Northwestern University Alumni

Transcript:

HELEN KIM: Welcome to the last episode of the year 2020. My name is Helen Kim from the NAA, and you're listening to Northwestern Intersections, where we talk to alumni about how key experiences have propelled them in their life's work. On this episode today, we're going to hear from Mike Raab. After graduating from Northwestern as an art RTVF major, Mike spent the next couple of years moving out to LA to work in the TV industry, taking a brief sabbatical to backpack through Europe, and joining a venture capital firm in San Francisco. 

And during his stay in SF, he was recruited to build out the Garage San Francisco, a community of Northwestern and Kellogg alumni founders, operators, and investors in the Bay Area. Recently, he moved back to Evanston to attend Kellogg's MBA program, and now serve as the associate director of the Garage at Northwestern, a community and resources for students interested in entrepreneurship. All right, Mike, thank you so much for being here today. 

MIKE RAAB: Thanks so much for having me. I appreciate it. 

HELEN KIM: So I'm going to start this podcast episode with the big question for you. 

MIKE RAAB: Oh. 

HELEN KIM: So when you graduated in 2012, did you ever imagine yourself being where you are right now in terms of your industry and your career path? 

MIKE RAAB: Absolutely not. I don't think there was any way I could have predicted what's happened so far. And to, me that's really exciting-- not only looking back and being able to string together the narrative, and the story, and what I've learned so far in my career, but also looking forward. I think that unpredictableness gives me a lot of optimism and hope for what's next. 

HELEN KIM: Mm-hmm So when you talk about unpredictability, let's dig deeper into that. So you studied RTVF during your time at Northwestern. Was that something you were always passionate about, or how did you decide to choose that study? 

MIKE RAAB: I came to Northwestern to study film because in high school, I liked to make home movies with my friends. But I also wanted to be more focused on the business side of the entertainment industry, so working in entertainment in Los Angeles was, when I entered Northwestern, the goal. And so I majored in RTVF, and then I had a minor in psychology and BIP, again with the goal of, after graduating, moving out to LA and working in either films or television. 

HELEN KIM: So did you end up moving out to LA? 

MIKE RAAB: I did. But I have to say, so as RTVF major, I talked to a bunch of Northwestern alums who worked in the industry my senior year, and basically all of them said, if you want to get an entry-level job out here, you really have to graduate and move out here, and then people will look at your resume or have conversations. 

And as someone who had a lot of friends that were econ majors going through recruitment in the fall, and getting jobs, and getting signing bonuses, I had a lot of anxiety that I was going to graduate without a job, and basically had to move out there unemployed and hustle for a few months. But luckily, my roommate when I moved out there was also a Northwestern alum named Meredith Dawson, who graduated at the same time. 

And she saw a job posting at a TV studio that she thought would be perfect. It was much more on the business and strategy and of the television industry. And so she passed along my resume, and that's how I got my first job out of school. 

HELEN KIM: It's all about that connection, isn't it-- that Northwestern connection? 

MIKE RAAB: Totally. Out there yeah. In Los Angeles, they call it the purple mafia, the Northwestern alumni community out there. 

HELEN KIM: How did your career take off from there? 

MIKE RAAB: It was an entry-level role, so I was an executive assistant to the executive vice president of brand management and digital media for a TV studio which actually had made and produced some of my favorite shows of all time-- and they were currently making them as well-- like Modern Family, Arrested Development, Homeland, the Simpsons. 

So it was really exciting to land there, even though it was administrative duties primarily. I was also super fortunate that my boss was also our mentor and gave me real work. So I learned a ton about the television industry in business-- not only from getting access to his phone calls and emails, and learning what the big issues of the day were or why strategic decisions were being made but he also gave me work-- whether that was financial modeling or building strategy decks-- that felt more intellectually stimulating to have that piece of it. 

After a year, year and a half, I was promoted to analyst, so I got to work more full-time with our finance team. And really, what our role was building businesses out of each individual television show. So each ancillary business-- whether that's licensing it to Netflix and Hulu and Amazon or international or home merchandise or music-- finding all those ancillary revenue streams. So it was a great peek behind the curtain of the industry at a really young age. 

HELEN KIM: Yeah. When you mentioned when your friends who are studying economics were getting recruited during fall quarter and getting signing bonuses-- that anxiety is actually so real, especially for folks who are not looking to go into that industry. And for someone who was also in the arts, it gave me a lot of anxiety just kind of sitting there. And I know I was working really hard, but to see my friends-- know that they're going to get a job at the end of the year made me feel like I was really falling behind. 

MIKE RAAB: Absolutely. And I think it's a really common feeling among a lot of college students, that they put all this pressure on themselves that they have to like land the perfect job right out of school or else they didn't work hard enough or they're not good enough-- when, in reality, I think, when you look at most careers-- doesn't really matter where you start. 

You can learn, and grow, and change from wherever you land. So a lot of the students we work with at the Garage-- we tell them stories of alums who have graduated and done different types of things that hopefully eases their anxiety around those feelings. 

HELEN KIM: Right. Let's keep moving forward in your career path. So you were promoted to be an analyst. Did you enjoy that job? Did you want to continue in that field? 

MIKE RAAB: I did. I enjoyed it, but after another year and a half or so, I felt like my learning was plateauing. And the company kind of felt like a family. There were execs who were there for 10, 20, 30 years. And so I knew I could stay and continue to get promoted and make more money, but I didn't think I was going to learn significantly more. 

And so I applied to a few other jobs. I decided maybe I wanted to go back and get my MBA, so I applied to Kellogg and a few other schools-- didn't get into any of them. And talk about anxiety-- I really felt stuck in the moment of-- I didn't have any other options. The way that I cured myself of that was to quit my job and backpack through Europe for a summer by myself. 

And that experience, I think, liberated me to the fact that you don't have to follow the corporate ladder or specific common career paths, but being able to take a break-- and then, when I came back, I actually was hired at a different division of the same company, given a title bump and a raise anyway. So it was kind of validating feeling of you can do something completely different exam, time off work, work on personal development, and come back in an even better position. 

HELEN KIM: Mm-hmm. What age were you when you quit your job? 

MIKE RAAB: I was 26. 

HELEN KIM: Were there any pushback from your family or friends, or did you feel like we're making the wrong decision at that time? 

MIKE RAAB: I was lucky, in that my family and friends were ultimately supportive, and that's just because of who they are. But I definitely, from some people-- more so strangers or acquaintances-- felt a lot of judgment around it, and that gave me a lot of insecurity. And there are definitely times on this trip where I would think, what have I done? 

Did I just completely ruin my career? Is anyone ever going to hire me after just quitting my job and not working for a few months? There definitely were tough moments, but looking back, I would do it again, absolutely. 

HELEN KIM: There's a lot of stigma around folks in their late 20s and early 30s taking a break during their job because that's what society says is that that's really the time you should be working your hardest to get the job you want. But for you, that was a really life-changing moment. 

MIKE RAAB: For sure. I agree with you. There's a lot of stigma. I think it's changing, but I looked around and I also had friends who-- around that same age-- 25, 26. I think people are-- have been in their first career for a few years, and some of them realize they don't want to do it forever. And that's a tough moment in your mid-20s when you went to school to study this specific thing, you took all the right internships, you've worked really hard for this, and oh, now you don't want to do it anymore? 

One of the things that I believe deeply in having these experiences was that, if you're not ecstatic, and happy, and killing it in your first job or your first career, you should try a lot of different things-- different careers, different cities. Figure out what it is both that you like and enjoy in the day-to-day work or the type of company-- whether it's a startup or a big corporation or in government-- what type of managers you like, and figure out all these pieces so that you're well-equipped for the rest of your career to know what you enjoy, but also what you're good at. 

HELEN KIM: Mm-hmm. And I think a question that a lot of people would have for you after hearing that you quit your job and then backpacked through Europe for a couple of months is, when you returned to start your new job-- which, you went back to your previous company, correct? 

MIKE RAAB: Yeah, a new division. So I first worked at 20th Century Fox television which, like I said, was a TV studio. This was a new group called the Fox Digital Consumer Group, and basically, there were only about 18 of us when I joined, but we were we were the beginnings of building what would be equivalent to like Disney+-- so a subscription consumer service for content-- so very different vibes, and it felt much more tech-focused and forward, which I was interested in and happy to be part of. 

HELEN KIM: Yeah. And then, how did you tell your hiring managers about the sabbatical that you took? 

MIKE RAAB: So the lucky thing was, when I got back and saw this posting-- and I applied to a bunch of different jobs and didn't hear back for most of them, so maybe I was partially right-- but I was fortunate that I saw this role, and I shot my former boss an email and said, hey, Mark-- just want to give you a heads up. I saw this role. I think I'm going to apply for it. 

And he was great. He shot a note back. They'd be lucky to have you. I'll lob over a phone call in your favor, if you need. So basically, I had a ringing endorsement from a high level exec within the company, so it didn't take too much convincing that I would be able to do the work. 

HELEN KIM: Now you're back in Evanston at Northwestern. So what are you doing right now, and tell us a little bit more about your role. 

MIKE RAAB: As of a few months ago, I'm the associate director at the Garage at Northwestern, which is physical space, community resources for students-- both undergraduate and graduate-- interested in entrepreneurship. And our real goal is to remove barriers to entrepreneurship. 

We believe it should be accessible to everyone, and that, even if a student doesn't necessarily want to found and start a company full time, that some of the lessons that they learn or skills they learn or ideas that they're exposed to of building something and creating something and putting it out in the world just opens up many more opportunities down the line. So I oversee a lot of the programs that the Garage has built since its founding in 2015. 

HELEN KIM: The Garage has not been around for a long time, so a lot of our alumni who graduated before 2015 are wondering what the Garage is doing. I know you mentioned that you want this program in place to be inclusive for everyone, so what are some other groups or events that you have put out there? 

MIKE RAAB: Just to touch on a few of our programs, our entry-level program-- we to say it's learn at your own pace. It's called Tinker. You sign up. You get access to basically 10 weekly emails about the fundamentals of starting a startup-- so evaluating an idea business models, customer acquisition, building a team. And you also get access to all of our programming and events as well as the Garage community Slack channel. 

So this is-- we have hundreds of students interested in entrepreneurship who can put in an ask for feedback or input or ask questions, and the community jumps in and helps out, which is great. Our primary program is called residency, and this is for up to 35 teams each quarter who are a little more serious about their project, have a little bit of traction, and are making real progress. 

And as part of this program, not only do you get dedicated space within the physical Garage when we're open, you also get a dedicated mentor within the community, an entrepreneur out in the real world who you check in with on a regular basis. And also, something that we've started in the new virtual world is what we call accountability house. 

So every couple of weeks, four to five different team leads, students who are founders, get together and talk through their goals, their progress, the hurdles and challenges they're facing in order to support each other and give each other feedback and input and ideas, because we find that, a lot of times, students have the same questions or are facing the same problems. 

And then there are a bunch of other programs that, again, the goal is to increase access and remove barriers. So just to touch on a few of those, Propel is a cohort program quarterly for eight women founders who have a project, and they get up to $1,000 in grant funding. They too have weekly accountability huddles. Dedicated mentor, and also have exclusive programming-- so speakers who come in and tell their stories. 

We just launched basically a copy of that called Activate, which is for black Northwestern students, and runs in a similar way. And we also just announced that we were launching something called the Opportunity Fund. So what we find often is that even basic startup expenses, like buying a website domain for $20 bucks or whatever, for some students is a real barrier-- that they don't have the cash to spare. 

So with the Opportunity Fund, that's kind of a pilot. The idea is to grant low-income students who are Tinkerers or residents up to $1,000 in startup expenses to get their startup off the ground. So that's a pilot, but we hope in the future to grow that and have it be donor-funded as well. 

HELEN KIM: That's amazing, providing access for all students across Northwestern. And I know there's another exciting news for you about your new podcast from the Garage. So tell us a little bit more about that, because now I have another podcaster friend from Northwestern. 

MIKE RAAB: That's right. We've been commiserating on podcasting earlier. So yeah, we're launching a podcast on January 5 called How I Got Here, and it really touches on what we chatted about earlier, about this anxiety that a lot of students have their senior years, looking for jobs, recruiting-- all that type of stuff. 

And so we followed the story of six recent Northwestern alums, all who were involved with the Garage, had some sort of entrepreneurial project, and where they've landed up a few years after school. So a couple of them have continued on with their startups or founded a new company, like Lucas Phillips with BrewBike, or Sarah Ahmad founded a company called Stable. 

But a bunch of them also went on and got jobs at companies like Apple, and Google, and Goldman Sachs, and Instagram. And the interesting thing is, for a lot of them and their stories, their projects, their startups were differentiating factors in how they ended up getting their jobs. So for instance, Ali Qureshi, who works at Goldman Sachs as an equity trader, he started a company at the Garage called Party in a Box. 

And when he was interviewing at Goldman Sachs for an internship, all anyone wanted to talk about was Party in a Box. And you can imagine that they see hundreds or thousands of resumes that probably look pretty similar, but Ali's experience and his passion to talk about his entrepreneurial endeavor really set him apart, and that's how he landed a role there. So we have six episodes in his first season. I think they all have unique perspectives and really good advice, especially for current students who are thinking about what they want to do after school. 

HELEN KIM: We're super excited to hear when it comes out, so we'll keep everyone in the loop. After talking about your time since graduating in 2012 to now, what is going through your head right now, just thinking back on going down the memory lane? 

MIKE RAAB: Yeah, it's crazy. There's a few things that we didn't even get to, but after I was back at Fox, I was there for less than a year, and then moved to San Francisco to join a venture capital firm called Sinai Ventures, which was actually founded by two other Northwestern alums. 

So it runs deep in my career path. And so that was really exciting intellectually stimulating, and I learned a ton doing that. How I started working with the Garage was based in San Francisco building out what we were calling the Garage San Francisco, which was a community of Northwestern and Kellogg alums, founders, operators, and investors in the Bay Area who support each other professionally. 

And so the goal there was to build this community and do what I call manufacture serendipity. So it's, how do we increase collisions of these alums who can support each other out, and also build a bridge back to students at the Garage on campus? And now I'm back here in Evanston, so feel super fortunate to-- I tell people I'm on my third career. 

I've worked in entertainment in Los Angeles. I've worked in venture capital in San Francisco. You could qualify what I do now as community organizing for a non-profit in Evanston. And so as I mentioned earlier, just being able to draw what I've learned, the type of experiences that I enjoy from all those very diverse experiences is-- I'm very grateful for. 

HELEN KIM: Yeah. And as an alum, staff, and current student-- because you're at Kellogg and right now doing the evening and weekend program-- 

MIKE RAAB: That's right. 

HELEN KIM: --is there any advice that you would like to share with the Northwestern network? 

MIKE RAAB: Again-- and this is maybe for a specific type of person-- but as we talked about at the beginning, I really value the diversity of the experiences that I've had, but they've also been wildly unpredictable. I ended up at the venture firm because a friend just offered me a job out of nowhere. I was not seeking it out, so I think being open to opportunities-- for a lot of these roles, I've had to move cities, which has been difficult at times, because you have friends and family. 

Los Angeles specifically-- I really enjoyed the weather there. But I think, for me, it's been-- I've never had a very strict plan of an end goal that I want to get to, and I think having that freedom and flexibility has allowed me to have a lot of really great experiences that I never would have sought out on my own. 

HELEN KIM: Thank you for tuning in to today's episode of Northwestern Intersections. For more information about our podcast, please visit northwestern.edu/intersections. Until next time, stay safe and take care of yourself and your families.