Shelley E. Kohan (00:57)
Lori, I’m so excited to have you today on Lead Like Her. I’ve been watching you for years. I think I met you, I don’t know, has it been a decade ago? It’s been a long time. But welcome. ⁓ you actually began your career at Procter & Gamble, and you later served as chairman and CEO of MarketMax, which is a company that provides

Lori Schafer (01:07)
Probably, yeah. It’s a showing pleasure to be here.

Shelley E. Kohan (01:24)
retail planning and merchandising intelligence software. So I’d love to start the conversation with understanding how did you end up in retail tech and what appealed to you about CPG industry.

Lori Schafer (01:38)
Well, we’ll start with how I ended up in the CPG industry. And ⁓ I wish it was a more glamorous story, but it was ⁓ pretty simple. I majored in mathematical modeling, which today is called AI. And ⁓ back then it wasn’t called AI yet, it was operations research, but it was a serious math major with a ⁓ business.

as a second degree. so Procter & Gamble to a 21-year-old coming out of college paid great. No other way to say it. I had heard it was a great company to go work for, but I wasn’t thinking about CPG at the time. Once I got in, I fell in love with the idea of brands and

because it was something I could relate to as a consumer. And so from that standpoint, ⁓ I was very enamored with how do you bring something like crust toothpaste or tide detergent or, you know, one of the hundreds of other products to market and the rest is history. So that’s how I got into P &G. And very quickly into P &G, ⁓ it was at a time in the…

80s that I’m dating myself, but it was in the 1980s that the CEO of P &G was looking for young people. He picked four of us, I recall, that could build technology that would help P &G sell more products to retailers. Those were the early days of category management and it was direct product profitability and space planning and

those sorts of things, the very early days. And that’s how I got my start. ⁓ after that, I was recruited away to ⁓ consulting and software in retail, and the rest is history.

Shelley E. Kohan (03:51)
that’s amazing

Lauren. I have to ask you if you don’t mind answering this question. So four of you were recruited in. Were you the only female?

Lori Schafer (03:54)
Yes.

Yes, I was. I was the only female. And I was the, I was the youngest one. Cause I, at that point I was, yeah, I was 21. And soon to be 22.

Shelley E. Kohan (04:00)
Interesting. Okay. Wow, that’s…

That’s amazing. So when you were in school, did you have like this natural ability for like math and stuff? Like how did you like, that’s amazing that back then you kind of saw the future of where we’re headed. And I’m just curious, did you find that you had this awesome skillset in math modeling?

Lori Schafer (04:33)
Well, I have to admit that I majored in mathematical modeling because my father, who is an engineer, said, this is where you need to go. My brother was ⁓ in medical school. And quite frankly, was, you know, we can’t afford to pay your way to college. Because back then for females, it was still pretty much, you know,

I mean, I had plenty of people tell me I was going for an MRS degree, which I was not. ⁓ So I was very gifted at math, and I was very gifted at just being a quick study on things. ⁓ thankfully, my father just said, go here. I think computers are going to be the future, personal computing, and that’s really what happened.

Shelley E. Kohan (05:27)
I love that, Lori, that’s outstanding. And so when I think of ⁓ digital wave technologies, you’re the founder and CEO of that company now. And I think about you in the field, I believe you are so far ahead of innovation in terms compared to the retail industry, and you’re so far ahead in terms of thought leadership. How do you keep your team ahead of this curve?

Lori Schafer (05:52)
Great questions again. I do want to clarify, I’m one of the founders. I am the CEO. So it’s a great company. Digital Wave technology was named Digital Wave because just quick story and I’ll get to the question, but the quick story is that technology happens in waves. About every decade, there’s a major wave of

in the computer industry, software industry happens in waves. you had, first you had mainframes and you had mini computers and then you had ⁓ cloud, then you had ⁓ internet and then the cloud. And these were all big changes, mobile ⁓ and then AI really start taking off, generative AI. And now those waves aren’t happening in every decade. They’re happening now in a shorter and shorter frequency.

And so we named the company Digital Wave because we want to keep our customers ⁓ future-proof and ready for the next big digital wave. So that’s a little bit about that. One more time, what was the main question? Yeah, how I get prepared, how to prepare the team, right? Yeah.

Shelley E. Kohan (07:04)
Just how you’re… No, just how do even…

Yeah, how’s the team always like you

guys are so innovative. How are you getting them out there and how are they staying so innovative? How are they staying ahead of the curve in this now this every five year wave or three year wave?

Lori Schafer (07:21)
Yeah, it’s more like a couple years. ⁓ A few things. When we first started, the company’s not that old. ⁓ We’re very seasoned veterans in the industry, but I handpicked a team that is very innovative. And so the company’s about going on at four years old next month. And you’d think we’ve been around for a decade or more because we all come with a lot of strong

retail business acumen and also strong technology leadership. But when we started before the whole generative AI wave, and then shortly after we started, ⁓ OpenAI came out with ChatGPT and all of a sudden it took off. But luckily before all that, ⁓ I could see what was happening and

I actually went to a class at MIT for myself. So I would learn all this. And it’s like a two week class, know, work nights, weekends, that sort of thing. And it was so good, I thought, you know what? I’m going to put my whole leadership team through it. And I took the time and gave them the time to do that. And it was probably the best investment I could have done because it got everybody on the same page.

Shelley E. Kohan (08:24)
Love it.

Lori Schafer (08:47)
this is where the world is heading, this is what we need to do. And I give all the credit to the team, they’re very, very sharp people, but it formed that foundation they needed. So that’s one example.

Shelley E. Kohan (09:01)
Can you,

no, that’s great, I love that example. ⁓ Can you think about a time when you had to lead your organization through a significant change or massive disruption? I mean, I’m sure there’s a lot just because of the field you’re in, but does one come to mind specifically?

Lori Schafer (09:19)
Well, I mean, again, what we just talked about, leading a tech company is constant disruption. This is, it’s nonstop innovation. That’s the world we’re in. So pretty much everything we do comes to mind. I think of that MIT course, ⁓ that was certainly one where I knew if we didn’t ground everybody ahead of the curve, you know, we may not get the right ⁓

thinking to the market. ⁓ There’s been a number of things. mean, I have built several companies and from the ground up. So, you know, when you’re starting a company from scratch and you you are building and bootstrapping and I think that’s a very important point. Bootstrapping is not going out and saying I need to raise 30 million dollars.

Bootstrapping means prove it. Do the really hard stuff first before you ever raise money. And make sure you’re profitable. That’s hard. So that’s leading. That is, and that is every single day. you know, my first company, I ended up taking over the company. I was not the CEO, but the company had some difficulty, financial difficulty, and I stepped in and had to turn it around and then.

Shelley E. Kohan (10:30)
Yeah.

Lori Schafer (10:48)
get it successful and eventually we took funding. we first made sure it had a good healthy P &L before we ever ⁓ went to the next step. So I’m all about innovation and I’m all about making sure we have a healthy P &L and balance sheet.

Shelley E. Kohan (11:09)
a good way to go for sure. ⁓ Let me ask you about, so on your path to leadership, so I grew up in operations, to operations, and back when I grew up in the 80s I was at Macy’s, Macy’s West, but it, you know, I was one of the few females in operations, and I can imagine in engineering and tech you might have had the same similar experience. So it’s

Lori Schafer (11:18)
Mm-hmm

huh. Yep. Okay.

⁓ yes, absolutely.

Shelley E. Kohan (11:37)
Tell me what was it like being a female leader in your field? Was it a challenge?

Lori Schafer (11:43)
You know, certainly in the 80s and even 90s, it was a real challenge. I think it’s gotten a lot better. I’m not going to say that there’s still things you can see, but I have to admit ⁓ it has gotten better. I look back and I think about the first company. I was with one of our salespeople, and this is again, this is in the 90s.

We walked into a retailer to do a demonstration and I’m not gonna say who or where because that’s gonna bias things. But we walked in to do the demonstration and the retailer said to this account executive salesperson that I had with me, ⁓ you’ve brought her along, she must be really smart.

And I pulled him aside and whispered in his ear and I said, I’ll do the demo, you lead. And he said, okay, and we did. And I don’t care what role, I wanted to make sure we got the deal done. And so from that standpoint, I was the person doing the demonstration, the lady doing the demo, and my salesperson was… ⁓

my boss for purposes of this meeting and it worked beautifully. We got, we ended up getting the deal. I forgot all about the situation until probably a few months later and that retailer found out I was a CEO and they called and apologized. But I said, I said, I said, apologize. said, don’t apologize. It’s okay. You know, we do what you, my attitude is always do what you have to do.

Shelley E. Kohan (13:31)
What? my gosh, that’s amazing.

Lori Schafer (13:41)
Don’t get offended. You know, you have to roll with the waves or the world you live in. And you can’t get offended and you can’t get upset and you just have to say, how do we make this work? So that’s one example.

Shelley E. Kohan (13:56)
I love that,

the ego at the door literally is what you did. So I think that’s great. So you’ve been recognized as retail voice by NRF. You are a rethink retail top expert. You are Consumer Goods Technology Data Leadership Award. And you are also an honoree for Women of Excellence by the Path to Purchase Institute. So you have lots of accolades in the industry.

Lori Schafer (14:01)
Always. Always.

Shelley E. Kohan (14:25)
What are you most proud of?

Lori Schafer (14:29)
What I’m most proud of is my team and being able to build companies in a difficult industry from the ground up. It’s hard. ⁓ I have to say, and you need a great team of people. And I have to say the team, the team, the team, the The rest of the accolades are for the team.

I mean, it’s really about the company. It’s not about one individual.

Shelley E. Kohan (15:02)
And I’m going to add a descriptor to what you said about building companies. It’s not just you’re building companies, you’re building profitable companies. And that’s amazing. Yeah, it’s very hard. So as a prominent leader in the industry, how do you prioritize your time? And more importantly, how do you decide like which projects you’re going to work on?

Lori Schafer (15:05)
Okay.

It’s hard. Yeah.

Great questions ⁓ and I’ve as the company companies in this case digital wave now has grown quite a bit ⁓ As they grow it gets easier because you have to do less ⁓ And focus on the bigger things and if it’s innovation And or if it’s P &L That’s it if it doesn’t move the needle and it doesn’t help our customers

and it’s not something that’s differentiating, I’m the wrong person. So, I just keep those things right in focus and I try not to deviate at all. Because I get pulled into everything, but you have to be able to say no. Are we growing our business? Are customers happy? And three, are we innovative? And that’s where I play.

Shelley E. Kohan (16:26)
I love that. What I’m hearing from you, one, you have a very clear focus, which is outstanding. And I think that’s a great leadership skill. But also for students and young women out there, the other thing that’s really coming through is this financial acumen, which is so, so important in our field, in any field, but I think particularly in our field. ⁓

Lori Schafer (16:41)
critical.

Absolutely,

absolutely. And go ahead.

Shelley E. Kohan (16:52)
So,

no, you go ahead.

Lori Schafer (16:56)
I was going to say, I can’t stress enough for people coming, young professionals coming out of school. ⁓ It’s becoming, you can’t be everything, but to get to the top of a company, you really do need to understand how a company operates. And what drives revenue? What drives ⁓ profitability? Margin? How do you keep costs more efficient? Those kind of things.

Shelley E. Kohan (17:26)
Yeah. So now in our industry, it’s very easy to get burnt out. So I’m going to ask you, you have like specific strategies that you use to like maintain your wellbeing balance? I know you’re laughing because it’s kind of a joke for our industry, right? But you know, how do you do it?

Lori Schafer (17:39)
Alright.

Yeah, no, they’re all very good questions. I laugh too because I don’t think I’m the best role model. ⁓ I’m kind of driven. So I’ll start off by saying that. I do, you know, do I get burnt out on occasion? Yes. But what I really try to do, I’ve always used exercise, so physical fitness, as something that’s an outlet. I’m a very high energy person.

So I have to burn the energy some way. And that’s a good way to burn it if it’s not thinking about work. And then the second thing is making time for family. ⁓ look at, throughout my entire career, I’ve been very good at that. think, you know, now both parents of my parents are in hospice and I’m caretaking for them. And that is my first priority, work a second. ⁓

And between, you and I’ve had to prioritize throughout different, you know, between family, work, and physical fitness, caring for myself, those change at all times. And sometimes you just have to say, is one for the next few months, this is two. A few months from now, the other one may go one, the, you know, let’s say the personal caretaking might go to one, and work may go to two for a week, and then it’s gonna flip again.

But you just have to keep personal well-being, family, and your role, your job, as I think the three most important things.

Shelley E. Kohan (19:26)
Yeah, I’m sorry to hear about your parents.

Lori Schafer (19:28)
Nah, it’s hard, but you know what? I’m gonna give him all the love I possibly can right now.

Shelley E. Kohan (19:34)
Yeah, I like how I think ⁓ the change is important, that it changes all the time. It’s not like one set of priorities, ⁓ depending on what’s happening around you. Let’s shift gears and talk about employee culture. So how do you promote diversity and inclusion within your organization or the industry?

Lori Schafer (19:41)
It does.

That’s right.

Sure.

Again, I’m probably going to say an answer that you may not, I don’t wanna say you may not like, but you may, it might cause question. I don’t promote it. I get it. And what I mean by that is if you look at either of the two retail software companies that I’ve run, both of them look like the United Nations, literally.

And, ⁓ but it’s not by design. I really focus on hiring the best people for the role. And luckily in software, and it’s gotten better, certainly after COVID, companies can be, they can be a lot more virtual. ⁓ Take for example, in software development or IT,

You can have people from around the world and you get far better results by having people from around the world. And I don’t look at ⁓ race, gender, creed, ⁓ ethnicity, religion. I don’t look at that. But it’s ended up both times where when I am running the company, both times.

I have ended up with complete diversity and you get a much better result from that.

Shelley E. Kohan (21:34)
Yeah, definitely a richer output for sure with diverse mindsets. Yeah.

Lori Schafer (21:37)
Absolutely.

And I’m sure as we get big, you know, as you get bigger and you get over certain limits, HR has to watch for those things as well. I’m just saying personally, I’ve been blessed that I’ve been able to assemble a team that, you know, and you can look on our website and you could see the team is diverse. It’s ⁓ an incredible team.

Shelley E. Kohan (22:01)
Yeah, all right, so let’s talk about mentors and role models. So as you were going up through the industry, did you have any role models or mentors that influenced your leadership?

Lori Schafer (22:13)
I’ve always had mentors and I’ve always picked role models. Mentors are closer ⁓ to me. Role models, sometimes I watch people from afar and I say, I wanna be like this and I wanna be like this and I don’t wanna be like this. So I’ve had both, meaning role models as well as mentors. Mentorship, I have always believed

And maybe because I started in the industry so young that I don’t know nearly as much as people that have already been through the ropes. So for example, in building an enterprise software company, I think back to my first one, I knew what the customer wanted, but I didn’t know what enterprise software meant at the beginning.

I was like 30 years old. didn’t really understand that. ⁓ And I also didn’t understand retail enough. And I didn’t understand consumer package goods or consumer goods enough. So when I think about my first company, I said, okay, I’m going to go get a board of directors that can shape me to run this type of company. So who can I get?

that is one of the best people in enterprise software. Who can I get that’s a well-known retailer? Who can I get that’s a well-known CPG CEO? And I set my mind to it and all three of them came onto the board. So I had actually, this was a long time ago, I’m dating myself again, but that’s a great example. ⁓ I got the president of SAP who became the CEO of SAP.

that, you know, years later, and he taught me enterprise software. A wonderful gentleman. And I got a top retailer, retail CEO, and I got a top CPG CEO. And those three were my true mentors, not just my board. So that’s one example. But I always, to this day, I have great respect for individuals that are

Shelley E. Kohan (24:10)
Love it.

Lori Schafer (24:38)
further along than me in whatever I’m setting my mind to do. Doesn’t mean they’re older, although usually they are, but it doesn’t mean that necessarily, certainly in today’s AI world, but it does mean people that are stronger and have more wisdom in the areas that I feel I need to be challenged.

Shelley E. Kohan (25:02)
I love Lori that story and I’ll tell you why. It’s great leadership lessons because one, you actually identified maybe where your strengths were not. So for young people understanding, you have to understand where your strength, where you don’t have strengths. And number two, I’ve never heard of this, hiring a board to help you in the role of a company. I think that’s like outstanding.

Lori Schafer (25:32)
Well, it’s again, I was only thinking about how do we make this company great? And I’ll tell you one other quick story that that now former CEO of SAP story, wonderful gentleman, Leo Apataker. ⁓ Somebody in the US had said, ⁓ you know, I’ve heard of so and so ⁓ who is this fine gentleman, Leo. And ⁓

He understands all this and he understands enterprise software and he’s creative. And I said, where is he? Well, he’s in Paris. And it was Thanksgiving, I think of it this week, it was Thanksgiving. And it was 25 years ago, something like that. And I was determined that I’m gonna meet this gentleman.

sent him an email and I just said, here’s what I do, here’s who I am. If I ⁓ ever have the opportunity to be in Paris, I’d love to have you and I have a cup of coffee. And he wrote back and he said, that would be great. Well, I took that literally and I said, okay, well, he must mean that. And so I actually came back a few weeks later, Thanksgiving week, and I said, I’m going to be…

in Paris on such and such a date, which was Thanksgiving, which was my only day off, because I was running around the clock. And he said, OK. And so I flew to Paris to meet him so that on Thanksgiving Day was my day off. I met him. We connected. He said it helped me. And the rest was history. And I flew home. That’s my story.

Shelley E. Kohan (27:26)
god. I love

that. That’s very creative and I love the fact that you really went after that.

Lori Schafer (27:37)
It’s called, when you’re building companies from the ground up, it’s called survival. And he, to this day, has said, don’t, have, Lori has such high energy, she doesn’t have a dimmer switch. She’s either on or she’s off. And when I’m off, meaning I prioritize sleep, I prioritize health, and I prioritize family, I’m off. But I’m pretty much lit up most of the time from an energy standpoint.

Shelley E. Kohan (27:42)
Yeah.

that’s great. Okay, so now we’re in the favorite part of my interview with you and it’s called rapid fire questions. So I’m gonna throw some questions out at you and I want you to answer them quick, quick, quick. What comes to mind? Are you ready? All right. What one piece of advice would you give to female leaders that are currently working?

Lori Schafer (28:12)
⁓ Okay.

Okay, yes, try it, try me.

Protect your confidence as fiercely as you protect your time. And I say that because a lot of female leaders deep down are not as confident. ⁓ I can say that about myself. My biggest, you know, I’m empathetic. I have a lot of great qualities that a woman brings oftentimes to the role. But confidence, I always have to be really well-versed to feel confident.

⁓ And I think it’s very important that female leaders show confidence.

Shelley E. Kohan (29:12)
Excellent. What three tips would you give students, our emerging leaders?

Lori Schafer (29:19)
only three. ⁓ That’s all right. Let’s see. ⁓ So students meaning they’re just coming into the workforce. Okay. Okay.

Shelley E. Kohan (29:20)
No, you can get more.

Yep, coming out, coming into the workforce. We’re studying now,

soon to be a leader in the industry.

Lori Schafer (29:35)
Okay, first and foremost, listen more than you speak. ⁓ Too many people have to talk too much. Listen, you’re new, you have a whole career ahead of you. There’s a lot of people that know more than you do, listen before you speak. So that’s one. ⁓ Be intellectually curious. Intellectual curiosity in today’s environment, without it,

you probably won’t survive, especially with all of the AI coming and, you know, genetic AI and so forth. You have to be intellectually curious. You have to ask questions. You have to, whether it’s, you know, whether you are on the shop floor like you or Shelly, whether you’re a merchandiser, wherever you are in retail, whether you’re in IT, you just want, you want to learn, learn, learn.

And there’s so many ways to do that now. And so I know within my organization, if you’re not intellectually curious in an interview, you don’t make it past the interview. So that’s two. The third one I would give, I would say, is critical for students or people first coming into the workforce. Keep your personal opinions about politics, religion.

Etc off of social media and out of the workplace and I say off social media as well because everything You’re you’re when you’re in the workplace, even if you’re not in the workplace and you’re off hours It’s accessible and You want to always protect the brand that you represent? So I my advice is Try to keep that

Shelley E. Kohan (31:05)
Mm.

Lori Schafer (31:30)
part of your life very personal. It doesn’t have to be brought into the workplace. ⁓ I can continue, but I guess, so that was three.

Shelley E. Kohan (31:37)
That’s excellent.

I love it. Those are great. ⁓ Okay, so what’s your legacy? What do you want to leave behind for the next generation?

Lori Schafer (31:58)
I I hope that I can leave a legacy of, she really built some great companies. But more importantly, I hope that my teams look and learn something from me where they can point back and go, wow, she really taught me. She was an awesome boss. She got me further in life than I would have gotten otherwise. She taught me.

how to deal with life, not just the job. ⁓

Shelley E. Kohan (32:34)
Okay, this is your last question and it can be fun. So here it is. What is your secret power?

Lori Schafer (32:37)
Okay.

I have a very good ability to see the future, not way out, but the next few years. And to be able to identify business problems and…

identify where the technology is heading and bring those together for our customers. I would have to say that’s it.

Shelley E. Kohan (33:08)
I love that. Excellent. Any closing thoughts that you want to share?

Lori Schafer (33:16)
Boy, this was quick and fun. Closing thoughts.

How about leadership isn’t about being right, it’s about being ready.

Shelley E. Kohan (33:31)
that. That’s awesome. Well, Lori, thank you so much. I know our students and young executives will be so thrilled and learned lots from your advice. So thank you for being here. Greatly appreciated.

Lori Schafer (33:32)
Yeah

Thank you, Shelley. It’s always a pleasure

to see you again and keep on moving like I do. firepower. That’s what we do. Absolutely.

Shelley E. Kohan (33:52)
I’ll try. I don’t know if I can keep up your energy,

but I’ll try.

Lori Schafer (33:59)
Absolutely, no, you’re great and I so appreciate the

time with you. So thank you.

Shelley E. Kohan (34:05)
Thank you. ⁓