Discipline, AI & Business Growth: Lessons from Navin Goyal

 On today's episode of Right About Now,
 I'll talk to Naveen Goyle.
 He is a doctor.
 He's an anesthesiologist.
 What he isn't is he's not putting you to sleep
 on this episode.
 We talked all about VC learning what it takes
 to build capital, the lessons that he's had.
 And ultimately, the innovations he's bringing to life
 with mobile anesthesiology.
 That's right, mobile.
 It's coming.
 It's the future.
 It's now right here.
 One of the hardest things to do
 when you're building a company is raising capital
 or determining if you need to raise capital.
 Naveen and I talk about that very challenge.
 How to decide if it's right for you, wrong for you,
 how to do it, all those things in this segment.
 Scaling a business is hard.
 Naveen and I talk about the challenges
 of scaling a business, how he did it.
 Some of the lessons that he's learned
 and of course, tips, tricks and all the insights
 for how you could do it yourself.
 Use a lot of AI integrations.
 We're looking at new technologies now,
 really for investment before utility.
 Some of that is the accountability
 that we have for businesses where we do an assessment
 and we say, hey, this is what your company is right now
 based on all the data within that company,
 which is curated, private data of that company,
 which many times a leadership team can't really even see.
 But to aggregate it in a way where you can understand it
 and then start making decisions
 on how you can build the most value.
 This is right about now with Ryan Alford,
 a Radcast Network production.
 We are the number one business show on the planet
 with over 1 million downloads a month.
 Taking the BS out of business for over six years
 and over 400 episodes.
 You ready to start snapping necks and cash and checks?
 Well, it starts right about now.
 What's up guys?
 Welcome to right about now.
 We're always talking about how to get you right
 in business and life and marketing now.
 Not what you needed to do six years ago,
 not what you need to do next month.
 We're not prognosticating.
 We're telling you how to get right now.
 That's why I got the good doctor here today.
 Dr. Naveen Goyle, what's up brother?
 Now much man, great to be here.
 Thanks for having me.
 Yeah man, co-founder of Loud Capital.
 We're going to talk about how to get money fast
 in the right way.
 No, that sounds sleazy talk.
 My radio jockey voice can sometimes
 straight up sound like I'm hard selling.
 But look, capital is a complicated thing for business owners
 and speaking from experience takes too fucking long.
 It's crazy and I know you experienced that yourself
 and hey, you should put people to sleep.
 And I'm telling you, you got the good doctor here.
 He's wide-ranging, you're talent to do.
 Thanks man.
 I represent a lot of people behind me.
 That's the difference.
 I love to do these kind of conversations and interviews
 but in the end, there's so many people that have helped me out.
 What made you you man?
 You're a doctor.
 I know what it takes this legit to do what you did
 and then now to own multiple companies.
 Before we get into the nitty gritty of capital,
 always like to know what are those ingredients for you man?
 What made you you?
 When I reflect on that, it's discipline.
 And I am that person who will grind every day
 if I believe in something.
 Not for a long time, but I will form habits every day.
 I wanted to be a physician and I wasn't the smartest student
 in the class.
 I worked my tail off at every stage.
 When I was practicing for a while after 13 years,
 I was getting bored.
 Learning curve was flat.
 And I said, what else can I learn?
 That habit of learning flipped into entrepreneurship.
 And I was like, oh my gosh, what's over here?
 I was like kidding, candy store.
 I started reading, listening to podcasts.
 I started becoming advisors locally
 and I just drank the Kool-Aid man.
 Discipline is probably the habit or the trait
 that has gotten me to different places.
 I read a comment.
 This isn't new.
 You may have heard it before.
 It said, you can have discipline or you can have regret
 one way is a lot more than the other.
 It's the truth.
 And in a lot of ways, it carries over.
 Talk to me, man.
 You go from being a doctor to building the mobile anesthesia.
 You still got to be in a clinical study
 to just, they're not necessarily residents
 within the hospital or something.
 In a more simpler way, as an anesthesiologist,
 I worked in a hospital and most of the care I did was
 in an operating room.
 If I was in OB, I was in laboring rooms,
 putting in epidurals, okay?
 That's the poor anesthesia.
 Basically, we go and we bring those anesthesia services
 to offices.
 So you're a dental office and you have kids
 that need teeth extractions.
 They usually need to go to a surgery center or a hospital
 to get that done only because of the anesthesia.
 Not because they need a sterile operating room,
 which is very high cost, not accessible, et cetera.
 We bring an anesthesiologist, nurse, paramedic,
 our equipment, medications, everything to do
 the anesthesia in the office.
 That service is essentially replacing the need
 to go to a surgery center.
 So that's what mobile anesthesia is.
 It's becoming more common, but there's a lot of hoops
 to jump through, especially in this country,
 to take care of a patient.
 We started Loud Capital and startup investment firm
 and teed this off at the beginning for a lot of people
 starting their business or they've got a big idea.
 They're a second idea, a second company.
 Capital raising is complicated.
 No matter how many people have tried to tell me,
 it's not, it can be.
 I know that you guys are simplifying
 and speeding up that process,
 but talk to me about what Loud Capital's doing.
 So Loud Capital is an early stage.
 Initially started out as investing
 in very early stage companies, pre-seed,
 no specific industry.
 And over the last decade, we've slowly shifted
 into deeper into healthcare.
 A little bit later, seed series A,
 as we've learned that our sweet spot is to be able
 to help companies that are established,
 probably have some customers and clients already,
 and we can accelerate their growth.
 We really want to be strategic investors.
 We called it Loud to be loud and active
 and not silent investors,
 because there's a lot of investors who put in money
 into opportunity or a startup.
 The thing is, we focus so much on raising money,
 but then what we tend to do with it is so important,
 but many times overlooked.
 And so to be a strategic investor is to say,
 I believe in this, however,
 these are learnings and wisdom and people
 that can help go to the next level and help you execute,
 because that execution gap is a lot bigger than I ever thought.
 Loud Capital is nowadays raising capital
 and investing in healthcare ventures.
 One is that getting us excited
 and there's many different traits that that occur.
 Active capital, you're providing both the money,
 but then the resource knowledge information
 to assist in the excuses.
 One thing to have an idea, it's one thing to expand,
 but how are you going to get there?
 And do you have the resources, not just the money,
 but the knowledge and resources to get there?
 That's the gap you're filling.
 Exactly, and it's planning for the change.
 You want these companies to grow, and as they do,
 you all grow people, you all grow capability.
 You bring people who've been to the North Star
 where you want to go, and you bring them into your company.
 Executives, and whether it's flexible executives
 or even full-time, we now have that under the loud collective.
 It's not just a couple workshops,
 it's not just strategic discussions,
 it's not just business development, which we do all of those.
 It's now bringing in people and it's working really well.
 There's a couple of things.
 The number one, you accelerate the growth and accelerate the timeline.
 Number two, you tend to need significantly much less money
 because you're not wasting it, throwing it out
 and certain and experimenting as much.
 Because people in talent, that's a big cost
 and it tends to take a lot of time and energy and burn.
 If you can reduce that, reduce the amount
 that the owner or founder has to give away,
 and you can show success earlier.
 And we're seeing that in multiple ventures.
 And so that's something I would love to tell my younger self
 in the journey of a couple of ventures I have.
 So if I'm someone that's thinking about this and hearing this,
 if I get venture capital and let's just keep a simple round numbers,
 I need a million dollars and here's the perspective
 or whatever it is that drives that.
 And if you're offering both capital and resource in people,
 you just nailed it.
 That's time and money.
 How does that get a factored into the equation of return?
 Because it's one thing if you loan me a million dollars,
 but if you loan me a million dollars, a CMO, a CFO and a CIO,
 they probably don't cost the same.
 Let's just talk in that general category of a million dollars
 and the use of funds is what?
 Okay, I need to hire people for sales, I need to do this
 and you do that.
 And what if we say, okay, we actually have that.
 We're gonna allocate some budget to that,
 but we're not taking as much risk because this is in-house.
 And now the founder and the company we invest in,
 it has to mutual agreement.
 It's not like we're forcing this upon,
 but if we know busy founders and business owners
 and stressed out ones especially, that's really helpful.
 Because if I don't need to look far or spend a lot of time
 looking for the right people to fill the gaps I have,
 then that's really helpful.
 Usually received with a really positive tone,
 which is, hey, I'm raising this capital.
 Number one, do you need a million dollars
 or do you need actually this?
 And then we're actually saving a lot of money
 just by bringing this in-house.
 And by the way, we just did this with this company
 and you can see and you can talk to them.
 That's how that works.
 And again, we're seeing results
 because they're growing fast.
 And we're holding each other accountable,
 including ourselves.
 We're looking at every couple, every month technically
 and saying, we made these decisions,
 we spent this money, are we getting our bank for a buck?
 Everyone looks in the mirror.
 So yeah, it's interesting because it's then,
 it's not borrowing and it's sort of is,
 but isn't, you're giving away equity typically.
 But it's interesting when you're loaning the money
 or giving the money for a turn
 and you've got your resources in it,
 you got a lot of skin in the game.
 It's also interesting because then if it don't work,
 then well, I guess you're all just in it together,
 ultimately because no one wins.
 Yeah, exactly.
 That's the venture game, and by the way,
 we're talking about less than 2% of companies.
 Most companies do not need venture.
 Most companies probably can go down other various routes.
 And that's another thing I learned about being a VC,
 I actually encourage most not to take a VC.
 Not just because they aren't the right candidate for it,
 because I've been through it as well
 and plenty of not so great things have happened
 and plenty of great things have happened.
 But I have that empathy.
 I blatantly tell people,
 you actually shouldn't be taking money from a fund.
 You actually should consider being a little bit more scrappy
 and potentially getting some of this funding down the line
 or in kind services because they offer this.
 I actually don't think venture capital is for most,
 even though a lot of people feel like that is the option.
 And it's exciting, by the way.
 It's a credibility stamp of, I got venture.
 I don't feel that way anymore
 because the pressure to grow that are many times unrealistic
 with the great opportunity ahead as a business,
 there's a mismatch there.
 I've been on both sides.
 I've been on the receiver founder side
 and I've been on the investor side, which I understand.
 Okay, we got to do this.
 Trying to be better as a venture investor
 and trying to be better as a founder and scrappy here
 to say, do we need to take money from people
 who might not understand or have the love
 for our business like we do?
 Yeah, talking with Dr. Navin,
 Goi-Oi.
 Co-founder of Loud Capital.
 Is it former anesthesiologist?
 How many is this?
 How many is this?
 You still have the capability of putting everyone to sleep
 at any time in my life.
 Except on this show.
 But does that ever go away?
 Do you have to keep getting, do you still practice?
 Yeah, I do some shifts here and there.
 I took a long break from it
 and then with the evolution of myself
 and really appreciating all the work I've done to become one.
 I practice once in a while.
 You do have to keep up your licensing,
 your credentialing, your continuing education.
 It's not something that take lightly.
 Nothing in the medical line really is straightforward
 or a quick check box.
 Exactly, well, I guess it shouldn't be on some levels.
 But I think we make it harder than it might need to be.
 You'd probably agree with that.
 Talk to me, who's the perfect target then?
 Who is the perfect model avatar for this type of VC?
 Ambitious and humble.
 Really have a big vision.
 Really humble to understand this process.
 It is extremely humbling.
 That's what I would tell my younger self.
 You get questioned all the time.
 Decision you make, that's great.
 Awesome, it's forgotten yesterday.
 You have new executives that many times
 are more experienced or smarter than you.
 You need to manage that.
 You need to manage your own self that you might have been
 outgrown by the company.
 That happens in companies.
 That understanding, which takes a little bit of time
 to spend time with that person,
 not just the idea and the vision and the existing company,
 it's really the ability to be molded.
 As investors, we also want to be more plastic as well.
 More flexible and fluid because what we think today
 could be very different 10 days from now.
 And we've really learned how to be moldable as well.
 But we really expect that from our peers.
 And in healthcare, we're investing in a lot of therapeutics,
 logistics and high level.
 We want our fund is investing in companies
 where if you invest in a great therapeutics company, awesome.
 But can we ensure that that can get to patients?
 And what do we need for that?
 Do we need education?
 Do we need logistical?
 Do we need operations?
 How do we get that medication to the patient
 as quick as as fast as possible?
 Holistically, that's why I'm in the venture space.
 Our team is because we care from the innovation itself
 and how that benefits patients.
 It's kind of a one-off, but that's so topical now.
 How's AI impacting anything that you guys are doing?
 Maybe even on the capital side or even in the medical field?
 You've got to be seeing some changes and different things.
 I'd love to see such a buzz word now.
 I'd love to know if it's impacting what you guys are doing.
 Oh, absolutely.
 Use a lot of AI integrations.
 We're looking at new technologies now.
 Really for investment before utility.
 Some of that is, memorials telling you about the accountability
 that we have for businesses where we do an assessment
 and we say, hey, this is what your company is right now,
 based on all the data within that company,
 which is curated, private data of that company,
 which many times a leadership team can't really even see.
 But to aggregate it in a way where you can understand it
 and then start making decisions
 on how you can build the most value.
 The biggest gap is the 100 things we're doing
 as a business owner, we think those 100 things
 are so important to the value of the company.
 But it's just a lot smaller.
 So that's the liver.
 We need to understand what that is
 and let's double down on it
 because the value you're building for yourself,
 for your employees, for your future stakeholders,
 we care about that.
 We use AI to integrate that data
 into consistently be efficient on how we execute on that.
 Because if I'm a consultant and I'm providing a 50 page report,
 that doesn't help a busy leader
 who has many gaps in execution on their leadership team
 or with themselves.
 But if you can bring that knowledge
 that's easier to digest,
 as well as execution power, how value is that?
 And that's what we're doing
 within our own companies that we turn out
 as well as the companies that we're helping.
 Steve Jobs called that signals and noise
 and he was a master of pulling out the signals
 and getting rid of the noise.
 And that's what you're defining is
 with all this data, what is it telling me
 versus what is the noise, what can I ignore?
 And it's both the tasks, too.
 What are these things that I'm doing
 that are signals that are driving business forward
 and then what's noise?
 That's powerful stuff, man.
 Thank you.
 And that's a great analogy, by the way.
 I love that.
 Working here by learn more about what you guys are doing,
 how to keep up with loud capital
 and hey, everything mobile, NFC, all you,
 I'm just fascinated by it.
 It makes all the sense in the world
 we need to make that happen universally.
 Yeah, thank you.
 I'm on LinkedIn a lot, man.
 And I have all the companies there
 and the websites and everything like that.
 I post a lot of LinkedIn.
 I try to share a lot of things that aren't your normal.
 Let's just cheer on for this big accomplishment,
 but talk more about the stuff that isn't going well
 or that many of us don't want to share
 kind of the vulnerability aspect
 that's really opened up my world.
 I love talking about it.
 Love it, man.
 Appreciate you for coming on.
 Thank you so much.
 Thanks for doing these, man.
 I love real conversations.
 And this is definitely real.
 Yeah, man.
 I appreciate that.
 That's the highest compliment I have gotten
 in a long time.
 And it is what we're trying to do here.
 You know what to find us, guys?
 Ryan is right.com.
 You'll find highlight clips, the full episode links
 to YouTube.
 Gotta see the good doctor in person.
 He looks good.
 He sounds good.
 He is good.
 Loud capital.
 Go check him out.
 We appreciate him for coming on.
 We appreciate you for making us number one.
 We'll see you next time right about now.
 This has been right about now with Ryan Alford,
 a Radcast Network production.
 Visit RyanisRight.com for full audio and video versions
 of the show or to inquire about sponsorship opportunities.
 Thanks for listening.