Ep 29 S14 - VaynerX’s Claude Silver on Why Being Yourself at Work Is the Most Strategic Thing You Can Do

In this episode of FOMO Sapiens, Patrick McGinnis sits down with Geoff Cook, CEO of Noom, the leading digital health platform combining psychology, technology, coaching, and clinical care. Geoff co-founded The Meet Group, a NASDAQ-listed social entertainment company he led for 18 years through its $500 million sale, before joining Noom to tackle something bigger: the full picture of human health. The conversation gets into why GLP-1s are only as effective as the habits built around them, what the real data shows about weight regain after discontinuation, how Noom's behavior change stack actually works, and why microdosing is quietly becoming one of the most interesting developments in preventative health. Geoff also shares why he started microdosing himself, what it did to his running habit and A1C, and how AI is making it possible to deliver genuinely personalized health guidance at scale for the first time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode of FOMO Sapiens, Patrick McGinnis sits down with Brandon Webb, former U.S. Navy SEAL, Course Manager of the elite SEAL Sniper Program, and New York Times bestselling author, to talk about his new book, Puddle Jumpers, and the uncomfortable argument at its center. The same mental management principles Brandon used to transform sniper training, including the visualization and self-talk frameworks developed by 1976 Olympic gold medalist Lanny Bassham, turned out to be just as powerful when applied to raising kids. The result is a parenting philosophy built not on protection but on preparation: letting children fail, experience consequences, and do hard things early so that they develop the roots to withstand whatever comes later. It's a conversation that will make a lot of parents uncomfortable and probably make their kids' lives a lot better. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode of FOMO Sapiens, Patrick McGinnis sits down with Max Marchione, co-founder and President of Superpower, a fast-growing preventative health platform making concierge-level medicine accessible for $199 a year. Max founded Superpower after a decade of misdiagnosis across more than 20 doctors, a frustration that led him to ask a simple but radical question: What if the best healthcare available to billionaires could be made available to everyone? The company has raised over $50 million, tests hundreds of biomarkers to build a digital twin of each member, and uses AI to deliver the kind of personalized health analysis that used to cost tens of thousands of dollars a year. But the conversation isn't just about health tech. It's about what it takes to build something from nothing as a first-time founder in your mid-twenties, why clarity comes from action rather than thinking, and why the single most important variable in your outcomes might be where you choose to live. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode of FOMO Sapiens, Patrick McGinnis sits down with Eric Ries, creator of the Lean Startup method and author of the New York Times bestseller The Lean Startup, to discuss his bold and urgently needed new book, Incorruptible: Why Good Companies Go Bad and How Great Companies Stay Great. Eric's core argument is as simple as it is unsettling: the corruption that destroys great companies is not primarily a problem of bad actors or weak ethics; it is structural. The systems governing organizations, ownership, incentives, accountability, board composition, and decision-making quietly reshape behavior over time until even principled leaders are producing outcomes they never intended. Drawing on two decades of work with founders, CEOs, and investors, and on vivid case studies from Costco, Patagonia, and H-E-B, Eric makes the case that incorruptibility is not a fantasy — it is a design problem, and builders have more agency than they think. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode of FOMO Sapiens, Patrick McGinnis sits down with Laura L. Rubin, founder of AllSwell Creative and author of The Big Unlock: Liberate Your Creativity Through Mindful Journaling, published by Simon & Schuster. Laura spent over a decade as a marketing and communications executive before building AllSwell into one of the leading voices on mindful writing, hosting hundreds of workshops for tens of thousands of participants and bringing journaling to some genuinely surprising places — from pro surfers to venture capital firms. The conversation gets into the science of what actually happens when you put pen to paper, why the inner critic exists and how to work around it, and why journaling may be the most cost-effective longevity and creativity tool available to anyone. Laura also introduces her four by four by four method — a gentle on-ramp for people who think they don't have time — and walks Patrick through a live coaching session that makes the whole thing feel very doable. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode of FOMO Sapiens, Patrick McGinnis sits down with Claude Silver, the world's first Chief Heart Officer and #2 executive at VaynerX, to explore what it actually means to show up as yourself at work — and why most people don't. Claude is the author of Be Yourself at Work, an instant USA Today bestseller that reframes authenticity not as a soft ideal but as a genuine strategic advantage, and the conversation lives up to that premise. They dig into the three pillars at the heart of her framework — emotional optimism, emotional bravery, and emotional efficiency — and what it takes to move through all three without skipping steps. Claude explains why the armor people wear to work is rooted in fear, why bravery without optimism goes nowhere, and why the people who seem most stoic are often the most emotional underneath. Patrick brings in the concept of pronoia — the belief that the world is conspiring to help you — and the two find a lot of common ground on what it means to lead from a place of genuine openness rather than performance. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode of FOMO Sapiens, Patrick McGinnis sits down with Charlie O'Donnell, founder of Brooklyn Bridge Ventures and author of Founder Unfriendly: What Investors Won't Tell You About Getting Funded, for one of the most practical and honest conversations about venture capital you're likely to hear. Charlie has spent more than two decades inside the New York startup ecosystem, starting as the first analyst at Union Square Ventures, helping open First Round Capital's NYC office, and going on to invest in over 100 companies through Brooklyn Bridge Ventures, the first venture fund based in Brooklyn. In this conversation, he dismantles some of the most persistent myths about fundraising: what "interested" actually means from a VC, why rejection is data and not a verdict, how to time-bind a process to create real urgency, and how to shape the conversations investors have after you leave the room. If you've ever wondered why a seemingly weaker startup got funded while yours didn't, this episode has the answer. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode of FOMO Sapiens, Patrick sits down with Jon McNeill, former President of Tesla, former COO of Lyft, and CEO of DVx Ventures, to unpack the operating system behind one of the most extraordinary growth stories in business history. During McNeill's tenure at Tesla, revenue grew from $2 billion to $20 billion in just 30 months. That kind of growth doesn't happen by accident — it follows a system. In his new book, The Algorithm: The Hypergrowth Formula That Transformed Tesla, Lululemon, General Motors, and SpaceX, McNeill lays out the five-step framework Elon Musk built at Tesla: question every requirement, delete every unnecessary step, simplify and optimize, accelerate cycle time, and only then automate. The conversation gets into how established companies like GM used these same principles to build the Hummer EV in roughly half the expected time, why speed is an advantage that shows up most powerfully on the balance sheet, and how the one-way/two-way door framework can help any leader make faster, smarter decisions without second-guessing themselves into paralysis. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sales isn’t about persuasion, and that misunderstanding is what keeps most founders stuck. In this episode of FOMO Sapiens, Patrick talks with Rob Snyder, a serial B2B founder, Harvard Business School alum, and venture partner, to break down what actually drives revenue in zero-to-one startups. Rob shares how two years of brutal rejection forced him to unlearn everything business school taught him about sales, and how discovering real demand (instead of trying to create it) unlocked rapid growth. Together, they unpack why founders over-invest in product and pitch decks, why customers don’t want to be convinced, and how the best sales conversations feel effortless. If you’ve ever built something you believed in, only to find no one buying, this episode will fundamentally change how you think about sales, demand, and product-market fit. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this episode of FOMO Sapiens, Patrick sits down with Liz Tran, founder of Inner Genius and author of AQ: A New Kind of Intelligence for a World That's Always Changing, to explore a simple but urgent idea: in a world defined by constant disruption, IQ and EQ are no longer enough. What we need now is AQ, the Agility Quotient, which Liz defines as your capacity to handle change, disappointment, and uncertainty. Drawing on a decade of work with over 200 founders and executives, Liz breaks down the four AQ archetypes — the Astronaut, the Firefighter, the Neurosurgeon, and the Novelist — and explains what each one looks like at its best and worst. The conversation gets into how AI is leveling the IQ playing field, why the most impressive résumés can actually signal lower AQ, and how the real divide in today's world isn't political or economic — it's between the people who are undone by change and the people who know how to use it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices