First Time Founders with Ed Elson – This Mother-Daughter Duo Started a Leadership Coaching Platform

28:09But working with Jordan, when we first got started, I didn't want that dynamic. She's the CEO. Jordan is the CEO of Medley and I am the co-founder. And so there were many circumstances in the first months where we would be in meetings, and I wouldn't really say much. And I remember that meeting, Jordan, when we walked out, and you're like, why didn't you say anything? I was like, well, you're the CEO. I was like, yeah, but you know the topic. Can you just jump on in there? And so it's been really great because I didn't want to be the over-the-top boss lady. We're peers in this context. We're running this business and building this business together with our colleagues at Medley.

28:49And so that's been a bit of an adjustment, you know, to know that we are coming at things from different angles. And there are going to be moments where I'm going to take the lead. And that is the right way. It's kind of like what it's like in any organization, actually. But here, I was more sensitive to it than I had been if she were not my daughter. I can imagine it's, yeah, way more sensitive. I would imagine it's more difficult. What's the experience been like for you, Jordan, as the daughter? It's been incredibly meaningful. You know, even just from the standpoint of growing up, my mom worked a ton.

29:22She had very high-powered jobs. And 10 a.m. on Tuesday, I was at school, she was at work, and we would reconnect when she came home from the office. Now, we start most of our days talking to each other. And it is a highlight when at 7.30 a.m., 7 a.m., 8 a.m., I get a call. Are you awake? I still have bad habits. I start super early. And I still kid myself and say, you don't have to answer me right away at 6.30 a.m. So I'm working on that. But that's a hard one to break. But I will say sometimes it's work and sometimes it's not. And I have learned, I've learned so much from getting to work with her.

30:10How to engage with people, how to listen to people. A lot of the skills we've been talking about earlier, my mind is often blown in meetings. Sometimes I leave the meeting and I'm like, how did you even see that? How did you know that this person was thinking X, Y, Z to tee this up? It's absolutely incredible. So from a professional standpoint, I've learned a lot. And I will say also from a personal standpoint, I've learned a lot by getting to see my mother in a working environment and see how she handles stress from work that I'm, you know, very, very close to and juggles different priorities and is constantly prioritizing.

30:49And I think, you know, I will echo the challenge that she shared around creating space for work and life. you know that is is always difficult we have built up enough trust now that if i say i need i need mom mode or i need work mode we're able to switch is that what you say mom mode please yeah i'm just like can we just put medley on pause for a second and talk about xyz yeah so all in all it's really enhanced our ability to communicate and we've gotten to know each other in a very different way. It's a very unique experience. And I'm excited for the future as we continue to grow the business and as both of our roles continue to evolve to continue to learn.

31:39The co-founder relationship is a very stressful and fraught one and very close. And then the mother and child relationship is very close, trusting, loving, and also pretty fraught and stressful. Has there ever been a moment where the pressure of work has put a strain on your personal relationship in a negative way at all? No. I'm getting a shaking of the head. Do you agree, Jordan? No, no. Yeah. I don't think so. I'm resting my brain. She's like, no. I'm aggressively saying no. No, it's perfect. Go, Jordan. Exactly. Sorry, go ahead, Edith. Your answer is no. No, I just, first of all, we want to let it go there.

32:20You know, we, and it's not that we agree on everything. I think we're very conscious of being respectful of each other's opinions, taking into consideration the opinions of other people on the medley team. And I honestly cannot think of a single time where it's gotten so challenging that I would sit and talk to my other two children or my husband about, you know, oh my gosh, you know, this is just out of control because we talk about it. See, that's the thing about being a related mother-daughter team is that we really do, even when we're not agreeing on something, believe that we have the same goal.

33:08So, yeah, I think that we work it through. What do you think? I would absolutely agree with that. And it doesn't mean, as Edith said, that we don't disagree about things, that there aren't moments of challenge or tension. In any healthy relationship, you're encountering all those things, right? You're encountering joy. You're encountering affection. You're encountering disagreement. But we do really have each other's best interests at heart. And I think that's important for any relationship period, but especially a co-founder relationship. If you have that level of trust and you know the other person is – you don't have any worries about the other person's intentions, you're able to communicate and navigate through different challenges.

33:55And it's really been a highlight of building the company, has been getting to work with Edith, work with my mom. So it hasn't all been sunshine and roses, but we know each other so much better. We know like a third dimension of how we exist and how we operate, which is really fun. It sounds like you both went into this kind of unusually skilled at the separation of work and life and making, you know, strategic decisions and separating that from your emotions. And, you know, you describe, you call Edith in certain situations, mom in certain situations. But did you know this going into it? Or has this been a training program?

34:40How did you figure this all out? There's no playbook. There's no playbook for someone like myself who worked in large institutions previously for 35 years to roll up into an organization where it's Jordan and myself sitting in a, you know, two-seater. because we didn't want to spend the money on a three-seater in a shared workspace. But you pay attention and you learn as you go. We were looking for our first analyst as an example. And there were so many things going on. It was really super early days. And Jordan looked at me. She said, she was calling me mom. There's only the two of us. And she says, mom, you ran HR for 35 ,000 person organization.

35:22You must know how to find candidates on LinkedIn. And I'm like, uh, that would be a no. I said, I could call somebody who can help me figure out candidates on LinkedIn. I'm willing to give it a go. But there were those moments of, oh, oh, yeah, you actually weren't operating yourself personally every aspect of all of the roles for the last, I don't know, 15, 20 years. but we move forward and we sit together and, you know, we figure out how to, you know, leverage the platform or any other platforms, et cetera, et cetera. But there's a lot of that because what do I know? I know a lot about the things that I've experienced as does Jordan, but I really respect that there's much in this construct of standing up medley from ground zero in a new category, working together as a mother-daughter co-founder team.

36:23There's as much that we have to learn, and there is no playbook for that. There's no playbook. That's one of the things we have most in common is our voracious need to try to learn as much as we can in every context. We both fundamentally believe we can learn from any situation and from any person. And that shared value has enabled us to work through these types of things and build up that muscle of communicating with each other. And, you know, for myself, I take my growth as a founder, as a CEO, really seriously. I have had a coach. I've been in a group, a group of other founders. I have a therapist.

37:08I take my exercise, sleep, all that stuff pretty seriously. And so does Edith. She does not miss a workout, let me tell you, every day. She doesn't mess around. And I think that has been a huge enabler for us because it's not as though we showed up on day one and then just said, okay, let's see what happens. It actually was a super intentional process for both of us to always be trying to learn, to share feedback with each other, to invest in ourselves and invest in each other. But this concept of there is no playbook is, I think, becoming the norm, not just for founders, but for any organization that wants to be relevant today and into the future.

37:50What is the playbook? What is the playbook when a new drug changes the consumer appetite? What is the playbook when technology that has been around for decades, explodes into this new incredible world of machine learning and AI. What is the playbook for next year, let alone for the next 10 years? And so I think that much of our experiences are similar to what we are talking with the organizations that we're working with about. When you think about what it takes to really build sustainably important organizations, You got to really have a culture that enables people to connect how they operate, how they interact, all those things that we were talking about with respect to listening and communicating, et cetera, to the ultimate goal, right?

38:44So if everybody walked out of the room and says, I feel really heard and I feel like included, but you have no idea like what you're supposed to be delivering and how you're supposed to deliver it, that's not the point of all of this. The point of all of this is to really appreciate the fact that in any kind of a business environment where the playbook may be known today and not, you've got to have intellectual versatility to operate and to engage in a very meaningful and steady, quick way. And that's what's super exciting for me about sort of reinventing myself into a founder. We'll be right back.

39:27Thank you.

39:57hours of freshness and odor protection. It's also free of aluminum, baking soda, and parabens. So you can give your underarms the same level of care you give the rest of your lovely self, body, and mind. With scents like cucumber and green tea, dragon fruit and coconut cream, and yes, coconut and pink jasmine, Dove Aluminum Free Deodorant offers freshness that won't leave you stranded. So the next time you're setting out to explore the world, don't forget to invite Dove aluminum-free deodorant along for the ride because you were made for adventure and your deodorant should be too. The search is over.

40:32An aluminum-free deodorant that won't let you down. Find your one true Dove. Choose Dove aluminum-free deodorant for 72-hour freshness and odor protection. Buy online at Dove.com or at a retailer near you.

40:49Support for the show comes from Public.com. You're thoughtful about where your money goes. You've got your core holdings, some recurring crypto buys, maybe even a few strategic options plays on the side. The point is, you're engaged with your investments. And Public gets that. That's why they built an investing platform for those who take it seriously. On Public, you can put together a multi-asset portfolio for the long haul. Stocks, bonds, options, crypto, it's all there. Plus, an industry-leading 3.8 % APY high-yield cash account. Switch to the platform built for those who take investing seriously.

41:25Go to public.com slash podcast and earn an uncapped 1 % bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com slash podcast. Paid for by Public Investing. All investing involves a risk of loss, including loss of principal. Brokerage services for U.S.-listed registered securities options and bonds in a self-directed account are offered by Public Investing, Inc., member FINRA and SIPC. Complete disclosures available at public.com slash disclosures.

42:31Thank you.

43:02We're back with First Time Founders. I'm sure this has taught you a lot about business, as we've just learned. I'm sure it's taught you a lot about motherhood, too, I could imagine. I'm wondering if you've learned anything new about what it means to be a mother having done this. Is there something you know now about motherhood that maybe you didn't know before you started this? Now, that is an unexpected question. So good job. I think it's something that I knew, but I would say has been accelerated to sort of the top of my consciousness. And that is, you have to be present. And I think throughout the years, I have three children.

43:57Jordan's the oldest. I have two boys. As Jordan described, I had a pretty intense professional existence. And as time went by and I got more ownership of my schedule, et cetera, I would show up from Mars, it seems, sometimes. My longest trip was from New Zealand to Providence, Rhode Island to see my son play soccer. But I would say that sometimes I was there and I could have been more present. But I was doing the best I could and I was giving myself high marks. I just shared this story of, wasn't that incredible? I traveled all the way around the world. But I do think that I've learned, particularly because we have to be very deliberate about the separation of work in our lives, that when Jordan says, oh, can I just talk to you about a few things that are not, like, that is focused time.

44:58That is really focused time. And when I hear, you know, I'm not having a good, you know, morning, I have to really respect that in a different way. You know, I'm kind of a, let's go, let's like push through. And I think that's a good lesson for motherhood that, you know, you want to have that relationship where when someone, when your child says, you know, I'm struggling with something that you don't try to fix it. because I'm a fixer, right? And so that I've learned a lot with working with Jordan in medley that when she asks me a question about life or work, she's actually most of the time not asking me for the answer, right?

45:51She's asking for an opportunity to talk it through. In fact, just the other day, you're like, listen, listen, I just want to talk it through. I'm not asking you to do it. I just want to, because I'm like, okay, I got this. She's like, no, you don't. I need to talk. I've been studying this for a long time. So that was a really interesting question. And I'll add, I'm expecting, we're expecting our first child in the fall and we're having a girl. So this will be really funny. I don't think she can work in the business quite yet, but just give her a couple of years. It'll be a three generation business.

46:24And I will say the thing that I'm trying to embrace entering this huge life transition is just the unpredictability of everything. You know, I mean, I have gotten so much more comfortable with both ambiguity, so looking into the future and not knowing exactly what it's going to look like, and also just the lack of control that we really have over things. You know, you don't think that you start a fundraise process and then Silicon Valley Bank is going to collapse. You don't think you're going to launch an in-person community and then COVID-19 happens. You just don't think that's going to happen.

47:02But that's life, right? Life is pretty unpredictable. And I've built up a lot of confidence in my ability to just navigate unexpected situations. And I think that will help me in parenting because from what I can tell and seeing my friends and even seeing, you know, in my family with my siblings and my cousins, you don't know what the child's going to be like. You don't know what life's going to give you. And part of that is part of the fun, I would say. So I'm looking forward to that. Do you have any hard boundaries? Like, don't text me at this time or anything like that? I try not to engage.

47:44And in fact, I don't actually engage with Jordan about work on Sunday afternoon at four o 'clock. That was a really bad habit I had because the cadence of the week gets started. I get myself organized. And, you know, I've done that for 35 years. So it was a hard thing to break. And it was very disruptive, actually, to Jordan and her husband and, quite frankly, everyone around me. So, you know, and for me, that's a hard rule. We were choking earlier about the 6.30 text. I don't really do that that often. I get up sometimes at five o 'clock in the morning. I don't do that because that's a drag. You know, you get up, whatever time you get up, you see this text, you like, don't even have your mind right.

48:30You got to like, you know, so that's a pretty hard rule too. Like if I've got something that really needs to have a conversation, I don't put it in a text at seven in the morning. You know, I'll say, hey, give me a call when you can. And the other thing I think is very important in this conversation about first-time founders is that people are watching you. Whether you have three people, 10 people, 20 people, whatever the number is, people do care about the balance that they have in their lives more every, every year. And I think that's really important and it matters. And so therefore, I can get pretty intense.

49:15Jordan can get pretty intense. And quite frankly, most of the people on our team can. But I really have watched very closely how Jordan has been very clear and respectful of people and their lives. And so that when someone is on holiday and hasn't been on holiday and is really delivered, she will literally say, okay, anything that's going to this person is going to go into an inbox, I'll be watching the inbox, just so you know. And that's different from the Goldman style. Perhaps, yes. But, you know, the interesting question is, what is it like? I haven't been in Goldman for, you know, six years now almost.

49:57What is it like now, perhaps? And there were moments then where, you know, there was no working for investment banking on Saturdays, whatever the case may be. But all of this is in response to the reality of who's showing up. And people show up wanting to be human beings with work being part of their existence, not their only existence. I'm going to shift to a quick lightning round here about organizational management, which I feel like you both are experts. I'm just going to throw you some questions and we'll get your hot takes on some of these. So we'll start with Edith. How can companies make meetings more productive?

50:36Make sure there's a clear agenda. Hold people accountable for doing the work before they come to the meeting. and as participants in the meeting, keep it concise, not my specialty, so I'll work on that and pay attention to who talks and who doesn't talk. Clear follow-ups to conclude. Jordan, is remote work overrated or underrated? Personally, overrated. But flexibility, I will say, is really what's valued from what we're seeing in terms of remote work. Good, concise answer. That's good. Let me see what I can do. Let's go. She's learning from the master, right? Edith, what is the best way to measure employee success at a company?

51:24The productivity of the company, not just in terms of the bottom line, but in terms of what the reputation of the company is and how they deliver that profitability. That's employee success, right? That doesn't happen without employees being successful. Jordan, when it comes to decision-making, do you prefer using your instincts or data? Data. But Edith prefers instincts. So we are a great match in that regard. Okay. Why are you pro data? Why is Edith pro instincts? You know, I think for me, data is more my natural approach. Although at this point, I've really been working on this. I actually do try to make decisions based off of instinct more.

52:14And the way I describe instinct is that it's actually accumulation of your experiences. So instincts are informed by data. But I think to start, you know, my natural inclination is, well, I want to understand and get all the information. But when you're running a startup and over the past five years, I've learned you really can get all the information. So you have to use both. Edith, how important is DEI and do you think it's something that every company should be implementing? Every company that wants to be a relevant company needs to invest in their people and create environments where everyone can thrive.

52:54And that's everyone. That's people who are part of the majority, people who are from different schools, from different languages, cultures, etc. Many people have asked me, particularly in the last year, what's going to happen with DEI? Is it going to be over forever? And it's like, I don't know. Do you want to be an excellent company? If you want to be an excellent company, you continue to do the work. You can call it what you want. You have to do the work. Do you think it's been politicized in a way that's been destructive to organizations? I think that it has certainly been politicized, and I don't think it has been particularly productive.

53:38I don't think it's been as disruptive as people might think. Right. Because strong organizations with strong cultures understand how important it is to extract excellence. And people ask me, what should we call it? I say, why don't you just call it excellence? Because that's what it means to have a truly diverse organization from a number of different perspectives. So, you know, all the organizations that I've worked with and continue to talk to, they're moving forward because they want to be great. And to be great, you have to have the diversity of experience, perspectives, culture, sexual orientation.

54:22The list will just continue to get longer and longer. What an exciting opportunity. Jordan, this one came to me because we were discussing the idea of bringing a full self to work. Is there space for political opinions in the workplace? And should leaders be taking up political opinions if they choose? It really depends on the company and their culture and their values. So for some companies who have made statements that they do not want to engage in the political dynamic, those companies are going to attract people who want to work in those environments. On the flip side, companies where leaders really are taking a stand are voicing their opinion in whichever direction.

55:08The same thing is happening, right? People are going to be drawn to working at those companies because that's a value that they care about. And so, you know, personally, I think that there needs to be a way for leaders to acknowledge what's happening in the world and give space for employees who are probably processing in some way or the other. That's what we try to do internally at Medley is really just giving space for people. But I do think that we're just going to see some real self-selection in terms of employees and they'll vote by going where they want to work. Final questions from me and thank you both for being generous with your time, Edith.

55:49Actually, we'll start with Jordan. Some advice to our listeners. We have a lot of female listeners on this show. Scott seems to think we don't, but we do. Do you have any advice on how to be a good daughter? I will say as you grow up and as you encounter different experiences, embrace the fact that your relationship with your mom might change. And that can be exciting. It can be a good opportunity. Or your dad. Yes, you're right. or your dad with your parents. Embrace this fact that your relationship with your parents likely will change over time. And I think accepting that can really enable new types of relationships to build with your parents.

56:34And Edith, any advice on how to be a good mother? Not to get a little syrupy here, but love unconditionally because it's a ride. And if you make that the core of your relationship, it becomes multi-dimensional it becomes positive reinforcement feedback direction and just some good hugs from time to time it'll all be okay but if you start with that center and you develop trust of caring anything that comes your way you'll be able to navigate and things will come your way I love that. Jordan Taylor and Edith Cooper are the co-founders of Medly, a group coaching platform. Thank you very much both for joining me.

57:25Thanks for having us.

57:31Our producer is Claire Miller. Our associate producer is Alison Weiss. And our engineer is Benjamin Spencer. Catherine Dillon is our executive producer. Thank you for listening to First Time Founders from the Vox Media Podcast Network. Tune in tomorrow for Prof G Markets.

57:49Thank you.

58:18looks super slick. Close that deal. Yeah, you won. Do that, doing that, did that, done. Now you can do that, do that with Acrobat. Now you can do that, do that with the all new Acrobat. It's time to do your best work with the all new Adobe Acrobat Studio.