August 17, 2023 • 46 mins
In this episode of “Inside the Oval” presented by Dignity Health, Jeff Fong spoke about his journey to the 49ers, the art of providing and receiving feedback, his role as the executive sponsor of APEX and more.
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Speaker 1 (00:11):
Welcome to the Inside the Old podcast resented by Dignity Health.
I'm Haley Jones.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
And I'm Patti Kwan, and today.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
We are joined by Executive Vice President of Finance Jeff Fong. Jeff,
thank you so much for joining the podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:24):
Well, thank you so much for having me, Jeff.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
What are your responsibilities as EVP of Finance for the
forty nine ers.
Speaker 4 (00:33):
Sure, so, I oversee the finance, accounting and payroll teams
reporting to our chief financial officer. For finance, I think budgeting, forecasting,
and long term financial planning. On the accounting side, I
would break up the teams as we have an accounts
(00:54):
payable team, so paying our bills, accounts receivable team collecting
our money and recognizing revenue. We have a reporting team
that reports our financials to the league, to our lenders.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
And supports all of our audit requests.
Speaker 4 (01:13):
And we also have a team that focuses on saying
non NFL events such as concerts and soccer soccer games.
And then I think a lot of people know what
payroll does because payroll makes sure that all of our
players and staff gets services workers that they all get
paid accurately, on and on time, and I would say
(01:34):
they're probably everyone's best friend.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
What does your day to day look like?
Speaker 3 (01:41):
Good question.
Speaker 4 (01:43):
Well, I'll start by saying there is never a dull day,
and every day is a little different some examples. On
the accounting side, we just finished for audits, so that
the accounting team was especially busy the past three months
(02:03):
focused on that. On the finance side, I'd say we're
currently right now working on analyzing our financial results for
the month and working on publishing our monthly management reports
that will go out to all the budget owners. I'm
also working with our director of finance on some analysis
of our longer term revenue streams. On our payroll side,
(02:28):
a big project for us is we plan to upgrade
our technology and so we're working on evaluating who may
be a really good vendor to partner with us, as
we always try to be best in class in terms
of the technology and we really feel like we could
(02:49):
make significant progress on innovation and efficiency with our organization.
Speaker 3 (02:55):
And then last is I have around.
Speaker 4 (02:57):
Twenty people on my team, so the whole people management
and really for me important to like set the local culture.
And right now we're really focused on, you know, getting
better every day. We're making sure that we're working as
a synergistic team to maximize efficiency.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
And you know, we always talk to the team about.
Speaker 4 (03:20):
Thinking differently, how can we do things better, and so
that we you know, we always try to have a
vision of what does best in class look like and
how can we get there.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
I feel like setting the culture is really important in
any job force. But like, I think you're in a
really amazing leader in your department, like you're the people
in your group love you, but also within the organization
as a whole, like you have been an ERG sponsor
and really been willing to talk to like anyone who
needs like advice or help, Or did you have a
(03:53):
leader when you were first getting into the workforce that
you model that off of, or how did you kind
of come up with how you are going to lead
your group?
Speaker 4 (04:03):
You know, I think that at one point to one
specific person, but I will say over time, I've worked
with some really cool and great people.
Speaker 3 (04:17):
My first job was at ernstin Young and I.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
Was put in a position i think my second year
where I started managing six different people. So I was
I think I was probably like twenty three years old,
and all of a sudden, going from a first year
staff where people tell you what to do to people,
seeing that you had some potential and saying well, why
don't you manage like three different audits and six different
(04:43):
people and so. But the good part about working for
a large organization like ernstin Young is that they had
some formal trainings, and so I thought that I got
some really good feedback really early on. Both I got
the exposure to managing people. I also got I also
got experience and formal training. Now as I've gone, you know,
(05:08):
throughout my career, I've met some really great people. I
think that one person that also stands out is that
my former chief marketing officer at Juniper Networks, where I
worked at. I really enjoy talking with him, and I
really like that he was so respected. He was very
(05:31):
successful before he came to Juniper, and I believe he's
a CEO CEO of a tech company right now. But
he would always give it to me straight, and I
really appreciate in terms of how he set the local culture.
He would tell me things like privately, like hey, here's
some things you may not want to hear, but I
think that this is like really like honest, and it
(05:52):
would be good for you to hear it, and I
always appreciated that because you don't always get that from everyone.
Speaker 2 (05:58):
You mentioned feedback, and we kind of talked about feedback
prior to recording. Do you have any tips just throughout
your career on both receiving feedback and providing feedback.
Speaker 3 (06:13):
Ooh, that's a good question.
Speaker 4 (06:15):
I think that in terms of providing feedback, it's really
helpful for me as I like set up my team
to share what my goals are. That's important for me
because that's transparency. I don't mind sharing what my goals
are with my entire team. So all twenty people on
(06:37):
my team, they know what my boss, our CFO, how
he measures Jeff, so you can see what all my
goals are. And what I try to do is I
try to then have the people that report to me,
and when they say they report, the next layer down
is that all the goals like lineup and so that
(06:58):
we're all going towards the same goal. So if I'm successful,
wells mean that other people are hitting their goals as well.
What I don't want is like a misalignment where half
the team has a goal and it doesn't align with.
Speaker 3 (07:14):
Where I'm at.
Speaker 4 (07:16):
And so setting those goals I think is important because
it gives you something to measure against. And then when
we have those conversations, we can have those honest conversations
against how they're doing. And so it is specific feedback.
And you know, for me, I try to always keep
it straight because one of the things that I really
(07:39):
value is and I think is part of my purpose
of what I get enjoyment is is to seeing people
continue to grow and succeed. And I think that people
can do that if they get the honest feedback. And
sometimes I may notice subtle things that they may not
notice themselves. And when I see people succeed. I've taken
(08:00):
one of those personality tests recently and I got like coach,
and I think that kind of fits my personality because
I really want people that interact with myself ask for
feedback to The best feedback I ever get is when
I see people succeeding.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
I got Mastermind, and it worries me. I just don't
like that title. You said you were working at Ernst
and Young. Did you ever expect yourself to make a
transition to sports.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
I did not.
Speaker 4 (08:37):
I you know, my career path was after Ernstein Young
I went back and got my MBA at Berkeley. So
I've worked at Ernst and Young for five years, and
then I worked at some large technology companies doing a
lot of cool finance roles, very interesting roles, very different
(08:59):
than I've gave me a broad perspective of finance. But
I never until I got here, I never knew too
much about the business of sports. I was always growing
up here in San Jose. I was always a forty
nine Er fan, and I knew about the team, but
I didn't know about the business side.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Thank god for podcasts like this where people can learn
a little bit more about the business side. Did you
ever think you would be working for your hometown team?
Speaker 4 (09:33):
You know, I didn't. It was just really the path
is just I think. What I would say is this,
one day in twenty fourteen, I was talking to an
ex colleague of mind from ernstin Young. So granted this
was probably at least ten years since I had worked
(09:56):
with my friend, and we're both forty nine or and
so I remember one day just asking him do you
think the forty nine ers have any finance jobs? And
as I mentioned, I didn't know anything about the business
of sports, but I just threw that out there, and
it was funny because he responded, I don't know, but
(10:16):
I know someone who does. And so we've all probably
heard that before, and you're like, okay, well, if he
did anything that would be really helpful. What he did
was that he Facebook messengered the CFO of the forty
nine ers, copied me on it and gave me a
(10:39):
really good recommendation. And so we got to that step
and I'm thinking, Okay, well, that's nice of him. But
what was the most amazing part was that within a
half an hour she actually responded and said, you have
pretty good timing. I'm actually trying to build a team.
Why don't you send me something about yourself.
Speaker 2 (11:03):
Facebook Messenger. That's crazy. I don't know how many people
can say they got a job via Facebook messenger.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
Yeah, And so that's I think for the audience.
Speaker 4 (11:16):
Maybe the lesson is that a positive working relationship and
friendship from ten years prior ended up helping me to
get this fantastic job here at the forty nine ers,
and so you never know, like who can help you
or who's watching your performance every day.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
I think that's one of the things I struggle with
is networking, Like, we meet so many people and I
have so many connections from different teams, leagues. My thing
is like always the how often do you reach back out?
How do you stay connected to them?
Speaker 4 (11:53):
Like?
Speaker 1 (11:53):
Have you ever gotten through that process and made it
where it feels natural to reach back out or to
just connect every sporadically.
Speaker 4 (12:04):
Well, one of the things that I do is that
if I use my LinkedIn and so if I see
someone in my connections get a promotion or just post
something interesting, I might not always post on their public responses,
but I may shoot them a private.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
Message note just to say, hey, how are you doing?
Speaker 4 (12:30):
Just to keep in touch and keep your name and
your connection there, I'll tell you from the highest level.
A really cool story for myself was that as part
of APEX, I was probably one of three hundred people
who watched Kim Pagoula, the you know, the owner of
(12:55):
the Buffalo Bills, give a presentation and I really like enjoyed,
you know, her her talk and the message that she had,
and so I was able to figure out her email
address and I just shot her a note afterwards, and
I wrote in the email like what I enjoyed about
(13:17):
her talk and also let her know that I was starting,
you know, I was the executive sponsor of the forty
nine ers Apace Group. And what was really cool was that,
I want to say, like, within an hour she wrote
back a very nice message and in terms of like
keeping like a network, what I thought was just and
(13:39):
it made me really happy when she reached it back
out to me, is I think that maybe you say
call it? Within the next year, she had met some
forty nine er alumni at an event and it triggered
her that, like, oh I remember that, I, you know,
had an email conversation with Jeft before, and she like
proactively just reached down and sent a note and let me.
Speaker 3 (14:00):
Know that, Hey, I just want to know how you're doing.
Speaker 4 (14:03):
But I met some forty nine er alumni out here,
and I just you know, I was like over the
moon to get that email.
Speaker 3 (14:10):
I thought that was really cool.
Speaker 2 (14:13):
How has your role evolved over your last nine seasons
with the team?
Speaker 4 (14:18):
I think for me, what was really cool about this
job was that I was the first financial planning and
analysis higher back in twenty fourteen, so right before Levi's
medium opened. So I'm going into my tenth season now,
(14:40):
and when I was first hired. You know, I mentioned
I have twenty people on the team now, so I
was like the first one. And my responsibilities then were
to develop the vision of the team, you know, figure
out like what skill sets and who are the right
people for the culture for the team, develop our budgeting
(15:04):
and reporting framework, and then decide like what type of
technology we're going to use. And so that was really
like the role that I had right when I started,
which was exciting for me because there's very few times
that you ever get to be the first one, and
so you get to set the vision, you get to
(15:26):
hire the people, you get to pick the technology, and
you know, fortunately I was able to hire some great people,
and you know, some of the decisions were pretty tough
because I you know, there's there there was tough interviewers
in the process, and it was.
Speaker 3 (15:44):
Not always unanimous.
Speaker 4 (15:48):
But you know, I think ultimately like we made the
right decisions and I was fortunate to have final call
and everybody that came on has been fantastic, and I
can honestly say that they've all done really, really well,
whether they're still here or not. We got everyone to
buy into the budget process, which was new, and then
(16:11):
I was able to successfully implement the financial planning solutions.
So I think because all those things went well over time,
I was able to continue to gain more and more responsibility.
And you know, I started as a senior manager in fourteen.
I think I got promoted a director in sixteen, vice
(16:31):
president in twenty eighteen, and then at the end of
twenty twenty one, I became the executive vice president of
finance in my current role.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
Right now, you mentioned interviewing. I'm curious if you, because
you have interviewed and hired a lot of people, if
you have any either red flags you look for when
you're interviewing someone, or things that people have done or
that you look for that set them apart.
Speaker 4 (16:58):
That's a good question. I'll tell you a story here
is that you know I told you earlier how I
got introduced to the CFO of the forty nine ers
and her name was Sipporah and great person, love working
for her. And the two questions that she asked me
(17:20):
are questions that I always remember, and this is how
I felt like, Okay, I'm actually I have a chance here.
And she said to me, she said, Jeff, you work
at Juniper Networks right now, and she said, I get
so many resumes that they all start to look similar,
(17:41):
including my mind. And behind her she had this big
stack of paper and she said, so I have seven
hundred resumes behind me. Tell me what makes you stand
out from the rest?
Speaker 3 (17:57):
WHOA And I was like.
Speaker 4 (18:00):
You know, so if you ever supports listening, she needs
to tell me if that stack was real. But it
certainly it was a high stack of vapor. But I
do think that for everyone. For A tip is that,
you know, I look for people who, whether you're working
in sports or not, and say you want to work
(18:22):
in sports, is like, what are you doing right now
to be great at your current function? Doesn't matter what
industry you are, Like, I'm always curious for people who.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
Are striving to be great at what they do.
Speaker 4 (18:37):
And then secondly, I think where this question goes to
is like, then they know what differentiates the health and
make it easy for the interviewer to understand. And you
can do that, I feel like in a in a
confident but humble way, if that makes sense.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
You mentioned being the first first in your position. Did
you feel any pressure coming into that role, and if
you did, like, how did you manage that?
Speaker 4 (19:09):
I definitely felt pressure because I was switching from an
industry that I was more comfortable with to an industry
where functionally I was confident in my skills, meaning like finance,
but industry wise I didn't have any experience. And so
(19:30):
how am I going to figure out who the right
people to hire are, How am I going to figure
out like the technology we use, and how am I
going to get people to buy in on the budget
process that I think will work the best for this organization. Fortunately,
one of the things I noticed is that my boss
(19:52):
was Scott Seventino, and he later became our CFO after.
Speaker 3 (19:59):
Support or left to go into additional endeavors. And so.
Speaker 4 (20:07):
What I noticed about Scott was that he was really busy,
like during the day, but if you waited around until
after hours, he was always willing to spend time with
you to learn the business. And that's what I needed
to do, is I needed to learn the business. And
(20:30):
Scott did something that was really cool for me is
that the.
Speaker 3 (20:35):
First time I met with like budget owners.
Speaker 4 (20:38):
Because of the finance role, you meet with a lot
of different people, and so let's just say there's forty
different budget owners.
Speaker 3 (20:45):
He went with me to each meeting.
Speaker 4 (20:49):
And I could tell that everybody really liked and respected him,
And for somebody who's brand new, that's like an awesome
feeling to know that people really enjoy working with your
boss are willing to share information. And so I was like, okay, Like,
(21:09):
if I can leverage and have these positive relationships like
Scott does, then that's going to build my confidence every
day that I could be successful here. And I think
that you know, what I tell people in finance is that, well,
you could be the smartest person in the room with
(21:31):
the biggest pedigree, but if people don't want to work
with you or you can't get information, that's going to
be really hard to do your job.
Speaker 3 (21:40):
And so.
Speaker 4 (21:43):
Maybe a takeaway for any of the managers like listening
is that you hired people for a reason and there's
something that you really liked about them. Think about are
you always putting them in position to give them the
best possible chance to succeed and show the skill sets
(22:05):
off that you think that they have.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
I'm curious, like, you are a very well liked and
respected person in this organization, but I think with your job,
it also comes with telling people know or like there
are like we don't have an influence budget. How do
you balance both of those?
Speaker 4 (22:26):
No, that's that is a very very good question, right,
And I will say that this is more like.
Speaker 3 (22:33):
Art than science. And this is.
Speaker 4 (22:37):
Where I think that people's like you have a different
relationship with each person, and that's why relationships matter, because
how I may approach it with, say one person on
the football side, could be totally different of how I
approach it with one of you. But I try to
(22:58):
connect always that, you know, what is the organization's goals,
how does that fit into with our priorities, and then
have that specific conversation with them, because yeah, as you said,
it's not always easy and there's always a more ass
(23:19):
than resources available.
Speaker 2 (23:21):
I'm going to take it back about a few months ago,
and we kind of alluded to it earlier, but you
took a risk leaving your former job to come here.
You know, I think you said it was title wise,
it was a little bit lower, maybe pay wise was
a little bit lower. Can you take us through that
experience maybe what your thought process behind that decision was.
Speaker 4 (23:41):
Yeah. Sure, So when I ended up getting the offerer,
you know, after you know, was introduced to supporta after
I you know, the interviewed great with Say Scott and
SUPPORTA and others, and the offer was made. Then the
(24:02):
question was, Okay, I don't know anything about the business
of sports. I feel like this is an exciting opportunity.
I had just recently got promoted to director at my
tech company, so at Junior per Networks, and I thought
I had a pretty bright future there. As you mentioned, Patty,
this role on paper may have not looked as great
(24:25):
to some because it was.
Speaker 3 (24:26):
A lower title, it was lower.
Speaker 4 (24:29):
End compensation, and most people, I think in our career
as we think.
Speaker 3 (24:33):
Of like going in a linear line up.
Speaker 4 (24:36):
But what it came down to it is that you know,
it was an extremely unique opportunity to lead and build
the finance team. So going back to like you would
be the first one, so you did. Did feel like
I had control that if I could build the team
from scratch, I could do it my own way.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
And when I.
Speaker 4 (24:54):
Looked, when I thought forward, and I said, okay, when
I look back at my career, I didn't want I
want to be in a position asking myself like what if,
Like what if I did this?
Speaker 3 (25:04):
Like where would I have been?
Speaker 4 (25:07):
And fortunately my wife also loves the forty nine ers
and was extremely supportive, so that really helped as well.
But that was really my thought process and it ended
up turning her out. You know where I'm at. I'm
still here going into my tenth season. So it's been amazing.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
Going into your tenth season and like looking back over
that time, do you have a favorite memory with the
forty nine ers.
Speaker 4 (25:34):
Yeah, my favorite memory was our NFC championship game here
that was that was just exciting to see Rahem go off.
I think he had what two hundred and twenty yards
four touchdowns, and to.
Speaker 3 (25:54):
Win the game and.
Speaker 4 (25:56):
Just see you know, family friends, all of our colleagues
together celebrating. I personally, I remember I gave Jed like
a big hug after the game, and so that was
a cool memory of mine and I and I remember
It's funny that I think it was my wife was
(26:17):
asking me, Hey, do you think we can go on
the field and celebrate, and I didn't, and I told
her I didn't.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
I didn't think so. But later on.
Speaker 4 (26:28):
I think they let everybody like out there, and so
you know, I saw all of our colleagues out there,
So it was pretty fun to go out there see
people doing like snow angels with all the confetti and
so that that's really my favorite mend Mary so far.
Speaker 1 (26:44):
I remember we got an email from like stadium ops
or someone and they were like, please, like you are
allowed to go on the field like tonight only, and
everyone was like, Okay.
Speaker 2 (26:58):
I think that's a lot of people's favorite memory. I
mean it's mine. So and I feel like the amount
of times we asked this question, I'm gonna say about
eighty percent of the time, it is the NFC Championship
game because it was just to your point, it was
a great memory. I don't know about you, but I
stall the convetti from the ground. I like took a
(27:18):
handful of it, shoved it into my bag and now
it's sitting like in a little jar on my fireplace.
Speaker 3 (27:24):
No, so I should have done that.
Speaker 4 (27:27):
I have the pictures of it, but I don't think
I have the actual confetti.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
Jeff, can you tell us about your role as exec
sponsor of Apex and how you've kind of seen the
ERG grow under your guidance.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (27:40):
So, I started as the executive sponsor of Apex in
twenty and twenty and at the time, I think we
were the first club. So the first team to have
an APEX group, and a big shot out to Jazz
who started it up me to be the executive sponsor,
(28:02):
because without him and all of his push to get
everything set up, you know, I think that we got
going a lot faster. And I think my original thought
when he had asked me to partner with him on
this is that we would focus on networking and professional development.
(28:24):
And that's probably an area that I'm most comfortable with.
But in you know twenty twenty call it early twenty
twenty one, there was the rise of API hate crimes,
and you know what we talked about is I felt
like our membership really needed was like a safe space
(28:45):
to kind of discuss their feelings. And it was a
really tricky time because most of us are at home
during COVID and so we can read on the news,
but we don't really know like what our colleagues are
are feeling, and kind of, you know, we don't we're
(29:06):
not in the office. It's hard to get you know,
just run into people and ask them like how they're doing.
And I remember one specific incident that Jazz and I
I think we're texting each other, and you know, there
was something in the news and we said, hey, should
we just do like an impromptu zoom and see who
shows up? Because this is how we're feeling, but we're
(29:29):
not sure like how everybody else was feeling. And I
just remember like in a twelve hour period we had
like twenty five or thirty people show up, which was
a significant number, and people were really like sharing like
their honest feelings and it was really powerful. And so
(29:50):
that was kind of like the start of really, you
know where apex Apex you.
Speaker 3 (29:54):
Know, got going.
Speaker 4 (29:56):
And you know, I think now to see us evolve
where you know, Patty with you and Sarah's leadership and
having six passionate what I call like up and coming
leaders on our board and all the stretch goals, I'll
say that we have from putting on cultural events like
(30:17):
New Lunar New Year to the AAPI Heritage Month and
we just had to professional networking events. I think that's
been really fun to see the ERG evolve and I
love seeing it makes my job easy to see that
we have six people that are really like driving things
(30:39):
for the organization. And you know, ultimately we've talked about
that our mission and vision is that we want people
in our membership to be able to to be able
to maximize their potential, whatever that may be. And I
think that we're going to make a lot of progress
just this year. And appreciate all of your your leadership.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Not only obviously you're heavily involved in APEX, but you're
also at probably every single executive speak easy that Women
Connect puts on why you know, why is it so
important I guess to get involved and to promote inclusion
within the forty nine ers.
Speaker 3 (31:19):
Yeah, no, I think that you know.
Speaker 4 (31:21):
To me, I've always been a big believer of like
playing it forward. You know, you get to a certain
position in life, you don't want to be the only
one you know. And I feel like just in general,
having a diverse workforce with diverse opinions is really good
for business. I've been fortunate to get to this point
(31:44):
in life, and I'm always learning.
Speaker 3 (31:46):
Every single day I can learn from all of you.
Speaker 4 (31:50):
I'm always reading, trying to you know, get better every day.
But I'm also trying to share, and I really enjoy
sharing for anyone who's interested in listening. You know, things
that I've learned along the way, and probably the greatest
feedback that I most value is if someone ever just
(32:12):
you know, pings you down the road and says, hey,
remember we talked about this, It actually like work pretty well,
here's what I'm doing, And to me, that's like something
I get a lot of satisfaction out of.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
You're also we're just listing things off now, but you're
also a loyal supporter of the forty nine Ers Foundation,
which again has a great cause and beneficiaries. But what
kind of took you into the role of wanting to
support them? And then do you have a favorite foundation event?
Speaker 4 (32:49):
Yeah, no, I think that as you mentioned, you know,
my wife and I are loyal supporters of the foundation.
We really enjoy giving to great causes and you know,
so I know you've had Justin on here and he does.
Speaker 3 (33:06):
A great job of running the foundation, and.
Speaker 4 (33:09):
We certainly are big believers in the Foundation's mission of
educating and empowering the youth through innovative strategies. I just
think that it's the foundation is very well run and
has such amazing support from you know, ownership, front office
and players. So, you know, I think Justin has introduced
(33:29):
my wife and I to so to very interesting people
who are doing great things in the community and you
know that when you believe in something, it it really
is something that is personal, but it's really you know,
kind of like integrates everything that I do in like life. Right,
(33:51):
It's kind of like people talk about work life balance.
I really believe in like work life integration and being
able to integrate, you know, pieces of my life that
I find are very important and be able to do
some of it, you know, a lot of it through
the forty nine ers is always you know, I have
to pinch myself sometimes in terms of events.
Speaker 3 (34:12):
So if two events come to.
Speaker 4 (34:14):
Mind, the picnic was really really fun because I got
to both volunteer for part of the time, and then
my family, parents and my brother's family was there and
his kids, and so for them to get to experience
some of the things that I see every day, I
(34:35):
thought was really cool. Now specific I guess big event,
the twenty nineteen Golden Getaway was a lot of fun.
Speaker 3 (34:45):
I remember I sat at at dinner.
Speaker 4 (34:47):
I sat next to you coach Sala, who was our
defensive coordinator at the time, and now he's the New
York Jets head coach. So to see him succeed and
he was such a cool guy, great conversation at dinner
that I that I remember, so I remember that, and
then of course flow Rider performed in nineteen so that
(35:11):
was something that was pretty cool.
Speaker 1 (35:15):
Looking back at favorites, I'm another one. We do like
a as a whole front office like day of service.
We've cleaned up a river bank, we built playgrounds. Like
do you have a favorite like getting out in the
community with the front office memory?
Speaker 4 (35:32):
Yeah, No, I thought it was very unique to clean
the creek that is like something like that's an area
that I didn't even know how to get to that
creek at the time, and so but having see so
many of our front office staff come out to help
(35:55):
and to hear from the organizers how this helps out
the community, I think that's an event that definitely stands
out in my mind.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
That one was funny because Patty and I wandered out
of the creek, like there was a bunch of trash
towards the highway or towards the road. So we had
wandered out of the creek and we were going up
this hill and then we like turned around and everyone
was gone, and we were like, did we get left behind?
Are we stuck in this creek?
Speaker 3 (36:24):
Forever.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
We were really in the zone. We just like kept
following trails of trash, which is like sad to say
that there's just so much trash down there, but we
were I was trying to fill my bag. I was like,
you know, the things that you found down there were
kind of crazy, but that was a medical event.
Speaker 4 (36:42):
You probably fill a lot of bags then, and we're
very focused.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
Yeah, it was crazy to see the piles like at
the end when we were done, and even just like
the bulk items that wouldn't fit in a bag. So
this is this is our plea to for everyone to
keep our keep our creeks clean. Jeff, you've done it
throughout this episode, giving like little tidbits of advice that
(37:09):
do have specifically any advice for anyone who wants to
get into the sports industry.
Speaker 4 (37:15):
You know, I've listened to some of the podcasts and
I agree with all the advice there. Yeah, I've heard,
don't be free afraid to reach out and ask for help,
be okay with coming in at a lower level to
get your foot in the door. I think that what
I'd add is, you know, it's a numbers game sometimes and.
Speaker 3 (37:36):
There's just not that many positions.
Speaker 4 (37:39):
So to maximize your chances, I would say be open
to relocating and don't just focus on teams. But there
are jobs at the league offices, there are jobs at
agencies that work and support sports teams. There's even like
(37:59):
tech companies that you know may have a sports arm
or sports focus and so too. You know, if you're
playing a numbers game. Since we're here and I work
in finance, then may give you the best probabilities. And
then you know, as I mentioned earlier, you know, to
(38:19):
think about what you're doing. You know, make sure that
you're also great at what you're currently doing, you know,
whether that's social media, selling, finance, or accounting. Because I'm
always interested about learning about people who are the best
at what they do, regardless of industry.
Speaker 3 (38:41):
And in certain some of these jobs.
Speaker 4 (38:44):
If you have a great functional skill, similar to myself,
you may be able to come in and so I
may be able to teach you like the business side
of it. But the thing that if you bring something
that's great from a functional side, that can certainly be
a way in.
Speaker 1 (39:00):
I think that's really important too. Loving the thing that
you do rather than it being in sports necessarily, Like
if you love social media. You love finance because like
I've seen so many people who come here because they
just want to work in sports, and then it's hard
and they burn out or they're not passionate about the
(39:21):
thing that they're doing outside of sports, and then they
just don't love it as much. And that's always hard
to watch because you're like, could have come with like
one thing that you really wanted to do.
Speaker 3 (39:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (39:32):
No, I think that's great feedback because this job is
probably like optimal because I get a come by my
passion for sports and finance. But all the jobs that
I mentioned earlier that I've had in my career, they
were all very positive experiences, And I think part of
it is that I really enjoy finance and accounting and
(39:56):
so functionally, if you at least enjoy that and are
striving to get better every day, it's kind of just
adds a different layer of satisfaction to now be part
of the sports industry.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
When you were in school, did you have a favorite class,
Like did you take a finance and or accounting class?
Speaker 4 (40:15):
Well, I can rule out the classes I was not
good at.
Speaker 3 (40:21):
I can say that the.
Speaker 4 (40:25):
Ones I probably enjoyed the most were probably like corporate
finance and starting to learn when I got into I
think my junior and senior years in college. I went
to the business school there in Berkeley, and then you
start taking more specific business classes, and I enjoyed some
(40:46):
of those classes. I'm not the best, I would say
if it comes to statistics or if you give me
the sat math question, like the hardest ones on there,
I'm probably not the first of that like solves the
questions as well, But I do understand finance concepts.
Speaker 3 (41:08):
I love to read.
Speaker 4 (41:11):
About finance, and so that's something that's probably more in
my wheelhouse than history.
Speaker 1 (41:17):
Last question, every job description has that like bullet point
that's like other duties as assigned at the very bottom.
That is just so broad and vague. But during your
nine years here, have you done something with the forty
nine ers that you would probably consider as an other
duties as assigned?
Speaker 3 (41:35):
That is your favorite question? Not I do I ask it.
Speaker 1 (41:39):
I think I've asked it for over fifty episodes.
Speaker 4 (41:42):
Now let me think I think I have two of
them that are that are kind of fine. So Patty
knows that some of us, like we play hoops in
the morning at the gym and I've been known to
sweep the floors if they're too slippery.
Speaker 3 (42:00):
I have no.
Speaker 4 (42:01):
Problem going to the front desk and saying, have me
the mom and let me like momp it, because we
don't want anyone getting hurt.
Speaker 3 (42:09):
So I have no problem doing that.
Speaker 4 (42:12):
Another fun one I think is on game days, you know,
probably the last five years, is I typically walk around
in a suit, and so if you go, if you
go on the main concourse, you know that you potentially
can expect to get a lot of questions, and so
they don't necessarily know that I'm the EVP of finance,
(42:33):
You're wearing a suit.
Speaker 3 (42:34):
They think that you can answer most questions.
Speaker 4 (42:36):
So I actually before I go to each game, I've
remind myself and I actually like study a little bit,
So I like look up. I have like a map
at picture that I can access very quickly of the
stadium of where all the sections are, and I do
like for our concessions program or remember inclusive program, I
look at where all the stands are and read all
(42:59):
the instruction. And because people have asked me like how
does this work? And I pride myself on being able
to try to answer as many questions as I can.
Speaker 2 (43:11):
That's funny, like instead of like just wearing plain clothes
on the concourse, you still wear a suit, but you
like educate yourself knowing what comes with wearing the suit
on the concourse.
Speaker 3 (43:25):
Yes, yes, I know that.
Speaker 4 (43:28):
I've got into a few situations where I do think
that when people like look at your credential, they'll they'll
give you a little bit of a pass because it
says finance and not you know, head of geest services
or head of security. But I've been able to answer
most of it. I remember one time it was a
(43:49):
tricky question. Unfortunately, our head of security saw me and
he came over and he helped me.
Speaker 3 (43:58):
So I appreciated that.
Speaker 1 (44:00):
Do you have a like favorite question that someone's asked you,
Like you get it and you're like, I can answer this,
I'm ready.
Speaker 4 (44:08):
I think the uh, my favorite question is just where
things are? What's the fastest way to get somewhere in
the stadium, Just that looking at it before I head
out to the game. That helps because it's like fresh
in my mind.
Speaker 2 (44:24):
That's incredible. I I always get lost. I cannot give
directions for the life of me. We've been here, you know,
six seasons and it still takes me a while to
like configure like where north, So you know, everything is
so kudos to you. I got to study the maps.
Anyone will ask me for help.
Speaker 1 (44:44):
But all of our interns started this week and they
were like, how do we get to and I was like,
I don't, I don't know. I should know, and I don't.
Speaker 3 (44:52):
And you know that the thing is is that.
Speaker 4 (44:57):
Practicing it with nobody around and trying to either answer
the question or bring up the map quickly when somebody's
asking you the question. That's a little different because it
feels like if you can't bring it up right away,
it feels like the seconds, you know, feel like minutes.
Speaker 2 (45:22):
I love it. You're taking to heart your own advice,
just being really good at what you do and loving it.
So I love that you love to give directions at
leave my Stadium. Jeff, this was really fun. Thank you
so much for joining the podcast. I know it's been
months in the making and so we're super excited and
(45:42):
glad to finally have you on.
Speaker 3 (45:45):
Well, thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 4 (45:47):
I really enjoyed myself and really enjoy working with both
of you.
Welcome to the Inside the Old podcast resented by Dignity Health.
I'm Haley Jones.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
And I'm Patti Kwan, and today.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
We are joined by Executive Vice President of Finance Jeff Fong. Jeff,
thank you so much for joining the podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:24):
Well, thank you so much for having me, Jeff.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
What are your responsibilities as EVP of Finance for the
forty nine ers.
Speaker 4 (00:33):
Sure, so, I oversee the finance, accounting and payroll teams
reporting to our chief financial officer. For finance, I think budgeting, forecasting,
and long term financial planning. On the accounting side, I
would break up the teams as we have an accounts
(00:54):
payable team, so paying our bills, accounts receivable team collecting
our money and recognizing revenue. We have a reporting team
that reports our financials to the league, to our lenders.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
And supports all of our audit requests.
Speaker 4 (01:13):
And we also have a team that focuses on saying
non NFL events such as concerts and soccer soccer games.
And then I think a lot of people know what
payroll does because payroll makes sure that all of our
players and staff gets services workers that they all get
paid accurately, on and on time, and I would say
(01:34):
they're probably everyone's best friend.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
What does your day to day look like?
Speaker 3 (01:41):
Good question.
Speaker 4 (01:43):
Well, I'll start by saying there is never a dull day,
and every day is a little different some examples. On
the accounting side, we just finished for audits, so that
the accounting team was especially busy the past three months
(02:03):
focused on that. On the finance side, I'd say we're
currently right now working on analyzing our financial results for
the month and working on publishing our monthly management reports
that will go out to all the budget owners. I'm
also working with our director of finance on some analysis
of our longer term revenue streams. On our payroll side,
(02:28):
a big project for us is we plan to upgrade
our technology and so we're working on evaluating who may
be a really good vendor to partner with us, as
we always try to be best in class in terms
of the technology and we really feel like we could
(02:49):
make significant progress on innovation and efficiency with our organization.
Speaker 3 (02:55):
And then last is I have around.
Speaker 4 (02:57):
Twenty people on my team, so the whole people management
and really for me important to like set the local culture.
And right now we're really focused on, you know, getting
better every day. We're making sure that we're working as
a synergistic team to maximize efficiency.
Speaker 3 (03:17):
And you know, we always talk to the team about.
Speaker 4 (03:20):
Thinking differently, how can we do things better, and so
that we you know, we always try to have a
vision of what does best in class look like and
how can we get there.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
I feel like setting the culture is really important in
any job force. But like, I think you're in a
really amazing leader in your department, like you're the people
in your group love you, but also within the organization
as a whole, like you have been an ERG sponsor
and really been willing to talk to like anyone who
needs like advice or help, Or did you have a
(03:53):
leader when you were first getting into the workforce that
you model that off of, or how did you kind
of come up with how you are going to lead
your group?
Speaker 4 (04:03):
You know, I think that at one point to one
specific person, but I will say over time, I've worked
with some really cool and great people.
Speaker 3 (04:17):
My first job was at ernstin Young and I.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
Was put in a position i think my second year
where I started managing six different people. So I was
I think I was probably like twenty three years old,
and all of a sudden, going from a first year
staff where people tell you what to do to people,
seeing that you had some potential and saying well, why
don't you manage like three different audits and six different
(04:43):
people and so. But the good part about working for
a large organization like ernstin Young is that they had
some formal trainings, and so I thought that I got
some really good feedback really early on. Both I got
the exposure to managing people. I also got I also
got experience and formal training. Now as I've gone, you know,
(05:08):
throughout my career, I've met some really great people. I
think that one person that also stands out is that
my former chief marketing officer at Juniper Networks, where I
worked at. I really enjoy talking with him, and I
really like that he was so respected. He was very
(05:31):
successful before he came to Juniper, and I believe he's
a CEO CEO of a tech company right now. But
he would always give it to me straight, and I
really appreciate in terms of how he set the local culture.
He would tell me things like privately, like hey, here's
some things you may not want to hear, but I
think that this is like really like honest, and it
(05:52):
would be good for you to hear it, and I
always appreciated that because you don't always get that from everyone.
Speaker 2 (05:58):
You mentioned feedback, and we kind of talked about feedback
prior to recording. Do you have any tips just throughout
your career on both receiving feedback and providing feedback.
Speaker 3 (06:13):
Ooh, that's a good question.
Speaker 4 (06:15):
I think that in terms of providing feedback, it's really
helpful for me as I like set up my team
to share what my goals are. That's important for me
because that's transparency. I don't mind sharing what my goals
are with my entire team. So all twenty people on
(06:37):
my team, they know what my boss, our CFO, how
he measures Jeff, so you can see what all my
goals are. And what I try to do is I
try to then have the people that report to me,
and when they say they report, the next layer down
is that all the goals like lineup and so that
(06:58):
we're all going towards the same goal. So if I'm successful,
wells mean that other people are hitting their goals as well.
What I don't want is like a misalignment where half
the team has a goal and it doesn't align with.
Speaker 3 (07:14):
Where I'm at.
Speaker 4 (07:16):
And so setting those goals I think is important because
it gives you something to measure against. And then when
we have those conversations, we can have those honest conversations
against how they're doing. And so it is specific feedback.
And you know, for me, I try to always keep
it straight because one of the things that I really
(07:39):
value is and I think is part of my purpose
of what I get enjoyment is is to seeing people
continue to grow and succeed. And I think that people
can do that if they get the honest feedback. And
sometimes I may notice subtle things that they may not
notice themselves. And when I see people succeed. I've taken
(08:00):
one of those personality tests recently and I got like coach,
and I think that kind of fits my personality because
I really want people that interact with myself ask for
feedback to The best feedback I ever get is when
I see people succeeding.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
I got Mastermind, and it worries me. I just don't
like that title. You said you were working at Ernst
and Young. Did you ever expect yourself to make a
transition to sports.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
I did not.
Speaker 4 (08:37):
I you know, my career path was after Ernstein Young
I went back and got my MBA at Berkeley. So
I've worked at Ernst and Young for five years, and
then I worked at some large technology companies doing a
lot of cool finance roles, very interesting roles, very different
(08:59):
than I've gave me a broad perspective of finance. But
I never until I got here, I never knew too
much about the business of sports. I was always growing
up here in San Jose. I was always a forty
nine Er fan, and I knew about the team, but
I didn't know about the business side.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Thank god for podcasts like this where people can learn
a little bit more about the business side. Did you
ever think you would be working for your hometown team?
Speaker 4 (09:33):
You know, I didn't. It was just really the path
is just I think. What I would say is this,
one day in twenty fourteen, I was talking to an
ex colleague of mind from ernstin Young. So granted this
was probably at least ten years since I had worked
(09:56):
with my friend, and we're both forty nine or and
so I remember one day just asking him do you
think the forty nine ers have any finance jobs? And
as I mentioned, I didn't know anything about the business
of sports, but I just threw that out there, and
it was funny because he responded, I don't know, but
(10:16):
I know someone who does. And so we've all probably
heard that before, and you're like, okay, well, if he
did anything that would be really helpful. What he did
was that he Facebook messengered the CFO of the forty
nine ers, copied me on it and gave me a
(10:39):
really good recommendation. And so we got to that step
and I'm thinking, Okay, well, that's nice of him. But
what was the most amazing part was that within a
half an hour she actually responded and said, you have
pretty good timing. I'm actually trying to build a team.
Why don't you send me something about yourself.
Speaker 2 (11:03):
Facebook Messenger. That's crazy. I don't know how many people
can say they got a job via Facebook messenger.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
Yeah, And so that's I think for the audience.
Speaker 4 (11:16):
Maybe the lesson is that a positive working relationship and
friendship from ten years prior ended up helping me to
get this fantastic job here at the forty nine ers,
and so you never know, like who can help you
or who's watching your performance every day.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
I think that's one of the things I struggle with
is networking, Like, we meet so many people and I
have so many connections from different teams, leagues. My thing
is like always the how often do you reach back out?
How do you stay connected to them?
Speaker 4 (11:53):
Like?
Speaker 1 (11:53):
Have you ever gotten through that process and made it
where it feels natural to reach back out or to
just connect every sporadically.
Speaker 4 (12:04):
Well, one of the things that I do is that
if I use my LinkedIn and so if I see
someone in my connections get a promotion or just post
something interesting, I might not always post on their public responses,
but I may shoot them a private.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
Message note just to say, hey, how are you doing?
Speaker 4 (12:30):
Just to keep in touch and keep your name and
your connection there, I'll tell you from the highest level.
A really cool story for myself was that as part
of APEX, I was probably one of three hundred people
who watched Kim Pagoula, the you know, the owner of
(12:55):
the Buffalo Bills, give a presentation and I really like enjoyed,
you know, her her talk and the message that she had,
and so I was able to figure out her email
address and I just shot her a note afterwards, and
I wrote in the email like what I enjoyed about
(13:17):
her talk and also let her know that I was starting,
you know, I was the executive sponsor of the forty
nine ers Apace Group. And what was really cool was that,
I want to say, like, within an hour she wrote
back a very nice message and in terms of like
keeping like a network, what I thought was just and
(13:39):
it made me really happy when she reached it back
out to me, is I think that maybe you say
call it? Within the next year, she had met some
forty nine er alumni at an event and it triggered
her that, like, oh I remember that, I, you know,
had an email conversation with Jeft before, and she like
proactively just reached down and sent a note and let me.
Speaker 3 (14:00):
Know that, Hey, I just want to know how you're doing.
Speaker 4 (14:03):
But I met some forty nine er alumni out here,
and I just you know, I was like over the
moon to get that email.
Speaker 3 (14:10):
I thought that was really cool.
Speaker 2 (14:13):
How has your role evolved over your last nine seasons
with the team?
Speaker 4 (14:18):
I think for me, what was really cool about this
job was that I was the first financial planning and
analysis higher back in twenty fourteen, so right before Levi's
medium opened. So I'm going into my tenth season now,
(14:40):
and when I was first hired. You know, I mentioned
I have twenty people on the team now, so I
was like the first one. And my responsibilities then were
to develop the vision of the team, you know, figure
out like what skill sets and who are the right
people for the culture for the team, develop our budgeting
(15:04):
and reporting framework, and then decide like what type of
technology we're going to use. And so that was really
like the role that I had right when I started,
which was exciting for me because there's very few times
that you ever get to be the first one, and
so you get to set the vision, you get to
(15:26):
hire the people, you get to pick the technology, and
you know, fortunately I was able to hire some great people,
and you know, some of the decisions were pretty tough
because I you know, there's there there was tough interviewers
in the process, and it was.
Speaker 3 (15:44):
Not always unanimous.
Speaker 4 (15:48):
But you know, I think ultimately like we made the
right decisions and I was fortunate to have final call
and everybody that came on has been fantastic, and I
can honestly say that they've all done really, really well,
whether they're still here or not. We got everyone to
buy into the budget process, which was new, and then
(16:11):
I was able to successfully implement the financial planning solutions.
So I think because all those things went well over time,
I was able to continue to gain more and more responsibility.
And you know, I started as a senior manager in fourteen.
I think I got promoted a director in sixteen, vice
(16:31):
president in twenty eighteen, and then at the end of
twenty twenty one, I became the executive vice president of
finance in my current role.
Speaker 1 (16:40):
Right now, you mentioned interviewing. I'm curious if you, because
you have interviewed and hired a lot of people, if
you have any either red flags you look for when
you're interviewing someone, or things that people have done or
that you look for that set them apart.
Speaker 4 (16:58):
That's a good question. I'll tell you a story here
is that you know I told you earlier how I
got introduced to the CFO of the forty nine ers
and her name was Sipporah and great person, love working
for her. And the two questions that she asked me
(17:20):
are questions that I always remember, and this is how
I felt like, Okay, I'm actually I have a chance here.
And she said to me, she said, Jeff, you work
at Juniper Networks right now, and she said, I get
so many resumes that they all start to look similar,
(17:41):
including my mind. And behind her she had this big
stack of paper and she said, so I have seven
hundred resumes behind me. Tell me what makes you stand
out from the rest?
Speaker 3 (17:57):
WHOA And I was like.
Speaker 4 (18:00):
You know, so if you ever supports listening, she needs
to tell me if that stack was real. But it
certainly it was a high stack of vapor. But I
do think that for everyone. For A tip is that,
you know, I look for people who, whether you're working
in sports or not, and say you want to work
(18:22):
in sports, is like, what are you doing right now
to be great at your current function? Doesn't matter what
industry you are, Like, I'm always curious for people who.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
Are striving to be great at what they do.
Speaker 4 (18:37):
And then secondly, I think where this question goes to
is like, then they know what differentiates the health and
make it easy for the interviewer to understand. And you
can do that, I feel like in a in a
confident but humble way, if that makes sense.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
You mentioned being the first first in your position. Did
you feel any pressure coming into that role, and if
you did, like, how did you manage that?
Speaker 4 (19:09):
I definitely felt pressure because I was switching from an
industry that I was more comfortable with to an industry
where functionally I was confident in my skills, meaning like finance,
but industry wise I didn't have any experience. And so
(19:30):
how am I going to figure out who the right
people to hire are, How am I going to figure
out like the technology we use, and how am I
going to get people to buy in on the budget
process that I think will work the best for this organization. Fortunately,
one of the things I noticed is that my boss
(19:52):
was Scott Seventino, and he later became our CFO after.
Speaker 3 (19:59):
Support or left to go into additional endeavors. And so.
Speaker 4 (20:07):
What I noticed about Scott was that he was really busy,
like during the day, but if you waited around until
after hours, he was always willing to spend time with
you to learn the business. And that's what I needed
to do, is I needed to learn the business. And
(20:30):
Scott did something that was really cool for me is
that the.
Speaker 3 (20:35):
First time I met with like budget owners.
Speaker 4 (20:38):
Because of the finance role, you meet with a lot
of different people, and so let's just say there's forty
different budget owners.
Speaker 3 (20:45):
He went with me to each meeting.
Speaker 4 (20:49):
And I could tell that everybody really liked and respected him,
And for somebody who's brand new, that's like an awesome
feeling to know that people really enjoy working with your
boss are willing to share information. And so I was like, okay, Like,
(21:09):
if I can leverage and have these positive relationships like
Scott does, then that's going to build my confidence every
day that I could be successful here. And I think
that you know, what I tell people in finance is that, well,
you could be the smartest person in the room with
(21:31):
the biggest pedigree, but if people don't want to work
with you or you can't get information, that's going to
be really hard to do your job.
Speaker 3 (21:40):
And so.
Speaker 4 (21:43):
Maybe a takeaway for any of the managers like listening
is that you hired people for a reason and there's
something that you really liked about them. Think about are
you always putting them in position to give them the
best possible chance to succeed and show the skill sets
(22:05):
off that you think that they have.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
I'm curious, like, you are a very well liked and
respected person in this organization, but I think with your job,
it also comes with telling people know or like there
are like we don't have an influence budget. How do
you balance both of those?
Speaker 4 (22:26):
No, that's that is a very very good question, right,
And I will say that this is more like.
Speaker 3 (22:33):
Art than science. And this is.
Speaker 4 (22:37):
Where I think that people's like you have a different
relationship with each person, and that's why relationships matter, because
how I may approach it with, say one person on
the football side, could be totally different of how I
approach it with one of you. But I try to
(22:58):
connect always that, you know, what is the organization's goals,
how does that fit into with our priorities, and then
have that specific conversation with them, because yeah, as you said,
it's not always easy and there's always a more ass
(23:19):
than resources available.
Speaker 2 (23:21):
I'm going to take it back about a few months ago,
and we kind of alluded to it earlier, but you
took a risk leaving your former job to come here.
You know, I think you said it was title wise,
it was a little bit lower, maybe pay wise was
a little bit lower. Can you take us through that
experience maybe what your thought process behind that decision was.
Speaker 4 (23:41):
Yeah. Sure, So when I ended up getting the offerer,
you know, after you know, was introduced to supporta after
I you know, the interviewed great with Say Scott and
SUPPORTA and others, and the offer was made. Then the
(24:02):
question was, Okay, I don't know anything about the business
of sports. I feel like this is an exciting opportunity.
I had just recently got promoted to director at my
tech company, so at Junior per Networks, and I thought
I had a pretty bright future there. As you mentioned, Patty,
this role on paper may have not looked as great
(24:25):
to some because it was.
Speaker 3 (24:26):
A lower title, it was lower.
Speaker 4 (24:29):
End compensation, and most people, I think in our career
as we think.
Speaker 3 (24:33):
Of like going in a linear line up.
Speaker 4 (24:36):
But what it came down to it is that you know,
it was an extremely unique opportunity to lead and build
the finance team. So going back to like you would
be the first one, so you did. Did feel like
I had control that if I could build the team
from scratch, I could do it my own way.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
And when I.
Speaker 4 (24:54):
Looked, when I thought forward, and I said, okay, when
I look back at my career, I didn't want I
want to be in a position asking myself like what if,
Like what if I did this?
Speaker 3 (25:04):
Like where would I have been?
Speaker 4 (25:07):
And fortunately my wife also loves the forty nine ers
and was extremely supportive, so that really helped as well.
But that was really my thought process and it ended
up turning her out. You know where I'm at. I'm
still here going into my tenth season. So it's been amazing.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
Going into your tenth season and like looking back over
that time, do you have a favorite memory with the
forty nine ers.
Speaker 4 (25:34):
Yeah, my favorite memory was our NFC championship game here
that was that was just exciting to see Rahem go off.
I think he had what two hundred and twenty yards
four touchdowns, and to.
Speaker 3 (25:54):
Win the game and.
Speaker 4 (25:56):
Just see you know, family friends, all of our colleagues
together celebrating. I personally, I remember I gave Jed like
a big hug after the game, and so that was
a cool memory of mine and I and I remember
It's funny that I think it was my wife was
(26:17):
asking me, Hey, do you think we can go on
the field and celebrate, and I didn't, and I told
her I didn't.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
I didn't think so. But later on.
Speaker 4 (26:28):
I think they let everybody like out there, and so
you know, I saw all of our colleagues out there,
So it was pretty fun to go out there see
people doing like snow angels with all the confetti and
so that that's really my favorite mend Mary so far.
Speaker 1 (26:44):
I remember we got an email from like stadium ops
or someone and they were like, please, like you are
allowed to go on the field like tonight only, and
everyone was like, Okay.
Speaker 2 (26:58):
I think that's a lot of people's favorite memory. I
mean it's mine. So and I feel like the amount
of times we asked this question, I'm gonna say about
eighty percent of the time, it is the NFC Championship
game because it was just to your point, it was
a great memory. I don't know about you, but I
stall the convetti from the ground. I like took a
(27:18):
handful of it, shoved it into my bag and now
it's sitting like in a little jar on my fireplace.
Speaker 3 (27:24):
No, so I should have done that.
Speaker 4 (27:27):
I have the pictures of it, but I don't think
I have the actual confetti.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
Jeff, can you tell us about your role as exec
sponsor of Apex and how you've kind of seen the
ERG grow under your guidance.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (27:40):
So, I started as the executive sponsor of Apex in
twenty and twenty and at the time, I think we
were the first club. So the first team to have
an APEX group, and a big shot out to Jazz
who started it up me to be the executive sponsor,
(28:02):
because without him and all of his push to get
everything set up, you know, I think that we got
going a lot faster. And I think my original thought
when he had asked me to partner with him on
this is that we would focus on networking and professional development.
(28:24):
And that's probably an area that I'm most comfortable with.
But in you know twenty twenty call it early twenty
twenty one, there was the rise of API hate crimes,
and you know what we talked about is I felt
like our membership really needed was like a safe space
(28:45):
to kind of discuss their feelings. And it was a
really tricky time because most of us are at home
during COVID and so we can read on the news,
but we don't really know like what our colleagues are
are feeling, and kind of, you know, we don't we're
(29:06):
not in the office. It's hard to get you know,
just run into people and ask them like how they're doing.
And I remember one specific incident that Jazz and I
I think we're texting each other, and you know, there
was something in the news and we said, hey, should
we just do like an impromptu zoom and see who
shows up? Because this is how we're feeling, but we're
(29:29):
not sure like how everybody else was feeling. And I
just remember like in a twelve hour period we had
like twenty five or thirty people show up, which was
a significant number, and people were really like sharing like
their honest feelings and it was really powerful. And so
(29:50):
that was kind of like the start of really, you
know where apex Apex you.
Speaker 3 (29:54):
Know, got going.
Speaker 4 (29:56):
And you know, I think now to see us evolve
where you know, Patty with you and Sarah's leadership and
having six passionate what I call like up and coming
leaders on our board and all the stretch goals, I'll
say that we have from putting on cultural events like
(30:17):
New Lunar New Year to the AAPI Heritage Month and
we just had to professional networking events. I think that's
been really fun to see the ERG evolve and I
love seeing it makes my job easy to see that
we have six people that are really like driving things
(30:39):
for the organization. And you know, ultimately we've talked about
that our mission and vision is that we want people
in our membership to be able to to be able
to maximize their potential, whatever that may be. And I
think that we're going to make a lot of progress
just this year. And appreciate all of your your leadership.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Not only obviously you're heavily involved in APEX, but you're
also at probably every single executive speak easy that Women
Connect puts on why you know, why is it so
important I guess to get involved and to promote inclusion
within the forty nine ers.
Speaker 3 (31:19):
Yeah, no, I think that you know.
Speaker 4 (31:21):
To me, I've always been a big believer of like
playing it forward. You know, you get to a certain
position in life, you don't want to be the only
one you know. And I feel like just in general,
having a diverse workforce with diverse opinions is really good
for business. I've been fortunate to get to this point
(31:44):
in life, and I'm always learning.
Speaker 3 (31:46):
Every single day I can learn from all of you.
Speaker 4 (31:50):
I'm always reading, trying to you know, get better every day.
But I'm also trying to share, and I really enjoy
sharing for anyone who's interested in listening. You know, things
that I've learned along the way, and probably the greatest
feedback that I most value is if someone ever just
(32:12):
you know, pings you down the road and says, hey,
remember we talked about this, It actually like work pretty well,
here's what I'm doing, And to me, that's like something
I get a lot of satisfaction out of.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
You're also we're just listing things off now, but you're
also a loyal supporter of the forty nine Ers Foundation,
which again has a great cause and beneficiaries. But what
kind of took you into the role of wanting to
support them? And then do you have a favorite foundation event?
Speaker 4 (32:49):
Yeah, no, I think that as you mentioned, you know,
my wife and I are loyal supporters of the foundation.
We really enjoy giving to great causes and you know,
so I know you've had Justin on here and he does.
Speaker 3 (33:06):
A great job of running the foundation, and.
Speaker 4 (33:09):
We certainly are big believers in the Foundation's mission of
educating and empowering the youth through innovative strategies. I just
think that it's the foundation is very well run and
has such amazing support from you know, ownership, front office
and players. So, you know, I think Justin has introduced
(33:29):
my wife and I to so to very interesting people
who are doing great things in the community and you
know that when you believe in something, it it really
is something that is personal, but it's really you know,
kind of like integrates everything that I do in like life. Right,
(33:51):
It's kind of like people talk about work life balance.
I really believe in like work life integration and being
able to integrate, you know, pieces of my life that
I find are very important and be able to do
some of it, you know, a lot of it through
the forty nine ers is always you know, I have
to pinch myself sometimes in terms of events.
Speaker 3 (34:12):
So if two events come to.
Speaker 4 (34:14):
Mind, the picnic was really really fun because I got
to both volunteer for part of the time, and then
my family, parents and my brother's family was there and
his kids, and so for them to get to experience
some of the things that I see every day, I
(34:35):
thought was really cool. Now specific I guess big event,
the twenty nineteen Golden Getaway was a lot of fun.
Speaker 3 (34:45):
I remember I sat at at dinner.
Speaker 4 (34:47):
I sat next to you coach Sala, who was our
defensive coordinator at the time, and now he's the New
York Jets head coach. So to see him succeed and
he was such a cool guy, great conversation at dinner
that I that I remember, so I remember that, and
then of course flow Rider performed in nineteen so that
(35:11):
was something that was pretty cool.
Speaker 1 (35:15):
Looking back at favorites, I'm another one. We do like
a as a whole front office like day of service.
We've cleaned up a river bank, we built playgrounds. Like
do you have a favorite like getting out in the
community with the front office memory?
Speaker 4 (35:32):
Yeah, No, I thought it was very unique to clean
the creek that is like something like that's an area
that I didn't even know how to get to that
creek at the time, and so but having see so
many of our front office staff come out to help
(35:55):
and to hear from the organizers how this helps out
the community, I think that's an event that definitely stands
out in my mind.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
That one was funny because Patty and I wandered out
of the creek, like there was a bunch of trash
towards the highway or towards the road. So we had
wandered out of the creek and we were going up
this hill and then we like turned around and everyone
was gone, and we were like, did we get left behind?
Are we stuck in this creek?
Speaker 3 (36:24):
Forever.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
We were really in the zone. We just like kept
following trails of trash, which is like sad to say
that there's just so much trash down there, but we
were I was trying to fill my bag. I was like,
you know, the things that you found down there were
kind of crazy, but that was a medical event.
Speaker 4 (36:42):
You probably fill a lot of bags then, and we're
very focused.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
Yeah, it was crazy to see the piles like at
the end when we were done, and even just like
the bulk items that wouldn't fit in a bag. So
this is this is our plea to for everyone to
keep our keep our creeks clean. Jeff, you've done it
throughout this episode, giving like little tidbits of advice that
(37:09):
do have specifically any advice for anyone who wants to
get into the sports industry.
Speaker 4 (37:15):
You know, I've listened to some of the podcasts and
I agree with all the advice there. Yeah, I've heard,
don't be free afraid to reach out and ask for help,
be okay with coming in at a lower level to
get your foot in the door. I think that what
I'd add is, you know, it's a numbers game sometimes and.
Speaker 3 (37:36):
There's just not that many positions.
Speaker 4 (37:39):
So to maximize your chances, I would say be open
to relocating and don't just focus on teams. But there
are jobs at the league offices, there are jobs at
agencies that work and support sports teams. There's even like
(37:59):
tech companies that you know may have a sports arm
or sports focus and so too. You know, if you're
playing a numbers game. Since we're here and I work
in finance, then may give you the best probabilities. And
then you know, as I mentioned earlier, you know, to
(38:19):
think about what you're doing. You know, make sure that
you're also great at what you're currently doing, you know,
whether that's social media, selling, finance, or accounting. Because I'm
always interested about learning about people who are the best
at what they do, regardless of industry.
Speaker 3 (38:41):
And in certain some of these jobs.
Speaker 4 (38:44):
If you have a great functional skill, similar to myself,
you may be able to come in and so I
may be able to teach you like the business side
of it. But the thing that if you bring something
that's great from a functional side, that can certainly be
a way in.
Speaker 1 (39:00):
I think that's really important too. Loving the thing that
you do rather than it being in sports necessarily, Like
if you love social media. You love finance because like
I've seen so many people who come here because they
just want to work in sports, and then it's hard
and they burn out or they're not passionate about the
(39:21):
thing that they're doing outside of sports, and then they
just don't love it as much. And that's always hard
to watch because you're like, could have come with like
one thing that you really wanted to do.
Speaker 3 (39:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (39:32):
No, I think that's great feedback because this job is
probably like optimal because I get a come by my
passion for sports and finance. But all the jobs that
I mentioned earlier that I've had in my career, they
were all very positive experiences, And I think part of
it is that I really enjoy finance and accounting and
(39:56):
so functionally, if you at least enjoy that and are
striving to get better every day, it's kind of just
adds a different layer of satisfaction to now be part
of the sports industry.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
When you were in school, did you have a favorite class,
Like did you take a finance and or accounting class?
Speaker 4 (40:15):
Well, I can rule out the classes I was not
good at.
Speaker 3 (40:21):
I can say that the.
Speaker 4 (40:25):
Ones I probably enjoyed the most were probably like corporate
finance and starting to learn when I got into I
think my junior and senior years in college. I went
to the business school there in Berkeley, and then you
start taking more specific business classes, and I enjoyed some
(40:46):
of those classes. I'm not the best, I would say
if it comes to statistics or if you give me
the sat math question, like the hardest ones on there,
I'm probably not the first of that like solves the
questions as well, But I do understand finance concepts.
Speaker 3 (41:08):
I love to read.
Speaker 4 (41:11):
About finance, and so that's something that's probably more in
my wheelhouse than history.
Speaker 1 (41:17):
Last question, every job description has that like bullet point
that's like other duties as assigned at the very bottom.
That is just so broad and vague. But during your
nine years here, have you done something with the forty
nine ers that you would probably consider as an other
duties as assigned?
Speaker 3 (41:35):
That is your favorite question? Not I do I ask it.
Speaker 1 (41:39):
I think I've asked it for over fifty episodes.
Speaker 4 (41:42):
Now let me think I think I have two of
them that are that are kind of fine. So Patty
knows that some of us, like we play hoops in
the morning at the gym and I've been known to
sweep the floors if they're too slippery.
Speaker 3 (42:00):
I have no.
Speaker 4 (42:01):
Problem going to the front desk and saying, have me
the mom and let me like momp it, because we
don't want anyone getting hurt.
Speaker 3 (42:09):
So I have no problem doing that.
Speaker 4 (42:12):
Another fun one I think is on game days, you know,
probably the last five years, is I typically walk around
in a suit, and so if you go, if you
go on the main concourse, you know that you potentially
can expect to get a lot of questions, and so
they don't necessarily know that I'm the EVP of finance,
(42:33):
You're wearing a suit.
Speaker 3 (42:34):
They think that you can answer most questions.
Speaker 4 (42:36):
So I actually before I go to each game, I've
remind myself and I actually like study a little bit,
So I like look up. I have like a map
at picture that I can access very quickly of the
stadium of where all the sections are, and I do
like for our concessions program or remember inclusive program, I
look at where all the stands are and read all
(42:59):
the instruction. And because people have asked me like how
does this work? And I pride myself on being able
to try to answer as many questions as I can.
Speaker 2 (43:11):
That's funny, like instead of like just wearing plain clothes
on the concourse, you still wear a suit, but you
like educate yourself knowing what comes with wearing the suit
on the concourse.
Speaker 3 (43:25):
Yes, yes, I know that.
Speaker 4 (43:28):
I've got into a few situations where I do think
that when people like look at your credential, they'll they'll
give you a little bit of a pass because it
says finance and not you know, head of geest services
or head of security. But I've been able to answer
most of it. I remember one time it was a
(43:49):
tricky question. Unfortunately, our head of security saw me and
he came over and he helped me.
Speaker 3 (43:58):
So I appreciated that.
Speaker 1 (44:00):
Do you have a like favorite question that someone's asked you,
Like you get it and you're like, I can answer this,
I'm ready.
Speaker 4 (44:08):
I think the uh, my favorite question is just where
things are? What's the fastest way to get somewhere in
the stadium, Just that looking at it before I head
out to the game. That helps because it's like fresh
in my mind.
Speaker 2 (44:24):
That's incredible. I I always get lost. I cannot give
directions for the life of me. We've been here, you know,
six seasons and it still takes me a while to
like configure like where north, So you know, everything is
so kudos to you. I got to study the maps.
Anyone will ask me for help.
Speaker 1 (44:44):
But all of our interns started this week and they
were like, how do we get to and I was like,
I don't, I don't know. I should know, and I don't.
Speaker 3 (44:52):
And you know that the thing is is that.
Speaker 4 (44:57):
Practicing it with nobody around and trying to either answer
the question or bring up the map quickly when somebody's
asking you the question. That's a little different because it
feels like if you can't bring it up right away,
it feels like the seconds, you know, feel like minutes.
Speaker 2 (45:22):
I love it. You're taking to heart your own advice,
just being really good at what you do and loving it.
So I love that you love to give directions at
leave my Stadium. Jeff, this was really fun. Thank you
so much for joining the podcast. I know it's been
months in the making and so we're super excited and
(45:42):
glad to finally have you on.
Speaker 3 (45:45):
Well, thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 4 (45:47):
I really enjoyed myself and really enjoy working with both
of you.
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