Ric Elias

I think right now, to be successful in the next five years, you almost have to be willing to

re-underwrite your skillset.

You need people that really are in that mindset and mode.

If I were to be annoyingly reductive about the Red Venture stories, would it come down to you were just earlier and better at understanding how marketing was changing in the internet era than others?

That would not be accurate and that would over-inflate really.

what we did.

We did not know we were earlier.

Actually, I would argue that we were a little late.

We were late to mobile.

We're trying not to be late in AI, but we're also afraid to be too early.

I think we bet on ourselves.

We work collectively better than most, and we're hyper-competitive against ourselves.

And in life, a lot has to do with picking the right competitors.

And I always joke that if this building, this campus was in Silicon Valley, it would be irrelevant.

This region is something.

I love that saying that you can either be the tail of the lion or the head of the rat.

So we get great talent because all the schools around here, super talented kids that want to stay in this region and want to be in a place where they get trained, they get invested in, they are pushed on.

They love coming here.

We have insane talent coming here.

My sense is, and I'd love to just pick any example you want, that frequently you would