Jason Molnar - Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer of Infinity Labs: Internal Motivation, Sales by Saturation, and Fostering Innovation

Jason Molnar  00:00

I love when people say you can't do this, that's not going to work, that's not going to succeed. Because what you've just done is you've poured gasoline on a fire, and it's going to explode, and it's going to backfire on you, not me, because I'm going to do my damnedest to make sure that that thing succeeds.

Callan Harrington  00:18

You're listening to That Worked, a show that breaks down the careers of top founders and executives, and pulls out those key items that led to their success. I'm your host, Callan Harrington, founder of Flashgrowth, and I couldn't be more excited that you're here. Welcome back, everyone, to a another episode of That Worked. This week I'm joined by Jason Molnar. Jason is the co founder and chief strategy officer of Infinity Labs. Infinity Labs is a technology company that delivers innovative solutions in various domains. Jason is a decorated US Army combat veteran. He serves on the board of directors of Operation Socrates, a nonprofit organization that supports veterans and their families. And he's also on the board of directors for the Ohio Veterans Collaborative, whose mission is to help Ohio veterans find success outside of the uniform. I really enjoyed this conversation. We talked about how they foster and invest in continued innovation within Infinity Labs. And I thought it was a really interesting setup. And it's something that came up on the show a few times, these skunkworks and innovation pods, and they call them crews at Infinity Labs. And he walked us through that. And I found it to be something that a lot of companies could take advantage of. One of the things I appreciate the most about Jason is his belief and determination. You truly get the sense that nothing is going to stand in the way from him accomplishing his goals. He walked us through a great example that totally puts this in perspective. They have seven founders at Infinity Labs, which is a lot. And we talk about that. What are the pros, what are the cons about this? And one of the things that he walked us through was what he called sales by saturation. And I've never heard of that term before. I thought it was a really unique way to go to market. And he walked us through all of it. And it is clear, when he talks about the effort that he put in and what those other founders put in. I just thought it was really, really interesting. And a number of companies can probably benefit from hearing that. So with that, let's get to the show. Jason, welcome to the show. I'm excited to have you here.

Jason Molnar  02:45

Yeah, likewise, glad to be here. Appreciate you having me.

Callan Harrington  02:48

Absolutely. So we've been trying to get this on the calendar for a while, which I'm really excited. Where I want to kick this off is tell me about crayons.

Jason Molnar  02:59

As a military officer, we work a lot with joint forces, and I love the Marines, right. I love that they're out front, I love their esprit de corps, their service. If you're not a fan of United States Marines, I'm probably not a fan of you. In many of my years of service, I think we're at almost nineteen, you know, I've met some wonderful people. But I had a friend from years back, a Marine lieutenant colonel, and he and I were rivals, right? We were buddies, we had different divisions, we would compete for resources, we'd work out together, you know, we'd drink together. We had a lot of camaraderie. Anyone who knows anything about the Marines, as an Army guy, we like to joke, you know, Marines eat crayons, right. We call them crayon eaters. That's not really true. Marines don't eat crayons, but if they did, I wouldn't mind anyway, because there some brave sons of guns. But he had a birthday, and before he came into the office one day, we always joked that red was his favorite flavor of crayon. Because you know, the Marine, the red. And I filled up a mixing bowl full of 500 red crayons, which I had to buy bulk, which is not cheap, and then put them in a mixing bowl, big spoon and milk. And I put them in his office, and I got there way too early, and waited for him to show up. Well, he shows up, and I'm in two offices over, and I don't hear anything. I don't know what's going on. There's no sounds coming from his office. I was assured there was going to be a cackle in my mind, because it was- I thought it was a damn good- I'm waiting for the joke, right, waiting for him to appreciate the brilliance of what I've just done. And there's nothing and so about ten minutes of nothing, and I'm like, alright, I'm going in his office. Something's going on; maybe he's on the phone. And I go in there, the door's open, and I walk in, and he has a mouthful of red crayons. And he's chewing it, and he says, "what? You didn't think I was gonna let you appreciate your own joke, did you?" And that's when I just realized Marines were a different breed, and I just thanked him for his service. He he beat me on my own joke.

Callan Harrington  04:56

This guy's five times ahead of everybody.

Jason Molnar  04:59

Yeah. He was multiple chess moves ahead of me. I didn't even get to enjoy my own joke, but later, he talked about it right. You know, months later, he talked about how some Army guy gave him a bowl full of red crayons. But in that moment, he defeated me. So I'll give. He won the high ground that day.

Callan Harrington  05:14

That's an excellent story. So you, you started your career out in the military? Is that right?

Jason Molnar  05:19

Yeah, that's right. That's right. I graduated from Xavier University in Cincinnati, Ohio, commissioned as a distinguished graduate in ROTC and went to the United States Army as an armor officer.

Callan Harrington  05:30

Did you always know you're going to go into the military?

Jason Molnar  05:32

You know, I had a lot of reverence for my grandfather growing up. World War II Marine, multiple awards for valor, heroism, Purple Hearts. If you've heard of John Basilone, who won the Medal of Honor in Guadalcanal, my grandfather was his radio man and a system machine gunner. So it took me many years to realize that my grandfather was directly next to what some would argue was the bravest guy on World War II. And therefore by association, my grandfather, who was with him, was also extremely brave, but never talked about that. He was a very humble man. I respected him, you know, greatly. He was my star, my moon, you know, my world kind of rotated around him. But it wasn't until 9/11, as I'm sitting in a physics classroom in Columbus, Ohio, in high school, and the teacher just looked, somebody came to the door, and the moment she turned on the TV, we saw a second plane hit the tower. Everything changed for me after that.

Callan Harrington  06:30

We must be the exact same age, because I remember that distinctly as well. I was in high school math class. I remember the teacher coming in and saying, you know, planes just hit the towers. I was like, I just remember, that sounds so absurd. Like, I just thought of like a small plane. You know what I mean?

Jason Molnar  06:44

Absolutely.

Callan Harrington  06:44

Like, like, I remember my mom was traveling a lot for work at that time. And they talked about that plane that was over Pennsylvania, which she was flying into Pittsburgh. So I was like, oh, like, I don't know, I'm in high school, I have no idea, right?

Jason Molnar  06:44

Yeah.

Callan Harrington  06:58

So yeah, that's powerful. So it was right from that moment, it was, I've got to do something about this?

Jason Molnar  07:03

Well, I did something extraordinarily stupid. I left that classroom, I had a scheduled period to leave, because I had to go pick up senior pictures for my sister and I. We had a pickup time, I had to go pick them up, I got an excuse from school, because I was a junior, and said, alright, go pick these pictures up. So I left and I picked the pictures up. And there was an Army recruiting station in the strip mall next door. And I went into that Army recruiting station, and said, I saw what just happened, I want to join. And the recruiter, understanding now many years later, on the other side of that, recruiters got goals, and they've got metrics they need to meet. He didn't waste time trying to harness my excitement. I was signing a contract before I could walk out of there. But I was seventeen, and I needed a parent signature. He couldn't sign it. And he says, all right, well, let's call your mom or bring this to your mom get her to sign it. Long story short, is my mom did not sign it. She said, if you're going to join the military, you need to do it from college, at least that way you're prepared. That's what stopped me. I tried to make a series of incredibly rushed decisions, and my mom stopped me, and I think I'm better for it.

Callan Harrington  08:16

Wow. So what impact did that have on you?

Jason Molnar  08:18

I learned a ton in ROTC. I had- there were a lot of great young men and women in that course. And frankly, I was growing up myself. I grew up without a dad, right. So I had revered my grandfather, but right before the end of high school, he passed away. So I'm left without the strongest male mentor in my life. I've got my grandmother who's in complete chaos, because she's not with him. And I've got my mother, who's dealing with her own demons, frankly, at the time. And so she's got two twin kids who are both leaving the nest at the same time, that wasn't easy for her. And ROTC helped me grow up and mature very quickly. Because the option was you either do that and maintain your scholarship or you fail, and you are no longer in college. You can't pay for it. What are you doing then? And so the amount of maturity it instilled in me very quickly helped me throughout my life. And I had a lot of good folks there that pushed that forward, who went on to do great things. A lot of military mentors, and then senior classmates, who were just wonderful human beings, who were good role models. But I chose that, the lack of chaos, because of where I'd come from, right. I had come from chaos, and I didn't want to go back there. And so for me, it was stay that path, commit now, it's going to be difficult, but it's infinitely better to going back to the world of shit you grew up in.

Callan Harrington  09:41

You know, kind of what I'm hearing is, you had this chaos, you wanted to- I don't wanna say organize that, but you wanted to figure out how can you- was it almost, how do I change the situation and have some control over that?

Jason Molnar  09:54

Oh, absolutely. And still to this day control is a problem my own life, right? I would say I've gotten a lot better, but even you know, in combat, once you have control over things that decide life and death, it's very hard to give up that control. But even before then, I knew if I could control certain factors and variables, that I wasn't going to be be mistreated, I wasn't going to be abused, I wasn't going to be in a situation that would make me uncomfortable, or in a situation that would find me poor and eating leftovers or nothing for several days at a time, right. So, for me, it was that ability to kind of harness that fear. It was a fear, let's be frank, it was a fear, that gave me a little chip on my shoulder that made sure I never went backwards, right. I always kept going forwards. And so it ended up motivating me and still does to this day, but it was much stronger when I was younger.

Callan Harrington  10:46

How does that motivate you today?

Jason Molnar  10:48

I love when people say you can't do this, that's not going to work, that's not going to succeed. Because what you've just done is you've poured gasoline on a fire, and it's going to explode, and it's going to backfire on you, not me, because I'm going to do my damnedest to make sure that that thing succeeds, simply because you've given me negative feedback. And I've used that, really, throughout my entire life. It's, it's honestly, it's been one of my major paradigms in my life, is constantly being told no, or that's not going to work, or hey, you know, this is what you can do with that, and then going above and beyond. And I think that all comes back to that, that not wanting to be in those situations where I was a kid. It's always trying to move the ball forward.

Callan Harrington  11:35

What I'm hearing is that that fear and proving people wrong is a big motivator. And I've definitely experienced this as well. If somebody tells me I can't do something, I'm almost going to- I'm going to try ten times harder. What I'm curious about is, how do you balance between proving them wrong and being strategic? What I mean by that is, I could prove somebody wrong, and be a huge waste of my time for going down this path as a result of it. How do you make sure that you're staying on track and you're not wasting time proving somebody wrong on an area that doesn't matter, you don't really care if you're right on?

Jason Molnar  12:09

Yeah, well, hindsight is 20/20. I have definitely wasted time proving a point. As I've gotten older, I've realized I don't have to prove that point instantaneously. Like an elephant, I remember. If you said something three years ago, that, hey, you're not going to be able to do this. Once I've aligned now the resources, the people, have the experience, and I'm able to execute, I'm going to do that. And I'm going to walk over your body, as I succeed and climb to the top of the hill. I used to be, immediately rush into the fray, right. As a combat arms officer, you're kind of taught that, you know, be first to rush in, lead your troops into the fight. And that was my mentality for many years, but as I got out of the military, or transitioned to the reserves, I realized the business side, you have to be more strategic. Frankly, as chief strategy officer for our company now, that I co founded, if we're not doing that, and we're rushing into things, you know, we're going to waste time, resources, and we're going to stunt our own growth, which is nothing that we want to do. So I have learned from those failures. But for me, failure has been- it's a discriminator. It's either been a catalyst or has been paralyzing. And I try to leave the paralyzing column over here. I just go as a catalyst. But that experience has really taught me there are moments in time where I can still prove my point and also be effective.

Callan Harrington  13:32

You co founded Infinity Labs, infinities had a lot of success in a very short period of time. How did this company form out of this? What was the story on how it came together?

Jason Molnar  13:43

Yeah, it's real simple. There were seven co founders, we have six now, and, God rest his soul, the one who died during the height of the pandemic. But what we really did, it was we were all working for one company, they had an idea of where they wanted to go, and we had another. And the analogy is we took our ball and went elsewhere. That's really all we did. We just thought we could do it differently. And we did. In fact, as we're talking today, it's the three year anniversary of our company today. So it's pretty apropos that we're having this discussion. And so the story is very simple. You had seven motivated folks who thought we could do something a little bit differently. We didn't know if that was better, but we knew it was different. Right? We thought it was better, but we didn't know. Lo and behold, you know, doing it in July of 2020, in the height of the pandemic, man was that a damn good time, because the government had to figure out how to use work and labor outside of secure spaces. They had to figure out how to unclassify certain types of work in order to keep it going. And then get it to a point where you would ship it, package it, and it would be dealt with in a classified space at a certain point. But a preponderance of that work has to happen in an unclassified environment. And so, at the height of the pandemic, July of 2020, right, March being the kickoff, and everyone's saying, you know, what the heck's going on. By July, the government was realizing, well, this is gonna last a while, we have to figure out how to work, and here comes Infinity Labs, right, into the marketplace. And we had an only remote solution at the time. And the government really liked the remote solution. And frankly, we had a lot of experience, going back to when we started 125 years corporate experience among the seven of us. They knew that they needed the experience, they knew they needed the skill set, and we were remote, we were only remote, and so it made it very easy for the government to shift resources and place them with us, because we could execute immediately. That, as a catalyst, we're at fifty-eight employees today, you know, we're doubling year over year growth, I think we're going to end the year somewhere between, let's just say seventy and seventy-five employees, again, doubling growth. We've used that really that snowball has continued to roll down the hill. But it all started at an opportune time, where everyone, there was a lot of fear, and we just took a leap.

Callan Harrington  16:02

With seven co founders, did you guys leave your jobs and then start this? Or was it, we're putting together, we've got an idea on what we want to do, let's see if we get a contract, if we get a contract, we're good? What did that look like?

Jason Molnar  16:20

There's a moment as you make that leap, where you're like, how are we going to fund this? What are we going to do? And the discussion really occurred over about twenty-four hours, and we all decided we're quitting and moving on. And so there was no prolonged discussion, there was no build up. It was, this organization is going one way, we're gonna go another. But if we're gonna go another, we have to make a clean break. It's fair to us, but it's also fair to the organization. We didn't want any entanglements, and so we were very purposeful about that. And so, really, overnight, we were all moved on and out of a job. You know, the first six months, it was tough, right? We were, we were self funded, and we had our own capital that we that we funded our initial six months on, and that included investments in infrastructure. IT is very important for government spaces. You have to invest in secure infrastructure right away. That is a giant cost center. But without it, you can do nothing. So we had to invest in IT, we had to invest in different resources, oh, and by the way, you know, we're still trying to recruit people to do work, as we're also selling those first three to six months. You know, it was a lot of grinding, a lot of, as my wife will remember, twenty hour days, you know, I looked back before I came on here this morning, at my first week of phone calls in the new business. I made 2800, or received a total of 2800, the aggregate phone calls in one week. Just got out there and immediately started selling the company, right? Understanding we were going to have expertise in core areas, we hit the go button, when we founded the company, and we all hit the phones. There were a couple people focused on the infrastructure, and they hit their own phones, right, trying to find vendors and folks to help stand this up. But a preponderance of us were out selling. I would say a good probably five out of seven at any given time were. Our CEO was really concentrated on building the infrastructure and creating those silos for us to be successful. And he's the real deal, by the way. Having all of us go out there as an aggregate and just, you know, pepper the field for prospecting helped a lot.

Callan Harrington  18:30

What happened? What were the results of that early campaign?

Jason Molnar  18:33

Oh, there was so much interest. No one could believe that seven jokers out of Dayton had broken away from a company and started their own. There was interest in just hearing what our company was going to be about. I remember, I think it was like my tenth or fifteenth phone call, in that range, a company said, I need to know what you guys are going to be about, because I find what you did fascinating. And all we did was talk about our capabilities. We talked about what we were going to do. We didn't concentrate on the past. That's not an effective solution. Nor is that legally a good thing to do, but we concentrated on what we were going to do. And we build up a level of interest immediately. I mean, LinkedIn blew up. I was getting sixty, seventy messages a week from folks. We were converting those into prospecting calls. And so a lot of government interest, a lot of industry and interest, and then frankly, a lot of media interest and Business Journal, Dayton Daily News, locally. I know this is very geo specific right now for your audience, but they were very interested in what we were doing, and that created a buzz, and we have really rolled with that buzz all the way here to year three.

Callan Harrington  19:40

Did Dayton end up being a big advantage because of the Air Force Research Lab that's there?

Jason Molnar  19:46

Oh, yeah. Anyone who's in any sort of defense industry knows that Wright Patterson Air Force Base is a mecca for defense contracting. It has the national Air and Space Intelligence Center, 711th Human Performance Wing, AFLCMC, the largest contracting apparatus, the United States Air Force, the Air Force Research Lab. You've got all these organizations there, who run their, some of their program, executive offices, some of their innovation elements, out of there. It is the place to be if you are going to be in defense contracting. One of the few, right? DC, Huntsville, Alabama, Dayton, Ohio, just to name a few. That list is certainly not all all encompassing. But being based in Dayton, we wanted to tell the Dayton story. And so if you even go back to our founding, you know, we really harped on, you know, the innovation. Dayton once led the nation in patents per capita. It's unbelievable to think that, frankly, a city that had long been forgotten in Ohio, even by Ohio's leadership, there is a renaissance going on in Dayton right now within the the defense community and some of the commercial sectors, where I think it could be another Cleveland, another Columbus, other Cincinnati.

Callan Harrington  20:58

It's interesting, right? Because you here, you know, if you want to be in tech, move to San Francisco, if you want to be in finance, move to New York. I think one of the interesting things is, it really just depends on what it is you're looking for. You can find these things outside of that. I think Dayton's a great example. I grew up in the InsureTech space, so the tech companies that were focused on the insurance sector, and happened to graduate college, from Ohio State, be in Columbus when that was happening, where you've got Nationwide Insurance, you got Progressive Insurance two hours away. You've got- Cincinnati's got a ton. There's Grange and a million other insurance carriers just in this area. Well, it was easy, right? You had access to huge clients, just like you had access to, you know, a huge client within Dayton. Well, it snowballs from there, which I think is really interesting. It's so much, you don't have to be in one of the major cities. But there is definitely a huge advantage to being in a city that puts you in communication with other people within that industry. Did you find that to be the case?

Jason Molnar  21:59

Yeah, well, one of the things I'm a big fan of is sales by saturation. It's not a term I've heard often, I don't even know if I coined it. But frankly, if you are saturating the market with prospecting, if you are calling every person in town, in your industry, you know, in a client space, you're getting a lot of the media attention, you're gonna get looks.You're gonna get people to understand that you're worth having a conversation with. And then our goal always was, well, let's be substantive in these conversations, let's not just be all flash, and no bang, let's actually have some meaningful conversations about what we can do together. And it was very quick, people realized we were not a fad. The conversations we had talked about a little bit of sensation around our founding and some of the press we were getting, which was great. But it very quickly transitioned over to a hard disruptive science acceleration, right? We've got some no shit smart people. And it's really easy to sell what they do when you let them just talk about some of their interests. And you let them talk about their designing of bioengineered algorithms, their understanding of acoustics, power, propulsion, thermal physics, right? People realized very quickly, this was not going to be something that disappeared overnight. And frankly, our customers and industry partners, they've invested ever since, because there's no slowing this train. We've been very fortunate in the people we've been able to recruit, but without them were nothing. And for us, it was really selling that capability early on. You want to do a hard project, you want to do something difficult, we're the company. If you want to do normal things that you're used to doing, that's not our bag, you should find a vendor who's going to do that. But if you want something difficult, that's going to give you some wrinkles in your brain, let's talk about that.

Callan Harrington  23:43

Do you think that you could have pulled this off without that team of seven? Not so much- and I guess the question in particular is, it sounds like you had the right people on the bus. But what I'm hearing, if I'm hearing you correctly, is we got these big contracts right out of the gate, because they knew that we had an infrastructure and a team that could pull that off. If one or two people founded this alone, do you think that you could have had that same success?

Jason Molnar  24:07

I think success, right, it's a roadmap. I don't think our mountain would be as steep, right, looking up the mountain and growing. I think it would be slower and gradual. Now all of us who started this company come from the school of entrepreneurship from Dr. Ken Edge, our CEO. I can't speak enough about his natural entrepreneurial instincts. That guy goes to sleep and thinks of businesses that make money. So having a guy like that at the helm, where he can lead you into the promised land with real leadership, understanding about the market, quick snap decisions based in experience, really helped us to grow. And frankly, to to get back to your question, I think we could be successful even if we had one or two of us, but again, that's a slower, slower descent up that mountain. Having seven of us allowed us all to divide and conquer. You know, our chief disruption officer, who unfortunately did pass away, that man had never done HR, and he took on HR from the very beginning, you know, he took on recruiting, and he was very affable and easy to talk to. And so the success on that side, for guy that never done it, he just embraced the challenge. And when you're a startup, you're gonna wear many hats, you know, it's not just a hat that faces forward or backwards. Your hat has full bills, right? You know, it's it goes every direction, north, south, east, and west. You're gonna have multiple things that spring up and understand, but having that core group of seven allowed us to divide and conquer. Those twenty hour days might have been twenty-four hour days for much longer. But we were able to dig in and grind enough where we were able to see success in short order, because of that group, because of their commitment, and using our resources wisely.

Callan Harrington  25:52

What have been some of the challenges, right? And you talked about, which I love, that all the successes that you have, but with that, right, growing fast comes with growing pains, typically. What have been some of those for you guys?

Jason Molnar  26:05

The investment in infrastructure, whether it's cloud based architecture, different computers, lab equipment, security, because we work in the defense space, the investment in infrastructure is non trivial. It can be seen as a cost center, and it is, but it's also really a cost enabler. Because there's no way you can grow your business in the defense space without that, right. There's only going to be so much, so many small contracts you're going to get without that, before they start asking, how can we progress this, what can we do, and if you're not ready for that infrastructure, if you're not building that, you know, from day one, day thirty, day ninety, you're constantly getting better, you're not gonna be able to, you know, really compete with that growth. It's going to be a constant challenge, you're not going to be able to do it, like, we're going to bring on, you know, anywhere from five to seven people in the next month, there's no way you can do that as a small business, if you don't have the HR apparatus, the contracts, their understanding of onboarding, and all those things. So we really committed to understanding the infrastructure, because we knew we were gonna hit a boom, we all had confidence in what we were doing, we were going to do well. And so committing to that upfront really has made this growth possible.  Have you raised any outside capital, outside of the initial investment that you guys all put in? No. We're not opposed to venture capital for any of the spin off technologies or companies we're currently either creating or researching. And we've got a couple that are still behind the cloak of secrecy for a little bit longer, that are really impressive. Short answer is we're not opposed to that, but as far as the company itself, no. We bootstrapped, day one. We haven't taken any outside financing. We've been fortunate enough that, with that initial investment in ourselves, that we've been able to substantially grow. We've been prudent with our decision making and our operating capital, and you just need to make sure when you're doing that, that you've got the requisite resources. And that can be a slow burn, if you're not ready for it, or you can grind and get it done on the front end, which is what we decided to do. Let's get the pain out of the way on the front, so we can scale and grow.

Callan Harrington  28:11

When you think about scaling, how does this org structure work? With seven co founders, what- how was that set up? Is it a flat organization? I mean, it sounds like there's clear hierarchy with the CEO, you guys all have a lot of admiration for, but what does that look like? How do you make that work? Is probably the question.

Jason Molnar  28:26

Let's just say we kick off, we hit our D-day, we crossed that line of demarcation, and we had a discussion on roles and responsibilities. You know, we fell into roles based upon things we had done in a previous life and, you know, different areas of expertise. I'm the guy that talks a lot, so I got put in charge of relationships for the company, right? I don't own all the relationships, but generally speaking, when it comes to business development, I really helped cultivate those. So we really just took our natural strengths and applied those in our new org structure, you know. We've got brilliant minds, they stay on the technical side, and also help bring in that technical side to develop business. That org structure, as we were developing it, really the the challenge that we have had is how do we make innovation, right? Our slogan is: innovation, entrepreneurs, creators. How do we make innovation part of the very fiber, the DNA, of the company. And so what we did with that is we actually created an inter-organizational structure, called a crew concept, where we actually empower, promote employees from within to lead innovation focus crews, to come up with research ideas, that they get to a point, we then make a decision on whether or not that's ready, that needs more research, or that's ready for a potential commercialization route. And so we have built that into the infrastructure, and that's an overhead cost, but it's an overhead cost that we want to do, that we will always do, and that will always be a part of Infinity Labs. Because if you're in an organization that does defense work, and you have no innovative element that commercializes technology, you're just doing services. And that's fine. That's a great model. But that's not what we want to do. You know, our goal is to build these commercial products for the long term, enduring solutions, and then always have that bottom layer of the pyramid, understanding that we can provide strong defense solutions to the United States government.

Callan Harrington  30:18

So these crews, these are almost kind of like little innovation Skunk Works, where they're coming up with- Their focus is, they're not working on client work, if I'm hearing you. But they're they're focused on, we're coming up with the next big technology that our clients can use, but that also we have the opportunity spin this off, find a founder or CEO to put over it, and grow this thing.

Jason Molnar  30:40

Yeah, so we're not at the point where that's what they're exclusively doing, right? You know, there's direct work, which they're all very, very accomplished at and doing well, and you know, that helps pay the bills. But we invest a significant amount of our own capital back into overhead and GNA, to put into these crews, to really give them the ability to innovate. A lot of other folks in our space won't do it, because they see it as a cost center, and that takes away from their bottom line. And they're right, it does, but we give a damn about innovation, so we're going to spend that money there. So yes, the mini Skunk Works comparison is a wonderful comparison, because that is really, you know, a model that we've embraced, understanding that these little pockets focused on different innovation areas, they're going to come up with big ideas. And as long as we continue to, not only, sponsor that, promote that, pay for that, that's going to produce fruit in the very end. And we're starting to see some of those seeds bloom, some of those seeds produce fruit. And so we're moving those from internal research and development over the fence to commercialization. And that's a big deal for a company to self-fund commercial research. That's not easy. But again, it's a cost center that we knew was going to be, you know, a business multiplier in the long run.

Callan Harrington  31:57

How do you specifically set that up? And what I mean is, you know, how many people are on one of these crews? Is this something that they only work on in specific hours? Or is this like, a nights and weekends thing? Or is this, you work on this on Friday afternoons? What are the, when you get some kind of like, the actual details? What does that look like?

Jason Molnar  32:17

Yeah, so we carve out time on each pay period for these folks to have what we call crew time, right? This this individual or group innovation time, we've seen that that works more effectively. Nights and weekends, you know, we came from a world where some of that work was expected and then you weren't paid for it. So, because we give a shit, we're not going to ask folks to do that, right? We're going to say, do it within your workweek, have a good work life balance, because if you weren't happy working with us during the workweek, and you find yourself grinding on a weekend, away from whatever you want to do, away from your family, you know, those things you really enjoy, you're gonna grow bitter and stale with the company you're working for. That's not- we're not interested in that. And so we make that part of the work week, to give folks that time, as a part of that, where we can understand, as we get bigger, this is going to grow. We've got crew sizes right now, I think they range from six to twelve, maybe six to maybe at the largest seventeen, eighteen. Our chief scientist is really the architect of that. But we have found we don't want to get them too big, we don't want them too small, because the innovation occurs in the interfaces, as our chief innovation officer likes to say, right. These conversations where you're talking about things on the very edge, maybe it's just Jason and Callan having a conversation, but we've come up- the crews, I should say, have come up with several ideas. And as part of that brainstorming, you know, this isn't a structured process. If you try to rein in innovation and put structure on it, you're gonna kill it. So we really are deliberate about letting that process unfold organically. And having those ideas. Sometimes we give them prompts, but other times, you just got enough brilliant people that they just pitch around ideas. And we've been very successful so far as moving those from idea, to pitch, to internal research and development, and then over the line to commercialization. So it is a process that is deliberate. But it's something we're always going to do.

Callan Harrington  34:11

It's one of those areas where- and I've been part of a company where we saturated our main product, and that product was our bell cow for years and years. And we just didn't bring in the next product fast enough. We were fortunate to still have a good exit on that company. But it was an important lesson where it's like you always have to be working on what's next. And that has to be- it doesn't mean that that's automatically going to be the next biggest part of your business. But it probably will in short order before you know it. So I loved to hear and kind of the breakdown of that. What comes next for Infinity? For yourself? What do you need to do to prepare now to hit that next level of growth?

Jason Molnar  34:53

Yeah, well, if I could sum it up in two words, what comes next is world domination. Right? I mean, that's the goal of any entrepreneur. If you're not out there to succeed, you know, as an entrepreneur, you're not going to have the fight, you're not going to have the grit, as Dr. Angela Duckworth, you know, so eloquently coined, to be able to keep up with the onslaught of nonsense you can hit with as a business owner. You know, we have some some grand designs for what we want to do. We really want to invest, continue to invest, in our advanced research and development. Dr. Nick Kuprowicz leads that, our Innovation Officer, and the plans that come along with that are some state of the art research and development equipment. It's an expansion in our current building in downtown Dayton. We partnered very early on with Wright State University. Dr. Sue Edwards believed in us immediately. She heard what our business was going to be about. She said, that's the way. Wright State is going to be behind you. We like what you're doing. We have engineers that can support you, and let's work together, there's not going to be a slowdown, there's not going to be a stop, we're going to diversify our research portfolio. It's only getting more breadth and depth, whether it's biotechnology, bioinspired algorithms, hypersonics, electronic warfare, edge computing. It just continues to grow with the amount of people, the smart folks that we hire. And then on the commercial side, we're looking to pivot that success commercially. And where we go beyond that, I think it's to the moon. I don't see us stopping it. Because as we build these capabilities, we build on the processes, to gather the revenue and to continue to grow.

Callan Harrington  36:29

What do you need to do to make sure you're ready to be the executive, when that happens?

Jason Molnar  36:36

It's a lot of getting out the word, honestly, about the company, and understanding the different challenges of growth. I want to market the company. I want people to understand what we do. But I also want to be an honest broker about what we do. I don't want to tell you we do fifty things when we do fifteen or twenty well. That's never going to be the way we operate. And so I think part of the challenge with being an executive in a company that's growing this fast, is you have to concentrate on, I think realistically, I can have about five big rocks at a time that I can concentrate on. And then I've got about twenty or thirty mediums. And then I've got about thirty or forty smalls that are behind that in priority. And I'm always moving these rocks forward, but the big rocks are going to be the ones that really produce transformational change, right. So marketing for the company is undergoing a big rock right now, right. As part of our growth, we're redesigning some things within the company. The website is going to get a refresh, and that's going to come with some enhanced material for advanced research and development, helping the team grow there. It's about getting the government to understand our capabilities, getting industry to see how our government work can have a dual use and purpose on the commercial side. And that takes a lot of resources to get the word out, right. We're not a large Fortune 500 company yet. So that's a lot of boots on the ground. And so prepping for that, frankly, is a lot of work. But what it does is it sets the conditions on the battlefield for success later. I like to think that grinding now will help success later. It started in the very beginning like that. And I think as long as we continue to do that, as a group, putting those resources and energy into the big rocks now, we're going to be able to scale into the future.

Callan Harrington  38:23

When it comes to building that that skill set for that, are you somebody that's more, I'm going to figure it out as I go? Or is it reading the books, taking the courses, reaching out to people that have been successful there, and to learn from them? What does that skill building process look like for you?

Jason Molnar  38:42

Yeah, it's all the above. For me specifically, you know, I don't have an MBA. I have a master's degree, but I don't have an MBA. So of course, I'm auditing courses to learn more about marketing. I'm learning more about different aspects of program management and procurements as part of continuing education. I think if you stunt your growth- your podcast with Rich Woo, he talked about having a coach. I don't have a coach, but I have a time in my schedule where I put continuing education, because I have to be able to advance as an executive if I'm going to lead other people. I can't stay stagnant. I can't concentrate on the things that are hard for me right now. So there's gonna be things that are much harder later that I'm not prepared for if I don't. So, I do focus on that. I have a lot of I have a lot of interest in peer-to-peer or peer-to-leader conversations where I learn. I'm a very experiential learner. So if I can have conversations, touch, wrap my hands around folks who have been through some of those same obstacles, have been through those pits as well. I can learn from that. And then frankly, I learn a lot- I travel, and so when I travel, I'm a I'm a serial podcast absorber. Your podcast is one of them I listen to. I like something that I can absorb, and understand quickly, and take lessons learned, and apply them immediately. There are other podcasts that are three to four hours. And those are great when you have time for those, but I need something that I can knock out quickly. And so I learn a lot from audiobooks, podcasts, where I can take those lessons, and learn them on the road, and engage my brain when I'm in travel mode. Last question I have for you, Jason. If you can have a conversation with your younger self, age totally up to you, what would that conversation be? And what advice would you give them? Yeah, I tried really hard, when I was young, to get attention. I don't know if that was a byproduct of my upbringing, or my circumstances. I have found out, I don't know, it's really within the last three years and the founding of this company, that being as authentic to oneself as one can, and just projecting that, is a real key to success in business. I don't try to be anything that I'm not. Sometimes I curse a little too much. Sometimes I'm a little too boisterous. Sometimes my opinions are wrong, and I accept responsibility, and I change my opinion based on facts. But frankly, if I could go back and talk to a younger me, I would say, don't try so hard, man, people are gonna like you for you. And I've really focused on building strong relationships, focusing on the business of the human connection, as a way for me to grow, both as a person as an executive. So my advice would just be that. Focus on being authentic, focus on the human aspect, the human element, of your relationships. Because we've certainly got a lot of business from relationships. I don't think that's going to change anytime soon.

Callan Harrington  41:29

Man, I can empathize with every piece that you just said there. Jason, this has been a blast, man. Thanks for coming on. I really enjoyed this.

Jason Molnar  41:38

Yeah, it's been an honor, being on your podcast, and continued luck and success, my friend.

Callan Harrington  41:42

Thank you.  I hope you enjoyed Jason and I's conversation. I loved hearing the story of those early sales efforts and the results that they received. If you want to learn more about Jason, you could find him on LinkedIn in the show notes. Also, if you liked this episode, you could find me on LinkedIn to let me know and if you really want to support the show, a review on Apple Podcast or Spotify is very much appreciated. Thanks for listening, everybody, and I'll see you next week.