Leap Academy with Ilana Golan - Client Spotlight: Doron's Leap to EVP and Ringing the Bell at NASDAQ!

Starting point is 00:00:00 One key lesson I have for anybody who is listening is if you consider joining Leap, do it early. I think it helps a lot in getting you set up in the right direction. But I waited maybe too long and joined. Actually, Leap did not exist when I left NICE, but I joined early in Leap, but too late for my career step. Doron leaping to an EVP role, ringing the bell in NASDAQ last week. Now that's a leap. Welcome to The Leap Show. In The Leap Show, we're here to bring experts from around the globe who share inspiring stories, concrete tips and insight

Starting point is 00:00:41 on what helped them become the best version of themselves and who they are today and create the incredible life that they wanted. Subscribe and follow us, share this with friends who are also driven and aiming for more because you'll hear stories and tips that you'll hear nowhere else. Hi, I'm Ilana Golan, CEO of Leap Academy, which helps driven professionals reinvent, leap their careers to the next level. Now let's get started. We have an amazing, amazing story for you today. How did this happen? Tell the audience a little bit about yourself because they don't know you. I actually started my journey coming off a role in a big corporate called NICE, doing business development, general management role there. I've been there for nine years.

Starting point is 00:01:30 And during the time that I was there, I was actually involved in quite a bit of M&As and also helped Qualitree focus their company on a new strategy based on cloud delivery model, the shift to the cloud cloud as they call it. And I did want to experience something different. I did want to actually shift my career to more of the investment side. And I had a couple of things that I've done there on the way.

Starting point is 00:02:00 The full story is that I joined the careerap in the middle of all of that. So during that time at Leap, my accountability buddy, Ron Sandhaus, and me got to know each other and had a meeting of the mind. So first we did, I think, a fairly effective process of figuring out what we want to do. My mind was still set at investment at the time. And the basic concept was to try and contribute my experience to as many companies as I can, kind of a fan out of the capabilities. To the reality, I found out that your ability to influence as a board member, as an investor, is fairly limited. So I started to fill the itch, as I call it, to put more of my own fingerprints on any company.

Starting point is 00:02:58 And there was a situation where Iran was actually picking up projects on his consulting company. He was starting his own leap into the venture side, forming his own investment arm. And he wanted some help. He basically wanted to take a project that was very exciting and interesting to him, but wanted to make sure that he's able to deliver and the type of capabilities he needed was right in my backyard mnas worked for four or five months on the project and there was a situation where pretty much i got an offer i couldn't understand so

Starting point is 00:03:42 and i loved it so I called Ilana. You called me and we couldn't resist, right? The bottom line that led for me to join the company on a full-time basis as their EVP of corporate strategy and corp dev and strategy. That's the official title. What does it take to enter such an executive level role in your mind? First, you need to build trust with primarily the CEO that's going to hire you. Building trust is one thing on my side. It's also understanding that persona, that CEO

Starting point is 00:04:27 is call it open for business in my specific field of view. So he means business. He wants to really grow the company in other non-traditional ways. And he's open for ideas and exchanges and, you know, discussion more than just a top-down marching order. I think that when you sign up for an executive role, you need to understand what happens when things get tough as well. When you join a company, especially in early stage, a fit within the other management team functions is an important one. Those guys are going to be your peers and a lot of times they're involved in one way or another in the interview or vetting process. And then you have the layer of the board and the board is very involved in deciding, I believe, any C-level or EVP-level type person that joins the management team. And especially when you talk about relatively early stage companies, the board is personally vetting the people. So, you know, the CEO obviously has a lot of say, but he's not the only player.

Starting point is 00:05:41 And I would say that the process first tends to be complex and second, lengthy at a time. In terms of when you actually communicate with the board, is it more strategy? Is it more leadership? I'm sure some people have it in their mind. Like, what should I expect? What kind of questions are there going to be? Call it combination of strategic mindset

Starting point is 00:06:03 and ability to listen, process, and maybe challenge their opinions. And you need to do it in a way that is in a way respectful, but yet forceful. So going into an interview, and I am sure that if I would just agree with whatever they said and you know compliment that whatever they've done is just perfect up till now nobody needs you that's interesting to them well the magic happened for you last week when you rang the bell on nasdaq i think first it's a virtual bell to be honest it's just a touch screen but yeah you know i i think i was in a very unique position first you join a company and that's the second week on job you go to nasdaq

Starting point is 00:06:55 with all the hype there it's not my first time at nasdaq but this time was different because it was a company that I did not help grow from the get-go. But the responsibility sinks on you there because that's the event where you get the money to spend wisely. And it's my role to spend it wisely. So that comes with a lot of responsibility. But the fanfare of people that invest, you know, good five plus years in growing a company and that feeling of relief that, you know, it's being recognized by Mr. Market. The goal is, of course, to make good use of the money and grow the company. So I look at it in that perspective, maybe a little bit more reserved.

Starting point is 00:07:51 If you can kind of capture for people who don't know me, don't know Lee, what did you get out of it? The key takeaways is, and I felt I needed it much, is that structure of clarifying things that maybe are floating in your mind and putting them on paper. You go through a fairly rigorous structure process, especially if you have a good accountability body like I had, and it kind of challenged each other to both go with the process, but also set goals for pretty much on a weekly basis. And that structure to me helped a lot. Thank you for listening and hope you enjoyed this show. Don't forget to subscribe, follow, share this with friends.

Starting point is 00:08:41 I'll see you in the next Leap Show.

Leap Academy with Ilana Golan - Client Spotlight: Doron's Leap to EVP and Ringing the Bell at NASDAQ!

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