Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:05] Speaker A: Welcome to another episode of the Worst Advice I Ever Got.
I'm your host, Sean Taylor, along with my producer, jb and today our guest is Tyler Zakam. Tyler is the founder and CEO of Broad Sky Partners, where he leads investments in growing high quality businesses with a long view on value creation. He brings three decades in private equity and investing, a track record of building great teams, and a reputation for pairing sharp analysis with real world judgment. He's here with us today, like all of our guests are, to talk about the worst advice he's ever got. So let's get right into it. Tyler, thanks so much for being here today.
[00:00:41] Speaker B: Hey, Sean, it's great to be here. Thanks for having me.
[00:00:44] Speaker A: So, Tyler, please jump right into it. Tell our audience what was the worst advice you ever got.
[00:00:50] Speaker B: The worst advice I ever got was you cannot have a career in anything involving finance or math.
[00:00:58] Speaker A: Okay, so give us a little bit of background about who told you that and what was going on.
[00:01:04] Speaker B: I think it was, it was, it was broad in terms of who told me that as a career feedback loop. I was not a great math student in high school or middle school, and I did not get exceptionally good math scores on my sat. And as I moved on to college, those were frameworks and constructs that influenced what courses I took, where I thought about, what types of careers. In college, you start to think about, what do I want to do with my life? And you know, your SATs were a real anchoring point as an indication of where you would want to spend your time or should spend your time. And so, and so that was an influence on, on, you know, where I should be looking forward and what I should be thinking about doing with my doing with my career.
[00:01:46] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, we already knew you were pre Internet because you dated all of us when you said the SATs, and we all knew what you were talking about because, like, they don't even do that anymore. Right? They take the acds now.
[00:01:56] Speaker A: Well, you can take the SAT still. Okay. But the act seems to be more universally, universally done. But yeah, what I heard, Tyler, was it started affecting your mindset. I mean, it sounds like you, you believed it, bought into it, and it was affecting decisions you were making right away. Right?
[00:02:13] Speaker B: It does, it does, it does. It influences your, your, yourself and, you know, what you perceive to be your strengths. And there becomes a conventional thought process around if you don't have this, you can't do that.
And, and as, look, as we, as we all age and grow, I think we all begin to appreciate and understand that who we are evolves and develops.
And a number, a score at a certain point in your life, 17 or 18 years old, shouldn't necessarily influence or dictate where you are as a young adult on the basis of these frameworks, scores, tests, you know, which, look, it matters. It's. I'm not suggesting it doesn't matter, but, but I am suggesting that the influence those have on you and one evolves.
[00:03:11] Speaker A: It sounds to me like you were hearing this, taking this very binary. All right, if this, then that. Right, you know, black and white to you. Is that, is that, is that right?
[00:03:20] Speaker B: It was. And it was. And so my journey, a little bit more on it is as I got into college, I grew up with a, you know, in a wonderful, wonderful household and one of, one of four boys. And my father was a physician, is, is, you know, is and was a physician. I, my two older brothers were in medicine. And.
[00:03:40] Speaker B: And so as I got into college, I went in with this, hey, this is kind of off limits like finance, numbers related things and a great curiosity for what else is out there. And so for me, while I had the worst advice ever of, you know, don't do anything math related into your career or not too much too math related, I did have a great curiosity for investing in markets. Where did that come from? I couldn't tell you. And, and really in my following, in an intellectual curiosity that I had around investing markets, M and A transactions, there were, I didn't take any courses in those areas, but I battled, I would say, in college, that kernel of curiosity around what is out there with this kind of pushback of, hey, that may be off limits to you, right, because.
[00:04:38] Speaker C: You'Re not good at math. So that's not for you. And like, so that's a big problem, I think right now is that kids are feeling really boxed in to make decisions younger and younger and younger. It's like, you know, even you think about sports like you play baseball, you gotta play baseball 10 months a year, you can't do all four and get, you gotta get really granularized. So if you find out you're bad at something early, you never even try. Do you think that's a problem that you're seeing now with just like the way the world is?
[00:05:01] Speaker B: Yes, I think, I think clearly there's a greater emphasis for, for a variety of reasons we don't, you know, have time to go into, you know, this morning here on greater specialization and earlier and a pressure on kids, young adults, you know, to, to, to specialize, you know, earlier and earlier and the world spins faster and faster, right? Technology, access to information. You know, it's a push pull thing, right? There's, there's, it's great to find that specialization. It's great to find that thing that you're, you're, you're really interested in, but it's also great to have your aperture open.
I feel very, very fortunate that for whatever reason, I didn't listen to the worst advice I ever got.
And then following, you know, following my instinct and what was of interest to me, not listening to that worst advice I got opened two very important doors for me. One of those doors was a profession, a trade in investing, private equity. And then a second door that had opened for me was as an entrepreneur.
[00:06:02] Speaker A: Hey, Tyler, I want to, I want to get to, you know, some more of. I, I guess I would call it moving more towards the gray versus the black and white. You're not good at math, therefore don't do this. But you felt this pull. But you referenced this gut feel. You referenced the influence of your parents. What were other things that influenced you to maybe be more open to pursue your gut?
[00:06:24] Speaker B: It's a great question. Yeah, very much so. I, I was blessed. One of my, one of my, one of my father's brothers. My, my uncle Mac was, it was, was in, was in the business world. And, and, and Mac was somebody that, you know, very clear recollections and memories. After college, you know, doing a summer internship with the business that he worked in, he, it really was a window into business. What is business? And I remember, you know, talking to him about that. What do you do every day? What do other people do? What does a CFO do? What does a CEO do? How does a business work? How does a board work?
He also went and got an executive degree at, from a, from a, from a top tier business school. Um, and, and that, and that, and that sparked an interest that I had and you know, what is. What, like you, you have a, like what do you do with an mba? What does that mean? What, what doors does that open?
You know, were, were incredibly helpful, you know, to me and to, to opening up again. I, I think of it as like an aperture of what don't I know what is out there.
And that was extremely helpful. And, and on, on the, and on the, the, the worst advice thing, it wasn't. I would call it frameworks and structure when you have this like score, you know, or this report card and, and, and, and how that influences one's path.
[00:07:40] Speaker A: Yeah, Yeah, I can, I can Totally see that, right? It's.
My math scores on the SAT were high and my English scores were lower. But I think I do better in communication skills and in writing things than I do and adding math. And I think there's a lot of, of gray here, right? Like, you can still be good with numbers even though you're not great at math, can you not?
[00:08:03] Speaker B: 100. I think I am a.
Probably a pretty good example of that. And look, things evolve. Like, what does it mean to be good with numbers?
Does it mean you have the, like, you can crack the, you know, you can solve the algebra problem or the derivative quicker than the next person? Or is it. You understand how numbers interact with one another? So if you put, you know, in my case, me in a room with a bunch of individuals and said, hey, you know, go. Go solve these equations, like, now fastest. I, you know, I'll, I'll submit that I will come in last or not, you know, near, near the top. If you give me a whole bunch of information on an industry, a company, a market, and say, hey, go sort through all this stuff and, you know, figure out, what do we have here? Is this interesting? Is it not? What do you think? I'll put myself up against a lot of people. Once you crack into the professional world, right, you begin to look further down the front windshield, right? So it's. You start staring at the steering wheel like, okay, I gotta do this. Like, I'm a corporate credit analyst. I gotta, like, break the numbers down. This is what I have to do. And you start to think like, okay, how much do I really like and how good am I and how efficient am I at the. This. But I did see that looking down, as one progresses in a career, the one, the way, at least the career that I chose, finance, investing, private equity, what you do in your, in your role evolves. And so I think this, this, this topic of gray and for anybody listens to who, who, who may listen to this. You know, the one thing that I would love, I'd love to pass on, right, with the benefit of time and experience.
[00:09:47] Speaker B: Is to push back against the convention, to push back against that. You can't do this because of that.
Especially when you feel in yourself that there's a light in that area that could be of interest to you. If it is, hey, your test, test score was terrible. You're not like, you don't. And you have no intellectual interest in that area. You know, look, those are all things we should listen to as well.
But to push back, but for the individual to push back on the, hey, you got this score when you were 17 or you were 21, or you got this bad grade, or these people say, you're stacked up against these other individuals and they've all got these grades and scores and places, and you don't. You can't push back against that, especially when you are starting your career.
And that's when the aperture should be wide in terms of what is out there, what is the art of the possible, what is of interest to me, because ultimately, right, Sean, we've seen in our careers, we do these jobs for long, for a long time, and the joy becomes, you know, this saying, when work isn't work, it's.
[00:10:58] Speaker A: It's.
[00:10:59] Speaker B: It's. It's. It's a part of you, right? It's.
[00:11:01] Speaker A: It's a part of.
[00:11:02] Speaker B: It's. It's a part of you as an individual. And I think that's kind of the sweet spot that we all want to try to find to some degree in our. In our careers. Right?
[00:11:10] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:11:11] Speaker C: I think it's your point about the black and back to the black and whiteness of it. You know, with.
If you trust in all the math and you trust in the numbers, then you're basically saying, ignore your instincts. You know, it's like, here's what it said on paper. And it's like, well, that doesn't feel right to me. It's like, I know, but look at the numbers. It's like, you know, I play fantasy football and I can look at some numbers. Some guys think they look. They look real good on paper, but it's like that they're not passing the eye test. And it's like, which one do you believe?
And so how have. As you're going through your, like, career as a, you know, in the private equity, how much as you have, you needed to rely on your instincts, even when the numbers are telling you something different.
[00:11:44] Speaker B: It's a great point you're making.
In my case, the pushback was at a point in my career.
I'm young, I'm in high school, I'm in college.
There's scores. It's in, it's in. It's informing a long, hopefully Runway of.
[00:11:59] Speaker A: What will or what. What.
[00:12:00] Speaker B: What I will or won't be doing.
And I think it's at those times that it's particularly important to push back on that black and white. We're all developing. We all develop very different. Like, our development curves right at those ages are so steep.
[00:12:22] Speaker B: The potential is so great when we're Evolving so quickly. So who you are in 19 is very different from who you are at 21. Who you are at 21 is very different than I'm out in the real world. I see what's out there. I see what I have to do is very different. When you're 25, I think as we get deeper into our careers and our professions, you know, that those, those curves, the slope of those curves, you know, evolve a little bit. And so, so now to, to your point specifically, in, in, in private equity, look, there is, there, there is importance and criticality to numbers and what numbers, what numbers say. I think the tricky thing is figuring out what are the right ones to look at. What are the right ones to really pay it, you know, to be, to pay attention to, to be black and white on it. Like in my business, that's in. Do we make a dis, do we make an investment or don't we make an investment?
[00:13:13] Speaker A: I'm, I'm curious.
[00:13:16] Speaker A: I think you probably understand why you were being told that, right? People were using, you know, scores and test results to tell you you shouldn't do that. But I mean, what would you tell someone today who, who's in the same boat? They're not scoring well in math, but they have this itch or maybe said another way. How would you have rewarded the advice that, that, that you got when you were not doing well?
[00:13:39] Speaker B: You know, that's a great question.
That's a great question. I, there's no begrudging what the feedback loop was to me at the time. I don't feel it. I have no sense of frustration, anger, I can't believe that negative energy around it, by the way. I probably would have given that to me as well.
[00:13:59] Speaker B: The people that gave me that, that feedback, they're trying to do their job, their best interest, right? Which is they're looking at their dashboard. I think it's the importance of the internal, of the individual understanding that they are, you know.
[00:14:17] Speaker B: Their paths are going to evolve. They, as individuals are going to evolve.
Whatever test score I get when I'm 16, 17, 19, 21 should not be a, a limiter on what I, what's, what interests me, you know, and what I want to do with my career. I get a horrible score on something, I have no interest in it. I have no intellectual curiosity on it. That's probably a good thing to put to the side and say, okay, that's not for me. But it's when you have this push pull of like, hey, wait a second, like, whatever. I didn't do great in this. The score, or these other people did so much better, or they come from this place and I come from here, you know, on this.
[00:14:57] Speaker B: And that's a negative, but I'm really interested into it. I'd love, you know, again, my colonel here today would be. Listen to that list. Like, listen to your gut. Listen to your instinct, especially when pushing against a convention of a score, you know, a rigid convention.
Especially when we're at points of our lives when, you know, we're, we're, we're.
[00:15:22] Speaker A: Evolving and we're changing Now, Tyler, clearly your gut was telling you to do things, and maybe at first you weren't trusting your instincts, but as you began to do it, it was.
There had to be a time where, like, you were, like, sucked back into not trusting your gut and trusting contemporary theory or what, what raw data said. Have you ever found yourself in that scenario?
[00:15:43] Speaker B: We all have different networks that we rely on, individuals that give us input and feedback. But the answer specifically would be is yes. There was one instance, which I won't go into the complete details here, and it was an important, it was a pretty important business decision. And it was one of these, you know, and this is life. This was a 50, 50. Like, I was right dead in the middle.
And, and, and as I worked through it, there was somebody that, that I had tremendous respect for that, that externally kind of tipped the scale for me in a certain way in that decision. And it ended up being something that I came to realize, you know, I had made the wrong decision.
[00:16:34] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:16:34] Speaker B: And so, and so all ended up being fine. Working out well.
[00:16:39] Speaker A: Right?
[00:16:39] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:16:39] Speaker B: But as I looked back on that, you know, I, I do, I do feel very, I do know very clearly in my mind that I, I, I waited. This other individuals who had the best of intentions, they always do.
[00:16:55] Speaker C: That's always the worst. That's what they always do.
[00:16:57] Speaker B: Intentions.
I made the decision on the basis of who they were and what they liked and what they felt was important, which are all great for them, but that wasn't me. So, yes, absolutely. Fluid, hard. And look, we're all confronted with that, right? That's life. That's life. No one bats a thousand. And it's like how you, how you navigate when you make those, you make those decisions, that that's what's important.
[00:17:21] Speaker A: You know, Tyler, as I listen to what you just said, I think that's the spirit or the fiber behind why our listeners listen to these episodes. You know, when we started this podcast, it was like, all right, how's this going to work? Why are people tuning in? What are they going to get from it? But I think you just really honed in on something that JB and I have not talked about before. It's this general curiosity to pursue what our gut says. And I think people listen to our episodes to learn what people have learned about these things because they have this gut instinct to want to.
To want to pursue curiosity, to pursue learning. So I'm really grateful that you came today to share the worst advice you ever got, because I think it, it really, for me, landed us into a new understanding of why we do the podcast. So, really grateful for your time and sharing your story today.
[00:18:11] Speaker B: Well, Sean, thank you for, for asking me to. And I appreciate having a chance to, to talk and catch up here. And so thank you to you and to JB both.
[00:18:20] Speaker A: You know, jb, I've spent time over the past few years getting to know Tyler, and it. A lot of what I like about Tyler really shines through in today's episode.
[00:18:31] Speaker B: He.
[00:18:31] Speaker A: How consistent he is. There's no big ego, there's no panic. He's just calm with thoughtful leadership.
[00:18:37] Speaker C: Yeah, definitely notice that too. You know, he talks about high pressure deals. Like he's describing a low key weekend project.
[00:18:44] Speaker A: Yeah, right. It's like nothing shakes him. Right. It's like you can, you can tell he's built his career on patience, not just quick hits or quick wins, which.
[00:18:53] Speaker C: Is kind of the opposite of how most people operate now. Like, what can I do now? Now, now, now everyone wants results tomorrow. And he's over here, you know, playing the long game.
[00:19:02] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, yeah. That's what makes it work. He trusts his process, he trusts his team. He surrounds himself with people who think differently, with different vantage points and all that keeps him and everyone else, you know, sharp.
[00:19:12] Speaker C: I like what he said, but, you know, he looks for people who challenge him, you know, not just agree with him. And, you know, that's a, that's a leader move.
[00:19:19] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, it really is. You can tell that mindset filters into everything. How he hires, how he builds, how he invests. You know, it just all commingles.
[00:19:26] Speaker C: I like. He's not trying to sound like a motivational guru either. He's like, look, I'm just doing the work quietly and, you know, hoping for the best results.
[00:19:34] Speaker A: Exactly. Tyler's story is a reminder that leadership doesn't always have to be about being loud and boisterous and powerful. Sometimes calm and clear gets you a lot further.
[00:19:45] Speaker C: Are you saying that I should calm down?
[00:19:48] Speaker A: No.
No. I don't even know what a calm JB Would look like.
Not sure I want to know that. So, just like all of our episodes, it's not the worst advice for everyone, but it can be for some.
[00:19:59] Speaker C: Yes, good point. That is. That is true.
[00:20:01] Speaker A: Yeah. Well, that's it for today. Thanks for listening, everyone. And be sure to tune in next time to another episode of the worst advice I ever got.
