Spread Joy, Reduce Suffering (ft. Craig Scharton)

One of the best things that ever happened to me, I would say, is that I got cancer when I was 23. I realized that we have one very precious life, and I wanted to make sure and do good with the one I had and, and use it all up. And so I've been very fortunate to try to do things that had meaning. This life is an incredible gift, and squandering gifts leads to a lot of unhappiness.

Welcome to Digital Voices, where healthcare and life science leaders explore the real work behind transformation. This podcast is about people, leadership, and the conversations that move healthcare forward. Now your host, Ed Marx. Welcome to another edition of Digital Voices. Thanks for listening. We know you have a lot of different choices, so many great podcasts out there to listen and watch, and you chose us, and we make it worth your while. Because we have amazing guests like Craig Charton. Craig, welcome to Digital Voices.

Hey, great to see you again, Ed.

It's great seeing you. And I want to describe how we first met. So it was really only recently. So I heard about all the great things that you were doing at Connect Labs Charlotte, which we're going to get into in a big way. So I reached out, I think we had a mutual friend brought us together. Yes, Sandeep, a mutual friend brought us together. Very thankful for him. And I was like, wow, I cannot believe that something like this is being built. And so you were kind enough. I think we're like almost like on the first day of some of the parts where we could actually walk in without, you know, wearing protective gear and check out this amazing facility. I don't want to steal the thunder. It'll come. You'll, you'll share it in a few minutes here. Before we get into all that, Craig, I have to ask, what songs are on your playlist?

Oh my gosh. Uh, this time of year I have my, uh, bizarre holiday track, which is, uh, the Hanukkah song by Adam Sandler.

Ah, love it.

Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer and Merry Christmas with the Family by Robert Earl Keen. Those are the top 3 that come to mind, but they're all, as you can tell, have a humorous bent to them.

Yeah. Yeah, those are great. And I haven't heard of Robert Earl Keen's name in a while.

Yeah, I'm a big fan. Although that song is inappropriate, none of you should listen to it.

I saw him in concert a couple of times. It's a great concert. What about life message and mantra? Are there sort of words that guide how you live and how you operate?

Well, yes. So I always keep my 5 ideals in mind, which are love, truth, beauty, wisdom, and peace. And so that's kind of my mantra I developed over the years of during meditation. And And the other is just spread joy and reduce suffering. If I keep it simple like that, I can usually stay within sight of my path.

Eventually, I mentioned this all the time on Digital Voices and we haven't done it yet, but eventually someday, just like we have a playlist of all the songs on Spotify, we will develop sort of everyone's mantras. And I think it'll make for a fascinating read, you know, like something easy, like downloadable. But Craig, before we get into Connect Labs, let's talk a little bit about you so we understand your background and how it all fits in. Tell us about you. What's your story like? Where were you born?

I was born in Fresno, California, which is the less lesser-known agricultural part of the state. The 8 counties around Fresno grow more food than any state in the country. So it's wildly productive, 350 to 400 different kinds of crops. So a huge diversity. And we're right at the base of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. So grew up surrounded by farms and fields and 45 miles, 50 miles to the entrance to Yosemite and about 55 to 60 miles away from Kings Canyon National Park. So, you know, fishing and hiking and camping and all that was part of growing up.

That's really cool. I like that. Was there a pivotal moment that happened growing up or maybe later in adult life that fundamentally changed your trajectory?

Yeah, one of the best things that ever happened to me, I would say, is that I got cancer when I was 23. And it really shook me out of like the normal life path of, you know, white picket fence and, you know, having a steady job and always getting a promotion and having perfect kids and all that. I realized that we have one very precious life and I wanted to make sure and do good with the one I had and use it all up. So it really changed my trajectory and my mindset and has allowed me to do things I would've never done otherwise because I'm not afraid to do them.

Is that Something that helped propel your interest in what you're doing today? Yeah.

So I've always, you know, it's, you know, thinking about what your strengths are and what you like, you know, trying to get those 2 things to blend. I really like working with people and finding their common goals and helping them move toward and accomplish those goals and then celebrate those outcomes. So whether it's working in a high concentrated poverty neighborhood or with an industry of water technology companies or startup medical device companies, like figuring out what those things are that can not just improve one company, but improve the opportunities for all the people that are engaged.

Yeah, no, I like that. Have your aspirations and goals changed over time? Like as you have these different experiences, did Obviously, I think the core of you has always remained the same as you have described, but in terms of different things that you've been doing?

Well, I'd say, you know, Joseph Campbell talks about, you know, when you get older, you know, you can't remember why you walked into a room or, you know, where you put your keys. But he said that, you know, you could start to see these threads as you look back on your life that you couldn't see when you were in the middle of it.

Yeah.

And so I've been very fortunate and sometimes made less than obvious choices to try to do things that had meaning. And so I really like that part of my life. So I've been able to do good work, but also it had a purpose behind it. And, you know, that drives me, I think, more than just Nothing wrong with people that have an economic goal. That's great. But I've always needed that extra part to really, you know, get me out of bed early in the morning and give me the reason to want to get up and perform.

Yeah, no, I like that a lot. Other than Connect Labs Charlotte, what are one or two major high points in your journey today? Because we're going to hit on Connect Labs here in a second.

Boy, you know, I'm fortunate to have had a lot of exciting things over my life. There was one big downtown project I worked on in my hometown. It took 8 years. It was—

Wow.

Had agencies within every, you know, state, federal, local, you know, it was very highly complicated. Took 8 years. There was no certainty that we were going to succeed all the way through the process. Uh, so after that project had its grand opening and, um, we were able to celebrate with 10,000, you know, of our closest friends and have 40 bands out on the street, you know, that, that was a really big moment.

Yeah, that's, that's amazing. And I thought the other one you were going to share, Craig, is being on Digital Voices.

Well, clearly, but that'll have to be on the next one because we haven't finished it yet. Who knows how this will go?

Oh man, we have to spend more time together. Hey, how, what would you like to be doing in the next 5 years? Have you thought?

No, I'm really, I see, you know, I'm 64. This is really one of the projects I want to ride out. You know, as we talk more about Connect Labs, I mean, I love helping companies grow individually. Um, I like to put that ecosystem together, but the fact that it's human health innovation. just gives it that extra push. I'm not just helping someone with a hair product, you know, or, you know, something that maybe doesn't have quite the potential for outcomes as these companies do. So it's a dream project to be, you know, like feeling like this is my— Like a last lap on the career path. This is where I'm happy and want to finish up.

Yeah, I know. I know it's amazing. So let's just jump right in. Tell us about it. Not everyone's going to know when we reference the name Connect Labs Charlotte, what that is. Can you share what that is? And then we'll get into some of the mission and vision.

Yeah. So within Charlotte, which you can see Charlotte behind me, that's not a screensaver or fake background. That's That's how close we are to Uptown Charlotte. There's a project called The Pearl, which is a health innovation district. So we have a lot of really strong partners within this new development, which just opened this summer. It has Wake Forest School of Medicine, a surgical training facility called IRCAD, which is arguably the best or at least one of the best in the world. It will bring 10,000 surgeons a year to Charlotte for training. Siemens Healthineers and a lot of other medical device-related partnerships, along with the offices for Atrium Advocate Health, all in this one place with people collaborating and working together. Within the larger context, I work for Wexford Science and Technology. And we are a developer that focuses exclusively on innovation districts. So this is one of our projects from around the country. And within those, we have Connect Labs, which is a space dedicated to people that are doing innovation.

Yeah.

So it can be, we have wet and dry labs for life science research, people doing more engineering kind of work with medical device. We have digital health companies, space for economic development partners and investors who can help our companies grow. And, you know, it's just that feeling of energy when you get these kinds of people within a floor or a space and you start to see all these incredible outcomes happening right in front of your eyes.

It's pretty cool. Yeah, it's a beautiful space. I've been very fortunate. You Personally led the tour along with Atrium counterpart on the, on that side of the facility. And it was just amazing. And it is like this small ecosystem and the connection. So I get the name and you're also building a hotel. Can you talk about the property and why that property or that part of the city was chosen? Because I think that's a really important part of the story as well.

We have this site, it was the historic Brooklyn neighborhood. We've incorporated that into the design of the the site to honor that legacy, but it also left 30 acres with, you know, within the heart of the city that were single-story buildings, not a lot of investment in it, with great proximity to uptown. And so that's become the development site. So we do have access to have, we have 2 buildings now. We'll be building a—

3rd.

Residential building, a hotel, as you mentioned, and 2 more research buildings on this site. Then we have more acreage across the street behind me where we'll be able to respond to what the market wants after we're done with these first 2 phases.

Yeah, it's pretty remarkable on so many different levels. That's what's the cool thing, and that's why it's so important to you personally as well.

Yeah.

And to your career.

And if people go on and look for Wexford Science and Technology, they can look up the PERL and they can look up Connect Labs as well. And we do have Connect Labs in other facilities throughout the country. So not only are the early-stage and startup companies on our floor connecting with each other, they have the ability to connect with the early-stage and startup companies in Phoenix and Sacramento and Baltimore, U City Square in Philadelphia, and others. So, you know, we're connecting on multiple different levels at once.

Yeah. Well, I love this one in particular, you know, because the PERL aspect and the Advocate Health and Wake Forest. And yeah, Dr. Rajesh Srishta, he was so grateful to be with us and give us Or the clinical side. Yeah. And it is cool. For those who haven't been, they should. We'll put the links that you just mentioned in the show notes so you can get kind of a virtual sense. But if you ever go, you should visit. It's an amazing facility doing great things. And like you just described, Craig, and I walked through it, so I saw it. Like, yeah, you could have all your innovators and they're right there and they can talk to these 10,000 surgeons coming in. And I saw that training facility is like over the top unreal. And all the other partners that you mentioned, one of them, there's a couple other partners that are there and they've committed to bringing their latest and greatest equipment. And so it really will be this sort of like a mecca for all things innovation and healthcare. And to your point, that's come through loud and clear a couple of times already, is that it's going to be impactful for generations upon generations and save a lot of lives, improve the quality of care, improve patient experience, improve clinical experience. You can tell I'm pretty excited about it, Craig. I think I'm ready to come back.

Well, you're welcome here anytime. And anyone watching or listening, you know, feel free. I love showing it off. It's a beautifully designed project. So, it's a real joy to be able to share with people.

So, Craig, obviously, you've been doing things like this. These are huge scale. Are you allowed to talk about what was the overall budget or investment? Like, this is a big-scale project.

Yeah. And I should have that number right at the top of my head. And I don't at the moment. We're about 700,000, 750,000 square feet in the first part of the project. And I don't remember what that number is, so I won't make it up.

Yeah. But it's massive in terms of the dollars and in terms of the infrastructure.

It'll be a multi-billion dollar project when we're all through.

Yes.

Yeah.

It's much more than building a football stadium. And so it's pretty cool. And the reason I bring that up and your involvement in all these things, because I want to talk to you now about leadership, because obviously to be selected to be the leader of this obviously says a lot about you and what you've done in your past. So you obviously have a history of great leadership. So I wanted to ask you a little bit about that. Like, what are one or two talents or skills, however you might describe them, that you think are super important for success when you're When you're leading teams, obviously you're not doing this by yourself. When you're leading teams, bringing others together to have success, what are some of those skills or talents?

I think it comes down to 2 things. Like, I really care about the people that work with me and I want them to succeed in what they do. And I view my role as thinking about how I can help them be successful. And I really take a lot of joy as they move on in their careers and become successful. I feel that same way about the companies that are on our floor. You know, my intrinsic value or reward, I should say, is really watching them grow and become successful and getting to share in that. So I think care is a big part of it. I actually care whether things work well or not. Usually I assume that if it's not working, it's my fault and I have to go back and think about it harder and find a creative solution to make things work. So that's a big part of it. I think the idea of fun is undervalued. You know, I want people to walk in and have a sense of fun. So you got to see the artwork hanging on the walls and the mural that will be up and You know, we don't just put out Doritos and Diet Pepsi. We are, you know, going to the market and finding fresh fruits and vegetables. And we're going to have smoothie days, you know, where we have a smoothie bar set up and, you know, trying to incorporate health on all these different levels, making sure the community feels welcome here. And we have events for the community. So, it's not just all the students and faculty and, you know, C-level people at Atrium Advocate and the surgeons. It's also a place where the community can come through. And, I want people to drive down the street and say, you should go in there sometime. There's some amazing things happening on cardiac and neurology and cancer and all these things. And, I want them to share in the excitement that's happening here. So, So I do think fun has a role in all of that because I believe if things are fun, you can't keep people away. If it's not fun, you can't pay them to go. So all these entrepreneurs are working long hours and putting a lot at risk. And if we can bring that sense of joy to them, I think we've made it a place worth being in.

Yeah. Craig, you know, you've talked a lot about your 5 sort of key values, if you will, love, truth, beauty, wisdom, peace, and the different things that you've been speaking about, about care for others, a lot of empathy, a lot of compassion, a lot of interest being purpose-driven, doing things with meaning. So this is completely off script, but where do you think that comes from? Because people will listen to leaders like yourself, Or people like yourself and talk about things and that comes out and then they often ask that question. And, and so I'm asking it for them. It's like, how did, how did Craig, how did that Craig come to be? What, what do you think?

Well, I think I've also always had kind of a sense of wonder about things. Um, I think that cancer diagnosis, you know, uh, really had a lot to do with it. Realizing that this life is an incredible gift and squandering gifts is, you know, it leads to a lot of unhappiness. So, you know, we all should, I mean, we're surrounded by riches. We're, I mean, there's just everything is here. And for us not to be grateful is really a huge missed opportunity. I mean, you can always want more, but Yeah. You know, being grateful for what we have is, is a pretty great way to go through life, I think.

All right. Another hard off-script question, Craig. So you're, I, I, I, um, agree with you on the, on one of the main premises that you just had in the answer to that question. You had that diagnosis, you know, you went through that cancer. So it was like, especially at age 23, it's like, dang, you know, life, life is important. It's short. There's no guarantees, you know, all that kind of stuff. And then that kind of makes you, and I, you know, I've had a similar epiphany. And I've talked to others who've had similar epiphanies. What if you, what if you don't have an epiphany like that? And I, we hope that no one does, right?

I think some of us have thicker skulls, so we're not going to get the message by reading a book. You know, you really have to have the message pounded in. And I had a recurrence when I was 35 and I just attributed that to very thick skull.

Yeah.

Like you didn't get the message the first time. Here's your reminder. Yeah.

Well, and that's what's great about this conversation. And I know our listeners, I want to say listeners, but we also are visual as well. I have to figure out what the better term is, but our audience, you know, for those that haven't had that sort of life event, that sort of pivot we spoke about, you know, how can you cultivate it? Without that, and certainly listening to people like yourself talk about it, I think is very helpful. So thanks for being transparent and authentic in all of your answers. Another question for you, Craig, you know, you're a very creative person. Obviously you work in a very creative industry, bringing all these pieces and parts together. Where do you go when, you know, maybe you feel like your creativity is drained or like it takes a lot of effort to put something like this together and you just need time away? So what do you do to sort of refresh yourself?

Well, I think there are 2 things that help sort of get us out of like the speed of life, you know, and it's just getting faster and faster all the time. Nature is a really great way to broaden your experience of time. You know, I used to live right below the giant sequoias and my favorite walk had 1,100 giant sequoias on it.

Wow.

And you, You think about them being around for 2,000+ years, and all of a sudden our little, you know, 70, 80 years is pretty insignificant. So I've found that nature really broadens that experience of time, which then allows you to free up your creative energy more. And the other really is being in old cities or old buildings, old neighborhoods, old downtowns. The same thing where you can like look at a building and think about, you know, someone worked there in a department store in the 1920s and they fell in love there, or, you know, like all these different things of these lives that have come before us. I really like this, the churches out here in the South, you know, a lot of them have cemeteries around them and you literally walk through a cemetery to church and I'm like, oh, every church should have that. Like, let's have this reminder of You know, how precious life is. And also that lengthening of time about, you know, the people that came before us and remembering there'll be people after us. And like, that really frees up my mind to one, not be so caught up in everything, but just that experience of expansion of time, I think allows the free, the creativity to kind of freely come through much better.

Yeah, I love that. Yeah. And I went super visual on you when you were giving that answer in terms of walking through a cemetery every day and how that could help remind you. And I had a great walk when I served in New York City. I had a short walk to work, but I forget the name of the chapel, but it's where John Adams is buried. So literally I'd walk by and see John Adams and a bunch of other great people. And I was like, always a good reminder, like, no, you know, just about life and the shortness of life and impact and all that kind of stuff. What, what are something that your parents made you do as a kid that you maybe rolled your eyes a little bit like, oh my gosh. Um, but now as an adult, you look back and you're like, dang, I'm glad my parents made me do that. Was there anything like that?

My whole family, we like to cook. And so like, even, I don't know. Very early, I don't know, 9, 10, you know, it was like, okay, it's your turn to cook breakfast on Saturday, you know? And it wasn't going to be putting out bowls of cereal. Like, you know, we were making homemade, you know, pancakes and French toast, and then it turned into crepes and waffles and, you know, all these different things. And so, you know, I get a lot of joy out of cooking still. So I think I think that was really fun. And our rule was like, if you don't like dinner, go make something yourself. So, you know, we weren't forced to eat what we didn't want, but no one was going to go make us something special. You know, if I think about the amount of hours that I've spent my life cooking, you know, and it also led to, you know, I cooked in a restaurant that some friends had, kind of a farm-to-table place. I ended up owning a restaurant for a while where we focused on fresh local foods. And so I think that added a lot to my life as well.

Yeah, that's very cool. See, we only tapped into a small portion. We'll have to have you back. This has been really fascinating. We're going to add some new songs to our playlist because we never have any holiday songs on there. So you gave us some good ideas. Yeah, that's one of my favorite songs, Adam Sandler. I think the song was so good.

I love that he laughs at himself, like right in the middle of the song. He's just so pleased and tickled. I love that part of it.

He's having a good time. And then your message and mantra, which I've already repeated previously. And then, yeah, just your life growing up sounds pretty cool. And I can visualize that as well. I have driven through that area. Talking about your pivot moment, cancer, how that influenced the rest of who you are and your life and career. Then we talked about your career, but also spent a lot of time talking about Connect Labs, Charlotte and the Pearl itself. And then we ended up on leadership and just like, what are the things that have been the key to your success? Craig, what did I miss? Or is there anything you want to double down on? I'll give you the last word.

Well, you know, we are building this ecosystem in Charlotte called Kind Health Innovation. So beyond just the Pearl, we're really building out this ecosystem of all these people that are both doing health innovation and all the services and organizations professionally that support those people. So our goal is to make Charlotte the most supportive place in the country for health innovators.

Yeah.

That's beautiful. So I just wanted to touch on that. You know, we've, we don't think we'll ever beat Boston on the number of patents and we don't think we'll beat San Francisco on the number of venture capital dollars deployed, but we do think that we could be the most supportive place for the people that are doing health innovation. And so that's a lane that really fits well with Southern hospitality and Southern charm and really fits the brand of our community. So I just wanted to touch on that for a little bit and let people know that We think this is a good place and we're really proud of the people that are already here doing it. Yeah.

And you should be. Thanks so much, Craig, for being a guest on Digital Voices.

Anytime. I enjoyed it. Thanks, Ed.

Thank you for listening to Digital Voices. We hope today's conversation sparked ideas, reflection, and connection. Subscribe on YouTube, Apple, and Spotify Podcasts so you don't miss an episode.