Roger Obando CTO of Baker Technologies

(Joel Beasley at 00:00:00) Today, we are talking to Roger, the CTO of Baker Technologies, and we discuss acting fast in an emerging market, advancements in cannabis tech. You can catch Roger at Tech on Broadway this Saturday in Los Angeles. All of this right here, right now on the Modern CTO podcast. Here we go. This is the Modern CTO podcast.

(Joel Beasley at 00:00:30) So I've got some good questions for you. We had a nice intro call yesterday to say hello. And I want to know how did you know that it was right to do this with Baker? Like, when you saw that everyone was going into this cannabis industry, what made you think, oh, customer loyalty slash point of sale, customer data? Like, what made you think that?

(Roger at 00:00:53) You know, I wish I could tell you that we had it all figured out from the start. But much like any other business, we started with a small piece of it and then listened to our customers. So what we started with was the online ordering portion of what we do today. And as we came to grow and speak to more dispensaries, we realized that the issue that we sought out to fix, you know, we identified the problem as too much demand, not enough supply for product. But at the same time, after rolling out the online ordering, which was the solution for that, we saw that the market shift was happening and that market saturation was coming down the line.

(Roger at 00:01:39) So we realized, oh, we're about to lose our market, and we need to figure out how to continue to grow. And that's when the whole how do you continue to engage and retain your customers became the main problem that we decided to solve. And that's where the loyalty platform came in.

(Joel Beasley at 00:01:55) Oh. Yeah. Because new markets are always volatile.

(Roger at 00:01:58) Oh, yeah. I mean, obviously, the marijuana market, cannabis market, is something that changes on a day-to-day basis. We, there's a joke that most of the companies in the space like to make, which is that the cannabis industry works in dog years.

(Joel Beasley at 00:02:12) Mm-hmm.

(Roger at 00:02:12) You know, so us being around three and a half years makes us twenty-plus year veterans of the space.

(Joel Beasley at 00:02:18) Absolutely. Because there's no one else to leverage the experience from you guys have at all.

(Roger at 00:02:22) Exactly right. You know, I mean, there are some companies that have been around a little bit longer, and we spoke about the point of sale market a little bit yesterday. Those guys have been around a little bit longer, but they're dealing with a very specific subset of the needs in the space from a technology perspective. You know, the rest of us, it's been, we watched the industry grow. We watched it become a thing, and there's been a lot of adjustment necessary.

(Joel Beasley at 00:02:48) I love when I hear you say things like, well, like any business, we started out and we had an idea and then we got some people and then we just listened to our customers because that is so rare. You'd be surprised.

(Roger at 00:02:59) Yeah. I mean, and the funny thing is, like, everything you read, everything people tell you revolves around that. And I feel like it's a very simple concept to grasp, but, you know, one of the things that I continue to talk about these days and I spend a lot of time thinking about is ego. Right? And to have the ego to think that you know the best solution to this industry that you've never been a part of is just ridiculous.

(Roger at 00:03:26) So to be able to go in and say, hey, we think we have a solution for this initial problem that gets our foot in the door. Now tell me what you need. And, you know, we, I think, have, are arguably the largest, in my mind, the best, technology team in the industry. So to have the sort of resources to say, okay. You have this problem. We'll address that problem. We'll fix that for you. We'll roll it into our roadmap, and then, you know, we'll roll it out to you. And then we continue to iterate in that same process, that same manner, and that's gotten us to where we're at today.

(Joel Beasley at 00:04:02) So did you start this on the idea like, did you start it when you knew that the legality was coming down the pipeline, like it was going to be legal, or did you start it after it was legal?

(Roger at 00:04:12) We started it right after the regulations passed for Colorado and Washington. So the vote passed and we knew that it was going to happen. And we identified, actually, the origin story of Baker is pretty funny. I have two co-founders and we met in New York City. We were all working at a co-working space together.

(Roger at 00:04:32) Through a series of events, I ended up sitting next to them. I, you know, I'd met the guys, but I'd never really worked with them. I was working on my previous startup and they were working on theirs. And I overheard them having a conversation about an event for cannabis legalization regulations. And at the time, I was already thinking about getting into the industry, and I had an idea.

(Roger at 00:04:53) And so I kind of butt into their conversation and asked them what they were talking about. After a few minutes, realized that their idea was way better than my idea. And as it turns out, they were a business guy and a product slash design guy. And I was like, well, I'm your tech guy. So we literally started the company that day.

(Roger at 00:05:09) It was something where, like, just these worlds collided. We were in the right place at the right time. We were all thinking about the same thing, and we identified that with legalization, there was going to be a need for tools in the space, you know, in the immediate future.

(Joel Beasley at 00:05:22) Oh, so smart. I love hearing the stories like that. And then you had great team, a team, and you've been in product for a long time. Like, technology teams, developing products is nothing that was new to you. Right?

(Roger at 00:05:35) Oh, no. I mean, I've, you know, I graduated, computer science degree from Duke University, in 2000 at the peak of the dot-com bubble. So, you know, and I was working professionally even before then. Even while I was in school, I, you know, interned at Lucent Technologies, and I've been doing side projects and working at different tech centers on campus. So, yeah, I've got over twenty years of experience of doing this, and it's been in, you know, everything from large multinational consulting firms to my own very small firm out of Los Angeles.

(Roger at 00:06:06) But even with that firm, I was working with, you know, the finance institutions and with entertainment brands and automotive companies. So, you know, I came to the table with twenty years of experience of having done this before.

(Joel Beasley at 00:06:19) Yeah. And it's, you know? So I'm going through getting my experience. Right?

(Joel Beasley at 00:06:25) I'm about sixteen, seventeen years into it. And so I was reflecting back on it. And I like when I'm talking to people like you that have large amounts of experience, because you kind of see you have all these different skills and you kind of grow them. Like if it's a video game, you have, you know, different skill levels and you're improving each one. And I find that the easiest one for me to improve was the technical knowledge, like, the how to write the good code and how to learn those types of things.

(Joel Beasley at 00:06:52) And the ones that took the most effort were the people things, like how to understand people, how to make them feel heard, how to communicate effectively, those types of qualities. What do you think?

(Roger at 00:07:03) You know, I think about that quite a bit. And in the position that I'm in right now, where, you know, our company is right around 60 people. My team alone is 14, not including myself. You know, I'm in a position where I continue to evaluate how do I provide value to my team. And, you know, the short answer is supporting my people and ensuring that they have a growth path that is outlined for them, that they know what their next steps are, and that they have a motivation to get to that point.

(Roger at 00:07:36) And I look back on why I feel that way, and it's really, it's all the experiences I had over the years as an engineer working somewhere. You know, I think one of my earliest, at my earliest job when I was back at Sapiens, I spent three and a half years as a senior engineer and never got promoted because I also have a visual design degree. So they were using me as a designer, as a front-end developer, as a back-end developer. And after three and a half years, I wasn't getting promoted because of the fact that I was spending too much time in each one of the different disciplines and not enough time in one. And that just felt like a slap in the face to me, you know, that, like, I was able to be flexible and to contribute in different ways and to not have a career path in front of me because of that seemed like counterintuitive.

(Roger at 00:08:22) So, you know, experiences like that along my career helped me identify that what people need is, one, they need to be autonomous. They need to be given purpose. They need to know that what they're doing is contributing to the overall good of the product in the company. But also they need to know what the next step is. They need to know where they're shooting for as far as a year, two years, three years down the line.

(Roger at 00:08:45) And I think at startups, it's easy to lose sight of that. You know, everyone is so just focused on, we have eight months of roadmap. We have six months of roadmap. We have eighteen months of runway, rather. And, you know, to not think about where your people are going to be, I think, is a real disservice to your company because that's how you lose good talent.

(Joel Beasley at 00:09:02) Well, I couldn't agree more. I'm a fan. I'm a fan of Roger. Yeah. You know, making, and this is something, I guess, you're experiencing now.

(Joel Beasley at 00:09:11) And the first thing I noticed is that you're kind of designing your company for the way you would want it to be. Right? Like, if you think you're being anthropomorphic and thinking about, if I was an engineer working at my company, how would I want it to be? You're doing that with all of your different divisions by developing your growth paths and really caring about the people. And it's so rewarding to care about people.

(Joel Beasley at 00:09:32) Like, it actually feels really good.

(Roger at 00:09:34) I completely agree, you know. And it's really interesting in that I was the founder who came to Denver first. You know, we started the company in New York, and we realized that if we were going to be successful, I had to be in Denver. One of us had to be in Denver, you know, pretty early on. And just due to the situation at the time, I was the one who had the most flexibility.

(Roger at 00:09:55) So I literally got in my car and drove out to Denver. And I was like, alright. I'm here. At the time, we had one intern, and it was myself and this intern. And we were doing everything, obviously, selling, building, what have you.

(Roger at 00:10:06) But because of that, I've always been the founder that everyone would see in-house. And it kind of put me in a position of being, you know, Baker dad. It's kind of a funny hashtag that we have here. You know, I've just been dad to these people for so long. And also, you know, I'm one of the older people at the office in the company.

(Roger at 00:10:26) So in a lot of ways, you know, I take that role very seriously in that, like, I treat them, as you said, as I would like to be treated myself. But I also, you know, want to make sure that they are getting that they're learning what they need to learn in order to be able to drive their career themselves, whether it's here or not.

(Joel Beasley at 00:10:42) Yes. That's it. That's all I have to say is yes. So meritocracy has been a pretty popular buzzword recently because of that one investor guy's book, Principles. Have you come across that word a lot lately?

(Roger at 00:10:54) You know, I think about it a lot. That's how I think, you know, in an ideal world. That's how organizations should be run. And I see that, you know, within my own team here. You know, we have, the age range of my team is anywhere from mid-forties all the way down to about 23.

(Roger at 00:11:17) And, you know, the position a person holds really has very little correlation to their age. It really has to do with who's willing to step up, who's doing the best work, who's going out there and teaching themselves new things and bringing that to the table, and really, you know, owning what they're doing. And then those are the people that rise to the top. I've worked in a lot of, no, not in, but with a lot of financial institutions, for example.

(Roger at 00:11:46) And it seems like there, you see the exact opposite. As long as you're willing to put in the time, as long as you're willing to put up with the pain, you're going to rise through the ranks. And, honestly, you know, I just, I don't see that leading to very many happy people. You know, I've got friends, you know, graduating from a school like Duke in 2000. I'd say, you know, nine out of 10 of my friends all went to be investment bankers.

(Roger at 00:12:10) That's just, you know, what they did. It's what you did when you graduated from school like that at that time. I was definitely the outlier. And I look back on the career of so many of those friends, and half of them are miserable. They're very wealthy.

(Roger at 00:12:22) They're very high up in their positions. And it's almost as if they, like, they can't afford to quit this job they hate. So, you know, I want to make sure that we don't end up with anyone in that position. And, you know, meritocracy, as much as some people would say it's an idealistic sort of situation, I think as part of a small organization where it's very clear who the best contributors are, I think is a great way to let people shine.

(Joel Beasley at 00:12:50) Well yeah. And it's very motivating too to know that if I put in effort and I'm creative and I go and learn more outside of my work, if I decide to use my free time to improve my skills versus running off and starting a startup and leaving the company, if I just improve my skills to be more valuable at that organization, then I can go places safely. I can rise through that organization safely without the risk of having to go off and do a startup or something like that. I mean, it's very motivating for your team to want to be better because they already have a platform where if they put more work into themselves, they will go farther.

(Roger at 00:13:30) I completely agree. And, you know, to see other people go through that. Right? To see, we have, you know, several young folks in our organization who came in as support people. And then they showed a real penchant as it were for product and understanding how a product works and understanding the shortcomings.

(Roger at 00:13:52) But not just that, figuring out how do you work around these shortcomings? How do you communicate with our customers that might be struggling at the time that, yes, what you're looking for may not exist right now. But if you do this, that, and the other, you can work around that situation. And, you know, a lot of those folks are in our product organization now because that's the kind of thinking you want in a product organization. You know, you want people to understand and not butt heads with your product.

(Roger at 00:14:16) You want them to be able to go in and understand it well enough that they can provide a solution, you know, whether or not they're developers. So, you know, I feel like that's another way in which you see someone who merits that position. They earned it. And everyone in the organization, there's no question as to why that person's there. You know?

(Roger at 00:14:33) They see. They've seen the history. They've seen the work they put in. They know why they got to that place.

(Joel Beasley at 00:14:37) Alright. So you're making me think all sorts of thoughts. I like Roger. Okay. So this just popped into my head randomly.

(Joel Beasley at 00:14:46) And I want to know, I guess I guess the way I'll state it is like this. So I had, I have a problem that I'm getting over or something that I'm working on. Right? And here's what it is. My dad took me to work with him at a very young age, like, eight years old.

(Joel Beasley at 00:15:03) He was taking me to work, like, way before, like, like, six years old or whatever. But around eight, he started putting me, like, in the cubicle, and then giving me a terminal to play with. Right? And I played some Carmen Sandiego on, like, a massive floppy disk, right, and some things like that. And then I started getting interested in doing more because there was only, like, six floppy disks I had.

(Joel Beasley at 00:15:26) Right? So I had a couple of games on the big floppies, and I was playing them, and then I got bored. And then that's so I started like, oh, like, look at this screen. I can, looks like a movie. I can type things into it and make it say hello back to me.

(Joel Beasley at 00:15:38) And then I started writing little functions and things like that. So then by the age of 10, I'm full on programming. That's all I really care about in life, right? And then I'm writing code.

(Joel Beasley at 00:15:50) I'm writing code. I'm writing code. And I start actually writing code that's being used in systems by 13, 14 as an intern for that company, just unofficially, right, because of child labor reasons.

(Joel Beasley at 00:16:02) So I'm always the young one, right? I'm always like the, "Oh look, it's Mitch's kid that he's bringing to work and all." Yeah, like, let him sit over there in the corner. Like, "Oh, give him this. Watch this. You go give him this task. He can do it." And I just, like, for me it was no different than when I went home after and played video games, right? It was just the same thing to me. So I was always the young one in the room. I'm 18 selling, you know, licensing my first technology for a million dollars, and I'm in a boardroom full of guys that look like my grandfather, right? And they're looking at me like, "Are we really buying this technology from this kid?" Right? So I've always felt this, like, I'm too young. I'm too young. I'm too young. Now, I have a four-month-old daughter and a wife, and I'm 30, and I'm starting to feel like I need to ditch that "I'm too young" thing.

(Roger at 00:16:50) I get that. And, you know, what's interesting in my position is something that's a blessing these days, but it was a curse for a long time, is that I look very young for my age. And so, you know, I started a consulting firm in Los Angeles, and I was maybe 25. And I would do things like be sure to wear my glasses as opposed to my contacts and, you know, dress probably a little bit better than most people in the meeting, just to be taken more seriously. And so I see that with a lot of the young people that work for me. And, you know, I'm very aware of the fact that I have the ability to influence a young person's kind of opinion of the company and about the way we do things. So I'm very cognizant of, you know, being sure to treat everyone equally and making sure to take the time for everyone regardless of age or status, just because, like you said, you know, I was used to being the brat in the room. I was used to being the young guy in the room, whether I was or not, whether I just looked it. You know, I remember being in that room and having those same, you know, grandfatherly-like people question the fact that we're signing over this $100,000 contract to this person.

(Joel Beasley at 00:18:02) Right.

(Roger at 00:18:03) So I think those past experiences definitely inform the way you act as a leader in a company.

(Joel Beasley at 00:18:08) Yeah. And I'm definitely breaking out of my shell recently, especially with this whole podcast, because, you know, it's just I realized that I am over this young thing and that the people I'm looking at now are, I go on Crunchbase, right? You look at the people who are getting funded and I'm like, "Oh my goodness, they look like my little nephews. You know, they're so young. Look at them. There's no way somebody gave them $5 million. Oh no, they're gonna make so many mistakes with that. I hope they have a good advisory board."

(Roger at 00:18:41) You see so much of that. And, you know, we went through 500 Startups. And you go to an accelerator program like that, you see the entire gamut. You know, there's the small startup that's two kids in college that just have a great idea, and they don't have any idea of how to build product. They have no idea about even how to go find technology partners to help them build it. And then you have the opposite end, which is you have startups that are, you know, four or five people in their forties who have been around the block a few times, and they have resources and they have networks. So, you know, seeing both of those sides, it's really interesting. It's perspective. It's like traveling, right? The more places you travel to, I think the better you understand any given individual. And so the more of these companies that you see and that you, you know, take the time to speak with these individuals, you know, the more, I guess, arrows you have in your quiver to deal with any sort of situation. And so with the young folks who work for me or who we might come across, it's always great to, like you said, anthropomorphize and put yourself in that situation and, you know, understand what might be going on in their heads.

(Joel Beasley at 00:19:55) Yeah. I mean, because it just boils back down to when you're doing that, you're just caring about people. So your products, you got a great UI team over there because they're very pretty. I like them. Very professional. What do your offices look like? Are they modern, clean, professional, open? What do they kind of look like?

(Roger at 00:20:13) Yeah. We actually just moved into our first office that is not a coworking space. We were bursting at the seams at a WeWork for the last two years. And now we have this incredible 10,000-square-foot space in downtown Denver, couple blocks from the ballpark. And my one of my business partners, David Champion, he has an architecture degree from Cambridge. So given the opportunity to design an office space, he was just chomping at the bit to make it happen. And, you know, I gotta say he knocked it out of the park. It's, you know, modern industrial space, wide open work areas with sit-to-stand desks. We have no offices. No execs get their offices. We don't, you know, again, meritocracy, we don't believe in that. We don't believe that just because you're senior, you deserve to have this private space. All of the breakout rooms are available to anyone who can use them. You know, we provide all the, not crazy. We're not crazy on the perks. We don't provide every snack you'd imagine, but coffee, kombucha, cold brew, couple snacks here and there. You know, generally speaking, making it a very cozy place to spend your day.

(Joel Beasley at 00:21:22) Yeah. You know, so when I had to get an office, well, because I have a four-month-old daughter. I have a nice home. Like, I built an office in my home, but my team was very remote for software development, all in the United States, just like, you know, California and Connecticut, things like that. So we didn't have much need to have a physical office. But when you have a four-month-old baby and you're doing a podcast, the Yeti will pick up the screaming from any corner of the earth. So we had to get an office. So I was looking, and I found one that was, like, you know, a giant, it had a giant open space, right? Like, 1,800 square feet, and it was a giant open space. I was like, "Oh, this is really, really cool." And then when I went to go set it up based on the need, I didn't necessarily think in my mind, you know, let's go do what everybody else does and go buy those standard-looking desks that everybody else has. I'm talking about the older stuff, not the cooler stand-up ones. But what my thought was is I've worked at home almost my whole life even when I've had companies with 60, 100 people because I like to control my environment and then go into the craziness. And that's just me personally, right? That's just how I like to live my life. So I designed my office to be a cozy home as well. We went to a home furniture store and furnished it like that versus the standard everyone gets a little desk and stuff. We have a giant table that we work at.

(Roger at 00:22:49) Yeah. You know, we have that too. That's a big part of what we have is communal work areas is how we refer to them. You know, I'm actually sitting in one of our five conference rooms right now, but the one to my left has an outdoor motif. So it's kind of paneled with log-looking panels, and there's just couches and a little kind of faux fireplace situation that's real cozy for everyone to kind of hang out in there. We have big tables in the kitchen that people could sit at together. We have our big conference room in the back that has a ping pong table in it that doubles as a conference room table. So there's definitely a lot of that. But I find that, you know, as you grow the organization and you have, at this point, we have our developers, we have our product people, we have our CS people, we have our salespeople. They all have very different needs. And, you know, our salespeople are on the phone all day long. They're at their desk standing or they're pacing or, you know, whatever. So having a mixed-use space has been a great idea for us, like, really being able to provide people with a variety of different sorts of environments in order to work in the best way they can.

(Joel Beasley at 00:23:55) Fantastic. That's what you want to do. You want to create an environment that's productive. Now when you have, we were talking about the stigma of being young. Well, there's also a stigma that is in the cannabis industry that everyone kind of has these pictures that pop into their head about what your business may be like simply because of the fact that you're in that industry. So is it like what they think, or is it different? You want to tell me a little bit about that?

(Roger at 00:24:24) Sure. I mean, that's something that, a piece of advice that someone gave me very early on when I joined the cannabis industry, was that you're gonna run into two different kinds of business people in the space. You're gonna have your businessmen who happen to work in cannabis, and you're gonna have your cannabis people who happen to be in business. And you want to work with the former and not the latter. And that's some of the best advice I've gotten since starting in this industry. Because, you know, if you think about the cannabis industry, it's been black market for decades, right? And you have these people that, surely they've done a great job with the limitations that they've had. But then as soon as legalization happened, everyone thought they could just kind of flip a light switch and go legit and run a business. But truth be told is, you know, it doesn't really work that way. You know, and in the early days, there was a lot of that real kind of small business trying to straddle that line of legal versus illegal, black market, white market. And a lot of the old habits died really hard. With us, we came in from the very beginning knowing that we wanted to do everything on the up and up. We knew that we are in a very precarious situation coming into an industry like cannabis. You know, you're really under a microscope. Everyone wants to make sure that you're doing everything on the up and up. So we were very, almost even overly eager to be able to show everyone that that was the case. As I mentioned earlier, this industry, it moves so quickly that the fact that we've been around for as long as we have and that we've just continued to be responsible and grow and show that you can build a software company in the cannabis space and have it be no different than a software company anywhere else, I think that's been a real kind of saving grace to what we've been doing here. And over the last few years, we've seen a lot, you know, most of those companies I was referring to, the smaller companies that were just kind of black market cannabis business people that tried to go legit, that, you know, they've suffered one of two fates. They've either been rolled up into a larger organization, or they've been, you know, they're no longer in business. So the maturation of the industry has been very interesting to watch, especially in the last, let's call it, you know, 12 to 18 months. You start to see, you know, Sand Hill Road VC capital coming in. You start to see executives from the Gap, from Target, from Walmart who are now jumping ship and coming to work in the cannabis industry. I mean, one of our clients in Washington state, the CEO is a former VP at Starbucks, right? You have these sorts of individuals who are coming into the industry, and they're really legitimizing a lot of what we've been doing for the last few years.

(Joel Beasley at 00:27:19) Well, it's kind of like when the ball starts rolling and everyone's kind of looking around. Are you guys joining in? Are you guys getting on? And then is this publicly acceptable? It's like, can we do this? And then once it hits scale, everyone's like, "Yeah, yeah, we have," and then all of a sudden it becomes a thing to have cannabis, some cannabis tech or cannabis something in your portfolio, you know?

(Roger at 00:27:40) Oh, yeah. Absolutely. And, you know, we always say that the first one through the wall is always the bloodiest, right? You know, the first ones who come out and do it are always gonna be the ones who take the most hits. And we've definitely had our share. Just like any other startup, you know, we've been in situations where we were close to running out of funding or where, you know, we lost a crucial portion of our customer base. And, you know, you start to wonder, you know, is what you're doing the right thing? It actually causes me to think about timing quite a bit. I think about timing of getting into this industry and how it was such a narrow window for us. Had we started six months later, we would not be nearly as relevant as we are. Had we started six months sooner, we probably would have run out of funding at a couple points. So, you know, it's amazing that the timing has played such a big role in what's happening in this industry.

(Joel Beasley at 00:28:34) Of course. And then you have the timing of your industry and being able to make, I think it's a lot about you too, making the decisions, right? Because the timing of the industry is one thing, but the micro decisions that you make on an everyday basis is also what keeps it going in the right direction. Your ability to see and analyze what's happening in the market and respond to it is the most important thing.

(Roger at 00:28:59) No, yeah. No doubt that that's been something that's been one of our better skills, to be able to identify. And, you know, even just based on what we were talking about earlier, when we figured out, "Oh, the online ordering is going to not grow at the pace that we thought, and what we really need to focus on is our ability to help them retain customers," right? Being able to say, "Yep, this is happening right now. This is what we should be getting after." That's really a skill that's been endlessly valuable for us. And, again, going back to that whole ego conversation, you know, having the ability to say, you know, "Let's be self-aware. Is what we're doing the best thing? Is there something we could be doing that would be better for our customers?" And the ability to say, "Okay, maybe we weren't right. Maybe we need to shift. Maybe we need to pivot." You know, that's been one of the things that's kept us going this long.

(Joel Beasley at 00:29:51) I've got some fun questions for you.

(Roger at 00:29:53) Sure.

(Joel Beasley at 00:29:54) So I got your picture up. I can see your face. It's awesome because you do look young. And if you see me, I always say, you know, "Oh, I'm 30 going on 16," right? Like, when I went to my photographer when she did the pictures for the whole show and everything, I said, you know, "Get some that, you know, don't make me look like a grandfather, but get some that don't make me look ultra young." Because if the right angle, I can look 18, right?

(Roger at 00:30:21) Yeah. I could see that. Yeah. I saw your LinkedIn profile picture. I kind of had the same thought that crossed my mind.

(Joel Beasley at 00:30:27) It's almost like an edge up in some cases because I get grossly underestimated when people just write me off, "Oh, he's a kid." I'm like, "Yes, please. Yes, I am. I'm a kid, and I don't know anything." That's where we're gonna go as we walk into this negotiation.

(Roger at 00:30:43) Absolutely agree. And the counterpoint to that is, you know, having twenty years of experience in the industry. For me, people will underestimate me, and you can say, oh, actually, I've been doing this for twenty years. And that will kind of put the shoe on the other foot.

(Joel Beasley at 00:30:57) You look like a musician. Do you play music?

(Roger at 00:31:01) I don't. But it's funny. I do have a lot of guys who work for me who do. I've seen that correlation in my entire career. A lot of really good developers play music.

(Joel Beasley at 00:31:10) Yeah. I play music. I play guitar and I play a little drum. I've been playing guitar for, like, I don't know, six years, but I've been playing drums for, like, the past year and a half, and I really like that, little piano and stuff. But, man, music is — we started listening. I'd never listened to techno before. Like, obviously, I knew what techno was, but we had never really listened to techno before. And then about three days ago, Jake started playing techno in the office, and I was like, oh, man, this is great background music for working if it's the right type of techno.

(Roger at 00:31:39) Yeah. I mean, I'm with you. I'm all over the map on music. Techno is great for programming, though. Anything without vocals, anything which is kind of like a constant beat without vocals, is great for programming.

(Joel Beasley at 00:31:49) Yeah. And running too. Really great for running. But like you said, I mean, I'm very, very diverse in my music. Just to give you some, like, real talk, there's this new movie called The Greatest Showman. Have you heard about that?

(Roger at 00:32:04) Oh, yeah. I've been wanting to go see that, actually.

(Joel Beasley at 00:32:06) So that's, like, actually, like, my hometown. The whole guy, like, the whole — his whole story.

(Roger at 00:32:11) Really? That's interesting.

(Joel Beasley at 00:32:13) Yeah. They actually use the elephants to make the bridge that connects one of our land areas to one of our islands.

(Roger at 00:32:19) What is your hometown?

(Joel Beasley at 00:32:20) Sarasota, Florida.

(Roger at 00:32:21) Oh, okay. I've been to Sarasota. It's been years ago, but, yeah, I've been to Sarasota. I had no idea.

(Joel Beasley at 00:32:26) They got popular because the economic development center got us listed as, like, the number one or two beach in the United States or the world or something, and then that just made our tourism go insane.

(Roger at 00:32:38) That's great. Florida strangely has a strong connection to the cannabis industry. A lot of the companies that were the early-stage technology companies in cannabis came out of Florida because Florida has, from what I understand, a disproportionate number of pharmaceutical companies in the country. And there's a lot of locations that are developing and producing pills. And a lot of the seed-to-sale software that you're seeing now, which is what the regulatory compliance software is referred to in the cannabis industry, are adaptations of similar software that was happening for pharmaceuticals in Florida.

(Joel Beasley at 00:33:18) Well, yeah. And so many people retire here. You know, you go out on a Friday night. You go to a bar, like, at seven or 8:00, and you'll find every other person in there is, you know, a 60 to 65-year-old retired person, multimillionaire. Move their company down here when they want, you know, just to go into a place to do some work. And we have a lot of medical stuff. You know, obviously, if you have an older population, you're going to get a lot of medical stuff and a lot of medical companies too.

(Roger at 00:33:49) Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, the medical marijuana market in Florida is going to flourish, in my opinion. It's going to do so well. I mean, I don't know how much you've been looking into this, but the data shows that in states where you legalized medicinal marijuana, opioid overdoses dropped by approximately, I think, 23%, because people start moving away from pharmaceuticals and start moving on to more natural medicine. And, you know, I'm not here to really, like, be that advocate for marijuana as medicine. I think there's plenty of people doing a very good job of that. But it really is kind of amazing when you see the numbers. And I think Florida will definitely benefit from that.

(Joel Beasley at 00:34:32) Yeah. I tend to be a human. And when you start, you know, saying things like you can't collect rainwater or you can't grow certain things in your garden and the government comes — like, I just — I'm not a fan of being told what not to do, provided it's like a basic human thing. Right?

(Roger at 00:34:53) I'm with you on that.

(Joel Beasley at 00:34:54) Yeah. Just like me as a person in general. But I — oh, The Greatest Showman. So I'm diverse in music as well. I just kind of wanted to embarrass myself a little bit because, uh, two or three days ago, we had a — I had a morning dance jam session with my wife and my four-month-old daughter to the soundtrack of The Greatest Showman, and it was quite fun.

(Roger at 00:35:19) I would imagine. I mean, I imagine any dance party with a child is always fun. They just make everything more fun, don't they? Like, you look at them and say to yourself, I should be having as much fun as this small person is having.

(Joel Beasley at 00:35:30) Yes. And every time I'm having a bad — like, anytime I'm getting, you know, distracted or something's going on — life — I'll just run home, run up to her and, like, tickle her. And she'll laugh, and I'll be like, oh, life is — this is — nothing else matters.

(Roger at 00:35:46) Exactly. Exactly. I don't have any kids of my own just yet, but I have a couple of nephews and a niece. And so I get my fix from them whenever I get a chance. But I completely agree. It really puts things in perspective.

(Joel Beasley at 00:35:57) I'm a big fan of Elon Musk. You like that guy?

(Roger at 00:36:00) Yes. I like a lot of things about Elon Musk. He's a pretty hard guy to keep up with these days, but, I think, you know, it's amazing what he's been able to accomplish in a lifetime. You know, he's accomplished in a lifetime what most people couldn't accomplish in three. So it's something to look up to for sure.

(Joel Beasley at 00:36:14) Right.

(Roger at 00:36:14) So it's something to look up to for sure.

(Joel Beasley at 00:36:16) And I wanted to know if there's a — this is a cannabis question because I'm not in a state where it's legal. So, or I'm not in a state where it's — whatever it is to where you can just go buy it.

(Roger at 00:36:28) Adult use, Joel.

(Joel Beasley at 00:36:30) What's the term?

(Roger at 00:36:31) Adult use.

(Joel Beasley at 00:36:32) Adult use. So you used another term the other day too when we got on the call, and you said consume. It's like you used it in a way you're like, yeah, we consume. I'm like, oh, that's like a thing people say. Got it.

(Roger at 00:36:42) Well, you know what's really interesting about that? Just to go off on a tangent a little bit. Right? We talked about how when starting in the cannabis industry, there's a tendency for people to dismiss you because of the fact that they think you're a pothead or they think you're always high. And so one of the tools that you need to use in order to just remove that stigma is to use more appropriate verbiage. Right? So we shy away from the term marijuana. You know, marijuana is a pejorative term. It was — the name comes from the fact that it was Latin Americans mostly who were consuming at the time when prohibition happened. And it was, you know, meant to disparage those users. Cannabis is not. Cannabis is the actual name of the plant. We use the term consume, so you don't find yourself saying, well, I smoke this or I smoke that. Because, and also just because of the way that the product, the market has matured, you know, we're not talking about just loose bud, you know. I mean, loose bud is great and there's people who really enjoy that, but there are topicals. There are tinctures. There are edibles. There are, you know, there are so many different ways of consuming that has kind of become the go-to terminology.

(Joel Beasley at 00:37:56) Yeah. Well, especially when you're in an area where there's — when it is legal, and then you have more options.

(Roger at 00:38:04) Oh, absolutely.

(Joel Beasley at 00:38:05) I think there's, like, one option in the place I live.

(Roger at 00:38:08) Well, yeah. We joke about how back in the day, when weed used to be binary, you either had weed or you didn't have weed. And nowadays, it's — there's definitely a lot more variety out there to choose from.

(Joel Beasley at 00:38:19) Here's a marketing idea for a cannabis company, and I'm going to strike marijuana from my vocabulary. I want them to create one with red hairs or take one with red hairs and then brand it to — it's for developers, and I want them to call it Raspberry Pi.

(Roger at 00:38:35) I like that. That's good. We're going to have to work on that one. Yeah. I'll talk to some people. We'll make it happen.

(Joel Beasley at 00:38:40) Push that through because, oh, man, that's — I'm not kidding you. The sales would just — you take a picture of that and you run it on Instagram or something to developers with, like, adrenal Raspberry Pi hashtag and the order is like —

(Roger at 00:38:54) Oh my God. That is actually a fantastic idea. There is a strain I happen to know called Cherry Pi. Uh, so I'm sure it's just a matter — and there are raspberry-named strains. So we'll get the cultivator to cross those breeds, and we'll get going on that right away.

(Joel Beasley at 00:39:06) So you're speaking on the 27th in San Francisco. Is that right?

(Roger at 00:39:11) Actually, not San Francisco. I'm in Los Angeles.

(Joel Beasley at 00:39:13) Los Angeles. My mistake.

(Roger at 00:39:15) Yeah. They're doing this great event. It's called Tech on Broadway. It's part of a larger event, which is Night on Broadway, which is kind of turning out to be, from what I understand, Los Angeles' version of South by Southwest. You know, Night on Broadway is really more to celebrate the arts and then Tech on Broadway is the tech portion, much like you're seeing at events like South by Southwest. So, yeah, I'm speaking on a panel on cannabis tech on the evening of the 27th, which is really great. As I was mentioning to you the other day, it's nice when we get the opportunity to represent in a non-cannabis-specific event. You know, obviously, we spend a lot of time at events for the cannabis industry, and I'm not even sure how many people understand how big those events can be. You know, we had MJ BizCon in Las Vegas in November, and I think something like 13,000 people attended or something along those lines. So to get the opportunity to speak to a non-cannabis-specific crowd is fantastic because you're — you know, it doesn't feel like you're shouting into an echo chamber. We all go to these cannabis events and we're all, you know, very much of the same mind. We all want legalization. We all want, you know, to continue the progress that we've seen in the industry. But when you go to these other events, it's, you know, you get a lot more people who are blank slates, and they don't really necessarily have their mind made up about what they think about it. So to be able to, you know, represent and show the rest of the world that we aren't a bunch of stoners, that we aren't all just, like, getting stoned in the office, that we're legitimate software companies and that we are no different than any other software company that they might run across — those are events that I really love speaking at.

(Joel Beasley at 00:40:57) Yeah. And I like that every day, it gets easier just to be you. You know? Like, it just gets easier and easier and easier just to be modern. And I know we're definitely a decade apart, but we've done, like, a lot of fighting to sell the future to the old guard.

(Roger at 00:41:14) Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, it's weird because when you're talking about tech, it's a different old guard. Right? Like, me coming out of school in 2000 and kind of jumping right into the startup world, or dotcom world rather, it's, you know, I feel very lucky that I was born at a time to where I could do that. You know, I've seen multiple bubbles. I've seen what happens when you get over-exuberance in a tech industry. And I feel really lucky about that. And you look at, you know, some of the younger folks that work here, that work for me, and, you know, they haven't known a world without the Internet. Right? So it's really weird to see like how those two worlds can collide and like how we can learn from each other. But when it comes to cannabis, what's actually very interesting is that having the older folks is beneficial for us these days. We have a lot of the baby boomers who, you know, might have gone to Vietnam, who smoked in the '60s and '70s, who, you know, really liked it. Then they got serious about their lives and they went and pursued a career and they went and had a family. And now they're retired and they're kind of like dabbling again. They're getting into the new cannabis culture. They're — it's nostalgic for them. They're, like, really enjoying coming back to it and also just being blown away by the advances that have happened in the last 40 years.

(Joel Beasley at 00:42:33) And I — when I — I was just thinking, I want to segment not on age with old guard, but with mindset. I've got very good friends who are VCs who are 70, 72, 73, and they think like a 35-year-old. It's not their age. It's the way that they think. What you were saying with the — like, one of the mindsets would be that you can only progress because of the amount of time you physically been present at the organization. Like, that's a segment that's dying, and I'm excited about that dying.

(Roger at 00:43:01) Oh, yeah. I couldn't agree more about that. You know, we talk about that. We talk about — you know, also, I think the way that you interact with the people that you work with. You know? In a lot of ways, at other organizations that were more old guard organizations, I wouldn't have nearly the close relationship that I have with my employees because of the fact that I should be senior leadership and I shouldn't be fraternizing with these people. Right? And I think that's all BS, quite honestly. You know, to not be too cliché about it. You know, these people are my family. I spend so much time with all these individuals, and to not be able to interact with them in that matter, I think would be a travesty.

(Joel Beasley at 00:43:36) So it's not awkward to have a — it's actually kind of positive to have a, like, a keg in a cowork space, you know, and it's always there, but people will only go grab it and tap the keg on, like, a Friday afternoon. Does that translate to cannabis?

(Roger at 00:43:52) You know, that's a really good question. There are companies here who promote the fact that they allow consumption at work. We have never been one of those companies. You know, we do have a fridge full of beers. And as you said, everyone just knows that you don't open that fridge before 5:00 or 5:30. Like, you just don't. You don't drink during the day. You don't — you know, it's counterproductive to the work that you're doing. And the comparison that I like to make is that if I worked at Jack Daniel's, I wouldn't be taking hits off of a fifth all day long either. Right? Like, I just — I wouldn't do that just because I work in that industry. So there are some parallels there, and that we do not allow consumption at work. But if it's after hours and someone steps outside with a vape pen, I'm not going to stop them. You know? If it's 5:30 or 6:00 and it's a Friday and someone wants to go outside and, you know, share a few hits of a vape pen with someone, sure. You know, it's your Friday and enjoy it. And I'll be inside, you know, having a beer and, you know, maybe someone else will go outside and take and do that.

(Joel Beasley at 00:44:54) So I've started consuming when — like, around 20. I consumed for the first time around, like, 22, 23. And just because — couple of friends, and it was — that was actually the very first time that I was, like, introduced to it. Like, I knew what it was, but that was the first time it actually came up in, like, my life in the real world, right, in front of me. So I was like, cool.

(Joel Beasley at 00:45:15) I'm a life scientist. I try things. I'm interested to know what this is all about. And then I was like, it's no big deal. Right?

(Roger at 00:45:22) Did you feel lied to in that moment like I did? When you first consume and you're like, this is no big deal. What the heck is everyone talking about?

(Joel Beasley at 00:45:30) Yeah. I was like, I can't believe it's such a big thing. Because you've seen politicians get roasted for it in high school. They, you know, consumed and it's like they're villainized for it. And I'm like, this is, you know, kind of fun a little bit. And so, anyway, it was very interesting.

(Joel Beasley at 00:45:50) Then off and on, recreationally with friends, you know, when the time was right. Just very similar to going out and drinking a little bit on a Saturday night, not getting hammered, just, you know, having a beer or two and hanging out. Right? And so then I found out that that whole concept existed. Like, you can consume too much, right? Just like drinking. And then off and on, recreationally for fun. And what I found was when I had my daughter, when my wife became pregnant, I was like, you know what? It's the act of the smoking, the smoke itself.

(Joel Beasley at 00:46:26) And I've been out to San Francisco quite a bit for conferences and things like that, and I had experienced edibles and all that good stuff. And I was just like, you know what? It's like a beer that you can't get in your state. It's like, I'm not going to go there just to get the beer, but if I'm there, I'll have a beer. And it would be nice if this beer was sold in my state so that every once in a while, I could go grab one. You know?

(Roger at 00:46:53) Yeah. Absolutely.

(Joel Beasley at 00:46:54) I think that's reasonable.

(Roger at 00:46:56) It's reasonable. And, you know, I want to talk about one thing you mentioned, which is very interesting in that the variety of product that's available to you is to where you can consume to your comfort level. Right? I mean, it's much like alcohol. Some people have a really high tolerance level. Some people don't. And the maturation of the market has led to all these products that are targeted towards different individuals. And having the adult use legalization happen means that that opens up to everybody. And also what happens that's very interesting is that you realize that what used to be called the medical market was never actually the medical market because it was needing to take care of everybody's needs and desires. Whereas when you have adult use and medical, what you start to see is that the medical shops end up really specializing in what will truly help someone who has a medical need for the plant.

(Roger at 00:47:54) And then when you end up in the adult use section, it's really kind of like a rainbow of everything else. You know, everything from super low dosage stuff to the more heavier sort of, you know, put you out sort of stuff that some people really enjoy. But it gives you the opportunity to identify where you fall on that spectrum. Whereas when the market's illegal, it's like we were saying earlier, it's kind of binary. You either have it or you don't.

(Joel Beasley at 00:48:21) Yeah. Yeah. It's like alcohol. You can go get the medical grade stuff or you can go to a bar.

(Roger at 00:48:26) Yeah. You know, but actually, it's really interesting. There's parallels during alcohol prohibition. Right? You couldn't find low alcohol level liquor back then. It was, you know, everyone was trying to get as much as they could get for as much bang for your buck was really what everyone was trying to get. And the same thing happened during marijuana prohibition and that everyone was trying to get the biggest bang for their buck. When you no longer have to worry about scarcity of product, it opens up opportunities for, you know, for a variety of desires. And I actually just read an article yesterday, which I thought was very interesting, about how they're predicting that once California gets up and running, one of the largest demographics they're going to have is millennial women, strictly because of the fact that millennial women right now are the largest consumers of wine in the country. That demographic is the largest consumer of wine. And they understand that, you know, much like a lot of people will want to go home and have a glass of wine to unwind, a lot of people want to go home and consume a little bit of cannabis to do the same thing.

(Roger at 00:49:31) And so, you know, it'll be really interesting to see how that plays out and see if that's truly the case. I think you get you and I in a room together, and we could just kind of go off on tangents all day long. So.

(Joel Beasley at 00:49:40) Yeah. I mean, look. That's the value. People listening. We have a little fun. We talk a little bit about, you know, just you're sitting there when people are listening to you, they're listening to you share your experience and they don't have that experience and that's where the value is. Thank you so much for listening to the Modern CTO Podcast. Share this. Get the word out. Thank you guys so much.

(Joel Beasley at 00:50:03) I couldn't do it without you. I appreciate it. You guys are the absolute best.