July 28, 2026 – Uncommon Leadership Keith Wyche and Noble Work Thad Bench

Intro 1 0:04
The AMS Radio Network, broadcasting from AM and FM stations around the country. Welcome to the Small Business Administration award-winning school for startups radio, where we talk all things small business and entrepreneurship. Now, here is your host, the guy that believes anyone can be a successful entrepreneur, because entrepreneurship is not about creativity, risk, or passion. Jim Beach.

Jim Beach 0:27
Welcome to School for Startups Radio. I hope you’re having a great day. Thank you so much for being with us. We have an amazing, fantastic show. First up, we have Keith Weiss with us, who was with Walmart a whole bunch of years, has written a new book called Uncommon Leadership. He was with a whole bunch of other companies as well. He’s an introvert, and you know I love those. But he’s so good, he’s amazing. We have an incr edible conversation about servant leadership and that kind of thing. Keith Weish, I’m very excited. And then after that, we have Thad Bench. He gives the best response to when I tease him. I tease him that he’s sold his company for 7 trillion. Wait till you hear how he responded. It’s the best response I’ve ever heard. Anyway, we’ve got a great show. We’re going to go ahead and get started right now because we are that busy with greatness. Here we go. Boy, am I excited to introduce our next guest. He’s had an amazing career. Please welcome Keith Weich to the show, he is a corporate executive with some amazing companies, an independent board director with some amazing companies, and a best-selling author of quite a few books. He has a new one out called “Uncommon Leadership: A Bluefant for Restoring Integrity, Trust, and People-Centered Leadership. Keith has had a great career at again some of the big big big names out there. He was a corporate vice president at Walmart. Was also with Cub Food, Super Value, AT and T, IBM, Pitney Bowes and Walmart. Wow, what a career! This book, though, is what is what number is it? Six or seven?

Keith Wyche 2:08
It’s actually number five, Jim. Number

Jim Beach 2:09
five, excellent. Keith, welcome. How are you doing today?

Keith Wyche 2:13
Hey, Jim, thank you so much. I’m doing great, and really glad to have this conversation with you.

Jim Beach 2:18
I am too. I’m excited to learn about you and learn about your leadership style. When did you realize that you were different from your classmates? That your career was going to be on a different trajectory than everyone else you were around.

Keith Wyche 2:35
I think it probably hit me in high school. I was in high school in Cleveland, you know, back in the 70s, and all of my buddies figured that they were going to either go pro at football or basketball. But my jump shot wasn’t good enough, and I wasn’t big enough for football, so I figured I had to find another way. So education and focus on business was kind of where I say I’d make my mark.

Jim Beach 2:58
All right, were you good in school? Were you a really good student?

Keith Wyche 3:04
You know, it’s funny you ask that question. I joke and say that I was probably a average student. In fact, when I graduated undergrad, I had like a 2.5 GPA. So when you know my grandmother came, she said, “But were you summa cum laude? I’m like, “No. She says, “Were you magna cum laude? She said, oh, you were just laughing, lardy. You were just glad to get out of there. Undergrad wasn’t so spectacular, but I went to grad school at Baldwin Wallace University and corrected that, and been a great student ever since.

Jim Beach 3:36
Yes, the lifelong learning seems to kick in once you’ve seen life, doesn’t it

Keith Wyche 3:41
exactly? You know that the school of life will open your eyes and it’ll make you intellectually curious and a continuous learner for sure.

Jim Beach 3:50
Yes, is good good enough?

Keith Wyche 3:53
Good is not enough. You know, especially when when greater is is within reach. You know, too often, and I was guilty of this as a kid. You know, I wanted to do just enough. I wanted to, you know, just get good enough. And I’ll never get one year. I came home and I had a bunch of B’s and C’s, and was pretty proud of myself. And I said, “Mom, that’s good. She goes, “No, it’s not. And if it is good, good is not enough. You know, when you get B’s and C’s, I know you can get A’s and B’s. And so that kind of stuck with me. And actually, was the name of my first book. Good is not enough.

Jim Beach 4:23
All right, tell us about the new one, Uncommon Leadership.

Keith Wyche 4:27
Yeah, this is. I’m really proud of this book, Jim. It was a book that was spawned about two years ago. My grandson was visiting for his birthday, teenager, and we were watching the news. It was one of those news cycles where everything was bad news. You know, this pastor got kicked out of this church. This executive was fired. You know, yada yada. This politician lied, and he said, “Pops, you’re a leader. Is that how you lead? And I said, “No. And it really dawned on me that you know we need to be careful of the example we set for future generations. And I just think in the last 10 to 15 years or so. Ah, we have really fallen off. I call it really a leadership crisis in this country, and so this book sets out to address that to move us from what was self-serving leadership back to servant leadership.

Jim Beach 5:14
Okay, what kind of leadership failure have we had? What where has it failed?

Keith Wyche 5:19
Well, that’s a great question, and you know I look at results and research, and there’s an Edelman Trust Barometer that said that seven out of 10 respondents believe that government leaders, business leaders, and journalists deliberately mislead them by saying things that are false or gross exaggerations. There was a Pew Research study in 2025 that said in 1958, 73% of Americans trusted the federal government to do the right thing almost always. By 2007, that number was down to 30% and today, Jim, it sits at 17% And so that tells me there’s a problem, and it’s even beyond that. Even in the faith-based world, Gallup did a poll in 2025 saying, “Okay, the trust for clergy, high or very high, has fallen from 67% in 1985 to 27% in 2025. So confidence, even in the religious world, is increasing just exponentially.

Jim Beach 6:16
That’s sad,

Keith Wyche 6:18
sad but true. And you know we had nothing but ourselves to blame. I mean, if you think about it, you know this thirst for power has eclipsed the calling to serve. Personal enrichment and short-term performance in corporate America has been prioritized over people and stakeholders. Character has not been held accountable as long as you get the results, right? You know, and then we live in this charisma-based world, where you know charisma over substance, when it comes to picking our leaders, are things that really are just you know put us in this this this pitch, this hole.

Jim Beach 6:51
Yes. Well, you know, I think the leadership across the board has done a really poor job. The religious leaders have done a poor job of policing themselves and maintaining a higher standard. I am very disappointed in the religious leaders of our times. Our politicians lie to us all the time. You know, I think all of them do-the Democrats and the Republicans. I don’t find any difference there. I think they’re all just kind of liars. I think they’ve done a horrible job. I I would give our leadership a solid F for for the last 40 years. What about you, Keith?

Keith Wyche 7:34
You know, I don’t know if I’d go back 40 years, but I would definitely say in the last 15 or 20, so that that you know our leaders again just you know refuse to act with integrity on a consistent basis, and they lose trust. You know, and trust really to me is a formula, right? You know, trust equals character times competency times consistency, and you got to have all three. If you have competency and consistency, but no characters, it’s problematic. Character and consistency with no competencies are probably, and so I think again, getting back to this self-serving idea, and maybe it goes back to the ’80s when you know the whole Wall Street area and Gordon Gekko, and you know just you know more is everything, and he who has the most toys wins. I think that type of mentality really kind of got us in this situation.

Jim Beach 8:19
I agree. Do you know my favorite Walmart joke, Keith?

Keith Wyche 8:25
No. What is your favorite Walmart joke?

Jim Beach 8:27
Do you know lots of Walmart jokes?

Keith Wyche 8:30
None that I can repeat. But yeah,

Jim Beach 8:34
mine’s not so much as a joke as just a commentary. I can’t wait to get your opinion and to see if it’s true. So, at Walmart, every year they give a big award for whatever company reduces their price the most because it shows efficiency and consumer awareness, and it’s great you can drive the prices down. That’s what Walmart is all about. They have an even more special award if you can do it two years in a row, and then if you do it three years in a row, they even got a name for that award. You know what that award is called?

Keith Wyche 9:09
What is that award called? I’m afraid to ask. Okay, I’ve not heard that one, but I can see how that might be a joke

Jim Beach 9:21
from the supplier side, right?

Keith Wyche 9:24
Absolutely, absolutely.

Jim Beach 9:25
What are your thoughts? Is that a fair commentary, or is that unfair?

Keith Wyche 9:30
I think that’s a bit unfair. But let me tell you, kind of, you know, where that thinking comes from, and it goes back to the founder who was really focused on providing everyday low cost to customers, and Sam Walton is very big on that. And so, what we try to do, what they try to do, I’m no longer there, is to get the best cost they can for their customers. And it’s really up to that business, that supplier, to make sure that again they’re making money themselves. I don’t think Walmart ever intends to put anybody out of business, but they. Fight to get everyday low prices for their customers, and so that’s kind of where that comes from. And actually, believe it or not, you know, other organizations and companies benefit from that because you know Walmart kind of sets the the tone for you know here’s the price we’re going to do this week on you name the product, and then the other competitors get in line and say, hey, when you gave that to Walmart, you got to give us something. So Walmart. I got to tell you, before I went to work there, I didn’t have the appreciation for it that I have now, and so I haven’t spent, you know, nine years working there, really understanding the culture. I have higher regard for it than I did beforehand.

Jim Beach 10:34
Well, that’s good to hear.

Keith Wyche 10:36
Yeah, it’s it’s a great place, and here’s what I mean by that, Jim. You know, I’ve never worked for a company where you can come in without a high school, with only a high school diploma, or even a GED for that matter. And if you’re willing to work hard, you can be promoted up the ranks. Our last CEOs pretty much all started as hourly associates, and I will tell you, having led 30,000 people who work for Walmart, the vast majority of these store managers and store leaders aren’t college educated per se, and they make a you know very very good wage in those jobs. And so I’ve seen people’s lives transform from being a single mom with one kid as a cashier, and four years later you’re a store manager, you know, making a couple $100,000 a year. So it’s still one of the few places I’ve seen that happen,

Jim Beach 11:22
and where does your leadership style come from? Is it something that you adapted and lived with early on, or is it congealed after many decades of you being at these great Fortune 500 companies?

Keith Wyche 11:37
I’ll be really honest with you. I was a horrible leader starting out, and the reason I was is because, like most of us, we we learn our leadership style, you know, by the people who come before us, and and that’s what we do. You know, emerging leaders don’t learn their ethics from a poster about values; they learn it from watching, but people above them do. And so, I was a Theory X type of leader that says, “Do what I say, get it done. And I was at IBM. I’ll never forget leading a sales team. And my thing was, I wanted to be salesman of the year to go through this thing called the Golden Circle. Right, it was the top 1% salespeople. And for six years in a row, I kept trying to get there. I made the 100% club, which was the second tier, but I never got to the top, and so I decided to quit. You know, I’m young, cocky, got my MBA, and when I was walking out the door, a guy who reported to me, who was much older, said, “Keith, have a conversation with you. And I was almost said no, but I said, “Sure, let’s talk. He said, “Let me tell you why you never got promoted. He said, “You were a leader that would break a lot of glass. You weren’t people focused. You weren’t focused on developing your people. It was about get the number, get the sales. You didn’t build teamwork, and you couldn’t create followership. And you know, I got to say that that stung because it was true. And that was the first beginning of an evolution of hey, I want to be a better leader than that, and so you know, taking those lessons and then lessons from every leader because you learn from every leader. You either learn what to do or what not to do, and so I start watching the more successful leaders, the ones that I emulated and looked up to, and begin to put pieces of their leadership style to create my own. And so, to your question, it was over years of of learning, and it’s a continuous learning. You’re always learning, right? You know, when I go to one industry to another, I had to learn. You know, one more story I’ll share with you. When I left Pitney Bowes, which was a corporate, you know, Wall Street type of environment, I went to grocery. Well, I went to grocery wearing the same outfit of suits that I wore in corporate America, and found out very quickly I wasn’t relatable, and so I had to modify my leadership style by modifying my dress to dress more comfortably, more casually, like my workforce. So those are the leadership lessons you learn over time.

Jim Beach 13:53
Let’s go through some of those lessons, can we? Some of the lessons in the book. Sure. Is there one or two that stick out to you and jump out to you.

Keith Wyche 14:03
Yeah, the the one that jumps out to me the most is called the discipline of listening. Listening as a leader, the discipline of listening. I’m

Jim Beach 14:11
sorry, I didn’t get that. Could you say that again?

Keith Wyche 14:13
You’re good. You’re good. You’re good. Yeah, it’s it’s about the fact that most leaders, and and I’m guilty of it. You know, we’re ego driven. We tend to think our way is the best way and the right way, but you really learn so much more by taking the time to listen. And when I say listen, Jim, I don’t mean listen just to hear or listen to refute. Listen to really understand. And a real practical example of that is, you know, when I’m in the grocery business, I go in my stores and I would try and find hourly associates, and I would say, “Hey, tell me three things that we’re asking you to do, or I’m asking you to do, that make no sense in the world, and then tell me three things that you know you wish I knew, or if you had my job, you would do differently. And just asking those two questions opened my eyes to opportunities. It opened my eyes to innovation. The products we needed to be offering that we weren’t, and so listening to me is just really a discipline that too often we don’t do as leaders enough, and if we do, we do it with the wrong groups, right? We listen to our direct reports. Well, you know, I don’t know about you, but I found out that when I listen only to my direct reports, I get kind of this curated, filtered example of what the reality is, because every level wants to make sure that you know they don’t piss off the boss. But when I get to that front line level, that frontline associate, that hourly person, they they give it to you straight. So that that that would be one of the chapters I really and one of the lessons it really will pay dividends your entire career. Can

Jim Beach 15:38
an extrovert learn to listen. I think introverts. This is one of the advantages of being an introvert, especially in sales, is that introverts are so much better at listening because that’s what you naturally want to do. You naturally don’t want to be the center of attention, so you don’t want to talk. So you are a great listener, usually not always. And then if you can learn to, you know, ask some questions, you can be great at sales. But an extrovert is always going to want to talk about how great my product is and how great I am at selling and how great our support is, and they are not, you know, they. It’s just hard to learn to listen because they always want to interject with their bright idea.

Keith Wyche 16:20
Yeah, you know, and I’m an introvert. Back then, I’m so shy of an introvert that I had to work out of it to become more extroverted when I needed to. And I think it’s about learning. None of us are extroverts all the time or introverts all the time. But I think it’s that discipline of saying, “Hey, you know, I can’t be the smartest person in the room. In fact, Jim, if I’m in the room and I’m the smartest person in the room, I lead the room because I think we can always learn from others. And you know, I’ve learned from the cashier and I’ve learned from the CEO. And so I stress the importance, particularly those extroverts, those types that are just you know gung ho to tell their story. You know, tell your story, but then take the time to listen to others who who may have their own story to tell, who do have their own story to tell, and when I was a leader, I’d go into a room, and it’s funny you mention that. You know, I’d have six people on my team; three were extroverts, and they would dominate the conversation. And I would make it a point to say, “Okay, hey, I’ve heard from these two. Hey, Jim, tell me what you think. You know, to an introvert. Hey, you know, and that way you open up that conversation. And good leaders know that. In fact, the the thing about good leaders is they they don’t have the answers. They just know the right questions to ask.

Jim Beach 17:27
How do you talk about purpose when my job is to drive a forklift? My purpose is to not kill anybody. You know, not to run over the CEO, you know. I just drive a forklift. What’s the purpose in that? I’m not going to save the world. I’m not going to save the Dolphins. Why do you expect me to have purpose when I’m doing a manual labor job?

Keith Wyche 17:56
Well, because the reality of it is, we all have a purpose that leads into the bigger purpose. Let me give you a perfect example. Just your forklift operator. We had those folks, obviously, in the back warehouses. You know, if that person doesn’t get that product off the back room and out on the floor and the shelves, people can’t buy that product, right? And this came in really important at Walmart when we were transitioning from a brick and mortar retailer to this omni-channel retailer, where instead of just coming into the store, people can buy when they want online, on their computer, on their phone, and people were having trouble connecting to that vision, right? And so I had a story I tell. I’m old enough, Jim, and you might remember this, but there was a store in the late ’70s when I was a teenager that was the number one retailer in the world. Any idea who that was?

Jim Beach 18:43
Sears.

Keith Wyche 18:44
That was Sears, right? And Sears was unique because they were really Amazon and Walmart before their time because they had their brick and mortar stores. If you remember, they had an auto care center, but they also had this thing called the catalog. Remember the Sears catalog? Oh, the

Jim Beach 18:58
day the Sears catalog came for Christmas. Oh my good Christmas! I would just sit there and circle things, you know, and dream

Keith Wyche 19:07
exactly. And so that that was really like Amazon and Walmart together, right? But here we are in 2026. They’re out of business, and so I have to help them understand that hey, we we have to make this transition because of that we won’t be here, and none of us will have jobs. But more importantly, here’s why your job is important, cashier. You are the last point of contact for that sales shopping experience for that customer, and you can have a social shopping experience. Maybe not get everything on your list, but if you have a great cashier and a great checkout experience, that that colors the whole trip totally different. And that person who has a great cashier experience will likely come back. And research has shown they’ll put one more item in the basket. Well, how does that impact the cashier? More items mean more hours. More hours means more money. And so you have to help them understand. Here’s how you fit into this business. We want to satisfy our customers. Here’s the role you play. Hey, mr. In the lot putting carts together, couple things. People like a clear, clean parking lot. They don’t like carts in the way. And so here’s where you play into it. And so you help everyone understand how their role, however small they may be, really feeds into the bigger vision. And once they see how they connect to the bigger vision, oh my gosh, you know, you just see a different level of ownership and enthusiasm. Very, very

Jim Beach 20:24
true. Do you think Walmart’s going to succeed in the omni-channel, the two-hour delivery game that we’re playing now? A lot of ads I’ve been seeing: the lady orders the next hour stuff for her party. An hour, you know, as the party’s you know winding down, she orders the to-do gift, you know, stressing that they’ll deliver so frequently. Are they going to be able to beat Amazon? Are they going to be a perpetual second place?

Keith Wyche 21:00
You know, I don’t put it in the frame of beating Amazon. I think in every industry you have you know one or two leaders, and let’s be clear, you know, Amazon in their space does a great job. But I will tell you that Walmart is a very close second, you know, and everything from drone deliveries to you know delivering medicine, you know, it’s really a unique experience, and the fact that you know Walmart is brick and mortar. Well, Amazon’s brick and mortar because you might remember a few years ago they would have made a big acquisition of something called Whole Foods, right? And so it’s not like it’s all e-commerce or it’s all brick and mortar. It’s a both. It’s a balance of both. I think if you look at the growth, both in you know Walmart’s e-commerce portfolio as well as their customer counts, they they are still formidable. You know, I think they’re number two now on the Fortune 100. They were eclipsed by Amazon just recently, but again, it’s a trillion dollar company or so, and and it’s again, it will be around. Very smart people, very capable folks, and there’s technology that you wouldn’t believe if you saw that’s waiting in the wings to be rolled out at the right time.

Jim Beach 22:07
Back to the book. What is the full cup story, and how do I serve from a full cup?

Keith Wyche 22:15
Yeah, the full cup story says, and the best example I’ll give you is that you know we’ve all been on an airplane, and they tell you these things like, “Hey, if things happen, you know, these oxygen masks will come down, and put your own on before you try and help someone else. And too often, as leaders, we’re so busy helping each other that we lose sight of ourselves, we lose sight of our health, we lose sight of those things, we don’t get enough sleep, and so the whole premise of serving from a full cup is that self-care is a leadership discipline. You have got to be, you know, I call it being a corporate athlete. You’ve got to take care of your body. You’ve got to get enough sleep. You’ve got to manage stress. And so it’s really important that as a leader that you take the time to do those things because you want to serve from a full cup, not an empty cup, because once your cup is empty, you can’t pour into anybody else. And as leaders, too often we we neglect ourselves, and it comes up in illness, it comes up in sickness, and different you know stresses and what have you. And so I think it’s really important that the leader take that time. You know, I jokingly say that you know Jesus had enough sense to take time away from his disciples and others to go by himself some time to rest and relax. And I think you know if he can do it, I need to do it as well.

Jim Beach 23:30
What message would you like to give to young 18-year-old men, particularly perhaps black men? Where how are we doing these days as a multicultural society? Are we getting better? There’s 18 questions there. You could talk for nine hours. Go.

Keith Wyche 23:51
Well, first of all, you know, I’ll I’ll do the generational thing. I think when I look at Gen Z and Gen Y and those folks, I think that they are just super, super creative. They’re native technology users. I mean, you know, I don’t know about you, but you know, the closest thing I had to technology as a kid was an etch-sketch, and so it was not, you know, one of those things where I grew up with it. So I think that they’re very native. I think that the other thing that they have that we have, Jim, is social media and the pressure of social media and those types of things, and so that that makes it a lot challenging for for younger folks. But I have total confidence that you know they they can make it. But when I speak to them, you know I kind of give them what I call my five Fs of life, and that’s you know faith. First, you know trust the plan, trust the path, even when you can’t see it. Have that faith, focus, and this is huge. Guard your time, guard your purpose. You know, when I was in college, Jim, I partied as much as everybody else. But one thing I did was I kept focus. So if I knew I had an exam on Monday or a paper that was due, I knew when to leave the party. And so focus is the second thing I tell them. Fearlessness. You know, walk through the fire. Even when it burns, you know there’s nothing wrong with fear. You know, in fact, fear is a healthy emotion for us to have. But be fearless, which means that you fear less, and you with courage walk through your fears. Fortitude, the strength to keep standing. You will get knocked down in this life, and it’s not about how many times you get knocked down. It’s how many times do you get back up? And the last one is fellowship. My grandmother gave me this one. It was kind of the birds of the feather flock together. She says the company you keep shapes the life that you will build. And so if you surround yourself with non-drunk people, guess what, Keith? You’re going to be the 10th one. And so those are kind of the things I share with younger people to again help ground them. These are lessons that you know. Again, we have learned over course of numbers of years. But it’s one of those things where if I could go back and talk to my 18 year old, 16 year old, 17 year old self, those are some of the lessons I would share.

Jim Beach 25:52
Fantastic, Keith. How do we find more about you? Follow you online. Get in touch. Hired you to come give a speech. Get a copy of the book.

Keith Wyche 26:01
That’s great. Let’s start with the book. Yeah, let’s start with the book. Right now, the book is available wherever you buy books: Walmart.com, Amazon.com, BarnesandNoble.com. You can follow me. Well, first you can find me on my website, KeithWeitch.com, K-E-I-T-H-W-Y-C-H-E, on Instagram, the Real Keith Whitech, and on LinkedIn Keith Whitech, and that’s where you can find me. Also on Substack at Substack, Keith R Whites. Have to put my middle initial in that one.

Jim Beach 26:30
Fantastic! Thank you so much for being with us. Congratulations on the book. I hope it sells well, and we’d love to have you back, Keith. You were great. Thanks a lot.

Keith Wyche 26:38
Thank you, sir. Appreciate it so much. Bye bye. We

Jim Beach 26:41
will be right back. We are back and still so very appreciative that you are with us. Very excited to introduce another great entrepreneur to the mix. Please welcome Thad Bench, to the show. He is the founder of a company called Benchworks. It grew up and was eventually called BW Health Group, but everyone knows it as Benchworks, so we’re going to stick with that. In 2024, he guided the companies to so much growth that they sold to Danforth Health for $7 trillion dollars, you know that might be a typo. So don’t quote me on that number, anyone. Throughout his career, he was very dedicated to long-term success as opposed to short-term profits. He built a career based on integrity and governance, and was incredibly successful. He has now got a new book out published by Forbes, which I think is you know makes it more prestigious in my mind. The book is called “Noble Work: A Practical Guide to Profitable Principled Business Growth. That, welcome to the show. How are you doing,

Thad Bench 27:58
Jim? Thank you very much. And you’re right; that was a typo. It was. It was only 6 trillion that we sold. Oh, I’m

Jim Beach 28:03
sorry. Okay, I require an intern for that.

Thad Bench 28:07
That’s exactly right. That’s exactly right. No, it was a constructive. It was like get by on

Jim Beach 28:12
only 6 trillion.

Thad Bench 28:13
Yeah, I think I would be able to obviously a mere fraction of that, but it was a satisfactory, a satisfactory exit. That for sure. So anyway, it’s a it’s a pleasure to be here, and thank you for your hospitality.

Jim Beach 28:25
Did you have any sellers regret at all? Even you know, not regarding the price, but did you feel like you were selling an arm or a child?

Thad Bench 28:35
Well, to a certain degree, you. I think that’s a natural course of things. You know, you go. One of the things we notice is that you’re you’re running the business. You’re working closely with your colleagues for a long, long time. Many of which I’ve worked with for decades, and then you you know consummate a transaction that’s very exciting. You know, the wires hit. That’s all well and good. And then, in my particular instance, my the president of the company, Tom Mcdonnell, took over and became CEO, and I was really just in an advisory role. And my team did a great job, so they didn’t need a lot of advising. So I went from going 100 miles an hour to you know something significantly less than that, and it is an odd sensation. And I think that’s one of the reasons that I wrote the book because I think it’s important for founders when they ultimately do do a strategic transaction, if that’s the path they choose, to retire into something, and that could be lowering their golf handicap, whatever it is. Throw themselves into something and stay busy, and that’s one of the reasons I wrote the book. And I also felt like the advice that I’ve been given over the years by many mentors, some of the things that I discovered along the way, and frankly, some of the mistakes I made were worth chronicling to help middle market companies prosper.

Jim Beach 29:56
And you dealt dealt with middle market and smaller market pharmacy. Companies didn’t you? Isn’t that we did for the bread and butter? Yeah,

Thad Bench 30:04
yeah. For the most part, we focused on small to to midsize pharma with a specialization in rare disease and cell and gene therapy. So it was a lot of high science work. But from time to time, we worked with some of the giants as well, Pfizer and others. So we were ecumenical, but we felt as if we were really well positioned to help those smaller companies grow and prosper and bring innovative therapies to market. That’s so that’s where we focused

Jim Beach 30:31
on like go-to-market strategy for them. Are these all yeah a lot of approved drugs? I’m kind of shocked. I feel stupid about this that there is small pharma. To me, it was the big six or seven or whatever, and then you know that’s it. I didn’t really understand that. Oh no, there’s a there’s the second thing I’d approve, and if they were, you know,

Thad Bench 30:56
yeah, there’s there’s a there there is there is there is a lot of that, but actually there are hundreds and hundreds of of life science companies in the United States and abroad, and our but you are right. Many of them, as they get close to commercialization, are getting an approved asset. Do end up selling, and that’s all part of their strategy. But in some instances, they actually decide to go alone, and and they feel very dedicated to the assets that they’re bringing to market, and they know it’s going to do some good, and they feel potentially that valuations will be better once they prove themselves in market. So there are a lot of them out there, and our job was really twofold: one, to help them plan their launch strategy, which is something that VentureWorks continues to do to this day, and then how to optimize their commercial trajectory afterward. And in addition to consulting, we had a full-service advertising agency that specialized in pharmaceutical advertising as well. So it was a it was a good platform, and and we had a pretty good adoption curve from that.

Jim Beach 32:01
All right, fascinating. I know that family lore says that we all went to college thanks to Genentech. My dad was a doctor and got into Genentech. Certainly before the IPO, he was very very very early, and so we all were told, “Thank you, Mister Genentech, every day of college.

Thad Bench 32:31
Yeah, there, they these these companies are is that the company

Jim Beach 32:35
you would have worked with? Yeah, yeah, sure. Then all of a sudden, they kind of exploded, right? No,

Thad Bench 32:40
and and there that that the the whole industry is replete with you know cases of that. But but to to be to your point, you know when these companies do hit, they do spin off a lot of free cash flow, and it’s been obviously very helpful to their investors. But one needs to also remember that many many clinical trials don’t get past the regulatory hurdles in front of them, and that’s all part and parcel of being innovative and and you know bringing high science technology forward. It doesn’t work all the time, and so so when they do actually get into market, the margins are very high, and they do spin off, as I mentioned, a lot of free cash flow, but that also is part of the fact that they have to to offset all the R and D and other things that go into bringing a product to market.

Jim Beach 33:32
Sure, of course, we all know the R and D expense and all of that issue. What are your thoughts on the United States paying for the R and D, and then the rest of the countries of the world getting the drug cheaper.

Thad Bench 33:45
Yeah, that’s that’s above my pay grade. Let’s put it that way. There, I see frustration with with drug prices, and I certainly understand that. And but again, I far be it from me to you know comment on those broader issues. My our real focus was to help these smaller companies chart their way forward and and bring their product to market so they can bring medicines that could help people. But I certainly understand the frustration there and and and get it that that it’s a hot button.

Jim Beach 34:19
Yes, it is, and I agree. It is above all of our pay grade. I mean, that’s something that’s going to have to be decided at the presidential and the congressional level if anyone ever makes a decision on it.

Thad Bench 34:32
That’s right.

Jim Beach 34:33
I don’t think that they will. I think our Congress is too weak to make big decisions these days. So anyway, oh, what are you? What are some of the lessons you learned going through a sales negotiation where you’re possibly going to sell your company? So, Danforth approached and said, “Hey, you know, whatever you got, you know, met up through a broker, whatever the circumstances were. How long did the process?” Take did you have times where you were second guessing? Was it your primary goal, and it took over your entire day for six months? Walk us through that story and what were some of the videos going on at that time?

Thad Bench 35:12
Yeah, no, no, it was an interesting process. So we were, you know, as I alluded to in the in the book, you know, noble work. We did not always trip to the light fantastic, as they say. We had some tough times when we were growing our business, but we started really get on a roll around late 2022, really 23, and getting into a very good commercial cycle, getting meeting lots of clients, and unsolicited offer came, or at least a serious dialog came from a private equity firm in Boston, and we got pretty excited about it, and got it, and we got thinking about what strategic outcomes might look like. And so, while that particular process did not go that far, it became clear early on that we weren’t not we’re not going to get together on valuation. It got our head into the game, and then shortly thereafter, another unsolid offer came in from a firm in the UK, and that one almost culminated in a deal. And because of some unusual English law, which I won’t bore everybody with, at the end that fell apart, and I was like, “Oh, geez, we put so much work into it. And I was pretty crestfallen, and thought perhaps I had negotiated too hard, or whatever the case might be. But went back to my team and said, “Look, you know, guys, this has been interesting, but it’s been a ton of work. Should we take a break from all this strategic stuff, and you know, just kind of grow the business and refresh ourselves a little bit, and then we can take a look at what strategic outcome might look like a year or two from now. And everyone said, “No, look, we’re we’re organized now. We’ve got a data room. We’re all set. We think you know keep our heads up and stay in market. So I said, “Well, if we do that this time, we’re going to hire an investment bank. And so we hired Edgemont Partners, great, great investment bank in New York, specializing as part of their business and in medical communications firms and other pharmacy support services. So they were very dialed in to the market and put a book together for us that really told our story and garnered tremendous amount of interest in the marketplace. So we’re very appreciative of the work that they did, and I certainly would encourage other entrepreneurs. You know, sometimes they they don’t want to run a process, but the competitive tension of having multiple bidders certainly drove a valuation that was better than not having that competition. So just keep that in mind. I think one of the other things that was critically important for us is that we made the decision to have a quality of earnings audit done prior to going to market, so we we commissioned one. It’s expensive to do that, and they really get into your knickers, as they say. They go through all of your books and finances to make sure that everything is done according to Hoyle and that there aren’t any irregularities there. And the advantage of that is that if there are any problems, you know, you discover them yourselves, obviously, and have an opportunity to correct them. In our particular instance, things were were good, but then when we went to market, the fact that we went and had already done a QV lent a lot of credibility to our story, and also the people that had been your torturers to a degree because they request all this financial data for weeks and weeks on end. Turn into your defenders because when an acquiring company comes in, they will have their own quality of earnings folks come and pressure test your financial reporting. And so, if there are any questions, then the firm that did your QAV gets to defend the work, and so that was an interesting thing that I had not contemplated before really getting into this strategic transaction. And if your business has any scale, that’s probably a good idea, a good investment before you go to market.

Jim Beach 39:18
All right, a whole bunch of follow-up questions. How big is the company, or was the company back when you sold it? By whatever you want to, any metric you want to share with us, employees, revenue. Yeah,

Thad Bench 39:30
yeah. We, you know, we had about at that time about, I guess, probably around 6570, employees, and and we were in the high 30s as far as revenue goes. But but we drove a yeah yep yep and but we drove a very good EBITDA off of that revenue and so so we were we’re very proud of of the of the trajectory of the business at that time

Jim Beach 39:56
and you had bootstrapped up to that point.

Thad Bench 40:00
Yes, that’s right. Yep, we had built it brick by brick. We never went out and raised institutional money. We had what I would choose to call a small friends and family round in the 2008, 2009 timeframe when the credit markets were so difficult just to build up some working capital, but no, we never brought in outside money, and so we were very dependent on cash flow and making sure that we monitored cash flow as closely as as we could, and we really stayed on top of that. So that’s one of the things that I think a lot of entrepreneurs, and I featured a lot of this in the book. You know, there’s a saying that one of my advisors gave to me said that you know torture the numbers until they talk. And so that was something we paid a lot of attention to our financial reporting to make sure that we could identify areas of opportunity to improve our results or problems that are inherent in the way we were doing things by just analyzing our our financials very closely.

Jim Beach 41:06
All right. So when you went back to the team and said we’ve had two you know attempts and we haven’t gotten a close yet, and they all said let’s continue to push for an event, they didn’t have a an equity voice in that, right? Why were you understand what I’m talking about? Why were the

Thad Bench 41:26
yeah yeah sure no let no that’s a that’s a no that’s

Jim Beach 41:29
motivated.

Thad Bench 41:30
That’s a great question, and so ultimately, some of them did actually not necessarily and

Jim Beach 41:36
sworn some employees. Yeah, so share,

Thad Bench 41:39
yeah, yep, and then also for others in leadership, we put out a change of control contracts, and so if there was a change of control, they would benefit proportionately based on the terms of their change of control document. So, so that was an incentive. But beyond that, when you get a team of hard chargers that that we did, a lot of them were ready to operate on a bigger scale, on the larger stage, if you will, that a privately held, self-funded business could provide. And so, ultimately, when we ended up going through this process, part of the consideration was culture. Culture is very important to me. We had a respectful one, and I really was concerned that our business be passed on to a good steward. And I can tell you that the folks at Danforth Health have been wonderful. You know, we’re obviously well out from the transaction date, and and they’ve done a great job of helping us grow the business, and and and they have acquired additional portfolio companies that we cross sell with, and that was one of the other reasons. In addition to having good culture, we wanted to see if the acquirer could provide us with strategic opportunities to help us continue to grow the business, and that came through in spades with the Danforth partnership.

Jim Beach 43:11
And did it make the company better going through that process? You know, the process of getting all of that stuff on paper and thinking through it all and having it all on paper was that process in itself useful, even if you hadn’t sold the company. Oh,

Thad Bench 43:25
absolutely, absolutely. I mean, there was no question. We we knew the ins and outs of the business. We knew, frankly, where every penny went. Obviously, our forecasting was very much dialed in. We had, you know, the business development culture because we knew that we had to be able to show continued revenue growth to be able to drive the best valuation. So we were extremely dialed into making sure that our business development teams were working effectively. So we had precision regarding our financials, all of our projections, and the business development side of the house was humming along very nicely because we had to. With that, that’s if you’re going to maximize the valuation, that’s the way to way to do it. Now, in fact, if if the transactions had not gone on, that would all been worth it because we were doing very well, and we would continue on and and and benefit from that rigor that the the whole sales process put put on us.

Jim Beach 44:28
All right, so you had the first unsolicited, and that deal ended up with X was the number, and it fell apart. And then the British came in, and that deal fell apart at a multiple of X, and then eventually a year later, you closed the deal with Danforth, Dan, Danforth, yes. At what? At 2x, at 7.7x. Where did it come in relation to? Yeah, yeah.

Thad Bench 44:57
So I am, I am contractually not a. To discuss the terms, however, I would say that it was a very favorable. It was it was multiples of what the earlier offers had been, and frankly, we also had written a significant amount of new business, even in the interim time we had grown, and so the valuation was fair, and it’s worked out very well for Danforth and for obviously for the folks at Benchworks.

Jim Beach 45:26
Well, very very well done. You get the real shots.

Thad Bench 45:41
Oh, look at that! We love that at the end. The rim shots-that-that-that’s the-that’s icing on the cake. Yes.

Jim Beach 45:46
All right. So tell us more about the book. I’m on Amazon, and I’ll just give you a little hint here. It doesn’t have the index available. You know, click more, or I can see the first chapter or that button underneath the picture of the book.

Thad Bench 46:02
Okay, well, we’ll have to talk.

Jim Beach 46:04
Ask them. Oh, Adam Whitty, you know Adam.

Thad Bench 46:08
Oh, yes, he’s a he’s a he’s a great guy. Correct. Yes, he’s the he’s the he’s the man behind Forbes books.

Jim Beach 46:15
Times, and so I think Forbes is amazing with the what they do, and Adam’s company is called Authority Advantage, and they got the deal with Forbes, and that was a great deal. Adam wins all sorts of awards for closing that deal with Forbes, but now they’re out there publishing a lot of books and making a lot of money for some authors. So tell us more about the book, and what do you want us to learn from it?

Thad Bench 46:44
Right. Sure. Well, thank you. And and I would just say that the the reason that I wrote the book, and by the way, anytime anyone says that they’re they they’re writing a book or wrote a book, it’s for me it’s almost a little bit of an eye roll moment in that you know who are you to think that you should expect somebody to spend you know six or eight hours sitting down reading your book but what special thing do you have to say and so I took the responsibility of writing your book very seriously and the the reason that I wanted to get these thoughts down is that I’ve been very fortunate over my my long career to have wonderful mentors that helped me along the way from when I first started when I was 24 years old all through my career, and I wanted to pass that great advice on to other entrepreneurs who were earlier in their career, and in addition to that, I discovered a few things that were very effective for me to help run my business. And then also, frankly, as importantly, some of the mistakes that I made. And if you learn from a mistake, then obviously you know it’s painful, and as long as it doesn’t kill the company, you know. You you you can be valuable. So the combination of passing on the mentoring, some of the stuff that I discovered on my own, and the mistakes, I wanted to break that down into very usable to a very usable book. That hopefully I joke that it it should have coffee stains on it. It should be on your desk, and you can refer to various chapters. Whether it’s you know how to build a go-to-market plan, or preparing for a transaction, or hiring, or firing, or how to talk to the bank if you’re getting ready to bust a covenant. I mean, all these things that that are all part and parcel of running a closely held, privately held business, and so that’s what I wanted to get down. And and you know, thus far, the feedback that we’re getting has has been positive, and and I hope people find it to be useful and they can help and use it to help them grow their business.

Jim Beach 48:58
Bust a covenant. That’s one of my favorite lines ever. Is that what you do when you tell the bank we’re not going to have our $2 million payment this month? That is correct. That is correct for that one.

Thad Bench 49:11
That is is exactly right. Yeah, sound sounds fancier when you say that. But now they they want to know how you know they loan against receivables, loan against other financial metrics, and frankly, in 2008, 2009, I I really didn’t know what the covenants, quote unquote, were in my banking relationship, and that was inexcusable. I, as a CEO, you have to know that. And all of a sudden, I get this phone call, and it’s like, oh, by the way, you know, you’re not in compliance. You’re going to have to put X amount of money in to get back into compliance, and I was like, “Wow, okay, well that’s interesting. So that’s when we did our family and friends around, so we could get back into compliance. And so yes, that is that is a fancy way of saying we’re we’re in some sort of financial strain. Here now, what I will tell you is that if you run a company and and there’s a I talk a lot about governance in the book, and if you are a trustworthy company, in other words, you tell the truth even when the news isn’t good, and you are really paying attention, you can go to a bank and and say, “Look, we’re six weeks from now or eight weeks from now. We’re going to hit a cash flow pinch point. We want to bring this to your attention, and we want to figure out a way that we’re going to be able to work our way through that. And here’s our plan: how we intend to remedy the situation. And if you are a clear communicator and you communicate in advance. That buys you a lot of grace, and and banks will 99% of the time will work with you. What they don’t like are surprises. And so, if all of a sudden you call up and say, “Hey, guess what? It’s Thursday, and payrolls tomorrow. We’re out of money, then you’re not going to get as receptive a an audience. Obviously, so you know, people respect companies that that again are transparent and try to do the right thing. And frankly, your employees know it as well, and your customers know it. And ultimately, gets to be a big advantage for you.

Jim Beach 51:16
Wow, you’d have to have cojones to expect the bank to throw in payroll like that,

Thad Bench 51:23
yeah. Well, yeah. With one day, that’s true. Yeah, but but believe me, it happens. I’ve I hear some horror stories about that. But now we we fortunately during the course of our long history, we had some very good people. Melissa Johnston, who was my COO for many years, was very much on top of the numbers, and so we had a good visibility and knew what what our position was, and that that was a real advantage for us, particularly as you’re navigating your way through a tougher period.

Jim Beach 51:59
I’m writing a business thriller and entrepreneurial thriller right now, and in the preface, the two entrepreneurs, the founders, go in and tell the bank that they missed their number by $2 million, and that’s the opening scene of the book.

Thad Bench 52:18
Yes, sounds a little bit like Margin Call, remember that movie? Yes, no, sounds yeah. Sounds like like like you’re onto something. So it would be a thriller. That would not be a thriller that I would want to experience, by the way. But go ahead,

Jim Beach 52:34
Pat. How do we find out more about you? Follow you online. Get a copy of Noble Work.

Thad Bench 52:38
Yes, well, I I think we’re all over Amazon. If you just Google it, you should be able to pop up. I should know my URL right off the top of my head. And to be honest with you, look, obviously, if we make some money from the book, that’s terrific. My motivation for writing the book is to help other entrepreneurs, and to this day, I enjoy doing that. I’ve actually just launched another company with a partner, a fellow by the name of Dick Kinsinger, called Honor Works. I guess we have a lot of affinity for work, as it’s an honor to work with you. Where our goal is to help middle and market companies grow their business through a strategic transaction. So a couple of different ways, and I’m also obviously all over LinkedIn. You know, Thad Bench on LinkedIn, and that’s a great way to contact me and learn more. And I certainly could direct you to the book and or have a discussion. And I’m not always looking for a commercial engagement. If I can just help someone, I’m happy to do that, and anytime it falls into something more, then obviously we can we can discuss that.

Jim Beach 53:47
Fantastic, Dad. Thank you so very much for being with us, and we’d love to have you back. Thanks a lot.

Thad Bench 53:52
Thank you. Thank you very much. Take care now.

Jim Beach 53:54
You too. We are out of time by now.