In this episode, we sit down with Preethi Menon, Senior Vice President of Integrations and Partnerships at Empower Aesthetics. After nearly a decade in consulting, Preethi joined the CXO Fellows Program and stepped into the challenge of building Empower from the ground up. She reflects on lessons from scaling the company, including overcoming perfectionism, embracing accountability, and moving fast to create value. Preethi also underscores the importance of humility, strong relationships, and the CXO peer network in her growth as a leader.

Key Takeaways:

• Learning to value progress over perfection helps leaders in young companies move with speed, capture opportunities, and create meaningful value before the moment passes
• Taking full ownership means recognizing that every choice and relationship matters, and leaders are directly accountable for the outcomes that shape the business
• Earning trust with founders and partners comes from humility and being willing to roll up your sleeves, especially when transitions bring uncertainty and change
• Leaning on a network of peers gives young leaders the perspective and encouragement they need to navigate the challenges of building a company from the ground up

Chapters:

• 00:00 - Introduction
• 07:42 - The Early-Stage
• 11:16 - Operational Learning Curves
• 18:15 - Building Great Companies
• 23:24 - Lessons Learned

Listen to our podcasts at:

https://www.shorecp.university/podcasts

You’ll also find other Bigger. Stronger. Faster. episodes, alongside our Microcap Moments and Everyday Heroes series—highlighting the people and stories that make the microcap space unique.

Other ways to connect:

Blog: https://www.shorecp.university/blog

Shore Capital University: https://www.shorecp.university/

Shore Capital Partners: https://www.shorecp.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/shore-university

This podcast is the property of Shore Capital Partners LLC. None of the content herein is investment advice, an offer of investment advisory services, or a recommendation or offer relating to any security. See the “Terms of Use” page on the Shore Capital website for other important information.

Anderson Williams: 00:00:18

Welcome to Bigger.

Anderson Williams: 00:00:19

Stronger.

Anderson Williams: 00:00:19

Faster.

Anderson Williams: 00:00:20

the podcast exploring how Shore Capital Partners brings billion-dollar resources to the lower middle market space.

Anderson Williams: 00:00:26

In this episode, I talk with Preethi Menon, the Senior Vice President of Integrations and Partnerships at Empower Aesthetic and a member of the Shore Capital CXO Fellows Program.

Anderson Williams: 00:00:35

Preethi explains why after a highly successful decade in consulting and with a clear career path in front of her, she made the jump to the CXO Fellows Program and Empower.

Anderson Williams: 00:00:44

She talks about building chairs for their first office and the experience of building a company from the earliest days with tons of opportunity, but no momentum and the feeling of pride and ownership for having her fingerprints on nearly every part of the business.

Anderson Williams: 00:00:59

Preethi offers important wisdom from a career of high achievement about the challenges of overcoming perfectionism in herself and her work for the sake of speed and value creation in a rapidly changing company.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:11

Finally, she talks about the importance of relationships, humility, and continuing to learn from and lean on her colleagues at Empower and in the CXO Fellows Program to expedite our own growth.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:22

To strengthen her team performance and to optimize value creation.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:27

To get started, will you just introduce yourself, say your name, what you do, and where you do it.

Preethi Menon: 00:01:31

I'm Preethi Menon.

Preethi Menon: 00:01:33

I'm the Senior Vice President of Integrations and Partnerships at Empower Aesthetics.

Preethi Menon: 00:01:37

We are a med spa platform, so think Botox and filler clinics, and we're based out of Austin and we also have members in Chicago.

Preethi Menon: 00:01:45

So kind of two cities.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:46

And your background includes some McKinsey time, some Accenture time, so got some big names and big experiences.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:53

What brought you to the CXO Program and specifically perhaps to Empower.

Preethi Menon: 00:01:59

I, um, basically grew up in consulting, almost a decade there.

Preethi Menon: 00:02:02

What brought me to Empower was I was in consulting, kind of minding my own business, thought this was gonna be my path, and then the opportunity of CXOs came up on the radar in LinkedIn.

Preethi Menon: 00:02:13

And at that point I really had this like fork in the road, whether to continue in the consulting path and go through the engagement manager, associate partner, partner route, or go into CXO.

Preethi Menon: 00:02:23

And what I will say for anybody who has, kind of, a foot in either area or has opportunities in both.

Preethi Menon: 00:02:30

One, congrats, that's huge.

Preethi Menon: 00:02:32

Um, you're clearly very smart and intelligent, and two, it depends on where you see yourself in the next five years.

Preethi Menon: 00:02:39

So that's the advice I had received from someone that was like, what do you want to do?

Preethi Menon: 00:02:43

What brings you joy and what drains you?

Preethi Menon: 00:02:45

In the consulting world, you build skill sets and I feel like I had tools in my toolbox to now be able to go into the CXO Program or Shore or microcap or private equity to build something beyond me.

Preethi Menon: 00:02:59

This is further from a project that's just kind of implemented where you are focused on, Hey, let's deliver what, whatever is in the statement of work.

Preethi Menon: 00:03:07

You are here building something that's greater involving people.

Preethi Menon: 00:03:10

Employing people.

Preethi Menon: 00:03:11

You're able to put people to work and you know, give them a livelihood.

Preethi Menon: 00:03:15

So that was kind of mainly my decision.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:17

And that sounds fantastic.

Preethi Menon: 00:03:18

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:19

But having been in consulting for 10 years, you were giving up a lot.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:23

It wasn't that you were in consulting for two years.

Preethi Menon: 00:03:25

Sure.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:26

You had a career journey and there was pretty well a path mapped out in front of you.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:30

That was probably a pretty nice life to look ahead of.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:34

Talk about giving that up as much as what you were running toward.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:38

How did you think about it?

Anderson Williams: 00:03:39

How did you process?

Anderson Williams: 00:03:40

What did your family think?

Preethi Menon: 00:03:41

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:42

In giving up that kind of a career.

Preethi Menon: 00:03:44

Yeah, that's a great question.

Preethi Menon: 00:03:45

So to answer that better, I'll have to take a step back and probably talk about what I did.

Preethi Menon: 00:03:50

To show you what I kind of had to give up.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:53

Yeah.

Preethi Menon: 00:03:53

And so at Accenture, I joined in 2015, and this was the time when the Obama administration was basically putting a push towards the adoption of electronic medical records and electronic health records.

Preethi Menon: 00:04:05

So there was a really big enforcement for payers and providers to get on these electronic systems and resources.

Preethi Menon: 00:04:11

So I was selected to be a part of Kaiser Permanente transformation, which is a payer and provider in the West Coast and Blue Cross Blue Shield's transformation.

Preethi Menon: 00:04:19

So they had Epic, which is an EMR implementation software.

Preethi Menon: 00:04:23

And so we were implementing Epic in every single Kaiser Permanente hospital and payer system along with Blue Cross Blue Shield.

Preethi Menon: 00:04:30

I had a team in Accenture, internal onshore.

Preethi Menon: 00:04:33

I had a team, Accenture offshore in India, and I had a team onshore Kaiser Permanente.

Preethi Menon: 00:04:39

So I had a team of 20 people to kind of make this happen.

Preethi Menon: 00:04:42

And in my early twenties, I was managing a team of 20 people.

Preethi Menon: 00:04:45

That was huge, my parents were like, this is incredible.

Preethi Menon: 00:04:47

We thought the only outcome of higher education was being a doctor or lawyer, this is so cool what you're able to do.

Preethi Menon: 00:04:53

And I really cared about the impact.

Preethi Menon: 00:04:55

So from an early age, I realized I didn't want to just do a strategy, recommend something as an unbiased person and be like, here you go.

Preethi Menon: 00:05:02

I want to handhold people.

Preethi Menon: 00:05:04

I want to motivate people.

Preethi Menon: 00:05:05

I want to engage with people to make an impact and make a difference.

Preethi Menon: 00:05:08

And so I did that at Accenture, then moved to McKinsey.

Preethi Menon: 00:05:10

At McKinsey, I was involved in the public sector and the private sector for payer and provider strategy.

Preethi Menon: 00:05:15

So in the public sector, think we're in Tennessee right now.

Preethi Menon: 00:05:18

State of Tennessee has X number of funds and they wanna implement public health initiatives, which is actually my background.

Preethi Menon: 00:05:24

I'm actually an epidemiologist by training before my MBA in my business world.

Preethi Menon: 00:05:28

So I got to tap into that, which was really exciting.

Preethi Menon: 00:05:32

But if Tennessee has X number of funds and they wanna implement public healthcare initiatives, we need to look at Tennessean cities.

Preethi Menon: 00:05:38

Do we wanna implement nutrition initiatives?

Preethi Menon: 00:05:40

Because maybe it's a food desert and we can help youth and young adults.

Preethi Menon: 00:05:43

Do we wanna implement community impacts?

Preethi Menon: 00:05:45

Because cardiovascular incidents and prevalence is high, right?

Preethi Menon: 00:05:48

So those kind of works in the public sector and in the private sector.

Preethi Menon: 00:05:50

How is doing M&A, corporate M&A, so think large pharma company buying a smaller pharma company, what is the future gonna look like for them?

Preethi Menon: 00:05:57

What is the path forward for them?

Preethi Menon: 00:05:58

So incredible impact, incredible work that I'm doing.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:02

And I, in my mind, was really set.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:05

I was at McKinsey at that point, so I wanted to be an engagement manager, associate partner, partner.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:09

I had a team.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:10

I knew my tribe.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:11

And McKinsey has a saying that says, make your own McKinsey.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:14

And I felt like I'd really mastered that.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:16

I was like, okay, these are my people.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:17

These are my tribe, these are my resources and I'm gonna make my career what I want it to be.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:21

At that point, Connor from Shore had slid in my LinkedIn DM. Oh, with an opportunity and said, Hey, this is based out of Austin.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:28

This is really cool.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:29

It's a med spa platform that we can build.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:31

And the CEO is this person, the team is this person, just come and meet.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:35

We would just love to have you be open to this experience.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:38

My parents have always told me, never say no to any window.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:42

You never know what could happen and so open myself up to that and that's where I was really struggling.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:47

You can ask anybody at Shore and they will say I was probably the hardest person to convert into a yes.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:52

Because I really did see myself in these both trajectories having a career.

Preethi Menon: 00:06:56

Anybody who is in that position, I would say know that certain companies like McKinsey, Accenture, they are always gonna be there.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:03

They are tried and true.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:04

They're excellent, and they are the best and the best for a reason.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:08

Opportunities in the portfolio world are so rare.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:11

After I said yes to this, Shore Capital Partners has invested in so many other cool verticals and so many other cool industries within healthcare; veterinary, orthodontics.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:21

This is a once in a lifetime opportunity.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:23

If it doesn't pan out, that's okay.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:24

I tried, right, and I gave it my all.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:26

Worst case, I would apply to Accenture again.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:29

I would apply to McKinsey again.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:30

I have my tribe, I have my resources, and if that network is true, then those opportunities will be there in the future.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:37

But this is something I just had to take a shot at.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:39

I love it.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:40

So now you're at Empower.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:41

Now I'm at Empower.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:42

Tell us a little bit about Empower, and you gave a little bit of an overview of what you do just as a med spa, but give us a sense of the stage of the company in terms of size and growth and that kind of thing, so that we understand the environment you're living in these days.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:55

Yeah, of course.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:56

So I came on to Empower over two years ago.

Preethi Menon: 00:07:59

So it was 2023 and at that point we had one platform practice, four locations, and I was employee number three or four.

Preethi Menon: 00:08:07

So pretty early on and we had a med spa platform practice, basically four locations in the northeast that we had partnered with, we were excited about, and I came on as the integrations head.

Preethi Menon: 00:08:18

So, integrations is kind of used everywhere, very vague.

Preethi Menon: 00:08:21

In our world.

Preethi Menon: 00:08:22

In microcap private equity integrations is when you find a clinic or a med spa practice that you want to integrate.

Preethi Menon: 00:08:30

You want to M&A into your roll-up platform.

Preethi Menon: 00:08:33

You are basically a fabric and you're trying to weave this practice into the fabric.

Preethi Menon: 00:08:38

And so that's my role, making sure once we close our partnership, so closing a partnership is almost like closing a deal on a home, right?

Preethi Menon: 00:08:46

So once we close the partnership and we've officially completed M&A, how do we make sure the bank has been transitioned and it's all coming out of Empower?

Preethi Menon: 00:08:53

The payroll, the team is getting their paychecks from Empower Aesthetics.

Preethi Menon: 00:08:57

Marketing engine we are using our resources through a centralized marketing promotion and discount strategy plan rollout.

Preethi Menon: 00:09:04

So that's what integrations is.

Preethi Menon: 00:09:06

And I was brought on because we were gonna be a heavy M&A platform, so we were going to find med spa practices that hit our criteria based on geography, based on size, based on team, based on compliance, to integrate them into our platform and to grow them year-over-year.

Preethi Menon: 00:09:23

So that's how we started off.

Preethi Menon: 00:09:25

Two years ago we had four locations, and now two years later, we have nine to 10 brands and it's at 19 locations now.

Preethi Menon: 00:09:33

So it's incredible what the growth has been.

Preethi Menon: 00:09:35

And when I first started out, I had been involved in corporate M&A, so I knew what M&A looks like.

Preethi Menon: 00:09:42

When a large pharmaceutical company buys a small pharmaceutical company, so you have two HRs, two sales, how do we figure out the path forward?

Preethi Menon: 00:09:48

Here this was completely foreign and at McKinsey, at Accenture.

Preethi Menon: 00:09:52

Another thing I wanna add is you have so many resources through a library.

Preethi Menon: 00:09:57

Accenture has their library that you can pull decks from.

Preethi Menon: 00:10:00

McKinsey has their library in the CXO world and the Shore world, our resources are humans and our resources are truly human capital.

Preethi Menon: 00:10:08

So with the CXO Program, what I loved is.

Preethi Menon: 00:10:10

You have the opportunity to meet the best of the best in every single area.

Preethi Menon: 00:10:15

The best of the best in integrations, best of the best in M&A and BD, and you're able to learn their lessons and where they hit pitfalls and where they improved.

Preethi Menon: 00:10:24

So McKinsey says, make your own McKinsey.

Preethi Menon: 00:10:26

You can build your own adventure and your career here.

Preethi Menon: 00:10:29

At the CXO Program, you start out as kind of a generalist, figuring out which platform you're gonna be assigned to.

Preethi Menon: 00:10:35

Once you're assigned, you're learning the practice and you're, again, jack of all trades, right?

Preethi Menon: 00:10:40

So if you come from a consulting background, it's a perfect transition.

Preethi Menon: 00:10:43

You're putting your hat in the HR world, in the finance world, in the accounting world, and you can see, hey, these things spark joy and really, really make me happy.

Preethi Menon: 00:10:51

These things drain me.

Preethi Menon: 00:10:53

So in the future, there are some people who love accounting.

Preethi Menon: 00:10:55

They wanna count day in, day out.

Preethi Menon: 00:10:57

I am not that girly, but gimme a PowerPoint and a fizzy drink on a Saturday night.

Preethi Menon: 00:11:02

I am so happy.

Preethi Menon: 00:11:04

So, you know, whatever makes you happy and brings that joy into you.

Preethi Menon: 00:11:08

Trying to understand how you can then build your specialization based on those activities.

Preethi Menon: 00:11:13

And so I think the CXO Program really gave me that chance.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:16

When you think about that, and you've got the network of people around you in the CXO Program, but it's still a big transition.

Preethi Menon: 00:11:23

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:24

What has been your biggest learning curve?

Anderson Williams: 00:11:26

Getting down into operations being number three or number four in an early stage, going from four to 19 locations.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:34

That's a lot in a short period of time.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:36

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:36

After a pretty stable career.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:37

Prior, what's been your biggest learning curve?

Preethi Menon: 00:11:39

Sure.

Preethi Menon: 00:11:40

The biggest learning curve was probably two areas.

Preethi Menon: 00:11:43

Accountability and understanding that 80% is good enough.

Preethi Menon: 00:11:48

So coming from McKinsey and consulting, you are drilled perfection into your brain at a very young age.

Preethi Menon: 00:11:55

And so in that world, you're on version 96, version 97, and to move to version 98, I need the approval of the engagement manager, associate partner, partner, and the client team right?

Preethi Menon: 00:12:04

So it takes a lot to get a document to final stage here in this company and any company in microcap, especially with the talent we have and the CEOs we have, 80% is good enough.

Preethi Menon: 00:12:16

The time to go from 80% to a 100% is so much effort.

Preethi Menon: 00:12:20

And at this point, every document I make, every document anyone makes on the team moves shareholder value incredibly.

Preethi Menon: 00:12:26

Meanwhile, a document going from version 97 to version 99, probably not as impactful.

Preethi Menon: 00:12:31

So that was a huge mental shift that it's okay if it's not perfect.

Preethi Menon: 00:12:37

I really struggled with it and I remember my CEO being like, Preethi, this is good enough.

Preethi Menon: 00:12:40

This is great.

Preethi Menon: 00:12:41

Send it out, ship it.

Preethi Menon: 00:12:42

I've approved it.

Preethi Menon: 00:12:43

And I'm like, yeah, but the graphics, let me make it prettier.

Preethi Menon: 00:12:45

It's good enough, right?

Preethi Menon: 00:12:46

We need the content out.

Anderson Williams: 00:12:48

It's an interesting distinction that you're making there because I think most people would hear 80% is good enough and think that somehow that's lowering the bar.

Anderson Williams: 00:12:56

And I just want to double down on something you just said is that actually 80% is delivering more value because it's 80% now, and that reality of microcap space is that's how you deliver the value that getting to 100%.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:10

You have diminishing returns anyway.

Preethi Menon: 00:13:11

Yeah, right.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:12

Right?

Anderson Williams: 00:13:13

Like in this space, because the teams are so lean and things are moving so fast and changing so quickly, that 80% is actually more valuable in some ways than 100%.

Preethi Menon: 00:13:21

Exactly.

Preethi Menon: 00:13:22

I'm actually really glad you picked that point, because even in emails, we'll be traveling.

Preethi Menon: 00:13:26

For example, I traveled here to Nashville.

Preethi Menon: 00:13:29

There are emails that went out while I was on the flight.

Preethi Menon: 00:13:31

By tonight.

Preethi Menon: 00:13:32

If I don't get to those emails and if I'm like, Hey, on Friday after all these CXO events, I will have time to thoughtfully sit down and respond to those emails.

Preethi Menon: 00:13:40

Those emails become obsolete because it has literally gone through so much conversation.

Preethi Menon: 00:13:45

Because speed is so important when you're building a company ground up and it's not speed where, hey, this is just rash.

Preethi Menon: 00:13:51

We're putting on, you know, wings on a plane, and just trying to take off.

Preethi Menon: 00:13:54

Speed in that we have to be cognizant of competitors in the world.

Preethi Menon: 00:13:58

We have to be cognizant that time kills all deals.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:02

And so in this world, perfection.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:04

Yeah, I would love.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:05

To pause time and have no one move.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:07

Everybody frozen and me just sit there being thoughtful as much as possible.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:11

Being mindful there's a time and place for that but when you're in this world, you really have to be flexible.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:16

You have to be okay with doing as great of a job with highest accuracy at the 80% mark and being okay to ship it out.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:24

And the second piece of accountability.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:26

With consulting, you are hired onto a project, sometimes you don't really get a chance to choose.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:31

Depending on demand, sometimes you do, right?

Preethi Menon: 00:14:33

But let's say you are on a project of your dreams, you're doing the work.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:37

You may implement and offer recommendations and a strategy to the client and be like, Hey, based on my unbiased third party eyes, this is what I think you should do.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:45

And they may say, politely, I would like you to kick rocks and I don't really like that strategy.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:51

And so you're like, okay, that's okay.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:52

I did what was told in my statement of work.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:54

I gave it to you.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:55

I'm calling it a day.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:56

Take whatever you want.

Preethi Menon: 00:14:57

And I can't wait to potentially be on a project in the future with you.

Preethi Menon: 00:15:01

Here it's not like that.

Preethi Menon: 00:15:02

So there is an accountability where I have true ownership.

Preethi Menon: 00:15:05

Whoever I hire onto my team, if anybody sends an email, it comes back to me if there's a mistake.

Preethi Menon: 00:15:10

If a partner is upset with how integrations went, or a team member heard something that was really hurtful, at the end of the day, it comes back to me and I need to sit and own it.

Preethi Menon: 00:15:19

And it's not just, oh, it's a six week project.

Preethi Menon: 00:15:21

I'm in it two years now, so, that's a hundred plus weeks, and we still need to kind of grind and make sure those relationships of our old partners still stay strong as we bring in new partners, right?

Preethi Menon: 00:15:32

So the closet can never delete files in your mental brain.

Preethi Menon: 00:15:35

You're just constantly adding more things and bolstering that ownership.

Anderson Williams: 00:15:39

Yeah, those longitudinal relationships, it's different than a transactional kind of relationship.

Anderson Williams: 00:15:44

Like you're gonna have to live with whatever misfired email or miscommunicated message to a team member, or otherwise you don't walk away from anything.

Preethi Menon: 00:15:52

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:15:52

It's all still there.

Preethi Menon: 00:15:53

Yep.

Anderson Williams: 00:15:54

And as such, they can't be perfect.

Preethi Menon: 00:15:56

They can't be perfect a 100%.

Preethi Menon: 00:15:58

So I always joke about this.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:00

I have such a unique relationship with each partner.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:03

So to zoom out, when we select a partner, they like us.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:07

I always call it the dating phase, right?

Preethi Menon: 00:16:08

We're wooing each other.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:10

I'm trying to show them, Hey, this is why empower's awesome.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:13

You should really consider a partnership with us.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:15

And my role actually expanded from SVP of Integrations to SVP of Integrations and Partnerships.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:20

So being brought in earlier in the process of integrations, integrations basically sits right between business development, where we find the practice and operations where you kind of work on stabilizing and improving year-over-year growth.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:33

And so in the business development world, we're dating the med spa partner or clinic or practice showing them, Hey, this is how we can grow the practice.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:41

And they're also showing how great their clinic is, right?

Preethi Menon: 00:16:44

Because we're also selective.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:45

And so once we kind of cross that border and we look to close, that's where the change happens.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:51

And change is scary.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:52

And now you're part of something bigger.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:54

You're part of Empower Aesthetics.

Preethi Menon: 00:16:56

And during that process I get really vulnerable with each one of them and they get really vulnerable with me.

Preethi Menon: 00:17:01

They're like, Hey Preethi, I have to do bank transitions and this is really stressful.

Preethi Menon: 00:17:05

'cause my team right now is asking questions and we're like, that's okay.

Preethi Menon: 00:17:08

We'll come on the ground.

Preethi Menon: 00:17:09

Let's work through everything.

Preethi Menon: 00:17:10

But I have a unique relationship with each one of them.

Preethi Menon: 00:17:12

Now when we bring all of them in a room together at a partner summit.

Preethi Menon: 00:17:15

I've told each one of them, they're amazing, beautiful, and special, and they truly are.

Preethi Menon: 00:17:19

But when you see them all together, how do you make each one still feel that specialness, even though they're part of this whole room of others and they're part of something bigger and you want them to feel motivated and you want them to feel engaged.

Preethi Menon: 00:17:31

And so that was kind of daunting in the beginning.

Preethi Menon: 00:17:34

But the people relationships that I've learned through consulting in client services has always carried through, and that's been my thread throughout my career.

Preethi Menon: 00:17:42

Anything I deliver, whether it's an email, whether it's a PowerPoint, or even a talk or discussion, yes, it may be 80%, but it'll have a 100% of my heart in it.

Preethi Menon: 00:17:51

I will truly make sure I have done the best I can do to make sure I deliver that.

Preethi Menon: 00:17:55

And so when I see them all together, it is so easy when the partners we chose and the partners who chose us are such high caliber and they see beyond just themselves.

Preethi Menon: 00:18:06

That ego is missing, that humility is present.

Preethi Menon: 00:18:09

That's what really brings me to the table every day and makes me so grateful to be part of Empower Aesthetics.

Anderson Williams: 00:18:15

Yeah, and Shore talks a lot and has been recognized for being founder friendly and your role and what you're doing is exactly why, right?

Anderson Williams: 00:18:23

It is a combination.

Anderson Williams: 00:18:24

It is a relationship thing where we are seeking the right founders and the founders are seeking the right investment partner and when that happens, it's pretty extraordinary.

Preethi Menon: 00:18:33

Sure.

Anderson Williams: 00:18:33

Right?

Preethi Menon: 00:18:34

A 100%.

Anderson Williams: 00:18:34

And so it becomes.

Anderson Williams: 00:18:36

Not to diminish anybody becomes a lot easier to be founder friendly when you find great founders.

Preethi Menon: 00:18:40

Yeah, that's right.

Preethi Menon: 00:18:42

That's right.

Preethi Menon: 00:18:42

When people ask, what's the secret to recruiting, or what's the secret to your great team?

Preethi Menon: 00:18:46

It all starts with recruiting, right?

Preethi Menon: 00:18:48

If you find the right people, you attract the right people, and so finding the right people also means that you attract the right people because you have brand recognition.

Preethi Menon: 00:18:55

Now, I think two years into it, we have a little bit of swagger where when we go to these aesthetic conferences, people are like, oh yeah, have you heard about Empower Aesthetics?

Preethi Menon: 00:19:03

When year one, I had to, you know, beg, kick, and scream to be like, hi, I'm Empower.

Preethi Menon: 00:19:07

Do you wanna hear about me?

Anderson Williams: 00:19:08

You're who?

Preethi Menon: 00:19:08

Yeah, exactly.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:10

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:10

That's the amazing part of an early stage company is when you've experienced that complete lack of inertia.

Preethi Menon: 00:19:16

Yes.

Preethi Menon: 00:19:17

Right.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:18

You're just having to build it.

Preethi Menon: 00:19:19

Yes.

Preethi Menon: 00:19:19

And the J curve that's always talked about, right?

Preethi Menon: 00:19:22

Yeah.

Preethi Menon: 00:19:22

So imagine the letter J I'm like using my finger, but I know this is a podcast.

Preethi Menon: 00:19:27

In the beginning, you're just putting in effort, energy, resources, time, and you might even dip a little bit.

Preethi Menon: 00:19:32

But once you hit that velocity, that speed that you can kind of go up, it's truly exponential that growth.

Preethi Menon: 00:19:39

And I think we're at the cusp of it, which is really exciting to see.

Preethi Menon: 00:19:42

And in the consulting world, you will always have that opportunity as well, but things are more stable, so it's more of a Y equals MX plus B growth versus an exponential like logarithmic growth.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:54

And there is that energy of the risk.

Preethi Menon: 00:19:56

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:57

Of the everyday figuring things out.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:00

That is, on the flip side, if that environment is for you, is part of the reward as well.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:05

Going back to what you described as you made the career shift of going and building something.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:09

Mm-hmm.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:09

Mm-hmm.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:09

There's nothing like building something.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:12

A 100%.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:13

Seriously.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:14

I remember when I was first hired on, we came in my first day I saw the space.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:19

They had just signed that space maybe a week ago.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:21

My first day was actually in a WeWork.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:22

We hadn't gotten the space.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:24

The next week we got the space, but that day I remember I literally built chairs for us to sit in.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:30

We didn't have anywhere else to sit other than the floor.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:32

So first day was like building the chairs.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:34

Ordering the furniture, truly building the company.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:37

What is the entity like, name?

Preethi Menon: 00:20:39

You know, anything you can think of?

Preethi Menon: 00:20:41

Credentialing, making sure our payroll names are set up for us to get paid ourselves.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:46

Checking the numbers and being like, is that the right paycheck amount?

Preethi Menon: 00:20:49

Because you don't have an HR team to rely on.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:51

You have people just kind of trying to build the plane as it's flying.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:56

Well, and then your fingerprints are on all of that.

Preethi Menon: 00:20:58

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:58

You've been in, in those decisions and you know what made it and what didn't, and you know what mistakes you made and where you really excelled at.

Anderson Williams: 00:21:05

It's that feedback loop is so tight.

Anderson Williams: 00:21:07

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:21:08

In these companies that it can be really energizing if you can navigate the intensity and the risk of it.

Preethi Menon: 00:21:13

Oh my God, that is so true because when you have bad days, you are gonna have bad days.

Preethi Menon: 00:21:18

A 100%.

Preethi Menon: 00:21:19

I truly believe it's like a marriage, right?

Preethi Menon: 00:21:20

Like a marriage will have great years and difficult months or difficult weeks.

Preethi Menon: 00:21:24

But there are days that are hard and I always go back to my why and I'm so sticky in the company myself, and by sticky, I mean I have so much attachment to the company.

Preethi Menon: 00:21:33

You're so right, have fingerprints on everything.

Preethi Menon: 00:21:36

I just look at the building.

Preethi Menon: 00:21:37

I just look at my office, I look at my friends in the company, and we are all so involved and so woven, and I've touched every little thing involved where even in consulting, they say you are two bad projects away from leaving the company because you don't have that ownership.

Preethi Menon: 00:21:51

You often are at the mercy of the partner and the client sponsor, and so you're just trying to do what's written in the statement of work, what's written in the RFP and what's being dictated by the partner.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:01

Here if things aren't working out the way I would like to see or the way the team would like to see.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:06

Of course my CEO will, you know, it's her vision and her mission for the company that really pushes us forward.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:14

But my work stream, at the end of the day, she really gives us independence.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:17

She gives us the guardrails to grow, but we have the independence to build it, what it needs to be.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:22

And so I have resources in the CXO world to capture information.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:26

And

Preethi Menon: 00:22:26

I'll say year one.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:28

I wouldn't

Preethi Menon: 00:22:28

be where our work stream is at without the help from Southern Orthodontics Partners and listening to Lisa Love who came during the CXO and talked about integrations.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:38

This is what best looks like.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:39

And I was like, that's what best looks like.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:41

I'm gonna copy that.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:41

We're gonna be best, you know?

Preethi Menon: 00:22:43

And now year two, I'm able to mentor somebody in the CXO Program.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:47

We have a longevity platform.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:49

And so I'm able to connect with her and talk about, Hey, this is what I'm doing for integrations.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:53

In case any of those nuggets of knowledge are helpful to you.

Preethi Menon: 00:22:56

So that full circle, being able to pay it forward, that's really beautiful.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:00

It really is, and it speaks to the power of having a cohort of young people that are all in these early stage companies, but have also been around long enough to have evolved out of, in many cases, some of the really challenging early stage to have picked up some inertia.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:16

To give you some context, some perspective, and some very specifics.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:20

You're doing a CRM integration, here's some.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:22

Best practices kinds of things, right?

Preethi Menon: 00:23:24

Mm-hmm.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:24

So it's like both practical and like emotional.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:27

Not like that's not practical, but it's all right.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:29

You're gonna be fine.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:30

Right?

Anderson Williams: 00:23:31

So what's something that, when you think about your time with Empower, what's something that you've learned in being in this stage of a company that you could have only learned?

Anderson Williams: 00:23:42

By being in this stage of a company?

Preethi Menon: 00:23:44

Yeah, that's a great question.

Preethi Menon: 00:23:46

I would say over time it's being okay to fail and being okay to execute.

Preethi Menon: 00:23:52

I think I am somebody who really values perfection.

Preethi Menon: 00:23:56

If I'm gonna put anything out in the universe, I want it to be the best piece of content or material that anyone's ever seen.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:03

And so I get stuck in analysis paralysis.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:06

I'm just sitting there being like.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:07

What if I took an extra day?

Preethi Menon: 00:24:08

Maybe it'll be better.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:09

Or what if I did it this way and then I have this impediment with this person, so I need to connect with them and they're not in office.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:15

And so I'll sit on things sometimes, especially in the beginning and even if you told me when I joined 2023 Preethi and was like, Hey girl, you just got to implement it.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:24

Just execute.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:25

Just call it a day.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:25

And if you fail, there are people to catch you.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:27

You're gonna be okay.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:28

But fail forward.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:29

I would've been like, Hmm, you can do that.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:31

I'm good.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:33

I'm going to do it my way.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:34

So I really had to learn through experience because whenever I did fail forward in the company for whatever reason, hey, we adjusted integrations to allow these things and this was a mission critical item that I didn't think was mission critical.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:50

So I let it go one week, and that ended up being something difficult and we need to now manage moving forward.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:55

It made my process so much stronger.

Preethi Menon: 00:24:58

It made my team so aware of things to look at so this doesn't happen again, and it taught other work streams, what to keep an eye out for.

Preethi Menon: 00:25:06

So that's something you're only gonna learn through swimming and being thrown in the deep end and trying to get to the shore.

Preethi Menon: 00:25:12

And consulting again, gives you all those resources in a playbook where they're like literally rinse and repeat.

Preethi Menon: 00:25:19

Sometimes you can't.

Preethi Menon: 00:25:20

I'm not trying to make it seem like you have this clear blueprint, but here there is zero blueprint.

Preethi Menon: 00:25:25

There is nothing other than me calling people in the CXO Program or seeing people and saying, Hey, what did you do?

Preethi Menon: 00:25:31

You know, behind the curtains without anybody there.

Preethi Menon: 00:25:34

Can I just ask you a question so I don't sound dumb?

Preethi Menon: 00:25:36

What should I do?

Preethi Menon: 00:25:37

And I have always been in a room with so much gratitude.

Preethi Menon: 00:25:41

I say this.

Preethi Menon: 00:25:42

And I'm very grateful to say this, but I've always been in a room filled with smart people and I've always pushed myself to be one of the dumbest people in the smartest rooms.

Preethi Menon: 00:25:50

And I was nervous when I came to private equity.

Preethi Menon: 00:25:53

Since not everyone has a background in X, Y, Z, what is that gonna be like?

Preethi Menon: 00:25:58

I'm so grateful that my eyes were open to meeting people of different backgrounds.

Preethi Menon: 00:26:05

In the company I'm in right now, I have the best of the best in HR. I have the best of the best in BD and sales, and somebody who's done e-commerce.

Preethi Menon: 00:26:14

Somebody who's done marketing beyond anything I can imagine.

Preethi Menon: 00:26:17

So I have the ability to connect with them at my fingertips, not only in the work stream world, but in the personal world.

Preethi Menon: 00:26:25

So back to your question, I think one thing I would've never learned before was fail forward and it's okay to try to implement again, making sure your management team and your CEO.

Preethi Menon: 00:26:35

Agree with your path forward, but if they do, why not?

Preethi Menon: 00:26:38

What's the worst that could happen?

Preethi Menon: 00:26:39

And that's what I've constantly told myself.

Preethi Menon: 00:26:41

What's the worst that could happen?

Preethi Menon: 00:26:42

And two, it's okay to be the dumbest person in the room.

Preethi Menon: 00:26:45

I know that's not what consulting or your degree or college tells you, but that's the only way you grow instead of being a drop of water in an ocean, you know?

Anderson Williams: 00:26:54

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:26:55

I have to go back on that and ask you, how does epidemiology play in your thinking?

Anderson Williams: 00:27:00

Is there something you learned in epidemiology?

Anderson Williams: 00:27:02

In that study that helps you frame things that way.

Preethi Menon: 00:27:06

Sure.

Anderson Williams: 00:27:06

I didn't wanna leave that 'cause you dropped that at the beginning and I hadn't gotten back to it, so I'm just coming back to, and we can delete this if we need to.

Anderson Williams: 00:27:13

No, that's okay.

Anderson Williams: 00:27:13

But is there something in epidemiology that has helped frame some of this?

Preethi Menon: 00:27:17

For sure.

Preethi Menon: 00:27:18

I became an epidemiologist before anybody knew what that was back in 2013.

Preethi Menon: 00:27:22

So no COVID, no other things.

Preethi Menon: 00:27:25

And back then my epidemiology focus was electronic cigarettes.

Preethi Menon: 00:27:30

So, and especially in Texas, there was no regulation on electronic cigarettes.

Preethi Menon: 00:27:34

And so my specific focus, I was working with the FDA and NIH on a sponsored study for nicotine use on the brains of youth and young adults.

Preethi Menon: 00:27:44

That was my research area.

Preethi Menon: 00:27:45

And so we worked on kind of public policy to see how we could raise the age in Texas because a 12-year-old could use a nicotine product thinking it's a bubblegum flavored cool e-cigarette doesn't have tobacco in it, so it's not as harmful, right?

Preethi Menon: 00:27:59

No rat poison, all those things.

Preethi Menon: 00:28:01

But it's still alters your brain, affects your lungs and still causes side effects.

Preethi Menon: 00:28:06

So what I learned that's actually very similar to our world of med spa is the regulation space.

Preethi Menon: 00:28:11

There was no regulation in that world there.

Preethi Menon: 00:28:14

So we were constantly proactively thinking, Hey, if regulation comes in this angle, what is our contingency plan?

Preethi Menon: 00:28:21

If regulation doesn't get adopted, what research can we have to support that?

Preethi Menon: 00:28:25

In the med spa industry, there is a lot of lack of regulation, and because of that regulation can spring up overnight, that can completely change our business model.

Preethi Menon: 00:28:34

So we have to constantly now think, what is a contingency plan?

Preethi Menon: 00:28:38

How do we manage that with this regulation?

Preethi Menon: 00:28:40

What if the regulation goes away?

Preethi Menon: 00:28:41

What will our revenue look like?

Preethi Menon: 00:28:43

How will our providers not only just revenue, how will our providers react?

Preethi Menon: 00:28:46

What services can we provide?

Preethi Menon: 00:28:47

So one, always being cognizant of the regulatory world.

Preethi Menon: 00:28:50

I would've never been as aware of that before my public health training.

Preethi Menon: 00:28:53

And two, the research world.

Preethi Menon: 00:28:55

So translating that into this world is when you have no data and you need to kind of figure out the path forward, and it's super ambiguous and super vague.

Preethi Menon: 00:29:03

One, sitting down and having stakeholder conversations, whether stakeholder is the CXO, whether it's stakeholders, the med spa, usually a conversation will always kind of get you to uncover new information that you didn't know before that gets you closer to the answer.

Preethi Menon: 00:29:16

And two, what are similarities current state that I can either track what are resources I can pull from, what are little puzzle pieces that I can kind of scotch tape together to make some sort of picture that I can then model a projection or model a decision that'll forecast the future.

Preethi Menon: 00:29:32

So we have the equipment to kind of make whatever choice we can make.

Preethi Menon: 00:29:35

So those are my two areas at a young age.

Preethi Menon: 00:29:38

Being in epidemiology, it still carries over.

Preethi Menon: 00:29:40

And I will say I have a risk averse piece.

Preethi Menon: 00:29:43

When building a company, I think you need to be bold, but I think you need to always be risk averse.

Preethi Menon: 00:29:48

You don't wanna be so bold and make certain decisions that could impact the company negatively.

Anderson Williams: 00:29:59

If you enjoyed this episode, be sure and check out our Bigger.

Anderson Williams: 00:30:02

Stronger.

Anderson Williams: 00:30:02

Faster.

Anderson Williams: 00:30:03

episodes.

Anderson Williams: 00:30:03

Specifically highlighting the CXO Fellows Program, as well as other CXO fellows profiles at www.shocp.university/podcasts or anywhere you get your podcasts.

Anderson Williams: 00:30:15

This podcast was produced by Shore Capital Partners and recorded in the Andrew Malone podcast Studio with story and narration by Anderson Williams.

Anderson Williams: 00:30:23

Recording and editing by Austin Johnson.

Anderson Williams: 00:30:26

Editing by Reel Audiobooks.

Anderson Williams: 00:30:28

Sound design, mixing, and mastering by Mark Galup of Reel Audiobooks.

Anderson Williams: 00:30:32

Special thanks to Preethi Menon.

Anderson Williams: 00:30:34

This podcast is the Property of Shore Capital Partners, LLC.

Anderson Williams: 00:30:37

See none of the content herein is investment advice, an offer of investment advisory services, nor a recommendation or offer relating to any security.

Anderson Williams: 00:30:46

See the Terms of Use page on the Shore Capital website for other important information.