Predicting the Future With Former Gartner Healthcare Analyst

0:05 I’m Eric Chemi and this is Politely Pushy. Welcome to Politely Pushy. I’m your host, Eric Chemi. Today, we’re

0:11 joined by Seth Feder. He’s an analyst and third eye advisor where he focuses on healthcare technology. Seth, thanks

0:18 for joining me today. It’s nice to see you there. It looks like you’re in the doctor’s office right now. Like, what

0:24 are you are you testing out equipment? It looks like a blood pressure machine over there. Looks like a like a heart

0:29 monitor over there. What where are you today? What’s going on? Yeah. So, um I’m not just like thinking

0:36 and writing about healthcare. I’m actually living the life. So, I’m helping an Indian tribe in northern New

0:41 Mexico set up a medical center. So, we got a blood pressure, an EKG machine,

0:48 uh to set up a medical network for them, installing computers,

0:53 doing all that kind of stuff. So, how does being an analyst help you do that job? Because that feels like much

1:00 more of a CIO kind of a job as opposed to, let’s say, someone who would be an analyst,

1:05 right? Yeah. So, I think it’s it keeps me grounded to like stay connected to

1:10 like what’s really happening with patients and with insurance companies, you know, here on the ground.

1:17 um it’s not as theoretical. You know, when I speak with people as an analyst,

1:23 it could be things can be kind of lofty and abstracted from what’s happening on

1:29 the ground. So, it’s kind of fun to do both of those things at the same time. I feel like I’m staying in touch with

1:35 what’s the reality today of delivering healthcare, at least in the United States.

1:40 What is the reality? Because everybody says it’s bad. Everyone says it’s bad in America, right? So, we got to change

1:46 this. we got to change that. It’s no good. We got to look at another country’s model. But then a lot of

1:51 people say, “Well, those count’s models are worse.” So, so being on the inside, having done so much of this, how do you

1:57 frame the American medical system? Oh my gosh, what a big question. Um, you

2:04 know, it’s it’s still a this terrible mess of blended like who’s paying for

2:10 care. So we still have people mostly getting care through their employer and

2:15 then the rest of it is a a mashup of state funded you know Medicaid and

2:20 government you federal government Medicare and it’s so confusing for people because

2:27 who you see in this country all depends on what insurance plan you have instead

2:34 of who’s the best doctor I can find in my area to treat my condition which you

2:40 I think that would be the ideal. Um it starts with who’s in my network and then

2:48 filtering down who’s still seeing patients, you know, and so we have

2:53 people traveling very far distances to see and get care. And I think it’s

3:00 really a shame. Yeah, that’s a good point. We when you put it that way, you remind me that I

3:05 have forgotten that’s how we think about it, right? It’s like, oh, who’s in my network? That’s the number one question,

3:10 not who’s the right person for this. Yeah, that’s right. Um, and I wish it

3:16 was the it should be flipped around. Uh, let me start with uh, you know, asking

3:21 my friends and family and, you know, what doctor do you recommend? And then it would be great if you could just go

3:26 see that person. Yeah. Yeah. That doesn’t that doesn’t work like that. Um, obviously what one

3:32 of your big jobs in the past, big brand name jobs, you were a healthcare analyst at Gartner, right? A lot of people still

3:38 obsess about how do I, you know, get covered in Gartner? How do I get their attention?

3:44 How do I get in front of them? How do I how do I have an AR program that is going to yield big results with with

3:51 companies like that? The Gartners, the Foresters, IDC’s. So, what do you wish every vendor would know before they ever

3:58 booked a briefing with you? I’d say number one is the the analysts

4:05 really appreciate hearing from vendors. Don’t be afraid to call them up. And you

4:12 know that I think maybe the secret is you don’t even have to have

4:17 an account with these analyst firms to speak with the analysts because they’re always looking for information on latest

4:24 trends and new technology that’s coming out. So, think of it as um it’s a two-way

4:31 street. I think a um leads me on my next thought is vendors think that it’s all one way. Like I just have to spill my

4:38 guts to this analyst and try to convince them of a point of view when really it

4:44 should be a information sharing event. You know, it’s like you’re you’re

4:49 you’re getting feedback, you’re providing information and your thoughts.

4:54 So I think analysts appreciate conversations not you know being presented to

5:02 how much of it is myth versus reality in terms of you know paytoplay right a lot

5:07 of the smaller companies we deal with think hey we don’t have a big enough budget that we’re going to matter. They

5:13 only want to talk to the big clients and we’re never going to be big enough in at least our current series A B C D raising

5:21 cycle. So why do we even bother? Where are we going to get anything out of this?

5:27 Yeah, I think the uh again I’d point to the fact that the

5:32 analysts, they want to know what’s coming down the road. And

5:38 end users often don’t know. End users are great for telling you what their problems are and unmet needs, but it’s

5:46 the the startup smaller companies like those with like you know under a hundred million in revenue um are the ones who

5:54 are moving fast the fastest and are being innovative and can help guide

6:03 analyst on where the technology is going next. How do you evaluate claims? because it’s

6:09 an interesting role that you have right now where you’re getting to evaluate claims in real life. Hey, this system works or it doesn’t work right here

6:15 working, you know, where you are trying to build up this medical center. As an analyst, how did you figure out

6:21 what they’re saying is true or not? I mean, you don’t get the opportunity like you do now, like you didn’t have that opportunity then. Hey, I’m going to go

6:27 see this piece of equipment. I’m going to go install it. Let me see what happens here. What was that like when you got a sense of I I hear what they’re

6:34 saying, but I don’t really know. Yeah. the the strongest evidence is

6:40 talking to a customer. So, give me a reference. Um, it’s okay if it’s if it’s

6:46 just your best customer or it’s only one person. It’s okay because it’s a data

6:53 point and it’s a third party. We can double check things. uh the analyst

6:59 can have a conversation with an end user and like you know like if you provide like that kind of reference it’s super

7:06 helpful you know when when companies like Gartner do a

7:12 uh you know when when they’re going to publish a formal document then they have to go through

7:19 data gathering they have to send out surveys for magic quadrant and they have to hit a certain number to be

7:26 statistically significant or to have, you know, great confidence in the numbers.

7:32 But typically, you know, that that’s magic quadrant. That’s one thing. But if

7:38 if your goal as a technology provider is uh you’re trying to influence

7:45 analysts um you know, not in a nefarious way, but hey, I’m just letting you know about

7:51 this new technology or a new result that we’ve had. a single data point is okay

7:56 because I think it provokes interest and gives um yeah the analysts they’re human beings they’re

8:03 um they’re looking for new ideas they want to write new research so giving

8:09 them even a single data point is is interesting

8:14 you mentioned magic quadrant right we got that hype cycle market guide like all these different things people could

8:20 be in what should a startup company let’s again like you mentioned that 100 million or smaller type of company. What

8:27 should they realistically be aiming for first? I think um just getting a mention. Um so

8:36 like magic quadrant, forget that. That’s not where you should be. Don’t even think about it.

8:42 Forget it. That’s for magic quadrants in my experience are for mature markets. You know, it’s for like database systems

8:49 or something. It’s kind of boring. Um, these are super big companies. You know,

8:54 sure, it’d be great to be in the upper right if you’re a small company, but it’s not going to happen in a in a

9:00 fastmoving technology like AI. Like I think I just saw Gartner came up with a new

9:08 definition for magic quadrant. I think they’re calling it um what is it? It’s like coming soon. It’s

9:15 not coming soon. It’s like um I can’t remember what what they’re calling it these days. Uh I’ll think of it in a

9:24 second, but so anyway, I think as a small company, you like the the nice

9:29 thing to be included would be a cool vendor and analysts like to write these reports. They’re short. They come out

9:36 more frequently and they like to list companies they think have done something cool or innovative. Um and that’s a good

9:43 target to shoot for. And the other one is like for a market guide uh to even get a mention, you

9:51 know, like to have your name published. You don’t have to be the focus of a market guide, but just getting your name

9:57 in the it it so you show up in searches, you know, when customers are looking for you. Um, so I think those that’s a more

10:05 reasonable expectation. Was there ever a time that a vendor

10:13 could change your mind in a single meeting? Like, was there something that they could do that you maybe you thought

10:18 something and at the end of the meeting you thought, “Okay, they’ve convinced me.” Uh, sure. I might keep an open mind. Um,

10:28 I think that, um, if you, if a company’s going to show me, um, a brand new

10:36 platform that we’ve never seen before and they’re making claims that

10:42 uh, they’re converting customers with this new paradigm shift, like, you’re

10:47 not going to believe that. That’s going to sound like um they’re overdoing it.

10:54 But I think um I’m trying to think of if there was ever a situation where that happened where like a single phone call

11:01 um I think if they show if they show you a slide or some data like hey we’ve

11:08 we’ve collected some results and we’re showing you the numbers that’s always convincing

11:16 you know more so than some anecdotal story about a customer.

11:22 So I think that so showing evidence because like analysts are typically

11:27 um numbers driven people you know logical looking for supporting evidence.

11:33 So if you can show like a survey that you did or something like that.

11:39 What’s the difference now let’s say working at third eye right not as big as gigantic of a gardener. Do

11:46 companies have more of an opportunity to to get get their message understood to

11:52 get something, you know, processed because okay, it’s a smaller boutique kind of a firm that that’s just has more

11:58 maybe willingness to not be as bureaucratic, for example. Hm.

12:04 Yeah. I think the the advantage of working with someone like Third Eye like we have more time so we can uh spend

12:13 time reading and researching uh about your company.

12:19 We can even call clients or customers of yours up. We can

12:24 spend time writing reports um and really concentrating just on you.

12:29 Um where at some like a big firm like Gartner like you don’t have that much

12:35 time to do that kind of thing. You have to keep things much more high level. You have to move fast. You’re uh typically

12:42 not focused on a single company but you’re focused on industries or segments.

12:48 So it’s hard to get very specific I think about a single company you know other than like anecdotally mentioning

12:55 one feature one result. So I think that’s that’s the main benefit of working with a smaller company

13:03 and you’ve gone back and forth right so you before worked at garden before working at Gartner you were director of

13:08 information management and technology at the uh medical school at UT Austin right the Dell medical school so you’re in a

13:16 position of having to you know have a penel have a budget what are we going to

13:22 you know what are we going to buy what are we going to decide on right so so you’re probably using analyst reports

13:27 maybe to help you do that and then you become for sure. Yeah. A gardener client. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. So, you’ve gone back and forth on both ways. That’s a

13:34 rare thing, right? A lot of people it’s like they’ve only been analysts. They’ve never been a customer or a vendor or or

13:40 a buyer or anything like that. So, what difference in let’s say values and and

13:47 ways that you think about this come to your jobs because you’ve been able to do different kinds of jobs across that

13:53 ecosystem? Yeah, I think um in my role now um well

14:00 where I’m sitting today um I’m back in the position of having to go

14:05 acquire technology. So when I I do my own little research so um like we were

14:13 or I’m investigating licensing for desktop applications, let’s put it that way. So, um, without

14:21 naming the company, um, so there’s a couple different options, believe it or not. Uh, so I, as an analyst, I put on

14:30 my hat like, okay, what are the main, what features am I looking for? What do my end users need? And then I can go do

14:37 some research and start ranking what the vendors provide. So, I kind of do like a little mini, you know, matrix for

14:44 myself. Um, and then when I call these vendors up, I can get right to the

14:51 point, uh, and ask them directly, um, I try to help them by just giving

14:57 them, here’s my criteria. Can you just answer these questions? Let’s avoid the dog and pony show.

15:04 Um, and would they listen or they’d still give you the dog and pony show? They always try like, let’s start from

15:10 the beginning. Here’s our story of our company from the very beginning. like no don’t show me that slide.

15:17 I don’t need to know like your entire corporate history. Um you know down the

15:24 line I think once you like first let’s get interested in the in the service or the product then we can get more

15:30 confidence in the company before we sign a contract. That’s how I like to operate.

15:38 So I’m not sure if that answered your question or not. No but I love the stories. I I just love because you you’ve been in so many

15:44 roles. So, I appreciate hearing the stories. I think that’s what especially I know the audience always says, “Let’s hear more stories, right? Let’s hear

15:50 like just those behind the scenes things that we don’t get access to, right? The

15:56 the hits and misses and the big fails that you wish somebody hadn’t done or or

16:01 things that people could learn from, right? Let’s say there’s a there’s a CEO and they want to know. Let’s say they

16:06 brought you in and say, “Hey, Seth, you’re in charge of our AR strategy now,” right? They’re let’s say some health tech startup, right? “We want to be big.

16:13 We want to get all this attention.” What would you do based on all the stuff that you’ve seen go right and go wrong?

16:22 Well, yeah, it’s all it’d be very dependent on the company, you know, and the market.

16:28 Um, but you know, without giving away too much free advice,

16:34 I’d say um, your messaging really needs to,

16:43 um, hit home to your enduser markets. You really have to know the segment you’re targeting.

16:50 What is their pain point? And let’s just speak to that. uh don’t talk to the

16:55 industry buzzwords, you know, like you’re not battling or doing battle um

17:01 directly against competitors. Yeah, that’s in your mind, but let’s focus on

17:07 what are we providing for the our client, our customer,

17:12 you know, and like that’s uh you know, when I was at Gartner, we I

17:18 have, you know, very specific tools that we I used to talk about with how to analyze and prepare your thinking

17:27 and your marketing campaigns and your AR about um how to speak to those message

17:34 to the market. Um, so we we don’t have time for that today, but I’d say like

17:39 focus on the customer um, and telling the industry what you’re doing for them. That makes a big

17:46 difference.

17:53 It feels to me that a lot of our clients, let’s say they come to us, they

17:58 say, “We want PR, you know, we want media relations, right? We want to get our story out there. The analyst

18:04 relations as part of that, right? As as part of the influencers that that are

18:09 similar to journalists with their reports, their writing, their stories in a way, their audience that they can

18:15 influence. Like your role as an analyst is an influencer. And it feels like sometimes they’re treating the two

18:22 groups with the same strategy, with the same approach. But oftentimes you need a very different approach, right? because

18:28 of what keeps a journalist employed might be very different from what keeps an analyst employed, right? The more you

18:34 can give them wins, right? Because I always say, look, journalists are trying to not lose their jobs, right? It’s it’s shrinking news rooms. They’re getting

18:41 measured on clicks and engagement and Twitter followers and those kinds of things. So, the more we can give them

18:47 success in those metrics, the more they’re going to come back to us. Analyst has a very different set of metrics that they care. They want a very

18:54 different set of material. Yeah, it’s interesting you brought that up because I think analysts get you

19:01 can get pulled into becoming a a journalist as an analyst and some you have to be careful like I’m not

19:08 reporting the news because sometimes you as you’re writing these uh market reports for your clients that sometimes

19:15 you feel like a journalist you have to stop and say okay I’m not here to report the news because that’s

19:24 sort of the past. The job of the analyst is to sort of predict the future by setting

19:30 up some kind of framework or paradigm that you’re trying to establish with your readers and your

19:38 clients. Um, so that they can visualize like where the market is and where it’s

19:43 headed based on this framework that you paint for them. Um, and really good analysts

19:51 kind of create a framework that they write about for years. Um

19:56 uh like for example at the at Gartner they had a a like hospital of the future

20:03 uh not quite sure that’s the title of it but they had that kind of paradigm where they were talking about like the real

20:09 time hospital that was instrumented and connected. Um this is before the sort of

20:16 the explosion of AI they were talking about

20:21 this um but like setting that up it it allowed them to explain the future and

20:27 kind of and paint a picture and then as vendors kind of came in to the market

20:32 they could place them in different categories within that paradigm.

20:38 So as uh so I would say if I was talking to you know a tech company or a service

20:44 provider uh explaining how you

20:49 fit into that paradigm is helpful because it helps well helps the analyst

20:56 think about you. Um so you should become familiar with that you know that platform or that paradigm the way

21:02 they’re writing about it. Um, like I said again, you know, analysts

21:08 are humans. They’re busy. They don’t have a lot of time to study your particular technologies. So, if you explain it to them in their terms, they

21:14 get it right away. And, uh, as long as you’re comfortable with how they’re going to frame you and stick you into

21:20 one of their categories, I think that’s a kind of a win-win.

21:26 You just mentioned sticking to one of those categories. I think about it from a journalist point of view as I talk to companies, you know, once

21:31 you get put into a bucket, you kind of always stay in that bucket. So, you want to get put in the correct bucket and you

21:37 want to help define that bucket appropriately that you’re, let’s say, punching upward instead of downward

21:43 because if you’re in a bucket with people all smaller than you, that can be bad and then you get stuck and and it’s

21:49 like those first impression kinds of things, right? Once you’re in that bucket, you never get out. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think you should be

21:54 prepared if you’re um getting on a call with an analyst

22:00 the you should be prepared if for the question analyst is going to ask like how should I think of you like what is

22:05 your product where where do you fit like they’re gonna I actually we I work with

22:11 an analyst that was usually his first question out of the gate um because you can’t expect them to have done the

22:17 homework so you should be prepared to answer that question and if

22:23 If it’s in none of the above, then that’s cool, but you’re going to have a lot more explaining to do, a lot more

22:30 education. Um, so yeah, I think the I guess there is a

22:37 danger of getting categorized and you’re sort of stuck there, but I think the the

22:43 benefit is which is pretty I think outweighs the risk is that it helps get

22:49 your message quicker across to the market through the analysts. I also like that you said a lot of

22:55 analysts become stuck and behave like journalists. they’re writing about news of the day as opposed to other things.

23:01 But you said it in a way like like there was a bad things. I know there’s a lot of a lot of journalists who become

23:06 analysts or vice versa. But but I wonder if because your perspective has been much more of the the CIO kind of person,

23:13 right? You’ve been either an analyst or the actual buyer but never an analyst and a journalist. So so your perspective

23:19 on it’s a little bit different in that ven diagram. You’re like, “No, you you don’t want to be an analyst who’s acting like a journalist.” Tell me tell me more

23:26 about that because it’s it’s it’s not been let’s say your experience. Yeah, it’s interesting. the like I said

23:33 the uh well analysts they get measured

23:39 by their readership you know clicks and downloads and things like that and also

23:44 the demand of their clients who want to speak with them

23:49 and simply reporting the news or what the past isn’t that interesting to you know

23:58 especially what I spoke a lot with CIOS

24:03 And at the same I think half half of my clients were CIOS and half were

24:08 were product market managers or chief uh product officers at tech companies for

24:14 healthcare. Um and both were mostly interested in

24:21 where is the market going um CIOS were mostly interested in okay here’s a

24:27 category uh here’s a problem we have we think that to solve it’s this category of technology who are the leaders in

24:34 that group who should we know about and where is that market going

24:41 so simply um talking about the past

24:46 didn’t really answer that question other than they may want to know like who’s

24:51 the most frequently purchased product in this category. That’s sort of newsy. You

24:56 know, they have certain percentage of the market, but they want to know why. Okay, that’s

25:04 fine. But can you why are people choosing them? So, you have to go a little bit deeper as an analyst to to

25:10 answer that question. Um,

25:16 let me just think about your original question if we’re if we’re on target. So

25:22 I’d say the for CIOS I think it’s most important um

25:29 as a journal you know if they’re reading an industry newsletter they can read about oh this

25:37 this hospital for in healthcare you know this hospital adopted this medical record system. Well, that kind of tells

25:43 you, you can kind of see those kind of trends, but like you know, why specifically is that happening and how

25:49 how is the competition reacting to that? That’s where the analysts come in.

25:56 Yeah, because I I know quite a few who’ve done the journalist analyst combo and they treat it similarly, right? Hey,

26:02 let me get my influencing out there. Let me get, you know, more speaking gigs. Let me get much more engagement. I want

26:07 a big Twitter following. I I want a personal brand as an analyst. I I feel like just from my background, the

26:13 journalists I know who’ve done that, that’s their that’s their MO, but they’ve never actually had a P&L like

26:18 you like you’ve they’ve never had to actually get these things installed. They’ve never actually worked with

26:25 leadership and management and employees. And so their their background is different. Their experience is different getting there. So I appreciate someone

26:30 who’s had let’s say a real world, right? You’ve actually had to get those nuts and bolts to actually work.

26:37 Yeah. you know the um I think the hardest part about a technology leader is explaining technology to your company

26:45 to your in internal um customers. So that could be like your medical staff for example,

26:51 right? If you’re working at a medical provider, the medical staff, they’re not buying the it. They just have to use it.

26:57 And in way you’re in a way forcing it on them. I bought it. You have to use it. Exactly. Right. Yeah. Try explaining to

27:05 a physician, which I had to do recently, why you have to enable two-step verification for your sign on.

27:12 Like that sounds like a pain. I don’t want to do it. Yeah. And like, okay, this is super important for cyber security reasons. Um

27:18 but like to them it’s like this is just another pain in my neck for slowing me down and um so uh

27:28 and like this is a lesson too not only for um for the end users but for the

27:35 management of the company you know like the CEO and the CFO have to understand

27:41 how technology works at a from a high level. So you know whiteboarding with

27:47 that group is super helpful so they can understand you know we had uh for

27:53 example like where I’m sitting now this organization we had a cyber security incident where the uh you know this is a

28:02 it’s an Indian tribe so it’s a sovereign nation there’s a governor and a lieutenant governor you know they have a

28:07 whole governance here so the governor’s email got hacked and someone was sending out email in his name under his account

28:14 asking people to click on this link to sign a document inside Excel.

28:20 So like that’s a weird email they get. But uh so uh obviously the governor

28:26 doesn’t want that to happen again. So I had to explain and show him we do a little whiteboarding of how two-step

28:33 verification can prevent this in the future. Um we

28:38 don’t know if his account was compromised. So it’s anyway it’s the job of the CIOS to explain technology and

28:46 and uh uh corral their users. Um

28:52 not you know I don’t think like vendors make the mistake they think that CIOS are always the decision makers and that

28:59 they’re they’re the buyer and uh I don’t think that’s really true like they’re

29:04 they’re educators they’re conveners uh Dr. Hamama uh at Harvard Medical School

29:11 talks about being the the convenor and chief is what the CIO does. Well, who is the buyer then? If it’s not

29:17 the CIO, is it is it some other leadership? Is it some procurement person? Finance, who is the one that’s

29:24 making that purchasing decision? The answer is yes. So that um it’s

29:29 everyone. So the uh the main one is like the the departmental user.

29:36 Usually decisions are for a purchase originate out of like a a business unit

29:42 or a department and it’s bubbled up to the CIO like hey we have this problem

29:47 and usually they do some research on their own. They go and do Google search and probably today they’re going to ChatGPT

29:54 and asking for advice you know and they come they come knocking on the door and like hey we researched we found a

30:01 couple of companies which one do you recommend? So that’s um that’s why when I was at

30:07 Gartner when I was speaking to tech companies my big advice was you don’t target CIOS

30:14 you’re targeting the end user unless you’re selling some IT some data center

30:20 specific product you know but even then though you’re targeting the networking manager or the

30:27 storage data storage director you know someone like that go more into that because I’m curious

30:32 from your perspective as an analyst then now knowing who the real purchasing you

30:37 know who the real purchasing decision making leader is depending on these different

30:43 products as an analyst did you feel a responsibility to reach a certain kind

30:49 of reader reach a certain kind of audience even if that person wasn’t necessarily the client that you worked

30:55 with at that company but maybe it’s someone else in the company that isn’t reading the research but is fundamentally the actual

31:02 buyer if that makes sense to the decision. Sure. Yeah. One lesson we learned is the the

31:08 CIO may not be the uh the key decision maker. Well, they

31:14 are decision maker, but in the early parts of the process, they’re not. Um

31:20 but they can veto a purchase. So what happens a lot of times is the the

31:25 purchase process um begins and then very late in the process the CI CIO says no

31:33 we’re not we we don’t buy stuff like that. So that that’s a risk. So, um,

31:39 you’re targeting the end user department buyer, but along the way, you need to, if

31:45 they’re not engaging the CIO early, you need to help them engage the CIO to at least avoid that terrible outcome. If

31:53 you go all the way through the whole purchase over many months and then end up getting vetoed, like that’s the worst

31:59 possible outcome for you. So, you need to help help your buyer be a good buyer.

32:05 In other words, don’t assume that they have a perfect process where they’re including it, you

32:12 know, and they’re looking at security and everything. You need to make sure they’re doing all that. So, it’s a lot, you know, a lot of a lot of

32:18 responsibility for sales to do that.

32:24 As you think about your different roles, is there a role that you you wish you

32:30 had but you haven’t had yet? Because you’ve done so many things, right? You’ve worked for right a medical

32:35 school. You’re with this Indian nation. You’ve been Gartner. You you have your own business. You worked for Dell the

32:41 company itself. You’ve done a lot of different things. Is there a role out there that you think, okay, I haven’t my

32:47 my education isn’t complete until I do some other piece of the puzzle?

32:52 Yeah, Eric, I want to be I actually want to be a certified bicycle mechanic. I think that’d be pretty cool.

32:57 Is that for real? Yeah. So, I’m a um I’m a big road biker

33:03 and now mountain biker since we’ve relocated here uh to the Mountain West.

33:08 Um I’ve always worked on my own bikes. So, I thought it’d be cool to work in a bike shop.

33:16 Is there really a certified bike mechanic? Is there a certification for that or can anyone Oh, yeah, there is. There’s professional

33:22 groups and training and um yeah, you can go through the whole as far as I haven’t

33:28 researched it extensively, but there’s courses you can go take and become a certified bike mechanic.

33:35 I mean, it’s a little bit like, you know, you’re being healthy, you’re on the bike, and it’s technology in terms of engineering. So, it’s a little bit

33:41 like your your health technology work that you’ve done. Yeah. Um, you know, everything now is

33:48 electronic computer software and bikes are no different. You know, now there’s

33:53 electronic shifting and um, you know, it’s I think gone of the days where

34:00 everything is purely mechanical. Well, how expensive are these bikes you’re talking about? Because my bicycle

34:05 has nothing electronic on it. Yeah. You know, these high-end like the

34:11 bikes you see at the Tour de France, they’re probably $15,000 a pop.

34:16 15. I I heard bikes definitely could be more than 10. So, that that makes sense. Oh, yeah. Um, you know, the the

34:24 electronic shifting, there’s computers that tell you the the power input into

34:30 the pedals, like the wattage, all that stuff is instrumented now.

34:36 Does the rider, if I watch the Tour de France, does the rider have that information while he’s draw while he’s riding or is that going to the team?

34:43 Oh, yeah. No, they they have a little screen right in front of them shows them how many watts they’re putting out. And

34:49 so those guys are, you know, they’re at the high end of the athlete performance.

34:55 So, like they’re watching their heart rate and their wattage. They’re not not really concerned with speed. They’re

35:01 just like watching. They’re looking at themselves as an engine and like how much power can I output and you know

35:07 over time and keep this going. What do you mean they’re not watching their speed? Why why would they watch I

35:13 get heart rate? I get why does the watts matter more than the speed? Yeah, because like you know you’re

35:18 climbing up a hill and like you may not be going all that fast, but you know how much wattage you’re putting out and you

35:25 know how how high your heart is and you can only go so high. So you’re targeting

35:31 an output that you can maintain over time that that’s your maximum speed.

35:37 Oh, I see. so the wattage the way the the speed is a function of things like slope and

35:43 wind and and other things, but all they can control is their wattage output. That’s right. Yeah.

35:50 I never thought about that. Yeah, very technical. The whole sport has become super technical. They’re going to need someone like you.

35:56 You’re gonna have to go back to Gartner and be the bike technology guy. Yeah, I would love to do that. Yeah. And just

36:03 write about the bike designs. Then you get free bikes for what’s the deal? Do you guys would you guys get

36:08 free stuff? Like how does that work in a in an analyst situation? Oh yeah. Well, you know, not at Gartner.

36:15 They had very strict neutrality policy and there was no gift giving or you know

36:21 um you know I think they had a separate group that did performance testing but

36:28 the analysts typically or definitely um you know there’s pay-to-play is um

36:37 I don’t know how to say it. It’s like it’s the the worst thing you could be

36:43 thought of as doing as an analyst at at company like Gartner. You know, you’re you’re neutral. You’re

36:50 in the best interests of the industry that you’re serving. So

36:56 you you know, no favorites, nothing like that. That’s got to be hard to do though,

37:01 right? Because everyone’s got their their biases of like who they think is better in the sense like I think this

37:07 company’s software is better. think this leadership is better. I think this management is better. Right. You’ve got

37:12 those things in your head certainly that that are still part of neutrality, but they’re your informed opinion based on

37:19 your analysis. Yeah. Yeah. Right. And just think about like if you’ve written a market report

37:26 and you’ve written and you’ve called out like leaders and people to watch or companies to watch, uh you’ve taken a

37:33 position. So you have to be I don’t know intellectually honest at the next go around

37:40 when you’re refreshing that report. You know if you were wrong or the market took a turn you have to you know I think

37:49 keep that best interest in mind. You have to be honest and say um the market took a turn and in the prior report we

37:58 said this but things didn’t turn out that way. Um, so be careful not to

38:04 take a position and defend it. You know, if I were if I were coaching a new analyst, that’s what I would tell. Like

38:10 your job is not to defend your thinking. Um, always be open to

38:18 the information you’re getting from the market. I like that. That’s good advice for me, too. Probably helpful at home. Your job

38:25 is not to defend your thinking. Right. Right. If it’s wrong, just say, “Okay,

38:30 we were wrong or this is different now.” Yeah. It’s hard to do. I keep saying as

38:36 human being, you know, we all um we want to be right. So, we feel we get defensive sometimes.

38:44 Um but if you’re yeah, you have a foundational belief or in ethics that

38:50 you are you’re honest and you’re open to new information. Um that’s a helpful way

38:55 of thinking of things. Yeah. Seth, I love it. Thank you for the time today. It’s been interesting to

39:00 hear about your experience and your roles and what you’ve done, what companies can do in order to, you know,

39:06 get get a little bit better coverage or think about how they can work in more of a win-win situation with analysts. So,

39:12 Seth, I appreciate the time. I appreciate the the good work you’re doing out there helping set up hopefully better medical care in this country and

39:19 and uh as you said, it’s it’s it’s a problem, right? And hopefully we can uh

39:25 one by one get to some better outcomes. May maybe in our grandkids generation it’ll be better by that. Yeah. Well, thank you. I appreciate it

39:32 giving me the time. I’ll tell you that one my parting thought is the good thing about healthcare. It attracts people who

39:39 are just kind of passionate about it. It’s not it’s it’s a great profession. The whole industry is is populated by

39:45 people with the best intentions I think. So that’s the good news. Everyone seems to always be striving for better. So

39:53 that’s my optimistic thought. That’s a good point. That’s a good point. I appreciate that Seth. Thank you so much. This has been great.

39:59 Thanks, Eric. Thank you to my guest and thanks for listening. Subscribe to get the latest

40:05 episodes each week and we’ll see you next time.