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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.
The Howler - Matt Bykowski v2 AUDIO
Wed, Jul 02, 2025 10:04AM � 1:07:51
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
Summer bucket list, weddings, concerts, Minnesota Yacht Club, Olivia Dean, Dairy Queen, European adventure, Barcelona, leadership, sales strategies, global sales team, tenacity, work-life balance, family activities, competitive sports.
SPEAKERS
Mary Newville, Chelsea Lowman, Matt Bykowski, Speaker 1, Speaker 2
Chelsea Lowman 00:03
Hi. Welcome to the Howler Podcast. I'm Chelsea. I'm Mary. Welcome to the July episode. It is our summer episode. We are in the thick of it. It's hot here in Minnesota. I can't imagine what it's like in
Mary Newville 00:18
Texas, here in Texas, oh, shout out to any of our pack members listening, where it's their winter, right? Because I know
Speaker 1 00:26
in Australia,
Chelsea Lowman 00:28
that's true. But how cold does it even get? Like, what is winter in Australia? Yeah, probably really nice. Probably like 70 degrees instead of 90 degrees Fahrenheit,
Speaker 1 00:39
rains. Oh, yeah, maybe I feel like in the Philippines, it rains more
Mary Newville 00:49
colder times. But anyways, it's summer for us. So any what's on the summer bucket list? Chelsea,
Chelsea Lowman 00:58
ooh, summer bucket list. Okay, I've already knocked out all of my summer weddings. I had three weddings within four weeks, all in May and June. So I'm done for weddings, which is great, and they were all in Minnesota local, which is like a dream come true. If you don't have to buy a plane ticket, you don't have to get a hotel, you can just sleep in your own bed. It's much cheaper.
Mary Newville 01:24
Yeah, any like, were there any funny moments at any of these weddings, or awkward moments, or amazing moments,
Chelsea Lowman 01:33
not really unfortunately
Mary Newville 01:36
memorable moment, you know, like a speech that goes awry, or a preacher that kind of is just not hitting the mark.
Chelsea Lowman 01:46
I don't want to call out anyone's a wedding on the podcast. My friends listen to my work podcast, but just in case, I think I'm going to keep those those thoughts to myself.
Mary Newville 02:00
They were all amazing. Loved them once in a lifetime experiences,
Chelsea Lowman 02:06
but no summer bucket list. I'm really excited. I'm going to quite a few concerts this summer. I'm going to Minnesota Yacht Club, which is like a music festival here in Minnesota. And Hosier is going to be there, who's, like, one of my favorite artists, and Remy wolf Fall Out Boy and a bunch of random people. And then I actually just put book tickets to see my favorite artist of 2024, according to
Speaker 1 02:32
my Spotify rap. Yes
Chelsea Lowman 02:36
or No, you won't know her, okay, um, her name's Olivia Dean. She's British, and highly recommend any of her songs, just everyone type in Olivia, Dean, you're not gonna guess. I just know, cuz I just like, it's not someone you know that I've talked about before. Well, I was not gonna guess, so I actually just booked tickets to see her in Denver with my best friend who lives in Denver. So that's exciting. I get to see her. We get to go see her together, because we both love her and like she's not huge, so she doesn't come to the US a lot.
Speaker 1 03:14
So that's my exciting
Chelsea Lowman 03:18
summer plans. What about you?
Mary Newville 03:19
Okay, well, I love all these concerts and being done with weddings. I mean, weddings are fun, but it is kind of nice just to, like, have your weekends open to paddle board and all the things you love to do. Um, okay, well, I was thinking about, have you this is so random that this is on my summer bucket list. Have you seen like on Tiktok, the Cookie Monster, like ice cream shell at Dairy Queen?
Chelsea Lowman 03:51
Well, I am not on Tiktok. Okay, me neither. I'm on Tiktok. Adam Mari. Just want you to know I do not have Tiktok.
Mary Newville 03:59
Wait, let the record show state. I also not on Tiktok. I just know everyone has seen it on Tiktok, but I saw it on Instagram. Okay, okay, okay, you haven't seen it.
Chelsea Lowman 04:08
No, I haven't, but I'm not an ice cream connoisseur like you are. Like, my poor, young age is not giving me ice cream.
Mary Newville 04:17
Well, I'm, like, passionate about ice cream, and I've been wanting to try this so bad. I'm probably calling it wrong, but it's like a blue, I think it's called Cookie Monster. It's like a blue chocolate shell coating for your ice cream, but has like, Oreo pieces in it. And the people on Instagram make it look so amazing. Okay, anyways, um, I tried to go get it this weekend because I've been thinking about it for weeks. Literally, I'm like, I want to go to Dairy Queen, and I just never do again. The opportunity presented itself. I was near one, so we went and they, they, they sold out. They don't know if it's coming back, because apparently, went so viral on tick tock that like Dairy Queen sold out instantly. So. So if you've tried it, let me know if it lives up to the hype, or if I can just, like, let it go that I missed it, but I'm hoping it comes back, because I really do want to try it. So I'll say that. But aside from my ice cream adventures, I am going to go to our Newcastle office in July, which I'm really excited about. Afterwards, I'm gonna go on a little European adventure and take some PTO and do London, Paris and Barcelona planning is like 95% done for that, just needing to make, like, dinner reservations because it's peak summer. Yeah, I'm usually not someone who's like plan every detail. I like to go with the flow, but I've never done Europe peak summer, so I've never had so many tours. Rest, like, Well, I haven't booked the restaurants, but the goal is to have everything booked, and if, like, with the dinners, like, if we decide to do something else, great, but at least we have an option, and we're not just, like, stuck with, like, something super touristy, or just something that's not great because it's the only thing
Speaker 1 06:01
available. So, yeah, okay, fun. What
Chelsea Lowman 06:05
right now? What activity or like tour or thing are you most looking forward to?
Mary Newville 06:13
Okay, good question. I'm most looking forward to Barcelona because I've never been to Spain, so, and that'll be the biggest chunk of the trip. So, okay, yeah, I would say I'm just, I'm excited for a European vacation, you know, like the cute summary clothes, the walking, the bustling streets, all the little shops, the Gela getting gelato. So we definitely want, like, space. There are tours and things, but we definitely that space to just, like, wander. I'm not the type of traveler that wants to be going 24/7 I want to, like, see the things I would really like to see. But I also want time just to, like, walk through the market or get an ice cream instead of the beach.
Speaker 1 06:56
So yeah, with a book, I'm really excited. Oh my gosh, that sounds
Chelsea Lowman 07:01
so lovely. Okay, I can't wait to hear when you're back all of your European adventures. It's
Mary Newville 07:07
true. Because actually, this is going to come in July. So in our August episode, well, depending on when you record it, nope, September
Chelsea Lowman 07:17
thing. Guys like we're recording the August July 1. So I
Mary Newville 07:24
kind of sad to think that in two podcasts, we will be recapping summer and it'll be fall. How is that possible?
Speaker 1 07:32
It makes me want
Chelsea Lowman 07:33
to throw up to be honest. Because, because once we we all know how this works. Once it's September, it's
Mary Newville 07:43
Halloween, and then it's Christmas. Yeah, exactly. Okay, let's not think about it. Okay.
Speaker 1 07:53
Here today's podcast guest. Should we let them in on a secret? We actually already had the interview. Oh, and it was so
Chelsea Lowman 08:04
good. It was so good. I really didn't know where you were going with this, but yes, surprise, surprise, we're filming the intro afterwards, because we're busy, ladies and we were in meetings right until the interview.
Mary Newville 08:17
Yes, this is such a good conversation. So good like, I think you all listening are going to enjoy you're going to be inspired. You're going to learn about things that are like about sales, but also applicable to anything you're doing in life, and lessons and and get to know Matt by Koski a lot better than you probably do right now if you're not in sales. So without further ado, Matt Bucha ski is a dynamic sales leader with over 15 years of experience driving growth in the technology sector, currently serving as the Senior Vice President of Global acquisition sales at Arctic wolf he spearheads global sales strategies empowering organizations of all sizes to enhance their business resilience via security operations. Throughout his career, Matt has held pivotal roles at leading technology firms, including rubrik code 42 and Dell he has a proven track record of building high performing sales teams, expanding enterprise markets and fostering channel partnerships. Matt holds a Bachelor's of Science in marketing from Minnesota State University. So we're going to cut right now before i do I'm so curious, Chelsea, what secret? Like, what was going through your mind when I said, Should we reveal a secret? Like, what did you think it
Chelsea Lowman 09:31
was so confused, because I was when you were like, when you kind of wrapped up the like, Oh my gosh. And then it's September and Time flies. I was going to jump in and be like, well, switching gears, should we? But then you kind of do. So I was like, okay, she's going to get she's going to intro Matt, and then when you and then I didn't really have any thoughts. I was just confused when you were like, we let them in on a secret. And I thought you were talking about the guests like. I thought you were like, being like, Should we let our guests in? On a little secret. And I was like, We didn't tell Matt a secret. What secret did we tell him?
Mary Newville 10:10
Anyway? Full Circle, let's get to this conversation with Matt Wieckowski, our Senior Vice President of Global acquisition sales.
Chelsea Lowman 10:17
All right. Welcome to the podcast, Matt. Thanks for having me. Yeah, I'm like, so torn whether I'm supposed to call you Matt or by cow, because everyone I know calls you by cow, but I feel like I don't know you like that. So I don't know what, what should we refer to you as
Matt Bykowski 10:36
you can refer me whatever you like. My cow is something that is used? It is stuck. It is a permanent thing, which I'm comfortable with. And feel free to use that or Matt as well. But thanks.
Chelsea Lowman 10:52
Okay, great. Well, just curious now that we're talking about it, did you go by by cow, or your last name growing up, or anything? Or is that an Arctic wolf thing?
Matt Bykowski 11:01
No, that is. That is a name that has spanned
Speaker 1 11:04
family, friends, wow. Okay, education,
Matt Bykowski 11:08
early career, late career. I think it's just a lot easier. I believe at one point in time I was on a team, a sales team, about 15 years ago, that had five mats on it. So I think that whole like idea of of having a shortened nickname or a differentiator is kind of an important thing, and that's just kind of stuck. So I kind of get introduced that way quite a bit. I think even some of our reports here at the office have have that on there, versus which is fine and fun. We come from a family, my family, personally, we're, we're big nickname people. We don't call each other. There's an event only used for me. I do have two brothers that also will get called the same thing. So, you know, it's, I can't say it's just for myself, but we are at we are a nickname family and nieces, nephews, cousins, etc. So
Mary Newville 12:02
okay, that's kind of fun. So I was going to ask, like, how of all the people in your family are you the one that got the nickname by cow? But it sounds like a lot of people in your family get that,
Matt Bykowski 12:12
but first, you know you're first, right? So, like, I'll take when you're first, you're first, okay? But I think, yeah, like I said, I think with everything from athletics to school to whatever it's, it's, it's simple and easy, and it kind of just sticks funny, it's definitely perpetuated itself. I get emails even sometimes people I don't know, you know, yeah, it's, that's interchangeable.
Chelsea Lowman 12:39
Well, you mentioned athletics. And if you've ever listened to the podcast, we always start off with some sort of, like, fun trivia or something based off of what we know about the person. So we've done like, Beyonce trivia for Kristen trivia for Lisa. So we asked around, like, tell us something about by a cow, and we found out that prior to ninth grade, you were a competitive figure skater. Oh,
Matt Bykowski 13:11
this story kind of comes full circle. I believe I know whom I've shared that intelligence with, but I can, I can make sure to clear the air for the holler podcast. Okay, good. I was never a professional figure skater. You have to be nimble. I believe it lean and you know what? You can perform on skates. That's not, definitely not me. However, even just yesterday, even just yesterday, during Father's Day dinner, we did talk about how our mother put three boys in Figure skates instead of hockey skates. That has, that has, that has been a thing because there's documentation of it. There is discussion coming from a state of hockey, right, you know, right? Not exactly a a normal thing, so you're not far from the truth. I think my figure skating career ended and started that same year, maybe in four or five years. Well, who do
Mary Newville 14:14
you think told us that information?
Matt Bykowski 14:16
I'm going to bet that it might be somebody in customer success. They might, they might lead a global organization, and their name might be Todd Warner. We know each other. That's an important piece of acquisition, customer success, working together trap, or maybe putting some false data out there? Yeah,
Chelsea Lowman 14:41
well, it was so funny because so we had Todd on the podcast last month, and we just released it, so you probably haven't had a chance to listen yet, but we found out about his Swim Spa. So we grilled him about the Swim Spa, and he said, I bet you, Matt told you about this, and I. Actually it was Kristen. Yeah, he guessed it was you. So then I reached out to him and said, Hey, we're actually having Matt on the podcast next like, what are some fun things you know about him? And he immediately said the figure skating thing, which I knew was a lie, but I was like, you know, what? Should we just go with it? And then I slacked it to Mary, and I said, Mary, this is what Todd told us, and we decided, let's just see what Matt does if he thinks we're about to do trivia based off of competitive figure
Matt Bykowski 15:29
skating. If it was, I only know a few of them, it's impressive what they do, and you end up watching it during the Olympics every so often. But I give it, Todd would have good reason to believe it being me, because I have a neighbor named Todd who also owns a large Swim Spa, and so we have a lot of fun discussing the Swim Spa.
Chelsea Lowman 15:52
Okay, Todd also told me that, but I thought that was a lie as well, because he said, he said another fun fact is that he has a neighbor, also named Todd, who has a swim spot. And I was like, you're just messing with me.
Matt Bykowski 16:08
No, he's definitely right. So he's full of, you know, he'd be good at two truths and a lie, you know, I tell you what?
Chelsea Lowman 16:15
Okay, so did you play hockey growing up?
Matt Bykowski 16:18
I didn't. We weren't exactly the hockey type. You know, you kind of follow sometimes in the footsteps of what maybe your parents kind of did. It's not always, doesn't always hold true. My kids don't exactly hold true. But no, we were a basketball, football family. We we have, we have some tall people in the family, so it's naturally a easy sport to to find yourself and we are not very good skaters. And my son right now is super disappointed and his dad and mother for not making him a better hockey skater. That is again, back to the figure skating. But I told him, I say, Hey, maybe I put you on some figure skates and teach us.
Mary Newville 16:59
So when you guys are giving your mom grief or putting you in Figure states, figure skates, like, what's her story? She was just like, oh, that's
Matt Bykowski 17:08
what was there. That's what we did. That's just how it goes. Which is, which is a great answer, because she showed up to be a good mom and said, you know, go learn you live in Minnesota. Gotta learn to skate. That's where my son is at. He's like, Dad, yeah, I may not play hockey, but I gather in the skate he's and he's not wrong. That's on the Bucha ski parent to do list here with our kids. Okay, we got way more hoops and soccer and football and baseball than than spend our time in ice arenas.
Chelsea Lowman 17:38
Okay. Okay, nice. Well, you we let you off easy. There's no ice skating trivia. Okay, just be prepared. Maybe when I see you in the hallway one day, I might just whip out a figure skating question
Matt Bykowski 17:53
for everything, every answer. Okay,
Chelsea Lowman 17:56
okay, well, speaking of when you were little, playing sports, learning to skate in your figure skates. Um, what did you want to be when you were little? And I doubt it was leading a sales team in cyber security. So tell us, like a little bit about how what you wanted to be, kind of what you studied, and how you got to Arctic Wolf. Yeah,
Matt Bykowski 18:21
great question. And I think all of us, you know, have different ideas of what we would be doing, how we would be doing it, and where we would be doing it, like any kid when you're growing up, you know, sports were a big part of our life, and my family's life continued to be so that was always something that every kid wanted to do, but once I realized that that wasn't going to be a, per, you know, a profession of mine, my first, my first real push was in I had the desire to kind of stick in that athletic area. But being an athletic director at like, a big 10 school was kind of my, like, my thing. I actually had an internship for it and in college, and chose not to end up going down that path. But for me, that was like a perfect blend, or it was kind of like the ad, or that the GM of the professional sports that was kind of like my, my idea of where I could participate and be and be helpful and thoughtful, and it would keep my interest peaked, so to speak, right away, and I did the internship in the summer. Quickly realized that, listen, you have to follow, follow a lot of different people in a lot of different places around the country in order for that to be successful. A lot of short stints in a lot of different parts of the country. That really wasn't something I thought that would be right, and I stumbled into this the sales gig at a company called compelling. There was a data storage company. A handful people here have some lineage there as well. But I grew up as my as my dad tells me the son of a soap salesman. So like my dad was a 40 year guy at Procter and Gamble, which is a fortune. He lived that career path for. Very so I knew, like, what he did was something of interest to me, whether it was selling soap or what have you, that felt like a very natural thing for me, right? I wasn't a I wasn't going to be a scientist, I wasn't gonna be a mathematician, wasn't going to be an engineer. That definitely wasn't me. So it kind of naturally led into the idea of, you know, what sales is probably for me, and what am I selling? Is that like an organization, like a university and athletics and the team, or am I going into something like technology? And happened to have a family friend that had started that business and got connected with that person after college is over, and found myself as an SDR, you know, 20 years ago in the data storage world, and here we are today, talking about cybersecurity. So that is kind of how I grew up with that space and that thought process on it always knew it'd be something dealing with people as that is something that really enjoyed, something I enjoyed today in the leadership space. So, yeah, it was, it wasn't like it was a big thought out, you know, multiple crisscrossing lanes of what I wanted to be. It's kind of had to figure out where it was going to be, and then in what context
Mary Newville 21:16
I feel like what we hear from a lot of our guests that we've had on the podcast so far different leaders is they kept following what they were passionate about or what interested them, and that took them to the next step. So take us a little bit into the details. 20 years ago, you start as an SDR sales development representative. What were those little things that kept leading you to now be leading a global acquisition sales team, versus customer success or marketing, or all the different paths you can come out of one year and well, first
Matt Bykowski 21:47
for anybody that's listening, and that the SDRs are listening, I think we've told them this before, is a lot of people that whether you choose to be in sales or choose to be in operations, you choose to be in HR, starting as an SDR is actually a wonderful thing. You learn a ton of skills that you are forced into learning don't get in other positions, and they can make you feel awkward. They could be challenging, they could be exhausting, they could be exhilarating. You find all those peaks and valleys as an SDR. I mean, I think we even have people in biz apps that started as an SDR at different companies, and realized, hey, I want to get into operations, right? I think Andrew back our CIO was an SDR at one point, so you wanted to, you kind of learned, I think a lot of basis for communication about what drive is, how to be self motivated. Those are all things you learn in that capacity. And for me, the reason why sales and getting into this SDR role. We call them dgrs, back then, was was exciting for me, as it was competitive. So I think a lot of people you'd find in the sales world like they like the scoreboard. It's what drives you, what's what drives you crazy, keeps you motivated, and keeping score is an important thing. And as an SDR, driving to be first, striving to be successful, kind of just kept pushing that next opportunity for me, and one I enjoy winning, like I think most of us enjoy winning. I enjoyed the success of seeing like the work you put in and the output and that you get that in sales very quickly. Don't get it in other areas of the business, but you quickly figure out what's working and not and you're measured. So I enjoyed that piece of it. It's what kept it relates back to, like practices and games, and the outputs of what how many jump shots you shoot equate to how successful you are shooting them in the game. It's kind of the same thing when it comes to comes to sales. So I followed a similar path as many do you go to the SDR, I spent the time in the channel world for a period of time. We have partner development reps here at Arctic wolf that I spent a brief stint in a partner development role understand how the channel operates and works, and then I got put out into the field as a young sales professional, packed a bag, moved Milwaukee by myself, worked out of my my house, and had to figure out how to make it work. And the only way you figure out to make it work is self motivation. No one's showing up and telling you to go. And I just really enjoyed that, right? And what I quickly figured out over different types of sales careers, whether it was calling on commercial accounts, SMB accounts, enterprise accounts, global accounts. I enjoyed the change of pace. So some people really enjoy, like, a repeatable process, and I want to stick with this one thing and sell into this type of a customer with this type of a tool I really enjoy, kind of understanding the different facets of each buying group or each company. You know, what is a fortune? 100 company need versus a fortune, you know, a company that has 100 people, they have different needs and priorities, and that that kind of pushed me to take on different roles at the individual contributor, contributor level, or the AE sales, AE role. And then, really, I got asked. Take my first leadership gig. So my first foray into leadership and managing a a group of AES. I was an AE that had been there a while and shown some progress, and as a rapidly growing company, my leader came to me and said, Hey, we need to, we need to find someone lead this group of people. And you've been here, you've proven success. I think it'd be a great for you take on the first leadership gig. So that was, that was me. I did it relatively early in my career, and had a lot of fun with it. Learned a ton of what not to do, especially what, especially when you imagine people that were your peers previously. Yeah. So that is, that's, that's what got me into it, and then as things kind of progress through different companies and different roles. I've worked primarily in growth companies, meaning you start with them when they're, you know, a couple 100 employee company, and they grow quite large. The last two companies, including Arctic wolf that I've been at, I joined with a couple 100 employees. And the last one, I think now, has somewhere in that five or 6000 and here at Arctic Wolf, or what 3200 I believe, as last week. So when you find yourself in those types of organizations or sales or anything else, you find a lot of career growth. I know it's super important our organization that we promote growth from with women and leadership with women. I just kind of followed that process all the way up, and found that I enjoy working on a broader piece of the business than I do necessarily on just me every day, right? It comes with some headaches and challenges, but I enjoy having different conversations about different parts of our business. And if that isn't something that you enjoy doing, you know doing this job is hard equally, so if you really like focusing on just a couple things, you know it's hard to be successful and hard to be a good leader, if that's really where your brain is at. So that's kind of what, what pushed me into along with a bunch of good mentors that said, Listen, I think you have the right makeup and DNA for this. I think you'd enjoy it, and then taking the leap of faith that it's what you want to do. Because once you become a leader, you're responsible for a team and the team's success, not just your own individual success, right? You're no longer the one shooting the jump shots are the one coaching the team, making sure you're doing the right drills and those types of things.
Mary Newville 27:17
Yeah, yeah. That's a huge shift too, especially like in sales, where you're used to bringing in the deals and closing the deals, and then you become a leader, and now you're encouraging, coaching, supporting, mentoring, the people that do that. What were like some of the bigger lessons that first leadership gig that you learned? Yeah,
Matt Bykowski 27:40
and I know this, I know this podcast touches a ton of people, so it's interesting. I think it applies to any real role within a company. You can't you can't play the game for the team, and sorry for my sports analogies, but like, you can't be the super rep, you can't be the coach and the best player. You can't be the coach and the player you need at that point in time of the game. So the biggest shift is that you need to set people up for success and work towards fixing problems to make them successful, right? And I think that piece in itself is the hardest transition, because a lot of people who get into leadership are some of your top performers. It doesn't always work out that way. Listen I I may have kept out of my capability of being the top rep at whatever company or the top individual contributor, or whatever role I was in, and maybe my ceiling is higher in leadership than it was as a nice as an individual contributor, right? And as a whether you're in HR or you're in biz apps, trying to do everything for your team to get the outcome never scales and works. It might work acutely. It might you might hit that project deadline the first time. You might even have the second time. But if you don't enable your teammates and your partners to drive towards what the team's success is, the company's success is that that's when things break and fall down. I think the biggest lesson learned for people that were high performers or are than asked to take on the next job is, how do you take a step back and you can't, you can't be super human to everybody that that is like, that is the one that hits, hits you in the, you know, in the nose the quickest, yeah. How do you learn to lead instead of do for people, right? It'll teach a man to fish you feed him for a lifetime. She teach him you feed him for a day. That is. That is like the most generic, basic form of what I view as leadership is no matter what capacity you're in at a company.
Chelsea Lowman 29:38
That's so true, I feel like it's something we've all heard as far as challenges for new managers, especially when they're, you know, high achieving individual contributors and then thrown into leadership, and not always with like, the resources and support that they need. From your perspective, yeah, I'm curious, from your perspective. Of, like, what is, what are some of the trainings? Or, like, missing pieces that would make that transition a little smoother? Or is it a little bit of, like, you just gotta get thrown in and learn it yourself and figure it out.
Matt Bykowski 30:15
Throw in an ice rink with figure skates and figure out how to do it, yeah,
Chelsea Lowman 30:18
yeah. Or like, as you're, as you're seeing, like, new leaders within your team. Are there certain things that you're telling, like, from the top down, like, make sure that they're, you know, getting XYZ resources. We want them to go through this training. Are there certain things that you implement within your team for new leaders?
Matt Bykowski 30:36
Yeah. So I definitely think you there's, there's some trial by, you know, try by fire or like, you know, jump in the deep end, and having to figure out a little bit of who you are as a person of makeup. That there's, there's a component to that no matter what, because you can have all the training, you can watch all the videos, you can listen to every seminar on the planet. But until you do it, you don't experience it. You only learn through experience. Now, you can be better prepared by listening and going through these things, but you have to learn it. I do think this company, Arctic wolf specifically, has done a really nice job of like setting people up for success. What I mean by that is that when we that can only speak for the sales side, obviously, but like when we set up new leaders and new mentors in our business, we surround them with that type of training. We surround them with coaching. We surround them with external coaching. In order for us to drive and say, here's what your map and world map looks like. Because you can have that training immediately. You can have all the coaching from Matt or from different lead of the company, but you have to go implement it, learn it, figure out what worked, and then come back and say, Hey, I had this situation, here's what I did. Didn't go very well. What do you suggest I next time? So this, this, this company does a really nice job, not only in onboarding new employees, which is really, really great process, but when we do put people through that promotion path, we enable them as best we can to grow, and then it's like a, it's a real thing. It is a, you know, how's that first month? Go, check in. How's that third first quarter? Go, what do we need to prove upon and that kind of, that just kind of builds right? So having the leaders that have gone through it before themselves also helps in that process. So we're lucky here at Arctic Wolf. We have resources. We invest in our people. Not every company or organization does the same thing, so we're very much set up to have success
Mary Newville 32:31
here. I feel like I have so many questions. But before we switch to leadership, I want to know more about sales at Arctic Wolf, but I mean from your leadership. Your leadership, see, I'm curious, what would you say are, like, what makes like a great salesperson? Like, when you see someone that's really successful, like, what are commonalities that amazing sales people have?
Matt Bykowski 32:55
Yeah, um, so we have a couple different, like, pieces of our business here, Arctic Wolf, right? We have, you know, Todd's business, like customer success, which, if you're listening, you've just heard that. And then you have our side, which is the, which is the net new business side of the house. So we're here talking to net new clients and new customers. And that's a different sales motion. I talked earlier about how I had a few different roles in my sales career, calling on big companies, calling small companies, being an account manager, where you own everything in the life cycle of that client and that customer. Here on my team, you know, we're really working with our partners, and our customers are bringing that new business in the front door, and that takes a lot of tenacity. So like, if you're asking, like, what makes up a great sales, there's a lot of qualities. And every every person has a little bit different makeup and what makes them successful. And every really successful sales rep in our person has a unique makeup. I put my thinking cap on here, has unique makeup to how they operate. So one top performer doesn't have the same makeup as the next top performer. They are special. And a couple other things where this person may not be special, but the one common theme across those people is is the tenacity, is the is the hunger, the desire and the drive to want to do it. This is not an easy job, right? It is selling things. Waking up every day to go and find a new organization that wants to partner with us for our security operations, isn't, isn't for the favorite part. So like you have to wake up self motivated and have the capacity to want to do it on a repetitive basis, so those and that tenacity can be applied as to whether you're trying to serve a customer that's, you know, one of the biggest the planet, or you're servicing a market where you're servicing customers who need a lot of different help that that makeup and drive for that person is key, like you. Don't find people that are successful, that are that don't have the sense of urgency, and those people are self motivated. And it's no surprise, you know, you look at the most successful people in the world, whether you're in investment banking, you're an HR company, you're an AI company, these people that are the top of their their game, have that tenacity, that that like urgency, that is always going so I think if you were to boil it down besides, say, be really good at this, this and this, Mary, right? It's, it's like, what component Do you have that puts you to drive and that, for me, the tenacity is a really, really important piece of the business. Will you show up every day when things are good or when they're
Speaker 1 35:46
well? It's really interesting.
Mary Newville 35:48
At the beginning, you talked about your love for sports and how you thought that would be maybe the path you'd want to pursue as a kid. And it's interesting that you found a different way to kind of scratch that itch, if you will, of like having a goal, wanting to get the win, working as a team, and I just this is, I mean, I don't know if there's any way to prove it, but I'm curious if like, you notice that people that did any like, whether it's sports or music, but or like, did something competitively in their prior to sales like, are more successful because they know what it's like to work hard and to fail and to work hard and to win.
Matt Bykowski 36:24
Yeah, and I'm really glad you didn't just say sports, because we have successful people across the world. It's Arctic wolf or other companies that are successful. Makeup for the person is the important piece of it. I don't care if you're the best cellist, the best choirs, the choir, competitive choir, the dancer, athlete. What it is, is the innate nature to want to practice to be good. And I think if you don't have that desire to practice, it can be learned. But like the initial piece of why would I want to go do this? They like process. They like outcomes. If I do this, I get that and that that kind of like this DNA, and what you're used to is can be applied to a lot of things. Doesn't have to just be sales, but it has found, for like quite, quite unequivocally, it like people who have and done competitive things typically enjoy it because they like, they like the inputs. They like the output. So measurable, very measurable. People don't like, you know, a plus b equals c. Don't necessarily like sales. Now, you throw a lot of flavors and twists and turns in there, but if you do enough of this the right way you should have, you know, you should the output you get on all those inputs should equate to success.
Mary Newville 37:45
Go ahead. Well, I'm just gonna add, I think the other piece is like, I don't know if it's just like, super confidence or bravery, but you have to face a ton of rejection, and yours, you know, and rejection, and that's hard. So there's something there too, of like, either confidence or combo of confidence and courage, just to like, keep swinging
Chelsea Lowman 38:10
resiliency, but
Matt Bykowski 38:13
it's tenacity. You know, it doesn't work the first eight tries. You gotta tweak it a little bit. But if you know that you try 10 times, you get one, right? So I gotta try 100 times I get 10. Like that. It that is no it's not really a different and that works for any organization. That's just how this whole thing works when it comes to like, marketing, when it comes to sales, when it comes to anything you can apply that, that method of really, to growing any business, because it is a what do you have? How big is the market that you can sell into? How many attempts does it take you to find someone's interested? How many times it takes to get finally interested, to get them to want to, you know, to partner with your product. So process is a really, really big thing. No matter what that process is. Another thing is, I find, I find interesting that's not necessarily super like that. We have a lot of people who have transit transitioned into sales that were people. Because it's not always just about the tenacity, but the tenacity can be applied to different things. I've hired a handful of teachers that have gotten into selling their patience, their understanding of what they're trying to solve, for the questions that they ask. And if you can deal with 33rd graders in a room for an entire year, I think you can withstand a lot of things. So it's kind of funny how those skills translate into a sales profession, right? Well, I know we
Chelsea Lowman 39:49
just spent a lot of time talking about tenacity drive resiliency. I love the commentary on teachers and patients and understanding too. But. But Matt, we're all human. There are days like, we wake up, we do not want to go to work, we do not feel resilient. We do not have the drive. Do you have, like, whether it's from your time, when you were in SDR, or just throughout your career? Do you have like, little tips or tricks that you use to, like, get yourself motivated, or look at that to do list, or look at that call log, and be like, Okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna get it done.
Matt Bykowski 40:25
That's, that's a really good question, because I think it's different for everybody, and I think it's different, honestly, for the type of role you're in for an SDR, a lot of you know, a lot of phone calls, a lot of emailing and LinkedIn, however, you're engaging with your potential prospects for a AE, it might be on the how did that meeting go? Or didn't go well for me in my day to day. And what it is is, you know, I'm dealing with these five things. How do I find, how do I find a reset to go now focus on this. For me personally, I need, I need to get up and give myself a physical reset. So a lot of times after I get off of a conversation, or I know I'm in meetings from 12 until four, in order for me to be great for the last hour or two hours a day, I need to go get myself a 15 minute walk while either walk and talk and solve another having a conversation with somebody, or just kind of give myself that reset. Now I think in sales, it is, it is about having that reset, and it's no different than showing up to practice for three days a week, for one game on Friday and not every day. When you show up to practice, are you at your best? But you have to know that if I'm if I'm in a rut or I don't wake up motivated today. You have to look at the body of work, and if you miss a couple of these days, you miss a couple of these work efforts that you should have put in, you're not necessarily going to get the same output, and it's really about how much you put in. And it doesn't always mean that the work ever you put in is always going to equate to automatic success, either. So just having that ability to kind of give yourself the 15 minute, 20 minute break, I think, is a is a good thing. It's how I do it. And I got people calling me in the morning that you know, that are in Europe, and I got people that are calling me late, then Australia and Japan. So I my time horizon window is really big, but I need to find a few, a few spots in the day to give myself, you know, the coffee walk, or the, you know, or the pace in the courtyard. So that's, that's me, but you have to, like, if you're gonna sign up for this, you're gonna have to know that, that that having that fortune tenacity to kind of keep going. Because the minute you take a week, couple days, few hours, it kind of just lingers. It's hard to play catch up that way. So but like making sure you're mentally ready to go, making sure you're physically ready to go, taking care of yourself. I'm a better preacher. I am a doer myself. Transparency, but that's that's a really important I know a lot of people that you know they need their the in their morning routine in order to be successful that day. So you kind of figure out what works for you. And every one of us, us three on this phone, all are built differently in terms of, you know, what makes us tick, and you got to make sure you give yourself that output to make sure you can be the best, because you can work a full week, and if you're not putting in the right work effort hours, you're not going to get out of it what you want. I don't care if you're in finance or if you're in sales, so making sure that you are ready to go to be able to put that time and effort in for your organization is equally Yeah,
Mary Newville 43:37
when you mentioned knowing what like makes people tick and such. On the topic of leadership, you lead a global sales team. You mentioned you're on calls with EMEA Europe. You're Australia, South Africa. What does it look like for you to engage and lead and motivate a global sales team?
Speaker 1 43:58
Yeah.
Matt Bykowski 43:59
Well, they've been doing it. It's almost come up on two years. So it is the first step for me in managing a global team. I had not managed a global organization previously, so that was a whole learning experience. So I think I had to kind of eat some my own dog food when it came to understanding what being a good leader is. How do you understand your peers? I can tell you that for my friends and EMEA, they're listening their cultures, how they work, how those businesses operate, is different than how they operate in Seattle. The same thing goes for Australia, and it definitely is the same place in a place like Japan, where things are totally different from what you're used to dealing with, really, when you compare places like Australia, the United States and Canada, EMEA, there's some similarities. But when you go, you know, into a place where you know, language can be a barrier, traditions and cultures can be a barrier, that that's something you have to learn. So you definitely have to learn, and be learning forward when it comes to how to operate within those. Folks culture, those folks understanding versus how you I think one of the biggest things you can learn from being a leader is like the facile treat others how you want to be treated. Like that works, but it's really treat others how they expect to be treated, not how you would want them, because that might be different to how they are feeling versus how you are feeling, right? That is a real thing that I've tried to play the heart here in the last few years. Someone told me that Captain Ron, if you listen, and that was, that was really, that was really a different mind shift for me. And then it didn't actually come into practice as aggressively first, like in the first period, it didn't really hit home until I figured out, listen, you know, people in our Newcastle office work differently than people in Eden Prairie office, same with Toronto. So that was something I had to learn, and going through that has helped me figure out how to best work with those folks and how the company can best operate. And it takes, it takes a lot of learnings. Everything is very much different, even though almost all of it, principally in sales, is the same. Like you take, you take all the building blocks of sales, selling in Germany, selling in the Nordics, selling in Australia, all those, all those playbook principles are all the same. Now what's different is how the organizations buy. You know, when do they buy? How do they do it? What does their engagement look like? How do they want to be treated during this cycle? What does their process look like? And it can be very different than a US and North American based culture of similarities, and we even have that here in the United States, people in Boston and New York buy different than people in Southern California do right. There are different like organizations and people buy and communicate very differently. So I think one of the secret weapons of being a great sales person, and quite frankly, of being a leader in any capacity, is understanding what you're walking into, because your square hole might not fit in that round peg in which they want to be treated or they're expected to be a coach or sold to or sold through. So those are, those are things you can take those same principles to, you know, the leadership group or your sales teams in other parts of the country. So that was like, if you want to talk about learning experience, you're talking to a person who had to really learn hard, and I'm not done, right? Like it is something you learn on the daily and the weekly about how to operate as a global company. It's really cool that we at Arctic wolf get to help, get to help end cyber risk to our partner partners around the globe. This isn't North American thing, but with that comes great responsibility and making sure that we're we're driving our partner communities and our prospects and
Chelsea Lowman 47:52
customers. I would assume through this process, you've had to utilize a lot of kind of the tenants of servant leadership, because you have a lot of your leaders in different regions having to kind of teach you about their region and cultures and tactics. And so it's not necessarily the info coming from the top down, but working in partnership to kind of understand the best way to work in these regions.
Matt Bykowski 48:20
Yeah, 100% and I think servant leadership is kind of that new, I should say new now. It's been around for 510, years, but yeah, I think you have to, you have to be willing. And kind of goes back to the same statement I made earlier. You have to understand how that group operates so you can support them, being on the being in the trenches with them, being at the office with them. Understand how things work. What makes those individuals or that part of the company tick. You definitely need to make sure you can work as best you can with the confines of how any organization works to support that. And I think that can be applied to, again, all aspects of our business, whether it's our s2, organizations supporting our customers, our HR, our biz apps, our channel, our sales team. So yeah, treating, treating others, how they expect to be treated, and then put in our flavor of how we do there to wolf, I think is, is where that that match has to get made. And being in leadership, it isn't about you, and that is what you asked. Why I got into it. And I told you, I really enjoy being a part of everything, and even if it's even it's just a little piece, right? I think it's great to be a part of the growing business anemia and APJ and APAC and Canada and everywhere else that we're that we're growing, but I'm definitely not the one on the street, pounding the pavement every day, talking to our partner community and talking to customers about the great value we bring that is done by the team. But the team needs to know and understand that you support that narrative, and you support how to get them to where they want to go, which is ultimately, you know, growth for the for Arctic Wolf. The company,
Mary Newville 50:00
someone on our team, Dan Oi, one of our people, partners, our senior HR leaders, he recently shared a quote by Simon Sinek that said, Leadership isn't about being in charge. It's about taking care of those in your charge. And I think I'm hearing that a lot, and what you're saying about how do you remove obstacles and help others be successful, and seek to understand that you can meet them where they're at and understand their needs to help them be successful. So and I think it's really cool to hear you talking about learning, because I think, like everybody goes through it, and everybody will at points in their career, like, be in new territory, and you can either kind of clam up and just be like, we're going to grit our way through and just like, do what we've always done, or, like, be open to like, know better. I do better, and I want to do, I want to learn, and I'm going to learn and be and be better. And I think that's a really cool thing that you're modeling for any everyone listening. I
Matt Bykowski 50:56
appreciate that. Dan, always a good business partner, too. He's, he's, he's, he's singing the same tune. And that's, I think, that that holds true. And the fun part about working at growth companies like Arctic Wolf and or others, if you're a different company like that, is companies that when we were a 200 person company, where we weren't the same company at 2000 and we're not gonna be the same company at 5000 and so learn as to what works. Because, you know, doing the same thing over and over and over again is what they call definition of insanity. I think it's important. It's easier to say than it is always to do. They become a big company. You're not as nimble as you once were all the time. So changes take people and process and cross functional leadership. And I do think one thing that we do really well here is at Arctic Wolf, we learned and we pivot. And I think we've done that very beginning. I think our executive team that has led us through all the different types of transitions continues to to do so, and we're very open to feedback. So that's, that's exciting, but it's also exciting about working at companies like that. So you get to experience the change. Anybody who hasn't done it. It could be very scary going to a company, it's only a couple 100 employees, but the amount of growth each individual can get, no matter what part of the company you're in, is 10x but you can get sometimes, and working at a, you know, a fortune 100 organization, either one better or worse, it is very different of the breadth of learnings you get by participating. Because it's forced.
Mary Newville 52:32
There's no choice. You're like, there's four of you. So figure it out.
Matt Bykowski 52:38
Has ever made all the right choices? And I know I haven't made all the right choices for my team. So what can you can you learn from them and then fix and adapt? And now you can't always just fix things like this anymore, so taking good planning and getting good feedback will help.
Chelsea Lowman 52:56
Wow, so many good leadership gems I can cut out so so many little segments before we get to our rapid fire questions, our fun questions. At the end, I did just want to circle back to mental health and well, being a little bit, you talked about your reset walks, which I love, but you also shared with us, you know you're on Morning calls with EMEA, you're on calls at 11pm with Japan. So obviously you're having to work through your own work life balance, or whatever you'd like to call it. So how do you prioritize your well being, your holistic well being, mental, physical, emotional, etc. I'm better
Matt Bykowski 53:42
at top. Talking what I am at practicing it
Chelsea Lowman 53:45
well, everyone is, everyone is, everybody
Matt Bykowski 53:47
is so, so listen like I have. I have two great kids at home. I got a very supportive wife with my family. My family requires us to be a pretty big team, and she does an amazing job of keeping our family scheduled. I have two very busy kids that like to participate in all sorts of activities, social and sports, and honestly that like my reset time. And listen, I'm not on 11 at 11 o'clock a lot of people, but it is. You have to make sure you are serving and being available for your teams and in the evening or in the mornings. So what, what I what I actually get the most pleasure out of is, is my kids activities. So I can't always commit to being home, because I travel a lot for for my my job, but on the weekends, on the weeknights, I am home, I make sure I show up right. And for me, I enjoy watching their learning process. You know, talked about like, you practice, you practice, practice, practice, you play. And for me, there's no greater thing than to watch your kids go enjoy and learn and be great at whatever they are wanting to do at that point in time. As we all know, kids minds change from but like for me, a mental reset. Excuse me leaving the office and going to watching the soccer. Game, or the flight, football game, baseball game, is a huge, huge thing for me. And then I get my handful of, you know, time around the year with the family, like a spring break trip or a trip to the family cabin or something like that. But those are the things during the week that really kind of help me, help me reset. You have to make as a priority for me, that's my priority. My priority is being as present as I possibly can to my kids stuff, as for somebody else, it could be different depending on what they have going on, but that, that is my fun way for the day, right? And then asking the kids, and if they're enjoying it. I'm really enjoying it. So we got a couple choir concerts this year. You know that quite excited about So, like I said, whatever the activity is that they're into
Chelsea Lowman 55:53
you're into it.
Mary Newville 55:55
Okay? What are the activities you find yourself in the on the sidelines, sidelines for in this season quiet.
Matt Bykowski 56:03
We're wrapping up soccer right now, right wrapping up soccer. It was a big bummer. We had a tournament camps this weekend. As you're here in Minneapolis, the weather and the rain killed all the fields. That was a bummer, but we got more time at home, which was kind of nice. We weren't, we weren't. The weekend wasn't full of eight games, but that madness every weekend, you look at the weekend madness like, oh my god, I just want to chill out. And then you then it shows up, and you're like, we're listening to pump up jams in the car. We're getting fired up for the games. So I really enjoy that kind of chaos. I think it's probably because it's kind of what we do on a daily basis anyway. So I find comfort in, like the moving and the things so like, even though the wind down for well being is really important, you know, going on date nights or do whatever it is, we also find comfort in, like, keeping moving, but in a different way,
Matt Bykowski 56:57
cheering goals or baskets or can't be as loud at choir concerts as you can.
Chelsea Lowman 57:04
Well, I feel like, I feel like you must score like 95% extrovert or something. I'm not hearing any introvert tendencies in anything that you're sharing. I
Matt Bykowski 57:14
don't have a lot of introvert in me, and it can be a challenge because me and my or my wife and I both are pretty big extroverts, I will tell you, though, and this is better become a thing, because I spend so much time being an extrovert during the day, right? I do need to recharge my battery, and recharging my battery during the weekday is easier than it is on the weekend, and that's so cool. I'm still, I'm still doing it, but you will find my, you know, my wife and I kind of over talking each other sometimes. I have recently, I think, you know, even as a couple years ago, I took on that global role. I find myself that you do give a lot, right? You have to make sure you can give as much at home as you can as well. And I do have to have that recharge time, you know, I kind of laugh. My wife says, All right, see you in an hour, nine to 10pm time for me is, what kind of mindless TV could I put on and kind of recharge my battery before going to bed? So, yeah, I think in what we do, you know, you have to like to want to talk to people. It doesn't mean that you're good at your job because you're an extrovert. It's definitely a skill that you have to have. And not every great sales person is an extrovert. Some of the best, of the best sales people I've seen are surgical in the way they attack their day. They're very specific words, and sometimes you know, the only adage is, you know, guy you know, give us two ears and one mouth. You should do more listening than you should. Should. Talking is also pretty important thing in sales, because that's how you learn what your customers looking to accomplish, right, right, right. And that can go and that can be applied to having the customer conversation, or like you talked about in student leadership, talking about your team, listening and understanding the feedback you're getting from is way more important than telling exactly how things are going to go all the time. Now is the time and place for it all? Don't shoot that, but that is a pretty big, yeah.
Speaker 1 59:19
Okay. Well, we
Chelsea Lowman 59:22
are at the end of our questions. We have our rapid fire, which is just first thing that comes to your mind, quick,
Speaker 1 59:30
okay, best concert of your life. Best concert of my life, Hootie and the Blowfish. Whoa, okay,
Matt Bykowski 59:39
babe. Hootie fan, where? What legacy hoodie. I like Darius Rutgers, country music too. But like I listen to who these Greatest Hits I repeat pretty frequently. So
Speaker 1 59:51
yeah, when was this? When and where? Oh,
Matt Bykowski 59:53
I've seen them a bunch. So like last best one was at probably the State Fair. Empathy. Here, like six years ago. And this is not just a map. This is a by cow thing, like our family. We're all hoodie fans. We went as a fan. Okay,
Chelsea Lowman 1:00:09
do they still release music? Or is it just like
Matt Bykowski 1:00:12
they just play their they play their jams, just like, you know, any one of the other great bands, you know, they just, they just continuously tour, you know, whenever they're looking for a buck baby or something,
Chelsea Lowman 1:00:23
okay, all right, favorite word,
Matt Bykowski 1:00:27
favorite word. We'll stick with the theme. I'll say tenacity.
Speaker 1 1:00:32
Okay, that's what I was gonna guess. Um, a place on your bucket list? Oh, this is a good one.
Matt Bykowski 1:00:41
Having haven't been there. It's not even far away from here. I've been very close. I've been to Calgary a few times. Scott Coleman, if you're listening, you know, we'll get there soon, but it's it looks beautiful, and we've gotten to a lot of places around which is which is good. I get to see a lot of unique places around the globe with my travels for work, which is really exciting, but that's a that's a close one. I hear Lake Louise is special in the summertime. So
Chelsea Lowman 1:01:09
I was gonna say, Do you want to because I want to go both seasons, but you would say summer,
Matt Bykowski 1:01:15
both seasons would be great, but I think going during the summer would be a unique experience.
Chelsea Lowman 1:01:20
Okay, what's something that people often get wrong about you?
Matt Bykowski 1:01:24
Guys are asking pretty good questions. What people often get wrong about me? I think that's a better question answered for somebody that knows me,
Mary Newville 1:01:35
that you were a competitive
Matt Bykowski 1:01:40
I'll call out. I'll call this out. I have a brother that works in Arctic Wolf. He's not my son, and there's a one around that he's he's my kid, but no one know about me. Like, listen, yeah, I don't, I don't. I don't really know the answer.
Chelsea Lowman 1:01:57
You're exactly how you seem people. Yeah,
Matt Bykowski 1:02:04
that's okay, yeah, I guess you said extrovert, right? So who's got a big personality? And I said, not, not always. Is that the case? Maybe, you know, I really, I really do enjoy my, my, my Fung Shui Time, My Time on the boat with
Chelsea Lowman 1:02:22
Fung Shui time.
Matt Bykowski 1:02:26
Like, I like, I like a lot of simple things too. I enjoy just hanging out, right and and kind of disconnecting from everything and being an extrovert. You might think that I love spending the entire weekends and social gatherings and things and, you know, kids, sports, hanging out the backyard, being quiet on the boat, kind of, it's nicer once in a while. Yeah, I don't have a clear answer for that. That's like,
Chelsea Lowman 1:02:51
that's okay. I mean, every, every human has introversion and extroversion within so it was more so I was just thinking of the introverts. When you were like, you know, we're gonna have a we're gonna recharge this weekend, we're gonna put on the pump up jams, I was like, I don't think the introverts are probably like, that's not for me.
Matt Bykowski 1:03:12
Fully that way different. It's a different muscle you're using, though, right? A family and a family muscle, versus, maybe, say, a work muscle. And those can give off different piece. You know, be curious. You go ask, Will Briggs, or ask Todd again? What? Maybe that same question. I curious as to what they would say,
Chelsea Lowman 1:03:31
yeah. And now I try to think even what Todd, what Todd's answer for himself was, but I can't remember, Okay, last question. Give us a snapshot of an ordinary moment in your life that brings you joy.
Matt Bykowski 1:03:44
Oh, that's easy. And I sound like a, you know, I'm repeating, you know, a statement I love, just the simpleness of watching my kids fail and succeed. For me, that's like the ultimate thing. And that was how my folks were. It's how my sibling, like I just really enjoy seeing my kids do something, practice it, or say they want to do it, and then for them to see the success on it. So I really, really enjoy that piece. That's why I say the weekend might be really busy with the things they're doing, but that is what gets me completely fired up on the personal level,
Speaker 1 1:04:24
yeah, I love that.
Chelsea Lowman 1:04:26
Yes. And actually such a common answer, like we've heard that from multiple guests, that they love watching their kids learn, and as someone who, like, doesn't have kids, like my friends are starting to have kids, but that wasn't an aspect that I ever really thought about being a parent. But it seems like it's like, overwhelmingly, one of everyone's favorite parts of being a parent, in
Matt Bykowski 1:04:51
between telling them where the hell are your shoes and why didn't you water bottle? You know, what are you doing? You know? And then not listening to you, and they said they were going to do something all the equal parts that they can, you know, make your life busier and crazier. I just that's like, it's the ultimate satisfaction of seeing and again, whatever it is for me and my kids, is primarily sports right now, a little bit of the choir stuff and here in the practice. But I think for any parent that that that has to be one of the best joys, because that's kind of why you why you do it, so that's also why you work really hard during the week, so you can give your kids the opportunity to do things, and then for them to have that opportunity. And by the way, there's also failures that come with this and those conversations. It's not always success all the time, but just seeing them, you know, learn is super fun.
Mary Newville 1:05:48
Yeah, such a fun conversation. I'm excited for the greater pack to get to hear you and your story and your thought process and all the leadership insights you've shared.
Speaker 1 1:05:59
Well, it's really fun
Matt Bykowski 1:06:00
getting to know you guys on this podcast. I watched some of the stuff this weekend, and there are some big shoes to follow, so thanks for having me on here. I appreciate it's my second ever podcast. Yeah,
Speaker 2 1:06:15
we can plug it in. The first
Matt Bykowski 1:06:17
one was a long time ago, and this thing, kind of first beginning. It was for a charity event. So, so not, not a sales podcast. So I think you can. I think I can, or a company podcast. So there's a first for everything. Thanks for including me and asking me, I ramble a little bit sometimes, so I hope it was concise and not too boring.
Mary Newville 1:06:35
No, this is great. I think people are going to love it to get to know you personally in maybe ways they they hadn't before. So thank you so much for joining us today. Have
Speaker 1 1:06:46
a great rest of day. Thank you.
Chelsea Lowman 1:06:48
Okay, well, that was a great conversation with Matt, like you said in the intro. Yeah. Really excited for not just the pack, but for the public to get to hear it like I hope a lot of external people get to listen, because they were just so many great tips around leadership, and I love his thought process, etc. So
Mary Newville 1:07:07
I was thinking too. I feel like a lot of people will be encouraged listening to it, hearing just the different backgrounds and ways and like, how you can be successful. And there's not a blueprint for success, because everyone could find their own way. Yeah,
Chelsea Lowman 1:07:22
for sure. For sure. He really touched on that a lot. Well, I know our intro was quite long, so we're going to keep our outro short. Thanks again for listening. And Mary, let them know if they want to be part of the pack. Where should they go?
Mary Newville 1:07:35
Yes, come and join us and be part of this one of a kind community at Arctic, wolf.com, backslash careers, that's where you can find all our current open positions. We will talk to you in August, happy summer.
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