Ep. 562 - Freshpet COO Nicki Baty - Why Bold Change Is a COO’s Superpower (Now, Not Later)

Second in Command: The Chief Behind the Chief with Cameron Herold

Second in Command with Cameron Herold

Management, Careers, Entrepreneurship, Business

4.9 • 224 Ratings

🗓️ 17 March 2026

⏱️ 47 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Ever felt like you’re carrying the weight of growth, but struggling to shift your company from band-aids to real, sustainable breakthroughs?

Meet Nicki Baty, COO at Freshpet, who’s rewriting the playbook for second-in-command leadership inside a rocketship culture. In this revealing conversation, Nicki Baty opens up to host Sivana Brewer about pioneering a COO role from scratch, installing trust (in teams and at home), and building a business fueled by missionary drive, not mercenaries.

Explore how to turn constant change into your secret weapon, earn buy-in when the North Star keeps moving, and design a culture that scales with speed without chaos.

You can’t afford to run on autopilot or yesterday's wins. Discover the steps that separate successful COOs from those stuck in a cycle of busyness. Listen now for exclusive insights you can’t afford to miss. The next wave of growth is already here, and this episode holds the edge.

Timestamped Highlights

[00:00] - The one guarantee for every COO—how to win when change is constant

[03:41] - Missionaries vs. mercenaries: Why purpose-driven teams deliver differently

[07:40] - Moving a family across continents for growth—what business leaders really learn

[12:11] - “Making room in the boat”: Building trust, networks, and resilient teams on the fly

[19:12] - Nicki reveals how to plan post-onboarding in a brand new leadership role

[23:35] - Finding your “most valuable pet parent” and reshaping the company around them

[28:35] - The surprising power of Freshpet's pioneering spirit—and what big companies still get dead wrong

[37:13] - The real difference between strategic priorities and tactical noise (and how most teams get stuck)

About the Guest

Nicki Baty is the Chief Operating Officer at Freshpet, a company redefining the pet nutrition industry with its human-grade, refrigerated pet food. Formerly President and General Manager of Hill’s Pet Nutrition US (Colgate-Palmolive), Nicki’s career has spanned the globe—from the UK and Europe to Asia and the Americas. She is recognized for her track record in scaling organizations, her passionate belief in purpose-driven work, and her relentless focus on building trust and sustainable growth in fast-moving environments.

🔗 LinkedIn | Website

Mentioned Resources

About the Co-Host

Sivana Brewer is a Fractional COO for Remote Teams and former COO at Closers.io, where she helped scale the company to multiple eight figures and built over 500+ sales teams in just 2.5 years. She specializes in leadership development, remote operations, and systems that empower teams to grow sustainably.

🔗 Connect with Sivana on LinkedIn

Important Links

Connect with Cameron: Website | LinkedIn
Explore the COO Alliance - The World’s Leading Community for Seconds in Command
Get Cameron’s book: Second in Command: Unleash the Power of Your COO Book
Take his course: Invest In Your Leaders Online Course (Use promo code PODCAST10 before the end of the month for 10% off)
Chat or video call with AI Cameron via Delphi

The Second in Command Podcast is an original production hosted by Cameron Herold. Brought to you by COO Alliance. Production and editing by Podcast Your Brand.

Transcript

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0:00.0	the piece, I think, with a COO, the one piece that's guaranteed is change.
0:05.3	Because ultimately, you're responsible for the execution. And if the execution
0:09.2	doesn't come in as you expect, you've got to adapt and be agile to change. But it's,
0:15.8	is it, of course, correction or is it plotting a whole new map of where you're going? And I think you have to be very,
0:24.2	very clear on which one you're trying to do because where it is just a simple course correction,
0:30.7	you want to make sure that the team understand that that North Star, that map is still very much
0:36.5	in place. There's just a slightly different way of getting there. If that North Star, that map is still very much in place. There's just a slightly
0:38.3	different way of getting there. If that North Star changes, there needs to be a much bigger
0:44.2	communication on what that North Star really is and again making sure that it's very, very clear
0:51.3	what the priorities are to get there.
0:58.0	Well, that it's very, very clear what the priorities are to get there. Welcome to the Second in Command podcast, produced by the COO Alliance and brought to you by
1:03.8	its founder, Cameron Herald.
1:06.0	In the Second in Command podcast, we talked to top COOs who share the insights, strategies, and tactics that made them
1:13.0	the chief behind the chief.
1:14.7	And now here's your co-host, former CEO of a multi-eight-figure remote company and alumni
1:20.5	member of the COO Alliance, Savannah Brewer.
1:26.4	Today's guest is Nikki Beatty, the chief operating officer of Fresh Pet, where she's pioneering
1:33.0	a brand new COO role in shaping the next era of growth for this fast-rising company,
1:38.6	redefining pet nutrition.
1:40.7	Before joining Fresh Pet in 2024, Nikki spent nearly two decades at Colgate Palm Olive,
1:47.0	most recently serving as president and general manager of Hill's Pet Nutrition U.S.,
1:51.4	where she led a multi-billion dollar business through a powerful phase of scaling and transformation.
	...

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