April 26, 2019

Q & A with Brian O'Connell, husband, podcaster, intellectually curious person



Brian is the podcast host of Anybody But Brian. He recently accepted a position to lead global digital strategy for Otis Elevator, Inc. Previously, Brian spent five and a half years working for Siemens and four and a half years working for JDSU in a variety of leadership positions focusing on business development, operations, and strategy. Brian has an MA with distinction in International Security from Georgetown University and a BA with honors in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics from the University of Pennsylvania as well as additional studies at Princeton University and the Sloan School of Business at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Connect with Brian at his Podcast: @AnybodyButBrian

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GB:  Brian, thanks for taking the time to chat. Can you share a bit about yourself? Any background info that's NOT in the bio?

BO: Thanks for the interest in me and the podcast. Overall I think most of my background is shaped by continuous learning. In college, I couldn't choose one major so I chose a program featuring three (Philosophy, Politics, and Economics). Professionally, I have worked for two companies over ten years but never had a job for more than about two years at each company thankfully being able to jump between strategy, quality, sales, product management, operations, and even P&L leadership. In graduate school I chose the broadest concentration they would allow (International Security Studies) so I could tour policy, economics, defense technology, and government budget accounting. In short, I love being challenged in what I do and surrounding myself with people I can learn from, whether that is talented creative people like my wife or yourself or people who have expertise in a wide variety of areas in sports, politics, cars, whatever.

GB:  When and how did you realize you wanted to build a podcast?

BO: So it essentially happened by accident. In the past few years, I had a fascination with the 2008 financial crisis. I think it has shaped nearly everything that has happened to people our age. It shapes our confidence in the job market, real estate market, what should happen with student loans, what jobs we have now, and the level of our wages and buying power. As a by-product of that fascination, I thought I was going to write a book. In fact, I tried to write a book. The focus was going to be on the role of the rating agencies in the crisis and how faulty ratings led some institutional investors liked state pension funds to buy into mortgage-backed securities without understanding the ramifications of that decision and effectively spread the crisis on a wider basis. Yet when I tried to write it, I never got further than a chapter. Furthermore, when I mentioned the book to two friends of mine (hi Mark and Kurt!) they basically said I seemed to cover it in 15 minutes and it would be really cool if someone covered multiple complex topics like that in a podcast in a short period of time - almost like a cliff notes for life. When they said that I realized that I enjoyed talking about the topics more than writing about them and that a podcast format would allow me to cover multiple topics and thus Anybody But Brian was born.

GB:  Is there any advice you have for someone looking to launch a podcast?

BO: Plan out your content and take it seriously. Personally, I underestimated the amount of time and effort it would take to sufficiently research and present these topics. My original intent was to do this on a bi-weekly basis, then that drifted to monthly, and now I am honestly struggling to keep up with that. Now I guess it would be easy enough to throw something together but I think it is important to put together something interesting for the small amount of people who listen.

GB:  What's your day job? How does that inspire your podcasting - if at all? What impacts does it have on your work?

BO: So I am actually in a little bit of a transition. I started a new day job on April 15th leading digital strategy for Otis Elevator. I will be focusing on how Otis moves people and how that integrates with broader systems like buildings, maps, delivery of goods, and security. For the last five and a half years I have worked for Siemens focusing on two key markets - renewable energy and infrastructure on Federal installations as well as maintenance and service for mechanical systems on Navy ships. Overall that is not terribly linked to my podcast but it does give me a great venue to learn about new technology. I am constantly surrounded by talented engineers who develop incredibly impressive renewable projects that deliver not only energy savings at Federal buildings and installations but also energy resiliency to keep those buildings and installations running during major storms or other events. Being surrounded by those technical talents and leaders is certainly inspiring.

GB:  What's your creative process like? Do you have any takeaway routines or strategies? A method to the madness?

BO: In the beginning, I covered items that interested me such as the role of the rating agencies in the financial crisis. Then it was influenced by books I just read. For example, discussing The Troubles in Northern Ireland was inspired after I finished the book Hope Against History: The Course of Conflict in Northern Ireland by Jack Holland. But now it has become a little more scattershot. In my next episode, I plan to cover the Dunning-Kruger effect. In the field of psychology, the Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which people mistakenly assess their cognitive ability or intelligence as greater than it is. In short, it means people who have little knowledge continuously assess themselves as being smarter than they are, and I believe that is incredibly emblematic of our time. It seems that faith in experts and academics is continuously failing. Being an expert means understanding and acknowledging that you don't know everything. Simple answers can rarely explain complex issues. Yet, those are the answers everyone seems to want. I think that is important to explore.

GB:  What does "success" mean to you?

BO: Success isn't about a number of listeners or anything like that. As long as I teach one person something or get one person to research or re-think something while I enjoy doing it, then that is success.

GB:  What's next for Anybody But Brian? Got any forthcoming projects or episodes we can keep an eye out for?

BO: Nothing big for me or the podcast - I just hope to keep it going month by month. However, I would be crazy not to use this as a small plug for my wife and her partner, Talia Miller, in their release of their new record label - Sheer Luck Records. The mission of their label is to "elevate marginalized voices, shine a light on diverse artists, and celebrate a talented and passionate community." I am extremely proud of what they have been able to accomplish in a short period of time and I am extremely excited to keep an eye out for what they will accomplish in the future.

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