20VC: From a $5,000 College Fund to a $10BN+ Public Company, How to Beat People Who Are Smarter Than You, Why Happier Teams Outperform and How Software Buying Patterns are Changing in 2023 with Henry Schuck, CEO @ ZoomInfo

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

The Twenty Minute VC

Finance, Venturecapital, Tech News, News, Siliconvalley, Technology, Investing, Startups, Business

4.4 • 637 Ratings

🗓️ 9 January 2023

⏱️ 48 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Henry Schuck is the Founder and CEO @ ZoomInfo. From ZoomInfo's founding moment, putting $25,000 on a credit card, Henry has led the company to today, with over $1BN in ARR, a market cap of over $10BN, and a team of over 3,600. This is one of the untold but truly great stories in software.

In Today's Episode with Henry Schuck We Discuss:

1. From a $5,000 College Fund to Founding a $10BN Company:

Why did Henry always believe early in life that he would be successful?
Along the way doubt sets in, what did Henry do to combat that doubt when he questioned his own ability and potential?
What does Henry believe he is running from? What is he running towards?
How did seeing the work ethic of his single mother impact his work ethic with ZoomInfo?

2. Henry Schuck: The Leader:

What does Henry believe is the difference between trust vs safety in team culture?
Why does Henry believe safety is built through performance? How does Henry manage and communicate underperformance? How long do you give an under-performer?
Why does Henry believe that happier teams outperform? What does Henry do deliberately and specifically to drive happiness in the business?
ZoomInfo is magnitudes larger than some competitors who receive a lot more attention, how does Henry think about this? How does he manage his own ego as a leader today?

3. Henry Schuck: A Leader in a Changing Market:

How does Henry maintain internal morale when employees see their stock options get smashed every day?
Does it suck to be a public company CEO in the current market? What element is the worst?
How are the buying patterns and behaviors of customers changing in 2023 vs 2021?
How does this impact the sales cycle, retention rates, upsell plans, and the structure of the customer success teams?
Dec 2023, will we be in a better or worse macroeconomic position?

4. Henry Schuck: Relationship to Money and Fatherhood:

How does henry evaluate his relationship with money today? How has it changed over time?
Why does Henry very rarely fly private planes? What does he believe this says about his values?
How does Henry instill the same desire and worth ethic within his children despite being a billionaire?
What does Henry know now that he wishes he could give to his 23-year-old self founding the company?

Items Mentioned in Today's Episode:

Henry's Favourite Book: The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles of Positive Psychology that Fuel Success and Performance at Work

Transcript

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0:00.0	The big premise is, teams that are happier, people who are happier, way outperform unhappy teams and unhappy people.
0:08.1	That happiness is actually the biggest advantage for a productivity perspective in business.
0:14.3	Welcome back. This is 20 VC with me, Harry Stebbings. And today we tell one of the untold but truly great stories in software.
0:21.5	This company is scaled to over a billion dollars in ARR, a 10 billion dollar public company valuation and over
0:26.8	3,600 employees. Yet, it did not follow the Silicon Valley and venture capital playbook. Today,
0:34.2	we delve into their incredible story on how they charted their own course, and so I'm
0:38.7	thrilled to welcome to the Hot Seat today, Henry Shuck, found and CEO at Zoom Info.
0:43.5	This is a very special discussion.
0:45.6	But before we dive into the show today, Secureframe is the leading all-in-one platform for automated
0:50.3	security and privacy compliance.
0:52.6	Secureframe simplifies and streamlines the process of getting
0:55.9	and staying compliant to the most rigorous global privacy and security standards, like SOC2, ISO-2,
1:01.9	ISO-7101, HIPA, GDPR, and others. Secureframe's industry-leading compliance automation platform,
1:09.4	paired with their in-house compliance experts
1:11.7	and former auditors, helps you get audit ready in weeks, not months, so you can close more deals
1:18.0	faster. Secureframe makes it fast and easy to achieve and maintain compliance so you can
1:23.7	focus on serving your customers and growing revenues. Automate your security and privacy compliance with Secureframe.
1:30.8	Schedule a demo today at secureframe.com.
1:33.7	So if compliance is one thing you always have to prioritize, you also always have to prioritize
1:37.7	your team and work?
1:39.4	Well, it's truly global today.
1:41.2	And until now, there's been no HR platform that's been able to handle everything
	...

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