Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:00:00] And whether or not you're able to, you know, build a successful business, what you will learn in that process, because of being stretched so far outside your comfort zone on a daily basis, can be absolutely reformative.

Andy Molinsky: [00:00:19] Welcome to From the Dorm Room to the Board Room, a podcast where we provide insights, tips, and inspiration for college students and young professionals, so they can make a really successful transition from college life to the professional world and beyond. My name is Andy Molinsky, and I'm your host. I'm also a Professor of Organizational Behavior and International Management at Brandeis University's International Business School, where we record and produce this podcast.

Andy Molinsky: [00:00:57] Okay. So, today's guest is Galen Karlan-Mason, who is the CEO and Founder of GreenChoice. And normally, I would be reading his bio, but this is a first on From the Dorm Room to the Board Room, he is right here. So, he is going to tell us about himself. So, Galen.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:01:15] Awesome. Well, it's a pleasure to be here. My name's Galen. And let's see, I was born and raised in a rural town in Southern Vermont, in the natural environment most of my days as a young child and raised by two parents that I would characterize as former hippies, though they may not own it the same. The reason I mentioned this is because I, you know, at an early age, was really engaged with ideas of social justice and an environmental stewardship. And these were themes and have been themes throughout my life, which carries me to what I do now.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:01:55] I attended Brandeis University as an undergrad. I was, actually, recruited to play soccer. And that was my focus for much of my young adulthood until I went to abroad and studied in Peru, where I started a nonprofit focused on youth empowerment. It was through that process that I learned even great ideas and great causes live and die by their funding. And so, when I returned, I was set on learning more about business and how to build sustainable business that had ethical consciousness and could promote sustainable, environmentally-friendly action within consumers. And so, that set me on the path to finding GreenChoice while I was a graduate student at Brandeis.

Andy Molinsky: [00:02:40] Cool. And I should put out a disclaimer here that Galen was actually one of my former students.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:02:48] Yeah, yeah. I remember it well.

Andy Molinsky: [00:02:49] So, Organizational Behavior, yeah. Okay. So, tell us about about GreenChoice. If you were—I mean, imagine you have to pitch the company, a reasonable amount to potential investors or even potential people who might want to join. What would you say about it?

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:03:06] Yeah. In one sentence. GreenChoice is a data-driven platform empowering informed food choices. What I've found while I was a grad student was that I was leaving the grocery store feeling like I had compromised either on my health or my personal values as a result of budget or not knowing enough. And I started to get really frustrated. I'd be overwhelmed by these countless claims in the store. I would go online and all I could find was blog posts by self-proclaimed experts with very few credentials. And, you know, I was overwhelmed and confused by what I should really be eating and what I should be buying. And I started to talk to other people and realized I wasn't alone. A lot of people felt this way about their food choices. And I started to realize that this was a big data problem. It was a big math problem that we needed some help solving, and we need a little bit of inspiration to get us to solve that problem. And so, GreenChoice was born from that.

Andy Molinsky: [00:04:04] So, okay. So, for instance, I walk into the supermarket, and I want something for lunch. And what would be an example of the dilemmas that you're talking about?

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:04:14] Yes. So, I mean, you know, we probably can all—you know, if you need eggs, if you've ever bought eggs, going in and looking at all those claims, and you've got cage-free and free-range and pasture-aged, and organic. You've got added omega. And I could keep going on. And, you know, what really does it all mean? And you start to learn that cage-free isn't really cage-free. You start to learn that free-range doesn't necessarily mean the chickens are ranging free. And, you know, this is just one micro example. You can replicate this throughout every aisle of the grocery store.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:04:46] You know, and then you look at kind of these fast food trends and diets that are really being propagated on social media. You know, many of them are coming from semi-informed places, right? So, they take a piece of science. They try to extrapolate it to a large population of people. And maybe that diet worked for a segment of the population. But now, it's being over-prescribed. So, we come in and we aggregate data on diet, health, and sustainability. And then, use that data to evaluate how recipes and various food and beverage products match up with your specific values and dietary goals.

Andy Molinsky: [00:05:20] So, what is—is it an app? What does it look like?

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:05:24] Our first—the first version of our platform is a mobile app that simplifies healthy values-based grocery shopping. And so, you can use us to scan products in the store or search and browse products on the app to see breakdowns of their food safety, processing concerns, nutritional value, and environmental impact. And we have over 80,000 products in our database. We cover many regional and national grocers. And so, you can use us to, one, compare products to build your shopping list in very informed way. And finally, you can actually scan your receipts to track your progress and get breakdowns of your impact and tips to improve.

Andy Molinsky: [00:06:01] Cool. All right. So, that's really interesting. And you joined a growing cohort of From the Dorm Room to the Board Room people who have founded very interesting companies while actually students. So, you're not alone, which is great. Really impressive. So, let's rewind, though. So, you said you grew up in Vermont. You attended Brandeis. You were recruited for soccer. Imagine GreenChoice wasn't on your mind when you entered Brandeis in Waltham as a freshman.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:06:28] No, definitely not.

Andy Molinsky: [00:06:31] So, tell us about your college experience. What did you—it sounds like going abroad was a real pivotal moment. Let's dig into that a little bit. What did you do before you went abroad and what actually motivated you to go abroad?

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:06:43] Yeah. As I mentioned, I was recruited to play soccer at Brandeis, and I saw it as an opportunity to really leverage this deep passion and love of mine for the game of soccer to open a door to a fantastic education. And I had never been an exceptional—I was not an exceptional high school student. I was never somebody who truly bought into traditional academics. And so, for me, I—you know, I had decent grades. I didn't have Brandeis grades. And so, to combine those things and seek an opportunity to really continue my education in a meaningful way, that was what drew me here.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:07:23] Self-admittedly, I—while I was here, soccer was—you know, as a student athlete, you're always tasked with balancing these two worlds. Obligations to your team and trying to be the best athlete that you can be, and obligations to your own personal development as a young professional, as a student. You know, I did an okay job, I think, at the end of the day. I didn't take advantage of a lot of the student activities. A lot of the clubs and things that, in hindsight, are really valuable aspects of the college experience. But what I did have was a really meaningful community in my team, and I connected with—I was able to connect with some professors that, ultimately, really inspired me to think about business because that was not my background.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:08:08] And I think one important piece to notice, when I came in, I didn't really know what I wanted to study, right. It's part of why a liberal arts school is for me. I get to play around and experiment. I thought economics was it. I started seeing those graphs, and my mind went crazy. And I said, maybe not. So, I—you know, then looked at international global studies, and the idea of systems, and how do these things influence the way that cultures develop. And that really grabbed me. And environmental science was, as I mentioned, a passion of mine. So, these things are all about systems. And I started to realize I like thinking about systems, and business is a network of systems.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:08:43] And so, that was kind of early days of me formulating, you know, my interests. What my career path would be, I had no idea as an undergrad, but I knew I wanted to study abroad before I was gone because I had had the privilege of spending a couple, you know, short periods of time as a young child studying Spanish in Mexico and Guatemala. My mom would basically save up change, and she would take my brother and I when we got enough savings to go travel abroad. And we would go in and stay with a host family and study the language. And so, I had this affinity for Latin American culture. I had a desire to improve my Spanish. And Peru was a country I knew very, very little about. So, for me, it was an opportunity to, you know, really build myself as an individual and, basically, explore a place that was very foreign to me.

Andy Molinsky: [00:09:34] And did you do, sort of, a traditional study abroad in Peru or was it something different?

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:09:41] It started traditional, but it quickly veered from that. So, I went my junior spring. It's a common time to go. And I was directly enrolled in the local university there. So, I mean, all my classes were in Spanish, and I went out for the soccer team week one, and ended up making the team, and ended up actually starting for the varsity team there. And this, you know, was really pivotal and that immersed me in the local Peruvian community in a way that I never would have been immersed otherwise. So, immediately, I had a cohort of friends that were Peruvian that were welcoming me into their communities, that were off the beaten path of the tourist. And it was forcing me to, you know, really—well, it was forcing me to improve my Spanish and to figure out who I was on my own, but it was also giving me the freedom to be who ever I wanted to be. I didn't know anybody. They didn't know me. I could reinvent myself. And I started to fall in love with that process.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:10:44] And so, you know, about four months in approaching, you know, the final month when I would return, I kind of had this come to, you know, not religious, but whatever, this kind of this pivotal moment where I said, "You know, this experience, it can't end yet. I'm not there yet. I'm at the cusp of something truly life changing. And I got to embrace it." And so, I called my coaches up from Peru. I remember the day distinctly, you know, shaking, just with nerves. I told them, you know, "I'm not coming back for my senior season. I've got to stay here, and I need to embrace this experience while I have the opportunity. There will never be a better time.".

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:11:25] So, I stayed. I continued to play soccer. I took one class. But really, I basically was on, you know, not a college student for the next seven months. And I started this nonprofit called the Galazos with a Peruvian teammate of mine just focused on youth empowerment through soccer. And those seven to eight months, I spent building the organization, made a lot of mistakes. I, ultimately, didn't have the success I would have liked, and came back thinking I would continue to—you know, I had to come back for one more semester at school and to finish up. And I came back thinking I would be able to fundraise remotely, my partner on the local day-to-day operations, and it didn't happen. You know, eight months, we spent building this thing. In less than two months, it had fallen apart. It was incredibly humbling. It was incredibly sobering. And, you know, that experience was really what triggered me to say I've got a lot more learning to do.

Andy Molinsky: [00:12:23] And it sounds like that was a great training ground too for learning what's entailed in starting something really. right?

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:12:30] Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And I think, you know, one of the biggest takeaways was there's a lot of formalities that go into like starting a business, and it's very easy to get hung up on like this big thing you're building. And I think we naturally fall prey to saying like it's gotta all be legit and put together when, really, there's a way to probably tackle the problem you want to solve in a very minimalistic approach. And I think meeting or go about it that way. And so, it's a great learning experience to say, "You know,  next time we go about this, I'm going to try and solve the problem for the people who have that problem as quickly as possible. And I'll worry about the kind of the other things later."

Andy Molinsky: [00:13:15] Interesting. So, I want to ask you, sort of, like some of your - I don't know - stepping back advice for college students, but I do have to actually ask you, what did your coach say when you called them and told them?

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:13:28] They accepted it. I think it was a first for them. And this maybe is a good segue into the second half of your question. It was a first for them to have somebody that had been recruited, that had spent three years on the varsity team, and then was stepping away from their senior season after all that time and commitment. I think, ultimately, I hope that they saw that it was important for me, and I surely knew that it was. So, you know, speaking on maybe advice, I'll—I'm always reluctant to share advice because I think a lot of people have advice to give, but I've always found that stories and real experiences are the way that I learn best. So, finding common threads from one story to another. So, I'll try and answer my advice in the form of a short story, which is, you know, it's so important, I find, that in our young professional lives, we are learning as much as we can. And the best way to learn is to embrace the unknown and step outside your comfort zone, right? And this, I know this is something very near and dear to your heart.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:14:39] So, in that process, it's okay to not know what you want to do. It's okay to not know where exactly you're going. In this path, this journey that we're on, success, it's not linear. I mean, maybe there are some people that have figured out how to make it a linear path and find happiness along the way. I sure haven't. But I've found happiness and I'm, you know, in the early phases of finding success. And so, for me, you know, the journey took a lot of zigzags. And I don't want the—you know, I don't want your listeners to think that I had this all planned and figured out, right. 

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:15:17] When I came back from being abroad, and I have one semester left, I started that semester with five classes. A week of being back, basically, I had some—I had had a hard breakup as a result of staying abroad. I came back, it only got harder being, you know, in each other's presence. And I lost a friend two weeks of being back to an overdose. And then, I lost my grandmother that same week. And my world was flipped on its head almost overnight. I had no idea what I was doing. And I was definitely not thinking about school or graduation. And I finished that semester with two classes. I dropped three just so I could pass those two. And I graduated three months late in August. 

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:16:08] A month before graduating, I had one offer to sell FiOS, Verizon FiOS, a door-to-door sales. And I had—thank God, I had applied to the BA/MBA program at Brandeis International Business School because, as I mentioned, on my return, I was, you know, humbled by this kind of failure I had had with Galazos. You know, I truly am grateful. I don't know what forces were at play, but I was accepted into the program. It truly, truly altered my trajectory. And I don't talk about this too often, but, you know, I definitely didn't want to be a door-to-door salesman. I didn't know what I wanted to be. I was not on top of the job process, but this was my saving grace. And I went into grad school kind of renewed.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:17:07] And before finishing my year of undergrad, I was actually kicked off of the men's soccer team. I had this idea that I would be able to play if I was a grad student because I still had eligibility, and I got kicked off because I was in such a, you know, deep state of kind of depression, quite frankly, and making choices that weren't good for me or good for those around me. And so, that moment to kind of have my heart—my first true love, soccer, ripped away from me because of my own actions, to have to drop these classes, to have to graduate late, to have no job options, it  kind of all came to a head.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:17:48] And very quickly, you know, it was almost overnight, I snapped out of it and said, "This is not the life for myself. Life is too short. I lost these friends way too early. And I'm doing them a disservice by not seizing every minute I have. And so, I'm gonna go to grad school, and I'm going to have one goal. I've never been the best student, but I have one aspiration. And it's not to get all A's, that'd be great, but my goal is to leave, to graduate from the business school if my entire cohort wanted to work with me. If I could achieve that, then I'd been successful." And so, that was the mindset I brought in to my graduate studies.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:18:29] I don't know if I achieved that goal. You'd have to ask my cohort, but, you know, I definitely was able to embrace learning in a really new way. I embraced academics for the learning that could be experienced in that process. And, you know, GreenChoice was born while I was there, I think, because I had opened myself up to seeking opportunity and understanding that there is not a clear path to success.

Andy Molinsky: [00:18:55] Really great story. And bring us back to how you actually came up with the idea for GreenChoice. I mean, you know, some people think about these ideas as sort of like this spontaneous burst of insight and, you know, it just comes to you or something like that. But I mentioned a lot of times it's not exactly that. So, I mean, how did it happen for you?

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:19:17] Yeah, it hasn't been like that for me in that the idea has evolved and grown with—you know, with nurturing and care. It actually was born. The initial seedling came from a class that prompted us to basically come up with any business idea and pitch it to the class in a Shark Tank like format. And this was the first time that I had had somebody, you know, in the academic context say, "Hey, go think about anything that would be valuable to the world that doesn't exist right now and try and create a business around it. And so, you know, I do distinctly remember being back home in my living room in Vermont with my dad, who's an environmental studies professor thinking about this obsession and addiction we have with our mobile phones and how we can't seem to separate ourselves from them; yet, while they capture us like this, they also hold so much power to really enable us to make informed choices. And we saw that as an opportunity to help people better understand the impacts of their purchases and realign their dollars and their spending with their values and the things that they want to support in the world.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:20:35] So, we said if we could actually map lifecycle assessment, if we could look up anything in your room, any, you know, from the chair to this desk, where did it come from? How are the people paid? Who made it? You know, how were the resources extracted? You know, what's the end of life? Where will it go after it's done being used? These things, if we get through basically the aggregation of all these data points, if we could simplify that for the user into a score, then we could help people make choices that really reflect their best interests. And that was the initial seedling for GreenChoice.

Andy Molinsky: [00:21:11] So, talking with your dad about that-

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:21:13] Yea.

Andy Molinsky: [00:21:13] Like articulating it in that way.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:21:15] Yeah.

Andy Molinsky: [00:21:15] That's interesting. And then, you came back and said, "We're not going to do about tables or desks. We're going to do about food," or?

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:21:21] Yeah, exactly. So, you know, I think it kind of came from this idea of saying, "Look, more and more people want to make values-based decisions. They want their day-to-day choices to line up with the things they care about." And because information is becoming more and more accessible about the impacts of our daily choices, we're starting to understand that, you know, ignorance is not bliss anymore. We have major, major climate issues on the horizon that are already impacting many lives. You know, we have a major health epidemic in this country, and we have incredible socioeconomic inequities that persist, that are incredibly systemic. And all these things, in many cases, you can follow the dollars. And the things that we're buying are key driver in many of these these challenges. So, massive opportunity for us.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:22:13] And so, it was really about how do we make it super convenient, super easy, and it should be fun too. Making good choices for you and the planet should be fun too. How do we facilitate this through the mobile device? And, you know, we saw food is a great first market because there is such consciousness around what—you know, from a health perspective, what people were putting in their bodies, and a growing awareness around food as having the power to be medicine and food's impacts on the planet. And so, we started with saying, "Hey, food will be the first of many different markets, of many different product types.".

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:22:47] I think as we got more into it, and this comes back to your early question, we got more into the problem and realized, "Oh, my gosh, there's so much potential in food alone." And it is at the nexus of all those issues I mentioned. And if we can, you know, really enable people to make great food choices for themselves, for their families, for the planet, then the impact is—you know, it's profound. And so, we've, you know, pivoted to really focus on on food and dietary choices.

Andy Molinsky: [00:23:16] So, you didn't go to—I know you went to business school, but you probably didn't train to be the CEO of a company in all the things that that entails. What—can you name a couple of sort of unforeseen challenges you faced.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:23:31] There's so many. No, I definitely didn't train to be a CEO, and I definitely didn't train to be a founder. But I think you learn as you go. And so, I—you know, if you are willing to embrace the risks associated with the unknown, then, you know, anyone—truly, I believe, anyone can start a company. And whether or not you're able to, you know, build a successful business, what you will learn in that process because of being stretched so far outside your comfort zone on a daily basis can be absolutely reformative.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:24:12] So, mistakes, you know, I think we've probably spent too long building the product. I think we probably fell prey to the same issue we did in—I did improve, which was to say, you know, we didn't—we could have started maybe simpler, and going out, and giving people, I don't know, a PDF, a document, a newsletter to say, "Hey, these are the products that are going to best match up what the things you care about. Start there." And we said, "Hey, we're building a mobile app." So—and I think that's one. Probably didn't take the easiest path to solving the problem initially. So, you end up spending more money than you need to. You end up spending more time than you need to.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:24:46] I'd say, you know, there's all sorts of mistakes in terms of, you know, I think, building a team. And I think one thing that's really hard to—you can foster a lot of things through good mentorship, but one thing that's really hard to teach is work ethic. And so, you know, on the flip side of this, if you're somebody that has, and I think many of us have, you know, some core driver that really can put us in a place of incredible work ethic, you know, it's really important that you find that space that inspires you to work really hard because that is a differentiator. It really is. And not everybody is in that space, especially people who are doing things that don't inspire them, that don't light them up. If it lights you up, and you're going to work hard, you will always be differentiated and have an upper edge.

Andy Molinsky: [00:25:32] It sounds like that wasn't the case for selling FiOS door-to-door, right?

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:25:36] No, I probably would've been terrible at it.

Andy Molinsky: [00:25:39] But—so it's—so, it begs the question, like, how do you find—I mean, we'll wind down here, because I think this is one of the most profound questions that people have is like, how do you find what you're passionate about? I mean, I know that it's not as easy as, you know, some simple platitude or, you know, way of doing it, but I don't know. Any insights? You seemed to have done that for now. And you know, what—I don't know. What advice would you give to someone who's kind of struggling with that?

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:26:07] Yeah, well, I think you just said two really powerful words. I haven't thought about it in this context, but for now, right? What are you passionate about for now? What excites you for now? It doesn't have to be your lifelong calling. And to hold yourself to the standard that you're going to figure it out, like your career path, is going to be what calls you forever. And you should know what is going to excite you forever. I think that's unrealistic, right? Growth inherently means change. And so, as you grow, you change, your interests change, your passions may change. And so, it's really around finding what excites you right now, and embracing that, and seeing where it takes you.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:26:47] And so, to find that, I think it just comes back to trying things. Like try as much as you can. As a student, you have that freedom to try things. I think it's very easy to feel like, you know, you need to know what you're supposed to study, you need to know your career path, to switch your major halfway through, you know, college, oh, it comes with so many challenges. But if you see something that excites you, that's pulling you, that you're gravitating towards, go for it, because those are the places that you're going to be able to be your best self, and probably be the most happy, and do the best work. And it may not be your life calling, but yeah, I think that for-now piece is critical. Find what excites you for now and do that by trying a lot of things.

Andy Molinsky: [00:27:32] All right. Well, that's excellent advice. And if people want to learn more about you, about your story, about the company, where can they go?

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:27:42] Yeah. So probably the best space is greenchoicenow.com. That's our company website. You can also find our mobile app. It's free to download in the Apple App Store and the Google Play store. So, it's available for both iOS and Android devices. But yeah. And reach out. I'm happy to share my info with you. And if anyone wants to talk to me directly, I'm more than happy to chat.

Andy Molinsky: [00:28:07] All right. And thanks so much for coming on, and especially thanks so much for demoing our first in-person broadcast.

Galen Karlan-Mason: [00:28:13] My pleasure. Thank you so much for having me, Andy.

Andy Molinsky: [00:28:17] Thank you for listening to From the Dorm Room to the Board Room. If you're interested in learning more about the work that I do in helping people step outside their comfort zones and transition successfully into the professional world, please visit my website, www.andymolinsky.com. That's A-N-D-Y-M-O-L-I-N-S-K-Y dot com. And also feel free to email me directly at andy@andymolinsky.com with any feedback or ideas for guests for future podcasts.

Andy Molinsky: [00:28:48] This podcast is brought to you by Brandies University's International Business School. By teaching rigorous Business, Finance, and Economics, connecting students to best practices and immersing them in international experiences, Brandeis International Business School prepares exceptional individuals from around the globe to become principled professionals in companies and public institutions worldwide. Thank you so much for listening.