Baseball players are notorious for superstitions — everything from wearing two different socks to putting pine tar on a batting helmet is on the long list of rituals that help some of the best players feel ready for a game. Chicago players are no exception.
By the time pitcher Turk Wendell came to the Chicago Cubs, he was known for quirky habits that he swore made the difference between a good game and a loss. He would jump over the foul ball line when taking the field, crouch on the mound when the catcher stood up, brush his teeth between every inning and even wear a necklace made of claws and teeth from animals that he hunted and killed, according to Bleacher Report.
His methods were odd, but it made him well-loved by fans and he could back it up on the field. Wendell’s pitching career boasts an 11.2 inning streak without any walks and 13.2 scoreless innings in a row.
Other Cubs and White Sox players are remembered for their superstitions, too. Ryan Dempster ate at the same Italian restaurant before each game at Wrigley. Hall of Famer and Cubs player Richie Ashburn didn’t fall asleep without a baseball bat in his bed next to him. Liam Hendriks, closing pitcher for the White Sox, finished bullpen warmups by throwing the same two pitches every time — although he prefers the term “traditions” over “rituals” or “superstitions,” according to The New York Times.
While the superstitions, rituals and traditions are part of baseball lore at this point, they point to an important aspect of joining a new team — sometimes bringing in an unexpected method can lead to noteworthy wins.
Built In Chicago spoke with four product leaders who are new to their team and plan to bring new plays and traditions to their field.
Enfusion runs an investment management SaaS platform.
Why were you brought on to lead the team at Enfusion?
I’ve worked on technology that enables the buy side for my entire career in a variety of roles. I started my career as an engineer knowing nothing about finance and leaning heavily into the technical aspects of my first job at Lehman Brothers. Over time, through on-the-job training followed by completing an MBA and earning the CFA designation, I became proficient in finance and business as well. Through several corporate shuffles from Lehman to Barclays and then Bloomberg, I transitioned into account management, then added business development and ultimately landed managing a sales and account management team.
I then joined BlackRock and led a client-facing research and thought leadership team, helping clients understand their portfolios — particularly the complex securitized products inside them. Through all these different roles I had always had an affinity and “side role” that involved helping determine the future of the products. I knew eventually I would find a place working in a product role. When such a role opened at Axioma, I took it, eventually leading product and research. It was through Axioma that I got to know Enfusion as a partner, and really understood the power that linking the full investment management operational chain together can have for clients. I joined Enfusion because I believe it’s a technology-first solution to the problems that the buy side faces, and has a huge potential to grow from its already solid base.
How do you plan on building team culture?
I believe that a leader’s purpose is to guide and lead his or her team toward the execution of their joint vision. For this to happen, first the vision must be set — and not always by the leader in question. What’s important is that there is a vision, people understand it, are motivated by it and it’s executable in the medium term.
Once the vision is established, it becomes a matter of execution. You’ll often hear the mantra “people, process and technology,” but to that I would add that values are of the same importance. How you work, or the culture that is created by the values you hold, is also of critical importance to how the team functions.
Software product management is a team sport, no single person can manage it alone. However, a former leader of mine also pointed out that software is an unfair sport — a team of 10 can outperform a team of 100 under the right conditions. As a leader, it’s my responsibility to make sure the conditions are there that allow the team and the culture to outperform our competitors in the marketplace. In practical terms, that means we put a lot of work into how our teams function, work with each other and are empowered to achieve success.
“Software product management is a team sport, no single person can manage it alone.”
What impact will the next big project have for Enfusion customers?
Enfusion has been working for some time now to get ready for the next phase of its growth. A lot of thought and effort by many teams has gone into our three-year plan, which we are now starting to execute. The strategy has us expanding our capabilities significantly to handle larger and more complicated clients, who have more assets and more intricate ways of working. But with these extra challenges comes a new place for us to use technology to bring a superior product to our clients.
The execution of this strategy is going to require us to hire significantly and build new capabilities within the firm, and to build an ecosystem of partners and new functionality around our platform. Notably, we’re going to invest significantly in our product and engineering teams while continuing to build our design capacity.
In our space, we are unique in having a technology-first mindset, and our products have some capabilities our competitors cannot match. The roadmap not only allows us to serve larger clients, but it makes the world better for our existing clients. I’m extremely excited to be able to be a part of this expansion of Enfusion’s team and our platform.
Origami Risk creates integrated SaaS solutions for risk management, insurance, safety and compliance.
What’s your professional background, and why were you brought on to lead the team at Origami Risk?
I’ve been in various technology leadership roles for going on 20 years now, and most recently led the creation and execution for building a from-the-ground-up SaaS platform inside a dying phone book company profitably to $350 million in annual recurring revenue in seven years. I’ve led both product and engineering teams, and for three years, I was even the CMO. This offered a full scope of inception, validation, definition, design, build and go to market in a single view.
I was brought in to help unify the product and technology functions for the next leg of the Origami journey. At Origami, we build solutions and solve problems for underserved markets, where other solutions are incredibly expensive and cumbersome to both implement and manage. My focus is on easier user experiences, and user-centric product design helps to ensure that Origami remains the leader in our markets.
How would you describe your approach to leadership, and how do you plan on building team culture?
I think people overuse the words “servant leader” without truthfully exemplifying the characteristics required. First and foremost, my style is one of empathy. To truly empathize with your team and across the organization, you have to take the time to invest in understanding their role, the tools they use, how they work and about them as individuals. I believe very firmly that I’m fortunate to lead a large volunteer army.
As a SaaS company, our true tangible asset is our people. We don’t carry inventory or own machinery. We utilize the cloud, and we have attracted and retained high-quality people. The reality is that high-quality people want to work with other high-quality people. So, leading with empathy then unlocks the ability to trust in your team and their capabilities and decision-making. If leaders don’t trust, they should self reflect on why not and rectify.
“Leading with empathy then unlocks the ability to trust in your team and their capabilities and decision-making.”
Once trust is established, a leader needs to empower. Tools, resources and time need to be provided to allow individuals to own their outcomes. Then and only then can we drive accountability, as leaders. It’s an otherwise obvious formula, but it has served me and my teams very well.
What initiative are you most excited to take on with your team, and why?
There is no shortage of initiatives for sure. I think I’m equally excited about a number of them. Probably the top of my list would be a reimagination of the administrative portal and its usability for the variety of stakeholders who heavily rely on it and use it every day to perform their duties. Origami is already the industry leader in time to implement and lowest implementation costs for our clients, and my excitement is magnified by the possibility that we can make even more gains by ensuring the tools and systems we provide our implementation teams and system admins are powerful, intuitive and automate time-consuming items.
I’m also excited about some learning initiatives we have kicked off to further invest in our people and to upskill, ensuring that our top-tier talent remains on the cutting edge of our industries to design, build and support innovative solutions week after week for our clients.
Lastly, it would have to be AI. Not just AI to do AI, but investing in the underlying data layers, large language models, increased controls, privacy and security frameworks needed to unlock some industry-leading AI capabilities that will move markets.
Rocket Travel by Agoda helps travelers earn loyalty rewards by booking travel so they can travel more.
Why were you a good choice to lead the team at Rocket Travel?
I love building things, understanding how things work, and developing new ideas. I’m very fortunate to have spent the past 13 years at Agoda. During this time, I managed products for many parts of the business, including web and app conversion teams, marketing, customer service and supply.
At Rocket Travel by Agoda, I hope to use these experiences to help create a best-in-class travel product for our partners. Even though I transferred internally, my experience at Rocket Travel by Agoda has been nothing short of amazing. One of my biggest learnings is how a B2B business vastly differs from a B2C business and how much care and effort needs to go into maintaining a partnership — I’m constantly impressed with how partner-centric our team is.
How would you describe your approach to team leadership?
I’ve spent most of my career in a straightforward, pragmatic culture, which has influenced my leadership style. I value having open, direct, respectful conversations, and find it essential to problem-solving and team growth.
4 Values for a High-Performing Team
Brockett noted that there are a few values that are essential for the Rocket Travel team to embody. “These are reinforced as core aspects of our hiring practices, performance reviews and promotions,” he said. Brockett shared the following:
- Think like a Scientist: “We like to solve problems via A/B testing, data analysis and deductive reasoning. When making a decision, we find a data-driven approach leads to a greater understanding of the problem and better outcomes.
- Bias for Action: “Many of our projects are time sensitive and require a great deal of focus, resilience and determination. We value product managers’ proactive attitude and willingness to get their hands dirty.”
- Product Ownership and Execution: “Product managers manage projects by applying structure and frameworks to their decision-making and prioritizations. We benchmark and talk to customers so we can build visions for products, set goals/milestones and help our partners grow.”
- Communication: “As product managers, we thrive in having fast-paced, dynamic conversations to solve problems.”
What aspect of the upcoming season are you most excited to take on, and why?
What I’m most excited about is more of a new organizational approach. We’re in the process of working with UX and design to have greater influence on our product development roadmap.
We have a loyalty product where customers can earn or burn loyalty points for travel, and it’s a huge part of Rocket Travel by Agoda’s success story. Our tech has been integrated with some of the biggest airlines and financial institutions, and I’m very proud that our team has built something that I believe is best in class.
I recently participated in a product design workshop where we brainstormed ideas for innovating our points product. There were at least 30 ideas shared for how to make the product even better for our customers. It highlighted customer flows and uses that we hadn’t fully considered before. We think these ideas have a lot of value, so we’ve run them through user studies, and we’ll see the changes by undertaking an A/B test.
I’m excited to see the results and demonstrate how effectively design and research can influence the product.
IMO Health is a clinical data intelligence company, improving how data is used across the healthcare landscape.
Tell us a little bit about yourself. What’s your professional background, and why were you brought on to lead this team?
I bring extensive experience as a product leader, with a strong background in data analytics, machine learning, product management and team leadership. My career has spanned diverse sectors including insurance, healthcare, education and technology. I was brought on to lead this team due to my expertise in managing innovative products and my passion for leveraging technology to improve patient outcomes and streamline healthcare operations.
How would you describe your approach to leadership, and how do you plan on building team culture?
Collaborative and inclusive. I believe in empowering team members by providing them with the resources and support they need to succeed. Building a positive team culture is important to me, and I plan to do this by fostering open communication, encouraging creative problem solving and recognizing and celebrating our achievements. Creating a supportive and innovative environment where everyone feels valued and motivated is my top priority.
Creating an environment where everyone feels valued and motivated is my top priority.”
What project are you most excited to tackle, and why? What impact will it have on the company and its customers?
I am most excited to drive the development and deployment of our Precision Normalize and Clinical AI products. This initiative is particularly exciting because it has the potential to significantly enhance the accuracy and efficiency of healthcare data management. By normalizing medical terminology and leveraging natural language processing, we can improve data interoperability and provide more precise insights for our customers.
These products will not only streamline operations for healthcare providers but also contribute to better patient care and outcomes, aligning with our company’s mission to advance healthcare through innovative technology.