Former Chairman & Chief Executive Officer, Intuit
Passing the Leadership Baton with Brad Smith
The Marshall University Lewis College of Business "Passing the Leadership Baton Series" is series of recorded interviews between the Hall of Fame (HOF) inductees and current Marshall students on various leadership topics. Since 1994, we have inducted Marshall alumni who are the best of the best of Marshall Sons and Daughters to celebrate their life-long success and contributions. We are extremely proud of their achievements and would like to have them share their experiences and stories with our currently students. Passing the Leadership Baton Series will be developed to nurture and strengthen...
About Brad Smith
Brad Smith, former Chairman and CEO of Intuit, has spoken at multiple QuickBooks Connect events between 2014 and 2018, where he discussed the company's strategy, product innovations, and the role of small businesses in the economy. At the 2014 event, Smith described Intuit's goal to be "the operating system behind small business success" and highlighted features such as QuickBooks financing, which he said had increased loan acceptance rates from 60% to 70% by using business data rather than FICO scores. He also stated that small businesses had created 60% of new jobs since the beginning of the recession and that if one in three small businesses hired one more employee, it would eliminate unemployment in the U.S. In 2015, Smith announced a $100 million fund for QuickBooks financing and said the company had facilitated over a quarter of a billion dollars in loans. He also noted that the company had testified before Congress as an advocate for self-employed workers. In a 2018 interview, Smith said he heard from customers that they valued connecting with one another, new product launches such as practice management, and innovations in payments, payroll, and capital access. He stated that "people don't care what you know until they know that you care" and expressed optimism about the company's future. In other appearances, Smith discussed Intuit's operating values, including a "70-20-10" resource allocation model and a "delight pyramid" for product design. He described an experiment where engineers developed a mobile feature allowing users to photograph tax documents for automatic data entry, which he said became a significant growth driver for TurboTax. Smith also spoke about his upbringing in West Virginia and his education at Marshall University, stating that leadership involves being true to oneself and playing to one's strengths.
Transcript (13 segments)
✨ AI-enhanced transcript with speaker attribution
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Katie Hadn0:00
Hello there and welcome to the Marshall University Passing Leadership Baton series. My name is Katie Hadn and I'm K. Leone, and today we have with us Brad Smith, current chairman and CEO of Intuit and proud son of Marshall University. How are you doing today, sir?
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Brad Smith0:11
I'm doing great. How are you doing today?
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Katie Hadn0:14
We're doing pretty good. Good. Yeah, so today we're going to cover a few topics that fall into what we see is a very unique category: looking at one's flaws and turning them into their greatest assets. So some of the topics that we're going to discuss today include diversity, authenticity, and transparency in the workplace. So let's talk about diversity in the workplace. We saw that you recently published an article on LinkedIn about diversity in the workplace, and from what we read, it seems that you think diversity strengthens the workplace very much so. With that in mind, what are some steps that you and your company have taken to be more accepting and open of diverse people from all over with different backgrounds?
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Brad Smith0:53
Well, first of all, it's great to have the two of you here on campus out here in California, and I love Marshall University. I still wear the ring every day, as you know. And when you talk about diversity, I think we're great examples of that—the three of us. Diversity in all of its forms leads to better outcomes. It doesn't matter if it's diversity of race, gender, sexual orientation, religious beliefs. When you bring people from different backgrounds together, we represent the world because the world is a melting pot, and the more we represent those around us, the better we can understand and the better we can solve the world's most important problems. One of the things that I'm always reminded of is the Human Genome Project. When they decoded the human DNA back in the 90s, what they discovered is 99.8 percent of all human beings are identical, but we spend our lives looking at that two-tenths of a percent that are different. Why don't we spend more time focusing on the things that are common, and then relish the fact that our differences are what makes us collectively stronger? So that's why I believe so much in our company believes in diversity.
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Katie Hadn1:52
No, absolutely. So I mean, we can tell that you care very passionately about diversity, especially the fact that people shouldn't hide who they are and that they should be accepting of each other's differences. Right. So it seems that being authentic really goes a long way in the business world, as we can tell from your many successes. Well, we'd like to move on now to authenticity, and that's one of your strongest points, as you say it in Intuit. We would like to know how you change your personal flaws into your assets, like how would you tell others how they would change it as well?
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Brad Smith2:20
Well, I think what's most important is to always be true to yourself. In this entire world, I can assure you, no one's going to be a better you than you. And that means you need to embrace your strengths, your gifts, but also try to minimize your weaknesses. But don't seek to be perfect. No one's ever going to be perfect. We all look in the mirror in the morning and we say, 'Gosh, I've put on a few extra pounds,' or 'I'm getting wrinkles,' or in my case, maybe my hair is getting a little gray—or a lot gray. But you've got to embrace that because that's simply an opportunity for you to be the best version of you you can. And this is the analogy I give: if you were thinking about life as a sport, I would suggest that you play baseball and not gymnastics. And you may say, 'Well, what does that have to do with embracing your flaws?' Well, in gymnastics, if you think about how the competitions go, you step out onto the mat and then they begin to deduct points for every mistake you make. And so what happens is a gymnast tries to be perfect and they're always playing with this tension. On the other hand, you think about baseball: the greatest hitter ever was Ted Williams. His best season he hit .406. His lifetime batting average was .344. That means he did not get on base two-thirds of the time. He struck out two-thirds of the time, and yet he's the world's greatest hitter. So I want people to step up and swing for the fences, and if you don't get on base, that's okay. You've got another chance to get up at bat. Play baseball.
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Katie Hadn3:41
So definitely vulnerability is something that would make you a stronger leader, like as you said, standing before it's a personal flaw. So we can say it does make you a stronger leader.
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Brad Smith3:50
You know, it does. And I think what it does, Kaylee, is it gives you the chance to create an environment where everyone treats success and failure the same. It's simply an opportunity to learn and grow. And if you can actually role model that as a leader, if you can stand up and talk about the mistakes you've made, and you make it safe for everyone else because then they say, 'Wow, maybe I could have that person's job because I make mistakes, but it didn't stop him or her from getting that position, so maybe I can as well.' And I learned that lesson from my dad. My dad was the mayor of our hometown in Kenova, West Virginia. And I had the chance to go home one day and watch him give a speech. During that speech, he used the word 'ain't' probably half a dozen times. After the speech, I went up and I said, 'Dad, are you open to some feedback?' And he smiled because he knew what was coming. He said, 'Sure, some. What's on your mind?' And I said, 'You used the word 'ain't' at least half a dozen times, and at our kitchen table, you never let my brothers or I use the word 'ain't.' What gives?' And he said, 'Son, look at me and look at them, and recognize that people prefer their leaders with flaws because that makes leadership more attainable for the rest of us.' So if they know I can become the mayor and I'm not perfect, maybe one of them is sitting there right now dreaming that maybe they can be the mayor too. And that's what leadership is all about.
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Katie Hadn5:05
Absolutely. Some great insight on that. Let's move on to the topic of transparency. So transparency, or what some other business leaders might call vulnerability, we've seen as a key aspect of your leadership at Intuit. For instance, you've had such great success with by speaking with your employees to gain more ideas for your company. Would you say your ability has allowed you to have more success because you're not like the other CEOs that sort of keep their feelings hidden? And if so, why? And does it really affect the workplace to such a great degree compared to these other companies where their CEOs aren't as open with their feelings?
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Brad Smith5:42
You know, Cody, I can't speak to how other CEOs leave their companies, and I'm not sure if they do or they don't express their feelings. But I learned early on from where we grew up to never mistake kindness for weakness. We're all human beings. We're sons and daughters, we're brothers and sisters, we're wives and husbands, we're mothers and fathers. And so it's important to first recognize that we're just humans, we're just people helping people. In fact, the Intuit logo dots the T's and not the I's. And if you look at the logo, it's because the two T's look like people with their arms extending out holding hands, and in between the two T's is the letter U and I. And it's people helping people, trying to get together to help you and I. So I love that concept. It's embodied in our company culture. It's the way I was raised, that's the way I'm sure you were raised. And I think that's the important thing for leaders to think about: we're just people helping people. So at the end of the day, what I would suggest any leader who is trying to hide their feelings is, there's an old quote my dad used to share with me: 'The further up the flagpole you climb, the more your rear end shows.' So you may think you're hiding something from your employees, but I guarantee you they're seeing the mistakes and they're watching the things you're doing. So you might as well be true about it, because otherwise your butt is showing either way.
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Katie Hadn6:53
Right. Absolutely. All right. So with all these points in mind, when you say these attributes have helped you become you, Brad Smith, do you have any advice that you could give anyone else that maybe could overcome these like flaws and accept their vulnerabilities?
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Brad Smith7:09
You know, the best piece of advice I can give is what I shared a few minutes ago: just be true to who you are. Wake up every day and try to be a better version of yourself. Continuously lean in and seek to learn and grow. Treat a setback the same way you treat a success, as an opportunity to learn. And the most important thing: never forget that life is a team sport. There's a great quote from Eleanor Roosevelt. She once said that we're all born angels with only one wing, and the way we learned to fly is by holding on to each other. There's an even better quote for me: it's not 'I am,' where you are, it is 'We are Marshall.' And that is life's placid: life is a team sport.
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Katie Hadn7:52
So we'd like to thank you all for being a part of this and watching. If you would like to see more of these interviews, you can go to marshall.edu / co beyond the College of Business website. And we thank you again for being a part of this. We are Marshall.