Interesting Notes from Last Week

April 15, 2021
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First week of my initial interesting thoughts on segments I listened to over the past week! Copying my notes below:

Week of September 24, 2018

  • Co-founder, CEO of Glow Michael Huang (Launch Pad Wharton XM)
  • Discussed working with his co-founder as Head of Product at Paypal - credibility in financing
  • Fertility, infertility community - massive growth for scale in China (post-single child, aging) Applications, connecting community with providers (some large fertility clinics, some small and personable)
  • Large funding rounds and how difficult it was to initiate a feeling of what it's like to go through these experiences
  • SC0x MIT Video 6
  • Why is it so difficult?
  • Metrics - how do you measure a system?
  • Trade-off of Breadth vs Validity of metrics
  • Outcome-based logistics - perfect order, perfect shelf
  • Politics and Power of Players - Who Wins?
  • Mom and pop vs megastores
  • Mega retailers vs mega CPG manufacturers
  • Visibility - who can see what and how quickly
  • Data stored separately
  • All parties don't have equal access to data
  • Massive data does not equal shared and accessible information
  • Uncertainty - who knows what's going to happen?
  • Variable demand of product (shorter lifecycles)
  • Variable manufacturing yield
  • Unreliable sourcing of raw materials
  • Inconsistent transit lead times
  • Increased complexity - why is it getting harder?
  • Exploding number of SKUs
  • Higher and diverging customer demands
  • New and merging channels (omnichannels) - online, stores, replenishing, different chains
  • Global operations - Why don't we ever close?
  • Most firms source and sell globally
  • Multiple regions, time zones, languages and cultures
  • Steve Johnson, author of Farsighted (Knowledge at Wharton)
  • Discussing why there isn't really an update to pros/cons list
  • Long-term decisions - how do we decision map
  • Considering alternative solutions, especially when it's a 'do this or don’t do that' initially
  • Processing out "what if / how does this go poorly?", "what about if it's best?", "what makes it weird?"
  • Ex: moving for a job (uses his own case of moving to bay area)
  • Gina Fyffe, CEO of Integra (Dollars & Change)
  • Talked about a discussion with a Serbian Uber driver who was concerned about the dependency Serbians back home had on aid How do we better get rid of dependencies in times of crisis?
  • Mentioned a case where a simple task like building a water well close to villages can save a ton of time, but more importantly Build it with a shovel and show them how to do this instead of Caterpillar tractor or something that would be too expensive to maintain
  • They'll offer money to people that have a passion to do something meaningful, but it doesn't always pan out Therefore, they don't write initial big checks
  • Mike Todasco, Director of Innovation at PayPal, (Work of Tomorrow - Wharton XM)
  • Increasing the creative output of employees across company
  • Before PayPal, he was founder/CEO of eCommerce marketplace Sketch Maven Spent 4 years as Director of Strategy, heading up m&a and strategic planning at NewPage, portfolio company of private equity firm Cerberus

One thing I recognized for the week is that I didn't get a chance to listen to any podcast episodes (20min VC, a16z or Data Skeptic). I did, however, start EdX's MIT Supply Chain Analytics course, which has been a good, fairly comprehensive foundation (for me, review) of optimization and how it applies in various parts of the supply chain. Gina's segment was fascinating to me in finance and how different many countries are in their services and day-to-day lives. There are a ton of opportunities in other countries to just simply "catch up" to things we may be used to, but this has to be done in an intelligent manner. Then, I added Steve Johnson's Farsighted to my book list - simplicity repeated is important, and he discussed our decision-making plans or maps haven't changed dramatically.