"I now realize the difference between having a fixed mindset on what leadership looks like, which is what we had before, versus a growth mindset which is now the path we’re on. There’s always more for us to learn and figure out as we grow.”
Samuel Witherspoon
CEO, IMRSV Data Labs
The public safety and security industry has experienced evolutionary shifts in the past decade, especially when it comes to the technology that drives it. Big data and artificial intelligence are now the tools that governments rely on to keep citizens safe.
At the forefront of this shift is IMRSV. Founded in 2013 by current CEO, Sam Witherspoon and CFO Bennet Brown as a service business, the company now builds products which use the most advanced machine learning capabilities. IMRSV’s mission is big and ambitious - to make the world a better place. Sam says good data, that’s also transparent, is vital to this mission.
“In a public safety context, it could be an investigation to arrest someone. Law enforcement needs to understand things such as, the people leading a specific criminal organization, if the proper evidence has been collected to prosecute them and if the actions taken by law enforcement can be justified by governing bodies. At IMRSV we envision a security industry that is effective but also more transparent and accountable. ”
During the global pandemic, many technology companies rapidly expanded and IMRSV was no different.
“We ran for a long time as a purely professional services business. For a long time, we had this very linear growth trajectory. Until we had a contract that justified hiring a person, that person was not hired’, says Sam.
Pivoting into software meant entirely new roles were needed and created. The impact of this was a doubling of IMRSV’s headcount in less than two years. It led to a common challenge found in surging startups. The company transitioned from a small team, where people wore multiple hats and inherently understood the culture and leadership structures, to having a larger team, more specialization of skills which need to be actioned and recently appointed leaders struggling to find their footing.
“Some of the original employees were really struggling to manage people. Yet we're very fortunate that everyone is quite humble about what they do and don't know. We have a strong culture of self-improvement. We quickly realized, within this new version of the company, the entire executive team needed help.”
Sam says rather than taking some basic training, they wanted someone who could help them forge new ground. An experienced leader who could bring fresh perspectives about the challenges they were facing and provide a roadmap for improvement.
Sam says deciding what he didn't want in a leadership program was much easier. Similar experiences, where he participated in team-building or coaching, had been dreadful.
“I’d been part of peer groups for executives before and the advice around building high-performance teams felt antiquated or cheesy. Sometimes we would be asked to participate in weird ice-breaking activities. It does not resonate with me at all.
Some people are thrilled by that kind of stuff. I always wondered why I was giving over half of my day for this.”
One of the biggest disappointments for Sam, when evaluating the landscape, was a lack of understanding and guidance for IMRSV’s needs as a fast-growing software company. There seemed to be few leadership programs which had that expertise. Some coaching and executive training programs had been referred to him, but nothing was the right fit.
“I didn’t want someone working with the team who had all these outdated practices. I wanted someone relatable. Someone who was hungry and invested in us getting better as a team”.
A post on LinkedIn from another SaaS founder caught Sam’s attention. The founder had just gone through some leadership training with Unicorn Labs and described exactly what IMRSV wanted. Leadership coaching and training, that didn’t “feel like” leader coaching and training. Fresh and original, not fake and obsolete.
“At the end of the day, I want to work with someone who shares our ambition of building a great company; making an impact on people’s lives. My first impression of Fahd was that he was the perfect fit. He’s one of the most driven people I’ve met. We love working with him.”
These assessment tools help leadership teams and individuals determine where their strengths lie and where they can improve. Unicorn Labs then builds a training program which ensures they focus on the right areas. Sam says he was skeptical of their accuracy or usefulness, due to his past experiences with “executive training”. Yet those concerns instantly disappeared after speaking with Fahd.
“We talked about personality testing and my resistance to it. But Fahd reframed their importance in a way that still sticks with me today. These are not 100% guarantees of your exact personality. The assessments are a tool for guiding conversations about where we can improve as leaders. I needed to work on being less direct and using more emotional intelligence. It wasn’t about “figuring me out” or following some dated methodology. It was about identifying the strategies we needed to become a stronger, high-performing leadership team”
“In terms of developing a high-performance team, there's no finish line. But Fahd’s given us so many tools to assess where we are in that race.”
Sam says the highlight of working with Unicorn Labs was an in-person retreat. Unicorns Labs creates a customized all-inclusive experience, where every element is taken care of. Sam says all the IMRSV team had to do was show up.
“It was the first time the IMRSV team had met Fahd in person. It was amazing. It was so well organized, and everything was so well planned and thought out. Even the chef he hired was incredible. It was apparent that Fahd had done many of these retreats.”
Team building retreats are one of the most effective ways to create a lasting impact on team dynamics. Unicorn Labs retreats are not lecture-heavy with endless monologues. All the participants are interviewed by Unicorn Labs and then assist in co-creating an entire experience that meets their goals and objectives. Retreats are a series of interactive and community-based activities and team-building exercises designed to ensure sustainable long-term results. Or to put it another way, Unicorn Labs works really hard to make it a memorable experience that stays with people well after they leave.
“I’ve always struggled to enjoy team-building games but this surprised me. Fahd made them entertaining, always coming up with creative and unique ways to keep us engaged and learning.”
After IMRSV went through the online leadership training and a retreat, Fahd continued working with them in a coaching capacity. Sam says for nearly two years now, he has had monthly coaching sessions with Fahd. Sam says this high-touch relationship has been extremely helpful as the company grows because his role as the top executive keeps evolving.
“We finally brought in people who are doing the things that I used to do, which I'm thrilled about. But this means I'm having to figure out and reinvent my role as CEO. Fahd has been extremely helpful in bringing some perspective to this. It’s been a great experience.”
Sam says they also decided to expand Fahd’s coaching services to the team at large. These sessions consist of Unicorn Labs facilitating town halls every few weeks. Sam says it has made a strong impact as the team grows and responsibilities evolve.
“We’ll do a team-wide activity with Fahd or he’ll run a session that’s a company-wide conversation about what we're doing, how we're doing it and what we can do better. I now realize that’s the main difference between having a fixed mindset on what leadership looks like, which is what we had before, versus a growth-mindset which is now the path we’re on. There’s always more for us to learn and figure out as we grow.”
The data was pretty clear when the IMRSV team ran new employee engagement tests, two years after working with Unicorn Labs. Nearly evey category had improved and beaten the average benchmarks.
The IMRSV team is still working with Unicorn Labs today but Sam says the change has been substantial. He says they have clearer definitions of what leadership is for IMRSV’s culture and what is expected of leaders.
“At the retreat one of the things that I wanted, and Fahd facilitated, was a statement of our values as an organization. Honestly, I used to think those statements were fairly mindless but I was very wrong. I was wrong because I was evaluating the inane of massive corporations. Statements like, "Try your hardest, work for the best." Those are just empty platitudes. Unicorn Labs helped me see the light into why values are important and what ours could look like.”
Sam says working with Unicorn Labs also forced the company to confront who they were and what was important to them. Some employees had expressed reservations about working in the defence industry. Sam sees this as a very healthy moment of transparency and openness for the company.
“Stating who we were, what our values were and why we're doing this, really helped people acknowledge that. It was scary at times because we knew it meant some people would move on to other opportunities. Yet when it came to finding replacements, it made hiring so much easier. We simply walked people through our principles to see if we aligned with them.”
Finally, Sam says a significant outcome was the realization that he and Bennet, as founders, had taken on too many things. It’s a common occurrence in startups and the cracks really start to show if the company starts to grow rapidly. Unicorn Labs helps IMRSV’s leadership team redefine roles and responsibilities, to ensure that all their hard work on evolving their leadership culture did not fall to the wayside.
“Fahd challenged us on the fact that we were doing things not within our job description. And you can't cut corners forever. A good example is we brought in a Director of Human Resources. This person immediately had an impact on talent acquisition and retention, because those are things that can be easily ignored when you're treading water on eight different priorities. Working with Unicorn Labs helped us lay the groundwork for understanding and achieving that”.
Since starting their relationship with Unicorn Labs, IMRSV has sent two other cohorts through in-depth leadership training. Sam says the strategies and lessons learned working with Fahd are now part of the company’s fabric. He says one of the biggest lessons is that leadership is not a place you arrive at, rather it’s a continual journey of improvement.
“I think in terms of developing a high-performance team, that's always a work in progress. There's no finish line. But Fahd’s given us so many tools to assess where we are in that race. We have what we need to keep raising our team to a different level.”
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"I now realize the difference between having a fixed mindset on what leadership looks like, which is what we had before, versus a growth mindset which is now the path we’re on. There’s always more for us to learn and figure out as we grow.”
Samuel Witherspoon
CEO, IMRSV Data Labs
The public safety and security industry has experienced evolutionary shifts in the past decade, especially when it comes to the technology that drives it. Big data and artificial intelligence are now the tools that governments rely on to keep citizens safe.
At the forefront of this shift is IMRSV. Founded in 2013 by current CEO, Sam Witherspoon and CFO Bennet Brown as a service business, the company now builds products which use the most advanced machine learning capabilities. IMRSV’s mission is big and ambitious - to make the world a better place. Sam says good data, that’s also transparent, is vital to this mission.
“In a public safety context, it could be an investigation to arrest someone. Law enforcement needs to understand things such as, the people leading a specific criminal organization, if the proper evidence has been collected to prosecute them and if the actions taken by law enforcement can be justified by governing bodies. At IMRSV we envision a security industry that is effective but also more transparent and accountable. ”
During the global pandemic, many technology companies rapidly expanded and IMRSV was no different.
“We ran for a long time as a purely professional services business. For a long time, we had this very linear growth trajectory. Until we had a contract that justified hiring a person, that person was not hired’, says Sam.
Pivoting into software meant entirely new roles were needed and created. The impact of this was a doubling of IMRSV’s headcount in less than two years. It led to a common challenge found in surging startups. The company transitioned from a small team, where people wore multiple hats and inherently understood the culture and leadership structures, to having a larger team, more specialization of skills which need to be actioned and recently appointed leaders struggling to find their footing.
“Some of the original employees were really struggling to manage people. Yet we're very fortunate that everyone is quite humble about what they do and don't know. We have a strong culture of self-improvement. We quickly realized, within this new version of the company, the entire executive team needed help.”
Sam says rather than taking some basic training, they wanted someone who could help them forge new ground. An experienced leader who could bring fresh perspectives about the challenges they were facing and provide a roadmap for improvement.
Sam says deciding what he didn't want in a leadership program was much easier. Similar experiences, where he participated in team-building or coaching, had been dreadful.
“I’d been part of peer groups for executives before and the advice around building high-performance teams felt antiquated or cheesy. Sometimes we would be asked to participate in weird ice-breaking activities. It does not resonate with me at all.
Some people are thrilled by that kind of stuff. I always wondered why I was giving over half of my day for this.”
One of the biggest disappointments for Sam, when evaluating the landscape, was a lack of understanding and guidance for IMRSV’s needs as a fast-growing software company. There seemed to be few leadership programs which had that expertise. Some coaching and executive training programs had been referred to him, but nothing was the right fit.
“I didn’t want someone working with the team who had all these outdated practices. I wanted someone relatable. Someone who was hungry and invested in us getting better as a team”.
A post on LinkedIn from another SaaS founder caught Sam’s attention. The founder had just gone through some leadership training with Unicorn Labs and described exactly what IMRSV wanted. Leadership coaching and training, that didn’t “feel like” leader coaching and training. Fresh and original, not fake and obsolete.
“At the end of the day, I want to work with someone who shares our ambition of building a great company; making an impact on people’s lives. My first impression of Fahd was that he was the perfect fit. He’s one of the most driven people I’ve met. We love working with him.”
These assessment tools help leadership teams and individuals determine where their strengths lie and where they can improve. Unicorn Labs then builds a training program which ensures they focus on the right areas. Sam says he was skeptical of their accuracy or usefulness, due to his past experiences with “executive training”. Yet those concerns instantly disappeared after speaking with Fahd.
“We talked about personality testing and my resistance to it. But Fahd reframed their importance in a way that still sticks with me today. These are not 100% guarantees of your exact personality. The assessments are a tool for guiding conversations about where we can improve as leaders. I needed to work on being less direct and using more emotional intelligence. It wasn’t about “figuring me out” or following some dated methodology. It was about identifying the strategies we needed to become a stronger, high-performing leadership team”
Sam says the highlight of working with Unicorn Labs was an in-person retreat. Unicorns Labs creates a customized all-inclusive experience, where every element is taken care of. Sam says all the IMRSV team had to do was show up.
“It was the first time the IMRSV team had met Fahd in person. It was amazing. It was so well organized, and everything was so well planned and thought out. Even the chef he hired was incredible. It was apparent that Fahd had done many of these retreats.”
Team building retreats are one of the most effective ways to create a lasting impact on team dynamics. Unicorn Labs retreats are not lecture-heavy with endless monologues. All the participants are interviewed by Unicorn Labs and then assist in co-creating an entire experience that meets their goals and objectives. Retreats are a series of interactive and community-based activities and team-building exercises designed to ensure sustainable long-term results. Or to put it another way, Unicorn Labs works really hard to make it a memorable experience that stays with people well after they leave.
“I’ve always struggled to enjoy team-building games but this surprised me. Fahd made them entertaining, always coming up with creative and unique ways to keep us engaged and learning.”
After IMRSV went through the online leadership training and a retreat, Fahd continued working with them in a coaching capacity. Sam says for nearly two years now, he has had monthly coaching sessions with Fahd. Sam says this high-touch relationship has been extremely helpful as the company grows because his role as the top executive keeps evolving.
“We finally brought in people who are doing the things that I used to do, which I'm thrilled about. But this means I'm having to figure out and reinvent my role as CEO. Fahd has been extremely helpful in bringing some perspective to this. It’s been a great experience.”
Sam says they also decided to expand Fahd’s coaching services to the team at large. These sessions consist of Unicorn Labs facilitating town halls every few weeks. Sam says it has made a strong impact as the team grows and responsibilities evolve.
“We’ll do a team-wide activity with Fahd or he’ll run a session that’s a company-wide conversation about what we're doing, how we're doing it and what we can do better. I now realize that’s the main difference between having a fixed mindset on what leadership looks like, which is what we had before, versus a growth-mindset which is now the path we’re on. There’s always more for us to learn and figure out as we grow.”
The data was pretty clear when the IMRSV team ran new employee engagement tests, two years after working with Unicorn Labs. Nearly evey category had improved and beaten the average benchmarks.
The IMRSV team is still working with Unicorn Labs today but Sam says the change has been substantial. He says they have clearer definitions of what leadership is for IMRSV’s culture and what is expected of leaders.
“At the retreat one of the things that I wanted, and Fahd facilitated, was a statement of our values as an organization. Honestly, I used to think those statements were fairly mindless but I was very wrong. I was wrong because I was evaluating the inane of massive corporations. Statements like, "Try your hardest, work for the best." Those are just empty platitudes. Unicorn Labs helped me see the light into why values are important and what ours could look like.”
Sam says working with Unicorn Labs also forced the company to confront who they were and what was important to them. Some employees had expressed reservations about working in the defence industry. Sam sees this as a very healthy moment of transparency and openness for the company.
“Stating who we were, what our values were and why we're doing this, really helped people acknowledge that. It was scary at times because we knew it meant some people would move on to other opportunities. Yet when it came to finding replacements, it made hiring so much easier. We simply walked people through our principles to see if we aligned with them.”
Finally, Sam says a significant outcome was the realization that he and Bennet, as founders, had taken on too many things. It’s a common occurrence in startups and the cracks really start to show if the company starts to grow rapidly. Unicorn Labs helps IMRSV’s leadership team redefine roles and responsibilities, to ensure that all their hard work on evolving their leadership culture did not fall to the wayside.
“Fahd challenged us on the fact that we were doing things not within our job description. And you can't cut corners forever. A good example is we brought in a Director of Human Resources. This person immediately had an impact on talent acquisition and retention, because those are things that can be easily ignored when you're treading water on eight different priorities. Working with Unicorn Labs helped us lay the groundwork for understanding and achieving that”.
Since starting their relationship with Unicorn Labs, IMRSV has sent two other cohorts through in-depth leadership training. Sam says the strategies and lessons learned working with Fahd are now part of the company’s fabric. He says one of the biggest lessons is that leadership is not a place you arrive at, rather it’s a continual journey of improvement.
“I think in terms of developing a high-performance team, that's always a work in progress. There's no finish line. But Fahd’s given us so many tools to assess where we are in that race. We have what we need to keep raising our team to a different level.”
