← Second in Command: The Chief Behind the Chief with Cameron Herold
Second in Command: The Chief Behind the Chief with Cameron Herold
Ep. 519 - FAN FAVORITE | Sarah Jones Simmer – 50 Million Users: The Ultimate Guide to Bumble’s Kind Leadership
00:48:40
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- [00:00]
A
Hey there. Just a quick note before we dive in. This is actually one of our older episodes, but we're bringing it back because it's one of the most downloaded ones we've ever released. Clearly it struck a chord with a lot of listeners and I know there's so much value packed inside. So whether you're hearing it for the first time or revisiting it, enjoy this.
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B
Fan favorite early on in my journey introduced me to a handful of amazing men and women who have played a role similar to mine as like a COO or a president or someone who's really helping to bring the visionary founders vision life. And I feel like I get such wonderful feedback and insights just from having mentor relationships like that that help me a bit understand the journey that I'm on and be more self aware of moments just like that that I was describing. Welcome to the Second in Command Podcast, produced by the COO alliance and brought to you by its founder, Cameron Herald. In the second in command podcast, we talk to top COOs who share the insights, strategies and tactics that made them the Chief behind the Chief. And now here's your host, Cameron Herold.
- [01:16]
A
Sarah Jones Simmer is the Chief Operating Officer of Bumble, the female first social networking app that brings kindness and respect back into the dating and social introductions. In her role, she oversees core business strategy, growth and marketing initiatives and facilitates the expansion of Bumble's rapidly growing team. Headquartered in Austin, Texas with offices around the world, Sarah has spent her career investing in, studying and operating businesses. Sarah has done public speaking on topics ranging from girls and women's rights in the future of ethical business, has a Master's in Public Policy from Northwestern University, and she used to run marathons and has completed an Ironman. Now she spends time outside of work raising two amazing young daughters. Sarah and I actually met at a X Prize event that was held at the TED Conference. Thanks for joining.
- [02:05]
B
Thank you for having me. I'm excited for today's conversation.
- [02:08]
A
Yeah, looking forward to hearing some of this. So you just before we were starting up, you said that Bumble has been doing the expansion into India and you were getting ready for some stuff with the the super bowl this past weekend. Why don't you, before you dive into that. But we'll start with those in a second. Why don't you tell us how you got in with Bumble? And maybe just for anybody who isn't aware, I don't know where they've been hiding, but tell us what Bumble is so they understand that as well.
- [02:31]
B
Sure. So Bumble is a social network built by women for everyone. We got our start in the dating world, as you rightly said, but have now expanded into friends finding through Bumble BFF and also business connections through Bumble Biz. We've got 50 million users worldwide. We actually just crossed that number this past weekend in the 4ish years of our existence. The company was founded in 2014 by a woman named Whitney Wolf Hurd, who was a co founder of Tinder and so is no stranger to the social connection space, but really felt like there was an opportunity to build a dating app and a social networking platform with women in mind. We get asked all the time, why did you enter such a crowded space? And the reality is, of course there were many other players in the space before us, but no one was operating through the lens of what women users want and how we could make these apps feel more approachable and comfortable and empowering for them. And that was Bumble. Stroke of genius was to build starting with a dating app, but now social connections platform where women make the first move. And that's our core USP in a heterosexual connection. On either the dating side or the biz side of the app, the woman has to make the first move. And once you both indicate interest in starting a conversation with one another, only she can talk first. And that was a real game changer in the space that really put the woman in the driver's seat and helped her feel like she wasn't bombarded by messages that she wasn't interested in and she had a bit more control how she was engaging in those conversations. And we'll circle back to that as we talk about things like India in a second because it really has allowed us to re engineer the way that relationships are formed online and bring a level of kindness and accountability and respect back to those conversations simply by changing the way that the dialogue gets started. And so we've obviously been excited to see that growth. I have been with the company for closing it on two years now and I actually got the job through a good old fashioned job posting, which I feel like is so rare these days. But I, you know, speaking to the power of networking, you I saw the job posting, I thought to myself, this is my dream job. And I went, I went and shook every tree that I could come up with that would help me get connected to someone in Bumble. And so was looking at who might be friends on LinkedIn or Facebook or otherwise with some of the key players on that early team in order to get my foot in the door. And that does make all the difference. But by way of background, I started my career in investment management. I was at a hedge fund in Los Angeles and I was in a fairly generalist role analyzing stocks, obviously, and then also macroeconomic conditions that were shaping the way that markets looked. And this was starting in 2007. So it was a wild ride to say the least. I joined the firm right as the sub brand meltdown was unfolding before us. And I was there through the crisis of 2008 and all that that brought to the market. And I love investing. I love thinking about what makes businesses grow and succeed and also what barriers exist to allowing that scale to happen. And got my first exposure to that, obviously in the investing world. And when after I had been there for a handful of years, moved over into strategy consulting with a focus on social good and had the incredibly lucky opportunities to work with brand Gucci and Keurig and Clinique and think about how they could leverage their full asset model as businesses to create change in the world through their brand and through taking advantage of the power of their brand to help their customers and users and consumers connect with causes that mattered to them. Which underpins so much of the work that I now do at Bumble. I moved to Austin a handful of years ago, 3ish years ago now, I guess, and have been sort of on this journey to finding myself at Bumble. And this feels to me like such an amazing way to bring to bear the things that I'm really passionate about. Working in the girls and women space, thinking about how businesses grow and scale and attaching that to this incredible company that is culture forward, that's thinking about what the future of Connection is. And that's inspired by the vision of this incredibly visionary founder, Whitney, and just to join a rapidly growing organization on such an exciting part of its growth curve. So I feel like I feel genuinely lucky each and every day to get to come to work in this space and work with the teams that I do around the world.
- [07:04]
A
I don't know where to start. I've got about eight different questions already just off of so I can go into Austin and talk about Whitney and Vision, talk about the culture first side of the company and causes and what you've pulled from the hedge fund in India. I want to go probably in the wrong direction quickly, but it's just because I'm so intrigued with India. I've been there four times. I've spent a total of three months there, done a couple big speaking tours. I've been to Dozens and dozens of cities in India. And I'm really curious as to how it's going and what your big lessons have learned because that culture is so different.
- [07:41]
B
Yeah, absolutely. I think that the very nature of the work that we're doing in the relationship space and whether that means dating relationships or business relationships or friendships, it's inherently incredibly localized. You know, there's no way to sort of do this templatized at scale, because the way that people connect and form bonds with one another is dictated by millennia worth of culture that have shaped the narrative around how people come together. And you're right, it very much takes going to the market, meeting with people, building teams in market, understanding what women in particular in India want to feel comfortable on social networking platforms, what it will take for them to feel like this is a place that they can trust to engage. And so the way that India came about for us actually was that we had the good fortune of having Priyanka Chopra now Priyanka Chopra, Jonas, join us for our Bumblebees launch dinner in New York in October of 2017. And she and Whitney really connected and started the conversation there that's been going ever since, which was to think about Bumblebees as this incredible tool. Women in India would love this as a career builder. Oh, and by the way, Bumble has these other really important opportunities for them to be able to connect and make meaningful relationships across their lives. And so how might we think about localizing for the Indian context? And that really kicked off a journey that I've been privileged to be deeply engaged with over the last 12 to 18 months now of saying, okay, how do we think about sizing the market and sizing the opportunity and whether this makes sense for us right now as a business? How do we think about going to market from a product perspective? And what do we need to adapt in the UX and UI and even potentially on the back end, like server side, how do we adapt ourselves for a predominantly 3G market? And then how do we think about marketing and reaching the audience there of all of these amazing women that we've been presenting? Privilege to me in our journey back and forth, how do we create both marketing campaigns and a product toolkit that meets their needs? And it's been an incredibly, incredibly, incredibly exciting journey. I think we always knew that Bungle was going to go to Asia in a really thoughtful and strategic way. And we have this privilege as a mission first company to not only say, okay, well, where's the addressable market opportunity in terms of Revenue tam. And we're watching incomes rise in a market like India and Obviously it's a 1 point percent, 2 billion person population. Like there's a meaningful, addressable market there. But bumble, we can also say, great, let's look at all of those numbers and all that analysis and couple that with where is there an opportunity to drive real cultural conversation and create opportunities for women? And where's the opportunity to drive good in the world and bring about the impact that is so essential to our DNA?
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A
It's one of the top markets on the planet for that, for sure.
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B
Absolutely. Absolutely. And there's already a conversation going on around women in India and what the future means for their careers, for their relationships. It's having a me too movement of its own. We are just there to sort of add another tool to the incredible empowerment journey of the women in India.
- [11:00]
A
Yeah, they're already rising up. It's almost like the wave is starting to surge. And you've picked the timing of it perfectly to almost empower it and leverage it as well.
- [11:10]
B
But you're doing, I think it's our, it's our duty to serve the women of India and understand their needs. You know, we're not driving the conversation, they are. We're just here to be another tool in their toolkit and to give them an opportunity to be in the driver's seat in some of these key connection areas in their lives.
- [11:28]
A
Well, it's interesting. I met with a CEO over in India years ago, and he was, he sells edible oils and he sells $300 million a year in oil. And I said, wow, how many countries do you sell oil? And he goes, just India. He goes, I only sell in a couple states in India. But he said, you know, in America you might use 1 tablespoon of oil a day. He said, in India, we use a quart. He said, americans always try to invent these products and try to market them to people who don't need them. And he said, in India, we find what the need is and we give it to them. And I think that's kind of what, you know, is you've, you've identified a massive need in that marketplace and you're just giving them the tools and they'll be able to run with that.
- [12:01]
B
You know, look, I think similar to, you know, the landscape in the US in 2014, there are tools, there are other apps and brands that we admire for the businesses that they've built in that market. But we didn't see anyone going to market in a truly authentic Woman first way, which is obviously the DNA of Bumble. And we felt like there was a meaningful opportunity to deliver on that promise to the women of India. And that's why, frankly, we've engaged women like Priyanka herself to help shape and guide that strategy. She. She can speak so authentically to her experience as an Indian woman. And we're just here to try to facilitate the creation of a tool so that women like her can have the type of opportunities for empowerment that she's had.
- [12:46]
A
Yeah. What lessons do you think you're pulling from this India expansion back into the North American markets, then?
- [12:54]
B
That's a great question. There are a couple actual features within the app that we were prompted to build because we were localizing for India that we've said, actually we could roll this out globally. So a couple easy examples of that are, when we started to look at India, it was clear to us that it would be table stakes to have both religion and horoscope in the app as a way for people to be informed as they wanted to make connections, at least within the dating side of the app. And we ended up building that functionality, badges and filters, and then deciding to roll that out globally and not just saving it for India. So I think there are some feature sets that we're building. There are things that we're learning about marketing that have relevance globally. And I think that also shows you how ultimately small and interconnected the world is. Right. While we all have such incredible nuances to the cultures and the ways in which we connect and build and form relationships, there's actually a ton of universality there, too, that makes us all human. And I think it's smart on us as business to say, how do we cross pollinate different ideas?
- [14:03]
A
Well, there's also a ton happening globally that we're not necessarily aware of unless we unplug. I was at an event last week called Abundance360, and we were talking about what's happening in China and how 30, 20 years ago, the Chinese companies would copy everything in North America and kind of rip off and duplicate. And then all of a sudden, they started to figure stuff out on their own because they'd copied so many companies. They got really good at running companies, and now they're deciding to innovate and do it on their own, and we're starting to look to what they're doing, or if we're not, we should be. That's even happening over in India. Like, you can just see the swell of what's happening over there, especially with commerce and with mobile, it's interesting to see you guys have picked that market. So walk us through, where did Bumble for business come from? And then on the friendship side as well, walk us through the expansion on that because I wasn't aware of it, but I saw something on Bumble Business the other day and I almost thought it was spam. I hadn't seen it yet and it just kind of popped up.
- [14:56]
B
No, it's not spam. Download it and use the app. Yeah. You know, both BFF and Biz came as so many great ideas do from watching how our users were interacting with the product. And so, you know, roll back to three years ago before Bumble BFF was a thing. We saw users in the product saying, hey, I'm not here to date but I just moved to Chicago and I'm looking for a new friend.
- [15:21]
A
Sure.
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B
Or I've just landed in Montreal for the weekend. What are the best bars for me to go check out? And so they were realizing that there was this efficiency around connection using this mutual opt in premise and using this really localized way of connecting that could have relevance in other aspects of their lives. And we saw a real opportunity to do that. And I think one thing that Bumble has done exceedingly well, and this is to Whitney and the early team's credit in the way they built the brand, is they built the brand in such a way that it wasn't a stretch to think about, oh well, Bumble could be for friends or Bumble could be for business. It was, I trust Bumble because it's creating this environment for kind, empowered connections that can easily extend to other verticals in my life. And I think we're probably the first brand in our space that had the permission to do that in our users lives because of the way the brand had been architected from the get go. It wasn't known as a place just for casual connections or for hookups. It was known as a place that existed for kindness and empowerment and meaningful relationships. And we've now been able to find, take that into other verticals of your life.
- [16:30]
A
Well, I'm going to stake my, I'll put a stake in the ground in this one that I think your Bumble for Friends will be bigger than any of the dating apps for dating. I think you've actually hit a nerve that is so big especially. No, I think I just, all of a sudden it dawned on me that there's just so many people out there that are just starving for real interactions with real friends and, and they don't.
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B
Know how, like, you see, I completely agree.
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A
Yeah. And it's, it's interesting. I live in a city called Vancouver, Canada. And, you know, I think of Vancouver is kind of friendly, but everybody I talked to is like, no, Vancouver is totally not friendly. I'm like, really?
- [17:06]
B
But really, I think Vancouver is friendly. I mean, all Canadians are friendly, right?
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A
Yeah, we think. Right. But then again. But people are still very lonely. Like, they're sitting at home and they're. They see what's happening on Instagram or other social media platforms and they long for lives that aren't really what they're seeing in social media. And they're just longing to go in and have coffee or hang out or go for a walk with somebody other than just.
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B
I mean. Agreed. I feel like we're living in an epidemic of loneliness right now. The UK actually just hired a minister within the government focused on loneliness. Well, because we've become so technologically connected that we become disconnected in reality.
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A
Well, and even, and even if you do get that one date or you get, you know, you're hooking up with somebody, I mean, like, you're not going to be hooking up 12 hours a day, but you got the other 11 and a half hours spending with somebody, like, Right, I heard it. Yeah, I heard.
- [17:55]
B
This desire to connect is like the very core of humanity. Right. There's a reason that solitary confinement is the harshest form of punishment. We all desire to be in relationship with one another. And, you know, what was such an incredible moment five years ago when, you know, our peers like Tinder and Bidoo and others came on the scene, was that they normalized this idea of connecting through a mobile interface or arguably a digital interface. Like, I think you saw issues in a new wave of the way people thought about online dating. Everyone was doing it. It was free, or it could be free. Right. And it no longer had the stigma of, oh, wow, you have to go online to make a connection. Like, now everyone was doing it. And I think we're seeing in certain cultures that a stigma does exist around making friends because people feel this pressure of, like, shouldn't I be able to make friends on my own? And the reality is, as an adult, like, once you get through arguably, like your education or other places that bring a whole bunch of new people together at once, and it's perfectly normalized to make friends. We go through these other experiences, like moving to a new city or becoming a parent for the first time, where you really do need a new friend group. And there aren't Resources to help you do that.
- [19:11]
A
I had.
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B
Here we have a technology that totally can bridge that gap, and we're excited about the adoption potential for it. For sure.
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A
Yeah. I think you've got. I think you've probably hit on one of the biggest app opportunities of the decade coming up because you've touched on a massive nerve. I remember I moved to Seattle in 1994 to open a company and I parachuted in. I hired 220 people in 12 months, but I couldn't really become friends with them all. And I was probably one of the. Probably one of the loneliest years of my life. And I remember going to this Irish pub by myself a couple days a week just to sit and try to meet somebody to hang out with and play cool and.
- [19:48]
B
Right.
- [19:49]
A
It was terrible.
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B
It's true.
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A
It was a really. It was a really bad. Because I didn't want to be going to a bar and, you know, being around people smoking and drinking beer every night and like, it was. But I didn't know where else to go. Like, I couldn't meet somebody on my map.
- [20:00]
B
What are those tools? Right. Yeah. And so we're. I mean, I had the same feeling when I first moved to LA, by the way. And you're like, I can't spend 24 hours a day with my coworkers. And so there's this built instead of friends. Right. But how do you build those connections? And I think for us, it's not only thinking about what are the digital tools to do that, which Bumble BFF obviously is, but then how. How do we create opportunities for people to connect in real life as well? And so we've done things like our Bumble Hive series. We did one in Vancouver recently. Actually, we had one in Toronto earlier. We've had them in New York, Louisiana. They're pop up for, you know, sometimes a week or two, sometimes several months, that are safe places to go and make connections. And the reality is, you know, walking into that space that everyone is there because they want to build relationships for dating, whether for friendship, whether for business. And think how empowering that feels to step into a room and know that everyone is here because they want to connect. You're not that odd one trying to butt your way into a conversation. Like you're. You're surrounded by people who want that as well. And. And again, it's about, like, destigmatizing this idea that we all want new relationship, creating the right format for that both digitally and in real life, to make people feel really comfortable pursuing new Relationships.
- [21:17]
A
Yeah, you guys are on. You guys are getting ready for some more accelerated growth. You mentioned a couple times.
- [21:22]
B
Thank you. I hope so.
- [21:23]
A
Yeah. Sorry. Get ready, Buckle up. You've mentioned a couple times Whitney with her vision. So how do you get on the same page with her and her vision? And how does she get on the same page with you and your plans to execute? And then how have you two decided to divide and conquer? I always talk about the kind of yin and yang relationship between the CEO, coo. How have you guys divided and conquered the business? And how do you keep each other on the same page?
- [21:49]
B
Yeah, that is a great question. And I feel like my working relationship with Whitney is one of the things I'm most grateful about in my entire bumble experience. I feel honored and excited to participate in her vision. And you know, that vision I think is the same one that it was four years ago, which is so incredible to meet a leader who understands from the get go where the business can go and really hold that clear as a North Star. And I think this gets to part of the answer later. It's like how, how do you stay aligned? You stay aligned by having clarity on vision, clarity on values, which is your way of living out that vision and then using those as the rubric by which you make decisions. And if you allow that to sort of stay as your North Star, then I think it becomes a way for you to be honest with each other and with the goals that you've set for the business. And it's a lens on decision making. She and I, and I think this is the most important relationship between any CEO and business leader and someone who serves in a role like mine. There has to be a level of trust and mutual respect that there has to be this ability to sort of push, pull on a day to day basis and then a really clear understanding of where your lane is and what brings you the most joy and how you're adding the most value to the business and where that is for the other person. And of course, no one ever like fully stays in a swim lane when, when you're operating a business that's growing as fast as ours does. But you know, understanding for each of us what our points of criticality to the business are and what brings us joy as professionals is really important. And being clear with one another about what that is. And I think all of it is a journey. And as the business grows and scales, that's naturally going to change. And so you have to position yourselves for adaptability, as that goes. And I Think that's not just a case for me and Weny. It's across the entire executive team and the leadership team that we're building across the business is, you know, how do you create clarity and set clear expectations at one point and then know full well that those are going to change dramatically in the next six months because of how fast the business is growing and be okay with that?
- [24:03]
A
Right.
- [24:05]
B
I mean, it's at least quarterly, if I'm being honest.
- [24:08]
A
Yeah. No. I try to explain to people how hard it is to bring someone from the corporate world into the entrepreneurial world where change is not only normal, but almost sought after. And people in the corporate world, I think they're craving the entrepreneurial environment, but they're just not used to it. It's just so different.
- [24:25]
B
Yeah, I think that's true.
- [24:26]
A
What do you do that drives her crazy?
- [24:34]
B
Oh, my gosh. That's a great question. I'd be curious what her answer to that is.
- [24:41]
A
Ask her.
- [24:42]
B
You know, I think, I think, yeah, you definitely need Oscar. I think one thing that I used to do and have now learned to handle better, and this probably is really normal when you're dealing with someone as visionary as she is, is when she would have an incredible, bold idea of something we could do for the future, I would very quickly go to like, okay, well, how does this fit in and do the budget to do this and where does it go in the timeline and just in project manage it, you know, because that's my job as like the strategist and executor to be like, got it. Like, does this work and how do we snap in? And I think what I have learned to do is meet and understand that vision first and meet that enthusiasm and understand why this matters to the company and where it could go before immediately jumping to all of the complicated reasons why it wouldn't work or why it would be hard or what are all the decision points that we have to make and really unpack the vision first. There's so much that I've learned in trying to be more disciplined about that that helps me be more comfortable shooting for the stars and being a thought partner with her in that shooting for the stars journey, as opposed to feeling like it's immediately like breathtaking.
- [25:57]
A
Yeah, it makes sense. I played the CEO role three times and I think you just, you uncovered the core, the essence of the CEO COO relationship when you can really get that two in a box firing. Our job is to be able to figure out the how to all their ideas, but somehow it's to keep the enthusiasm, as you said, high, to match their enthusiasm. And just because they have that great idea doesn't mean we have to put it in place tomorrow morning. Although they kind of sometimes think they do. Our job is to kind of grab it, stay excited about it, and then ask the questions later. But have you ever done a Colby profile? Hey, it's Cameron. I hope you're loving today's episode. Quick question for you. Does your company have a strong leadership training program in place to grow the skills of everyone who manages people? If you want to help yourself and your company grow, get everyone who manages people learning from my invest in your leaders online training program. There are 12 core leadership skills that I cover online, and they're all going to really grow. CEOs pay me $78,000 a year to coach them one on one, and now you can all benefit for 1% of what they pay me. These are the same leadership skills that I created and certified everyone in at 1-800-got junk when I was there as COO. Go to investinyourleaders.com today and use promo code podcast10 before the end of the month to get 10% off each manager you sign up. Now back to the show. So we have. I started a group called the COO alliance, and it's the only network of its kind in the world for the second in command. And we had all of our COOs do a Colby profile and we had all the CEOs they work with do one. The only thing you learn from a Colby profile is how you start things. And you start things in one of four ways. You either start with a high fact finder, which I'm pretty sure you are, is you ask a lot of questions to start a project. And you need to ask a bunch of questions. Where does it fit in the budget? How are we going to pull it all together? You have to ask all those questions. Once you've asked them all, then you can start. The second profile is someone who has a high, what they call follow through, but it actually means systems. You have to put like a checklist or sop. You have to put like a system or a checklist in place before you can start working on it. And then most entrepreneurs fall into the third category, which is quick start. And they basically start. They kind of fire ready, aim, they plan later. They start first. And then the last one is the implementer, which is someone who needs the tools or the physical models. It would be like an architect or an engineer would have drawings and prototypes built before they would start. And the key is when you have someone like you, who's a very high fact finder for the CEO, is for them to understand that all of your questions, you're not debating us, you're merely trying to gather up all the stuff that we've probably been rolling around in our head for three months. You might need 10 minutes to catch up with us. And we never give it to you. I had the best, so interesting.
- [29:07]
B
I'll definitely take it.
- [29:08]
A
It's really worth it. It's K O L B E A. I'll link it in our show notes. But it's a really powerful tool because you figured it out. But some people never ever do.
- [29:19]
B
The. Well, I feel honored that I actually the same person introduced us. Adam Grant, early on in my journey, introduced me to a handful of amazing men and women who have played a role similar to mine as like a COO or a president or someone who's really helping to bring a visionary founder's vision to life. And I, I feel like I get such wonderful feedback and insights just from having mentor relationships like that that, that help me a bit understand the journey that I'm on and be more self aware of moments just like that that I was describing.
- [29:56]
A
Did you. I used to struggle with feedback and I used to take it so personally. I think it was because I was, I felt like I was working so hard that any feedback I got, I always felt like I was being told I was shitty. I felt like I was being picked on at school in grade four again. Did you ever struggle with that feedback or did you always receive it? Well.
- [30:16]
B
You know, I think early in my career I probably did. And I think also sometimes it's hard to not internalize that. Becoming a parent for me was a major lesson in becoming a better manager and also becoming a better like recipient of feedback. I mean, because think about it like you, you can cook this beautiful recipe for them, right? And then they throw it on the floor and you can't internalize that feedback as like, well, I failed as a mom, you know. And so I think it really helps you to start to separate like action and outcome from like, who is this me as a human being.
- [30:52]
A
Yeah.
- [30:52]
B
And I also think it's important for me as a leader in this business to try to model that as we're creating feedback loops and feedback cycles internally, whether that's in a formalized process, like we just gone through our semiannual review process, or whether that's informally. But I think one thing we've really Focused on that. Bumble is kindness is a core value for us, and that is something we live out in a way to engage with our users. But that's something we live out about in the way that we engage with one another. And kind doesn't mean nice. It doesn't mean we only ever say nice things. It means that we operate in our interactions with one another from a posture of kindness. And that should mean authentic feedback. That should mean the ability to speak with one another with respect and as equals. But if we know that, you know, I'm hearing this feedback from someone because it's coming from a place of kindness, and every interaction I've had with them reinforces that we are all treating each other with kindness. It becomes a lot easier to receive that feedback for what it is and to learn from it and use it to correct the next output as opposed to using it to sort of shape your perception of yourself or that you're a failure.
- [32:03]
A
Yeah. So many lessons from raising kids that you pull in. It's interesting. You talked about throwing the stuff on the floor, but I also think about how we raise our children, that we would never really raise our kids the way we try to grow our employees. You know, we wouldn't do an annual review with our children. We would. We would praise them every minute and give them criticism every minute. Right. We would kind of grow them differently. There's a huge, I think, a huge amount of lessons from that stuff. Can you.
- [32:30]
B
Yeah. I mean, I feel like I changed so much as a manager when I had children. I think early in my career, I loved managing people that were just like me and that were motivated by the very same things as me, because it's easy to understand. Right. You're like, okay, great, now I just have more resources to do things the way that I want to do them, and I know how to motivate them. And I remember struggling at times, and I would find people with different motivations that. Because, you know, like, it's your job, employee, to mimic me more closely or to learn my ways of doing things. And that is so totally wrong. And when you have a child, you realize really quickly, so you need to understand what motivates them and use that as a way to positively incentivize good behavior. Right. And that totally changed the framework for me. And it helped me to understand that it's my responsibility to motivate my team to do their best work as opposed to their responsibility to satisfy me or some objective that I've set for them. And I think flipping that framework is such an important leadership paradigm that each of us need to go through on our own journey.
- [33:38]
A
You may have your book right there, by the way. Like all the leadership lessons from being a mom like that. I'm not kidding. Like the reality. I'm writing down this list of things that I call the grandmotherisms, which is just all the truisms that I've learned from my grandmother that really apply in business. That business is so simple, we overcomplicate it. Can you tell me how? I was coaching somebody in Italy this morning, a CEO of a public company in Italy, and he was talking about having to fire one of his key people and we were talking about doing it with respect. I'm curious how you guys at Bumble do it with kindness. How do you let someone go with that empathy and kindness that you hired them with?
- [34:18]
B
Oh, I mean, I think for so many people, one of the least fun pieces of business overall is when things don't work out. And I think knowing from the get go that the kind approach is going to be what is kind for both of you and if that person is not set up to succeed and not capable of succeeding in the role that is expected of them, that it's the kind thing for them too, to be given the chance to move on and have other opportunities. And I remember a time early in my career where I really wrestled with having to let someone go and then was able to see that six months later she was thriving in a way that she wouldn't have been able to in the role that she was in and she found a better fit elsewhere. And I think, I think knowing and letting yourself feel confident that it's going to be the right thing for both sides if you go forward with this decision, that frankly, it's sometimes unkind to everyone involved to hang on longer than is right.
- [35:22]
A
Yeah, kind of. We're setting them free, right?
- [35:26]
B
Yeah. And I think not holding them to expectations that are never going to be attainable for them. And ideally, if you've conducted that feedback loop in a kind and thoughtful way all along, it shouldn't come as a surprise, Right. There should be transparency, there should be an understanding. There are the occasional times when, you know, there's a cause that's different than we're talking about here, which is like performance issues or not being the right fit for the role over time. And not everything is going to go according to a perfectly programmed performance improvement process, etc. But if there is an existing feedback loop in place between the employee and their manager and across the team, then those decisions should be a result of an ongoing understanding that things aren't working and a desire to be kind for both sides.
- [36:18]
A
Walk. Tell me how you've balanced. I've got kids as well. Mine are 17 and 15. Mine didn't throw dinner on the floor last night. He decided at 15 to 16, spread it all over his plate to make it look like he enjoyed it. Like, you still?
- [36:30]
B
No. So you're saying it doesn't get better, right?
- [36:34]
A
Like, we know these tricks. Come on. What have you learned in terms of balance? They talk about career, life balance. It's so hard. But how have you adjusted to excel in your career and kind of continue to grow in your career and be a mom and raise kids? Like, how. What have you learned and how have you grown from that? Because I think there's some big skills that we can pull into the business world from just having to do that.
- [37:00]
B
I have not figured it out. And I think that anyone who tells you they have a blocking, it's really hard. It's really hard. I have a one year old, she's actually going to be two tomorrow, so almost two year old and a four and a half year old.
- [37:15]
A
Wow.
- [37:15]
B
And so, like, I'm in the thick of it, you know, and I have the little one, like, headed to revolt from sleeping. And as you would imagine, you know, my hours for sleep are somewhat precious as it is because we're operating in so many different time zones. And the reality is you learn to roll with it. And I think that's a good lesson for business, too, is that there's nothing quite as unpredictable as a child. And so if you can learn to deal with that unpredictability, then I think you can learn to deal with a lot of what business grows you. This is very much in line with what Sheryl Kinberg outlines in Lean In. I genuinely, I think it's also to my husband's credit, like, I have a wonderful partner in life and him. And he shoulders more than his fair share of household responsibilities. He's a wonderful dad. The kids are young, so there's definitely still a lot that I have to shoulder as a mom that he just can't get or that, you know, they come to mom first. And so I would be remiss if I didn't say that he was a major part of what has happened, allowed me to take on some of these new career challenges. You know, I can't go back and forth to Mumbai as many times as I have without his support. So I. I have so much gratitude for him. I think when you're in an early stage company, the idea of work and life being in balance is the wrong objective to have. And I think that also sort of like pits them against one another. Like this concept of work life balance implies that they have to be imbalanced and that you're picking one or the other at all times. And I gotten to know Neil Blumenthal and his wife Rachel, who are both incredible entrepreneurs and he talks about this concept of work life integration as a parent and they have two small children as well. And I think that's a better framework to use because it doesn't imply that, that the pendulum is always going to be perfectly balanced. It just isn't.
- [39:06]
A
No, not at all.
- [39:06]
B
And you have to like let go of this idea that there is like something to be achieved there. And I think for every individual it's different. I love my work and I get such joy and satisfaction from it. I am not watching the clock during the day thinking like, I can't wait to go pick up my kids from daycare, you know, like. And I'm being honest about that. But there are moments that I set aside as sacrosant and I try to make it a priority to drop them off at school once a week or to take a half a day so that I can be at the Halloween carnival. And I just sort of have to know what's best for me in that regard. But I do feel like within a culture like Bumble, where there are going to be people making choices about their parenting life soon, it's also really important for me to model what's possible and be honest about the difficulties and the trade offs. But it's super, super worth it. As I think you know from personal experience, it's not easy, but it's really worth it.
- [40:05]
A
Oh, it's so worth it. I mean, it does. I promise you it gets easier. It get your, your taxi schedule. The taxi schedule gets busier, but it gets easier. Except, I don't know, like every once in a while then it's like, yes, officer, I know my child is really a good kid. I mean that gets harder as teenagers too. So lots of fun. Give me one big. I've got two more quick questions for you. One I want to actually ask about is the Super Bowl. But one other quick one. If you were to go back to kind of the 21 year old Sarah, who is really kind of starting her career in business, what's a big leadership lesson that you've internalized that you've learned either from success or failure that you would have wished you'd known earlier.
- [40:47]
B
I think maybe be kind of my expectations on myself. I mean I remember early on seeing stories of, you know, entrepreneurs who were 26 years old and had built multi billion dollar companies and feeling like because I hadn't done that yet, you know, that I've missed some big opportunity or like what am I doing with my life And I think maybe I had it to do all over again. I think I would do what I did which is to spend a lot of my early 20s in a place where I could explore different type of types of businesses and understand what really interested me. And that's what I love about investing. Frankly, I got such great exposure to so many different sectors and could see how businesses operated in different spaces and it's a wonderful place for someone. I feel like I have a bit of professional add, like I need to be engaged with new and different things. So starting with investing and then moving over to strategy consulting had to do a lot of that and, and I think allowing myself to just be gracious for that or grateful for that journey and to learn as much as I can without holding myself to this measuring stick that wasn't me, you know, to be, to be satisfied in my own journey. And I try to now be more self aware in that in terms of the way that I interact with my team and the relationships that I'm building there. Because each of us is on our own different professional and shouldn't hold up other entrepreneurs or incredibly visionary leaders. That's like the only rubric for success.
- [42:15]
A
It's awesome. And by the way, I don't think ADD is a disorder. I think it's an entrepreneurial superpower. I think it's critical for leadership to have some ADD so they actually see everything instead of being so completely maniacally focused on something. So give us some of the lessons. What did you guys learn from working in doing some marketing with the super bowl.
- [42:38]
B
To give ourselves more than like 8ish weeks to prepare next time. It was, I mean super bowl always comes together really last minute because I think you have to do so much under secrecy because you don't want things to leak before you're ready for it. It was just an incredible, incredible opportunity. Whitney and early founding team had had a vision of engaging Serena specifically from four years ago. One of our earliest marketing tactics was putting stickers on tennis balls that said the ball is in her court. And this is a really easy way for people to understand how bumble Works right, Like the ball's in her court. You can't talk to her until she makes the first move. And using that as a way to help incentivize women like, go for it. This is an opportunity. And Whitney said to Caroline and Alex and Samantha, her early team members, maybe someday, if we work hard enough, we'll be able to partner with someone like Serena. And so being able to forge years later have seen that vision come to reality is incredible. And, and there's no one like Serena in terms of setting the bar for what's possible as a woman in sports, in life, in her business career, as a fashion designer. I mean, she is so multifaceted and so inspiring. And we're just honored to get to work with her as a, you know, as a global ambassador for us. She's, she's so much more than just a spokesperson and a centerpiece of that commercial. Although all of that is really wonderful. She's involved in the business on a day to day basis and cares deeply about what we're trying to build, which is amazing. It's really, really amazing. And the journey of getting to do something like that with her and with so many of our team members. As you might imagine, Bumble's around 100 people worldwide. I promise you this touch each of them, which it should. It's a meaningful investment and a really incredible opportunity for us. And every step of it, while super fast paced, as I implied, was incredibly exciting and inspiring.
- [44:36]
A
That's really cool. One final parting word of wisdom. If you were to kind of leave us with something that you'd like everyone to think about or consider, My guess is it's going to be tied to something, but I'm not going to lead you. So what would you want us all to consider in our roles as leaders?
- [44:53]
B
I will tie this right back to Bumble, which is make the first move. Feel empowered, feel like you have this opportunity, I think, especially as a woman leader, to step into a leadership role and then treat yourself and your team with kindness. As I talked about, I think culture and vision and values and mission is the way that the businesses of the future are being built. I think there's a lot that we've inherited in terms of our expectations of what corporate America or corporate culture more broadly should look like. And if nothing else, I hope Bumble is really helping people to reimagine what that could be. We're trying to not only build an app with 50 million users around the world, but we're trying to build the business of the future. Which was built from a women founder, from a Female first leadership team. I think there are ways that business right now in front of our eyes, is being reinvented, and we want to be a part of that conversation. And being a company that leads with culture and mission and vision and values is a massive piece of that because it dictates how we interact with one another and how we interact with our users, and our users feel that, and that is what has allowed us to be profitable and to be generating the revenue that we are. And all of that is so meaningful and important, but it sets the standard for what is going to be possible in the way that businesses are built going forward. And we're just excited to be one example of what that could look like.
- [46:21]
A
That's awesome. You've mentioned so often just the role of the woman's narrative and the women's issues and stuff. Have you attended TED Women yet?
- [46:29]
B
I have, yeah. I'm not gonna go. It's looking every other year, isn't it?
- [46:34]
A
I think it is every other year. I went three years ago to the one I was invited to go to, TED Women in San Francisco. And it was extraordinary just to be inside of the female narrative that we just don't get as often, or maybe we don't take the time to really listen. But as guys, it was amazingly powerful. I'll link it in the show notes, too, because I think it's just an amazing conference for people to be at.
- [46:54]
B
Yeah, no, agreed. And I think what's exciting about this moment of time that we're living in is the female narrative is not even just one narrative. Right. It's very nuanced. There are so many intersectional components of feminism and what this global conversation, as we talked about, is looking like. And the more that we can allow those differing and important voices to be heard and to engage in conversations in every facet of our lives, I think there's culture as a whole is going to rise by empowering 50% of the population. It's only good for businesses, only good for economies. It's only good for cultural conversation, for government, et cetera, et cetera. And it's just incredibly inspiring to look around and see the moment on this building for this. And I'm thrilled that Bumble can be a small part of that.
- [47:44]
A
Well, I think as our Canadian prime minister said, I mean, he said, well, it's 2017. Like, you know, we're ready. It's kind of. Well, it's 2019. We're ready. Right. I think. I think the world is ready for this. Sarah Jones Simmer, the Chief Operating Officer for Bumble thank you so much for joining us on the Second in Command podcast. Really appreciate you sharing everything with us today.
- [48:02]
B
Thanks Cameron. I really enjoyed it. You've been listening to Second in Command, brought to you by COO alliance founder Cameron Herald. If you enjoyed this episode, please be sure to like, share and subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and our other podcast streaming platforms. For more best practices from industry leading COOs, visit COOAlliance.com.