บทถอดความฉบับเต็มของ Altruistic Entrepreneurship: John Neal's Vision that Changed Healthcare Decisions

hundred miles an hour or in that range, high nineties, low hundreds kind of thing. So, let me ask you a little bit about being a catcher it's known as the field general. You're the only player that has a different perspective out of all the other players on the field. You're looking out, everybody else is looking towards home plate, You know, one knock on baseball from some people, myself included, it's a little bit of a boring sport sometimes. if you're in left field, you may not touch the ball the entire game. It may not get hit to you, but if you're the catcher, you're involved essentially on every play. you're controlling the environment, you're the leader on the field. So tell me how being a catcher and being in that vantage point, helped you excel at sports and eventually business and excel in that John: Yeah. so there's a lot of input, a lot of information that goes into the catcher and him really directing play in baseball. And it's not evident to the casual fan all that's going on, but there's a lot going on and to this day I can still appreciate baseball in a way that a lot of people can't, having been in that position. and it really covers The gamut, everything from calling pitches based on who the batter is, their tendencies, the strike, ball strike count. But then depending on how we're pitching a batter, how we set up the defense, so playing to position, making sure the shortstops, whatever the case may be, make sure that we're approaching that at bat and that batter appropriately so that Hopefully we get the guy out. so There is a lot that's going into each and every pitch. And you know, I can say that over time, pretty much everything I've done has involved data and information and then assimilating that data, organizing that data. It kind of started with baseball and being a catcher and applying those skills to the game, but then having learned some of those skills and then learning a lot more over time and my experience in my career. it was definitely a starting point Will: Yeah, absolutely. And baseball is a very statistic driven sport, probably the most out of all the sports they track every stat, every statistic, every every pitch, every strikeout, So that makes sense that, you being a catcher, being in that world, learning early to analyze that amount of data would propel you forward into what you eventually later became. But after high school you had some opportunities to play in college and ultimately played at the University of Tennessee. what other options were on the table for you other than the vols? John: Yeah, so I actually had an appointment to West Point and was very close to taking that. In fact, they had sent me a plane ticket. I actually have the receipt still to this day. but about three days before I was supposed to leave, I chose not to. Fortunately wasn't too late to consider some other options. So really it boiled down to three options for me. and the options were Alabama, Vanderbilt. Tennessee. And I was a

lifelong Tennessee fan having grown up. And that was back when of course, college sports has its challenges these days with NIL and all those kinds of things. But back in the day, loyalty meant a ton. so I was I was a tried and true Tennessee fan. actually had I used my head, I probably would have ended up at Vanderbilt, but I used my heart and I actually strongly considered Alabama, really liked their their coach at the time a guy named Schollingberger, but I ended up at Tennessee, kind of went with my heart. And really don't have any regrets. I regret that ultimately my my career ended prematurely. But other than that, fantastic experience and to have played in the SEC and having experienced that level of competition was something that's really been invaluable to me, even to this day. Will: Yeah, that's interesting that you had an appointment to West Point to go play baseball. My brother played football at the University of Florida, but also in his process had an appointment to West Point to play, baseball and football. He was essentially John: Well. Will: do both sports and he also elected to go with his heart over his head and wound up at the University of Florida because he was a lifelong Gator fan. And he played for Steve Spurrer. He was actually on Steve Spurer's very last team he coached at the University of Florida. And, I think when he sat down in a room with Steve Spurrier and Steve Spurrier asked him point blank, Hey Rob, would you like to be a gator? And the word yes came out of his mouth very quickly. John: I can't fault him for that. Will: absolutely. what did you major in at Tennessee? What was your area focus, and then what did you do after once you graduated? John: So my area of focus until I was injured was baseball and baseball and baseball. It literally was my full-time job. And academics at the time were secondary, and that was just the way it was. It didn't matter what your sport was, if they were paying for your school. And the way baseball worked, and to this day, it still works this way, although there are NIL considerations, but you have a limited number of scholarships. So you have a travel team of 25 guys. You had 14 scholarships to distribute. So other than one guy on a baseball team, you had a partial ride. so everybody had some money, but not everything's paid for. Didn't matter. The coaches expected your full attention and effort. and academics were secondary, it was kind of, talking out of the side of the mouth when they said, hey, you gotta go to class, you gotta do well in school. but I actually did go to class. I did pretty well in school. I maintained some focus academically, but I definitely prioritized baseball because That was the expectation. but my major was was finance and I actually learned quite a bit and enough. and it gave me the foundation to do some other things coming out of school. Will: And you touched on a couple of times that you had an injury that basically upended your baseball career. What

was that injury John: Yeah. Yeah, so it's interesting. my life has been a series of curveballs or detours. And this was the first one. I thought I had a plan. I had this ambition to play professionally. I was an undersized catcher in this you see, but I was pretty good defensively. a defensive catcher was valued professionally. so I thought, look, worst case I can play for two or three years. In the minor leagues. It was just something I wanted to do. But ultimately early my junior season, we're playing at Alabama. I'm on first base, first inning of the game. They just wet the infield. And in baseball, when you're on base, pitcher throws the ball, you get something called a secondary lead. So you kind of hop off towards the next base to get a jump in case the ball is put into play or something happens so that you can advance the next base. Well, in this case, I got my secondary lead. The catcher for Alabama came up fake to throw to first and I dove back. And the problem was when I dove back, my hand stuck in the dirt and it dislocated and ruptured tendons, ligaments, dislocated my shoulder. I didn't realize how serious it was I actually finished the game, but the next day I literally couldn't raise my arm. And coach said, Hey, you know, we gotta get you in to see the doctor. I didn't go to the doctor and I came back and played two weeks later, last game I ever played against Florida. And I was just done. I played the game and somehow managed to get through it, but next day it was worse than ever. So that was it. I had surgery a couple of months later. And back then the type of injury I had couldn't easily be repaired. they essentially tight my shoulder such that I don't have range of motion. So my career was over in a flash. But what that did for me is it refocused me on academics. And got me thinking about my future in terms of what's next after I get out of school. So that really shaped how I thought about things and what I thought about pursuing. I even considered a coaching career and was offered that with university attention on that staff, but thought it was in my best interest to go get a real job. And that's Will: Yeah. John: what I ended up doing. Will: and thinking of you sliding back into first nowadays the players wear those oven mitts on their hands or I don't know if that's exactly what they're called, but that's exactly what they John: Yeah. Will: look like. to prevent those types of injuries, And I guess, the exchange of looking ridiculous, wearing oven mitts, but hopefully you won't get injured while you're wearing those mitts. John: I would have worn everything. Anything and everything. Will: we often hear the term student athlete thrown around, right? And I think that's little S big A. You've mentioned NIL a couple of times, kind of upending how we've traditionally viewed college sports. but what are your thoughts on the implications of NIL on young athletes coming out of high school? John: Yeah. it's disappointing. really it's

taking the student part out of the equation, like you were saying. And it's just emphasizing the wrong thing it's one thing as a student athlete, look, I don't fault them for pursuing the financial opportunity. but for those who don't make it and don't generate enough in the way of income. or lack the direction to put whatever financial gain they have to work for them to build a future, I think it's to their detriment because what's happening is they're just not getting the education. So if the athletic side of the equation doesn't pan out for them, what's next? And I think that that's the greatest fallacy of the whole entire system but then from a fan standpoint or even An alumnus that love to follow his team. I find myself losing interest just because you can't make those connections with the program and the people and the kids that were there before. and even the people I know at Tennessee that are more closely involved in the athletics program, they're on the front line of it and they realize. And I think many of those folks in particular know that it's not sustainable. Something's gotta give. And I'm hopeful that it will give. I know there's some legislation up for consideration. hopefully that's gonna help. take a step in the positive direction, we'll see what Will: And as Ronald Reagan famously said, we're from the federal government and we're here to help are some of the most dangerous words ever uttered. so we'll see how that legislation works out. And also to your point, John, These players aren't having that opportunity to immerse themselves in a culture at Tennessee, the University of Florida, wherever, and build that, trust with their other, teammates. And that's unfortunate too for those kids because there's important lessons that can be learned from sports. but as a casual fan and observer that's another downside of this NIL debacle. John: Yeah, everyone's a mercenary. Yeah. Will: soldier of fortune, have gun will travel. and so you majored in finance and you redoubled your efforts on your educational opportunities after your injury, you graduate from the University of Tennessee. What'd you do next? John: Yeah, so honestly, I didn't plan well. I went back to Nashville and started looking for a job, had my finance degree. I did pretty well, I had a good GPA. but had not networked, hadn't done all the things that are critical in kind of setting out on the right path and securing a good first job. I actually went to work for a company as a financial analyst. that was the title. And It was a company called Service Merchandise. I don't know if you remember Service Merchandise, but it was it was essentially a catalog showroom. So they would produce these Sears like catalogs and they'd send them out to people. They were books, they're like 300 pages. They featured jewelry, but then they had a lot of other stuff, household items and the like. And you go into the store, you fill out a form and they put it on a conveyor belt. You couldn't just go to the shelf and pick up what you wanted, go to the cashier and pay for it. You had to go through this process. And it was the most backward, inconvenient process that you could ever imagine. Anyway, so I worked for this company. And looking around, there was just the sense that everything needed to change. Like they needed to change the store model, they needed to change some of the management of the team. I was fresh out of college, but just looking around, I could tell some things weren't working the way that they should. So Kind of in a nutshell, I had a great experience in that it was so bad because it showed to me how many things could be wrong in terms of people, operations, efficiencies, inefficiencies. so I learned a lot from that. And it also got me focused on making plans and taking steps that would lead to future success personally. so this was another one of my curveballs. or unexpected terms. So I didn't last more than a year and a half. I decided I'd go back to business school after the service merchandise debacle. So I ended up I had a chance to go back to the University of Tennessee and get my MBA. even then I knew it wasn't a great idea to go to the same school, but I didn't have to pay the tuition side of it. So it kind of made sense to me. So anyway it turned out fine. So I went back for two years and got my business degree and set my sights on getting into the financial services industry. Will: so after you got your MBA, did you in fact get into the financial services industry? John: Did so my objective before I went back to business school and thinking about what do I like to do, what do I want to do as a career? And I love studying the financial markets and do to this day. so I thought best fit would be okay, I want to be a stock equity analyst and then hopefully evolve into a portfolio management career. So at the time, mutual funds. Peter Lynch was big with Fidelity. So there were these big mutual funds. John Templeton had a bunch of mutual funds as well that were international. so I thought, hey, that's where I want to be. Didn't exactly turn out that way. Will: so where did you end up working? John: So in my pursuit of these equity research opportunities, I interviewed with Raymond James here in Tampa and interviewed with a firm called Morgan Keegan. reality was I realized at the time, look, I didn't have the pedigree to go to Wall Street and work for the big firms at the time, Merrill Lynch and Goldman Sachs and those, but I did have enough in terms of an academic background, and I think my athletic background and some of the things that I done, I had a profile that appealed to these regional investment banks. So I interviewed for equity research analyst positions with Raymond James and Morton Keegan. And in both cases, and by the way, it was interesting, I bet Raymond James still does this. They actually gave me a test when I went in there. And I think it's a screening test. And if you don't pass it, like, see

you later. But anyway, I got a call back from him, so I must have been okay on that test. But I interviewed with Morgan Keegan and Raymond James. Morgan Keegan offered me a job in investment banking. And I thought about it. There wasn't an opening an equity researcher. And as I started thinking about it and learning more about the opportunity, I thought, hey, that could be a great training ground for me. And I took the job with Morgan Keegan. And then about a week after I took the job with Morgan Keegan, Raymond James called me and offered me the same position. It's very ironic. And I loved Tampa at the time. I didn't know much about it, having spent most of my youth in Nashville, but anyway, it kinda worked out. Got back here eventually. Will: So where was that job located? John: So that was based in Memphis. and I spent about two years doing that. And my whole goal goal going into that was to learn as much as I could and literally drank from the fire hose. I worked on I actually have a record of this. I was looking at it because I thought you might ask me about it. I worked on 18 live transactions in two years, meaning they were done deals. They were either equity offerings, IPOs or secondary offerings. or MA deals. I was exposed to so much transaction activity and got to meet these senior management teams of the companies that we were working with. And through that process, I learned a ton. I learned a ton about financial statements, what made companies tick, what the keys were in terms of how markets valued those companies. What were the key differentiators for those companies? was it the line of business? Was it the management team? Was it the way that they did things? And it was a combination of all those things. But what impressed me most were the people that I met, the entrepreneurs that were running these companies. And what I realized is and it didn't take me long. And this really shaped how I thought about what I was doing at the time. I admired those people in what they were doing with their companies to grow their companies and make an impact. I admired them more than really all of the work and the people that I was working with on the day to, I admired that a lot more than I admired the work that was being done in the financial services industry. So that shifted my compass and focus to wanting to become and really knowing that I was an entrepreneur at heart. I could see myself doing those things. So What I was on the lookout for, and it actually came to me sooner rather than later, was that next opportunity. and that next opportunity was to be part of a founding management team. Will: what year are we talking about John: So this would have been kind of mid mid-90s, I was in investment banking for a couple of years. I worked as an investment banking associate. but what was interesting, we were a small group. We've only had 20, guys. There were no women. And because of that, I was assigned an incredible amount of responsibility. I remember going out and meeting with a senior management team for an equity offering by myself. and That was incredible experience at such an early age. I ran a process to sell a Wendy's franchisee at the time and pretty much wrote the book myself, went out and marketed myself and and actually of course the MD for our group took all the credit, but I did all the work and I learned a ton. So, you know, typical of how a lot of those things work in the financial services industry. Will: Yeah, so at this time you're working in the financial services industry and you have that kind of aha moment. Hey, I'm an entrepreneur and I want to maybe do something on my own. So walk me through when you first had the idea to create and start health health grades, how how did that come to you and and and did you see a need in the industry? you said early nineties, websites are relatively new at this. Time right? Like like it's not they're not established like they are today. the dot com boom era type thing. Is that is that the time frame we're John: so there's a little bit of an intermediate step in here, and this is another curveball. you're right, So this was the era of the internet. So Netscape, AOL, Yahoo, those companies are all just booming, right? Incredible excitement. A lot like what's happening with AI now, although I think AI's it's different this time, right? But At the time there was enormous interest in the internet and what it was becoming. But when I left banking, I actually teamed up with a couple of other guys. One of them is Carrie Hicks, who is a friend to this day. But we had just sold Carrie's company, LBA Healthcare Consulting, and he was looking for the next big thing. And kind of collaboratively, the three of us got in a room and said, Hey, there's this opportunity to roll up or consolidate. Orthopedic physician practices. There were a few other companies in that industry at the time, but none of them were push pursuing orthopedics. So what we did is we assembled a group of founding orthopedic practices, best practices in the United States, brought them together and created a company. It was called physician practice management roll-up. We took it public, and my job was to go out and acquire additional orthopedic practices, mostly on the east coast. And we had Amazing success for about a year. And about a year after we got into that business, stock did great. So went public at like eight dollars a share. Stock trades up to thirteen. We're all excited. We're going out and making acquisitions with our stock. This is great. That model worked as long as your stock still held value because we would acquire these orthopedic practices using a combination of stock and cash. We needed our stock to do well. What happened at the time, there were a couple of large companies, five core and med partners, they decided they would get together and contemplate a merger. Well, when they did that, they basically blew up the entire industry because through the

due diligence process, there were some discoveries that were made that revealed some of the weak spots in the model. And essentially, a lot more was being paid for these different kinds of physician groups and practices than they were worth. And It was just the flawed model. It didn't work. So the bottom line is what was a successful business quickly imploded. We ended up selling all the assets back to the orthopedic practices. And Healthgrades at the time, which was there was a little company inside of specialty care that had hospital information. It rated hospitals. Healthgrades still does that to this day. so it's about hospital quality. And anyway, that was what remained of the remnants of specialty care. So they used that entity, that residual entity, to start this hospital quality business. I left. I was like, you know, the internet is so hot right now, I need to figure it out. So I left what was left of specialty care and the health grades hospital quality business and went to work for the senior management team of a company called Service Magic. these companies are all in Denver. So at the time I moved from Memphis to Denver to start specialty care, and then still in Denver and Golden Colorado was Service Magic. So I joined their senior management team, really learned about the internet and how it worked. and Service Magic actually now is Angie's. so there was a lot of consolidation In that business over time. Ultimately, what happened to Service Magic was acquired by Barry Dillers Interactive Corp. And lived there for a long time. He bought Angie's, combined Service Magic, Home Advisor, Angie's into one company. Now that's a public company. But anyway, I worked two years for that company and decided to exit and relocated to Tampa, where my brother was living at the time. My parents were retiring. we had my daughter in Colorado, wanted to be closer to family, so relocated to Tampa. Lo and behold, when I get back to Tampa, I reconnect with Carrie and had a conversation one day. And I'm I'm happy to share you know what happened there that kind of led to the genesis of health grades. Will: Yeah, absolutely. Please share. John: Yeah, so Carrie and I longtime friends, we would catch up periodically. And we were having a conversation one day and Carrie was talking about their hospital data and what they were doing to distinguish certain hospitals. It really matters, by the way, where you get treatment, especially if you have more significant conditions or diseases. Where you choose to go to the hospital and have surgery or get treatment, The results are superior for the best hospital. So that's what that hospital business was about. But the company at the time, which was just healthgrades, there was no dot-com to it, had a repository of not just hospital data but physician data. And there really was a dearth of information about healthcare providers, whether it was hospitals, physicians, nursing homes, it just didn't exist online. There was nothing. And what I had learned at Service Magic is that. There were these these opportunities to create marketplaces. And in the case of Service Magic, it was about home services, where we would connect people that had maybe they wanted a remodeler or made, we'd connect consumers with home service professionals. And my theory was that, and talking to Carrie, I said, you know, Carrie, I really believe that because there's this data asymmetry is what I called it. and there wasn't good organization of the data. So I said, Carrie, hey. What if we organize the data in a way that makes it consumable for consumers and transparent? So we want to educate and inform consumers of healthcare. And lo and behold, there was a business there. I figured out with a small team, we literally had four other people, myself and four other people. we had a $10 million business in about six months. Because what I found is that there were millions of people at that time. This would have been about late 2002, early 2003. there were a couple of million people at that time going on Google, mostly Google, and looking for physicians, just searching on a doctor's name or orthopaedic surgeons, Tampa, those kinds of things. so there was a there there. the trick was in trying to figure out a way to monetize that business. Will: Yeah, and obviously you guys built the better mousetrap in order to figure out how to monetize that business because before healthgrades dot com came along, other than searching Google, it's essentially a word of mouth game as far have you been to this particular doctor? What do you think about that doctor? should I go to that doctor? But when you're talking about when people are dealing with life and death health consequences and seeking treatment that they need for whatever is ailing them, time is not on their side. And being able to, find that particular doctor or specialty immediately and that's the doctor that hopefully is going to get you the right treatment program and, put you on the right path to getting better, you guys took that situation and basically poured gasoline on the fire and turned it into something that essentially took off overnight. John: it did. And I'll tell you at its core, and this was the original intent with the hospital data as well. the objective was altruistic. And even to the point where we sold healthgrades.com in twenty twenty one to Red Ventures in United Healthcare, that was always the primary objective. How can we guide consumers and assist consumers in finding best healthcare based on their specific condition or need. And with that as our guiding mantra, I think that helped us to focus in the right way. So it was always the patient first, not just the consumer, but the patient first. What can we do to enlighten and inform them so they can make that right selection based on their specific need. But with that, you know there's Altruism will take you only so far. We had to figure out how to make the platform

self-sufficient. And there was a lot of trial and error. Initially, what we did is we would sell reports to consumers, so physician reports, hospital reports, even for some time nursing on reports, and they would pay us. the problem is the data wasn't always consistent. So we had more data for certain physicians indoor hospitals than we had for others. And if you're charging everyone the same price for different data sets, that's not really equitable. So we evolved to a model that was more of what the internet became, and even to this day, in most ways, it still is that an advertising model, meaning that consumers were able to access all available information for free. and in return for that. we would get sponsored. So we we built a huge audience that way. by the time we sold the company to Vestar or were taken private in 2010, we were probably generating around 10 million visits per month, which at the time put us in the healthcare category among the leaders especially intent-driven consumers or patients in this case Very seldom were you able to get in front of a such a specific audience. So there was a lot of value in that. and if you think about who would the advertisers be, well, it's the providers themselves. So the health systems, the big hospital systems were our biggest clients, we worked with them all and literally across the entire country, gave me the chance to visit pretty much every major city in the country over four or five years. So we formed this incredible network. And that reinforced our data. Because when we would partner with these health systems, they were able to funnel data to us that was otherwise unavailable. We made that available to consumers. So we would package that up. And then the other thing that we did that was unique and a step forward and seems a little simple in this day and age, but we facilitated the connection between the consumer and the provider. and we would do that with a call center oftentimes. And now it's done, hopefully with the little button where you can schedule online, but it's still a huge challenge in healthcare to open up physician schedules. Will: healthcare is obviously a very personal and individualized circumstance for each particular patient. And what you guys were doing through health grades was essentially empowering the the patient to be able to understand and gather the data necessary to make their best health decisions. Because if you've ever been in the healthcare system as a patient you feel very small So was an obstacle building the trust with the end user or was the information provided being gobbled up, and appreciated just because it was there John: Yeah, so there were two problems we were solving for. So on the provider side it was the inconsistency or lack of transparency in the data. It was just absent or unavailable. And we had access to some of the data. part of our strategy was to go out, let's secure more data. so there's quantitative data objective data and then there's qualitative data qualitative is the reviews that you see online right so we had two different kinds of data sets but our focus initially was on the objective quantifiable data and then we complemented over time gather reviews as the platform grew obviously that kind of feeds the beast as consumers come in they complete surveys questionnaires about the physicians And that's highly valued by consumers. All of us today as consumers obviously like to know what other people's experiences are. so that was on the provider side. really again, addressing information asymmetry and organizing data. That's really what that amounted to in terms of how we defined it. But on the consumer side, it was really about creating awareness that this data existed. And that consumers could use it, but also putting it in a form that was consumable. So that was really what we called a product effort within healthgrades.com is to present and package that information in a way that consumers could easily distill what was important to them. And to differentiate and distinguish among physicians, so comparison tools and those kinds of things, It could be location based, it could be patient survey or experience based, or it could be volume-based, is it related to number of procedures, where they practiced, what hospital, those kinds of things. So there were a variety of variables that we would present to the consumers and allow them to filter and adjust based on what they wanted to emphasize. Will: and other than what you just said, were there any particular obstacles or missteps that you had to overcome in order to make health creates the success that it was? John: there there were always challenges. Everything was about solving a problem, and the data was imperfect. So a lot of times as we aggregated data, we would find inconsistencies or errors in the data. And that got back to the source of the data. And these were gold standard sources of data, sources that had been relied on for decades. And what we found is that the data. Oftentimes it would be incomplete or inconsistent. And that was not okay. So we had to work to solve that problem. And where we couldn't resolve the problem, to be transparent about that when it came to consumers and present that in a way that they could understand. the consumer problem is ongoing. anytime you're engaging with a consumer, you're always trying to refine, educate, inform in our case. And it's an imperfect science. one of the areas, for example, where we struggled a lot was with patient surveys. We would get a lot of complaints from physicians. so validating that a consumer actually went to a physician and then completed a survey, oftentimes people that are dissatisfied they have a greater propensity to actually complete a survey, that was problematic because disproportionately you're casting more negative reviews than positive reviews. Not always. and especially what we learned is the physicians that had great bedside manner, they

may not be the best physicians, but if they had great bedside manner, they could have great ratings. and then physicians, even though they could be the best, most experienced, have the best outcomes in their field, they could have a terrible bedside manner, they get poor ratings. they didn't receive that well. And oftentimes there's a balance to be struck between qualitative and objective data. And we would try to help the consumer with this. Yes, it matters what other people are saying, but when it comes to this specific condition or disease, here are the things that you need to prioritize. So we were always problem solving around making the best match. you know, there are these matching sites based on relationships. We were actually applying the same types of thought and capabilities to matching consumers or patients with physicians. Will: Yeah, and other than understanding that, the consumer that had a bad experience is more likely than not to fill out a a survey and be negative there. were there other things that you learned about consumer behavior from this experience? John: there was always learning. I think one of the things is once you give a consumer some information, they want more. And they have a certain minimum expectation around the quality of that information. And if you don't meet that expectation, you're gonna draw the ire of the consumer. so it was something that we were very, very mindful of. it was never perfect. we were always working to resolve and get better. Consumers have very high expectations. We didn't have a problem with that because it made us better, but it challenged us a lot. And the challenge really was a function of and we worked over time. We had a lot of time at this. We had almost 20 years. actually I was involved in health grades in different capacities, but Almost twenty years to work to solve the problem and even to the last day that I was directly involved in running the company day to day, it was something that was front of mind and the highest of priorities for us. Will: you touched on earlier your experience with service merchandise and how basically that was an education on how not to do things. and then you work with service magic and ultimately with health grades. But in your mind, what separates a good idea from a successful company? John: it's interesting. There can be many good ideas. And what I realized is that a lot of people can have a lot of good ideas, but very few people can have a good idea combined with good execution. And good execution is a function of several things, but I think it starts with the idea. Then it's about people. It's about people, it's about belief, it's about teamwork, it's about operationalizing the idea. And that's where getting back to athletics and the focus on team and collaboration and communication, all those things become really fundamental to having a successful business. And even today, you look around at the most successful businesses, they can check all those boxes. And certainly they're better at some things than others, but always, and because I talk to a lot of entrepreneurs and consider different kinds of investments, and have I had time to observe some of these pursuits over time, you can see which ones are more likely to succeed, and you can also see which ones are more likely to fail. And I have enough experience now, I've seen which ones have failed. And again, it's those key areas that really drive the success of a business. Will: ultimately you exited what happened there? John: So what what happened with healthgrades.com, so there was healthgrades, the hospital quality business. And then what I invented or created with a small team was healthgrades.com. We grew that team when we were taken private. So Healthgrades at the time, Healthgrades.com was a small company. we were taken private in 2010 by Vester Capital Partners, private equity firm out of New York. And they they took the company private. So I stayed on in a leadership capacity for about four years after they acquired the company and stayed on the board of directors from their acquisition in 2010 all the way through the cell to red ventures in 2021. But came back later, kind of get to the career art will is I came back later on a date. so I worked with the company in a business. dev and product parole for about four years, left day-to-day activities to to do some other things outside of Health Rates, stayed on the board of directors, came back to consult with them in 2016, and ultimately came back in a full-time capacity to run the entire operation day-to-day in then we ended up selling the entirety of healthgrades.com in 2021 to Red Ventures. Will: what do you what occupies your time now after selling to Red Ventures in twenty twenty one? John: Yeah, so actually I feel like I'd finally gotten to what my original objective was. I am a student of the financial markets. I love to invest so I invest in public companies, but also you know private investments are are as well selectively. I'll look at those. but really between focusing a lot of my energy and efforts on the investment space, maintaining relationships that I've established over time. and trying to facilitate connections and give a little bit back to people I've met over time and assist people in whatever way I can. Will: you mentioned a couple of times AI how do you see AI changing the world in which entrepreneurs live for the good, the bad, or indifferent. John: Yeah, I think there can be good and bad. in fact we see some evidence, almost every day there's a news story. There was the news this week of escaped rogue agents from open AI. One of the Claude models escaped. So there's that and there's definitely the concern there and I've read read some books and a lot of research about what can go wrong, but Also believe there's a lot that can go right. And I think what it does from an entrepreneurial standpoint, and having spoken with some folks and even the stuff that

that I do, I'm very AI forward by the way, and that's really where I've focused a lot of my attention over the last really since 21. some of this I anticipated, but it's unbelievable what's happened. but I think what it does entrepreneurially is it accelerates. I think that these companies can move faster. they'll have more resources, more data. Data, data is almost always a differentiator when it comes to startup businesses, having access to data and being able to organize data. But the other thing is being able to realize business objectives and goals without huge capital raises and enormous amounts of human capital. So you can do more with less. I'm an optimist when it comes to the impact AI is going to have on employment over time. I just think there will be more happening. There will be more winners. And I think AI is going to be interwoven in a lot of what we do and certainly into a lot of these startup and entrepreneurial businesses. I think it's very exciting. Will: from, playing baseball at the University of Tennessee to creating, inventing, launching, and ultimately selling healthgrades.com, what defines success for you now? John: I think it starts with I didn't start on on this path, but it's doing something meaningful that's going to be impactful in a positive way. not just individually. I think to me that was always secondary. not that financial success didn't matter, but I think my objective was always to be part of something that was meaningful and beneficial to society or to groups of people. And that was my guiding principle. And I think that was our team's guiding principle with Healthcare. And even with you look at a company like Service Magic, there was value in connecting homeowners with home service professionals in a way that they otherwise couldn't do it. So I think that there has to be a goal or objective that has a positive impact. if I had any recommendation to anyone that was considering starting something, I would start there because ultimately that's gonna give your life purpose and meaning when you wake up every day. And it's something that at Health Grades, at almost every company meeting, myself or someone would use some example of how we had positively impacted someone's life. And it was very real, it was tangible and Even if you're the coder sitting in the back room, if you have that compass, that mission, that purpose, and it really is making a difference, a positive impact on a person or society, that really can motivate and incentivize you in a way that at least to me, money cannot. Now I know there are exceptions to that. There's an entire financial services industry that's transactional. and certain people are quite content with that. I couldn't be. And that's why I admire entrepreneurs and what they do because I think for the most part, it's not necessarily about money. And I think any financial reward that accrues to entrepreneurs, they deserve it. They've earned it because they've created something that

other people value. Will: That's a great answer, John. And I got a few more questions for you, and I'll get you out of here. And that was an amazing story you just told me about your success journey with healthgrades uh.com. this the lightning round question. There's some easy questions, yes or no. They're basic questions. You can expound on them as much as you like. you'll understand them as we go. First question: dogs or cats? John: Dodds. Will: All right. Very few people respond with cats, I always say this phrase has never been uttered aloud in the history of the world. Thank God we had that cat. because it's never happened, no one's ever said it. what bucket list item would like to do John: So a couple of things. I would like to go on a safari. That's one thing that I think would be pretty cool. But climbing Kilimanjaro before the the glacier melt they have a glacier atop Kilimanjaro, it's melting. I'd like to get up there before that thing melts all the way. So that that's on my list. Will: Who is your favorite catcher of all time? John: so growing up it was Johnny Bench. and I tried to emulate him for a long time, but he was he was a much better hitter than me. Will: do have a favorite major league baseball team? John: so growing up, believe it or not, it was Chicago Cubs, Harry Carey. So we had WGN in Nashville. So I got to watch him a lot. I got to watch the Braves, but they were so abysmal. And I just couldn't find a way. Dale Murphy, I felt so sorry for that guy. because he was a great player and he was on some terrible teams. Although, you know, Atlanta came around, I had a good friend that ended up Greg McMichael ended up being a pitcher for the Braves and still works for them today. Yeah, so these days, I'm a hometown boy, so I you know, I pull for the race. Will: the moon landing, yes or no? All John: yeah. Will: right. Aliens, yes or no? John: Yeah. Will: If you could fly time travel or be invisible, which one would you pick and why? John: time travel. I'm fascinated by it. In fact, if you look at my library, digital library now mostly, I have probably twenty or thirty time travel related books. So it's just that not so much the the idea of change, but I just finished a book. It was called Midnight Train, and it's somewhat related to time travel, but the belief that these choices, every choice you make is consequential. And certain choices are hugely consequential. In fact, growing up, I figured this out a long time ago, especially based on my career path. You know, it's gone so many different ways, and I could have made different choices along the way. I don't necessarily have regrets, but I often think about well, what if I had taken the right door instead of the left door? And those kinds of choices, there are probably four or five choices you make in your life that are hugely consequential and influence. everything in every way that comes after that. And that's why the whole idea of, you know, multiverse or time travel really

appeals to me is because I believe in that, the power of choice and the consequences of choice. Will: What's your favorite food? John: Probably hell of it. All forms of fish, Irish and love seafood. Will: what's your favorite hobby? John: All right, well, tennis. it's gotta be tennis. So tennis, I love tennis because it you know, I never played as a kid. I started playing on when I was forty seven or forty-eight. And a lot of the skills were transferable from baseball, so the hand-eye and all that. still trying to figure the game out as you know. but I love just the physical side of it, being able to do something, be around my friends, so the social aspect, but also get a good workout. I've all but given up golf. because I prefer tennis. I get so much more out of tennis than I do. Will: And best thing about tennis as opposed to golf is that you can pick up tennis when you're forty-six or forty-seven, and within six months, eight months, a year, you can be playing pretty decent competitive tennis if you have some athletic ability in you. Where golf, on the other hand, you can pick that up at 46 or 47 and just continue to be miserable into your fifties because it is a relentless, punitive sport that just, you know, continues to move the goalpost on you. One day you feel like, I can hit my driver. Now putter's gone to sleep or my nine arm's doing okay, but now your wedges are terrible. I guess that's why people keep coming back. But it is a tough, tough, tough sport. It also takes up a lot of time and and you're generally not getting any exercise while you do it. John: All of that, a hundred percent, yes. Will: Yeah and yeah. Tw speaking of tennis, who is the greatest tennis player of all time in your opinion? John: So all right, my heart says Fetter, I love Fedder, I loved watching the guy play, just a maestro on tennis court, I love his character, but the greatest player of all time was Joker. Will: Yeah, there's something about Jokovic that you can just see it in his eyes and also conversely in his opponent's eyes at those moments in the match where he knows that he's going to win he just breaks people down John: He's really amazing. And I've got a quick Djokovic story for you, personal experience. So we used to go to the tournament down in South Florida when it was at Key Bis Game. And my girls have two girls, and they were about probably about seven and ten at the time. And we were staying at a hotel where some of the players were playing, and they just finished a charity event at the tennis courts at the hotel. It's like two days or a day before the tournament. And we knew that they were gonna be wrapping up the charity event. We had been down in the court. So my girls each had the big yellow ball, right? And they wanted to get a couple of autographs. And I won't name the female player, but there was a very prominent female player that walked back to the hotel and my daughters were asking her for an autograph. She blew right by them. Well, Djokovic saw what happened. He didn't even wait for them to say anything to him. He walked over to them and started talking to them, signed their balls, asked how they were doing, said, Hey, you want to get a picture? He knelt down, but I've got the picture still, put his arms around. The guy was amazing. And I know a lot of people question his character and some of it deservedly so. but in my personal experience, he blew me away with that. So I like to share that story about him. I don't know if there are as many good stories about him floating around, but That made quite the impression, especially in contrast to you know what didn't happen with the female tennis player. Will: Yeah, absolutely. And that's great to hear about him, because I think historically, through his career, there was Federer and there was Nadal, and he was kind of the third guy. So people were probably already in the Federer camp. Other people love Narafa Nadal. And then here's this Djokovic guy that really owned court, he's serious business oriented, He's trying to be the best in the world of something. He really didn't have time for, maybe the niceties and things that go along with that. And so people kind of put him off to the side unfairly characterized him as not being personable But now that he's basically attained everything you can attain in the sport of tennis, you start to see more of his personality come out, even after he loses. Of course he doesn't like to lose, but I think that's really great for him that he's finally able to exhibit and not only show that he does have a great personality and he's given so much to the sport, but But allowing the fans he does so deserves to finally move over into his camp and all he had to do is win twenty-five majors to get their appreciation. but I love that for him. I my my whole household, we're we're big Djokovic fans. so when he wins, my house is happy. So I always want him to do the best. But that's a great story. I'm glad that that happened to your daughters and And that's a wonderful thing to hear about him. does Ketchup belong on a hot dog? John: Yes. Will: what is your favorite book, movie, song, and sequel? John: favorite book. Wow, well, I hadn't thought about all time. I'm a huge Ken Follett fan. So I would say his historical fiction would be my favorite series of books. World Without End, I think, is the first in that series. And then you said movie, favorite Will: Yes, sir. John: movie, Braveheart. And favorite song. Shoot. Listen to everything. I don't have a favorite song. Will: That's fair. And what about SQL? John: I guess Matrix. I love the Matrix. Will: is there a place that people can learn more about you, learn more about health grades other than healthgrades.com, which is still up and running to this day. John: I have a LinkedIn profile. haven't really engaged with that in a while, but there's some information about me there. and anybody listening, if there's something I can do to help them and advance their business, their connection, their careers, I'm happy to try to help folks. I wanna be able to give back. Will: All right, John. Well, thank you so much for sitting down with Pod Number today. It's been an absolute pleasure talking with you and I hope to see you soon. Thanks. John: Thanks, Will.