The Secret to Great Content, Engagement, and Trends ft. Devin Reed | Revenue Reimagined Ep. 050

Devin Reed's transition from a quota-carrying sales rep to the Head of Content at juggernauts like Gong and Clary proves the power of blending sales directness with marketing creativity. After failing an internal personality test for 'not being curious enough,' Devin launched his side hustle, The Reader, on nights and weekends, eventually taking over content at Gong. His playbook? Scale what works aggressively, back insights with raw data, and never settle for incremental 10% improvements when you can double or triple results. Devin's latest venture, the high-production podcast 'Read Between the Lines,' exemplifies his philosophy of 'opposite thinking' in content creation. By analyzing the competitive landscape and doing the exact opposite—swapping standard Zoom grids for an in-person basketball court studio, and replacing surface-level questions with deep, personalized research—he maximizes the critical 'first click' impression. He argues that in today's crowded market, building an audience and a personal brand is the ultimate career leverage. On the leadership front, Devin highlights the sharp contrast between managing direct sales personalities and introverted marketing creatives. While sales thrives on blunt feedback, marketing requires creating safe spaces for ideation. Ultimately, bridging the toxic gap between the two departments comes down to shared revenue KPIs and building a marketing team that hits the 'true north' triangle: mastering the company's point of view, the product, and the market audience.

Discussed in this episode

• How Devin failed an internal personality test for not being 'curious enough' and used the rejection to launch his side hustle.
• The strategy behind Gong's content engine: aggressively scaling data-backed insights without sinking the ship.
• Why you should ignore outdated career advice that prioritizes a corporate job over building a personal brand.
• Applying 'opposite thinking' to podcast creation by ditching Zoom for high-production, in-person interviews.
• The concept of the 'first click' and why you must be maniacal in editing to retain new content consumers.
• The fundamental differences in managing direct sales personalities versus introverted marketing creatives.
• How shared revenue KPIs and the 'true north' triangle bridge the gap between sales and marketing.
• Parallels between extreme ownership in parenting and building psychological safety within corporate teams.

Episode highlights

1. 1:30 — The origin story of The Reader
2. 6:15 — Building Gong's powerhouse brand
3. 11:45 — Ignoring outdated corporate career advice
4. 15:30 — Creating Read Between the Lines
5. 18:45 — The power of opposite thinking
6. 23:10 — Adapting leadership: Sales to Marketing
7. 27:50 — Sales and marketing alignment secrets
8. 32:20 — Parenting vs. executive leadership
9. 37:15 — Devin's summer of scale plan

Key takeaways

• Scale what works aggressively
• Use opposite thinking for content
• Align teams with shared revenue
• Adapt leadership to team DNA
• Audience and brand are life

Transcript

we had this concept of first click, which is how often do you get introduced to a podcast, it sucks and you go back for seconds. Never. Never. You get one click, so we need to make every moment count.

Welcome back to another episode of the Revenue Reimagined podcast. We have with us today, none other than the sales wrap, turned head of content, who is the previous head of content at the small little brands that have done a decent job with content. You've heard of like, I don't know, Gong and Clary, two of the biggest names in the space. Now, founder of the reader, he hosts a YouTube show, which is called Read Between the Lines, which has probably the best production value I've ever seen.

The Reader newsletter, and he's consulting for companies like Notion, Audience Plus and more, none other than Devin Reed. Thanks for joining us, man. Thank you. Thank you.

It's cliche to say thank you for having me, but I am grateful that you are having me on the show. So, I'm excited. Yeah, no, we appreciate. And it's like perfect timing as you like start up your, you know, you've done some consulting and you've done a lot of work in the past, but one of the things I like to talk to like founders, especially newly minted founders, like what's that origin story for the for the listeners?

Why did you want to go jump in two feet? You've been super successful in all these great organizations, and you're like, I'm going to go do it my own way. So, what's that origin story for you? Yeah, I've got I've got two origin stories.

And you can tell me which one you want, or I can yeah, I can give you the fastish version of both. But there's an origin story of starting the reader roughly six, seven years ago, and that has a a somewhat juicy origin story, if I can tease you a little bit on that. Give you a bit of a cliffhanger. Uh, and then there's another perhaps the second uh origin story, which is a couple weeks or months ago, which is like why I leave Clary and and do uh the founder life full-time.

So, Dale, I'll let you choose your adventure early in the show. Which one would you like? And I take no offense to either choice that you make. I I like the one that's like juicy.

So, I'm in marketing. I know how to sell a story. Uh, no. So, so what happened was I was uh I was in sales uh for the first six years of my career.

And at the time, this was, I don't know, how many years ago, seven, eight years ago, whatever it was. I was at Avenbrite. And I was like kind of just realizing that my time as a rep was about to come to an end, uh just by choice. Like I had, you know, I found my groove and all, but you know, so I started exploring, um, you know, I don't know, sales enablement jobs.

I could probably do that, right? And there's no there's no open rolls at Avenbrite. And I'm like, okay, what about marketing? And so, you know, I I was lucky enough to get kind of uh introduced and built a bit of a relationship and dare I say, uh groomed by this hiring manager.

And she told me, hey, this content marketing manager just quit. We have an open roll, you should apply. And I said groomed because she coached me like multiple times through this process. And so I I, you know, uh applied.

I went through the whole process, and the last step was a personality test. You're laughing, because you know where this is going. And I remember taking it, and then like the the you always know like good news travels fast. Like in this scenario, like I heard nothing for a week.

You know, after like, you know, a lot of interaction and hearing back. And so I went, this is not good. And so it had been one week, it was Friday morning, and I walked to my desk, and the little G chat popped up, and it was like her, and it was like, hey, can you meet me in this conference room? And I was like, it's like getting a text, like, hey, Dale, we need to, you know, we need to talk.

It's like, okay, cool. So, I go in there, and they printed it out. They had like my results, I guess, and it was like, you failed the personality test. And I was like, what?

You can fail those things? They're they're pass fail, I don't know. And so she I remember them saying, you're not curious enough. That's you don't seem curious enough for this role.

And I ironically, Adam is making a very curious face right now. Um, and so I was like, mad and confused, you know, my hope I was very let down. And so I left that room kind of kind of pissed, honestly, but I was like, if you can't get the job from an internal transfer, no external CMO is going to hire you, dude. Like you have to go get some experience.

And sure enough, they brought someone in who was wildly overqualified. The the gal they ended up hiring was like 10 years in marketing for an IC role. And I'm like, okay, I get, if you're going to hire her, just tell me she's better. You don't have to tell me I failed a personality test.

You know, you can let me down a lot easier. So, I started the reader with the uh, you know, the the lovely encouragement from my wife, who was like, you know, go just start consulting or writing. And so I was making 30 bucks an hour writing anything I'd get my hands on. Like, you need a blog, outbound emails, like I got you.

And so that was the initial Genesis of the reader. Um, and I did that, you know, I was working in sales for probably the next three years at Avambrite and then at Gong. Uh, I went to Gong next and was like hitting quota during the day, and nights and weekends. And uh, nights and weekends, you know, writing for the reader, just to get some some clients and some experience there.

So that's the initial Genesis. Super cool. I love that. Interesting.

So I I I'm kind of I'm fascinated by your journey, right? Like Gong for a long time for me and a lot of people, when people are like, what what do you want your brand to represent, or how do you want to tell your brand story? It wasn't necessarily, oh, like we we want to be in your face, like Gong, but it's like, Gong does it really well, right? And Clary does it really well.

But they didn't start as doing it really well. How did you take it from what it was, like what's some of your strategy that built Gong into the powerhouse brand that even it is today, right? Like there's so many conversational intelligence tools out there. But when people think CI, they think Gong.

When people think revenue, and I say this as someone who competed with Clary, like I would hear all the time, well, is that what Clary does? Yeah. Yeah, it's a it's a very very fair question. I would say at Gong, um, I think they started on a really great foot for for step one, which was, you know, you have to and it's been helpful.

It's been uh almost two years now since I've worked there. You know, as time goes on, you can reflect and really dissect like what worked. And the thing I have to give credit to is Amit, the CEO, used to be a CMO. So he gets marketing.

Our CMO was Udi Legor, who's a legendary creative marketer. The guy gets brand better than anyone I've probably ever met. And so those are who's at the like they're leading the ship. So you're already in a great spot.

And then we had Chris Orlob, who with Amit launched Gong Labs very early on at the company's trajectory. And so to start with Chris, who's a great writer, knows the market, and then you have these data-backed insights, I mean, that's a great first step. Like, that's phenomenal. So, when I joined the marketing team, um, I joined as a sales rep 2017, when there was like 40 employees.

No, was it 40, yeah, 40 globally, 12 in the states. And then I joined marketing two years later when there was probably 150 100 employees, something like that. Um, and so at that point when I joined, I was supposed to join Chris's team as his first hire, as I'm taking the job. He's like, actually, I'm going to go back into sales, so you can just have this job.

You can just be me now. So, I started writing Gong Labs, and you know, he was doing webinars and, you know, some email marketing. And there's really two things. So, again, I want to be, you know, super clear.

I got a great baton handed to me there. It was my thought was simple. Scale what works and don't sink the ship. Gong Labs works, people like the data.

They like this bold direct approach. Learn that, add your own flavor to it, and just execute. And so for the first six months, it was pick, you know, how do we continue to do these data, you know, back to how, you know, how do we do these reports, these blogs. What are the mechanics that Chris has set up?

And then how do I just double? Like, that was the mindset. There is no 10% better with Udi Legor. There's no 15% better with Amit.

It is double, triple, quadruple. And that's terrifying to a lot of people, but when you come from a sales background, you're terrified all the time. So you're not really worried about about some additional pressure. You're like, this is great.

So, that was kind of like, you know, um, the kind of the initial thought. And then the next was I come from a teaching background. So, I know that some people will always learn by reading first. Some will love audio, some will be visual with video.

And so I went, great, I have a gem. Let's, you know, you know, later we launched a podcast. Okay, great, let's launch a video show. Okay, great, well, you know what I mean.

We just started scaling out channels by keeping that same strategy of data-back sales tips that help you close more deals. And I think the ability to stay true to a strategy and to execute at a high level, we got this compounding effect that I don't know many marketing teams get to experience, because I think they just change strategies too often, and they don't let it really play out till those lagging indicators come in. Yeah. And I think, you know, you were doing this early before it became en vogue is taking one piece of content, repurposing it over different mediums.

Um, cuz now, you know, it's all over the place. You just take a podcast, slice it up a bunch of different ways. Um, but that was when you were doing it. It's kind of like in the beginning of Google Ads, or like anything that has that's in the beginning of it.

And I always say like sales and marketing destroy everything that's good. So as, you know, you're going into all these different channels, like people just use it in a different way. So, it's super interesting. Um, one of the things that I'm curious about as you're starting your new journey uh into what you're doing.

I'm sure you get a ton of advice. I'm sure you've gone through a bunch of uh different uh processes in your head. What are some of the things that people have told you about like starting your own business, running your own business, that you're going to be like, I'm not going to take your advice. Like, I'm going to do it my way.

What's some of that what's some of those things that you're going to just do your way? So so the the question is what is advice that I'm probably going to ignore? Yeah. Um, that's a good question.

I think some of the advice and and I'll be clear, if someone by chance has given, you know, is listening and the person gave me the advice or is thinking of giving, or has given similar advice. What I've what I've realized, Dale, real quick is like, I think almost all advice is well-intentioned. The challenge is that person is often giving me advice based on their career path 10 years ago, 15 years ago, and the world is just different. And so one of them was like, don't even leave Clary.

Like, you need Clary. You need a full-time job. You're too young. You don't have a like, and and, you know, you don't want to have enough, it's too risky.

And I had to zoom out and think, why would this person tell me that? And another person of a similar kind of demographic. And it was just someone of an older generation who thinks a little bit differently than I do, which is like, you know, you need a corporate job. That is who you are in your foundation.

And that audience brand stuff is cute. And I'm in the I'm in the camp of like, audience and brand is life. Like, that's that's going to open up all It's opened up every door for me in the last five years. So, I had to kind of, you know, push past that.

And these are people I really respect. If I named who it was, you would your eyebrows would go like up. You would be shocked. Like, they're very smart people, very very smart people.

So, I had to ignore that. The other one that's a little bit more recent like in the last couple weeks was, um, kind of the same trap, I think a lot of marketing teams fall under, which is you got to be on Instagram. You got to get on Tik Tok. You got to be on Twitter and like scale, scale, scale to these channels.

And again, I'm like, I don't know, LinkedIn and like my newsletter has been has been done pretty well right now. I think maybe this show is my next thing. And like, yeah, I don't know how Instagram works anymore. I'm I'm just old enough with like, I guess, enough kids that I'm like, I just know how to send things to friends.

So, the real like between the lines is is just staying focused. That's something I promised myself I would do is like the first three months is setting up consultant, uh you know, the consultant side of the business. Get the process down pat. Get the sales uh, you know, the process of delivering the strategy down.

That's my own sales process down. And earn the right to go do that shiny creative stuff of like shooting Tik Tok reels or whatever it is, you know what I mean. Dale Dale dances on Tik Tok. Um, you know, it's funny, I think a lot of people give that advice of, oh, don't go do this and you need the corporate job.

And for some people that makes sense, right? But like you you spent so much time not just building Gong and Clary's brand, but building Devin Reed's brand. And I'm I'm I'm going to give do you do you know KD, Devin? Uh, Kevin Dorse?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I do. So, I'm I'm I'm going to give KD a little plug here, but like and it took me a long time to realize this.

You spend your time on LinkedIn or with Gong or Clary building your brand, so that you can do your own damn thing. Not that you, you know, have to sit there and do it for someone else. Um, I love the risk that you you've taken. And I think that being able to parlay all that success to help other companies do what you've done for Gong and Clary through the consulting is super cool.

But I want to talk about I I want to talk about the show for a minute. Um, so the first episode I caught was the one with Doug Landis. Um, and then I've watched a couple since and known Doug for a while. Incredible human being.

Um, I was amazed at the production value, uh the thought that you put into the questions, the deep research that you very clearly do for your prospects. What made you say I want to do a show like this, cuz it's fucking expensive. It takes a lot of time. Like this isn't two minutes of research versus, hey, I'm just going to do a, you know, 30-minute podcast like, uh, oh, I don't know, the one that I'm on right now.

Yeah, yeah. Well, to be clear, there's nothing wrong with this style podcast. I've done two of them, you know, one at Gong, one at Clary. And, um, the reason or the thinking behind the show was kind of two things.

One was I I needed a I was I won't go into details. I was just at this place in my life. I was going to in a down spot. It was, you know, we all go through rough patches.

And I was like, I need I need to take a big creative swing right now to just get my like juices flowing, to get my confidence back, to get my momentum back. And I've always had this like idea for a podcast. Like if I launched the Devin Reed show, so to speak, like, I've always I've had ideas floating. And I was like, if I'm going to do it with my name on it, I got to go big.

I have to go, you know, I have to do something very different and really challenge myself creatively. And I can tell you this show is a freaking challenge. Like, it is tough. Like, I we rented out a basketball court in Chicago.

I thought it was the coolest thing in the world. I had no idea about setting up a studio on a basketball court. Like, they hated me there, cuz I'm like, what do you mean I can't bring in my own furniture on this thousand, you know, 10,000 hardwood where like professional players practice, you know what I mean? So stuff like that you don't think about.

Um, but you know, what I did was the same thing I do when I am designing content strategies or even channel strategies, which is I do a competitive landscape analysis. And so I listened to 20 what I'll call content and marketing focused podcast. I listened to all of them. And I just wrote down, what is everyone doing?

What is the where's like the crowd, the herd? And one of them was, you know, zoom boxes, obviously, it just makes sense. That's just one of the many. It was they all typically start with uh today I'm sitting down with uh Devin Reed, he's the head of content at I'm like, I'm going to fall asleep right now and I'm not even at Devin's like like him yet.

And uh, you know, just like very surface level questions. And so I went, great, I made this list of like, what is everyone doing? And I did I made what's the opposite? Okay, everyone's in zoom, I'm going to go in person.

Uh, questions are surface level, I'm going to do crazy research. I'm going to surprise my that's what it was. I'm going to surprise my guests with how much I know about them. At least at one point in the show.

And the other thought too was you can tell, I mean, you guys are very good at this, but you can tell on some shows they don't they don't know the guest. They like literally look their LinkedIn for 10 seconds. And they ask questions that were clearly written for five guests before. Like it doesn't have any connective tissue.

And so I asked myself, okay, what makes a great podcast? A great conversation. What makes a great conversation? When the people know each other, and when they're comfortable.

So let me just do that behind the scenes. And you know, so I know I'm I'm I know I'm going a little bit of a monologue here, but I was really just intentional with like, how is this show going to look and feel? And all the way down to when you see it on your LinkedIn feed, and you see that, you know, that thumbnail for that half second I have your attention, has to look different, has to be different. And so when you click into it, hopefully, uh, and this last thing I'll say is we had this concept of first click, which is how often do you get introduced to a podcast?

It sucks and you go back for seconds. Never. Never. You get one click.

So we need to make every moment count. Be, you know, be maniacal in the editing room, be maniacal about the location, the guest selection, like everything was really meticulous. And then that leads me back to, I really wish I had given myself like 30 hours a day during uh pre-production to to put it together, but I'm I'm really grateful for how it turned out and the reception has been has been really, really good. People buy from people.

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We're in this eight second, 10 second world of like IG, Tik Tok, like you got to capture people's attention straight away. Just like in any other technology as well, right? Like working with founders right now and if they're starting to use a technology, if the if the user doesn't like it in three, four clicks, like all of a sudden now you're not getting a renewal, you're not getting an expansion. Um, so it's it's uh, it's that way.

Every everyone's buying for attention. Like, where are the eyeballs going? How can we get eyeballs? And how can we get them back on on what we're trying to uh, trying to put through?

How was um, I I'm super fascinated by marketing people that have been in sales because I think the best marketers have been sales people and the best sales people have been marketers. Like I I think there's an evolution instead of the divide, there's an evolution. But how has your leadership evolution worked since you went from sales as carrying a bag to leading a team to then going into marketing group. Like how's that leadership evolution uh progressed for you?

It's a fantastic question that no one in my life has ever asked, especially on a podcast. So that's a great I really respect that question. Um, wow, let me think about that for a second. Um, my first my first thought, I kind of smiled.

I don't know if you saw my a grin creep on my face, Dale, was, you know, I I worked at a sales tech uh company that, you know, you know, we're sales people selling to sales people. So, you got to earn that trust in the first two minutes with a CRO, VPF sales, or else that deal isn't going anywhere. And so, you know, I'd say I don't want to use I don't think the word aggressive is quite accurate, but you need to be direct, you need to be very proactive to be a successful sales person, amongst many other traits. And when I got in into marketing, the DNA of a marketer and a sales person is just very different.

And so the way that you lead a marketing team, and the way that those, you know, you manage, you know, personalities and expectations, I think are very different. Um, you can you can be a little bit more direct with sales. Sales people, I'll say a little bit at least, right? Um, and I would argue if you're not direct in sales, you might lose respect with your peers.

Whereas in marketing, if you're too direct, you will lose respect quickly and you're an asshole. And forgive me, you can bleep that if you're not allowed if I can't say, if I'm not allowed to curse on the show. Um, so uh Adam curses all the time. Okay, I'm not I I I drop F bombs in every episode.

Okay, I I'm uh I have two little girls who are one and three. So I can't curse in any other room but this my office. So sometimes it's like the filter uh the filter comes out. Um, so I would say, you know, like learning that, you know, and there's a lot more introverts in marketing than there are um in sales.

And so just learning, you know, how to manage and motivate people and make them feel heard and make sure their ideas, you know, being creative is a huge part of marketing. And when you're an introvert and you're a little bit junior, and then you got Devin Reed in the room, who's like known, you know, it takes a it takes a lot of skill and refinement to get people comfortable that they feel they can voice their opinions and you want to make sure you validate those opinions. Whereas in sales, it's kind of like loudest voice in the room wins and there's a lot of shouting and a lot of cursing. Uh, pending on where you look.

Um, so I would say that was kind of the the first one, um, for me, at least from that like sales to Gong leadership role. Yeah. I love that. Super interesting.

It it's I find it fascinating that you went from sales to marketing. Um, because they are to your point, they like they're different personalities, right? Um, like I tend to do better leading sales teams than marketing, even though like I do all go to market, because I am that very like outgoing, super direct, pointed person. I think Dale, while a sales leader tends to be a little more reserved and relaxed.

And I think that's why cross-functionally he's probably better than I am. Um, just cuz I'm older, man. That's all it is. And that's probably true that that probably is true also.

And it helps a lot. Um, listen, I I took your advice. I won't say what it was, but like the other day, like I was totally not myself, and I didn't do something. And what was your answer today?

You're getting older and wiser. Um, so uh uh uh 100%, but that that journey is interesting. When you look at sales and marketing, you know, there's a lot a lot of this, right? And a lot of our founders don't know how to align them.

Uh I'm super curious your point of view, having worked in both. Like, how do you really drive sales and marketing alignment? Like what what is Devin Reed's secret to sales and marketing alignment? There's the the easy answer that's been said before that I will say just to be clear.

And then I think there's the slightly hidden one that we don't like to admit in the marketing team. The the first one is the shared KPIs. Um, that's the first one. And it's been said before.

So I'm but I got to say it. It's like, you know, if you're counting MQLs or pipeline influenced and you're celebrating because you hit those goals, and the sales team is not hitting the revenue targets, there's a problem. There's a problem. And that's conversation with two founders today.

And that becomes toxic at the cultural level, and that it never gets better from that. You have to fix that first. I won't I'll I'll leave it there. There's a whole metrics conversation.

When you let's say you have that. Let's say you're like, no, Devin, we're all in on revenue, and I only get, you know, my uh, my bonus is based on revenue as a marketer. The next reason is that sales doesn't trust marketing because marketing doesn't know the audience or the market as well as the sales team does. And so a lot of the marketing ideas and deliverables, as one CEO told me, feels 10 to 20 degrees off true north.

It's not really how our audience talks. It's not really how our product works. And so then you go to the sales team, and you're like, here's this deck that doesn't sound like anyone that you've ever sold to, right? Here's this uh, I don't know, ebook that isn't focused on a topic that they've heard this week, right?

Like, those are the things where it's like, ah, you don't really know what the hell you're talking about. So, and you're like doing these MQL things, and half those MQLs kind of suck. So, F off, right? Like, that's kind of the the oversimplified uh, you know, I don't know, uh, D evolution, there's a word for that.

That's the correct one there. Um, that that's what I've seen happen over and over again. And so the answer I think is like, and I try to coach my teams on this, is there's kind of like this like triangle that I think of for like elite marketing teams, which is you got to go know your point of view. So like, what is your message?

What is what is your company believe? You got to be a product expert. That's number two. And three, you need to be a market expert, which means your audience.

I know there's like competitive landscape in there as well. But if you can get all three of those things, you're in you're way ahead of your competition. The challenge is not one guy or gal is going to hit that for you on the marketing team. You need to build a team.

Go get a prod you know, go get someone who's like from product. Bring them into marketing. Go get someone who is in, you know, an accountant, because you sell to accountants now. Like, build a team that has these balances because what happens is you get checks and balances across your marketing department where someone in accounting, I'm working with an accounting uh tech firm right now.

And they're like, the CEO used to be an accountant. He knows it inside and out. But no one in the marketing. Use that voice.

But no one in the marketing team has and they're not connected enough. A CEO can't run marketing, right? So those are the start the the things. So it's like, you got to get on, you know, to put a bow on it, you got to get on the same page from a KPI standpoint, which is really the accountability standpoint, and you got to get on true north.

Awesome. I love that. So, I'm curious. You were talking about your daughters a little bit earlier, one and three.

Um, I remember those days of mine's now 18 and 15. I have a daughter and a son. And um, I'm curious, what's easier to manage? Two little girls or the mark?

Oh, man. Well, it depends because the tactics I can use from a morality standpoint vary. I can lie to the one and three-year-old pretty easily. They don't know.

Like, magic is still very in the realm of possibility right now. So, if I just don't know, or I'm a little tired, I can go, oh, that's just magic or, you know, I don't overuse that. But I can get away with some stuff. And I'm pretty creative off the off the cuff.

I can come up with things. I would say the the the truth though is like, if I mess up as a leader at work, I'll own it. I'll have a conversation with them and I'll feel bad for a couple hours. Pending, you know, pending the trans you know, pending the transgression, right?

You know, I spoke a little harshly with that him in that meeting, right? You know what, I kind of just the way I worded that in front of Dale. I really wish I hadn't said it in a public setting. You know, and I'll I'll call you, Dale, and go, hey man, I just want to let you know, I'm I don't know if you picked up on it, but I'm sorry that I did that.

Here's how, you know, here's my intention. And I'll feel bad. But by dinner, I'm good, cuz like we're adults, and that's just life. We make mistakes.

When you mess up with your one-year-old daughter, or your three-year-old daughter, and she cries, or she gives you this look of like, oh, I messed up, dad. You're like, oh, like, it's just the sucker punch. And I'm like, oh, I really messed this one up. And then it's like, I'm in bed, I'm laying at the staring at the ceiling like, oh, I got to do better, Dev.

You got to do better tomorrow. Now, luckily I I still go to my daughter in the moment, you know, say, I'm sorry, you know, hey daddy, I don't know. I raised my voice, or I cursed on accident. Never at the kids, but you know, you might.

Someone cuts you off in traffic. Oh, you motherfucker. And you're like, like, how do you think my my three-year-old knows a lot of curse words? And it's from me in traffic.

I'll be honest. Like, you know, and so, you know, the depth of pain, if you will, the guilt is a lot heavier when it's your own kids, especially girls. Um, but uh, I'll be honest, there's a lot of overlap. Like, just owning it is like the biggest thing.

Like, when I mess up, I just tell my daughter, oh, I'm sorry. Daddy made a mistake. Daddy's not perfect. And she's like, okay, cool.

So I can have, I tell you, no, you still cannot have the candy. I'm just sorry the way I responded to you at the moment. I'll tell you, um, you know, it's funny, because as as your kids grow up and they evolve through the process and you're going through these evolution pieces, there are very similarities to managing a team and managing the kids in the family. And like they respect you much more when you own it and you're able to empathize, sympathize and then like, you know, change direction, cuz they see more than ever the actions are much louder than the words.

And so what they see happening is what they'll will will emulate. So, I can appreciate that. Well, that's a good point like when you think like team culture, you know, like in the in the work setting, like, you know, to me, it's just what actions and behavior you allow and tolerate and what you don't tolerate. Like, to me, that's just baseline.

And it's the same with like a healthy or a toxic family life, you know what I mean? It's like what behavior does, you know, it's not fair the dad gets that a certain way, but nobody else does. And so I've uh I would say if without a doubt and that's a surprising clip, I've become a better leader, rather in the B2B setting or even just with any setting from having kids and just having that like, dare I say extreme ownership. Awesome.

I love that. Yeah, it's it's funny how much parenting comes back to managing teams, right? I I have a 13-year-old. Um, and the the tactics I use with him or the tactics I use to manage teams are arguably very similar.

And and like I don't know if that's to say that sometimes I feel like I'm managing children or that my child is like older than he wants to be and I feel like I'm managing an adult. We could figure out which one that is. Um, but I think there's a lot of overlap. I would say that managing kids is easier um than managing teams.

My personal opinion um to your point like you could bullshit them. Um, you can't bullshit if you hire right, you can't bullshit your team. Um, because they're going to know when you messed up. And I I want a team who will call me out.

Like, hey, that doesn't like respectfully, but like, are you sure? Like, what about this? Have you thought about that? Like, bring those ideas.

Like, I don't want to be the smartest person in the room. I I want to Dale, you'll never let me live this down, but like, I want to be your EA. I want to get everything together for you, so that you can do your job effectively and just be be the administrative glue and help with the strategy. Um, very different with with a kid.

Um, it's a good point too and it's like trust I know trust is like, you know, obviously trust is important. But to have it what do you call it? Trust or a safe spot where it's like, hey, you can always come to me and either say you messed up or I messed up. And it's okay and it's a constructive conversation.

You know what I mean? Like even in a team setting, I've had someone say like, I don't know, I gave some advice on one of our team calls and she's like, well, last week, you told me the exact opposite. And the room got quiet. And I was like, yeah, yeah, I'm not perfect.

Okay, you're right. Like I just, okay, it's all good. And like, you know, because the room got kind of quiet for a second like, well, how's that like he's been challenged and I'm like, guys, I don't know everything, all right? I'm human too.

I'm I don't know. I forgot. So, having that safe spot and the same thing with kids, obviously, it's like it just uh, I don't know. It it just it makes it all very enjoyable when there's, you know, that safety there.

I love it. I love it. Devin, let me ask you, what's um, what's next, man? Where where's Devin Reed going?

Where's the reader going? What's what's on the horizon? Um, great question. So, right now, it's a consulting and media business for the reader.

And so, the first part is uh, the the the that's the summer of scale, which is scaling up the consultant, and um, getting that business. Um, I'm not expecting humming by the end of summer, but really, um, I don't know. What's before that? Not idling.

Somewhere between idling and like just absolute on stride, you know what I mean? And so, revving. Revving. Okay, I'm going to rev.

I'm going to rev for a bit. Um, but no, the truth is, you know, we, you know, um, I've been in B2B SaaS for 11 years, and the pace is just floored, redlining for 11 years. And so I'm like, we moved to San Diego last week. Um, to slow down our life pace.

I took this venture knowing I can control the pace. And so I taught my wife, I'm like, you know, you look at expenses, lifestyle, saving, investing, then we go, cool. This is the number we need to hit. You're not going to hear me say we need to double that this summer.

You're not going to hear me say more. We just need to hit that exact number for three months in a row. And then and if I can work four hours a day, great, I'm not working more. Like, we're going to go to the zoo.

We're going to go to the beach and enjoy this time. Best zoo in the country. It is an amazing zoo. My kids are there right now, actually.

I'm a little jealous. They all went without me. But best zoo in the country, hands down. Um, and so that was it, like foundational summer, right?

I want to enjoy the pool. I don't I don't want to just be like in this office for 20 hours a day. So that's that's the first step. Over the next 18 months, my goal is to scale, um, my audience on the on the media side, and scale the revenue, right?

It's basically audience growth and monetization strategy. So in about 18 months, they're 50/50. I want to even out those things. And then over the next 18 months from there, do less consulting and make the media, um, the primary breadwinner.

And we'll do that in a few few different ways. Still sort of working through a couple business, um, business strategies there. I love it. I love it.

As we as we wrap up on time, we are actually uh our next call is with one of your old bosses. Uh we're going to go hang out with Kyle Coleman for a little bit. Oh nice. Very cool.

In incredible human being. One of my favorite people. He's a sweet heart of a man. And I don't know if I've ever said that about any grown man in my life.

He's like the sweetest man. He's uh he he he's he's a good dude. Can we uh can we dive into some rapid fire? Yes.

How many words do I get? I'm I'm I'm notoriously terrible at rapid fire. 10. Okay.

I'll tell five to myself so I can around I'll still go past that. All right. You get five, five words. Okay.

Early bird or night owl? Oh, early bird. What's the first app you check on your phone when you wake up in the morning, or check first app you check? There you go.

I was going to say these words don't count. I don't check my phone in the morning. It's a very tough thing. Uh first thing is Instagram if there was a basketball game or in season NBA, I know I'm going over cuz I want to know highlights.

But if not, then email because I email. Celtics or Mavericks? Warriors, so Mavericks, I guess. You Oh, my kid would love you.

I don't really I could go a whole another 45 minutes on my my you and me both. The the answer is neither one, we don't give a shit. Move on. Yeah, really.

I don't care. I hope it's a great game tonight though. So, on your IG, you have a photo of a tattoo of uh two racing flags that say the marathon continues. What does that mean?

Yes. Uh great hip-hop artist Nipsey Hussle is incredibly inspirational and his brand he's built a oh, just A plus brand called the Marathon. I'm actually wearing the shirt. This is the Marathon.

So his whole thing is the Marathon Continues, which is just his like one of his great interviews was uh I know I'm going over five words by a long shot. But he goes like, you know, for all the people going through it, going through all the emotions, the only reason I'm here is I just didn't give up. I went through all the emotions. I went through all the hardship and I just kept going.

And so I just absolutely love that. Nipsey's Nipsey's the man. What um trying to think I I I I have a few ones that I want to go to. I just don't know which one.

Where do you fart where do you fart? We got to get that shit out. Where do you where do you start first? Marketing or sales?

We fart around the house, unfortunately, for my wife. I don't we might not edit that. Where where do you start first? Marketing or sales?

Where like where do I advise someone to start? Yeah. Oh, just get sales over with. Just get in there, just do the tougher one and start in sales and then go to marketing.

I think it's much easier. Awesome. We'll just wrap this up a little bit. Dream vacation destination.

Well, the one that I've been to, Thailand. Love Thailand. The one I haven't gone to yet is Greece. We're working on getting out to Greece.

That's what's on the radar. Awesome. What about you guys? Dream dream uh destination you have not gone to.

What's on the list? I haven't gone to would be Australia, I think. Um, Yeah. Uh, I've been to Thailand.

I love Thailand as well, but I think Australia would be mine. Nice. I um, I did Thailand, Vietnam last summer. Absolutely loved it.

Um, my dream I I don't want to take your answer. Greece is up there. Uh, probably African safari. Uh and we're in the process of planning it now.

To to as much as Dale loves when I go on vacation. This guy's got more vacation than anyone I know. I got to check I got to check the RR handbook. Hold on here.

It's unlimited and he and he abuses it. Um, I have to hit you up on that. We have the girls are little when they're old enough to, I don't know what that age is yet, but we want to do the African safari as well. But like I can't carry both of them throughout that and enjoy it.

So, I'll probably hit you up on that. Not at one and three either. You you want them to like really enjoy that one. The zoo is Africa, as far as they know.

They're at there now. I could just lie and be like, yep, this is Africa, like cool. Awesome. We love Africa.

So, um, that's why I joke with my wife when they're like, she's like, I want to take them to Tokyo. I'm like, until they're smart enough to know that like, wherever I'm like downtown, like Japan town in the local area is not Japan, then I will take them to foreign countries. But if I can lie, again, back to my leadership skills, I will lie to my children. I'm in.

All right, Devin, I appreciate it, man. thank you for joining the show. Where can people find you? Where can people subscribe to your show?

You guys are awesome. This was super fun. This is a highlight of my day. Thanks.

Uh, best way to to find me is uh, well, LinkedIn if you want to connect there. Uh, I'm pretty active there. Um, the newsletter is definitely uh great. The reader.

co/newsletter. Maybe we can just drop the link in uh in the show notes. And then, um, yeah, the the reader uh YouTube channel as well where you can find read between the lines. Or if you don't like YouTube and you want to listen with your headphones, Spotify, Apple, read between the lines.

It's a big green logo. You'll see my mug. Can't miss me. I love the name.

Awesome, Devin. Thank you so much, man. It's been pleasure. Thanks, guys.

Appreciate it.