In this concise "6 questions in 7 minutes" interview, Professor Pete Alexander talks with Dan Eckert, a serial CEO who leads StatLab, a private‑equity‑backed healthcare company focused on cancer diagnostics and, more recently, COVID‑related infection‑control products. Eckert explains why working in healthcare is rewarding—early cancer detection saves lives and pandemic response work feels vital. He emphasizes that the most important chapter for any business is building a strong company culture, arguing that a great team and culture can carry a company through challenges. His leadership advice centers on people: developing emotional intelligence and mastering effective communication across all levels of an organization. Eckert recommends fellow entrepreneur Dennis Barnett as a guest, praising his record‑management ventures and cultural expertise. He shares a personal anecdote about his first paying job mowing lawns in extreme Phoenix heat, illustrating humble beginnings. The episode closes with Eckert’s contact information (StatLab website and LinkedIn) and a reminder to find the podcast on major platforms.
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This is Professor Pete Alexander with the Winning at Business and Life podcast, where business leaders share their insights. It is 6 questions in 7 minutes because successful business leaders are busy and rarely have more time to spare. So let's get to it. Question number 1: In a few sentences, please tell me who you are and what you do.
Hi Pete, uh, this is Dan Eckert. I'm a serial CEO. More recently I've been a serial CEO of several private equity-backed companies. Pretty much my whole career I've been in healthcare, and I'm an avid lake lover. I live in Lake Tahoe.
Dan, it's so great to have you on the show. Question number 2: What's the best thing about working in your industry?
Oh, that's an easy one. Uh, you know, StatLab, the company I run today, is in cancer diagnostics. So the best thing about that is sooner or later pretty much every one of us is going to have a family member or, God forbid, ourselves be impacted by cancer. The products we sell enable labs to detect cancer earlier, which literally saves lives. And most recently, as a result of the COVID pandemic, we've actually moved into infection control products. So we've been helping healthcare organizations meet the demand to address that pandemic. So both of those things, I think, for all of the employees in our company make us feel great about what we do.
I love it. I hear that passion in your voice. It's so great. Question number 3: I have a fictitious book with all the answers for business. What chapter would you think most companies should read?
Oh, that's an easy one for me. I think it's the chapter called Building a Strong Company Culture. You know, to me, there's a lot of things you can learn by doing in business and a lot of fundamentals that you can learn either in school or by the school of hard knocks. But the main thing that it comes down to in my experience is building a great team and building a strong culture. If you do that the right way, you can pretty much get everything else wrong. The team and the culture will carry you through and really generate unusual levels of success. So I would for sure say the chapter on culture.
I couldn't agree with you more. I think about companies that had the strong culture where I really looked forward to working with them on a daily basis, and then the opposite where the culture was poor, and when the stress hit, it just kind of, it multiplied because the culture wasn't there to help offset that.
No, I totally agree. And you can tell a toxic culture immediately and you can also tell the alternative. The positive culture just exudes from all the employees from the first time you walk in.
Absolutely. Question number 4, other than the generic work harder, have a great attitude and care for customers, what advice or insight would you give to other business leaders?
Yeah, you know, it's interesting. I say to people all the time, business and leadership would be easy if you didn't have to work with people, but you do. And the only way to get success is through people. So from my perspective, it has everything to do with emotional intelligence and everything to do with working on communicating effectively with your groups of employees up, down, and across the organization and finding ways to really engage them, you know, and per the earlier question, connecting them to the reason why what you do matters and to the passion you have for that. So I would say definitely, uh, you know, focus on people, emotional intelligence, and effective communication. Pretty much every company I've been in, the number one challenge is communication.
Very well said. Thank you. Question number 5: What other business leader like yourself would you like to acknowledge and invite to be on my podcast?
Yeah, that's an easy one. It's a really good friend of mine. His name is Dennis Barnett. He's a Sierra Leone, Sierra serial entrepreneur. He's been in multiple industries, but mostly in the records management industry and has built several companies. But when it comes to culture and building a great team and the things I just talked about, there's nobody better than Dennis. So I think it'd be great for you to interview him.
Perfect. I'll reach out to him. Thank you for that referral. And our last question, question number 6, please tell me about your first job.
Ah, you know, that's a fun one. My first paying job literally was, uh, in Phoenix, Arizona, working for a landscape management company.. And I can tell you, I will never forget mowing lawns and doing those kinds of things in 115-degree-plus weather. I was notorious for being the guy on the crew that found the one piece of shade that a tree would provide in a yard or wherever we were because it was so crazy hot. But yeah, that was my first experience. And from there, you know, launched off into the rest of my work career.
Oh, I love it. And I can, I can imagine just the heat and the shade, probably at least giving about 5 or 10 degrees of, of, of of shade for you that was just like almost an oasis for you in that situation.
Yeah, it was a temporary relief from the crazy heat for sure.
So Dan, thank you so much for being on the show. How can people find you?
Uh, well, they can find me at www.statlab.com, or you can find me at LinkedIn. Just look up Dan Eckert Stat Lab and you'll find me there.
Perfect. This is Professor Pete Alexander with the Winning at Business and Life podcast. For more insights and ideas, please go to LinkedIn, YouTube, Facebook, or iTunes and search for the Winning at Business and Life podcast. Thanks for listening.
