The Roundabout Show with Tim Courtney

From "ideas worth spreading" to products worth building with Thaniya Keereepart | Episode 10

Thaniya Keereepart has spent 20+ years at the intersection of product, community, and behavioral economics, from MLB's first live streaming app to TED's founding head of product, scaling TED from 500K to 2 billion video views and building TEDx. She's navigated the tension between what a brand wants to be and what its community needs it to become at Patreon, Harvest, the Athletic, and MetaLabel. Themes: * Community as brand amplifier — Opening TED up to TEDx uncovered talent the mothership never would have found, including Brené Brown. * The product-community circular relationship — Why product teams need a liaison role that makes user satisfaction a product metric. * Creator legal infrastructure — MetaLabel and Artist Corporations build legal tools around how artists actually work, not how corporations do. * Original thinking in the age of AI — AI content normalizes to the center of a bell curve, where non-AI assisted thinking allows for novelty. Takeaways: * If your community needs something and you don't build it, someone else will. Patreon → OnlyFans. * Harvest waived fees during COVID. 2021 became their highest revenue year. Generosity is rewarded. * Product leaders must face users directly. Shielded teams create misaligned products. * Start with human problems, not technology solutions. Product before protocol. Chapters: 2:14 - Growing Up on Airplanes 6:40 - Dreams Worth Helping to Actualize 13:25 - Building MLB's Live Streaming Product from Scratch 18:25 - TED's Founding Head of Product 20:59 - The Birth of TEDx 30:37 - Community as Brand Amplifier 34:54 - The Athletic and Sports Journalism's Future 45:12 - Harvest and the Business Case for Generosity 52:57 - The Circular Relationship Between Product and Community 58:50 - The Product Liaison Role 1:06:07 - MetaLabel and Artist Corporations 1:20:37 - AI and What Endures 1:28:51 - The Roundabout Brand Story Links: * https://thaniya.org [https://thaniya.org] * https://www.linkedin.com/in/thaniya/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/thaniya/] * https://metalabel.com [https://metalabel.com] * https://theathletic.com [https://theathletic.com] * https://getharvest.com [https://getharvest.com] About Tim: Tim works with leadership teams on community product strategy and co-creation programs. If this episode sparked something for your team: tim@roundabout.community [tim@roundabout.community]

Customer Experience: The operating system for trust and growth with Jeannie Walters | Episode 9

Customer experience isn't customer service with a bigger budget. It's the operating system. Jeannie Walters has spent two decades proving that to Fortune 500 teams, and her book Experience is Everything codifies the playbook. Tim and Jeannie dig into what happens when CX leaders drive change from the middle of an org chart, why your B2B customers compare you to Uber, and how trust builds or erodes at scale. Key Themes * Community is downstream of experience. A strong community doesn't come from marketing. It comes from a product and culture that earn the right to gather people. * Scores are indicators, not outcomes. Reporting NPS as an outcome loses executive attention. Tie CX to revenue and cost reduction. * Proactive design beats reactive service. Customers have an experience whether you design it or not. Intentional vs. accidental is the difference between trust and churn. * The influence job. CX leaders rarely control what needs to change. The work is influence: organizational goals, not feedback scores. * Filling the vacuum. When communication stops, customers write their own stories. They're almost always negative. Key Takeaways Your customers compare you to every experience they've had, not just your competitors. Start with a CX mission statement for your team. Results spread by osmosis. Ask executives when they last talked to a customer. The discomfort opens the conversation. Build feedback loops for frontline workers. They see problems before dashboards do. Frustration is anger without control. Design for reassurance and agency at risk points. Trust at scale requires systems: conscience, communication, consistency, credibility. Chapters 02:29 - Origins in the Social Media Era 07:02 - The Story Behind the Book 09:25 - The Influence Problem 14:18 - Customer Service vs. Customer Experience 19:38 - Customer Experience as Innovation 24:41 - Making the Case with Tight Resources 28:47 - Mission Statements That Work 36:12 - Jeannie's Executive Worksheet Trick 41:53 - Building a CX Culture 50:19 - Moments of Truth 53:25 - The CX Case for your CFO 58:10 - The Four Cs of Trust 1:03:59 - Placing Customer Experience on the Org Chart 1:06:32 - Clarity Over Perfection 1:12:08 - Community is Downstream of Experience 1:19:56 - The Future of Customer Experience 1:23:11 - AI and Customer Experience 1:29:08 - Trust in a Cynical World 1:31:17 - Connecting with Jeannie Links * Experience is Everything by Jeannie Walters: experienceiseverythingbook.com [http://experienceiseverythingbook.com] * Experience Investigators: experienceinvestigators.com [http://experienceinvestigators.com] * Jeannie Walters on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeanniewalters/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeanniewalters/] About Tim Tim works with leadership teams on community product strategy and co-creation programs. If this episode sparked something for your team: tim@roundabout.community.

The Creatine OG: From analog to agentic AI with Steve Jennings | Episode 8

Steve Jennings has been building for four decades. Competitive cyclist turned founder of Maxim (Europe's top sports nutrition brand), then PepsiCo, open innovation, and now Jenerise, a creatine company co-founded with his daughter Rachael. We cover why comfort kills your edge, how endurance sport trained him for entrepreneurship, building consumer community before the internet, and how brands must go all-in to win at open innovation. Steve tells the creatine origin story: a bag of white powder handed to him in a hotel, 47 days to a finished product and gold medals at Barcelona 1992. We close with how he's using agentic AI to de-risk product market fit. Key Themes * Discomfort and uncertainty are Steve's operating systems. He doesn't enjoy chaos, but he thrives on it. Endurance sport built him a tolerance most people never develop. * Brand communities before the Internet. Maxim built consumer community through cycling clubs and showing up. No platforms. No playbook. * Open innovation as DNA, not a campaign. LEGO went all-in with IDEAS. * Creatine's second act. Now the focus is cognition, bone health, and longevity. The science caught up with what Roger Harris predicted in 1992. * Building with AI at 65. Agentic tools compresses months of research into days. Key Takeaways * Product is the catalyst for community. Build something worth talking about. * Five pillars of everyday human performance: nutrition, movement, sleep, environment, people. * AI compresses time to market. Less capital means stronger negotiating position. * It will always be human first. Modern tools augment this thesis rather than supplant it. Chapters 02:39 - The Drive to Keep Building 06:47 - Thriving on Chaos and Uncertainty 10:59 - Cycling as Entrepreneurial Training Ground 19:10 - Regulating as a High-Energy Founder 25:05 - Five Pillars of Everyday Human Performance 32:21 - Building a Consumer Community Before the Internet 39:58 - Product as the Catalyst for Conversations 46:21 - LEGO Ideas and Open Innovation 49:11 - Why Brands Don't Go All In on Community 57:14 - You Have to Invite Customers into the Brand 1:02:14 - The Creatine Origin Story: Barcelona 1992 1:15:21 - Creatine Beyond Sports: Cognition and Longevity 1:19:55 - Building Jenerise with Daughter Rachael 1:25:02 - The Whitespace in the Creatine Market 1:28:04 - Agentic AI for De-Risking Innovation 1:38:20 - It's Always Human First Links - Steve Jennings on LinkedIn [http://linkedin.com/in/sjennings1] - Jenerise [http://jenerise.com] - Scientists may keep UK athletes one step ahead [https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/12645172.scientists-may-keep-uk-athletes-one-step-ahead/] - The Untold Story Behind Creatine, and How I Played a Pivotal Role In It Becoming a Global Supplement Phenomenon [https://stevejennings1.medium.com/the-untold-story-behind-creatine-and-how-it-became-a-global-supplement-phenomenon-cb0d41e91c2e] About Tim Tim works with leadership teams on community product strategy and co-creation programs. If this episode sparked something for your team: tim@roundabout.community [tim@roundabout.community]

Your next CMO will build agents, but real strategy can't be prompted with Julie Mossler | Episode 7

Julie Mossler built the comms function at Groupon through its IPO, ran brand at Waze through the Google acquisition, and has been a four-time CMO across web2.0, crypto, and AI. Now she runs Common Fortune, advising founders on go-to-market and category building. This conversation covers building brands from the inside out, why small cross-functional teams outperform org charts, what AI is doing to marketing roles, and why attention might be the last real moat. Key Themes Culture builds the brand, not the other way around. Groupon's voice came from comedy writers and improv actors. Julie built Groupon's PR prowess on top of that culture, where most comms teams rein in their creatives. Speaking of reins, AI might be automating more and more operations, but it will never know when to put the pony in the freight elevator. Small teams with decision-making authority multiply output. The best ideas aren't limited to roles, titles, silos, or seniority. AI is collapsing junior roles, not eliminating marketing. One hire who builds agents replaces the headcount that used to do copywriting. The CMO of the future builds tools and tells stories. Sycophantic AI tells you your ideas are great. Real strategy can't be prompted. Read the zeitgeist, make bets, and learn from mentors who've honed their skills over decades. Attention is the last moat. Anyone can ship a product or press release; the differentiator is getting people to care and to keep coming back. Key Takeaways * Hire for personality and judgment. Scripts can't compete with someone who knows how far to take it. * Cross-functional teams surface growth ideas that fall through the cracks of individual job descriptions. * Campaigns end. Infrastructure compounds. Invest in briefs and knowledge bases. * If you can't critically evaluate AI output about your domain, you don't know your domain well enough. * Don't build a Ferrari to drive to the grocery store. There's no point in automating operations for a business without traction. * Find a mentor. Strategy is learned through people, not prompts. Chapters 00:00 - Introduction 01:38 - The Collapse and Rebirth of Media 05:14 - Journalists Learning to Vibe Code 06:46 - How Julie Picks Winners 09:20 - Inside Groupon's Editorial Machine 14:07 - Improv Actors in Customer Service 19:38 - The Pony in the Freight Elevator 22:23 - Categories Worth Watching Now 28:46 - Small Cross-Functional Teams and Leveraging Volunteers at Waze 36:52 - Where the Junior Roles Go 40:20 - Strategy Can't Be Prompted 43:33 - Campaigns End, Infrastructure Compounds 48:56 - The Ethics of AI Tool Choices 53:10 - Human Skills Julie is Long On 58:01 - We Shape Our Tools, And Thereafter They Shape Us 1:01:15 - Don't Build a Ferrari to go to the Grocery Store 1:03:10 - Attention Is the Last Moat 1:06:07 - Julie's Novel and Accountability Time 1:09:16 - Limitless Possibility Links * Julie Mossler: https://www.linkedin.com/in/juliemossler/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/juliemossler/] * Groupon: http://groupon.com/ [http://groupon.com/] * Waze: https://www.waze.com/ [https://www.waze.com/] About The Host Tim Courtney works with leadership teams on community product strategy and co-creation programs. If this episode sparked something for your team, get in touch: http://roundabout.community [http://roundabout.community].

LEGO® IDEAS: How we scaled a fan community-driven product business with Daiva Naldal | Episode 6

LEGO® IDEAS turned fan creativity into a nine-figure product line. But the hard part wasn't the platform, it was integrating a disruptive innovation engine into an 80-year-old organization without killing the trust with users that made it work. Daiva Naldal led that integration, designing the systems that scaled a Japanese-language experiment into a global business, alongside host Tim Courtney who led Community and Experience for IDEAS between 2011-2018. Tim and Daiva trace the arc from LEGO's near-bankruptcy in the mid-2000s through the first LEGO Minecraft set that hit its vote threshold in 24 hours, and beyond. They share the structural decisions that made scaling possible, and the willingness to walk away from commercial opportunities to protect community trust. The views expressed by the host and guest are their own and do not represent those of any current or former employer. LEGO® is a trademark of the LEGO Group of companies which does not sponsor, authorize or endorse this podcast. Key Takeaways * Your most passionate users are leading indicators. Build the infrastructure to hear them. * Open innovation isn't a campaign you turn on and off. Treat it that way and you'll only get campaign-level results. * Commercial proof creates organizational pull. Match the core business's numbers and resistance turns into demand. * Founders need to transition from being the decision system to designing one. That's the bottleneck between startup and scale-up. * AI accelerates production. Human foresight and judgement become more valuable, not less. Chapters 0:00 - Show Intro 02:10 - Daiva's LEGO Journey and the New Business Group 04:46 - The Muji Experiment and LEGO Architecture Origins 06:37 - Finding Innovation as a Craft 08:59 - The Wild West of LEGO CUUSOO 15:32 - Minecraft: When Fans Read the Market First 18:39 - Building the First LEGO Minecraft Set 22:27 - LEGO's Near-Bankruptcy and the Return to DNA 26:39 - Making Innovation Relevant to the Organization 28:58 - Closing the Circle: From Fans, For Fans 33:28 - Building Trust at Scale 36:28 - The Participation Promise 39:44 - Capabilities the Organization Gained 43:50 - Open Innovation Beyond LEGO 46:35 - Principles for Early-Stage Founders 53:31 - Scaling Mistakes Founders Make 58:35 - AI, Human Foresight, and What Stays Valuable 1:03:14 - Three Takeaways That Click Links * Daiva Naldal: https://DSTN-ventures.com [https://DSTN-ventures.com] * Daiva on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daiva-staneikaite-naldal/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/daiva-staneikaite-naldal/] * LEGO IDEAS: https://ideas.LEGO.com [https://ideas.LEGO.com]