SPOTLIGHT: How CEO Sam Jacobs Is Redefining Pavilion's Identity | Sam Jacobs, Founder & CEO @ Pavilion

Sam, what was really interesting was seeing you build this community out and the speed at which it increased.

Before we go into the challenge you've solved, tell us a little bit about why you think this community... became what it became so quickly like there was a real there was this early group that had come together and then it just like shot up what was this what was the state of the community greater community that this was so needed like what was happening

There's a few, and this is also directly related to the mistakes I mentioned in our last full episode that I've made a number of, that there are material flaws.

There are flaws in the business that I created and it was by veering away from what I'm about to say.

So the first, there's a couple pieces.

The first is that, as I just mentioned, originally Pavilion, formerly Revenue Collective, had very strict membership requirements.

You couldn't just sign up online and you had to be an operator In our world, the people that are celebrated are investors like Chamath or David Sachs or Bill Gurley or Brad Gerstner or Harry Stebbings, or it's CEOs and founders.

All you hear about are CEOs and founders and you hear about investors and you don't hear about operators.

This was a club for operators and not for those people.

It was actually in the face.

It was an FU to those people.

So first, who it was for was very, very clearly defined and who was not allowed to join and who it was not for was very clearly defined.

Related to that, it had a very strong point of view.

And the point of view was that effectively it was a union for operating executives.

and or a guild, but it was an association whose business it was to advocate for the operating executive.

We taught people how to negotiate.

We taught people how to ask for severance.

We taught people about equity.

We taught people what double trigger means and how to do a cashless exercise.

We taught people to bake in the right to consult into their employment agreements so that us as CEOs couldn't tell people, you know, you can't do any side work or moonlighting when it was noncompetitive.

So we equip people not just with like the skills of how to do go to market, but the skills of specifically how to lead their professional lives with more security and stability.

So that point of view was critical, absolutely critical.

And and then.

Of course, there were some other stuff, right? Like not everybody could join.

So there was big FOMO.