Delve Talks: QuHarrison Terry, Mark Cuban Companies

Transcription

Intro [00:00:01] You're listening to Delve Talks, a podcast that digs into the challenges around design, product development, leadership and innovation, your hosts are Dave Franchino and Stefanie Norvaisas. Dave is the President and Stephanie is Vice President of strategy at Delve, a design and innovation consultancy.

Dave Franchino [00:00:28] Well, welcome. Hello, everybody. Dave Franchino here and I'm joined by my co-host, Stef Norvaisas, Delve's vice president of strategy. If you know me in the past, my background is in engineering. Stef's background is the social sciences and cultural anthropology. So, we'll be tag teaming today with questions from different perspectives.

[00:00:46] And I am really thrilled and honored to welcome to QuHarrison Terry. He's growth marketer for Mark Cuban Enterprises. He's working in Dallas for one of the most famous venture capitalists in our time today. Beyond that, he is a very respected marketer, a future thinker, and he founded the Inevitable /Human community that brought together professionals who are interested in future trends in technology. He may not remember this, but I first met you more than five years ago when he was still a computer science student at UW Madison and he launched a company that was utilizing blockchain technology and issuing cryptographic circuits or certificates of authenticity to protect intellectual property of people who wanted to buy digital art pieces, one of a kind, digital art pieces. And it's really a testimony to Qu's foresight and maybe my ignorance that I remember thinking at the time what does blockchain have to do with art and who would pay for something digital? And considering that a digital art piece sold a couple of weeks ago for sixty-nine million dollars, it's just a continued authentication of how far ahead of his time ...

QuHarrison Terry [00:01:50] You got this one thing there. It wasn't just a digital art piece that sold. It was a Wisconsin artist.

Dave Franchino [00:01:56] That's right.

QuHarrison Terry [00:01:57] There we go. There we go. We got to rep the hometown.

Dave Franchino [00:02:03] Not surprising, Qu is one of the top voices the technology for the last four years. So really pleased to welcome him. As a reminder, our podcast focuses on creating a culture of innovation. And we've got conversations with a wide variety of people trying to glean insights into their experiences and what might be applied to any field. This year, not surprisingly, we're focused on creating a culture of innovation in the new normal, whatever that means. So welcome, Qu Very pleased to have you join us.

QuHarrison Terry [00:02:30] Yeah. What's up? I'm excited, Dave. It's been too long. And Stephanie, it's so amazing. Welcome to Delve. The last time we talked it was Design Concepts and they did this rebranding and now I'm here. So how do I say it right?

Dave Franchino [00:02:46] Delve is correct.

QuHarrison Terry [00:02:48] Cool. It's great to meet everyone and thank you for having me.

Dave Franchino [00:02:52] So I know this, but you've got such a fascinating background. You've been an entrepreneur since high school. Maybe our listeners, you could start by kind of briefly talking about your professional journey.

QuHarrison Terry [00:03:03] Well, it was not linear, I can tell you that much, it was all over the place. But the one thing that has been true is if you go back 10 years and you look at it and you say, well, what is the kid done? The input has always been the same. I've always been creating I've always been kind of doing the same things, ideating, and showing up with ideas and trying things. Some things worked out. Some things didn't. You go all the way back to high school; I think my first true venture was a T-shirt company that made these Kool-Aid themed inspired shirts. And that was cool at the time in high school, ended up selling out, and not understanding kind of the business, logistics and heuristics, right? When you when you say, like, you know, run a business it's one thing to sell a product, but then knowing how to retain inventory, how to think about research and development, and producing in the next round and all those things, those lessons I learned early because I got them wrong in the early days, but turned that over into many other enterprises. We had the agency that was acquired I think late last year, early this year, and that was fine.

[00:04:06] And so there's a lot of things that I've done, and I've learned a lot since then. But the one input that's remained true and constant is I've always been a creator and I've always been looking at emerging trends, technologies and things that are forthcoming and saying what is the intersection between this and something that I know a lot about? Or I might have a close connection to someone that is truly an industry expert. And that brings me to today, I guess, for the people that are very new to the story. Started out did like some clothing stuff in my early, early years, like high school or early college, got to college, decided to get a job, realized that working for fifteen dollars an hour wasn't going to cut it. And so, I said, hey, I got to pay for college. Fifteen dollars isn't going to get me to this forty thousand dollar bill. So, I ended up starting an ad agency with a few buddies at college. I think, Dave, you might have seen one of those campaigns where I used to put the Power Ranger suits on and do all that crazy stuff, but we did a lot of guerilla marketing. That was fun. From there, we did do a blockchain company that was our first venture-backed startup and that was fun. I learned a lot of lessons on what it meant to raise money, how to grow and manage a team, how to think about company culture, how to grow. Got a chance to then evolve from there and join the team over at Redox as their first marketer and built the Redox team to what it is today. And that's an incredible brand that I got to work on. And by way of Redox, when I finished up there, I ended up getting a chance to work alongside Mark Cuban. So that's the quick, you know, five minute version of my story. Happy to talk about any points. But all in all, it's like what I was doing 10 years ago is the same thing I'm doing today.

Dave Franchino [00:05:50] So we know for the last couple of years, you've been working as a growth marketer for Mark Cuban, I'm wondering what you're able to tell us about the work you do.

QuHarrison Terry [00:05:59] Well, it's simple, you know, Mark has a lot of ideas, a lot of entities that he likes to invest in and just ideate on, and when Mark has an idea, he hits me up and says, hey, what do you think about this? Or can we explore this, or can we look further into this or how could this company grow? And so, nine times out of ten, whether it be, you know, one of the Shark Tank companies that we're working that I'm working with, or it'd be a good idea that Mark is just kind of exploring behind the scenes or if it's something, you know, stealth or we haven't really invested in publicly yet. But we're still trying to put the pieces together. I'm kind of one of the go-to people to that puts that together and spends it up and turns it into reality.

Dave Franchino [00:06:43] So one of the things we wanted to focus this season of the podcast on is navigating towards the new normal. I know that's really cliched phrase, but one of the things that we listen to is a podcast you were on last May, which would have been a very different time. And at that point in time, you talked about the pandemic as a Black Swan event. I think you said something about it making your previous thinking kind of questionable. Tell us a little bit about that, what your mindset was as the pandemic unfolded. How did change kind of the way you approached work?

QuHarrison Terry [00:07:17] It changed everything, I think it did a complete reset, everything that I knew, everything that I knew that was true prior to January 2020 was no longer true. And that's took some long, thoughtful time just to myself, trying to reiterate and realign with kind of my own purpose, basically, you know, what am I doing? Why am I doing it? And that alignment, I think I just needed time. And I mean, it was also a very it was very it was a horrible time. I mean, we're thank God we're still alive right now. But, you know, a lot of people, unfortunately, weren't able to make it even to this moment. And we all felt that. We all had families or friends or friends or friends, the friends of the family, all of that. We saw some of the calamities that ensued. And I don't think we're done processing just that alone.

[00:08:08] And so, I mean, obviously, the first point is remote work is now here to here to stay on the future thinking side. I definitely have some thoughts there. What changed is we're all at home. We're all connected or just, I mean, this whole concept of what is an essential employee kind of unfolded, right? And so now we have essential workers, nonessential workers, which is crazy by way of like the world and society and just kind of the things that we have. But thinking about the world and those two buckets really did make me go back and say, OK, all of these things that I might have thought of being true, I never thought about it from this whole concept of "is this essential work?" Is this an essential gathering? Is this like non-essential? Are these people vaccinated? Is this something that's worth the risk? And that’s what I meant when I said those words a year ago. But I'm happy to go down that path because there's a ton there to unfold.

Stefanie Norvaisas [00:09:07] I'd like to know just a little bit more about ... So, you had this event, many of us did, where it's sort of like when you're on a speeding car and all of a sudden it stops and you're like, wait a minute, where am I? And you're sort of readjusting now that you've had sort of a year to reflect on it. Is there anything you would have done differently before the pandemic in terms of your futures work and your predictions and where you were spending your time?

QuHarrison Terry [00:09:40] Yeah, I think I would have cared a little less about it. You know, I think the in-person moments that we have with our friends, our family, our loved ones, those moments matter and they mean something. And I think after 2020, you know, that definitely takes a new precedent in my life, my daily life. And I think that there are some interactions that I'll just never be able to get back by way of me being obsessed with some of my future thinking. Because does that mean I wouldn't be a strong contender or have solid ideas to compete with? No, it just means that like, you know, prioritizing the people that are in our lives and disconnecting is one of those things that it's hard to do when you're caught up in the metaverse. So, you caught up on what's next and you're caught up in all the cycles that just exist within our digital entrees, right? I look at it as like every device we have is a new meal that our minds get to consume and just process. And, you know, I've got four or five screens in front of me just to do this call. And a lot of my time has been on these screens. It had been prior to 2020 with the people that I love. And you take that away and there's just no possibility to do it or there's a big risk. It really puts a lot of things into perspective. So quite frankly, I would just readjust the time allocation. I would have prioritized some things differently and spend time in a few different ways. But that's what I would have changed.

Stefanie Norvaisas [00:11:04] And then just a follow up question. How do you see ... I really am keying in on the essential versus non-essential, right? And that's such a ... those are very powerful words.

QuHarrison Terry [00:11:22] Yeah. I mean, it's very comparable to the 60s and racism, right? It's like colored, non-colored, right? And like not to make people so uncomfortable on this podcast. They're feelings, but like, we're segregating people, essentially. It's just a different terminology, different label. But the byproduct of that is going to be felt for years to come. Think about the people that got rich during the pandemic and had a chance to work a remote job and had a chance to not feel what it's like to be furloughed, to lose a check, to not know where your next meal is going to come from, to not know if your lights or your heat are going to get turned off. You know, we're in the minority of the population where if we the people listening to this that didn't have that happen to them and the people listening to this that don't even know what those words mean. And that's like crazy because we're missing this whole psychological way of thinking and methodology that I think should be applied to all future thinking here on moving forward. Because if you don't, you're just going to repeat what history has shown us in the past.

Stefanie Norvaisas [00:12:20] But what's also interesting for me that that threw into light was that the obvious, I shouldn't say all, but many of the essential jobs are our lowest paid, least appreciated jobs and workers. And yet they turned out to be the most essential. And so, I'm really curious, as your reaction to that and then also to understand, has this put the notion of innovation into a different light for you or where would you put innovation? Is it essential or nonessential?

QuHarrison Terry [00:12:58] Innovation is always essential. It's like, you know, if we don't innovate, if we go back to way back to Darwin's natural theory of selection, you're just going to die, right? So, if we let science take it, it's a pretty calm time. But if I look at it from today's perspective, what is innovative? I think some of the most innovative ideas that come by way of the pandemic, they didn't come from the places we thought they would. You know, I look at some of the ideas on what we thought. Let's go back to like March of 2020 and remember all the thought leadership articles people put out there, like, yeah, we're going to turn it copper everything. We're going to make vending machines everything. And like America is going to look like Asia, you know? And like we're still getting revolts at masks adherence today in 2021, you know. Where's that future thinker hat today where it's like, yo, I thought we were going to look like Asia because there's no there's no I mean, I spend a lot of time in Asia, and I don't I don't see people fighting with each other or people getting tackled in banks because they didn't wear masks. And so, I think we have a whole web of things to kind of think through and iterate upon and innovate through because we're still on day zero. If you ask me on this, like we still don't even know what coming back fully looks like. You know, people ask me that question every single day, five, six times a day. And I'm like, you know, what month do you think we're just going to magically come back? Like, we've got to figure it out.

Dave Franchino [00:14:25] Qu, I want to dive into something you said earlier, which is it seems like the pandemic is really like many of us forced us to kind of -- not force to but allow us -- to sort of really value and appreciate the kind of personal connections with the people that matter to us and real tangible kinds of experiences. And the paradox there is that the pandemic is also driving us to an increasingly digital world. I mean, look at the experience we're having right now, right? They're kind of antithetical to one another. And I normally, if you could have erased the pandemic and say jumped back in time five years, how would you, QuHarrison, have approached resolving any of these sorts of dilemmas? I might have said, well, he will be looking towards the future of technology and how technology is going to be able to help us through this. If it's a fundamental paradox that the technology is becoming part of the problem in addition to an intrinsic part of the solution. Where do you see that leading in the near term and maybe the long term as well?

QuHarrison Terry [00:15:20] I think we've got to go back if I'm being honest, I'm trying to find my phone because you won't believe what kind of phone I have. Make a guess. What do you think?

Dave Franchino [00:15:29] I think it's a flip phone.

QuHarrison Terry [00:15:30] I went back, but not that far back. This is an iPhone with the home button. Do you know why? Because the home button is much more practical than face ID when I have to wear a mask. Like you know, it's much easier to just touch something. And in some cases, this works with the latex gloves on, right? And so, you ask me, like looking to the future of technology, you know, there's a lot of cool, exciting tech that exists. I just don't know if it's very applicable to our current circumstances.

[00:15:55] You know, I was in Texas, unfortunately, during the Texaspocalypse that we had. You know, I'm from Wisconsin and it was still pretty bad. We had it was 10 degrees. Homes are freezing. There was no power or Internet. Some people didn't have water or heat for even a week. And in that, you know, I had books, I had pens and paper like a good journal. And then by way of, like, the sunlight going up and down like that was that was it. Like, it went way back to like, you know, when the sun goes down, it's dark. If you got flashlights and candlelight, that's about it. But like we're going back to, like, the original man-made inventions in like what technology was in its most primitive state. And that's just not here in Texas. But a lot of the last year has seen people go back to some of these technologies that aren't as futuristic as we might have liked to see 2021 look like.

[00:16:49] Now, does that mean the innovation that has come from, you know, years and years of inspiration and thinking -- no it still exists. Like, I still have the Samsung Fold. This is a super-cool device, but it's not that practical when I can't go anywhere, right? Like, I don't need all of this phone when I go out, like when I go to my desk or when I get up from my bed, like, my life's pretty simple from a technology standpoint. So, I say that to say, like, I think we have to look back, see what was working. Is that really applicable to now? And I think that while we're looking back, we can't forget that the future is still among us and it still surrounds us, like, it's still forthcoming. And by knowing that, we have to say you have to kind of be in two places at once, like you've got to make it work through the time that we're in now.

[00:17:35] But you have to also say, like, hey, when this thing goes away, we can't stay in the past. We have to kind of catch up and we're going to have a lot of room to catch up on. Like there's a huge gap there. That leads me to the next point. I definitely think that there are some things that I've done differently now by way of things that have happened in our lives, because I think that there has been a great equilibrium. If you're a remote worker and your company has had to figure this out and they have no intention of going back to work as it once was. Their talent pool has drastically increased, so what it meant to be a top-tier employee just a year ago, what it means to be a top-tier employee just two years ago or 10 years ago, that you can throw all those rule books out the way because you're competing not just with the ZIP code that you're in, not just with the state that you're in, not just the 50 states you're surrounded by. Forty nine states you're surrounded by. You're competing with the whole globe because the Internet is just about everywhere. And if you let Google and Facebook tell it, you know, in 10 years’ time what the projects they're working on, everyone will be connected or I mean, Tesla also. I mean, Elon has the satellite Internet to the star link or whatever, right? So, everyone's going to have it. And that's going to be something that we're working towards. If it's not here today, it'll be here the next decade or so.

[00:18:57] So once everyone has an Internet connection and companies have figured out logistically how to make this work on the books and the economics behind remote work, I think we still have some accounting catching up to do there. There's a huge possibility that your colleagues are going to be someone in India. There's a huge possibility that your colleague is going to be someone in Nairobi or, you know, Japan or you name it. I mean, because I see a lot of people on teams that I've worked with, they're in remote places. Whether they should or shouldn't be there, that's another question. But they are and they're doing their job and you can't argue with it. But at the same time, if they can do their job there, that means all the people around them that have similar skill sets or maybe even better skill sets can also do their job there. And so, the whole concept of what it meant to be a freelancer has gotten really interesting to me because I think that we all effectively have now become freelancers.

[00:19:52] Freelancers have been working in this remote society for almost two decades now, right? You know, the early, early before the people, before Tim Ferriss, and then when Tim Ferriss made the four-hour workweek popular, there was a whole nother wave. And so, you can just say give or take 20 years people have been doing this, but they've been a small subset of the working population. Now that that is the normal and it's common, it's table stakes. I'm curious to see what skills we as individuals need to have to stay competitive. I have some thoughts and some thinking on that, but that's where my mind's been in the past year.

Dave Franchino [00:20:24] Well, let me drill into that. So, I completely agree with you that technologically and logistically that's where we're headed. How do we create a culture of innovation in that type of environment? Clearly, you thought of that, and that's front and center in our minds and ironically, Stef and I just rolled out of a meeting talking about the future of work. And although we're talking about certain logistical and technological aspects of it, the real focus is on cultural and workflow and interpersonal aspects. What are your thoughts in that regard?

QuHarrison Terry [00:20:56] Well, I think the first thing is you have to look at the person, right? So, one thing that you can say is true if you read any business schoolbook and all the proverbial knowledge out there is if you have issues at home, you're going to have those issues arise in some capacity at work. Right now, when you take both and you make them one and the same, there's a whole web of I'm just going to be frank, your shit that you inherit that now comes by way of having the place you work being also the place you stay and reside and contemplate your life beyond work. And we haven't really figured that out yet. This is like still our ... too, I'm like on this journey. They're like and there's some companies that have been doing this for a while. But like, what does it mean to have like a workspace at home and then a way to disconnect and unplug? And I think it's the company's job to actually empower the employees. So, if it's like if the employee doesn't have the greatest computer, I think most companies have said, OK, yeah, I'm going to ship you your computer and some monitors and stuff like that. But thinking beyond that, like, you know, some people are intimidated by having these big giant screens and like, they can't focus because they have to be on Zoom and they don't like the way they look on the picture, an image. Like us guys, we don't think about that. But, you know, the other, you know, I mean if you're a woman it's not that crazy for you to say, hey, I don't like my appearance today. But then, if you turn off your camera, you're not connecting with your colleagues. So, we're putting people in really, for lack of a better term, f***ed up places. So, it's like your job. I'm at home, I'm supposed to feel comfortable, and I have to like, say, like decide. And we at the company, we're like, this is the company culture we're going to have our webcams on. We're going to have our screens on. But if you've got kids at home or dogs or whatever, you got cleaning people coming in and whatever you have, this is your home. You can do whatever you want. Like, I need you to feel comfortable in your home so you can be the best person on my team or whatever team that I'm working on. And so, it's a really weird dilemma. It's almost like a Catch 22 or a really, really cold game of the Prisoner's Dilemma. We're doing game theory and I think the best companies are going to have to throw out the playbook, throw out a lot of the things and just say like, hey, what works for one employee might not work for another employee, but like we are agnostic, we need you to feel right, and when you feel right, let us know because then and only then we'll have a perfect equilibrium.

[00:23:17] And there are some people that now work best at like 3 am. Team members where it's like they might not ever show up to a meeting, but their work is always super, super, super dope and flashy. And I've never seen that performance from them. And so, I just kind of trust that and say, like, hey, you know, send your written updates in and we'll figure it out from there. But me as a manager, it's a little bit different, right? Like I have to put myself in positions where, you know, I don't have that daily check in with that person. So, I just have to trust that they're going to get the job done. And sometimes, you know that trust is living in an i-message, not a Slack. And that's just something I've got to be OK with. And I think this is that point where we're figuring it all out. And I think culture, when it is one and the same, is something that none of us really have all the answers to.

Dave Franchino [00:24:05] Qu, if it's not overly sensitive, I want to ask you -- you went from being really visible and all over the media and we could see from what we could tell that you kind of pulled back from being online and have been pretty quiet since June. And I'm just curious, you've talked a little bit about your decision to pull back. It just happened or was it was it purposeful?

QuHarrison Terry [00:24:23] It was definitely purposeful. I think the severity of the pandemic, right, there were too many messages, and no one was paying attention. There was too much misinformation, there’s too many people that wanted to be a part of the spotlight. So many people that just wanted clout. And quite frankly, it's like, I have a lot to say, but there were people that were trying to say things that were much more important than anything that I could say, right? You look at some of the findings at the time when I stopped, like Dr. Faucci was proposing some of the things that we've inherited today. But, you know, we could have gotten in front of some of the calamities that have ensued. And I thought the greatest thing that I could do to help the pandemic was, one, bring awareness in the social circles that I'm in behind the scenes, and then to just not participate in the echo chamber, right? And by killing the messenger myself, I would remove my voice from the echo chamber. But ideally, that would inspire others to just kind of pay attention to it and that didn't work. But it was an idea.

Dave Franchino [00:25:26] I think that's fascinating. Do you plan to re-engage and what does that look like? And on what terms?

QuHarrison Terry [00:25:32] That's a great question. I mean, like, you know, I've yeah, I will reengage at some point. I think it's inevitable on that front. What will it look like? I think it will be a little bit more global Qu. So, I think, you know, you've known me for Boy Future and technology. Some stuff. Some people know me for health care. I think I'm going to go beyond just kind of like the work or the job and really look at cultures as they as they are and like take all the interest that I have and meet people in different cultures. So, the first area that I'm going to be focusing on is Japan. I've been learning Japanese during the pandemic, so teaching myself how to speak Japanese. And that's been a journey in itself.

Dave Franchino [00:26:15] Yeah, it's fascinating to hear you tell those stories, those experiences. Just a quick story from our past, that similar sort of us being a little tone deaf ourselves. It was somewhat into the pandemic when we realized that the tagline on our website still said, what keeps you up at night? And of all the things that were keeping people up at night, the things that we were focused on as a business was probably the last of them. But it did kind of reset the messaging that I think all of us firms need to think about in the appropriateness of our go-to market message. I'm kind of curious. You've always been an inherently optimistic person. And what are the things that have changed make you optimistic for the future?

QuHarrison Terry [00:27:01] A couple of things make me optimistic for the future. So, democratization has happened a lot, right? I think that there's a lot of things that are happening, whether it be on the economic side. Look at the stuff that's happening within Wall Street and just kind of the education that's unearthing in these Reddit communities and beyond. And then you have the stuff that's happening by way of crypto and like all of the things that are associated with that, I think we look at the stuff that's happening in regard to how we get logistics, like how do we get and consume products? I think we've gotten a lot smarter and there's a lot of cool businesses that can now be built upon like these improved logistics models.

[00:27:52] Remember, like, you know, when the pandemic first happened, was that in like a year ago, like March, remember, Amazon shut down. Remember, they were like, yo, we're only going to ship essential items and like there might be delays. You remember getting that email anyway? Yeah. Like, you know, I'm going in like, you know, people are still ordering more stuff than they ever have in e-commerce and we're making it work. Their systems that like I order something, it comes the same day. It's absurd, right? And so, there's new infrastructure that exists that just didn't exist by way of just 375 days ago. And so, when I look at that, I'm like, wow. Like as a creator, as an innovator, it's like, OK, like what? New businesses now can be built on Amazon because of this one day shipping. I walk into the airport and I see Amazon's just walk out technology, you know, where it's all computer vision so you can just pick stuff up and you just walk out, and they charge your card on file. That stuff is really cool. I think that technology got accelerated because of covid, because of the pandemic. And so, knowing that there are new technologies and new playgrounds to play with, then I think entrepreneurs and innovators can look at some of the stuff that's emerged and been accelerated and saying, hey, what are some of the gaps that I can color in or what's the delta between this community in this technology? And you can innovate. You can innovate a lot in those places.

[00:29:22] So one thing that I would add to that just to summarize, is not only do we have new infrastructure, we also have new ways to reach people. I think that, like, one thing that the pandemic did do is it forced us to figure out where are our sources of truth digitally. And so, it also forced us all to get some new skills. People are now comfortable hopping on Zoom and Teams. I remember just two years ago installing Zoom and getting it up to speed was actually an accomplishment on its own, right? And now it's like my grandma has it. So, it's one of those things where new personas have attributes and heuristic properties that you wouldn't have usually segmented in that audience before. So, I think that there's new ways to reach people as well.

Dave Franchino [00:30:20] So it may be a little bit of a cliche question, but we talked about a new normal. What do you want to come back and what do you hope kind of stays in the past?

QuHarrison Terry [00:30:34] I think events should come back, but in a hybrid form, and I think that's going to be really hard to do because it's really hard to capture that like if you make a really good digital event, it doesn't necessarily make it the best in-person event. And so, I know there's companies out there looking to kind of bridge that gap. But it'd be cool if things that we once knew as a society for social activities could reemerge but it's optional. Like if I want to show up virtually or if I want to show up in person, you know, I have that option. I think we've seen it kind of emerge where like restaurants are now QR code based, right? So, a special doesn't have to be what some people decided was a special and then ordered and sent to a graphic designer and they ordered and laminated the menus. And then, you know, you can change menu items in real time. Now, like, you know, most restaurants never really had that ability. But now think about the experiences that could be built upon that in like there's just so much that exists where, you know, things that we once did and just kind of took for granted are now like here-to-stay normal.

[00:31:39] One thing that I think is kind of cool is before I worked at Eat Street for a little bit. So, I've always been kind of close to like the online food ordering space and delivery and just kind of that whole industry. Those kitchens were something that I think we all knew about, like they always existed. They didn't necessarily have the brand that they have today, but they were always the thing where, you know, there was an Asian kitchen, and they would sell like pizza and wings and all these things. But online they could put up different brands. And that was also a selling point way back when. Now those kitchens can exist, but you can do it in a way where my location, because I'm staying in a house like I'm trying to practice the social distance lifestyle, I can't change my zip code. I can't even go to that that neighboring zip code and say, like, hey, let me go pick up some food. But what I can change is the food options available to me through some of these online carriers and apps. And I think that that's like one of the coolest inventions ever because, you know, today it's food and like some essential items like on the card and all that stuff. But like think about the logistics there. You now can deliver to everyone within a single zip code radius. And if you pair that with the right marketing, you can build some really phenomenal experiences on top of that.

Dave Franchino [00:32:56] Right, do you have time for just a question?

QuHarrison Terry [00:32:59] Yeah, go ahead, go ahead. We're good and stuff.

Dave Franchino [00:33:03] But I guess just assuming that many of the people who are listening to this podcast are sort of similar to Stef and myself, we worked at traditional companies where we had employees that came into the building in the morning and left at night. We marketed somewhat geographically. And, you know, we were dealing with the perspective of that normal. What advice and recommendations would you have for a leader of a creative organization if you're stepping into their shoes and wargame out the next year or two years? What advice would you have for them to drive forward dynamically?

QuHarrison Terry [00:33:39] Forget everything you once knew about communication and relearn communication. What does it mean to communicate visually? And if you're bilingual? What changes? Like, you know, some cultures text differently. Some cultures don't even use text message. They use their own apps, right? Like WeChat, WhatsApp. But overseas, like there's different ways to communicate digitally than in person. We've all lived in a world long enough where if you have a career, you know how to interact in person like Conference Dave Franchino is a lot different than Office Dave Franchino, but those are things you have to learn. And I'm saying the vice versa for you, Stef. I'm sure you have, you know, when you're going out to a conference vibe and then when you come back and you're giving the presentation back at the office, those are skills that we learn by way, our careers have probably thrived on some of that stuff. We aren't going to a conference in that capacity any time soon, right, but that brain space, it's time to refresh that and update that change the cycle. What does it mean to go beyond? What does it mean to get inspiration and throw up an ideation stage session on a Disney Plus group hangout? Like I'm making this up right now, but it's something that could happen. And like for team culture, maybe that's cool. Maybe by way of the logistics thing I talked about, you know, what if we did a group lunch, but we all like it was somebody's job to pick whatever we're going to all eat and like, they just send it all out, like using Eat Street or Uber or whatever it is. And that's kind of cool, right? Because now it's like we're still communicating, we're still connected, we're still there. It's just the method and medium at which we do that it changes because we're not getting on a plane going to Vegas. We're not getting on a plane and go to Florida or California. We're just kind of figuring it out online. But we're saying Teams is for our office stuff, we still need culture beyond the office.

Stefanie Norvaisas [00:35:39] I love that. When the pandemic started, I was commenting that I don't know how to do meeting anymore. I mean, I had all my props and my white boards and my stuff. And I walk around the room and I'm like, I don't know how to do meetings anymore, but my hands are tied behind my back and I have to re-learn something that I just take completely for granted, having been doing this for a while. I know you're pressed for time, but I have one more question, which is I'm thinking about the pandemic. But technology, in general, has been really the rate of change has been exponential. And with the pandemic, I personally have seen a lot of technologies that were nascent kind of being fast forwarding. On being more readily accepted and adopted in great swaths. And one of the things that I've been wondering about is -- and you touched on this earlier -- in many ways, the technology has outpaced us. We don't really know what we've created. We don't really know how to use it to its full capacity. And furthermore, we don't really know how to govern it or regulate it. And so, in that, if you agree with that sort of general premise, what are the kinds of things that worry you about this pace of change, and especially in contrast to this, what you said at the beginning, which was you would slow down and spend more time in real moments with family, right?

QuHarrison Terry [00:37:12] Yeah, I share some of the same concerns I think as all my techie friends share. I think the what's possible by way of big data in machine learning and even A.I. is just it's really hard to fathom and collectively envision. Dave and Stephanie, if I called you three years ago and said, you know, this deep fake technology is going to get so good that like a soccer mom is going to learn how to use it, right? And she's not going to use it to send stuff to grandma or like be in many places at once. She's going to use it to create drama on her daughter's cheer team. So that way it infuriates and 2021. And that's by way of deep fake. And deep fake hasn’t even really hit the circuit yet, like we're still maybe three or four years out and that's what's happened in 2021. So, when I look at what's happening on that machine learning side, when I look at what's happening, I'm seeing how a terror attack on a I mean, like how a soccer mom becomes a terrorist essentially to some little girl. And I think about all the psychological traumas that that girl is going to have in her family is now going to have to deal with because of some fake computer-generated images. Like imagine being that kid's mom. I'm actually more worried about the family that, like, has to deal with that in the oncoming years than I am the person that did the crime because they don’t, I don't even think they thought as far as they could on like, you know, this person might not ever post a photo of themselves again. They might not live their lives digitally ever again. And this is, I think, beyond cyber bullying. We saw how powerful that could be in the early 2000s. And we put legislation and government and we put some structure around it. And, you know, you could say it didn't really stop it, but it made people aware,

I don't know how to make people aware of the calamities that could ensue from A.I. And I'm not here to be like, you know, Terminator, the worst thing ever. It's just like it's simple things like that person. That person that had the fake images of them and they were like seen smoking, drinking and like was nude photos and all that stuff. And it was all like fakes and like that was shared and their identity was smeared and washed. Like that's a hard thing to come back from, especially if you're like a 13 year-old girl in high school and just trying to deal with society as it stands today with the pandemic. That's just the start. And so, I'm like, that's what worries me. That's what keeps me up at night. I'm glad that, you know, things like that happen. And it forces teams of computer scientists to get on their shit and say, OK, we've got to do better at spotting this stuff and getting out in front of it beforehand, because I think that before then it was the people were like, OK, OK, we can detect these images with an 80 percent threshold. You know, that wasn't good enough. Now we're at a 90 and, you know, ideally, we'll get to 99 and you're nearly 100. But we can't be out here in a society where we don't know what's real and what's fake.

Dave Franchino [00:40:22] Do you think there's hope for adjudicating truth in the future? I mean, it occurred to me like prior to the invention of the printing press, you know, we kind of needed to see something in person to believe it. And then we went through this long period of time where there were believable truths because we didn't see them personally, but they were told to us by trusted medium or we saw visions of them we trusted is the truth.

QuHarrison Terry [00:40:45] Dave, I think digital trust is where the impetus of a new iteration of that, because I think about Clubhouse and how dangerous that platform can be. And you haven't really seen me as a marketer on Clubhouse. I think it's an interesting tool but like, if I if I'm talking to you as a marketer in order to really make a clubhouse work, I have to market much more like a church. Like, you know, you have someone that's going to give a sermon, someone that's going to come listen and follow. And then every now and then, you'll get to bring some people up on stage with you, right? Like that analogy for Clubhouse fits. So, if I then say, OK, what is the gospel of the day? What is the truth? Then it becomes a really interesting question, Dave. And so that's where this, yes, digital truth, I hope we get in front of it. I don't think Clubhouse is that dark. I think it's a cool technology but as with most technologies there's a dark side and a good side.

Hopefully, the teams at Clubhouse get in front of that one. But I mean, by way I look at the platform and like that, that I think what you just said is like, you know, there are now people that will never even see it as long as they can hear someone that sounds like me or someone that sounds like whoever's icon is get on there and say like, hey, I'm going to do X, Y and Z. You can do a lot from fundraising to fundraise for an NFT. And you can raise money for a charity and good cause. You could probably do a lot of hate speech. You can cancel someone. You can do a lot. And that's just by way of talking on a Clubhouse chat. So, yeah, the technologies that have ensued, they have really strong questions about truth and what is truth. And so that's the place to look.

But I think sometimes we have to look at what is six months to a year out and what can we control. And I think we all have to say, hey, let's make sure we get through this pandemic. Let's make sure we get the people that are around us, that are near us, doing as well as they can be. If we can do anything to change and help them, we're making ourselves available to do that. I think that that's where we as leaders should fall right now and the future will figure itself out. I believe in Americans. I believe in humanity as a whole. And I think right now, like, we all have some really cool things to show our unity. And by way of the pandemic, you know, we've made some really, really strong strides on really difficult conversations such as racism and, you know, segregation as far as like opportunity and access. So there has been a lot of good stuff that's happened. And yes, truth is, is a question and construct that we all are going to deal with, but that's going to be forever true, unfortunately.

Dave Franchino [00:43:20] Qu, I think that’s some really inspiring words and I'm really appreciative to hear those from you. And that is a very inspiring way, I think, for us to draw this wonderful conversation to a close. I want to make sure you get to your flight. Once again, this is Dave Franchino joined by my co-host, Stephanie Norvaisas, and we really have enjoyed this conversation with QuHarrison Terry, growth marketer for Mark Cuban Enterprises and one of the most forward thinking individuals that I know. And that goes way beyond technology. So, it's been a privilege and a delight, as always.

QuHarrison Terry [00:43:49] Appreciate it. You still in Madison?

Dave Franchino [00:43:53] We are still in Madison. You get back here, we’d love to see you in person and make a non-digital connection. That first non-digital beer is on me.