and they're getting.

00:28:16:08 - 00:28:39:21
Rob Wolcott
An 80%. They're then editing it. It's it's profound. And then top that off with they just acquired an indoor drone company and an outdoor drone company. And this this company axon it just joined S&P 500. They just keep growing and they keep blowing away the street's numbers because most people most market analysts have not figured out the fundamental proximity driver.

00:28:39:21 - 00:28:48:10
Kevin Eikenberry
What they do and strategy. Yeah. So well you said you're going to get us two, you gave us one, you get another. Oh.

00:28:48:12 - 00:29:01:04
Rob Wolcott
Sure. I mean, I can keep going. There's another one that the market. So axon is right. It's up like 100 and some percent just in the past year I, I stand by it. But you know look I'm not making any recommendations here and.

00:29:01:06 - 00:29:01:11
Kevin Eikenberry
I.

00:29:01:11 - 00:29:21:18
Rob Wolcott
Pretty highly value but one that the market hasn't really, respected yet is in 3D printing. And you've probably heard a ton about 3D printing and people are saying, see, I told you that's not going to work. People have been talking about it for a long time. But, you know, that's what happens with disruptive technologies. There's a lot of hype.

00:29:21:18 - 00:29:49:10
Rob Wolcott
And then we underperform and people say, see, I told you that's not going to work. A bunch of companies go bankrupt or go out of business, which has been happening. But what also happens when the carnage is out there? There'll be a few companies, and this has happened many times in history. There'll be a few companies that are well-capitalized, that have a solid strategy, and they go up and they start buying up these other assets, technologies, companies that that have meaningful stuff, and they roll them together.

00:29:49:10 - 00:30:14:17
Rob Wolcott
So right now, a company doing that, it's still under the radar. It's called Nano Dimension. They are becoming the leader in additive manufacturing. 3D printing is part of additive manufacturing. They just this year, confirmed they're going to be buying direct metal. They're buying Mark forged. They're rolling up these companies. It's still like $2 and 30 sense of share or something like that.

00:30:14:22 - 00:30:26:07
Rob Wolcott
But their market cap, Kevin, is equal to the cash they have on the balance sheet after these acquisitions. So you're just at the very beginning of seeing these things roll out.

00:30:26:09 - 00:30:28:17
Kaihan Krippendorff
I feel like there should be some kind of liability statement there.

00:30:28:17 - 00:30:33:11
Kevin Eikenberry
I was just going to say like, no, I think, you know, you are an investor.

00:30:33:11 - 00:30:37:08
Rob Wolcott
And you're not. Take my advice. I'm just telling you that I have.

00:30:37:10 - 00:30:43:00
Kevin Eikenberry
Authority and we could, you know, there'll be no disclaimer, everybody. But because I have personally.

00:30:43:01 - 00:30:43:04
Rob Wolcott
That.

00:30:43:05 - 00:30:44:22
Kaihan Krippendorff
Performance is not an indicator.

00:30:44:22 - 00:30:46:11
Kevin Eikenberry
Of where you go. That's what I was looking for.

00:30:46:11 - 00:30:47:20
Rob Wolcott
I have personally.

00:30:47:22 - 00:30:49:18
Kevin Eikenberry
To do all I'm asking you to do. I go.

00:30:49:20 - 00:30:52:10
Rob Wolcott
Okay, yeah, you do what you want, it's all on you.

00:30:52:10 - 00:30:57:01
Kaihan Krippendorff
But just log on to Walcot investments.com.

00:30:57:03 - 00:31:10:01
Kevin Eikenberry
Well, that's not the link that I had. So, you know. So I want to ask both of you, a couple other questions I'd like to ask all of my guests before we finish. And the first one is Kai and you first. What do you do for fun?

00:31:10:03 - 00:31:12:04
Kaihan Krippendorff
Oh, I cook, I love to cook.

00:31:12:08 - 00:31:12:23
Rob Wolcott
Yeah.

00:31:13:01 - 00:31:20:10
Kaihan Krippendorff
I'm a I'm a non, you know, an amateur chef is, is this is how I would characterize myself.

00:31:20:11 - 00:31:26:22
Rob Wolcott
Okay. Actually, Kevin, half of my hands feed is. Yes. And the other half is.

00:31:27:00 - 00:31:27:08
Kevin Eikenberry
Itself.

00:31:27:10 - 00:31:27:21
Kaihan Krippendorff
Nice cooked.

00:31:27:22 - 00:31:28:10
Rob Wolcott
Yeah.

00:31:28:12 - 00:31:31:10
Kaihan Krippendorff
Yeah. I can show you the pizzas that I made yesterday.

00:31:31:11 - 00:31:33:18
Kevin Eikenberry
Well, yeah. You mentioned that already. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

00:31:33:20 - 00:31:35:12
Rob Wolcott
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

00:31:35:14 - 00:31:51:02
Kevin Eikenberry
And then the other question and I'm going to have Rob go first because he knows the question and I'm not sure in the pre conversation that you heard this. So you'll get the chance to hear it because I think Rob go first. So Rob what are you reading these days.

00:31:51:04 - 00:32:12:21
Rob Wolcott
Well I love history. It's also your other question. What do you do for fun? There's nothing I love more than reading great history. And I discovered a couple of books that have been reprinted that won Pulitzer Prizes back in the 20s and 30s about American history. And I it's it's fascinating to see the perspective at that time.

00:32:12:21 - 00:32:30:18
Rob Wolcott
So what I'm reading right now is called the founding of New England. It won the Pulitzer Prize, I think, in 1922, and it's a fascinating read. I'm I already knew quite a bit about the history of New England, and I have to say, I've learned it probably two what I knew before from this book.

00:32:30:20 - 00:32:32:16
Kevin Eikenberry
Awesome. Kahan. What do you.

00:32:32:16 - 00:32:52:07
Kaihan Krippendorff
Yeah, yeah. So I, you know, I have a podcast and so I'm always getting pitch books and I read there are two that this this one I just pulled up I really like this is kind of an unknown book. Data Rules Reinventing the Market Economy. Christina Alaimo and Janice Colleen Clinicos. And it sort of says, hey, data isn't just information.

00:32:52:07 - 00:33:22:15
Kaihan Krippendorff
Data are social constructions that change the way people think. And so it is a very kind of forward thinking, view on, on, on data and how it is going to shape how is shaping, companies and industries. And I also really am loving Marcus Collins wrote a book called For the Culture. He is sort of a marketing guru who was involved, for example, in developing the brand beats, which was, Doctor Dres collaboration sold to Apple.

00:33:22:15 - 00:33:40:10
Kaihan Krippendorff
It's just like brands should create cultures around them that inform identity and have customers and, and employees be kind of, you know, kind of link their identity to. And that's where the strength of brands come from. Those are 2 to 2 books that I'm very into right now.

00:33:40:12 - 00:34:03:22
Kevin Eikenberry
Perfect. All of that. Everybody will be in the show notes, along with, a link to these fine gentleman's book proximity how coming breakthroughs in just in time transform business, society and daily life. Beyond that though, above and beyond getting a copy book where you guys want to point people to learn more about your work. Or any place else you want to point people.

00:34:04:00 - 00:34:18:17
Rob Wolcott
Great. I'm I'm always on LinkedIn. Robert C Walcott you can always reach me there and let me know that we met on Kevin's podcast because, I mean, I guess really we didn't meet, but reach out on LinkedIn. And also you can find me at Twin global.org.

00:34:18:18 - 00:34:23:12
Kaihan Krippendorff
Yeah. For me, LinkedIn. And then also we have proximity book net as well.

00:34:23:14 - 00:34:41:23
Kevin Eikenberry
Proximity book dot net. So a question for all of you before I say goodbye to all of those of you you're watching, listening and to you of in question, for all of you that I ask you every single week as viewers and listeners. And the question is now what? What action will you take as a result of being here?

00:34:41:23 - 00:35:19:00
Kevin Eikenberry
What what things did you make note of? And no, we're not talking about the investment advice. We are talking, however, about what ideas did you get about the, the the how can you apply the idea approximately how will you really is the question how will you apply that idea? What actions might you take for versus some of the things that you heard about, the predictive nature of it, or even just to start to build a new perspective around all of it, along with the ideas that you just heard about what we can be doing next as leaders to start to reduce the friction and move us closer to P equals zero.

00:35:19:02 - 00:35:48:06
Kevin Eikenberry
My point here is this everybody, that if you don't take action, this might have been entertaining, but you could have probably found better entertainment purely, ultimately you came here so that you can become more effective. Well, I know I said maybe could you maybe like, my point is, we do hope that this was entertaining, but we also hope this is something that you can use to transform your future and become a more effective leader, create more effective organizations, make a bigger, positive change in the world.

00:35:48:11 - 00:35:54:10
Kevin Eikenberry
That's what we're here for. And that's what we've got to do again next week. Thanks, guys, for being here. It was a pleasure to have you with you.

00:35:54:12 - 00:35:55:13
Rob Wolcott
Thanks, Kevin. It was great.

00:35:55:14 - 00:35:56:09
Kaihan Krippendorff
Thanks, Kevin.

00:35:56:11 - 00:36:08:11
Kevin Eikenberry
Everybody. We will be back next week for another episode of the Remarkable Leadership Podcast. Until then, tell someone that you heard this. Invite them to join you. You know what to do wherever you're watching your podcast. We'll see you soon. Thank.