Think Like an Owner

Ep.180: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by David Dodson ( @Dave-Dodson ). My guest today is David Dodson. David is an investor, former CEO, professor at Stanford, and as of July 13th, 2023, an influential author having published his first book, The Manager's Handbook. I read an advance copy ahead of the recording and was incredibly impressed with how strategic and tactical it was in showing you ho...

Ep.179: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Julian Scadden ( @JulianScadden ). My guest today is Julian Scadden, CEO of Nexstar, an industry education, coaching, content, and data business all-in-one for plumbing, HVAC, and electrical companies. I am super excited for this episode. This is a fascinating company and has been mentioned by no less than three other podcast guests to me, so I'm thrilled...

I want to tell you about our audience survey we are currently running. These surveys help us create the best content for listeners and better understand your needs and interests. Thank you in advance for sharing your feedback, we greatly appreciate it. After 30 days we are giving $250 cash to 4 survey responders, just add your email at the end of the survey. Take the survey here: https://bit.ly/3Q...

Ep.177: Alex Bridgeman ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Sieva Kozinsky ( @sievakozinsky ). My guest on this episode is Sieva Kozinsky, co-founder of Enduring Ventures, a holding company founded in 2019 with 17 acquisitions to date. Sieva and I met at a dinner following the Berkshire Hathaway meeting in Omaha, his first time attending the meeting. A theme from our first conversations in Omaha that con...

Ep.177: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Mark Stiving ( @Stiving ). My guest on this episode is Mark Stiving. Mark is a pricing expert and consults with companies on developing stronger pricing and product positioning strategies. Our discussion today on pricing is wide-ranging from the purposes of pricing, value-based pricing, segmentation, and who's responsibility pricing is in an organization....

Ep.175: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Philip Hussey ( @philipdhussey ). My guest on this episode is Philip Hussey, CEO of Outerland, a landscape maintenance, new build, and snow removal business in Cape Cod, owned by Chenmark. Philip took the CEO role through Chenmark's GVP program in January 2022. A concept he spends a lot of time thinking about that we discuss in detail is their focus on th...

I want to tell you about our audience survey we are currently running. These surveys help us create the best content for listeners and better understand your needs and interests. Thank you in advance for sharing your feedback, we greatly appreciate it. After 30 days we are giving $250 cash to 4 survey responders, just add your email at the end of the survey. Take the survey here: https://bit.ly/3Q...

Ep. 173 Alex Bridgeman ( @Aebridgeman ) is joined by Clayton Collins ( @ClaytonACollins ). Today's episode was recorded live in late April 2023 at SMBash in Austin, Texas, with my boss, Clayton Collins, CEO of HW Media. We opened up talking about how the role came together, but for a short preview, I took a Chief of Staff role with HW Media in March 2022 to help build a media and data company in t...

#172: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Doug Cook ( @DougCook ). This episode was a live recording at a joint event in Chicago between the Booth and Kellogg Business Schools. My guest was Doug Cook, Chairman of several companies throughout Illinois in windows and siding, chimney care, garages, elevators, and more; With windows and siding being his most notable business in Feldco. Doug gives a dee...

Ep. 171: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Justin Nassiri ( @JustinNassiri ). My guest today is Justin Nassiri, founder and CEO of Executive Presence , a managed social media service for ambitious CEOs, with a focus on LinkedIn today. We talk about why CEOs should care and focus on building a social media following, and how CEOs can optimize their social presence, including a walkthrough of the m...

I want to tell you about our audience survey we are currently running. These surveys help us create the best content for listeners and better understand your needs and interests. Thank you in advance for sharing your feedback, we greatly appreciate it. After 30 days we are giving $250 cash to 4 survey responders, just add your email at the end of the survey. Take the survey here: https://bit.ly/3Q...

Ep 169: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Amir Haboosheh ( @amirhaboosheh ) My guest on this episode is Amir Haboosheh, Co-Founder and CEO of Snowball Industries, a home services holding company with 4 portfolio companies today. Their vision is to build a permanent, publicly traded home for these companies, and Amir and I talk extensively about what an IPO looks like and the benefits and tradeoff...

Ep. 168: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Daniel Hudspeth ( @danielhudspeth ). My guest today, Daniel Hudspeth, is the CEO of Discover Health, a concierge medical practice business with locations in California, Boston, and soon to be Seattle. During his search Daniel did extensive research on private pay healthcare and eventually developed a thesis to acquire multiple concierge practices across...

Episode 167: Alex Bridgeman ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Chris Hoffman ( Chris-Hoffman ). My guest, Chris Hoffmann, is the President and CEO of Hoffmann Brothers, a home services business based in St. Louis. Hoffmann Brothers have scaled from $10 million in 2015 to over $100 million in revenue in 2023. We talk about how that journey happened, their experience building executive teams, investing i...

Episode 166: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Ed Redden ( @Edward-Redden ). Ed and his partner Justin Vogt are former podcast guests from episode 59 where we talked about starting Evermore Industries, an industrial services holding company. Last year they acquired AVUITY, based in Cincinnati, which sells physical commercial office sensors that detect motion, temperature, humidity, and more, alon...

This is the third and final episode in our three-part series on Chenmark, a highly successful small business holding company founded in 2015. Today they have acquired 11 operating companies, completed 30+ acquisitions when including add-ons, and have over 600 employees today. This third episode takes a deep dive into their CEO recruiting function and what has to happen to keep Chenmark on its grow...

Please take 2 minutes to complete this audience poll and give feedback on the podcast This episode is the second in a three-part series we are running on Chenmark, a highly successful small business holding company founded in 2015. Today they have acquired 11 operating companies, completed 30+ acquisitions when including add-ons, and have over 600 employees today. This second episode focuses on th...

Please take 2 minutes to complete this audience poll and give feedback on the podcast This episode is the first in a three-part series we are running on Chenmark, one of the most well-known and studied holding companies in the entrepreneurship through acquisition world. And for good reason! Since its founding in 2015 they have acquired 11 operating companies, completed 30+ acquisitions when includ...

Please take 2 minutes to complete this audience poll and give feedback on the podcast My guests on this episode are Jalen Ross and Orlando Remak, cofounders of CAM Collective, a holding company for association management companies like HOAs founded in April 2022. Today they have four member companies. I was lucky enough to meet Orlando during a trip to Ohio two years ago before he had started CAM...

Please take 2 minutes to complete this audience poll and give feedback on the podcast Daniel Reese is my final guest on the CEO series with early career CEOs. Daniel acquired IntellaTriage in November 2019 after a military career and searching with a distinct thesis. IntellaTriage handles after-hours calls for providers, senior living businesses, and others with a remote nursing team. Daniel and I...

Please take 2 minutes to complete this audience poll and give feedback on the podcast This episode is the second in our CEO series with early career search CEOs in their companies. Today I'm joined by Adam Ilowite and Michael Upex, CEO and President of Axero Solutions, respectively. Axero is a digital workspace platform for internal communication, collaboration, and knowledge sharing that was acqu...

My guest, Ryan Galea, is the first guest in a CEO series I'm doing with search CEOs who acquired their companies within the last 3 years and have early lessons and emotions in their very recent, or current, memory. The series aims to learn strategies and hear stories from early career CEOs about how to manage the first couple of years running a new company.  Ryan acquired VoiceFriend in August of...

This is the last of a six-episode series with Trilogy Search Partners focused on Search, Search-backed acquisitions, and small business operations. Today we have a great conversation with Stijn Hendrikse, an operating partner at Trilogy. As an author of T2D3.pro, serial entrepreneur, and marketing leader, Stijn has contributed to the success of 10+ startups as a C-level executive, including the Ch...

Today's episode is a rerun with past guest Ross Brendel, a co-founder and the managing partner of Westerly Group alongside cofounder Rich Littlehale. Westerly Group invests in acquisition entrepreneurs with committed, permanent capital to pursue a specific industry thesis over an indefinite time horizon. They are investors in several of our podcast guests such as Justin Vogt and Ed Redden, Eric Fa...

My guest on this episode is Sandy Paige. Sandy has been an operator several times over his career, including being a general manager at a Maine paper mill, a director of The Jackson Laboratory, and others which gave him a wide range of experience to use in growing the company he acquired as a searcher, Explora BioLabs. He's also an outlier in being one of, if not the, oldest searchers. But his res...