Build it and they will come: How to systematize data for the whole organization

Ryan Barry: Hi everybody and welcome to Season 9 of Inside Insights, a podcast powered by Zappi.

Ryan: My name is Ryan Barry. I'm very excited to kick off this season with one of my favorite people in the entire consumer insights industry, Helen Wolf, the Senior Director of Global Consumer Experience Insights. Helen, thank you so much for joining us. I'm so excited to share your story and your learnings with everybody on the podcast.

Helen Wolf: Thanks for having me, Ryan. And thanks for kicking off your latest season, season nine. It's been really fun working with you and Zappi for quite a few years now. And, uh, I look forward to seeing how the next few years kind of progress. 

Ryan: Yeah, it's going to be fun.

Ryan: I talk about this a lot. I think it's such an interesting time. And it has always been an interesting time to be at the center of consumer centricity. But I think now with the adoption of technology, with the things that we can do with models, it frees people like you up to do the more fun things, um, which I'm excited to get into with you.

Ryan: Um, I wanted to just start by saying there's a lot of people in corporate insights roles that have started in an agency and have moved over to corporate. There's a lot of people that are deeply grounded in best practices of marketing science and methodology. There's a lot of people who are good at stakeholder management.

Ryan: There's a lot of people who understand marketing, and there's a lot of people who are pragmatic about how they do all those things. There's very few people that can do all of that, and you are one of them. And it's genuinely been a pleasure to work with you. I'm a huge fan of yours, as you know, I tell your boss that every single time I talk to him, I love, I love your approach to doing the right thing, but not getting stuck in the weeds and constantly progressing your function, and everybody, we're going to share a little bit of Helen's journey as part of the team at Colgate, who's really helped them step change insights.

Ryan: I wanted to start this episode by embarrassing Helen with a compliment because I mean it, uh, you're awesome and if this industry had more people like you, we'd be flying. So thank you for everything you do for the customers. 

Helen: Oh, thanks, Ryan. That's really nice to hear. 

Ryan: Absolutely. So, alright, we've, as you said, we've been working together for a while.

Ryan: Before we hit record, we were reflecting on the early days of our relationship. Um, we'll talk about work stuff, but one of my fondest memories is when we kicked off our Insights Alliance. So I don't talk about this too often, but since it's in the book, I can now talk about it.

Ryan: We all met in Austin, Texas. And our mission for the weekend was a bunch of people, uh, coming together to create new solutions. Um, that new solution is now called Amplify. A lot of you listen and use it to test your ads. But my favorite memory of that weekend was, Helen, I think you were at least five months pregnant.

Ryan: And I remember vividly, we went line dancing, and I thought, that's pretty badass. Because you were, you were cutting up the line dancing rug. So I, it's like my, it's one of my fondest memories of you. It's awesome. 

Helen: I have to say that that memory, uh, of the weekend. Yeah. It's punctuated with fantastic flip charting and, you know, like great conversations with inspiring, uh, uh, people from across the industry.

Helen: And also the strong memory of, uh, the colors, the music, the, the sort of vague dizziness of, of line dancing. Um, and it was really, really good. 

Ryan: You know, look, I mean, that was it. That was a different time. That was before the pandemic at a time where. You know, people coming together was just easier. And I think as a business, we're starting to get back to that. But, um, I just want to start by saying that weekend kicked off one of the most fantastic collaborations I've ever seen, which is a group of corporate insights leaders collaborating together in a non competitive way to elevate, um, their, their work, not just in terms of the tools they use, but how they work.

Ryan: And Helen was a key part of that. So you've been part of the team driving digital transformation for a while. Um, we've been part of it. There's a lot of other companies that are part of it. Um, and there's been a lot of progress made. What are some of the learnings that you would share to others who are maybe earlier on in the journey from your experience of kind of paving the way on this front?

Helen: I think it requires a little bit of, um, the ability to sort of zoom out and zoom in. Um, and I think that's a core skill for folks in our industry that we need to keep an eye on the big picture and the detail that kind of powers it. Now it's very easy if you're, um, somebody who likes thinking big and has the ambition for doing things better and sees the vision for something like, um, the systematization of insights, the fact that we have everything in an integrated data set together that we can.

Helen: Leverage that to give us predictions and stop us from having to kind of keep retesting things. Some of the ambitions of that fully connected ecosystem are like they're inspiring and they help us give us a North Star and where we want to go, but we have to keep an eye also on the day to day and then zoom into what that actually means for running projects.

Helen: And if, if the, the. The building blocks don't fit together well enough. The tower itself is going to not have the structural rigidity that you need to get to that lofty goal. So, when we're thinking about this, it also comes down to not just, um, being clear on where you're going, but also the pathway to get there.

Helen: And that gets around to the idea of, uh, change management. And how do we need to spend a lot of time, more time thinking about that, that I think that I'd even realized, I don't know, even five years ago. 

Ryan: Yeah, it's interesting, because I think a lot of people forget the why, the anchor vision. 

Helen: Yeah. 

Ryan: But I like what you say, like, once you have that, the path to get there, uh, there's, there's, I think at this point it's old research, but I still, I still love it.

Ryan: It's from Gartner, and they studied a bunch of B2B decision making. And it was the person who brings fresh perspective and a clear path forward that usually can drive change, not necessarily the shiniest toy or, or what have you. And I think change management is one of the hardest parts where there's some components in things about change management that you can recall that maybe, maybe others can codify and help themselves a little bit because it's, it's hard work.

Ryan: Because most people like you are working in decentralized matrix organizations for the right reasons, right? Local P&Ls help activate local customers, there's value to that, but that also is quite hard to systematize. So any kind of lessons on the change management front? 

Helen: So there is a, you know, that, that wonderful phrase of uh, it's from field of dreams, I believe of build it and they will come, um, you know, that idea of, you know, you, you kind of have to prototype the vision, identify like how we can and I think you guys do a great job of this, how do we turn something that seems aspirational but slightly out of reach into something that feels concrete enough, that people can get their fingertips onto it a little bit.

Helen: And I think, you know, finding, identifying a demo identifying a good use case, um, identifying a way of, uh, like piloting something that kind of gets you towards where you want to go. So a good way to turn something that can feel a little tricky, a little aspirational, uh, into something that feels concrete.

Helen: And I think one of the things that we, we kind of forget, you know, we're not just trying to build a better mousetrap, but you do also have to build a better mousetrap, right? Like what, what is it, that idea of what is it you're firing? If you're hiring something like, what is it, what's the, what's the underlying problem that you're solving for the.

Helen: Teams will be using these techniques. What's their frustrations? And that comes down back to, you know, getting close to stakeholders, listening to what their needs are, um, finding those, those friction points that you can, um, look to, to solve, um, and identify which of those is relatively easily solvable, fits on the the pathway to the future vision that you have and can be kind of.

Helen: easily communicated and addressed that way. 

Ryan: Yeah. And the discovery point really resonates with me because, you know, you don't want to get hung up on a faster mouse trap, but if there isn't a problem, people won't change. And I think a lot of times what I've seen, Helen is like people get anchored in the global vision of systematization, standardization for the global benefit.

Ryan: But if you're a country manager in Italy, let's be honest, you care about the Italian P&L and like, how does that help you? And how does this agenda help you? And I think there's a real tension there. And so I know like when we started our work together, there was a lot of effort on the mousetrap because we, I think we all knew that if the thinking wasn't going to be better, why change?

Ryan: Um, because look, fast and cheap is a good thing. to a point. Um, but we need to make sure that when consumers are brought into the room, the recommendations that are being made are actually credible and going to drive more units, right? So it's, it's a, it's really interesting. So I think that discovery point is a key one.

Ryan: Um, and I think the other thing you said of breaking it into chunks really resonates with me. Like I, I, you know, I think where is their momentum in opt in and how do we focus there Versus Maybe where there isn't. And there's going to be a little bit of that in big companies that you have to contend with.

Helen: Yeah. We have a phrase, um, follow the sun that we use in innovation and in Colgate. And I really like that it's, it's sort of identifying where, like, you know, you can take it, you know, the light out of the tunnel or anything like that, but like, where is it that your pathway is most easily illuminated? How can you kind of get to, to where you want to go, uh, by, Looking towards, uh, a vision that kind of inspires you that way and taking steps towards it, etc.

Helen: But I think in general, people are pretty good, are better at kind of identifying shortcomings and I, and like focusing on problems than they are at Seeing opportunities. So you kind of have to partner both, right? You can demonstrate the opportunities. You can, um, make those more tangible, um, but in partnership you need to overcome the, the, the problems or the nickels, the whole thing's back.

Ryan: Well, and that's part of like, I think the legacy, uh, I don't even legacy. I mean, it's sort of in the DNA of a lot of insights, people, particularly. Let's be honest. It was 15 years ago. The job was risk mitigation. Yeah. It wasn't growth maximization. It was to bring data to help protect the company from making a bad decision.

Ryan: And so a lot of folks are just. I mean, they're trained and they're experts to spot flaws, to spot the problem, um, and I, I love to follow the sun because it's, it's just a great reminder, like, where is their momentum? Where can we go? Um, and, and I think how can you bring those people under the tent of the journey, right?

Ryan: Something I think you did very well is like, how, who are the people that are, want to go to the sun? How can they help build this? Um, and I think it's one of the things that a lot of central teams do, and I know there's been, you've had central. local and central again in your career, which we'll talk about in a second.

Ryan: But, um, I, I think a lot of teams in the center forget that, that bringing people in on their journey to the sun is the only way they're going to get there. 

Helen: 100%. Yeah, I completely agree. 

Ryan: So, okay. So when I met you, uh, you were in a global role. Then you were in a country specific role and now you're back in a global role.

Ryan: So take me through, I guess, the change that you've experienced. And obviously we don't want to expose any kind of Colgate dynamics specifically, but just in terms of six years ago, being in a capabilities role, then you're in a market, by the way, the U S market, which is the single biggest market that your company operates in.

Ryan: And now you're, I think, two years back into a more central role? That's right, yeah. So I guess the from to of that global role was really interesting for me to hear you talk about because I just think it's changed so much.

Helen: I think it's one of those things I was kind of feel it's a bit like a pendulum like, um, where different companies sit on that spectrum, I always kind of in my mind visit it like one of those, um, election, like positioning pendulums a big swing a thon that people have.

Helen: Where is the, the dynamics between local and global, and that that reflects the organizational structure that you're in you know, is this a top down kind of organization the bottom up organization, but increasingly like, It's a yes and answer to these two things, right? Um, I, I feel like the sort of the happy medium between the two, um, is looking at a little bit of understanding what are the, the, the challenges in terms of, you know, driving growth really does come from the, from the bottom up understanding what, um, the, the local.

Helen: Teams who are actually what we call winning on the ground trying to make sure that they are delivering the what they need to be successful, uh, at the the point where people are buying the products or services are interacting with the brands. How do we identify what? can help them continue to build that momentum.

Helen: And how can, at the top, how can global groups help to facilitate that? How to, how can we streamline the things that make it, that add friction into, into the work? And how can we, Provide the tools and the clarity and the setup that allows teams to focus more on the actual learnings and the actual opportunities rather than getting stuck in the, the, the mill of the process in that way.

Ryan: Yeah. I mean, I, I like that you say it's yes. And to Helen, cause like, I think at least from my experience, seven, eight years ago, a lot of global teams were vetting capabilities. But we weren't in the work. And I think the systematization swing enables us to think like, what are the right systems that we need and the right capabilities that we need and the right data that we need, but, but the right local nuance to bring to these things so that they actually work for the ecosystem.

Ryan: And I, I think I'm hopeful that the rise of like, big centralized COO driven digital transformation that consumer data gets into, keep it that way. I mean, I, I think, you know, like I work in software and we would never have three CRMs. We wouldn't have three ERPs. And I think a lot of Companies that are your size and scale.

Ryan: Not 10 years ago. We're like, wait, why do we have six different ERP systems, let alone 20 different ways to see if an idea is good or five different ways to track a brand. And, and I like, I like the empowerment of this because if it's locally relevant. The teams on the ground can spend their time impacting what happens on the ground, which is sort of the job in the first place.

Ryan: Uh, but there is a bit of a give and take there, which I know you, you sort of get well. Um, and it, and it must have been interesting to have the middle of your Colgate experience be in such a major market where it's like, if global doesn't do something that works for us, we can't use it because we're like, We're the biggest part of the P&L guys.

Ryan: Like, you know, it's, um, it's, it's quite interesting. 

Helen: I think that there's also the perspective of you need to understand the dynamics and you need to be able to get the context. Yeah. So as it's, there's a lot of, one of the core skills is, um, is listening. And I mean, one of the things I think I most enjoy about my work is the opportunity to collaborate, work together with, um, folks, uh, yes, across my function, across different parts of the business, but also across different functions within the business as well to understand where they're coming from and know what success looks like for them and what's sort of holding that back.

Helen: Um, it is sort of saying, right. Tell me about your situation. And then my job is thinking about, well, how do I take that up a level into a more conceptual framework and then solve problems at a more conceptual level? Rather than solving each individual problem, identify the suites of problems and the types of challenges that we can then help address that way.

Ryan: I love to hear this. So you're listening to stakeholders. I mean, there wasn't a time too, too long ago where most insights people said, this is what marketing wants. The fact that data and insights in your organization is in one place means you're naturally more cross functional. I love that. You're like, okay, what does the supply chain need?

Ryan: What does sales need? What does finance need? And that's serving as a basis point for the capabilities you develop. Is that still the way, is that a, is that an accurate reframe of what you said? 

Helen: Uh, yes, it's hard to intercept all of these things or to make all of these connections at the same time, a company, it's a very people oriented one.

Helen: So, you know, having a network is really important. And I have a lot of wonderful people I've worked with across, you know, across the business that I love to kind of check in with and get their thoughts on. But there's also a trust of like-minded partners in each division they understand.

Helen: better about what the demands are within that division, uh, cross functionally as well. Uh, so it is the task for all of us to not just listen to marketing, but also to listen to marketing and understand their point of view within the wider framework of the business and therefore improve our business acumen, et cetera.

Ryan: I love it. By the way, my comments aren't Anything to do with having a negative opinion of marketing. Marketing is really important. I think my comments are more inspired by what you say, because the customer should be an objective body that the whole company is leveraging to make better decisions. And, you know, we'll talk a little bit about the future, but I feel really strongly that if we can get the consumer and all the data companies like Colgate have about its customers codified better.

Ryan: Well, everybody can just have the coveted Jeff Bezos, what does the customer say, in their head as they're making decisions and, um, that's, I just think that's a better world for companies and obviously the consumers who, um, are going to hopefully buy your products and put them on their shelves, you know, so that's, it's just really exciting to hear that.

Ryan: And I think I have to say I think there's a stronger correlation to what you're saying when insights and data transformation are connected functions versus other organizations that I've seen where chief data officer chief insights officer or whatever those two titles are are fragmented and then as a result of that.

Ryan: Who owns the data is the fight, which is not even the right thing to ask. The company owns the data, you know? And it's profound to see the difference at Colgate within, you know, really a short amount of time in terms of the front two of capability.

Ryan: So that was really interesting. One of the things I'd love to talk about with you is a little bit about the future. So, okay, you've got to a place of standardization of key things the company needs to learn.

Ryan: Codification of what all the various stakeholders need to influence the evolution of capabilities. What do insights people spend their time on in that paradigm? And where do you see technology and insights people collaborating? As time goes on now that we've, you know, I think in the case of your organization, you're at a pretty advanced level relative to maybe some other organization, just because you've been on a journey for five years.

Ryan: So talk to me a little bit about what's next, given all the buzzwords of technology, but also the progress you've made in terms of building a set of tracks that Colgate can run on.

Helen: That's a, uh, a complex multifaceted question right. It would be remiss of me not to mention, uh, the, the elephant in everyone's room, which is AI and AI in our, in our world. And, um, it, it, to me, it's, it's very exciting to be in this moment in this industry. I think we're all figuring out how to use all the different capabilities of the best to our best advantage.

Helen: Right. So the, um, and I'm not just talking about generative AI, which has obviously got, um, its own specific cases and I think has somewhat, um, vampire some of the , the, the conversation, but also totally the machine learning. Um, part of the work as well, like, you know, being our ability to have predictions from data sets, right, be able to say, okay, well, we've run lots of tests like this.

Helen: We therefore think that potentially this is where we are starting. And, you know, we like, I think there's an opportunity to take the process and kind of reinsert what does this mean to us? We can at the moment, I feel like we may be a little bit.

Helen: Trying to get our arms around the process, but if there's I see a frontier where we start seeing it a little bit more like, okay, here's my hypothesis and let's validate that. I think that's one of the key things that I find helps turn something that is testing into learning. is to be able to say, okay, what's my expectation going in?

Helen: And this is where, you know, as an insights person, you probably need a little bit of experience, a little bit of, um, intuition, understanding of category as well, like it's, it, you need to know what, like where the, the, the baseline is or your null hypothesis. And that's ideal to capture that before you actually do work.

Ryan: So, you know, where what's interesting to me about that is, I think, like automation, which we were talking about seven years ago, it's a similar thing, right?

Ryan: Like, it was, it was enabling people's output to be greater. Which has kind of been the constant trend in this industry, from my perspective, like technology has just elevated the game, not replaced the game. 

Helen: Yes. I agree. Like technology is, um, there's, there is a risk that we can end up being servants to the technology because you can test everything that means that you do, and that, that's just.

Helen: Um, that's not learning that's testing for its own sake. And I think that we're at the phase where we're trying to kind of reinforce that the learning parts, the important piece. So putting in the fundamentals, like making sure that our are the data that lies at the core of the predictions or that that we're using to build models off of is a really good representation of the world.

Helen: Like if you're building up, you know, rubbish in, rubbish out type thing, let's make sure that we get, we have a true deep understanding of people. And we, I see frankly, a resurgence on the more fundamental, the foundational work that empowers everything. And then, uh, on the top, as we sort of flow on from that, make sure that you're not just testing.

Helen: to prove out your own ideas. It's that you have an idea as to where things are and then looking to be challenged against that or identify where things are kind of going differently. The generative eye side, I've, I kind of see it as a little bit, um, I mean, tapping into the ability that, you know, there's these amazing LLMs that have, surfacing thoughts and connecting dots in a way that perhaps we as humans don't always see.

Helen: And there's a tendency in quantitative market research to kind of push everything towards the mean and the outliers kind of get a miss a little bit, but generative AI can help flesh those out, bring those to the fore in a narrative way. Um, it's almost a bit like qualitative work where instead of looking to get representation, you're looking to learn all the richness of the ideas that exist out there.

Helen: I think generative AI can help us do that, in a really nicely story told way that can hopefully again, allow us to partner those things together. 

Ryan: Yeah. And I think like, I like what you say about the qualitative nature because Step one is sort of already done in your company's case, right? Like we test ads in a certain way.

Ryan: We test concepts in a certain way. We track brands in a certain way. We understand things in a certain way. All that data goes in one place. That means you put an LLM on top of it. It can cut across it and give you a representative view of what Colgate knows. But one of the things that really excites me, Helen, is like the evolution of how we can learn from customers.

Ryan: When data can be codified rapidly. I was reading this in HBR, I think a month ago, um, about data analytics being something that's, you know, really in the sweet spot of what a language model can do, and I've seen it. And as you've seen it with some of the stuff we've been collaborating on. So I think about it as, you know, just from a straight up, like technology perspective, how do you ask fewer questions in a more engaging way and leverage what you know about Helen?

Ryan: And how people like Helen think about advertising to learn new things, to test new assumptions. And I think that that falls in line with a mission critical imperative for this industry, which is data quality. If the data we're not collecting isn't representative and engaged and real, there's no point, right?

Ryan: And so I think we've got to attack that from a lot of angles, Helen, but if we can leverage technology to ask questions differently, And the systems are all integrated. Then you're kind of cooking with gas and, and I sit there and then go, okay, the system's integrated, the data's smarter, the mousetraps are more engaged.

Ryan: We're starting to get back to a more fundamental hypothesis and question asking what does an insights person spend their time doing? That's really motivating. What do you see? Is that like a future paradigm of where they actually spend their days? 

Helen: I certainly see that that that the skills of connecting the dots across multiple different sources of learning, uh, domains to, to kind of bring together, um, and, and sort of weight appropriately in terms of like how much confidence to put behind different sources, um, is something that will become a huge, differentiator, right?

Helen: So, um, mentioned earlier that businesses were in the past, we were looking to, you know, uh, risk mitigate, etc. And make sure that everything is the case. Well, I think here. Yeah, our jobs are now to help identify growth opportunities. Where is it that growth is going to come from? And how can we give the business confidence, to go after something, uh, that, could, you know, that it's one of many alternatives.

Helen: How do I flash up those alternatives and identify which of those we should have most confidence in? And I think that not only do we need, you know, market research style insights to get us there, but we also need to look at integrating the places where consumers are offering up, um, deeper learning.

Helen: proactively as well. So, you know, looking, leveraging social media and all the myriad, uh, places that we have as people to express ourselves. I'm not sure that as an industry, we do that as well as we potentially could. Um, and I'm excited to see how LLMs are going to kind of help. Turn the huge thick, both big and thick data that comes from that into something that we can truly leverage in our day to day.

Helen: And also this idea of making sure that we spend enough time seeing people holistically. So, not just through the lens of the products that they buy or use on a daily basis, but also how our products and services fit into their wider lives. What's driving them their wider lives in that arena as well.

Helen: And, you know, that's there. We have a ton of experience in this arena. Like that was something that the genesis of market research decades ago was exactly. Let's bring that over into the modern age and see how we can have technology help us do that. 

Ryan: Yeah, because that's the thing. Like, I get pissed a lot because all we talk about is technology sounds ironic because I obviously represent a technology company, but the purpose of technology is to enable an outcome, 

Helen: Right?

Ryan: So the standardization of systems and tools and the codification of multiple data sets. enables that holistic view. You've probably heard me complain about this. People don't just buy toothpaste. They then go eat junk food, then they drink beer, then they go to a concert, they sleep in late, and then they go to yoga.

Ryan: And understanding all of that makes you a better marketer and a better, a better operator. And I think what's, what I, what I hope anyway, is we, we have some people who are curating data and others who just understand it and are able to shepherd it. And, and I know that a lot of like bigger companies and sort of compensation dynamics get in the way of this, but I, I still yearn for a day where the whole company has access to what the consumer thinks and feels holistically accessible to them.

Ryan: And that's something that I do think. If set up correctly with the right guardrails, the right mousetraps, the right best practices, the right process governance, you can really unlock a lot of growth for a company and then have insights people who are genuinely storytellers curious about culture, shepherds of culture, be able to be in really high impact situations.

Ryan: And there's a from two there. Um, that's exciting to me, but I mean, you've seen some of this, right? So like, look, I mean, AI is going to have a similar elevation impact, I think, to what agility and automation had when it, when that was the vogue phrase. And I mean, I just think about that from an advertising or innovation perspective, which are the kinds of areas where we've collaborated.

Ryan: I mean, have you noticed a difference; test versus learn game, even in that early adoption? 

Helen: Think in some ways, uh, it's easier to see an innovation, sometimes because it is, as you, as you talk about that, that future where we have a greater understanding of, um, how humans are thinking and feeling. And we, we, Kind of tap into a corpus of understanding and a depth of understanding that helps us serve better opportunities and greater outcomes.

Helen: It is an easier leap in innovation to get to, well, what's the problem I'm solving? What's the job to be done in some of the other arenas? And there's a sort of an intuitive curiosity, um, that drives the innovation process. So I think that's where it is, you know, and, you know, it's by nature.

Helen: Uh, opportunity for feeding, right? So, you know, you're starting with this wide aperture and, as you're going on, you're narrowing, et cetera. And, uh, fleshing things out. That really lends itself to, uh, this being the leading edge for that type of thing. I think it's a little bit more tricky, for other parts of our growth, growth orientation when it comes to communication.

Ryan: What I see from a lot of our customers is advertising's harder to genuinely move from testing to learning because it's innately cross functional inside and outside the organization.

Ryan: And when I've seen it done well, you've got people staring at all the advertising learnings, the storyboards, and then amplifying ideas. It's just really easy to say and hard for companies to do because it involves agencies and media planners. And so it's definitely hard. Um, but I think the elevation that we're seeing in innovation and it also the infusion and innovation of what do we know about brand principles?

Ryan: What do we know about supply chain and how can we leverage AI agents to, to amplify a workshop that helps us come up with a bunch of ideas right in front of us. So I am very excited to, uh, to hang out with you soon in New York and to pave the next five years together, just like we did the last five.

Ryan:Thank you for joining me to kick off this season. It was really fun to talk to you and we don't get to talk enough. So we don't need a podcast as an excuse, but this was really lovely. 

Helen: Thank you so much Ryan. I look forward to seeing you in New York.

Helen: From having listened back to some of the podcasts, I discovered that you're a birder. I did not know that. 

Ryan: I am a birder! What's your favorite bird, Helen? 

Helen: Oh, so, uh, my favorite bird is the Karoo scrub robin from South Africa, which, my PhD was in behavioral ecology, which is looking at the field of understanding how behavior is shaped by evolution. And I looked at birds as model species. So I spent three and a half years putting spy cameras and microphones on bird nests. 

Ryan: All right, so now we know what we're talking about when we hang out. I have birdhouses and bird feeders and it's like my favorite thing. I'm not nearly as sophisticated as you, but I start every single day drinking a cup of coffee, staring out at the birds.

Ryan: My favorite bird is a cardinal because I think that being natural is crazy to me. I mean, it's just such a beautiful color. So yeah, shout out to all the bird lovers out there. Maybe we can pivot the podcast and just talk birds, you know?

Helen: Yeah, absolutely.

Ryan: And you know, as I've said on this podcast before, going outside and observing nature is a great way to unlock creativity and thinking in your subconscious.

Ryan: So, you can make fun of Helen and I, or you can go outside and appreciate nature because it's a beautiful thing. Um, we have a really interesting spin on season nine. This is the only episode that I'm going to be doing from the comfort of my home. We are hitting the road this fall because we are, uh, doing a bit of a tour.

Ryan: We co-authored a book with our friends at PepsiCo and featured stories like with Colgate and many of our other key customers in terms of work we've done. And we're going to try to break down for people how you can be more systematic and intentional. And also the theme of this season is Ryan's hitting the road.

Ryan: So Helen, thank you for being my last official day at home before I traveled 12 of the next 15 weeks. It was great to share this moment with you. Um, we've got a lot of exciting things coming up, so stay tuned. It's gonna be a fun season. If you want more ways to get involved, just hit up our website.

Ryan: We have a Connected Insights Conference. It's going to be amazing. We have the book coming out. We also have our weekly newsletters where we're breaking down ads and concepts and other things. So I hope you get some value from that. But this was super fun. I was so glad to kick off the season with you Helen.

Ryan: It's been a long time coming.

Helen: Thanks again and see you in New York. 

Ryan: Yeah, look forward to it.