"World of DaaS"

Spotting talent is really hard. Identifying A-players can feel impossible. Peter Thiel has one of the best interview questions for identifying talent, “What important truth do very few people agree with you on?” But Daniel Gross disagrees. Daniel believes easygoing questions like “What movies do you like to watch?” elicit more telling responses.
Daniel Gross is the CEO of Pioneer, a reimagined version of the startup accelerator focused on identifying, motivating, and enabling the next wave of founders. Daniel previously founded Cue, which was acquired by Apple, and was a partner at Y Combinator. Daniel co-authored with Tyler Cowen the soon-to-be-released book, Talent: How to Identify Energizers, Creatives, and Winners Around the World. Simply put, Daniel is an expert on spotting talent.
Auren and Daniel dive into Daniel’s favorite interview questions, how to distinguish between good and great employees, what makes a 10xer, and how to measure productivity. They also explore why the strongest leaders are energetic, enthusiastic, and funny.
World of DaaS is brought to you by SafeGraph. For more episodes, visit safegraph.com/podcasts
You can find Auren Hoffman (CEO of SafeGraph) on Twitter at @auren

Richard Hanania is a foreign policy expert and author. He’s the president of the Center for the Study of Partisanship and Ideology and a visiting scholar at the University of Texas’s Salem Center.

Richard and Auren discuss which players have the most sway over American foreign policy and how they’ve affected the US’s global strategic positioning. Richard breaks down the failure of expert opinion in the intelligence community to anticipate events like the fall of Afghanistan and the invasion of Ukraine. They also discuss sanctions, NATO expansion and partisanship in Washington.

World of DaaS is brought to you by SafeGraph. For more episodes, visit safegraph.com/podcasts.

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You can find Auren Hoffman on Twitter at @auren and Richard on Twitter at @RichardHanania.

Mark Penn is the CEO of Stagwell and a longtime pollster and strategic advisor. He’s a former senior executive at Microsoft and has advised politicians including Bill Clinton and Tony Blair.

Mark and Auren discuss Mark’s books Microtrends and Microtrends Squared, in which Mark identified minor demographic trends and predicted their outsized impact on society and the economy. Mark gets into the mechanics of good opinion polling and breaks down the major differences between political and consumer polling, and how internet polling is affecting the industry. They also discuss Stagwell and Mark’s digital-first strategy for disrupting the old-school advertising holding companies.

World of DaaS is brought to you by SafeGraph. For more episodes, visit safegraph.com/podcasts.

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You can find Auren Hoffman on Twitter at @auren and Mark at @Mark_Penn.

Christopher Ahlberg is the founder and CEO of Recorded Future, a cyberintelligence firm that sold for $780 million in 2019. He formerly co-founded the business intelligence software company Spotfire.

Christopher and Auren discuss the global cybercrime landscape, from emerging threats and ransomware gangs to international conflicts and the geopolitics of taking down hackers. They dive into how the US can improve its cyber defenses, both in the public and private spheres, and talk about the sprawling US security apparatus. They also discuss cyber operations in Ukraine and what we can expect from future conflicts.

World of DaaS is brought to you by SafeGraph. For more episodes, visit safegraph.com/podcasts.

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You can find Auren Hoffman on Twitter at @auren and Christopher on Twitter @cahlberg.

Terry Kawaja is the founder and CEO of Luma Partners, a media and technology investment bank. Terry has advised on over $300 billion in transactions, including some of the biggest deals in media, tech and advertising.

Auren and Terry discuss the changes in the markets over the last few months and what they expect from the M&A landscape in the near term. Terry shares his thoughts on the long-term outlook for consolidation in the media and advertising space and where he thinks the next most innovative companies will appear in adtech.

World of DaaS is brought to you by SafeGraph. For more episodes, visit safegraph.com/podcasts.

You can find Auren Hoffman on Twitter at @auren and Terry on Twitter @tkawaja.