679: Kat Cole - From Hooters Waitress to $500M CEO, You're Interviewing for Your Next Job Every Day, Learning vs. Ego, The Four Key Mindsets for Senior Leaders, and The Journey of Who You Become

**Ryan Hawk** (0:03)
Welcome to The Learning Leader Show.

**Ryan Hawk** (0:06)
I am your host, Ryan Hawk.

**Ryan Hawk** (0:09)
Thank you so much for being here. Go to learningleader.com for show notes of this, and all podcast episodes. Go to learningleader.com. Now, on to tonight's featured leader, one of my favorites. It's Kat Cole, CEO of AG1. When she was hired at AG1 a few years ago, they were doing $160 million in revenue.

**Ryan Hawk** (0:30)
Now, they're doing more than $500 million a year.

**Ryan Hawk** (0:35)
Before that, she was president of Cinnabon and Focus Brands. And before that, she started as a Hooters waitress who earned an MBA before her undergraduate degree.

**Ryan Hawk** (0:46)
I do not know anyone else who has done that.

**Ryan Hawk** (0:48)
We first recorded together in December 2015, more than a decade ago. It's episode number 78, one of my all-time favorites. We chose to do it again during this conversation we discussed.

**Ryan Hawk** (1:02)
The questions she asks and what she listens for in executive interviews and how they reveal whether someone can actually do the thing or just talk about it.

**Ryan Hawk** (1:13)
I love that Kat took us inside the room for this. And then the two questions she asked before every career move that have nothing to do with money or title. I think this would be helpful for you. And then how she adapted her communication style at Hooters to neutralize opposition without confrontation and what it taught her about leading in any environment. I think this story could be super helpful for someone, especially when you may find yourself in a situation where somebody opposes you for no reason at all, which is the case for Kat. Ladies and gentlemen, please enjoy my conversation with Kat Cole. This episode is brought to you by my friends at Insight Global. Insight Global is a staffing and professional services company dedicated to being the light to the world around them. If you need to hire one person, hire a team of people, or transform your business through Talent or Technical Services, Insight Global's team of 30,000 people around the world have the hustle and grit to deliver. Hiring can be tough, but hiring the right person can be magic. Visit insightglobal.com/learningleadertoday to learn more. That's insightglobal.com/learningleader.
Kat, it's so good to see you. Welcome back on The Learning Leader Show.

**Kat Cole** (2:46)
Thanks for having me.

**Ryan Hawk** (2:48)
11 years ago? I mean, 2015 was our first conversation. That's wild to me to think about.

**Kat Cole** (2:54)
That's bananas. I know.

**Ryan Hawk** (2:56)
Well, speaking of your life and what's changed, you go join AG1. Correct me if these numbers aren't fully right. I believe when you joined, the revenue was 160 million bucks in 2021 And now are you guys doing like 600 plus a year, million?

**Kat Cole** (3:14)
Yeah, we just, you know, for what we communicate, we're doing over half a billion in revenue for several years and profitable. So it's been a pretty wild ride. We've over 3x'ed the business.

**Ryan Hawk** (3:27)
I mean, that's an insane amount of growth. What do you feel like has been the key or the keys to that?

**Kat Cole** (3:31)
It's the product, man. It's like because there have been so many times that we weren't doing things as well as we could be certain marketing approaches or even channels. We were in one channel for 15 years, only D to C. 80% of retail is in brick and mortar retail. So we're doing that volume and less than 20% of where the transactions happen. And so arguably, we were limiting ourselves in a lot of ways. And so what that points to is a lot of people who love the product and keep buying it for a long time and who tell their friends. There is no way you get to those numbers in that short of a time without customers who make this a very serious, consistent part of their lives and have for years, right? So there's compounding revenue, there's compounding growth year over year from existing customers from previous years. And then they tell their mom or they tell their sister or they tell their husband.
And they tell their aunts. And then, yes, we still keep investing and try to get better at traditional business marketing and growth. But you don't get our level of growth and success at that scale. It's really hard to keep growing at that scale without people being really happy with the product. So that's it. There's a lot of other things on top of it, but that's the one variable that you can't remove and get the same outcome. You can't market your way out of that not being true.