“I would sacrifice talent for culture”

[00:00] Larry: I'm here with Todd Smith, who is the co-founder and CEO of TAHO Labs. Todd, thanks for being here. I want to start first with who TAHO Labs is for. Like, who's the person whose day gets better because TAHO Labs exists? I'd love to understand a little bit more about them, if you will.

[00:22] Todd: Yeah, so, um, thanks for having me on. Um, so the, uh, uh, TAHO is an infrastructure software company. We're building infrastructure software that helps everyone access, uh, more capacity in the machines that do computing today for us. Right? So, uh, we aim to land within data centers. We aim to land within, uh, within the infrastructure that supports, uh, AI, AI initiatives and enterprises that, uh, execute AI today. Ultimately, the goal is to drive down the cost of getting all of this work done. Uh, we're trying to do it with less resources. We're trying to do it consuming less energy. Uh, and we're, uh, the end goal is the end user of these enterprises. we want to serve. We want those end users To have a far more, we want to make their ability to get that computing done, that AI done far more accessible at the end of the day. So that's what we're doing this for. uh, We do aim at Um, helping out small businesses. We do aim at helping out individuals. We have initiatives in the university realm that offers heavy discounts and in some cases we even have the ability to get our product out to those groups, you know, at no cost. We can help that community as well to, you know, to, uh, to grow and to better leverage, uh, AI and hyper computing on the whole. So, um, that's, that's, that's what we do. That's who we serve and, you know, the goal in serving.

[02:11] Larry: Yeah, that's fantastic. I know the answer to this question, but I'd love the listeners to hear. What were you doing right before this and what was the. What made you decide to step into this new venture?

[02:24] Todd: Yeah, so just before this, I was an executive at Docker. I was running multiple operational teams, technical operational teams that were at Docker. Just before that, I was working with Snapchat and just before that I was with Facebook. And both of those pre-IPO and helping them build out those infrastructures for serving their customers. So that's what I was doing prior, you know, in. In Facebook and in Snap, we definitely dealt with a lot of the overhead in executing all of those computing paradigms of the day for each of them. And then at Docker, being exposed to the intricacies of containerization. In understanding what all overhead for executing AI today is. We basically, myself and my two co-founders, who who I've worked with in the the past at other various companies and some of the ones I just mentioned, we got together and said, hey, let's try and build a software solution. Uh, that deals with a lot of the overhead that people assume are required today. And, uh, let's see if we can't do something better. And, uh, that was the inception of TAHO Labs and that's what, that's what we set forth on to, uh, build a software product that's gonna help the physical world deal with the challenges and the, um, the limits of what can be done today on computers.

[04:05] Larry: I love your story and I've been following your journey. It. It's been a fun one. What would you say the first six months actually look like when you launch that thing and then, you know, you're, you're six months into it. What did that look like, you know, for you all?

[04:25] Todd: So, uh, What I've learned is, uh, you know, there's, there's, there's three ways, there's three dimensions that a founder needs to activate. And, uh, it's, it's three dimensions, really. it's visionary, it's operator and then it's strategist. So when you do launch that first That first six months, you're dealing a lot with that visionary, right? And, uh, and it's really looking at what that end possibility could be. And then, uh, and then that, uh, that strategic individual, that strategic dimension needs to activate. And, uh, you spend a lot of time in that first six months activating. that strategic piece and getting a getting a strong plan together and then you got to kick into that operations piece. Now, I mentioned visionary operator strategist, that's not, there's not a specific order to those. You have to activate on those at the right time and I think that every, I think that every startup requires a different combination or a different timing on when you activate on those different pieces. And it's not even just, it's not like eight weeks of one and two weeks of the other. I mean, you're activating on, you're activating on different, different facets of that every day. But, um, when it comes to, when it comes to, when it comes to that initial six months, there's a heavy bias in the beginning, for me, it was the visionary piece and then followed by the strategic piece. but then you roll up your sleeves and then you're digging. So it's all ops at that point, right? So. You know, that's kind of what that, that looks like. It's, uh, it's, it can be lonely because you got this great, you know, you got this idea that you feel is great and your co-founders feel is great. And, uh, but it can be lonely at first, right? Because it's interesting to see how people step back at, uh, that meme or that gif where Homer Simpson stepping back into the hedges, You know you see a lot of people With that motion, right? And, uh, um, but you also really do find out who truly cares and who's truly there to help out. As you, uh, as you start to get down that path and you start to, uh, You start to get a little bit of You start to get a little bit of, you know, some minor success under your belt, and you start getting some forward activity, whether it be through technical, you know, improving what you can do technically, improving what you can do in the marketplace with traction, even the ability to raise capital, if that's a part of your plan. Once you start getting a little bit of success in that realm, it's, you know. Other people start to, you know, come back out of those hedges or, you know, start to reappear. But you really find out that first six months for me was a real test in discovering who, whom you can really count on when the chips are down or when things are really tough. And it's not that anything got easier over the last two and a half years. But, um, you know, it's, uh, you really do. There's plenty of moments where you're tested throughout that time. And you identify, you know, who, who's, uh, you're gonna be surprised when you find out who is really worth their salt as far as somebody that's gonna invest in you. Whether it's time, attention, or even, you know, resources. It's really interesting to find out who those people really are because it's full of the highs and lows all the way through it. But that first six months is also the realization of all of that occurring. It's that, uh, [inaudible] the people you had qualified prior to be there when you need them or not. and then all of a sudden these people come out of nowhere that you didn't even know or you hadn't fostered a strong relationship with, and they're all in on helping you out. So it's really interesting, and the first six months is a lot of that.

[08:53] Larry: Yeah, I think you're spot on with the different hats, having to wear as a founder, and it can be challenging, for sure. Knowing your journey and your story, and you're such a good dude, it's easy to root for you and TAHO Labs. Transitioning to hiring, who was your first hire and how did you find them?

[09:21] Todd: It was actually, for us, it was one of our advisors. And, uh, um, and it was more or less for us. Um, uh, it was just somebody that had, uh, really saw through the same lens that we did. Um We adapted our product today isn't exactly what we had set out to do in the beginning. It's very normal in the That's very normal in the startup world, where, you know, you start going down a path, sure-footed. This is the idea idea. And it's almost this misstep or this happenstance where all of sudden we're pursuing this thing here but but oh my this is there's something far more intriguing over here just just slightly off course let's Check that out. You end up, you know, you end up in a discovery mode. You end up, you know, there's innovation that occurs that all of a sudden will pivot the company on its, uh, on its, on its core offering. And that's what happened to us. And quite frankly, everybody I've ever talked to. I haven't met a founder yet that didn't run into that, you know. And it's really, it's interesting. It's really interesting how that happens. So, um, you know, you asked about the first hire and our first hire was attached to the original goals and what we're going down. They were a technical advisor that leaned in hard and we ended up bringing them on board, uh, for a while and, uh, and they helped us, uh, they helped us get, get our feet under ourselves.

[10:58] Larry: Yeah, that's like in, in what you called out a moment ago, listening to the market and making a pivot, you know, not getting so attached to, to what, you know, you know, maybe, you know, and, and, and putting it out there and being okay to, to go in a different direction I think is spot on. What was that like when you're, when you've hired that first person and you're handing off something that maybe you've done for a long time? Like, what is that like giving it to someone else and trusting them with your baby?

[11:28] Todd: So delegation is something that I've been doing for a while. And, um, you know, bringing them on board, they were a known entity. There was somebody that, you know, one of the founders had worked with prior, so felt pretty safe in that realm. We felt very safe in that realm. Uh, and yeah, I do get it. Um, I wasn't a fingers-on-keys founder, right? Uh, we do have fingers-on-keys founder, but I wasn't, so it was a little easier for me. I think that our fingers-on-keys founder saw it a little bit different, and I think it would have a really different, uh... Answer here because it was tough for that person to, you know, to let go and, and, and let that happen. But, um, it was, it was, um, for me, for me, I, you know, just speaking indexing to myself, it wasn't that hard me to do that, but Through the evolution of the company, there's, there's, there's some other things that happen that early in the company. We've been around for two and a half years now. So, you know, the first six months isn't as fresh anymore, right? And a lot of things changed throughout that course, especially for that first 12 months, really. I think that one thing that I didn't understand back then, and it's the most important thing to me now, uh, is culture. We did set out to build a purposeful culture back then. However, we didn't know enough. We hadn't experienced enough to really refine that culture to what it is today. And a lot of the culture we had intended to build were to correct things that we had experienced in big businesses prior. But those those things that help to fuel or move or move the culture the right way in those big businesses, we found does not not does not cross over to the startup world well. And there was a big learning curve there. Okay. And I state all of these things because you're asking about turning over our product, our baby to a first hire. And, uh, giving them the freedom to execute, empowering them to execute, I think is a big part of maybe some of the struggle that a lot of people go through. How that execution occurred, not what was executed, but how it was executed, is where we really started to learn a lot about what we needed to do culturally. Because we hired That great individual, we hired some other great individuals, grew as a team to, you know, um, you know, went from a team of just a couple coders to, you know, seven people coding. And when we, but we started to realize how things were getting done, whether it was interpersonal. Whether it was, um, you know, the actual product that was landing in the repos, um, there was a lot of the how that we thought we had solved because we were fixing things from bigger businesses that we brought forward and then understanding that. We're indexing to the wrong things here altogether, and we weren't solving anything. We were seeing really bad problems by bringing in best practices from big businesses into here, and it was breaking things, right? So, that was, uh, that was a big discovery for us, and quite frankly, more so than... More so than turning the baby over to those early employees, uh, it was how it was being executed, how they were executing, became the bigger challenge for us rather than the handoff or the delegation, right? It was how, right? And that all a points back to culture. And, uh, and culture has since become the most important thing to us, the most important thing we hire to within our organization. It's 100% culture.

[16:13] Larry: Yeah, that, yeah, that's fantastic. I know we could probably spend all day on this question, but how do you hire to culture? What are some things that you're looking for, or, like, I don't want to give away the secret sauce, but

[16:27] Todd: It's not secret sauce. People can go online. They can go to taholabs.com. They can click in the careers section. They can look at our culture deck. We post it for everybody to see. And, uh, um, in there it defines, uh, it defines why a person would like working here and why a person would not like working here, right? We're very clean on that Grit is a an enormous value in our culture the ability to be resilient Um, uh, the ability to own failures own the challenges. There's also an aggression that we see within our culture. There is a dominance. There's a value for dominance and the idea of dominating our industry. Okay? And it's not about dominating conversations. You know, there's plenty in our culture about how we bravely show up and represent our ideas. And that needs to come through as well. Um, people that activate when called upon, or they activate and they don't wait, uh, they're, you know, they need to be people that, uh, that are self-motivated. And, um, these are things that are in our, that are seated in our culture. Another piece of it is, is really around dedication. It's about conviction, and it's about being all in. All right? When somebody's, and I explain this to people, you know, when they're in the interview process, I explain to them, look, if you work at TAHO Labs, it is the number one most important thing. In your life. When you work at TAHO Labs, it's a family decision to work at TAHO Labs because the family will make sacrifices for you to execute what you need to execute here at TAHO Labs. We do lots to help people out. We do lots to help remove some of the burdens that they have in life. We offer really strong benefits. We have a lot of things that we try to do to help people, you know, take care of the things that they have in life that they need to take care of. There's responsibilities that they need to take care of. However, the decision to work here is a family decision. To work here, and because there's going to be a lot of sacrifice in order to help us move, in order to help us be successful in order to participate here. And you gotta be all in, and we're very clean on that. We're very, very clean on that. And it's important to us, it's important to us to hire for that. If that's not your thing, if you're looking for work-life balance, by all means, I wish you all the best in the world and go find it. That's important to you and I want you to go find it. Work -life balance is not something that we value here.

[19:33] Larry: Yeah. I love the intentionality in that and you used the word that I don't think I've ever seen in a list of values on a company website is dominance. But the beauty in that is you define it, uh, what it is and who it is you're looking for. And it's it's a part of your, you know, your ethos, which I, which I think is fantastic. And putting that out there for, for anyone to understand, um, you know, whether they're in or they're, you know, they're not a fit. I think that's fantastic. What advice would you tell a founder that's about to make their first hire? You're two and a half years into this. What advice would you give to someone that is early on, back where you were two and a half years ago?

[20:18] Todd: I'd be purposeful about building - I know, I hate to be a broken record here, but I'd be really purposeful in, um, number one, I'd be purposeful in how you define the culture. This person is going to help you. They have to echo that culture into every hire that's after them. Okay. They set the pace for that culture. I would sacrifice. There is talent and skills for culture match, okay? So because they're going to lead the way, everybody's going to look to that person and how they behave in the environment to, and they're going to index their own behaviors to it. So I think it is most important that before anything, above and beyond all else that they echo exactly the culture that you want to build within your organization from a purposeful perspective. Now, I also told you I screwed that up in what we thought the culture should be from the very beginning, however, if you can take from my mistakes. Learn from that. Go check out our culture. Pull from it what makes sense for you and, you know, build out your own. This isn't our idea. You know, if you look at, like, Netflix. There's plenty, you know, they were kinda one of the ones that first published a culture deck. They have a really really big, exhaustive culture deck. I think that it needs to be slimmed down quite a bit. but they have one, right? And have... go, uh, feel free to go look at ours. Take, take from it what you like, [inaudible] the rest, and build it, you know, make it your own. But I do feel as though, you know, hiring for that culture fit sets the pace for you to have a successful organization in the future. Because how people work. It's so, it's, it is more important than what they work on, right? It's how they work is the most, most important piece. And, uh, um, and that's just going to be a guiding light for you. The other thing that I'll note is that first person that you land, I, and I will say this for the first almost dozen people that you land, okay? Uh, I will take somebody with high aptitude over a high, uh, over a high specific skillset. right high aptitude somebody that has a fungible talent set that can be focused on that can be focused on any thing Um, you know, across your, across your technical stack, at least in the, in my realm, uh, in the, uh, in the tech realm, that, uh, that jack of all trades, master of none is, is definitely, is definitely more valuable to you at this stage. And hiring for that across multiple, across multiple roles as you go forward because the ability, you don't know what's going to come up over time. Your ability to forecast what you're gonna need into the future at best is maybe a six-month planning horizon, and beyond that, you're not gonna know what you need. And even in that six-month planning horizon, you're gonna get some stuff wrong. The ability to pivot the resources you have, your most expensive resources, your personnel, your team, the ability to pivot them and swarm them to the most important thing to get done at any given point in time is really valuable. So culture fit and then high technical aptitude to work on many things, right? So those are the two big things.

[23:59] Larry: Fantastic. There's a lot of nuggets in there. I really, really appreciate it. Last question, where can people find you online?

[24:07] Todd: Yeah. taholabs.com. Come check us out. We're doing amazing stuff. Um, the, our technology is unlike any other technology out there. [inaudible] who are trying to fight the good fight and get far more capacity access for more capacity in the infrastructures that are out there today but nobody does it like us and we truly truly drive utilization on all of the machines people are using today to their fullest potential.

[24:36] Larry: Yeah, that's fantastic. Todd, thank you so much.

[24:39] Todd: Yeah, thanks a lot, partner. Good to see you.