145 - Embracing AI and Digital Transformation with NEORIS' Tim Marx

Welcome to Listening with Leaders. I'm Doug Noll, lawyer turned peacemaker. I teach executive leaders how to listen to emotions rather than words so that they can become the leaders everyone wants to follow. And I teach those same leaders how to be authentically present, available, and connected to their families despite being insanely busy. I have learned that we are 98% emotional, and only 2% rational. Learning how to listen to emotions is, in my experience, the foundational skill of life. Stick around to the end of the show, and I'll reveal how you can be on our next guest in 15 to 20 minutes. So let's get started. Mark, welcome to Listening with Leaders. You are the Chief Transformation Office of Neurys, which can be found at neurys.com, N-E-U-R-Y-S.com. Welcome to the show.

Thank you, Doug.

So how about starting off with a little bit of a backstory, who you are and what you do?

Sure. Well, I'm the Chief Transformation Officer at Naoortis currently. I joined the team about 6 months ago. And Naoortis is a digital consultancy and business partner to some of the largest companies in the world, right? We've been providing tech services for more than 20 years and serve clients across 14 countries in which we operate. You know, what exactly do we do? We combine deep industry knowledge and the highest technological expertise to help our clients on their digital journeys, creating tailored solutions to help them overcome specific business challenges.

Got it.

Right. So the idea is not just, you know, extra manpower, it's, you know, strategic digital transformation ideas and we help them not only design what that's gonna look like but also implement the solutions. So that's a little bit about Naoris, where I am now. If you'd like, we can get into some of the backstory, but I've always been told to lead with what you're currently doing. Well, that's okay. And so I wanted to do so.

That's okay. And before we get into the backstory, because I'm really interested in how you got to where you are today, what's your role as a Chief Transformation Officer?

As the Chief Transformation Officer, my job is to help, you know, the CEO and all the business leaders identify the biggest areas to value creation potential, right? And to help make that happen. So it's a little bit of kind of my past life as a consultant meets my another past life of mine, which is as an operator. So the idea is really how do I identify where we have the biggest areas to create value, whether that's, you know, redesigning processes, whether that's changing our pricing policies and things of that nature. And then work with the team to make it happen.

And so you're working on the customer side of the, of the business, the client side of the business where you're, or is it this more internal where you're looking at how you can help the company develop more value for existing clients and maybe potential clients? Right.

On the Chief Transformation Office role is mostly internally focused. And so we're helping now get better. Now at the same time, my role in particular because of, you know, a little, my past experience and a lot of the nature of the work that we're doing, especially with US clients, I do get involved on the commercial side as well. But if you want to say what we do look at as a Chief Transformation Office, that's a little bit more inward looking.

Got it. And so how do you, what was it, tell us, give us a little backstory about your career that got you into this because it sounded like you're, bringing a bunch of different experiences together to be able to perform what you're doing today. Tell us a little bit about that.

Sure. I'll try to be brief. You know, I grew up in Philadelphia, and when I graduated college, I wanted an experience that was international, a little bit different than what I had been accustomed to. I had tried to learn Spanish in a semester in Spain and failed miserably. And so I wanted to really pick up on that. I moved to Mexico with a Fulbright scholarship and while I was there, really liked what I was doing and like being in Mexico. And so I decided to stay, look for a job, joined a consulting firm and spent most of the next 17 years in, in the, at the Boston Consulting Group. You know, I left that to about 6, 7 years ago because I wanted to get a little bit more operational. I wanted to see a different side of businesses and I wanted to work on, work with some smaller companies. And so after doing some venture capital and the like, I wound up actually running a startup. Now that was a blockchain company. And then when I left the blockchain company, was looking for, you know, a role that combined the two things, you know, I really liked what I had done in consulting and the skill set that that provided. And I really did like operating as well. But, and so I was looking for something that really could combine the two things. And that's why the, the role as a Chief Transformation Officer has been, you know, ideal for me.

And so you're still based in Mexico?

No, I actually live in Houston now. I spent, I would say from 2000 to 2015 in Monterrey, Mexico. You know, I had a regional focus as well. So I spent a lot of time across Latin America and, and the United States, moved up to Houston several years ago, but still maintain those strong ties. That's why a company like Nayartes was particularly interesting to me because it allowed me to leverage all of the knowledge of the region, you know, my knowledge of Spanish as well, but also combine it into a business that also, that has a huge vocation to serving the US market. So it really was the best of both worlds.

So you've been with the company now for, I think you said 6 months?

Yes, about 6 months.

What is it that gets you really excited in the morning to get up and go to work?

The potential and all the work that needs to be done, but really it's the potential of what really believe in what we're doing and the value that we're creating for clients and the absolute need for companies like Nowartys to help serve our clients. And we, we do a lot of things from, you know, even some old school technologies, Cobalt and the like, helping our clients maintain their mainframes. But at the same time, we're leading the, I would say, you know, revolution in how software development is done, you know, incorporating tools such as GenAI and the like and really helping our clients push the boundaries of what they thought was possible and what they probably didn't even think was possible a year ago. And so really that idea of, you know, kind of all that, all the work that needs to be done, the many ways we can serve clients, you know, really gets me excited. And then if you look at that and you look across many countries, many regions and the like, just the opportunities for growth in the industry and for Neoris in particular because of how well we're set up in our strong value proposition.

So it sounds like Neoris is obviously a tech company or a tech consultant company, how much technology knowledge did you have coming into the company?

My tech background is not as all that strong. I studied finance and I have an MBA. I learned obviously from running a high-tech startup what I needed to know as far as blockchain and things of that nature. And so I'm comfortable with technology. I just, if you ask me to implement or do the coding, I don't think that would go particularly well for our clients.

So it sounds like you've got a pretty high-level understanding of how everything works.

Yes.

And at that high level, you can talk intelligently with other people in the company and with clients, potential clients about what services you guys can provide and how you add value.

Of course, of course, very strong understanding of what we provide, our value, our value proposition, the offerings and things of that nature. Yes, but going in and coming in, no, I hadn't worked in this industry specifically. So something I had to learn.

Right. So there's been a probably, probably been a learning curve for you.

You could say.

You're laughing. So it sounds like it's been pretty intense.

It has been. But if there's one thing I did learn from my time in consulting is being able to jump into a different industry, really identify the key the key ways to create value and execute on that. And so it was just another challenge in a long list of many. And I was just really excited because, again, because of the industry, because of what it represents and because at the end of the day, this is the future. And so I'd rather be dealing with the future than living in the past.

So you mentioned AI. We've, I've been following the OpenAI, Sam Altman craziness. In fact, I just posted a post on LinkedIn about it today. And what's your take on the direction of AI and how it's going to be affecting your company's business?

Well, without, I mean, I don't know enough to intelligently add anything onto the Sam Altman and OpenAI conversation specifically. But when it comes to AI and specifically GenAI, again, it sounds cliché, but But it's the future. That's where we're going. I mean, it's going to revolutionize the way software is developed. It's gonna revolutionize, you know, many aspects of people's businesses to the extent that we're incapable of today even acknowledging the extent of what that may be, right? But the fact is, you know, we know it's coming. The fact is whether or not there are people that want to slow it down or, you know, kind of put controls on it and the like, It's kind of a one-way street. And, you know, people, you can slow it down in some jurisdictions, maybe more than others, but at the end of the day, it is, it's something that's gonna happen. And so we need to have a handle on it. And that's why we went out and we signed up. We use, we're using Copilot and we're rolling that out across all of our resources. Because we realized that we need to know this, our consultants need to know this. And the only way to really serve our clients effectively into the future is by being on the vanguard and using the tools of the future. And so that's, I would say that's our take. I mean, if you think about 15 months ago, we're not even having this conversation.

Exactly.

Right. And so maybe even 6, 9 months ago. And so sitting here and being able to say precisely exactly how it's gonna impact, I don't think, at least I don't know, I don't think anybody really knows. But what we do know is, yeah, we need to be using these tools and we'll figure it out on the, along the way. Right. And we'll figure it out alongside our clients because how they incorporate it and how they use it will be different from industry to industry, client to client.

That's right. It was, so you mentioned COBOL. I read, I, I remember COBOL. I learned how to code in 1969. On a mainframe. That's how, that's how long ago I started. And I was just reading the other day about how so many mainframe systems are still based, still based on COBOL, which is really an antiquated language. And they're thinking that they can, they're going to be able to use this generative AI to rewrite, um, to rewrite the, the code into something that's going to be more usable. I thought that was just a really fascinating use of of AI and something that could really be powerful because recoding is extremely time-consuming and expensive. Of course, we'll see what happens. So this show is called Listening with Leaders. You've been in all kinds of different roles as a consultant, as an operator yourself. How important has listening been in all the work you've done in business over the last two decades?

I mean, I don't think you can list it high enough on any list of important factors. And if you can't listen, you can't learn. And if you can't learn, you're gonna get stuck pretty quick.

Right. You've probably been in the presence of, of people who are good listeners and in the presence of person, people who are not so good listeners. What, what are the characteristics that you've seen that differentiate the really great listener from the maybe not so good listener, somebody who needs a little more help?

I think it's, I think it's presence. And what I mean by presence is we've all been in the room with really great listeners and you feel like you're the only person in the room, whether or not they have a million things going on, whether or not they're dealing with a lot of issues on their own. As we all are, you really feel like you're the center of the universe for that 30 minutes or 45 minutes or whatever it is. And then obviously on the other extent, you have the people that you can tell are paying about 10% mindshare to the conversation and 90% is elsewhere. So I think that's the feel that you get. And so as much as obviously the proof is in the pudding, if somebody's listening, you're gonna be able to move on and make decisions and work together or do things, I think it starts with that just general feel because you know when you're being paid attention to and you know when you're not. And so can you create that environment for other people? I think that's the most important thing.

That's a really cool distinction. Do you feel heard and validated or do you feel ignored or not like you're not important? What do you think for the listener who's making you feel like you're really being heard, like you're the only person in the room to your point, What do you think that listener is doing that other people don't do?

First of all, they don't interrupt. And I think that it's very easy to interrupt people because we have something we want to say, right? And the like, or we have a really good point, but then we realize that sometimes people want to be heard as much People want to be listened to, you know, as much as they want to be right.

Right?

So a lot of times it has less to do with getting to the right answer and more just allowing that person to express their thoughts and make them feel heard. So I think that's one thing is don't interrupt. Number 2 is you can tell when somebody is, let's say, not interrupting, but mentally interrupting. What do I mean by that? You can tell when they're thinking about what they're going to say versus what you're actually saying. I mean, you can normally pick up on that. I, I don't know, it seems like intangible to me, but, you know, at least I could feel it. So I think that idea of staying present and really listening to what the other person's saying, you can differentiate that versus the person that's already formulating the rebuttal, if you want to put it that way, right? And the other thing is just you know, eye contact and the like. I mean, it sounds again pretty cliché, but how many times are you talking to somebody that they may or may not be listening, but they're looking down or they're not looking at the camera, or, you know, they're, they're, they just seem to be somewhere else. And it just gives you the idea that they're not there, even if they are, right? And so I think there's just some of these both, you know, tangible and then intangible clues that just make you feel either comfortable or not. And I think at the end of the day, that's what it comes down to. Are you comfortable in that conversation? You feel like you're being heard, you feel like you can express yourself and it's a two-way conversation, or do you feel uncomfortable for any of those other factors?

Right, exactly correct. And I guess, I guess I'm sort of smiling because I teach people how to listen, but what I teach is to avoid the problems that you were talking about where people aren't paying attention, where they're thinking about what they're gonna talk about. Like I teach what's known as Type 2 listening, where your total focus is making sure the speaker is understood from the speaker's frame of reference. And you do that primarily by listening to emotions rather than to words. In fact, that's what I teach. Ignore the words and pay attention to the emotions, and you'll learn more from that than you'll ever learn from trying to listen to their words. Which is— and it's just, you're just reinforcing that. Really, really cool. Um, so one more question and I'll let you go. What is one thing about Tim Marks that we would never know unless you revealed it to us?

Man, it's really— I guess I should have been ready for this type of question, but either way, I'm a pretty open book. I do think one of the interesting things about me is that I'm naturally an introvert, although I've been, I guess, by the choice I made, the career choices I've been in and things of that nature, I come off as an extrovert. And so I think that's one of the things I've always had to deal with that, you know, obviously the definition of, you know, introvert and extrovert a lot of times gets confused, right? It's not as much whether you're good with people or not, it's where you draw your energy from, right? And so I think people find that odd when they know me quite well and then all of a sudden realize like, wait, okay, you're more introverted than I thought. And I don't think, obviously it's not a good or bad thing. It's just after a lot of time, I just need that a little bit of alone time to charge my battery up again.

You're the guy. Yeah. You're the guy. I'm an introvert. So if I get it, if I, if I've got it correct, if you're like me, you're the guy who would rather have solitude and be alone and maybe be with your intimate other than go to some big party and rock out and meet everybody in the room and work the room.

Exactly. That's probably exactly right.

And that's, I'm the same way. And we can function in the outside world, we function with people, but where we get our energy from inside. Whereas extroverts get their energy from other people around them and being out there. And I find that to be very draining. I can do it, but it's very draining. I suspect you probably have the same experience. Exactly.

Right.

Tim, thanks so much for jumping on the call. It's been a great conversation.

Thank you, Doug.

Pleasure. Doug Noll here. Thank you so much for listening to Listening with Leaders. If you are a successful executive leader who would like to be on this program, please visit podcast.dougnull.com/podcast. If you got something out of this interview, would you please share this episode on social media? Just do a quick screenshot with your phone and text it to a friend or post it on the socials. If you know someone that would be a great guest, tag them on the social media to let them what you'd like to know about the show and include the hashtag #ListeningWithLeaders. I love seeing your posts and guest suggestions. We are regularly putting out new episodes and content. To make sure you don't miss any episodes, go ahead and subscribe. Your thumbs up ratings and reviews go a long way to help promote the show and mean a lot to me and my team. Want to know more? Go to my website, DougNoll.com, or follow me on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram. That's @DouglasEnoll. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you on the next show.