Synergist Senior Sound Bites - November 2019:
Jean Xin

Jean is the Senior Director of Strategy and Operations at Mythic, where she is responsible for leading strategic initiatives to ensure Mythic is well positioned to address the needs of a rapidly changing AI market. Additionally, she was the first business focused hire at Mythic and oversees organizational scaling. Previously, Jean was a Principal at the Venture Capital firm Data Collective. There, Jean focused on applying artificial intelligence to novel and high-impact problems in the real world (e.g., manufacturing, materials, agriculture, healthcare), as well as improving the workplace through better enterprise technology. Prior to joining DCVC, Ms. Xin worked at McKinsey & Company, where she advised executive teams on company-defining decisions, including data and technology strategy and M&A. Ms. Xin holds an S.B. in Brain and Cognitive Sciences and Management Science from MIT, where she focused on computational cognitive science and finance, respectively. 

Tell us a bit about your background.
I did my undergrad at MIT and studied Brain and Cognitive Sciences as well as Management Science. I always enjoyed understanding what made businesses successful and achieving things with people. I stumbled across a consulting internship my sophomore year and discovered I really liked it. I spent a few years at McKinsey and ended up getting recruited away to a VC firm called Data Collective. The firm was growing really fast – I was the first Associate and saw some really cool deals involving the most fascinating technology and had a seat at the table. Having done the advising and investing thing, I got really interested in joining a cool startup. I was at the right place at the right time and started at Mythic, a fabless semiconductor company that makes chips for AI inference. Today I’m the Senior Director of Strategy and Operations at Mythic.
 
How much foresight did you have in your career to date?
Everything is a cushy narrative in hindsight, right? In college and high school, I had a five year plan, and these days I have a 6 month plan with a loose idea of the next five years. At McKinsey they had all of these super helpful planners, and after McKinsey realistically the jobs were more opportunistic. I had known someone, and then they reached out, etc. None of them were posted on the open market but rather came through others. I always kept my options open, though it does take a certain risk tolerance to do so.
 
What are the key responsibilities of your role?
I started as the Director of Business Operations and am now the Senior Director of Strategy and Operations. I can roughly break down my job into two components. On one side, it’s strategy: working on a lot of things such as figuring out how we will scale the organization, making sure we have the right capabilities in place, starting new teams, new offices, etc. I work very closely with the CEO as well as with the board and investors here. The other half I took on is less common – the operations side. All of the corporate functions, legal, finance, IT, office management report up to me. I work closely with the Director of People Operations here and it’s all about the business of how you actually run the business. Nitty gritty things and putting in just enough process.
 
What do you love the most about your job?
Being on the leadership team of a fast-growing place has been incredible. There’s something really special about having the opportunity to do things for the first time at a company – you get to shape the culture, the way things are done, and the strategy from the ground up. It has also been tremendous working with people who have been in the industry 20-30 years and getting their perspective on how to do things. I also love the team I work with – the leadership team and my reports. I’ve been fortunate enough to be surrounded by lovely and truly competent human beings which makes my life easier. Being able to rely on my team to know what to do and helping them navigate the organization and align them with our larger business goals has been very fun.
 
What has been the most challenging part of your job?
Sometimes the uncertainty can be hard. When you’re doing an early stage startup, you don’t have that much data. At a large company you can analyze the last ten years of the P&L… that doesn’t exist at a startup. I like to use data as much as possible but decisions often come down to using your best judgment and networking with people who may know more than you. You have to be able stomach both technical and market risk. The flip side is everyone remains flexible and rolls with the punches vs. doing something a certain way just because that’s how they’ve always done it.
 
Advice you’d share with people early on in their careers?
You have your job, and you have your life. I was told by a high-powered McKinsey partner early on in my career that your life is more important—make choices that benefit all of you, not just your career. Another piece of advice I’d say is when you’re thinking about your new job, think about a few different vectors: 1) People. Who are you directly working with, who is your team? 2) Place. What’s the brand stand for, what do they do, what’s the mission? 3) Position. What will you do on a day to day basis, what are the tasks you’ll perform, and what are you exploring? Figure out what your stack rank in these things is. You need to figure out what works for you. Most younger people don’t choose people as the priority, I see many older people put it first. It doesn’t matter what your order is, you just need to be self-aware.
 
Where do you see yourself in 5-10 years?
I’m not completely sure, but right now I’ve thought about two options. First, I could see myself taking the Sheryl Sandberg road to a COO role. I could also see myself going back to VC with this new perspective. From my role I feel like I can now better understand major trends in a market, what it takes to win. Ideas are cheap, execution is everything.
 
Do you have a life motto?
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence therefore is not an act but a habit. People always focus on these big moments, but it’s more about what you do day to day.
 
Favorite books?
Recently, I read Educated by Tara Westover, which was outstanding. Two “self helpy” books that changed by life are Daring Greatly by Brene Brown and The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey, which I read as a teenager. My favorite fiction is Pride and Prejudice and the Harry Potter series.
 
Thank you so much for joining us, Jean! To learn more about Mythic, click here.