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Want a peak behind the curtain into one of the best places to work in cybersecurity and the minds of the innovators behind the industry’s leading security operations platform? Tune in to The Howler podcast!
Hosted by Chelsea Lowman, People Experience Specialist, and Mary Newville, People Experience Senior Manager, the culture duo connects with pack leaders on leadership insights, mental health and overall wellbeing, and how they lead their teams to advance our mission of ending cyber risk.
Season 4 Episode 1 Brian NeSmith - AUDIO
Fri, Sep 04, 2026 4:42PM � 54:39
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
Podcast anniversary, Leadership advice, AI impact, Cybersecurity, Platform transition, Arctic Wolf, Business innovation, Career growth, Personal development, Critical thinking, Decision making, Digital learning, Security posture, Company mission, Future technology
SPEAKERS
Speaker 1, Speaker 2, Mary Newville, Chelsea Lowman, Brian NeSmith, Speaker 3
Mary Newville 00:00
Hi, welcome to the Howler Podcast. I'm Chelsea, and I'm Mary, and welcome to our third birthday. Celebrating three years of the Howler podcast is wild to say. Wild, like mainly because I feel like we've actually been doing this for 10 years. Like I'm like, how has it only been three years? I, it feels like lifetimes have been lived.
Chelsea Lowman 00:33
It's serious. It makes me think about in our very once we got the green light to pilot the podcast, and you and I made um kind of made a breakdown and a roadmap of who we were going to interview, and we went through the current C-suite and senior leadership at the time. And I remember when we were writing it out, we were like, "Ha ha ha! September 2026, we're never going to get there. Yes, and here we are.
Mary Newville 01:02
Here we are, like in a blink of an eye. Here we are. I mean, that is Arctic Wolf time-10 years in a day and a month-and you know blends into the same. Because I remember that too. Like when we listed out all the leaders, we were like, "Whoa, it's going to take us till your point, September of 2026, to get through all the executives. And here we are. Here
Chelsea Lowman 01:22
we are. Here we are. So we thought in honor of our third birthday we would do a little top three reflection with Mary and I before we get to. Don't worry, listeners. It's not just us talking. We do have a special guest. Yes,
Mary Newville 01:41
very special guest. A very special
Chelsea Lowman 01:43
guest
Mary Newville 01:44
are gonna love it.
Chelsea Lowman 01:46
So Mary and I chatted in preparation for this a little bit about what how we wanted to reflect. So we came up with three questions that we wanted to discuss in our top three. So our first one, to no one's surprise, is our favorite moment from the podcast. So, Mary, do you want to go, or do you want me to go first?
Mary Newville 02:09
Okay, I can go. Okay, I kind of cheated-not cheated. I'm not going to cheat, but I-I had to say my favorite moment. I decided it would be interviewing Tricia Farrow. Oh, okay. People just thinking all the guests we've had over the past year. It was just fun to get to chat with her. So she's our leader. I've reported to Tricia now for the last four years, I think, maybe more. So to see her move into the SVP role and get to chat with her in her C-suite title and chat with her was fun. So I picked that as a favorite. But also, I will just say generally, I love all the moments of getting to know our leaders personally, like
Chelsea Lowman 02:58
their stories
Mary Newville 02:59
about their kids, their travels, their hobbies-like learning last month about Chris loves to garden, and I'm, or even yeah, just the the little things. It's fun to get to know our leaders personally. So, what about you, Chelsea? I'm very curious. Your favorite moment?
Chelsea Lowman 03:21
Well, to no one's surprise, mine is like a funny moment. Okay, I
Mary Newville 03:26
can't wait.
Chelsea Lowman 03:27
I know. I was thinking too, and the first things that were coming to mind for me, I was gonna cheat a little bit too. Was it's not a moment from recording the podcast, but all the feedback we get from like pack members and new hires, especially new hires who are like, oh, I you know during my interview process I listened to the Howard podcast, or you know in the weeks leading up to my first day I listened to you know the episode with my senior leader and oh and we always get such nice feedback and it's everyone's so kind because you know we're Mary and I are just doing our best. This isn't probably the most polished podcast out there, but everyone's just always so sweet and yeah. So the feedback is one of my favorite elements of the podcast. But my favorite, the first thing that came to my mind for a favorite moment of the podcast is I don't think our listeners know about this, so maybe we'll have to release a little special behind the scenes.
Mary Newville 04:33
I'm like on the edge of my seat for what you're about to share. I have no idea what you're going to say. But
Chelsea Lowman 04:37
if you're an avid listener of the podcast, you'll recall that either in our December or January episode, we talked about Santa Claus, and after the discussion, we realized, oh, like what if a pack member, someone's listening to this while they're in the car with their kids or something? Maybe we should do a little disclaimer at the beginning of the episode to let. Know that we're going to be talking about how you know how Santa isn't real. Now we might have to have a disclaimer at the start of this episode, but so we said, "Oh yeah, that would just kind of be funny and silly to do a little disclaimer. And I won't go into too much of the details, but Mary went to To say this little disclaim, we went to record the disclaimer, and she made it sound like we were talking about some X-rated material. And she was like, "If you're good, you know, just a warning, we talk about adult topics, and my face immediately-it was just so funny because we were talking about Santa. I totally forgot about that, but that was so funny. It was so funny, so that just like really made me chuckle. And again, I think I naturally lean towards like funny, silly moments, and we've had some really fun moments with guests. But that moment, I mean, I was crying, laughing. We were just-it was so funny. Oh my
Mary Newville 06:13
goodness! I'm so glad you brought that memory back because it was one of those moments in real time where, as soon as I said it, I could like see the look on your face, and I was like, "That was not the right terminology for this. But now I don't know what to do. I think you did clip it though, so maybe we can have our podcast producer insert it right here, play it back for you all. Hi, howler listeners! Before we start today's podcast, we're recording a short little intro for you. A disclaimer: the beginning of this podcast, we do chat about some adult content. So, okay, what what would you say?
Chelsea Lowman 07:11
Adult content? No, no, no, no. What would you say? I don't want to say we're talking about Santa because then kids will want to listen. Yeah, I immediately, as soon as we were done crying and laughing, I was like, "Alex, send me that clip immediately for my personal records. I can watch it on a bad day.
Mary Newville 07:35
I'm so glad you brought this back out of the memory bank for me, because I totally forgot about it. Yeah,
Chelsea Lowman 07:40
sorry not not to bring up your trauma, but it was a really funny moment. Okay, the next question in our top three was one piece of advice from a guest that has stayed with you. This one was hard for me because I feel like we've had so many gems,
Mary Newville 08:01
yeah.
Chelsea Lowman 08:02
Especially around leadership, and yeah, I don't know. I'm curious what what did you pick?
Mary Newville 08:10
Well, the one that came to me is one that I've been thinking about since, and it was when Will on Will May's episode he talked about the bus, and he had his commissioned artwork that he referenced, and he talked about creating your own energy. And it's just a concept I have been thinking about a lot lately. Of like, do I know what gives me energy, and do I have like intentional rituals to kind of like go to the Mary Nouvelle gas station, if you will, of like we're filling up the tank and manifesting our own energy. I so there's I've been trying little things like reading every morning and really trying to like get my. If anyone remembers our New Year's resolution conversation from this year, I think I talked about how there's like I'm gonna give myself like a quarterly ritual to kind of figure out. And the Q1 ritual was the morning routine. It took me until like end of Q2
Speaker 1 09:14
to
Mary Newville 09:14
really start getting into that rhythm. But I have been loving it so creating your own energy, and then also actually last week, last month's episode with Chris, not Chris Kraft or was it Chris Kraft? Matt Seltzer.
Chelsea Lowman 09:27
Matt.
Mary Newville 09:28
Yeah, last month's episode, Matt Setzer and him. I had actually learned this from him in observation, but getting to talk about it with him really solidified the learning. But I was in a meeting with him where things were really getting off the rails, like we were spiraling and going, and he just piped in and was like, "Everybody, this is out of scope. Let's get back on track. And it was so helpful in that moment of like, "Oh yeah, let's just call it what it is. We are way out of scope right now. That can be figured out later. Let's get back on track, and then we. Talk about that in real time with him of just being direct and and just talking about that moment for me has helped like solidify the learning of like that is such a helpful I don't even know if it's called a tool like it's not necessarily tool but yeah sometimes you know you just feel like when you're in the moment and I as an empathizer sometimes I just lean in and I'm like yup okay this matters. We got to talk about it, but just that, like, it's not rude. It's just pretty factual. Like the status quo, great combo. Yeah, let's put that in a parking lot for later. So,
Chelsea Lowman 10:33
yeah, that is
Mary Newville 10:34
what came to mind for me. What?
Chelsea Lowman 10:36
Yeah,
Mary Newville 10:37
what? And that's a good
Chelsea Lowman 10:38
one. And I love that. I mean, so often when we talk about like advice and leadership advice, especially with our guests, obviously we with our senior leaders we can like get a sense of it of of that advice they're sharing and how they lead. But a lot of it is usually like you know more theoretical, where it's like nice that you have the example of like I was in a meeting and I saw Matt literally like you know walk the talk basically so that's so cool I'm going all the way back I think this was maybe our second year of the podcast or our first year I don't know, but when we had Lisa on and her backpack analogy, I think has really stayed with me. And I use it like I've shared it with so many other people, not even professionally, but even more so personally. But her whole analogy, and I can't remember if it was when we were talking about leadership advice or mental health or both, maybe I think it's great advice for both. But basically, the analogy of like you're wearing a backpack, and we all can remember like going to school and like having a million books,
Mary Newville 11:55
yeah,
Chelsea Lowman 11:56
in our backpacks. Maybe not kids these days because they just do their iPads, but we used to have to us old folks used to have to walk around with like the heaviest textbooks imaginable in our backpack, and the idea of not letting others just throw books in your backpack, yeah, and being really intentional with like what you're taking on and the energy that you're accepting and and all of that, and then being mindful of the books that you put in other people's backpacks. I just love the whole analogy because I could really feel the weight of the backpack on me.
Speaker 2 12:30
Yeah.
Chelsea Lowman 12:31
And so again, I've used like I've shared that in personal conversations with friends. I'm like, you're letting them throw a lot of books in your backpack right now. You know, just
Mary Newville 12:40
like you can take that weight out.
Chelsea Lowman 12:42
Yeah, take that weight out.
Mary Newville 12:43
Or
Chelsea Lowman 12:45
yeah, or it's like okay, we just have to accept right now. You're gonna have to take a lot of their books because you need to be there for someone. You know, like I just love the analogy. So that one has really stayed with me.
Mary Newville 12:58
Okay, I love that. I'm glad you brought it back for me because that is such a good
Chelsea Lowman 13:02
one, and it's
Mary Newville 13:03
so easy in life to not think about. You don't. It just happens subconsciously. Yeah, it's like that's not mine to own. Yeah, just because someone said or thinks that doesn't mean I have to carry it. So yeah, really powerful. Yeah,
Chelsea Lowman 13:18
then all of a sudden your back hurts and you don't know why. Yeah,
Mary Newville 13:22
the analogy. Yeah, yeah, that was the rule.
Chelsea Lowman 13:26
Okay, last but not least, what have you learned about yourself through hosting the podcast? Do you want me to go first? We can. Yeah, do you want to go first?
Mary Newville 13:37
Yeah, yeah.
Chelsea Lowman 13:39
This one was a hard one for me while I was like, well, not hard. While I was reflecting on this question, I kind of, I think I wanted to get somewhere else, and I kept coming back to this, which is funny because I feel like that's, it kind of is in line with what what my reflection is. But I think one thing that I've always not struggled with, but I think especially in how we both show up on the podcast, like I'm more like fun, and I want to joke, and I and that type of thing, and then it's made me like question, like, oh, how am I showing up then? At like, am I being professional? Like, is this affecting my executive presence? You know, like just some of those things I think I get in my head about, and um, and then again, our dynamic, I think, of like you, from my perspective, you come with like these like warm, thoughtful reflections after people talk, and I'm like, I want to do that. But I think what I've learned about myself is it's okay. Like I feel comfortable and confident, and like what in my personality and what I bring to the table. And it doesn't say anything about like my professionalism or lack thereof, and that it's important that we have this dynamic and that we're different, and that you will think of questions that I wouldn't think of, and then hopefully vice versa. I'm bringing something to the table, and so I think just like feeling more confident in that has been my journey over the three years. Of like, I wanted so badly to be like, oh, why didn't I think of that question when they said this? Like, I feel like you're really good at like hearing what they say and then adapt. Like, pulling a real life example from Arctic Wolf of like, oh, well, this group is doing this. They're like blah blah, and I'm like, oh, how'd she do that? And then just be like, you know what? That's beautiful that Mary can do that, and I love that. And you know what? My brain's gonna go somewhere else, and that's okay. Yeah,
Mary Newville 15:54
no, great, okay. But you know, it's so funny. Like we always see in others what we don't have, or I don't. It's so easy. Not grass is greener, but you are so good at like the pop culture references and the quick little. And I'm always like, ugh, I would have never in a million years thought of that. And I just like our podcast wouldn't be as like. I also don't think it'd be fun. We wouldn't get to see these different layers to our leaders, because you bring like the fun and yeah, I think I could say the exact same thing about you for what you bring to the podcast and how you're so good with like the pop. I keep saying pop culture every day. No, it's not
Chelsea Lowman 16:38
pop culture.
Mary Newville 16:39
It's like
Speaker 1 16:39
The
Mary Newville 16:42
yeah, so I love that you settled more into just your strengths because people probably wouldn't like the podcast as much without you, probably for sure.
Chelsea Lowman 16:53
No, I don't know about that. Yeah, I think yeah. To your point, I think I've just learned to yeah. There's beauty in all of the approaches, and you don't need to compare. And especially when you're just showing up as yourself,
Mary Newville 17:08
like
Chelsea Lowman 17:09
we're supposed to just be ourselves while we host. So that's been a learning journey throughout the past three years. Okay, what about you? I'm so curious.
Mary Newville 17:19
No, I was. I mean, I was thinking that I've gone through a ton of like life transformation throughout the podcast journey, even from just like moving from Minnesota to Texas and like finding my person and getting engaged. Now close to getting married, and it's interesting, just like how it's interesting to see something stay constant while everything else around it changes. You know, yeah. When I was think about like what I have learned about myself through the podcast, I feel like it's really similar. Of just I don't need to show up and be Bren� Brown or Trevor Noah or Chelsea Lowman. Like,
Chelsea Lowman 18:01
yeah, the
Mary Newville 18:01
best I can do is show up as myself, and and our leaders are just people at the end of the day too. You know, like everybody bleed bleeds red. Everybody,
Chelsea Lowman 18:13
you know,
Mary Newville 18:14
those phrases of like we all have to do chores or we're all human. You know, so I think it's been fun just to like lean into that. But I will say, like practically, when I listen back to the podcast, but like I don't know if I want to share my tells because now you all are gonna notice this. But I do notice that I say like a lot. So over the duration of our podcast, have I actually implemented something to work on this skill? No, but I have noted. Maybe awareness is the first step. I say like a lot. I also
Chelsea Lowman 18:49
same
Mary Newville 18:49
say wanna and gonna instead of want to and going
Chelsea Lowman 18:59
to. Okay,
Mary Newville 19:00
and sometimes I don't finish. I imply where I'm going, but I don't finish my sentence. Have you ever noticed that?
Chelsea Lowman 19:09
Yeah, but I think that's. I think those are all things we all
Mary Newville 19:12
do. Oh, is are they? Because I just noticed them about myself, and I'm going to work on that as like a communicator in on this podcast. So
Chelsea Lowman 19:19
I definitely do that a lot with questions, where like I'll just start going and I can tell the guest knows what how the ending is going to be. So then I want to stop, but then I realize, oh, like I should probably complete the question. But then it ends up, then I don't know where to. I lose it, and then I'm still talking. Where it could have just been a really concise question, but then I'm like you know, and but I feel it. But so I like I'm with you, and the likes. Oh my gosh, so many likes. But even when I'm mindful of the likes in my day to day, I feel like in a in this setting where you're just talking and you know I just can't I can't think about it because I just. Being genuine, totally.
Mary Newville 20:02
So does a balance, and I feel like the one thing I've tried to work on, and maybe I'm getting better at it because one what you just said in yours, but being more conversational, like I do think about the podcasts I love to watch, or even like late night TV shows. You know, when when when some celebrity shows up and they were like, "How are you? How was your day? It's not a coincidence that they come with this like hilarious story of
Chelsea Lowman 20:26
right. It's all your
Mary Newville 20:27
kid, like they planned
Chelsea Lowman 20:29
it. So, not
Mary Newville 20:30
that I'm not in the sense of like not that you're trying to be not genuine, but there is something defensive. Like, instead of just being like, "Good, right, a point of view and a thought to share. So trying to grow, grow in that sense.
Chelsea Lowman 20:46
Well, I think again, the podcast wouldn't be what it is without Mary Newville. So we both of us got to show up. That's that's I feel like a good life lesson for everyone is just just be yourself and
Mary Newville 21:00
totally and listener, whatever, wherever you're at today, like the world just needs you to be you too.
Chelsea Lowman 21:08
Yep, exactly.
Mary Newville 21:09
Wow, what a great wholesome moment
Chelsea Lowman 21:11
I landed on here. Seriously. Okay, well, that was that was a fun reflection. It was it was harder than I thought because I was really trying to go back to like early episodes too, you know like I don't even remember you know the memories I used to go, but it's been a fun three years, but we're excited to have our special guest on.
Mary Newville 21:36
Yes, drum roll pre please do you want to
Chelsea Lowman 21:39
know? Yeah, yes we are very excited to bring back Brian Naismith, our co-founder and executive chairman. And Brian was our very first guest on the podcast, so we thought it was super fitting to have him back for our three-year anniversary episode. To just again have a little bit of reflection, but then also talk about where we're going and what do these next three years look like? All right, welcome to the podcast, Brian. We're so excited to have you back, our very first guest.
Brian NeSmith 22:14
It's a pleasure to be back.
Chelsea Lowman 22:18
Yeah, seriously, and thank you for joining us, we hear you're like halfway across the world right now.
Brian NeSmith 22:24
Yeah, I'm at a hotel here in Amsterdam, so for
Mary Newville 22:28
leisure, for work, a combination.
Brian NeSmith 22:31
No, no, for fun. We're on a broader family vacation right now, so we're touring and doing. I'm not a big tour guy, so that's kind of a bit of frustration. But you know everybody else is enjoying it.
Chelsea Lowman 22:43
That's funny. I think Chelsea can relate to that. I I do like tours, but my mom will make us do like six tours a day, so it gets a little much. That's my
Brian NeSmith 22:53
daughter. That's my daughter right there. Plus them all.
Chelsea Lowman 22:58
I told her when we went we went somewhere together last year. I said I'm not doing more than one tour and one museum a day. We gotta, we gotta cap it. You know.
Speaker 3 23:09
Good call. Good
Chelsea Lowman 23:10
call. Yeah. Did you conveniently schedule this while they're out on a tour right now?
Brian NeSmith 23:14
No. No. They're. We run out of tour of you know all these windmills and everything else, and after about 10 minutes, I was like, "Okay, I've seen the windmills. Can I go now? Have you
Mary Newville 23:29
had stroopwafel yet?
Brian NeSmith 23:31
Oh yeah, yeah. Had stroopwafel. We I actually bought some wooden clogs. Oh
Chelsea Lowman 23:38
really?
Brian NeSmith 23:39
Yes, I did. So we actually we went to a shop where they made them, which was so I did do that.
Mary Newville 23:47
Are they comfortable? Yeah,
Brian NeSmith 23:49
not comfortable at all. I'm purely purely display. Like they're just gonna go in a room in my house and just I was in Amsterdam at one point in time. Those just
Mary Newville 23:58
feel like a broken ankle waiting to happen. Like I just can't believe people used to wear those. Yeah,
Brian NeSmith 24:04
I I couldn't imagine it, but
Chelsea Lowman 24:07
no. Okay. Well, again, we're celebrating three years, so we some of our questions have a little theme about three years ago, three years in the future. But we just wanted to again. We thought it'd be really fun for the pack to hear from you. It's a really exciting time at Arctic Wolf, and especially they don't get to hear from you as often anymore. So I'm sure they'll be super excited. So all of that being said, like I said, it's been an exciting past couple months. We had some major announcements at Black Hat, obviously we have continued innovation around AI. So, as a co-founder, is there a moment over the past three years that has made you stop and think, like, "Whoa, this is exactly what I thought Artick Wolf could become. Like, this is this is what I was envisioning, or is it completely different?" Like whoa! I never thought we'd be here.
Brian NeSmith 25:03
Yeah, I think it's a bit of both. I think that the original idea of helping organizations understand their security posture and how they fit into it hasn't, you know, that idea exists. I think the implementation of it is wow, like very different. You know, throughout the city. I think the thing that I find most powerful. We've been living through, I'd say, one of the most difficult things a company can live through, which is a platform transition. We've been, you know, changing the underlying technology. You know, it's imagining driving the car down the road at 100 miles an hour, and you decide, you know what? I think I'm just going to change out the engine and the interior and everything else. And you know, it creates some bumps in the road, but I think we're starting to see the other side of that, and some of the benefits that flow from that. And like you mentioned, AI is one of those, but there are definitely going to be other benefits that flow from that. We're starting to see a bunch of those and these announcements. I think they're the beginning of a wave of those things.
Mary Newville 26:05
What about over the last three years has surprised has surprised you?
Brian NeSmith 26:13
I I guess I didn't you know from what AI was originally didn't expect it to have nearly as much of an impact that I now think it's going to have even more. So I originally I thought, okay, this will have some, you know, it'll help efficiency, it'll help improvement, it'll help with efficacy, you know, all these sorts of little things. But I think it actually it's it's reinventing the business, and so that's a, you know, I can admit with some, you know, that I was probably a bit wrong in the in how much that was going to change things and and what we're doing and so I it's it's clearly you know it is not just for our industry I think it's for our entire society is you know in ways that none of us can fully anticipate AI is going to change things and we're just the beginning of that process. That being said, I think it's going to be a lot bumpier than people think. I think sometimes AI does amazing things, and sometimes it does things, and you're like, "What just happened there? Like that's not expected. But yeah, that's the thing I think that probably is the biggest thing that I didn't get coming into this.
Mary Newville 27:23
Yeah, totally. I think all of us, right? Like, it's just been even in the last year alone, the way AI is changing work and what we can do. But also to your point too, it like sounds amazing. Then you start using it, and you're like, okay, this isn't. This is requiring like more. It's not just like flip a switch, turn a prompt on. Like, there's a lot.
Brian NeSmith 27:47
Yeah, it's but the you know the innovation pace is you know occurring at a rate that you know what you couldn't do six months ago you know is going to be an afterthought that what you can do a year from now, so it's just everything is changing very rapidly, and and so that's yeah, it's going to be interesting.
Chelsea Lowman 28:10
Yeah, we've been obviously talking with all of our guests recently around AI, and I'm always just curious, like your personal use, like where you fall in the in your adoption of AI. Are you? Would you say you're an expert and you're using it? I would say expert
Brian NeSmith 28:30
would be an overstatement. I I do use it a fair amount, but I I would say that I I you know I don't do as much work day to day, so I don't get as much opportunity to do it. But I I do try to push the edges of it and try to see why it breaks and why it does weird things and do things to it. So you know, I'll I'll give it task. I had a a little thing where I was I asked it to build a birdhouse for me, so I gave it a budget and asked it to do it, and it was kind of entertaining to to watch it. And you know, like, so I did this with Claude, not the company's version, but my own, and and it did pretty well. It struggled a little bit when it was kind of a debate. You could see the AI kind of asking me and try to get me to feel: Did I want something just off the box that I could order from Amazon and it was done, or did you want me to build one? I asked, "No, I want you to build one. So it put together a parts list from Home Depot. It ordered the parts and had them delivered. It hired a contractor and
Chelsea Lowman 29:37
a birdhouse contractor.
Brian NeSmith 29:39
Yeah, they just showed up. You know, they just showed up at the houses like ding dong. We're here to, you know. And I, I gave the, what did I give the AI name? I gave it a name, Shannon, for some. I don't know why. There's no meaning to it. Just so Shannon, yeah. Shannon hired us to come build a birdhouse, and so, but then when they started building it, it left off parts. So, so it's like this is interesting. I I got this from there was a YouTube video of a guy that used both Claude and then OpenAI as two competing versions to build a lemonade stand, and it's a YouTube video you can go read, and it's actually very fascinating. That kind of triggered me to do that, but I'd say I more play to understand the edges of AI right now, what it can do, and and sometimes it's truly, you know, you're like, wow, it did that, and other times you're like, what was it thinking? There was just an article today where they were highlighting that children still learn better than AI, so it's kind of weird. They're capable learning things, so they're trying to figure out why, and so they're going to mean to, you know, crack that nut and figure out that problem about why is it that they do that. But it's still, it's just the pace of the way things are innovating. You you have to work really hard just to keep up with everything that's taking place.
Mary Newville 30:57
Yeah. Well, I'm so glad you shared the backstory of how you came up with the birdhouse idea because I was like, wow, how does one even like come up with that prompt AI? But now I feel inspired to come up with my own little experiment, you know, in all my free time. But I am curious, Brian, as a founder, is your mind just like turning with ideas? Are you brewing up your next company, or if you were to start a company, do you have it in mind?
Brian NeSmith 31:25
No, I I can fully say that I'm well on the the the path of retirement. Okay, anything I do is I think you know conducive. I I would say work wise, I still spend most of my time just looking at small companies and throwing things over the fence to the team that actually has to live with it because they're the ones they're going to have to own it after the fact and figure out you know how to how to make something work and available you know for folks that want advice or guidance or things like that. So both Arctic Wolf and former employees from other companies I worked at as well, so. But no, I don't. I would say probably the largest thing I'm doing right now is really trying to understand how I should think about my grandchildren and the way they should evolve their education to kind of anticipate way things are going to unfold here.
Mary Newville 32:16
Yeah, that is super interesting. Do you have any thoughts at the moment.
Brian NeSmith 32:23
I
Mary Newville 32:24
here. Yeah,
Brian NeSmith 32:25
I think that's just that it's still the fundamentals. Like, you know, I think that you know, reading, writing, arithmetic, like you know, those sorts of things. You know, if you learn how to read, you learn how to write. Writing forces you to learn how to think. Like I can, I can tell. Like if you go to person and say, "Do you understand this? and then they'll talk about it for a little bit, and I'm like, "Okay, can you write me a three-page paper on it? And then when you start writing it down, you realize, "Oh, I don't really understand this. Oh yeah, you know, writing something down makes you understand it. Coding something makes you understand it. You know, so I, you know, play. Actually, my daughter does a lot of this as well. But there's a classic routine where you can teach kids about how to do coding, which is you get a loaf of bread, get a peanut butter jar, bar, you know, a jar of jelly, and some utensils, and you say, "All right, you know I'm the computer program. You tell me through what you're doing how to build a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. And they're like, you know, they're like, well, open the bread. So you reach over and just rip it open and shred it, and bread goes everywhere. And they're like, you know, and then they're like, you know, okay, open the jar, and but they don't tell you how. So you're sitting there trying to smash the jar on the table, and they realize they have to tell you to twist the top, and then it just-it just makes you realize with coding how much work there is in the steps that are involved, and so it's kind of a fun exercise as well. But that's a pretty class. That's not me making it up. That's a classic routine. If you want to show kids about how coding works, that's really the idea, and then they get it. They at some point, they're like, "Oh, I have to know every step, every step along the way that can cause that to happen.
Chelsea Lowman 34:06
I mean, honestly, if you had done that exercise with me, I also would have just said, "Open the breath. The
Brian NeSmith 34:16
hilarious one, because I did this group, is so they finally got that, and they're like, "Okay, spread the peanut butter on the bread. So I stuck my hand in, took out half the peanut butter, and just smacked it across the whole loaf of bread. At
Chelsea Lowman 34:30
that point, I'm sure they just are laughing, so they want the. Oh yeah, yeah, going crazy.
Mary Newville 34:35
Yeah, I feel like I've heard of that when like planning bring your kid to work day type things of like I've heard people describe for kids like an algorithm as just a set of instructions to execute. But the peanut butter and jelly is quite messy, so I feel like we've done like train like your parent like train your robot, i.e. your. Parent to like walk across the room or something. Oh yeah,
Brian NeSmith 35:03
you can do a whole variety of things. It is
Mary Newville 35:04
interesting though when you talk about like the knowing how to think still and create or like the like coding like it teaches you how to think. I was just listening to a podcast over the weekend where someone was talking about just as they evaluate how they use AI in their own world, they've decided that they always want to write their own first draft because that forces them to like engage with the content, and they let AI do the revisions. But they were just talking about how an AI does the first draft; it's hard to even know like what you think about it. I just thought it was a really good point. I was like, I totally see that myself too. Like I think you got to know,
Brian NeSmith 35:44
yeah,
Mary Newville 35:45
yourself.
Brian NeSmith 35:46
Well, the point is, I think that we're never going to get to a model. I think where AI creates, it copy creates, so it's never doing something brand new, like completely out of the box. You know, it'll copy create.
Chelsea Lowman 36:00
It'll
Brian NeSmith 36:00
absorb all the material it's been given. It's learning and doing, but that that leap that that humans can make that intuitive leap to something completely new. I I just we're a long way away from that. It'll look like it does create something because you can go tell it to create me a PowerPoint for my next board meeting with this information and that. But it's doing that because you've fed it all the previous powerpoints that it's gotten and knows what's in there, so it's not creating something actually new. So it's that to me, I think that that's why the kind of reading, writing, you know, arithmetic. I I joke with it. I try to emphasize like don't worry as much about you know science and biology and history, you know, those are good things to do. Don't get me wrong, but creative, you know, being able to critically think about something is just hard. And writing and mathematics are the two things. You know, reading is a fundamental thing as well. And then all the other things that surround that, you can learn all that. That's just you can go from there, all sorts of different directions.
Mary Newville 37:03
Yeah, super interesting. Well, back to our three year. Unless Chelsea were going to say something else. No, no, you go, you go. Okay. Well, I was going to say back to reflecting on three years. What's something that the pack might not realize about the decisions leaders are making today to prepare for the next chapter of growth.
Brian NeSmith 37:28
Oh, I I'm not sure. I think kind of what sits in the next couple years that's in front of us is is mostly self-evident. I think a lot of acquisition opportunities are going to grow as the platform, you know, the Aurora platform that we've developed early comes into its full maturity. Our ability to absorb other technologies, other capabilities is, I think, going to accelerate. So, I think we're going to see a lot more of that stuff. That people probably are like, "Why aren't we doing this? Why aren't we doing that? But I think we were hindered by the ability to be able to absorb those things, you can't just go buy something and just automatically it works. It has to fit within a paradigm of the way our system works and the way we engage with customers. But I think now that's probably going to be the biggest thing, where most of the leadership is going to be spending a lot more time. It wouldn't surprise me to see some acquisitions that are also not necessarily even just fully cybersecurity. So I think that as we start to understand where we can leverage what we're doing, I think there's going to be some unique opportunities.
Chelsea Lowman 38:32
Okay, exciting times ahead. Well, I know we talk internally a lot about innovation and market leadership, and and kind of where the industry is headed. If we brought you back in three years, if you would come back on the podcast again, hopefully it's still happening three years from now for our six-year anniversary episode. What's one thing that you hope employees are saying about Arctic Wolf? And maybe even like what we're doing externally, but then also maybe like culturally, internally, how yeah, I'd say
Brian NeSmith 39:09
that you know the it really goes to the basic mission statement, you know, of of you know us helping our customers be safe, and and kind of there's a whole variety of ways to express that, but I think that basic statement still remains true. That's that's what we're here for. That's what we'd like to do. You know, AI being not just the only thing. I think that we haven't. You know, right now we're kind of all wrapped up in the two-letter AI, but we haven't. You know, mixed in quantum computing into this thing. So, you know, and and I think that as much as AI is going to fundamentally change things, everything we think that is encrypted now and is protected, when quantum computing comes into its full form, all that encryption is going to be able. You're going to be able to break it. So even that historical stuff from three years ago that was encrypted is not going to be safe. So there's just going to be all of these sorts of things, and I think. Our job, and what we're going to have to do is is continue to kind of stay on that mission. We're here to really help our customer understand their security posture and make them be safe and be able to take advantage of AI, to be able to take advantage of quantum computing, to be able to take advantage of just all the new technology and the possibilities without a lot of the negatives that come along with that.
Mary Newville 40:22
Yeah, it's like there's. I mean, we know this. Yeah, there's even more a need for the work. Yeah,
Brian NeSmith 40:29
it's not going to change. I think that the basic mission is going to stay the same. It would sadden me if all of a sudden that wasn't the mission anymore because that would mean that we become something fundamentally different. But but sometimes that happens. Can't can't stop it. Yeah. As far as internally, I mean, I still still am a, you know, I'm I'm hoping it's still viewed as a good place to work. I know we're not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but
Mary Newville 40:52
no place
Brian NeSmith 40:54
is. Yeah. I try to tell my wife that I'm perfect, and she just somehow never seems to fully agree with that. You know, sorry, Tony. After 41 years, you're just gonna get what you get, right? 41
Mary Newville 41:09
years, though-that's amazing. Congratulations, congrats!
Chelsea Lowman 41:12
Yeah, I love our mission. It's to your point. It's so simple, but there's so much within that, and I think it's so easy to be motivated by and rally around. So yeah, I hope our mission doesn't change either.
Mary Newville 41:33
Agreed. Okay, Brian, as a founder, for all our pack members listening, kind of a different angle of a question here, but we have so many pack members celebrating because of our big hiring boom in like from 2020 to 2022, celebrating 4567, years with the pack. As a founder, what advice do you have for our pack members as they act as founders in their own career here at Arctic Wolf, and and also being acting as a founder and how they operate at Arctic Wolf.
Brian NeSmith 42:06
Yeah, I. This is advice I think I would give pretty much anybody, whether you're right out of school or whether you're later in your career. Think about two things, which is don't forget your your own education, like learning, like be willing to invest some energy and time in that because it's just easy to to get caught up in the day to day. I got to book the next order, I got to generate the next piece of code, or you know, write the new marketing campaign. But kind of investing yourself and setting some time aside, you know, on an annual basis to to invest in yourself, and I think as a company we wanted people to encourage that. We clearly see that with our security engineers. So I think that's you know probably one of the things, and then the second one I'd say is a universal paradigm, which is you you need to think about your job, but if you put yourself in and try to say, "How could I make my manager's job easier? So, you know, as for Nick as the CEO, his you know the managers is the board of directors and the shareholders, so he's got a much broader mandate. But everybody else in the company, if they just kind of looked at their boss and says, and you know, you can ask them, but more creatively think: What could I do that would make you know her job easier, better? And you will do yourself wonders in your career if you take that mentality. As opposed to what is what is she or he going to do to make my job better? It's like no, put yourself the other way around, and and you do that. It it you know it may not immediately get recognized, but it'll get recognized, and it's just a-it's a very good thing
Chelsea Lowman 43:46
to do. Love that
Mary Newville 43:47
helpful reminder.
Chelsea Lowman 43:49
Well, before we get to our brand new rapid-fire questions for you,
Brian NeSmith 43:55
okay,
Chelsea Lowman 43:56
we talked about this a little bit, but we obviously have to talk about the future of cybersecurity, what is exciting you the most about the future, and then Arctic Wolf's kind of role within
Brian NeSmith 44:10
it? Yeah, for me, I think that you know I I kind of get to be a repetitive thing here, but that the platform transition that we're, I think, coming through is going to enable us to compete in a whole variety of different ways that have been challenging historically. And the rate of innovation, when you get through that, just dramatically accelerates. and And so, I think for us, I don't think there's a question. People need cybersecurity. They need all the kind of things that we do. And I think especially for the you know smaller organizations, and I mean they're not that small, but smaller. You know they're not going to be able to afford some of these higher end solutions, and so we we come in as a perfect you know perfect for that kind of mid market down to that smaller enterprise, and and really give. Giving them the what you know a large enterprise profile would look like, and so for me, cyber is a great space. I think our platform's in a great position. I think we're competitively in a great position, and and it's really now just incumbent upon us to take advantage of
Mary Newville 45:16
it. Let's do it.
Chelsea Lowman 45:19
Own the moment.
Brian NeSmith 45:20
Exactly. Yeah.
Chelsea Lowman 45:21
Amazing.
Brian NeSmith 45:23
Nobody came up with that phrase, right? Not me. Just to be clear, wasn't me.
Chelsea Lowman 45:30
Okay. Well, we've already got to the rapid fire. This was such a quick combo, but these ones are a little bit more challenging than like favorite concert, but we still want you first thing that comes to your head. Okay, all right, I'll try. All right, what app do you open first thing in the morning?
Brian NeSmith 45:50
I clear my inboxes, so I just flipped in my phone and all my email, all my texts, all my Slack, and just because there's just so much going on, so it's yeah, just first thing.
Chelsea Lowman 46:03
Are you someone? Do you not like to have any notification? Like you don't like to have little number notifications on your apps. Does that bother you or no?
Brian NeSmith 46:12
Yes, it does. Me too. I can't. It would be ADHD in me. It's just like don't like that little number up there.
Chelsea Lowman 46:21
Yeah, no, I can't do it. I mean, I don't have to do it immediately, but like some of my friends have like 1000s of emails, like their numbers have 1000 something. Oh no, no, no, no. But I
Brian NeSmith 46:31
clear inboxes. I try to avoid clearing inboxes continuously, so I clear inboxes first thing in the morning, and then usually right after lunch, and then sometimes like not right when I leave for work, but toward the end of the day. And then try not to try to have thought time in between that where I'm not fully interrupt driven. So try to create all my interrupts at once. And then I've tried to train a lot of people around me, which is if you really need me to be interrupted? Text me.
Mary Newville 47:02
Yeah.
Brian NeSmith 47:03
So if you email me, there's that's not a guaranteed interrupt. You slack me, not a guaranteed interrupt. I'm going to ignore them until I come up to my next cycle time.
Chelsea Lowman 47:12
Yep. Set those boundaries.
Brian NeSmith 47:14
Yep.
Chelsea Lowman 47:15
Okay. What's a hill that you'll die on?
Brian NeSmith 47:19
Oh, probably anything related to my family and the growth of my family. That's about it. Love.
Chelsea Lowman 47:25
Okay, is there a recent book, podcast, or idea that has influenced your thinking?
Brian NeSmith 47:34
One that I recently read. It's it's not super old, but it's not immediate. It's a book written by Annie Duke called "Thinking in Bets. So she was a World Series of Poker player and University of Pennsylvania academic. But "Thinking in Bets, the the the paradigm of it is that you have to make decisions with imperfect information. So if you think of a poker game, you know what your hand says. You don't know what anybody else's hand says, but you got to bet. So how do you do that? And
Chelsea Lowman 48:07
I'm anxious thinking about it. When you
Brian NeSmith 48:10
think about business decisions, you think about things we're doing, where we choose to invest in certain technologies or another one. We don't know exactly what's going to unfold. So you're really thinking in bets, and the hard part is, we're not good at recognizing good and bad luck. So a lot of times, people, you'll you'll make a good decision and you'll get a bad outcome, and then you'll think that was stupid of me, and it wasn't. You know, 90% of the time that would have worked out in your favor. 10% of the time, it didn't. But remember, 10% of the time, it doesn't. So you can get a bad outcome. So thinking in bets kind of is a way of teaching you to get the mindset of weighing the probabilities of what might happen, knowing you have highly improving information. It's actually a really powerful paradigm.
Speaker 1 49:00
Yeah,
Brian NeSmith 49:00
and you know Annie Duke, I've listened to her several times. Pitch, she actually teaches this as a course. She's written another book that I haven't read yet called Quit, which is knowing when to give up or when to say no on something. So, but drinking in bets is the the one there. And I apologize. That's the hotel phone.
Chelsea Lowman 49:22
All good, all good. We're almost
Mary Newville 49:24
sat down. That sounds so weird. Me too. I'm gonna be reading it. I
Chelsea Lowman 49:27
read it for sure. What's an underrated skill that you think everyone should learn?
Brian NeSmith 49:34
Typing. Learning to touch type.
Mary Newville 49:37
Yeah.
Brian NeSmith 49:39
So I took it when I was in high school, I would recommend for any young boy when you take typing in high school, it's all young girls in the class. It was myself and so it's a good reason to do it anyway. But I learning how to type is just so powerful. You know, as much as is you're going to engage computers with audio, you're still. Be typing a lot of stuff and learning to touch type with you know that hint pack hunt pack sort of thing but touch type yeah
Mary Newville 50:05
yeah
Brian NeSmith 50:06
because I can still type probably about 6065 words a minute so yeah it's just a great skill when you're even doing an email or writing a report or you know just
Chelsea Lowman 50:19
yeah what's something you've changed your mind about recently? Anything?
Brian NeSmith 50:25
Oh, the AI thing. Then I was stupid two years ago, and how much I-I don't know if it's recently. It wasn't a bright moment where I said this is bad, but I think that you know I underestimated the effect there. I would say it was by far the the biggest thing.
Chelsea Lowman 50:39
Okay, okay. Last one. What's one thing that instantly improves your day?
Brian NeSmith 50:48
Oh, that is a good question. Instantly improves my day. I, you know, I would probably say if I exercise first thing in the morning, so that is usually a good day for me to start. I'm inconsistent in doing that, but when I do do it and I'm done, I'm like, okay, I can take on the day. You know?
Chelsea Lowman 51:13
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's one of those things where you're like, as soon as you don't want to do it, and then as soon as you do it, you think. Oh wow! Yeah, I guess it really does make me feel so much better. Why don't I just do this? Yeah, amazing, amazing. All right. Well, thanks so much, Brian, for joining us again. Hopefully, you had a good time. We didn't scare you off this time, and you'll join
Brian NeSmith 51:40
us again through our success. Happy anniversary. Happy three-year anniversary!
Chelsea Lowman 51:44
Thank you. Thanks for helping
Mary Newville 51:46
us celebrate. I'm so excited for the pack to get to hear from you. Yeah, take care, guys. Yeah. Have fun in Amsterdam. Bye.
Chelsea Lowman 51:53
Bye. Okay. Bye. All right. Another great convo in the books. Yay! I feel bad. I didn't realize Brian was on family vacation, but
Mary Newville 52:02
I know Betty
Chelsea Lowman 52:03
was free. So it sounds like he he didn't mind a quick little chat,
Mary Newville 52:08
a little break, a little break. Honestly, like I loved that conversation. Like even just the building a birdhouse and all the books and the podcasts he's read. It's like he's clearly a lifelong learner, and I'm always inspired by people like that. So I also, though, I hate that he checks his email first thing. Like he's so successful. I'm trying not to do that when I wake up. Like my phone break, right? Then you see an example of like a really successful person. Yeah, really works for him. But we all have our own our own,
Chelsea Lowman 52:42
yeah,
Mary Newville 52:43
things that work for
Chelsea Lowman 52:45
us. Yeah, and at different phases of your life, maybe you have to, like you always say, maybe you have to check your email in the morning, and then other phases you won't. And
Mary Newville 52:53
very true, very wise, Chelsea.
Chelsea Lowman 52:56
I'm just repeating, Mary Newville. All right. Well, thanks everyone for listening. It's some it's September here at the pack, so we have our sixth annual Run with the Pack 5k happening later this month, which is talk about anniversary six years of the 5k. So if you haven't signed up, there's still time. You can head to the Run with the Pack 5K Confluence page. So make sure you sign up for that if you want to enjoy a little movement with your fellow coworkers. And then mid September, September 15th is the start of Hispanic Heritage Month. So be on the lookout, as I'm sure there will be a month full of colorful, fun festivities from the Lobos crew. So more to come there. Make sure you're in the Lobos Slack channel, which is just hashtag Lobos.
Mary Newville 53:55
They always do such a good job. So I'm excited to see
Chelsea Lowman 53:59
what
Brian NeSmith 54:00
unique
Mary Newville 54:00
activities we'll have going on this year. Well, we hope this finds you well wherever you are and listening. And if you've been a Howler podcast listener for three years, you should let us know. We'd love to hear it. Yes. Otherwise, if you want to join this one of a kind community that we call the Pack, you can see all open positions at ArcticWolf.com/careers, and we will catch you all in October.
Chelsea Lowman 54:26
In October, here's to three more years!
54:30
Woohoo! Bye.
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