And I thought to myself that every single software in the world is becoming better except for the one that people use the most…
-Mathilde Collin, CEO, Front
Episode Summary
If you are a knowledge worker, chances are you manage most of your life and communications through email. And while collaboration platforms have come a long way, email always seems to stay the same. Most workers accept its limitations because they don’t believe there is a better way. But what if there were?
Mathilde Collin is the CEO of Front, a customer communication platform. She looked at the limitations of email and didn’t think it was a problem too big to solve. In fact, she found her mission.
In this interview with host Scott Luton, Mathilde Collin talks about:
• Why email is failing most of us today as a customer communications hub
• The story behind Front’s tradition of onboarding each employee with a set of Legos
• What it actually takes to create a better customer experience
Episode Transcript
Intro/Outro (00:03):
Welcome to supply chain. Now the voice of global supply chain supply chain now focuses on the best in the business for our worldwide audience, the people, the technologies, the best practices, and today’s critical issues. The challenges and opportunities stay tuned to hear from those making global business happen right here on supply chain now,
Scott Luton (00:32):
Hey, good morning, everybody. Scott Luton with you here on supply chain. Now welcome to today’s show. So today’s episode is really focused on a variety of things, but, uh, big theme is gonna be customer experience, certainly a big, hot topic in today’s world supply chain and otherwise, and as we all know, that experience can be optimized by developing strong customer relationships more on that in just a minute, but I wanna formally welcome in are our guest here today. She’s a fellow founder and entrepreneur and her organization’s doing big things in the customer experience space and beyond. So would no further do when welcome in Mathilde Collin co-founder and CEO at front ma how you doing?
Mathilde Collin (01:12):
I’m doing great. I’m very excited to be here and chat with you, Scott.
Scott Luton (01:16):
Well, we are too, uh, we’ve been admirers of what you’ve been doing and, and, uh, the type of what your organization’s been up to. And as we talked about, pre-show the type of culture you’re building for those extended family members that y’all call frontiers. So more on that and much more here today on supply chain now. Okay. So ma till, uh, up front here, I want to get to know you a little better. Uh, let our audience get to know you a little better. So tell us first off, where did you grow up and, and, you know, give us a few anecdotes about your upbringing?
Mathilde Collin (01:46):
Well, maybe you can tell for my accent, I was, uh, born in France, uh, in the suburb of Paris. Um, and you know, as far as I can remember, um, I was a very happy kid. Um, and maybe the, the thing that was most defining about who I was and still am today is very competitive. Um, I loved winning I, so I did a ton of sports. I played soccer, I played tennis, I played board games. Okay. Um, and it’s still a huge driver for what I’m doing today. Um, so that’s one piece about myself, the other pieces, for some reason, I’ve always cared about human beings, just cuz there are human beings, we’re in this boat altogether. Um, and I feel like we should care for one another. Mm. Uh, and one of the things that I realized when I was a kid being a happy kid was a lot of the, the adults around me. Weren’t super excited about their job. Like weren’t looking forward to going to work every Monday. Uh, and it made me so sad as like if that’s, what’s growing up means I’d rather not grow up <laugh> and a huge part. You talked about frontiers and you know, a huge part of also what drove my decision to start a company was maybe the naive dream of trading, a place where people would be happy to come to work every day and be engaged. Um, so two anecdotes.
Scott Luton (03:12):
I love that. Okay. Let me back up. Cause we’re gonna get into the front story in just a second. Um, but I love how that is so connected to who you are as a human, but also as a child and being that proverbial happy child. So you mentioned you played soccer and tennis. Which one were you better at?
Mathilde Collin (03:29):
Um, I think I practiced tennis way more, but I was more gifted at soccer.
Scott Luton (03:35):
Okay. All right. Um, and with soccer, what position on the field did you play?
Mathilde Collin (03:41):
I was striking goals.
Scott Luton (03:43):
Okay.
Mathilde Collin (03:43):
<laugh> and playing on the left
Scott Luton (03:45):
That what, you know, whether it’s world cup or whether it’s Olympics or whether it’s professional, there’s probably no better celebration than a soccer goal. You know, getting that goal and seeing the team come together and celebrate. Is that, was that cool? Mai,
Mathilde Collin (03:58):
I loved it. I loved the fact that it’s, it’s a team, uh, game. I love tennis as well. I played as a team, uh, played tennis, but yes, love celebrating success. I actually, so one of my areas of improvements as a CEO, I’m not so good at it, but when you strike a goal, like you don’t have anything else to do than, you know, celebrating. So that’s easy and business is a bit harder.
Scott Luton (04:18):
It is, it is. Okay. One final, uh, uh, question about your upbringing. You know, when I hear France and growing up in a, in a suburb, just outside of Paris, that iconic world city, I think cuisine and food, what’s one food dish that is inseparable from your upbringing that you really just, uh, loved as a kid.
Mathilde Collin (04:39):
Um, it’s interesting because my mom is actually, uh, half French and half Swedish and I have, so I think I have way more memories. So let me think about a French. So I’ll tell you because it’s the thing that I miss the most. It may be very basic, but I love baguettes. Like it’s the most cliche thing, but I’ve been living in the us for nine years and in San Francisco I’ve been enable to find an okay baguette, not even just, okay. And then I just took it for granted that every day, every morning you could edit every dinner you could edit. And now I miss it so much with like every meal I make. So that’s, that’s the like next disruption I want to work on
Scott Luton (05:22):
I’m with you, you know, uh, during the pandemic, especially during, during the, the, the deepest throws pandemic, uh, homemade bread making became such a big thing, not just here in the states, but globally. And to your point, there’s such a, uh, a big difference in, um, you know, bread. You find a grow store and that homemade character field, uh, you could almost taste the whole story behind the loaf when you have really good homemade bread. And of course you pair it with great butter and it doesn’t help you shed some of these, uh, pandemic pounds. But man, it’s really almost irreplaceable.
Mathilde Collin (05:55):
I
Scott Luton (05:55):
Agree. So, uh, baguettes, uh, finding world class baguette baguettes will be part of your, your, maybe your next chapter, but let’s talk about your current, uh, your current chapter. Y’all been doing some really big things for quite some time at front. Uh, we were just celebrating your, one of your most recent, um, recognitions where, uh, a group, uh, named you one of the best places to work. And you were talking about that culture and, and those frontiers and how important it is for folks to look forward to those Mondays. But first, before we talk about, uh, what you’re up to now, let’s go back to the Genesis of the company. You’re one of the co-founders, how did it all start?
Mathilde Collin (06:34):
So I graduated, um, I dunno, maybe 10 years ago. Uh, and then I actually had to find a job because I had to pay for the loan that I had made to go to school. Um, so I, I wanted to start a company. I had studied entrepreneurship, which is the thing in France, but I couldn’t really afford starting company. So join a software company. I was doing a contract management software, um, and I stayed there for only a year. So I loved everything I learned. I loved the ability for softwares to change how people work at skill, but the culture of the company made me very unhappy. And I didn’t know how much of an impact the culture of a company could have. I was super fortunate afterwards to meet with my co-founder and our first investors who agreed to fund the company pre-product. So that was very fortunate.
Mathilde Collin (07:24):
And so I started the company a year after I graduated. So I don’t have a lot of work experience for, to France. The reason I started France was because I felt like email was the tool that knowledge workers were using the most to get work done. And yet hadn’t evolved in the past 25 years. And I thought every single software in the world is, uh, literally becoming better except for the one that people use the most. Um, and I think that goes back to the impact I wanted to have. And I felt like if, you know, the product was, uh, good, then it could have a meaningful impact on people’s lives at work. Um, and then on the competitive nature of myself, like the, the market is so big. Um, and I enjoyed that. So that’s how it all got started in France in, uh, we launched eight years ago, um, four days ago.
Scott Luton (08:14):
Okay. Well, okay. Big anniversary then just four days ago. Yes. Um, so if I heard you correctly, you saw email as, as, uh, still the powerful vehicle that it has been, but you saw it kind of having stagnated a bit going back for a couple decades. Right. So how did, if I, so if I heard you, how do we reinvent email to really maximize art of the possible that, uh, it poses, right?
Mathilde Collin (08:39):
Yes. A hundred percent. So I, I was thinking like, what is, um, what are the main characteristics or of how work gets done today? Um, and how is email different from what people expect and how they work? And the way I felt was, so first of all, today you must always work as a team and email makes information very siloed. Like it’s your in your inbox, no one has access to it. Right. Um, and so the first thing I thought was, well, if it was collaborative and you could easily, you know, collaborate on a draft, add internal notes about an email and start an internal discussion, assign something to someone to make sure that, you know, who is accountable for replying to someone that would be a wonderful improvement. And then I thought there’s so many manual tasks that you’re doing every day. There are so repetitive, you archive you for CC BCC, like everything inside, right?
Mathilde Collin (09:36):
Like if you could automate some of these repetitive tasks. So for example, you know, you could say if an email contents, this sentence, then make sure that you assign it to this person. If it’s in French, then put it in this inbox. If, um, it hasn’t been replied in three hours, add a flag. Like you want to make sure that you’re replying less than three hours. So automation and the last piece was, um, analytics. Like every software in the world pretty much gives you data, uh, how you work and email is the tool you use the most and gives you zero data because it’s siloed. So I think like very early on, this was, um, how I envisioned it. It should be collaborative, it should be automated. Um, and it, it should give you the right insights later on, we added a fourth piece, which is, it should be integrated with the other tools you’re using. You’re gonna use many other tools. Let’s make sure that we bring the context so that when you are looking at an email, you know, everything about your customer or your shipments, or like whatever matters to you so that you give the best answer possible in the fastest way.
Scott Luton (10:39):
Uh, man making emails so much more powerful, making it so much more functional, uh, reinventing it in many ways. Uh, also using it as a, as a better, uh, platform for gathering data and insights and analytics. Um, man, what a, what an incredible, uh, adventure now, eight years and four days later. So now that we know kind of the Genesis and some of the main aspects of front that led to you, uh, you know, starting the business, tell us about front today and build on what build on those key, uh, aspects of, of the platform and tell us where does the company stand today?
Mathilde Collin (11:17):
Of course. So I think there are many things we’ve learned over the past eight years when you tackle a very big problem. Like the one I described, I think it is amazing because of the scale, the impact you can have, but the challenge is you want to make sure that you also focus on like specific pain points, industries, teams to make sure that you’re really doing something amazing for them versus something good for a little bit of everyone. So I think what we learned,
Scott Luton (11:46):
So like special specialization, a little bit of customization is what I’m hearing there. Mattel is that right? E
Mathilde Collin (11:50):
E exactly. And, and I think that, yeah, I’ll, I’ll talk more about this. Um, email still has these wonderful things that it can be used by lots of different teams and industries, but it doesn’t mean all teams, all industries, independent of size, et C. Right? So the thing we realized is where the stakes are the highest, when you think about communication is for a lot of businesses on customer communication. So at the end of the day, why a business exists is to serve their customers. And so if you screw up on your communication with potential customers or customers, you put your business at risk,
Scott Luton (12:26):
Bad things happen, right? Yeah. Bad things happen.
Mathilde Collin (12:29):
Exactly. And the reason why today we talk about front as a customer communication hub is because what we realize is the most value that we people were getting were when they were talking to potential customers and customers. So that’s, um, a change from how we talked about it eight years ago. And today, then we also understood that some industries have a really strong fit with front and specifically the teams are industries that need to do an exceptional job at communicating with their, uh, whatever customers mean for them, right? Who are operationally more complex and so need more coordination like these industries. And so supply chain logistics, and I’m sure we’ll get back to it, but these are examples of industries where the stakes are high. If they do a good job, their business can be meaningfully better and different. They can retain their customers better, they can save more money.
Mathilde Collin (13:31):
And so we started over the years, talking more to these industries and making sure we understood them deeply and built the product that was aimed at delivering the most value for them. So today we’re, uh, you know, we have offices in four different, um, cities, Paris, Dublin, Chicago, and San Francisco, um, as well as a remote team, um, we have 450 employees, um, over 8,000 customers, uh, across a hundred different countries. So we’ve been growing quite a while. Just the same time last year, I think we were 250 people. So, you know, we’ve grown fast. Um, wow. But it’s been, it’s been very exciting.
Scott Luton (14:12):
Well, uh, congrats on all the growth and, and all the, uh, recognition and, and by outside parties, I wanna go back to on the front end, we were talking about, you know, celebrating those wins and how it can be a little more challenging in the business world. I think, uh, I don’t know about you Mattel, but I think, cause there’s so many things, right. You never wanna stop. There’s never a finish line there really isn’t and it’s tougher for leaders to, to really zero in and be in the moment. Right. And celebrate with your team. What’s one of your favorite ways you, you and your team and your, your frontiers have celebrated your growth over the last, uh, eight years and four days.
Mathilde Collin (14:51):
Such an interesting question. So I, we have this thing at front, it’s very specific to front, but, um, since the very early days we’ve been building Legos, um, and every time there is a new person that they join front, they get to pick the Legos set they want, oh,
Scott Luton (15:09):
Love
Mathilde Collin (15:10):
It. Um, and then we get to build it all together. It’s just a great way, um, to, to meet people over a Lego set and we’ve managed to build custom Legos, so custom mini figures. And so to, to celebrate a milestone, um, or a project, like whatever it is, we will create a <inaudible> that’s custom made for each employee and, and give it to them. And so now people on their desk have a few different MiFis based on their accomplishments and the projects they were a part of. So that’s been a, I’ve loved doing that.
Scott Luton (15:45):
Okay. I’ve gotta get some pictures. We’re gonna have to compare notes after they show. I love that idea cause who doesn’t love Legos and, you know, beyond the fun factor, uh, I love kind of what it implies because every, everybody plays a role in the big picture and, and that bigger thing that you’re building. Right. So I love kind of how that reiterates that, um, you know, successes or some of those tougher days, right. Where everyone, everyone kinda pulls together, you digs deeper in the trenches and, and just powers through, uh, those tougher days that are part of any journey. Um, alright. So I wanna shift gears over, um, cause the broader thing we’re talking about here, uh, one, one of the broader things that, uh, platforms like front, uh, are, uh, are, uh, helping organizations get better and more effective with is customer experience. Now I would argue the notion of customer experience has been around a long time, but now here in, in recent years there’s been a rise of kind of a formal CX or course, uh, customer experience, um, methodology. So, you know, when it comes to, uh, optimizing, uh, and really implementing a successful customer ex experience program from your point of view Mattel, and kind of even beyond front a little bit from your point of view, what’s a couple things that our listeners that wanna optimize CX should really know.
Mathilde Collin (17:04):
So I think, uh, maybe at the highest level, and then I’ll, I’ll go one level deeper, but it needs to be a focus. Like I think, um, over time every industry becomes commoditized and every business will have to differentiate on customer experience. Also, I think in the past few years, and especially during the pandemic, but it’s become more and more of an expectation that a company will deliver amazing experience. So the first thing they should do is make it a priority, hire people that take it seriously, want to invest. And I can’t emphasize enough how crucial it is to a company’s success. Everything else would be a short term optimization midterm long term. You’ll have to be excellent at it if you want to win. Mm. Um, so now going like how do you do this? Cause, you know, great to say this right. <laugh> um, so, so I think, how do you do this is one, one of my belief is what people want is they want communication to feel very personal.
Mathilde Collin (18:09):
Uh, they want to feel like they’re talking to a human being and they don’t want to, you know, receive like your ticket number 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, reply above this line. You’ll be like, what happens behind the scenes is your problem, right? Like this is your company, the person that’s reaching out to you, shouldn’t be exposed to whatever is happening behind the scenes. Um, and so I think companies need to invest in technology because that’s the only way you can scale and not just put more humans at the prime, the more humans you put at the prime, the more complicated your processes become. And the more time you’re gonna spend on processes versus actually getting back to your customers, um, so invest in technology, but making sure that the technology you use puts the human at the forefront of this experience. That that to me is what I deeply believe in and where the world is going.
Scott Luton (19:02):
I, I love that. Um, you know, digital transformations, another phrase we’re hearing so much about, but, uh, as, as Kevin L. Jackson and many of our other hosts and guests have, have, uh, really reiterated time and time again, it’s really human transformation. Right. And, and we can’t lose side to fact of what you just shared. Yeah. Uh, um, go out and find the right technology that that’s deeply relevant to what you’re trying to do, but do it with your team and, and never make sure we center on what they’re doing after, after to your earlier point, your first point, making sure we hire folks that have those common values and want to be, um, you’re talking about being a happy, happy child in your early days, you know, wanna make others happy, right? If you wanna really be focused on, on, uh, you know, customer service and, and customer experience, it’s a big part of the DNA on your team is one beyond the technology, the DNA on the team that you hire. Right.
Mathilde Collin (19:59):
Hundred percent. I like, I couldn’t agree more with everything you said.
Scott Luton (20:03):
So, uh, you know what my kids are telling me, ma tilt, uh, we’ve got three kids here, um, uh, Brantley Gracie and Ben, and they’ve been telling me that the short abbreviation for a hundred percent, these days is honey P have you heard that yet? In the lexicon? Okay.
Mathilde Collin (20:19):
I havent I’m, I’m too old.
Scott Luton (20:22):
<laugh> well, be on the lookout, be on the lookout, uh, honey P okay. Someone switch gears, uh, again, congrats on all, uh, that the front team and, and all your frontiers have been doing love, celebrating, uh, uh, startup and entrepreneurial, uh, growth. Uh, you’re building quite a capable team, uh, globally. So we’ll have to get a check in we’ll to check back in with you maybe at the end of the year or beginning next year, but you also clearly much like we do here at supply chain. Now we, we, uh, you know, um, do good give forward and be the change, right? That’s a core mantra along with deeds, not words, right. You, uh, ma till and, uh, mentor, aspiring entrepreneurs through, uh, several different programs as part of what I understand to be part of your, you know, give forward, uh, all raises female founders, office hours is one of the groups that you mentor groups with, uh, fellow entrepreneurs, or wanna be founders with along those lines, Mattel what’s one or two pieces of advice that you would share with potential founders in our audience.
Mathilde Collin (21:27):
So, so many of them maybe I’ll start with one that’s very controversial, which is don’t, don’t listen to most advice and act any advice. I think your responsibility is to gather a, a lot of them, but I think human beings have a willingness to tell you, like, this is what you should do, what you shouldn’t do, and you are the best person to know what you should do, and shouldn’t do so. Just take them as inputs and data points, uh, but just be aware of the fact that you will always know your customers, your market, your team, everything better than anyone else. So with that being said, I’ll still do the opposite of what I just said and give some advice. <laugh>. Um, I think, uh, maybe two that are completely different. The first one would be about, uh, mental health. I think founders have an insanely hard job.
Mathilde Collin (22:16):
Like it was true five years ago. When you think about what they’re going through right now, I mean, you, the pandemic changed everything. The macro environment is changing in the supply chain world. There is a crisis, like there is way more disruption. There has been way more disruption in the past two and a half years that there than there’s been in the past, like 10 years. And so it is more important than ever to take care of yourself. You’ll only be a good leader if you’re a happy, balanced, human being. And so there are many things you can do for this. Like, you can make sure that you take some time off, you can make sure that you don’t check your emails right before going to bed. And first thing, when you get up in the morning, like many things, um, but I would say, just make sure that you invest in yourself.
Mathilde Collin (23:03):
This is a good investment for your company as well. The second thing is I’m a huge believer. There is an article I wrote a few years ago, um, about discipline. I’m a huge believer that discipline drives a ton of the success of your company. More so than for example, the vision you have, which you know, is important, but in my opinion, not the most important thing. And this is part of the reason why I think I started France. And, you know, when people use France, they use it many hours day. This is a way to make sure that you are on top of everything. Like, you know, exactly who’s in Ling. What, and I think this discipline, this rigor is absolutely critical in order to succeed. Like so many stars need to align in order for you to succeed. It’s insane. So when you’re have a business that’s growing like first be super proud of yourself and then make sure that you keep investing in this discipline, which, you know, has, I could talk for hours about what it means, right? Uh, between the goals, the processes, the team, and, um, everything. But these would be my two pieces of advice.
Scott Luton (24:11):
I appreciate that. You know, if I’m hearing you correctly, you know, uh, whether you are a, uh, a team member and maybe you’re clocking in and out and putting in your, for each week or, or if you’re, um, a founder, your, um, uh, founder and putting in, <laugh> no telling the amount of hours. One, one of the things I’m hearing you say is, is making the best use most efficient use of those hours. And if you can, you know, if you can, um, engage with, with tools and platforms like front or other things out there that, um, you know, allows you to save time and touch something, just once I, I think that’s some of the advice I’m hearing you say, and then the other, uh, which I think is so universal and so human and, and certainly one. And I’m, I’m about to ask you one of your key Eureka moments, but one of mine over the last couple years was your first piece of advice.
Scott Luton (24:59):
No, not the don’t listen to advice, although that, that there’s a lot of value there about invest taking care of yourself, investing in yourself. You know, I’ve heard it put as simply, there was a very successful business person in the Atlanta area that was deeply, um, sign, uh, significant for many folks. And they said when they were, uh, when they were tired, they slept when they were hungry, they ate when they were ready to work, they worked. And it’s so simple, but oftentimes we don’t listen to that inner voice. You know, we don’t shut down email, like what, like you were saying and take time to take care of ourselves. Right.
Mathilde Collin (25:39):
I hundred percent. I mean, my, I mean, I’ve had a few European moments, but one of the things that seems like a sad story turned out to be a great story is my co-founder who’s the CTO of the company was diagnosed with cancer and of 2017. And then my entire world collapsed because my entire balanced fell apart, um, is healthy now. And, um, I’m a way happier human being today, but it forced me. I, I think I pushed so hard on making sure that the company was doing well, that he was doing well, that I forgot about myself. And then, you know, one day I just woke up and couldn’t go to work. And that forced me to change a bunch of things in the culture we have at front in how I operate on a day to day basis still today, you know, many years later, five years later, um, I meditate every morning. I just take 10 minutes and it just gives me the head space that I need in order to be the best version of myself. Mm. Professionally and personally. So I agree with what you said.
Scott Luton (26:36):
I, I love that Mattel. Thank you for sharing. Uh, thank you for that transparent share about one of the, the tougher times. And it’s good to hear that your fellow co-founder, uh, sounds like they beat cancer. Yes. That is wonderful. That’s amazing. It really is. Uh, and, and how, even through the darkest times in our journey, you know, there’s lessons to be learned and applied and, and that’s one of, one things you shared with us. Um, alright. So we’re gonna ask you in a, in a second, how folks can connect with you and learn more about front. If, uh, I can see a lot of application for making email more powerful, uh, to using platforms like front, uh, in global supply chain, you know, cause it’s all about those customer relationships. That’s the name of the game? That’s the core of everything, as you’ve mentioned on the front end. Um, but beyond what you just shared, if you look back the last couple years, you know, we’re big on Eureka moments, some days have 27 Eureka moments, others, others, thankfully have just a couple, but anything else that really has stuck with you in terms of a Eureka moment in, in recent years?
Mathilde Collin (27:41):
Um, I think maybe, uh, so on a, on a completely different topic, um, I feel like the more your company grows, uh, the more, um, the better you are at managing your team, the more impact it’s gonna have, like at the end of the day, my impact, you know, with like just what I do every day becomes, um, not as important as how I can empower the people that work with me. And maybe the biggest learning I’ll tell you. The biggest learning from last year is I have an executive team at France. Um, they’re wonderful. Uh, and in order to build trust within a team, it takes so much deliberate effort and you can never take it for granted. Mm. And you constantly need to invest in it. Once you have this, it just multiplies the impact of everyone by so much. And so I used to believe that, you know, we can do enough site every other in every half year and it’s gonna be great. But the reality is when you get to work in fast changing environment, there are so many decisions you need to make so many new people that join so many new parameters. You need to take into account that in my opinion, constantly investing in the trust that a team has, will never, ever be a waste of time. So I’ll just share this one from the past year.
Scott Luton (29:01):
Oh, ma till that is, that is, um, you gotta preach out loud to the folks in the back, cuz trust without trust, you’ve got nothing, you’ve got nothing. Uh, and with it, you can truly, and I know this sounds cliche, but you can truly move mountains, you know, and, and, uh, it’s challenging to build, but gosh, if you build it and then you lose it, you’ve truly lost everything. So thank you. That, that’s a great high point to wrap our conversation, uh, here today. Okay. So Matt, till, uh, Colin, uh, whether folks are interested in kicking the tires on front, whether they want to maybe, uh, I don’t know if you do a bunch of keynotes, I think you’d be a brilliant speaker and an inspirational speaker, or if they just wanna learn more, how can folks connect with you and front?
Mathilde Collin (29:47):
Well, so front, our website is very simple front.com. Okay. <laugh> um, and yeah, I mean, so, so they should go on the website. Um, if they want to learn more about France, like in this place specifically, we work with amazing companies like, you know, SS freight for wording and Flexport and convoy and Prairie.
Scott Luton (30:10):
Okay. Wow.
Mathilde Collin (30:11):
And like, we have so many companies, you know, we didn’t spend a lot of time on, on this, but I think for this industry, at this specific moment in time, investing in being operationally stronger and retaining your customers better is absolutely critical. So first can go on the website, they can ask for a demo of our product and I’ll make sure that there is a wonderful frontier. That’s gonna explain to them how front can make this experience better and deeply understand their business as well, to make sure there is a fit. I personally, um, spend some time, but not too much time on Twitter. Um, so Colin Mattel. So my last name then first name. Yeah. Um, and I reply to, uh, direct messages. I reply to tweets. Um, there are pros and cons of this social media platform, but the good thing is you can get in touch and you can hear what people have to say. Um, I post there, um, I write a medium or LinkedIn or like on fronts blog. Um, and if I’m gonna do a talk or a keynote, like this is usually where I will post that this is gonna happen. So these two ways,
Scott Luton (31:23):
I love that. Uh, and you know, Twitter sometimes can get a bad rap, but I, I find it to be a fascinating channel. Uh, it’s been interesting as the world’s opened back up, some of the folks I’ve been, uh, I call it Twitter friends with, or digital friends with, I’ve had a chance to meet him person at different conferences and cups of coffee. And it’s just been a great, um, you know, great relationship building device, which of course I know you value because, uh, uh, what you’ve been doing day in, day out front that’s what front does. Yes. Um, and then one of the quick comment and folks we’re gonna have you, you’re gonna be one click away, check out all of the ways that you can connect with ma till and front. On the episode page, you’ll see links there. Uh, you know, here at the end of the conversation, you mentioned some of the, uh, well known organizations, active members, uh, part of global supply chain that you’re working with. So maybe next time we have you back on, we we’ll, we’ll dive deeper into, uh, some, some of ways that supply chain leaders are using, uh, front, but nevertheless, um, ma till really had a wonderful time, learning more from your journey here today. It’s been a long time coming. Uh, I appreciate your time and, uh, folks, you gotta connect with, uh, Matilde Colin and front. Thank you very much for your time here today. Ma till
Mathilde Collin (32:34):
Thank you so much for having me. I also had a great time.
Scott Luton (32:37):
So folks, hopefully you’ve enjoyed this conversation so much as I have, uh, just really Frank, uh, transparent experiences from, uh, company on the move and from, uh, one of the co-founders and fearless leaders behind the company. So check out front connect with Matt till be like me. I’m gonna connect with her on, on follow her on whatever very soon. Uh, but whatever you do, whatever you tune, I I’ve got about 18 pages of notes from ma till to here today. Uh, on behalf of our entire team, Scott Luton, challenging you, Hey, be like ma till do good, give forward, be the change that’s needed. And on that note, we see next time, right back here. That’s Apache now. Thanks everybody.
Intro/Outro (33:15):
Thanks for being a part of our supply chain. Now, community check out all of our programming@supplychainnow.com and make sure you subscribe to supply chain. Now anywhere you listen to podcasts and follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram. See you next time on supply chain. Now.
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Featured Guests
Mathilde Collin is the co-founder and CEO of Front, a communications hub for building strong customer relationships. Front serves more than 7,500 businesses and has raised $138 million in venture funding from Sequoia Capital, Threshold Ventures and Uncork Capital, as well as executives from Atlassian, Okta, Qualtrics, and Zoom. Mathilde is known for her values-driven leadership style and for championing top-down radical transparency. Before founding Front and moving to San Francisco for Y Combinator in 2014, she received a Master’s degree at HEC School of Management. Mathilde mentors aspiring entrepreneurs through All Raise’s Female Founders Office Hours and the Pioneer Fund. She has been recognized in Forbes Next Billion Dollar Startups, Inc. Female Founders and Forbes 30 Under 30: Enterprise Tech. Based in San Francisco, Mathilde is from Paris, where she earned her Masters in Entrepreneurship from the HEC School of Management in 2012. Connect with Mathilde on LinkedIn.
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