Welcome to invest in yourself, the digital entrepreneur podcast. Join the podcast mogul Phil Better as he interviews successful entrepreneurs that make their living in the digital world. Now let's join your host Phil Better and his special guest today on invest in yourself, the digital entrepreneur podcast.

Welcome back to dig welcome back, digital entrepreneurs, to another really insightful episode of Invest in Yourself, the Digital Entrepreneur Entrepreneur Podcast. I'm, of course, your host with the most feel better, and I'm here to guide you through the ever evolving landscape of digital entrepreneurship. Today, we have a special guest whose expertise spans the realm of leadership, artificial intelligence, and strategic advisory. Today, our guest today is no stranger to the forefront of technology innovation. He's a seasoned CEO coach, a captivating keynote speaker on AI, and an esteemed board member with over 2 decades of experience at the helm of various tech companies. He see he steered the course for giants like Apple, Google, and Microsoft offering invaluable strategic counsel along the way. His insights have graced prestigious platforms including the Wall Street Journal AI Conference, the National Association of Corporate Directors, and esteemed academic institutions like MIT, Stanford, Venture Labs, and Harvard Business School. Today, we delve into the into the intersection of AI leadership and entrepreneurial vision, gaining profound insight from none other than the brilliant mind of our esteemed guest.

So dear listeners, fasten your seatbelts and get ready to elevate your understanding of AI and leadership as we warmly welcome to the show Glenn Gao. Glenn, welcome to the show.

Phil, thank you so much. What an awesome invitation and, introduction for me, and, I'm really excited about our discussion here.

I am super excited. We were getting along great before we even started. So, like, I know this, this episode is gonna blow my mind, and we're gonna create a connection that is gonna span generations, I Phil, because of the value bombs we're gonna be dropping here on, what is the forefront pretty much of AI. So before we go into where we are today and what you do today, let's go back to where you began. What made you wanna become an entrepreneur, Glenn?

Well, I've actually been an entrepreneur more than once. The first time I wanted to be an entrepreneur because I've I I figured out that I had a particular set of knowledge and expertise. And in my existing job, I wasn't able to really leverage that knowledge and expertise the way I wanted to. And so I said, well, I'm just going to offer my services to the world and figure out how to make that and and turn that into a business. And that became a business I ran for 25 years, and it was a fantastic opportunity. Huge risk, but a fantastic opportunity, and it turned out extremely well. And so it was all about wanting to serve others with my expertise.

I like that. So it was just I had this vat of knowledge that I wanna spew out into the world and help people with. And my job's like, no. No. Keep that vat closed. And you're like, okay. Screw it. I'm going off in the vat of knowledge spewed forth, and here we are today.

Exactly.

And and the same thing happened the second time. Now I'm a CEO coach and, as you mentioned, a keynote speaker and a board member. It was about recognizing that I could add value in a in a particular way, in a special way, and just stepping out and doing it. I think that's one of the key things about being an entrepreneur is recognizing that we have to just sometimes Phil plug and do it. And that's what I've done here.

I love it. I love it. So how did you Phil in were you always interested in AI? Because I'm I'm gonna jump right into the main topic because I love AI. Sure. Sure. Let's do it. So how did you fall into the role of, like, falling in love with AI? Like, you obviously, you worked with some of the giants in the tech world, but, like, how did where did AI come into your world? So, Phil, it actually happened when

I was in venture capital. So I was in venture capital for 5 years, And the amazing thing thing about being in venture capital is that you can predict the future. And and the reason I say that is that every day, an entrepreneur is walking in the door, and they're saying Phil is what's happening in the world, and we're gonna take advantage of it. And you pay attention to the patterns that you're seeing from the entrepreneurs saying this is what's gonna happen. And you eventually realize when enough of them say the same thing, they're probably right. And so I saw people talking about the massive, massive changes that were going to be enabled by AI, and I said I need to understand this at a deeper level. And the more I understood it, the deeper I went. And the more I understood it, the more I became excited about it.