Prime for Growth Episode 6 - Next Generation Innovation

If you're struggling to make your mark in a business with history, the challenge is real.  So is the opportunity to break new ground using powerful legacy tools and experience.  This episode is all about finding the difficult, but valuable, balance between innovation and history, harnessing the past for a better, energized future.  

Whether you are born an entrepreneur,  or born into a family of entrepreneurs, there is no doubt that moving beyond the family legacy can be both a burden and an opportunity.  

Anthea Sargeaunt started her entrepreneurial career right out of high school, building a business to pay her rent through her post secondary education path and launching her ambition to build something meaningful.  Her lessons in entrepreneurship motivated her to create something world changing, while respecting the boundaries between family and business - an age old problem to which she applies a modern approach.  Her company, 2S Water, has a huge mandate - to enable real time water testing and help enterprises and governments to improve global water safety.   But, transitioning from intergenerational legacy to leading edge innovator is daunting in many ways, and running an engineering-focused business as a risk taking entrepreneur is no less overwhelming.

Transcript

Angela Armstrong  0:00  
Welcome to Prime for Growth, a podcast about the journey of possibility that entrepreneurs live every day. Our conversations with these everyday innovators explore why, when and how they implement change in their businesses - and sometimes what happens when they don't. I'm your host, Angela and I've been working with entrepreneurs while growing a financial services company for more than two decades. I've learned a lot from our clients over the years. And I hope you will, too. Thanks for joining us on Prime for Growth. 

Anthea is the leader in remote real time water testing. She's also a second generation entrepreneur navigating the challenging ground that lies between the legacy of a family startup engineering business, and the new remote workforced,  globally client based,  tech iterating future that is the everyday reality of her company, 2S Water. 2S is innovating real time data rich information for organizations who need to keep an eagle eye on the quality of the water coming into and going out of their systems. These include municipalities on the one hand, and industrial players on the other. Their corporate mission is inspiring, "Fresh, clean, trustable water for all". But as we will hear,  pretty,  inspirational and aspirational words alone don't turn an idea into reality;  that takes grit and persistence. And Anthea has got both in spades 

You referenced just a couple of minutes ago, you referenced the difference between the time in your business maybe 12 months ago, and the tension or intensity that's in the business now . What's changed?

Anthea Sargeaunt  1:45  
Well, we're about to go to market. But what's changed is awesome things things have been going, really, they've been progressing really well. So basically, in late 2020, we deployed our first sensor to a municipality, we learned so much that was that was the MVP, we then took our learnings, we now have what we're calling the commercial MVP, which is very close to commercial final -  actually closer than I thought it would be. And we're deploying it this month, I can now say this month, finally, to to our first paid client. So we kind of have this like the moment of truth, our first commercial deployment is to the United States. So we can't physically be there, we're really relying on our partner to be the hands on and be the like, actual technical. So there's a big trust factor. And, you know, a big requirement. This is the moment when it all comes together or we are, you know, back a stage from where we are now. You know, we never quit. But this is a moment of truth that is very exciting. And if we pass this moment of truth, we're passing into what I think is the most exciting stage of the company where, you know, we've built the product. And now we have to build the company, the machine that is the company that you know, takes that first glance and seeing that 2S Water logo all the way to a satisfied customer who wants to refer us to others. That's the part I think is really exciting and fun. And we're on the cusp of stepping into it.

Angela Armstrong  3:21  
Industrial and commercial water needs consume large volumes of water, and also discharge large volumes of water.  Testing it coming into their systems and testing the quality of the water output from the system is essential to maintain both public confidence and water system safety and effectiveness and productivity inside these large production systems, which helps keep their costs down. Water is one of the largest byproducts of manufacturing. And companies today who are focusing on a triple bottom line, namely people, planet and profit,  are engaged in water recycling and reduction initiatives. And testing for quality is a critical component of this. Water is also one of the most important inputs in another critical ecosystem -  life. For all these reasons, the issue of managing the quality of increasingly scarce freshwater supply across the planet is on everyone's radar.

Anthea Sargeaunt  4:19  
It's really it's an all hands on deck right now, which is great. And  the team's really pulling together. And I think we're all having a lot of fun, although everyone is nervous about what we're saying.

Angela Armstrong  4:30  
Well, there's a lot riding on it just in terms of emotional investment. There's all of the technical investment. When you say everything is about to unfold right now, and your first paid client deployment is a deployment for which you cannot be present  - a year ago could you conceived of deploying your first paid client without physically being on site?

Anthea Sargeaunt  4:56  
Even in the days of COVID it was a huge huge I like that there was serious debate in the company is like, Are we going to try and apply and get that that like, key skilled worker? And even if I can, and like is it morally acceptable to send my employee into a country that has a much less rigorous approach towards this disease? Like, it was a very, very difficult choice to do that. And I think we are exceedingly lucky in the innovation partner that we found, you know, we have that, that classic kind of Crossing the Chasm innovator as, as our lead there, I remember when we, when we met him, he told us the story of another deployment they did, and he goes, I knew how to fix it, I knew exactly what they should do, and they wouldn't listen to me. And that was, that was the first story that he told me that I went, I wanted to play. That's it. Yeah, you're the You're the one you're getting my first sensor. So um, there was a certain luck and a certain fortuitous this and finding that classic innovator, on the other hand, it would have been really, really difficult to send somebody. So we would have been really inhibited in the number of facilities we could have deployed to. On the other hand, you know, a question that I had continually from investors a year ago was, how are you going to manage deploying the sensor? I don't get that question anymore. It's obvious, we need to be capable of remote deployment. Now the question is, what is your remote deployment mechanism look like? And luckily, that's something that we were already engaged with. 

Angela Armstrong  6:22  
as you're getting into practice at live, like if you're going to have proof of concept coming through this, just like when you had your MVP, and you did your first deployment in the municipality, you're going to take away phenomenal learnings, because you'll never get good at it unless you start. We were just,  I was talking with Christina Milke just before and she said, you know, you flex your innovation muscles, you  flex your risk taking muscles, you have to practice doing those things.

Anthea Sargeaunt  6:48  
 Absolutely. And you know, there's always a philosophy to certainly internally that if we're not uncomfortable, then we're probably being too conservative.

Angela Armstrong  6:59  
Do you think everybody on your team shares that? 

Anthea Sargeaunt  7:02  
Oh, well, I can tell you right now everyone on my team is uncomfortable. We're about to deploy to our first client, with varying levels of acceptance, but absolutely everybody that I'm always thrilled with how hard my team pushes and how willing they are to embrace those risks. And the risk tolerance of my team is not all the same, you can see that some people are sometimes feel like we're taking much more risk than others do. And that helps us balance so that we land in that kind of mid zone, and those incredibly innovative individuals don't drive us, you know, over that edge. Yeah, but conservatives don't keep us back too far. So I'm a big fan of having balance and diversity on the team in order to gain that proper balance.

Angela Armstrong  7:49  
When you're when you're thinking about your organization that and you said you want to have a diverse team, because you want people to pull you back from it like somebody to grab you by the collar and go, that's a cliff. And then you need the people that are pushing on the other side. Now we get to go farther, we're going to build a ladder on the way down, it'll all be good. Where Where do you find yourself on that spectrum?

Anthea Sargeaunt  8:09  
Oh, that's a good question. I'm probably more of the risk side than then I thought I was before I got into this. I will say that for sure. Like I thought I was relatively conservative. Some of the decisions that I've made over the course of this business have taught me that I am less conservative than I thought.

Angela Armstrong  8:25  
But what made you think you were conservative? What What things? What characteristics or attributes did you observe about yourself that made you feel like you were conservative?

Anthea Sargeaunt  8:33  
Well, I'm just, you know, I'm financially like, in my own life, I save money. I make good decisions. I don't spend like, the frivolously I, you know, I do all the things that I was taught to do to be a fiscally responsible adult. I don't go to casinos. I don't gamble. I don't do any of these kinds of high risk behaviors, but hand me a business and apparently I'll shoot for the skies. I didn't,  I didn't know that about myself. So it's been a learning experience.

Angela Armstrong  9:01  
It's interesting, because I wonder if what you would have characterized as risk has changed.

Anthea Sargeaunt  9:07  
You know, I've I've been in business for a lot of years. And the more control you have, the more fun it is. So I am like at peak fun right now, you can't get any more entertaining than this. But that's probably also why I'm willing to take more risks because it's, you know, my background is business. That's my designation, like, I'm not a heavy tech person. I understand the tech. I do very well on the tech side. But business is my degree , business's my science. You know, if I go back to school will be for a PhD in business. This is the game I play and I love it. And it's a game that rewards risk.

Angela Armstrong  9:41  
So tell me what about being in Versailles with your family watching your dad, try to you know, somehow balanced families got to have fun, uh, supposed to be here with my family. I'm in Versailles, the height of decadence and opulence. I was there myself a couple years ago. It's It's just otherworldly, really. And probably a big risk probably the Louis the build that in succession, you know one at a time. We're all a little bit of risk takers.

Anthea Sargeaunt  10:14  
Well, it was a huge risk because they moved it out of they move the capital and it was failing risk because they the the whole monarchy crumbled around that show of opulence. Yeah, now you're getting me off onto history No,

Angela Armstrong  10:28  
but I will and you and I will talk about it, besides I love history, which is why one of the reasons I was in Versailles, but when you think about your dad on his phone, how old were you when you guys were in Versailles?

Anthea Sargeaunt  10:40  
I was an early teenager. So somewhere between 13 and 16, I'd say

Angela Armstrong  10:45  
so probably, you know, fairly influenced by what you see your parents doing, right? You're watching and you're judging, you're saying, I'm not going to do that, or I'm always going to do that, or I'll never do that. What part of watching your dad in that experience in that family environment compelled you into a business track

Anthea Sargeaunt  11:04  
 over there's a missing factor to this, because my business partner now it's my father, I didn't step away from that, I looked at that and said, that's a problem that needs solving. And I can help him solve it. He doesn't need to be having that unsafe work life balance where he can't monitor things. And part of what I did to fix that work life balance was to go work with him. And I started working in the at the family business, to replace my grandmother who was the CFO at the time. And so it working for the family business for me has always been an an act of filial piety, which I realize refers to boys, not girls, but we'll just ignore that battle.

Angela Armstrong  11:48  
We'll think of it as a neutral term.

Anthea Sargeaunt  11:49  
Yeah, exactly. It's always been an objective to to be able to step in and make the life of my family better in a way that they did for me. You know, they sacrifice those years of work, why was dad on the phone in Versailles, because he wanted to buy a better family life for our family, he wanted my brother and I to be able to go on trips to Versailles. And he was willing to sacrifice his own enjoyment on that trip, so that we could have what we wanted, I had an opportunity to repay that favor.  And 2S Water is that end culmination or probably not the end combination. It's the current step on that journey of repaying that sacrifice that that previous generations made for me. And, and I'm always happy to be able to do that. ,

Angela Armstrong  12:40  
so how many people in your family have been involved in the family business over time.

Anthea Sargeaunt  12:45  
So at the peak at the engineering company, I think there was six of us from the direct family who were on payroll for the company, it was not, that was the reasoning and the logic for stepping into the business was the the opportunity to repay what has been paid to me, it was not an easy and smooth journey. Partially because we were three generations, my grandmother who grew up with no electricity, and me Who, who got an MBA very young and thought she knew everything and could change the whole world. That was not a happy work situation, like we made it work. But it was difficult that three generations split, I do not recommend the bit too far in in time and distance.

Angela Armstrong  13:29  
When we think about business sustainability, we consider the challenge of moving our business online, both our workforce and our customer reach and communication. Who is better prepared to manage in this time of rapid technological shift than people who are digital natives. Family businesses who have integrated their millennial members into the business may have a real advantage when they're seeking to remain relevant to the market, and also strip off their own blinders on what has worked in the past, versus what is going to work in the future. In a crisis, like the global pandemic, fear can actually seed a freeze behavior. And there's a well known biological syndrome called tonic immobility. This is literally a temporary state of motor inhibition due to extreme fear. I think intuitively, we may have all experienced this sometime in our lives, and can understand that it applies psychologically as well as in a real physical way. Since that behavior is probably not survival oriented. Letting crises like this one spur us to flex new innovation muscles might just be what ensures that our business survives in the next generation.

 But I'm an entrepreneur and I'm not in a family business. And I would say there's joy and there's hardship along the path here as well. And family entrepreneurs often tell me there is that you use the word piety and I translate that to kind of loyalty, that sense of commitment and dedication that sort of goes beyond The end of the hours of the day.

Anthea Sargeaunt  15:04  
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And, and balancing that as well, because there definitely is that ongoing obligation and that obligation to do harder and be better. And then our family also came with an expectation to, to go above and beyond and to sacrifice more than the rest of the employees. Even when I started out at the reception desk, the the obligations for me were more stringent than for the other employees. And the, the expectations were higher. And, and I benefited from that now. But it was a difficult place to start.

Angela Armstrong  15:40  
Well, how humbling, right? very humbling. So yeah, you're further before you're doing what you're doing now the roots are engineering. And then 2S Water has evolved out of that. But I think of engineering as a kind of innovative culture. It can be you know, it's regulated, it's prescribed. But there is also ideas and ideation that occurs within that. Do you think that the roots of the organization and that experience that your dad had of building things, generating ideas and creating things? Do you see that as a kind of fuel for where you are? Or where did your sense of innovation -  Where did that come from?

Anthea Sargeaunt  16:25  
So that's a good question. Because absolutely, that was an ongoing trend. You know, throughout the life of the business, my father's founded 10 different businesses over his life. Some of them went nowhere, some of them went somewhere. But every time like, every couple of years, an idea would come along, that would grab enough attention that they go for it and run with it. So that was definitely part of the ongoing culture of the of the family business. Having said that, I started my first business when I was in university, my husband and I started a business in order to pay our rent. That was when we decided we were going to do so it was enough of an ongoing culture that I picked it up and started doing that kind of iteration outside of the family business before I even joined the family business so hard to say exactly where that kind of spirit came from. My mom was a career government, she worked for CBC her whole life. So that really different dynamics inside the household. It's always interesting to me that I picked up my father's kind of Modus versus my mother's of that like public service. But I do kind of feel that I picked up kind of that service attitude, which was incorporated into the whole thing. So difficult question to answer in the long runs,

Angela Armstrong  17:34  
what was the business you and your husband started, most people just go get jobs to pay their bills. So

Anthea Sargeaunt  17:40  
my husband and I had a hilarious business. We build cat furniture. So 

Angela Armstrong  17:46  
like, like, like scratching posts? 

Anthea Sargeaunt  17:50  
It was kind of fun, because we managed everything from like, sourcing to production sales. So we would go into the ravines and out into nature and find beautiful pieces of wood. And then we would sculpt them into these cat purchases. And then we would take them to the farmers market and sell them and that's how I paid my rent through university was the cat business. And between Versailles and then cats were

Angela Armstrong  18:12  
We've gone everywhere. So when you finished university, and you were on this business track, and you had chosen to go to work in the family business, starting in the lowly ranks Have I got to work my way up. And I'm sure part of that is the family saying we don't want to be seen as providing favors, we have to be conscientious about the rest of the team. But what other things did you learn along the way, starting in that way in the business and working your way into the roles that you had later.

Anthea Sargeaunt  18:46  
And I think I'm even more than a good advantage. I think it was a in retrospect, a conscientious plan that my father put into force in order to get me to learn the different aspects of the business. And it was incredibly effective. I often describe myself as a jack of all trades because I worked. I started the reception desk, I worked in accounting, I worked in HR, I worked in sales we had we managed a property management, we managed manufacturing operations, like professional services, everything we did was very, very different. And I got a little bit of all of it, which for many years, I thought was a confusing skill set for that I realized is perfect for an entrepreneur because you have your fingers in every kind of pie. And having that basis of at least a passing level of understanding of each aspect of a business has been incredibly, incredibly useful. And now I can dig deep and get that additional training that I needed in the silos that I am solely responsible for at this stage of our business. But it was a very, very useful education, not only in the different silos of business but in the the experience that an employee has being in each of those silos and how dynamics work because they are the engineering office was quite large. At one point, I think we capped out about 30 employees, which for you know, in one space all doing technical work highly trained employees, it is quite a dynamic workplace.

Angela Armstrong  20:15  
Doing research for this podcast, I learned that there is a name for the historical way in which business and wealth have been transferred to the firstborn child, or in most places in the world, the firstborn son, it's called primogeniture. There's also a bit of kind of entrenched belief that boys were more suited to taking over the work of running an enterprise. There's a kind of certainty to belief that self reinforcing when sons are expected to take over the business and they're become socialized around the table, at the father's arm in business meetings or accompanying them on trips, and learning in an informal way, the ways of thinking and doing that are gonna lead to later success in managing the business. While primogeniture is still a dominant social practice in many countries, research shows that more and more merit is driving successor choice. In other words, the talents, proclivities and interests of the successor, rather than just this historical practice. In some countries, that change is being hindered by bigger legal constructs. For example, in India, it was only in 2005, that property rights were legally conferred upon daughters, despite their marriage status. However, Research also shows that among cultures where women do not have these kinds of barriers, in a family business, women reach pay equity more frequently, and are selected as senior leaders more frequently than in non family owned businesses. This may be because family businesses are not hindered by external optics and choosing the right leader. And the people have intimate knowledge of who and what a leader is made of. In fact, compared with the s&p TSX, where 5% of CEOs are women, family businesses measure about 13% of their CEOs as women, this is significant because 80% of businesses in Canada anyway, are controlled by families.

 Yeah, so having this more 10,000 foot look at how a business parses. So what are the operational aspects? What are the the monetary and fiscal aspects? What are the people aspects? What are the client facing aspects of the business? And then underpinning all that, is this sense of product creation and delivery? What was your favorite part? Like along that journey of exploring all these different aspects? Which part Did you enjoy the most?

Anthea Sargeaunt  22:40  
So right now, my, my really favorite part is still the customer discoveries. Actually, I just really, really love talking to people about and when you reach that, that moment, when they start to share their actual problem. And they'll actually tell you in granular detail, what they're dealing with, that, to me that feels not only like prized information, but the the moment when you establish that relationship, the moment when that that trust has occurred, and then you they give you a an understanding of something that you didn't understand before they let you into their world, that's still my favorite moment right now. I just love it. And I think in the future, a lot more of my favorite moments will be the same kind of moments with my own employees. Because as we scale, more and more of my time will be internally facing versus externally facing. And people are always the most fascinating part. So that same experience, I believe, will transition into learning and cultivating my own employees. But right now, it's about establishing real relationships with people who are doing complicated things and suffer from a problem that I can actually help with. And, and it's the moment when they get excited is the best moment of my life. I love it.

Angela Armstrong  23:55  
When you're having that conversation with a client where you, you start to feel energized, because I can tell that's very energizing for you. And it is for me as well. It's my favorite part of my role. When I when I the opportunities that I do have now to talk to clients. Is that sort of the the thin edge of the wedge of innovation for you where you can say, I know we have knowledge and expertise. I want to know how to apply that to you. And it's going to be in a unique way for every customer because the problems are a little bit different.

Anthea Sargeaunt  24:27  
Yeah, I think actually, the description of the thin edge of innovation is is very accurate for that. Because that's kind of the entry point for new innovation. If you can't properly connect on that problem if you can't properly understand that problem, and then solve it in a way that makes sense to them. Because just solving it isn't enough. It has to be in a way that makes things better, you can solve problems in a way that makes things worse. You know, we see that in the sensing industry where the current solution is so ineffective, but it's a solution. That that is really where The magic happens. And if you cannot get that little wedge point in, you're never going to gain traction. And I think that's a problem that a lot of early entrepreneurs have is that they're scared to have that conversation because they're worried they won't get that excited moment. And if you don't get that excited moment, you don't have a product, or you suddenly are talking to the wrong customer, I'll say that you might have a product for someone else. But if you cannot get that first connection, there, there's no business, there's nothing, you know, you're never going to make a sale, especially if an innovative product where in order to get into the market, I have to pass on my enthusiasm for risk to someone who might be rather conservative. And, and be well rewarded for being conservative within that role. They're not going to gain that enthusiasm, they're not going to pick up on my energy, then we're never going to get past the goalposts and and the bigger and more invasive your technology, the more excitement, you better be conjuring on both sides of the fence, because that's a harder. So I think we're lucky in the fact that we're not an incredibly disruptive technology. I pity people who are coming through with full water treatment systems, because in order to test them, they need to disrupt existing systems, I can add into those systems and then disrupt them with information, not physically disrupt them and tear them apart. 

Angela Armstrong  26:17  
So it's interesting, you said, sometimes innovations make a problem worse.  What is it about that that you've seen in, in the marketplace that kind of has inspired you guys to go in the direction you're, you're going, where's an example of that where you've seen a problem get worse? And why don't the companies involved in that recognize that they're, they're actually regressing instead of progressing.

Anthea Sargeaunt  26:44  
So I think one of the things that we see a lot on the sensor side at least is where people come up with new sensors that technically solve the problem. they detect the thing that requires detection, but the sensor itself is so difficult to use, it requires so much maintenance, so much human intervention, that they've In fact, created a new problem. And my theory on why that exists, because of course, it's gonna be different in every scenario is that many companies are led by scientists, they, the person who created the product is also the person who runs the business, they've taken eight or 10 years of science, so that they come up with this great product. But what I feel many businesses Miss is I've taken eight or 10 years of business, it's a full discipline, just like science is a full discipline. And too many people try and tack these things together, they tell that scientific innovator that their happy place is outside of the lab, doing an entirely different discipline. I think often that's not true. I think if we worked more to combine highly technical innovators, with business students who actually wanted to do innovation, that that would be a really successful format of moving forward because we ask these career scientists to just pick up another discipline. And that's not fair. Like that's a huge ask. And then we're surprised when they fail. Like the you cannot replicate the amount of business training that, you know, that I've had, that you probably had with, you know, a few courses run through an accelerator, it just doesn't cut it. I think people undervalue that the requirements of business skill in order to do this job.

Angela Armstrong  28:29  
We talked earlier a little bit about flexing those risk muscles. I imagine science is experimental, but it's iterative. It's data driven. It's hypothesis, results, iterate, hypothesis, result, iterate, when we ask a scientist to, to hypothesize, put a framework in place that's testable, that's measurable. These are all very rigorous practices. And a leap of faith is may have a discipline of we have a hypothesis, we want to test it, but at some point in time, you're you're jumping off the cliff, you're no longer having somebody hold your collar, these he got to go. So we built the parachute. If we never test the parachute, it's like all that stuff we did on dry land, doesn't matter. Because at some point in time, we have to go and you have to say this could fail and we're never going to maybe get to perfect science is generally that that's kind of where that juxtaposition is to.

Anthea Sargeaunt  29:40  
Absolutely I the more that the closer to academia that I drew my employees, the more conservative they are on that scale. The ones we pulled straight from academia can be really really uncomfortable sometimes with the risks that I asked us to take because what is done in academia  is so much more done than what is done in an early stage startup. What's done in an early stage startup is like, you know that expression like hate your MVP, I have to tell my guys that all the time, I'm like, we cannot, we don't have the time or the money to make something we love, we'll get there. But right now, we have to make sure what you've made works and doesn't work in terms of you sitting there. You know, being there ready to help, it has to work on its own, it has to be independent. And that's such a really hard transition.

Angela Armstrong  30:33  
MVP minimally viable product is a pared down version of the envisioned product. It can be a product that looks like it works, but is still powered in the background by human effort. Or it can be a set of tools that are bundled together, but not in their ultimate final version, intended for testing a product idea. It's the simplest core feature set that allows you to deliver value to your client. If you've got a clearly defined strategy and want feedback on that strategy's relevance, an MVP may allow you to do this, here are some ways in which it allows you to see your impact in the market. Number one, you can test the product idea with the least amount of resources expended. Number two, accelerate your team's learning about what adds value to the client, and what simply doesn't. Number three, get to market faster, helping you raise money more quickly and more easily. Number four, perhaps advance your competitive edge from a timing perspective. And number five, evaluate the question, should I have even built this in the first place? That question might even be the number one question that you're seeking to answer. Ways to evaluate your MVP include doing a product, for example, building a website and seeing how many clicks you get on that product. And this is called a curiosity measure. The rate at which people interact with your product concept can give you some sense of how relevant it is in the marketplace. Another one, to approach is looking at a new service, you can perform the service and evaluate how much customers are willing to pay for that service. or third one is if you've got an existing product and you want to add some features, you could advertise the features to your customers, and measur clicks on a link for more information or tell me more for a future interest. One of the most famous MVP companies that became globally famous when acquired by Amazon is Zappos. Zappos started when the founder had an idea that people might buy shoes they had never tried on if he removed the barriers to returning unwanted product. He started by simply taking photos of shoes at retail stores, and posting them on a website. The infrastructure came way after the idea got its legs. Another famous success story is Dropbox, which I personally use daily. It was only a demo video before it raised the capital that allowed it to actually build its software. MVP also has a dark side. An example where an MVP snowballed into something entirely different is the notorious Theranos' black box, Edison story. Edison was a portable blood analyzer that purported to perform many discrete blood tests on site. But it was really an incredibly lean set of successful tests. And a large set of outsourced traditionally performed lab tests.  Was the CEO Elizabeth Holmes really hoping to eventually make her MVP a success, and the story just got away from her. We may never know the entire story. But in August of this year, after a year of COVID induced delays, she goes on trial for fraudulent misrepresentation. A great podcast on this story is called The Dropout. And there are a number of other books and publications on the story. 

Yeah, and MVP by itself is scary, minimum viable, minimally viable, it's, it's barely working but go with it anyway. 

Anthea Sargeaunt  34:13  
Yeah. And and that's been a tough learning lesson for the the academic side of my team and the r&d side of my team is that, you know, we reach these points where I say, We're going like we're far enough and we're going, you have two weeks, get it ready, and it's going and whatever isn't ready isn't going. That's an uncomfortable situation for everyone. And it's so vitally necessary. And ironically, when some of our best work happens, because there's nothing like a hard deadline to make everybody pull together and and realize that that done enough is done. 

Angela Armstrong  34:48  
And I guess the deadlines are your job.

Anthea Sargeaunt  34:50  
Yeah, right. And sometimes, sometimes those deadlines are external, but I've set up and sometimes we set internal deadlines, and we make them as hard as steel because that drives things forward faster if we do that. 

Angela Armstrong  35:04  
So for you, what's a go? No Go place like what place do you get to into your, in your head and your heart? Because Because everything you do in business is a bit of an intersection of those two things. How do you know that you're at the go point, because sometimes you also have to be prepared to pull the pin. It's like negotiating in a car, you got to be prepared to walk into the dealership, right? That's the, that's the classic wisdom, I'm sure the same is true of innovation, sometimes you have to be able to pull the pin and say, it's a no go, or that minimally viable product is really just a failure, we should reserve re-resource and go in a different direction.

Anthea Sargeaunt  35:45  
To to minimal on the minimal viable product. Yeah, that's a really dangerous thing. Because as a startup entrepreneur, never quit is like in our blood, never, ever stop, never give up. And I have seen other entrepreneurs sit on stage and go, I should have quit a year before I did, and I regret it. And so you have to kind of internalize that and say, there has to be a cut off line. And I don't think from the position that I'm sitting in that I can properly see that. So when I have a tough decision that I'm not entirely sure that I should take, the first thing I do is I call my co founder, who is my father, and I talked to him, and then I call my CTO, and we talk it over. And then I call my mentors, and we talk it over. And by the time I'm done those conversations, we should have reached some kind of alignment, we should if I can convince my co founder and my CTO that my path is right, then we don't make that decision yet. We go back and we keep banging it until we all agree, because the three of us are smart enough to make any decision. And one of us not necessarily

Angela Armstrong  36:53  
sounds like the innovative process for you guys requires a lot of tension, right, a tension between pressure to drive forward on an idea that you had. And then this tension of but if we go to market with that, the damage of failure, it might be too much to come back from so that tension between those two forces? How do you make sure that everybody is comfortable on your team? Did you I mean, you know your dad well enough, you had to learn about yourself, whether you're comfortable with doing that, have you managed to find the T people in your team that have can manage to live in that sense of tension, because not everybody wants to be there.

Anthea Sargeaunt  37:38  
And you know, I think that was a big learning experience for my CTO when we brought him on is that there was a period where he really had to adjust to the levels of tension that not only existed but I expected him to be an active participant in like, it wasn't enough that he watched my co founder and I, you know, disagree over something, I wanted him in there. And I didn't want him with me or with my co founder, I wanted him pulling in a third direction, because that's when we make good decisions is when the tension is the highest. And then we can reach an accord. And it's so vital though it's so absolutely vital for moving forward. Because the the information sets that we have are different. The the risk that we're willing to tolerate is different. And that like I really very much feel for solo founders, because having that dynamic tension in my leadership team is vital for our survival. And it I will say the one thing is it makes me really scared of bringing on the next person. Because how do we maintain that tension? while adding more people? How do we get them into the argument as a productive player, because I don't want someone who's going to sit on the side and not not pulling it in their own direction.

Angela Armstrong  38:52  
So when you've got a trio, if you're a traditional decision, shape is a triangle with a person at eg apex, Do you often end up with kind of a tiebreaker? somebody goes, I hear both you but I'm kind of leaning here. And so that's that where the decision skews? Or do you go down a level to gather more information? When do you say we have enough information to make that call? You talked about using external advisors? Do you also look at the market your stakeholders in the market and kind of fly things up the flagpole with them a little bit?

Anthea Sargeaunt  39:27  
Absolutely. I mean, we test that everywhere that we can and like that's part of my role. I'm the external facing person. So it's my responsibility to not only where the CEO hat, but also where the sales hat and say, This is the customer feedback I'm getting. And this is, you know, these are the features that are important to my client and I don't care about what you're working on right now. Whereas my CTOs job is to say you know, the, the the Product Development Chart is as it is and we're gonna follow it. And you know, having that tension is is very important and getting as many viewpoints as possible is important. For how we resolve an issue, I don't actually think that that we do default to the two versus one. If we really have one person out of the three of us who doesn't agree, we're not in agreement, you know that. Many people say consensus doesn't work in the long run. And in the end, I do truly believe as the CEO, if push comes to shove, I have to make that decision. But so far, and to date, if I can't get one of those two guys on board, then I'm back on the phone with them. And we're still arguing it out until they admit that I'm that they can agree with what I'm saying. Or they convince me that I was wrong. If we, the three of us are smart enough that if we can all reach an accord, there's something that still needs unpacking

Angela Armstrong  40:48  
is one of the conversations you have, because every time I talk about innovation, it somehow circles back to culture, the the people that you do have on your team, or you don't have on your team, what your strengths are versus maybe what you're missing, and how you fill those gaps. And we often come back to the culture and the unintended consequences, that as a CEO, you might be making those driving decisions and saying, I've got to go no go decision, and I choose go. And those have trickle down effects on the rest of your team. How do you shore up that culture of support in the organization so that even when people may be feeling a little bit like I'm not ready to go and Anthea said it and I kind of trust her, but I'm still I, fundamentally a scientist, I don't want to be uncomfortable. I want to know that I can measure and iterate and test and and I want to feel safe to fail. How do you cultivate that inside of 2S.

Anthea Sargeaunt  41:50  
So culture is an issue that's very high on my mind lately, because it's difficult, it's a difficult in a way that it never was before, we've always been a somewhat remote team. But we are a fully remote team right now, I this is this is my house in the background, like I'm working from home, my CTO is in Victoria. You know, my guys come into the office when they physically have to, but they're in different rooms working separately from each other, because we are very serious about health and safety. And that means that developing the culture has taken a really different turn, we don't have those opportunities to influence and share culture, beyond the ones that we actively create, creating a culture where we are interacting with each other, you know, we have daily meetings where the whole team piles onto the call, we have social events that we've planned out that, you know, once a week, we have a lunchtime where we all come in, and we're not supposed to talk business, we're not great at not talking business, but we're working on it, the culture has to be conscious to a certain degree, but also, to a certain degree, I'm less in control of it than I would like to be because I'm not there. I'm not like, and no one's there, everyone's alone. And that's a really, really different dynamic than even a year ago that we would have had where at least I was in the office, you know, at least we were in the same physical location. And we don't see it going back, like the way that to us is evolving. We're going to be addressing, you know, North American, South America, pretty much right away, it doesn't make any sense to try and force that all into an office in Edmonton. Like, it just doesn't. So that's a question that, you know, if I hope you have lowly insight on because we're that's something we struggle with on a day to day basis. I do know, certainly for the, you know, our r&d team, they can be very uncomfortable with the challenges that we ask them for. And we've just tried to establish a culture of truth and openness. But the business decisions have to move forward. If I waited until my r&d team were comfortable, we'd be a couple years from now, probably until they wanted to release a product. So pushing those boundaries as part of my job. And trying to create an environment where my guys are comfortable enough to do that is something that that we work on all the time and is a truly unique challenge for this day and age. So I don't think I have a good answer. Is that the short answer to that one?

Angela Armstrong  44:16  
Well, it's the burning platform conversation. It's there was no choice. we iterated we move forward in the best way we know impossible. We have tried to evaluate what we needed over the last 12 to 15 months and companies like yours that have said, actually what's happened is tremendous potential potential creation of our business in a completely different way that maybe we didn't, we wouldn't have been able to move that rapidly. But using this fully remote platform. I have a friend who designs corporate culture, it's one of her her passions, and she works with organizations, not to say here's what your culture is, but to have discern it for themselves. Maybe because it is something that grows from the inside out the fact that you're physically remote. It only impedes your culture, if you allow it to, if you can still allow your team to say, What do what are my expectations about how 2S behaves? Because culture I  always feel is not What do we do? Or what do people think we are? It's how do we behave.  If there's a difficult point, if there's a conversation that needs to be had, if there's tension or conflict, what is our ethos around and using that word a lot? I feel like somebody from Princess Bride, I don't think that means that you think it means. Which is one of my favorite movies. But but I think this sense of culture being every employee's the answer to the question about what is your expectation or your experience that 2S what is the way in which they would manage this issue? If If this came up? And the answer to that question will probably become pretty close to defining your culture? Whether you like to hear that answer or not. Sometimes it's an uncomfortable answer. And you say, Oh, I didn't realize those are the the impacts of some things that we've done in the past, or maybe the type of people that are on board. And we have to shift that. Do you feel like you are going to have to bring in different kinds of thinkers as your team becomes fully remote? And how do you activate innovation, when you're really well distributed? Because you often hear about all use the time more an example of Google and these collisions, you know, we're going to put people in these environments where they can collide and water cooler ideas spring into life as a some kind of a new concept. How do you do that when you're all far apart from one another? Is it really focusing on back to solving those client problems and bringing those ideas back into the organization?

Anthea Sargeaunt  47:03  
I think it's about creating space for those kinds of interactions. The watercooler conversations weren't about the watercooler. You know, they were just about everybody being in the same room in a way that people felt like they could talk. So part of what we've really tried over the last year is to reward people for speaking up about anything like interrupting a meeting, you know, we reward the r&d guys, when they say no to us. That's, that's a moment when we when we pat them on the back, if they bring up issues, we're always telling them how, how pleased we are with that, because there isn't a casual way to do that anymore. It's got to be in these like, kind of orchestrated meetings, there's no just, I'll just pop by her office and mentioned it to her that doesn't exist anymore. So making sure that that that culture of openness and communication exists. And then that those opportunities exist, where, you know, yeah, we have our daily stand up meeting, does it wrap up every day, as soon as we're done? Oh, sometimes we hang on the line, and we just chat about what problems are facing and work and, and what ideas we might have. And we make sure that casual is part of it. And people are really adverse to meetings, and that they're like, Oh, what a waste of time. But, but that's how we can fake the water cooler is by providing that casual interaction time for our staff in digital ways. And they exist, and we're surprisingly comfortable using them, as long as we reward the behavior that we want to see. 

Angela Armstrong  48:38  
Well, I think that's a really great answer. And it's provocative because it means that you are actually going to be enabled by the diversity of peoples and places that your team end up originating from, as long as you can continue to have those informal. I think it's it's about generating trust and familiarity. So can I ask you, how do you reward people for stepping up in into them interrupting a Train of Thought or process? How do you reward that? It's really great.

Anthea Sargeaunt  49:11  
I have little kids. So I just rely on the old fashioned like, pat on the head style. I just call it out when I see it. Like, thank you so much for doing that. Did you guys just see how we did that? Because that was uncomfortable, like kudos. That's what I want to see. Like we were very intentional about that. And we have a bit of a wide range for generationally. So sometimes my co founder can bring in a little bit of that old world culture that I don't want necessarily to be our culture. You know, when I started the business, it was you come to work, if you're sick, you're at your desk, and you know, your 10 hours a day and you better be smiling when you're there. And so being intentional about the aspects that we don't want in our culture as well. When when something that's the the culture the old companies comes through that I don't want anymore. We call that out right away, too. And it's not against the person is no, that's not that's not our culture. That's not our culture to ask people to work on weekends when there's no reason to, that's not our culture to expect you to be here 10 hours a day, it's our culture to let you manage your life. And making sure that we're that we're calling on both the good and the bad in a way that that rewards the good but doesn't punish the bad but just draws attention to the fact that it's not how we want to proceed as a company.

Angela Armstrong  50:27  
How do you get to find what's the right recipe of types of people? Or the process of like, what is that that magic? intersection of of ingredients? where you say, Oh my gosh, the idea generation and the brainstorming the blue sky moment that just happened there was phenomenal.

Anthea Sargeaunt  50:51  
Um, well, I feel like I've maybe like hinted at this before when I was discussing tension. My my answer to that is the most diverse team possible like that you want everybody to be highly, highly different from different cultures from different backgrounds, introverts, extroverts, you know, different genders, different orientations of everything, because that's how you get real understanding and real dynamic.

Angela Armstrong  51:18  
When you start the work of shifting a traditional business into a new future oriented business, there are really important things you have to tackle. The Pillars of a new innovation, digital first enterprise that are essential to surviving include the challenges of remote workforces, maintaining effectiveness, productivity and culture when your team is widely distributed. In a research document from MIT, which surveyed over 500 companies, they believe that these four factors are critical. Impact, speed, openness, and autonomy, impact being defined as what is your vision to change the world that people can attach themselves to? Speed is your willingness to iterate before you have all the answers. In other words, you have to be able to hit go when go time comes around. Openness is your ability to engage with your team, and with broadly diverse sources to gain information and insight and share that very openly and transparently. There are no wrong answers. There are only ideas that you iterate down into something plausible and relevant for your clients. autonomy is how much discretion your team have to operate, make decisions, can they be creative and act? Or are they reliant on very formal structures and policies which hinder that creativity?

Anthea Sargeaunt  52:40  
All of those views need to be in there. And the more we have and the more we can balance against each other, the more likely we are to arrive at the right answer. So it's everything everything should go in the pot. It should be that minestrone where you reach into your fridge and get a little bit of everything that's in there.

Angela Armstrong  52:56  
What do you make, like when so you've got this great stew, or this minestrone? I love minestrone. So you've made this phenomenal minestrone. Your client asked for chicken noodle soup or or chicken noodle soup is what they eat every day for lunch at 12. Sharp, and in the same chair with the same soup and same soup spoon and bowl, and you're going to introduce this flavorful brand new construct to them. Do you feel like on the team side on the team on your client side, that you try to encourage them to have certain kind of depth of field as well as like that diversity of people around the table as well?

Anthea Sargeaunt  53:36  
That's a really interesting question, especially because the industry that we're working in, more often than not, my clients are very homogeneous in the fact that they're, you know, well educated male, probably between 30 and 50. They they've worked a career at heavy industry, you know, usually mostly at the same business. They're a very set group of people. And they You are right, they do not want to eat minestrone. That is not what they would like for dinner. They would like their their Kraft Dinner that they've been making every time and they tell us that they're very clear about it, is it and that's part of leads back to like, Why are these other companies solving a problem in a way that doesn't work? You know, if somebody's sitting there saying I would like Kraft Dinner, don't serve them minestrone. Like are my job is to create an amazing and functional culture within my team, but my job externally is to solve a problem in the way my client wants. And enforcing what I think is an excellent culture for my company, onto my clients isn't what they asked for. So much as I would like it and if they asked me I will tell them about the diversity of my team. And if they ask me how that works, I'm happy to share with them, but that's not my business and that's not what I'm selling. I'm selling a solution to a water problem. So that's what you know, they're not buying a bowl. Minnesota. So yeah, that's things that we want to encourage. And I would never let a client come into my team and and start judging people on my team, if I felt like there was discrimination coming from a client, that client would be done. But that doesn't mean I need to force them to embrace the values of our company either.

Angela Armstrong  55:17  
Well, and if they can't see the the unique solution that you're bringing to the table, then maybe they're not your client, the end of the day, right? Yeah, you're the kind of client that's got a values match, and that is willing to step a little bit outside of their known, but that's the challenge. And when you're doing something that's innovative, and stretching the boundaries, there's a lot of education you have to do you got to be really patient and find the client that's willing to go on that journey with you. How do you go? How do you do qualify? People, the right the right customer?

Anthea Sargeaunt  55:53  
So I'm, interestingly, even though we're early in our sales path, I feel I have a really strong answer for that one. There's one metric and there's one value that we look for in all our employees, that we also look for in our customers. And that's a commitment to environmental protection. If you're, if he you know, and I'm thrilled to say we found a strong strain in Vienna, that in the mining industry, where people want to go and go beyond that, that's where the line stops for us, is, we are on a mission to protect the world's water with real time data, I'm sure you've heard me say that before, I'm gonna say it a million times again. And if you're not on that mission, that's where we have a problem, you can not like the rest of what I do, and I'll still happily sell to you. But if you want to install that sensor so that you can get away with it, you know, in terrible environmental infractions, and you have the data, you need to say that you're you're okay, that's not for me, there, we're gonna walk away from knowing

Angela Armstrong  56:51  
how do you know when you've gone for a ways down the road with somebody that their commitment to this environmental, focus and protecting water? How do you do about a test you apply? Are there metrics that you look in within their organization to see, what are they actually acting on? versus what are they talking about?

Anthea Sargeaunt  57:13  
Um, I think for us, it's always been relatively clear in that customer discovery process. And it's part of being vocal about it. But like, I often start my conversations with that line that I just dropped on you, we're here to protect the environment with real time data, we don't shy away from our mission. And that's a bold thing to do in the mining industry, which is an industry that's been dominated by a reputation of poor environmental ism. And it's easy to tell for us certainly, because it's such a core directive, the people who are talking about bare minimum versus like, actually caring about those metrics and understanding. And I think, you know, to a certain degree, it's simplified for us. And then people who don't care in the mining industry are never going to buy our product. Because what, what's, you know, we've we've managed to niche ourselves so hard that we cannot been difficult to apply us outside of our core directive. But that's part of what we wanted to.

Angela Armstrong  58:11  
In 2018, the European Commission adopted the term cultural innovation, to acknowledge both the role that science has in modern society, and the aligned value that social and humanities are playing in the evolution of societies witness the rise of ESG. And its increasing importance, not just at the grassroots level, but at the corporate and international financier level as well. In today's world, a multidisciplinary team, not just a team of scientists are brought together to model problems and consider all of the intended and unintended consequences of innovations, and why when and how those innovations should be made, and applied in the world. The last few decades where we have witnessed the separation of culture and innovation is evident in North America, when we look at our ability to send devices into deep space to take pictures of faraway objects, but our failure to solve basic human hunger and housing issues in our own backyard. Culture innovation is a step beyond scientific innovation, where the idea of CO creation becomes important. The company and its customers can jointly agree on what value looks like, and how to create it, and how it will impact both the economic and social environments. The stakeholders to these decisions could have far reaching impacts on the world.

Anthea Sargeaunt  59:35  
To respond to your example of the entrepreneur with the problem and the data, one of my mentors, likes to drill this line into me, which is love the problem, not the solution. And that sounds like the key error that's happening here. And also kind of relates to what you were saying before about science versus business. But I really strongly believe that business benefits from being more scientifically rigorous by gathering the data and properly analyzing the data. He actually has everything he needs to to solve the problem, he's found the problem, that's actually the hardest part. And now it's just letting go of your solution or and figuring out what the actual solution to the problem is. And then maybe coming back and saying, What aspects of my original solution can we still apply, but unless you love that problem, and, and to a certain degree, that took some time for us as well, it took time to really love the problem, because it takes time to find the people who also love the problem who are out there, who you get enthusiastic when you talk about it. Now you do a lot of customer discoveries, and people aren't suffering that problem. You're doing customer discovery in the wrong silo. But you might not know that you might not feel that, that passion and really connect with that problem. So finding, identifying, quantifying and understanding that problem. that's step number one, and it comes before the product. And if you've gone the wrong way, then you have to let go of the product to understand the problem and then come back to the solution.

Angela Armstrong  1:01:05  
So do you have a part of this, this whole process this whole? I can tell it's obvious, you have a passion for it. That passion sometimes can drive you into that that tricky place where you've fallen in love with your solution instead of being dedicated to solving the problem. Do you ever find yourself tripping over that? Or if there's a thing that you personally tripped over? What's that?

Anthea Sargeaunt  1:01:34  
Well, I think that's why we run that intense dynamic of that high tension dynamic in the management team. Because I tend to fully commit to things. And then like, I will fully commit to one plan, you can talk me out of it. Now I'm fully committed to not doing that plan, I don't do things halfway. And that's not always an advantage, right? Because it means I don't necessarily fully ponder the ramifications of each decision. So having a management team where I'll call one person, and they'll say, you should absolutely do this call the next person, they'll say you should absolutely do this other thing really helps me get away from that bias, of getting committed to an idea. And then like 150% committed to it, whether or not it's the right path, which is so easy to do at this stage, like because things are moving quickly. And the stakes are high. And and everyone's passionate about what's happening. So that introspection sometimes needs to be forced, because flash decisions are often wrong decisions. 

Angela Armstrong  1:02:38  
that that's absolutely true. And I have been guilty of that many times in my career where I come up with a great idea, I invest in it, I persuade my team that we're going to go down that path. And then I only to migrate chagrin, because I never want to have trickle down consequences that impact my team negatively. But sometimes I've been guilty of that where I ran too hard on optimism. And the team had to come up behind me and you know, pick up the pieces and try to fit the square peg in the round hole. And I've learned now to make sure they're at the table and say, so there's an opportunity here and this is the problem. Can I get all your ideas? Have you ever heard of integrated project delivery? No, I haven't. It's a construction modality. It's kind of like, I call it design build on steroids. And I'm sure that's a horrible way to describe it from from the construction industry, the practitioners that are expert in this, but the idea is not one line goes on the piece of paper unless you have everybody around the table. So if you're going to build a building, you need the owner, you need the contractor, you need the tradespeople, you need the lighting supplier, you need the guide that's going to do the excavation, you need the plumber, you need the electrician, all these people that are going to weigh in at that moment to make the most cost effective, the most efficient solution. Beyond that there's a shared risk, shared profit pool shared outcomes. They have this thing that they call the big room. And everybody goes into the big room and says, Okay, here's a problem. Everybody stand around and look at the problem. And everybody says it goes, the one guy might say, well, what if we try that and then the next person might say, you know, Jane might say, yes, however, we would have to consider the this impact is that's going to trickle down. So there's no, there's no blame. There's no pointing the finger out. That's not my end of the boat that sinking. So I'm gonna sit back as my part's already done. It's shared risk, shared reward. And I love the idea of innovation. And it sounds like you've really cultivated that worked hard to cultivate that your team. There's shared outcomes, there's shared risk, we're we're not looking for consensus. We're collaborating to To get to the best outcome for the client and keeping the team in mind as well, because it impacts the team. This is a job that they have, they might love the job, but it's still work that they do that they want to feel purposeful and successful at.

Anthea Sargeaunt  1:05:13  
And I think I'm like hand in hand with that there's a really selfish reason for wanting that structure as well, is that when, when I make a bad decision, and of course I do that impacts the team. And that impacts the business because I am in a position where I can do that, I can make a decision that's really going to have amazingly bad ramifications on everybody, that is a possibility, by going through this process, and by knowing that everyone has been consulted, and that we've included as many viewpoints as possible, we made as logical a decision as possible. If I have to go back to my team and say, I think I was wrong, and I think we need to change tactics. And every time I've had to do that, my team have been there to say, okay, we made the best decision at the time that we could we use the information available, you didn't shoot from the hip, you did your best, let's just move on and get it done. As a first time CEO, as a female CEO of an entire team of men, in a heavy industry like that, it would be in arguable to say that I need that support, I need that backing of my team to not only believe in me, but also let me know that they believe in me, because what we're what I'm doing is not average. And and that comes with its own set of challenges. And I think that as entrepreneurs, we underestimate the real like monetary, actual value of our emotional state, on the team and on the business, and especially post COVID, I think that's been something that's been really top of mind. Because if before COVID, we have this opportunities, you know, we go on to these social events, and you meet up with other entrepreneurs and other people in the startup community, and they'd be, you're great everything's you're doing is great, didn't matter what you're doing, everybody there was great. And now we're cut off from all that support. How do we meet with we meet with mentors who are great, but they help us but they're also like you're doing this wrong, like, think think harder, and then go back and which is the support we need. But I think that we've underestimated the cost of losing that social support that we all took for granted to a certain degree before that.

Angela Armstrong  1:07:27  
So whenever we do with remote teams, we have to factor in ways to have points of connection points of building trust points of making sure that our collegial teams continue to be collegial and not feel like that somebody is dumping ownership on them of something that they didn't choose into. So it's nice that that's been a function of your focus in the last period as well. And you've had phenomenal success. I mean, you guys were just recognized with a with some clean tech awards, Canada's clean 50, you want to clean tech competition, recognition for the mining industry in the states Tell us about that

Anthea Sargeaunt  1:08:07  
mining clean technology challenge, which is put out once a year by the Colorado School of Mines, and picks the the best up and coming new technology, we were super honored to win. And it's real validation of the market that we've picked. And the mining industry is focused on on water right now. And it's created a lot of momentum for us that we're trying to do our best to take advantage of right now. But it was through opportunities created through COVID as well, because, you know, as as a mom of two small kids, we previously tried to minimize travel for myself. So would I have applied to the Colorado mining clean technology challenge, I don't know. Because that would involve me physically leaving and we were really conservative about the number of times I had to physically leave because, again, back to that emotional aspect that has a huge impact on my work life balance that I had to manage. So, you know, these opportunities, a lot of them came about because of COVID. And we've tried our best to take full advantage of them. And I hope that we maintain that kind of culture moving forward. And and for us now it's trying to leverage those opportunities in that recognition into as much market traction as we can. The mining industry is conservative. And having that validation is a great way to to knock down some of those early barriers to get to get that market penetration. So, so fingers crossed, it all comes together. But it's been it's been a great opportunity for us to to get that recognition and to get into those higher levels of those large mining organizations with it so

Angela Armstrong  1:09:42  
well they're silver linings of COVID. I've been saying this for most of the last year that there were things that were incredibly challenging and push our boundaries but the boundary pushing that occurred sometimes was challenging our own assumptions and biases and opening up things that wouldn't have been previously quite as normalized? So I think those are, those are phenomenal. What's your wish? If there is one thing that you could wish? Personally, I know what you want for the business. What do you wish for yourself as CEO? in your in your own growth journey over the next few years?

Anthea Sargeaunt  1:10:23  
Um, that's a good question. I think I'm, I'm really excited about the scale opportunity that's about to happen to us. So we're reaching the stage now where we're going to be building out that the infrastructure of the business and I think that's phenomenally exciting. I'm really excited about building out the the procedures and the and the structures to build a business. That's what I've trained to do my whole life. And I've never had the opportunity to do it from scratch. And I'm very excited about that, like, ridiculously I know, people don't like this part of the business. I'm so excited to do it. For myself, I think I'm the COVID. I am going back to that, again, it's really introduced surprisingly shocking. I mean, like, right when we got on this call, what's the first thing you said, like we're just going straight from meeting to meeting to meeting, and that's my life every day. And it's surprisingly overwhelming sometimes. And the stress of that and carries out across the family. So my big goal right now is to to find an equitable balance, where, where my company still accomplishes those goals and was important to affect the head of it. And I'm not going to not not overwhelmed but not maintaining that balance in the way that that needs to be maintained.

Angela Armstrong  1:11:42  
There is no question that water is a critical consideration for everyone on the planet. And Anthea's bold vision to protect the quality of water and earth is vast and daunting, as vast and daunting as the amount of water on the planet right now that's inaccessible for people to use. As an innovator, she knows that success will take a really tough combination of courage and vulnerability, courage to find the changemakers inside a traditionally oriented client set, encouraged to put their own business core values right out front, where it will inevitably limit their prospects to only those prospects who are fully aligned with their vision. It also takes vulnerability to be open to criticism, willing to lay down your passion from time to time and allow for constructive tension to live inside your organization. It takes vulnerability to also take a step back from your passionate viewpoint, to see through others critical lens and vulnerability to build and transform a business with a rich legacy into something resilient far into the future. The thing that's most inspiring to me, though, is that if people like Anthea succeed, maybe some of the one in nine people globally who drink water from unsafe sources(That's the entire population of Europe), the 1.1 billion people on the planet who don't have good access to water,  And the 2.7 billion who face periodic water scarcity will start enjoying a different kind of life without water as a daily struggle. I applaud the effort. And I'm glad to talk to people like Anthea. 

Join us our next episode of Prime for Growth, where we speak with somebody who's looking at food security, the issue of how do we eliminate high transportation costs and the risk of huge amounts of spoilage in our food, when we move it from the places where it grows to the places where it's consumed. Primed for Growth is produced by Prime capital, with support of Canadian western bank, the bank for entrepreneurs who is obsessed with your success, and the business execution specialists results unleashed, who help you bridge the gap between strategy and execution. Till next time, go forth and innovate.