Don Wittman: Technology For A Better Future

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Alright everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Business Blast Podcast. I'm your host Tyler Wagner. Today I have Don Whitman with us. He's an expert known for teaching advancement of technology for a better future. His breakthrough LinkedIn strategies are uniquely structured as a pool strategy system for greater LinkedIn results. So welcome to the show, man.

Thank you very much.

Of course. We'll jump into the first one, Don. The first question I have for you is, what is the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?

Well, I guess one of the things a while back is when I interviewed for Priceline. I went in there to try and be the head of security, and Priceline was having issues with availability, and I was interviewing with the CIO and Basically, there was a presentation by Oracle about their parallel server, and I basically told the CEO, "Do you really believe that presentation?" He kind of looked at me like I had 6 heads and basically said, "It's, you know, the product's a farce. You actually have to take your systems down more often, not less often, because of the maintenance on it." Basically, I went from interviewing for the head of security to interviewing for the vice president of architecture and engineering. Wow. Yeah. Went on from there to make Priceline the most available travel site for 7 years in a row.

Yeah, that's awesome, man. I actually use Priceline, so that's awesome. The next one I have for you is, what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?

Well, you know, most companies now are 24/7, so, you know, being available, being fast are what people are looking for. And if you're not, you're going to lose business. And people, a lot of companies don't get it, don't want to invest in it. And Priceline was being available all the time. You know, it just, it was like night and day, right? In the time, you know, people go down for Sundays and stuff. This doesn't happen as often now, but a lot of companies still have problems being slow. And those two things are the biggest thing. No, insurance companies now are starting to want to be available 24/7 because their users are demanding it. It's an online world. A lot of companies still don't get it. And, you know, people need to understand that this is a me generation and you have to give people what they want. They want their information. They want to be able to do whatever they want 24/7. And without that, you know, you're going to get passed by by somebody else, no matter how big you are.

And it could tie in, but what is your best piece of overall business advice? So not necessarily industry specific.

Well, companies need to be social, you know. People need— companies need to prove themselves to the public as why I should do business with you. You know, why are you here? Why should I trust you? What are you doing for the public? What are you doing for the industry? What are you doing for me? And what are you doing for the environment? I know some people really want to see companies that are environmentally friendly. So your social view with the outside world is affecting the current generations. They— that's part of their decision-making. And I think that's going to become a bigger and bigger part of their thinking. And if companies don't make— move that direction, they're going to have a problem. And that part of being social is it attracts people, right? People who see your— environmentally and socially aware are more likely to want to work for you, do business with you, all that kind of stuff. And it's really important. And people are just— some of the big companies are just starting to get it.

And if you could give your younger self one piece of advice, what would that be?

Probably get more degrees faster.

Nice. And how many degrees do you have now?

I don't. That's my problem. That's part of what I do. I left school early. I worked my butt off to get up to a CTO level. And I don't, you know, if I had degrees, I wouldn't have to work this hard. It would have come faster and more furious. So the problem is, is a high school diploma and a college diploma aren't what they used to be. Today, you know, college— the college sheepskin is the same as a high school diploma, right? It's just one of those checkboxes. So if you want people to consider more of your education, you really need to get a master's in something or an MBA to prove that, you know, to prove that you're in business. There are so many people out there, particularly in the upper parts of the industries, executives who have many degrees, who have several degrees, that's part of the checklist now. It isn't that they're any smarter or any better. It's a checklist. And that's part of the problem is, you know, people aren't really challenged how good you are. It's, did you, did you meet the checklist? And, uh, you know, society used to really deeply interview you to find out whether you could do the job or not. Now it's, you You don't make the checklist, you're not considered no matter what. So it's a whole different way of looking at being able to be an executive is you gotta have the sheepskins.

And kind of going down a little bit of a different path, but in your opinion, what is the key to happiness?

My key to happiness is working hard and playing just as hard. You know, when I was in Priceline, you know, We worked a lot of hours. And it's, you know, it's just like the West Coast back then. You had breakfast, lunch, and dinner served at the office, catered. So you worked your butt off. You're always in early. You always left late. But, you know, we got on vacation, you know, we partied hardy. And when I was there, you had 5 weeks vacation. I mean, I could barely even take it all. And they allowed me to work, you know, summertime. I had a family place up in the ocean in Maine. And, you know, I could work from up there. I could work anywhere in the world. And, uh, it was great. And it's part of being part, you know, working hard and partying hard is, you know, you get all that energy built up to get things done, be very, very successful, and you get the other benefits that come with it. And that, you know, most companies, uh, realize that if you're a hard worker, you get a lot more leeway and you can have a lot more family time and fun time.

And what is the best book that you've read and what was the number one thing you learned from that?

How to Win Friends and Influence People. And it's all about that. You know, I'm a, I'm an engineer by training and, uh, you know, we're kind of geeky, don't have a lot of social skills, and, uh You know, people really want to be able to talk to you. You know, they want to be able to communicate. And, you know, how do you convince them that you're doing the right thing and they're part of the team? You have to be able to talk to them. You have to be able to communicate with them. The world is about teams, right? You have agile. It's all about teams. There's no more individual, right? Everything is teams. Everybody has to work together. You know, no one wants to go, you know, I know this guy is the God's gift to programming or whatever, whichever way you want to do it, or MacGyver's gift to marketing. People don't want to hear that, you know. They want us to— you want to be good, but you have to work as a team. You have a team, you have to be able to communicate, you have to be able to influence people. And that's hard if you, you know, if you're— if you haven't spent the time to try and exercise that and learn how to do it, you know, and how to win friends and influence people. Really changed my outlook on how to deal with people.

Yeah, dude, that's a lot of people's favorite books, so totally. And then what is your favorite quote and why?

Well, it's not really— it's a quote that is sort of put together, you know, it's not really the right person. This is sort of an engineer's quote. You know, uh, when I do projects or buy stuff, there are 3 things that matter: cheap, better, fast, right? That's what you need to think about. That's what makes the world go round. 2 out of 3 is good, 3 out of 3 is great. It's, it's a pure techie thing. When I went down, go down to my CFO, I got a project, it's, you know, good, it's cheap, better and fast, and he gets his money back quick, he doesn't think twice about signing the check.

Got it, makes sense.

So, you know, and they love it, you know. The best thing about a CFO who, you know, is talking his language, and you know what qualifiers he's looking for, you know, am I gonna get my money back? Right now, if I could, you know, Priceline is a really great example, right? If I could reduce my expense by doing a capital project, you know, where's that expense money got to go? Advertising, right? Yeah, because companies are rated on how much expense they have, right? If I could take capital out of it, I mean expense out of it, and put it towards advertising without messing up my numbers, Life is good. Life is really good. You know, he'll trade that all day long. And, well, you know, people don't realize that, you know, these guys are driven. They're driven by numbers. This, you know, quarterly numbers. You got to make your numbers. You can't spend too much money in expense. You're spending money in capital, it makes— means that you're investing in the future, and the street loves it. So, you know, give the CFO, the boss, what he wants.

Yeah, absolutely, man. Dude, thank you so much for coming on. It's very insightful. The last question I have for you before we let you go is where's the best place for people to find and connect with you online?

Well, they can connect me to my website, which is whitmantechology.com, or they can send me an email at don@whitmantechology.com.

Perfect, man. Thanks again for joining us.

My pleasure. Thank you.

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