Move the Ball Forward: A COO Dad's Framework | Amit Shah (Dad of 2, Virta Health)

[00:00:00] Amit Shah: We have made the conscious decision to continue to invest in our careers in that way. and it is a conscious decision.
[00:00:05] Amit Shah: It's not like we've fallen into it. and that conscious decision and decision making is part of why I can say that it's fulfilling.
[00:00:13] Adam Fishman: Welcome to Startup Dad, the podcast where we dive deep into the lives of dads who are also leaders in the world of startups and business. I'm your host, Adam Fishman. Amit Shah is the COO of Virta Health, a 500 plus Hypergrowth health company on a mission to reverse type two diabetes. His wife who couldn't join us today is the CEO of Guild Education, a company that's even bigger than Virta.
[00:00:41] Adam Fishman: Together, they're raising a four and 2-year-old dealing with skyrocketing careers and building demanding companies. Today we talked about their decision to start a family as two busy C-level executives, how they partner to run the household through shared values, trade-offs, and incredible support structures.
[00:01:00] Adam Fishman: Teaching kids to learn and be resilient. What advice he'd give to career-focused execs who want to start a family, some fantastic frameworks and one of his favorite life principles. People don't care how much you know until they know how much you care. If you like what you hear, please subscribe to Startup Dad on YouTube or Spotify, so you never miss an episode.
[00:01:21] Adam Fishman: You'll find it everywhere you get your podcasts. Welcome Amit Shah, uh, to startup dad. And a very special thank you to Annie Riley from the Best Manager ever podcast who introduced the two of us. thank you Annie, and welcome Amit.
[00:01:37] Amit Shah: Thank you so much. I'm really excited to be here. Adam.
[00:01:39] Adam Fishman: today is a very special treat because you, sir, are a former Michigander like me
[00:01:46] Adam Fishman: and also went to U of M, so go blue.
[00:01:49] Amit Shah: go blue.
[00:01:50] Adam Fishman: you know, our football team is, uh, doing okay, but, there's always next year we're gonna
[00:01:55] Adam Fishman: be so good next year.
[00:01:56] Amit Shah: look, we won, we won recently enough where I still bask in that glow. You know, I still, I still bask, uh, bask in that glory and, uh, probably, you might think this too, like the value of my degree has, has luckily not, tracked the, the performance of the football team. So I still am very grateful for, for the time there.
[00:02:13] Adam Fishman: yes. Michigan's still a top-notch academic institution, so,
[00:02:17] Adam Fishman: aside from U of M, you are also the COO, chief Operating Officer of Virta Health, which is a really big job.
[00:02:24] Adam Fishman: Uh, as I understand it. I know plenty of COO's
[00:02:27] Adam Fishman: but. I would be remiss if I did, did not mention that your wife Bija has an even bigger job than you because she is the CEO of Guild education.
[00:02:37] Adam Fishman: So power couple here, we got a power couple. and the two of you have a 4-year-old and a 2-year-old. And we were talking about this before you came on, and it's like you in the wintertime are in like the Petri dish of disease with a 4-year-old and a 2-year-old. so I imagine COO, CEO, 2 kids, four and under, like I imagine your house is pretty busy. Would that be an, an accurate uh, assessment?
[00:03:03] Amit Shah: Yeah. I always say our life is super full. and luckily for us it's also super fulfilling. It is pretty full. And to your comment on Petri Dish, first of all, maybe listeners can hear it a little bit, but I'm also sipping this tea here. this week.
[00:03:15] Amit Shah: It's full fulfilling. and a little bit under the weather too,
[00:03:18] Adam Fishman: Yeah, my son has had like the, the longest duration cold that I think I've ever experienced before. And he sounds like, I don't know, he has like the death rattle in his lungs or something like that. But he's fine. He's on the mend.
[00:03:30] Amit Shah: Adam, you should probably take him to a dock or something, man. I,
[00:03:33] Adam Fishman: that's right. From the health, from the health, uh, tech, uh, COO, uh,
[00:03:37] Adam Fishman: that's probably a good idea.
[00:03:38] Amit Shah: if child has death, death rattle, then take two Doc
[00:03:42] Adam Fishman: Okay. It's not quite the death rattle unless like child protective services gets called on me.
[00:03:48] Adam Fishman: okay. So you uh, and your wife were both C-level executives when your oldest was born,
[00:03:54] Adam Fishman: what was the decision like for the two of you to start a family, with such high flying careers?
[00:04:01] Adam Fishman: And did you talk about career progression as part of this decision making process?
[00:04:08] Amit Shah: Yeah, so Bijal and I had dated for quite some time before we got married and through the dating process, and by the time we got married, we both knew we wanted to have a family. My first reply to that is that we weren't questioning whether or not we wanted to have a family.
[00:04:25] Amit Shah: The fact that we were both executives C-level well, at least I wasn't C-level, she was C-level. I was close.
[00:04:31] Adam Fishman: You were trending in that
[00:04:33] Amit Shah: I was trending in that direction. I, you know, I had a, I still had a great and, and quote unquote big job at Virta. But,as we went through the process, we got married, we knew we wanted to have a family.
[00:04:42] Amit Shah: And as we went through that process, honestly, it just took us longer to have kids than we had expected. and we. Had the benefit and the blessing of being able to use a lot of modern science. So we, you know, our kids are IVF babies, that's not something that we've, shied away from sharing. but because it took a while by the time we had children, it was more that just was the time that all these things were happening and in a very positive light, like how awesome that we were able to grow our careers in that way.
[00:05:12] Amit Shah: you know, to that point, now what you said is absolutely true. in some ways, there were parallel tracks. We, we knew we wanted to have a family. It ended up taking longer. one very conscious decision that we had made, and especially Al Credit Bijal had made, is to not have her.
[00:05:27] Amit Shah: Lean out of that until we made that decision, which to this day we haven't, you know, and to this day now, we have two kids, and life is both pretty full and fulfilling. And we have made the conscious decision to continue to invest in our careers in that way. and it is a conscious decision.
[00:05:42] Amit Shah: It's not like we've fallen into it. and that conscious decision and decision making is part of why I can say that it's fulfilling. it's not easy. There are trade-offs, there are days where it doesn't feel fulfilling. but by and large, I, I think that's the case. So
[00:05:56] Amit Shah: we didn't really have a discussion on, well, if we wanna keep investing in our careers, is this still the right thing to do? We have always viewed it as both of these things can be true. There are tradeoffs to making them true. But both of these things can be true.
[00:06:09] Adam Fishman: I'm curious how the two of you. Partner together to run your household with two kids, you know, four and under with such demanding careers. I mean, imagine that, you know, being COO and being CEO of, you know, many hundred million dollar a RR companies, it's time consuming.
[00:06:31] Adam Fishman: so is having a four-year-old and a two-year-old.
[00:06:34] Adam Fishman: how's your partnership evolved or like how do you guys trade off the, the work that goes into family and career?
[00:06:40] Amit Shah: I'll start with. Anybody that knows Bijal and I actually would be, humored by how different we are on so many things. she is incredibly creative, uh, and super, uh, empathetic kind like she's, she's really just a, a very wonderful human in many ways.
[00:06:58] Amit Shah: I spike very high, not surprisingly, given the COO title on operations and like, you know, structure and
[00:07:05] Amit Shah: She does not spike high on that. anyway, so that's something that, that we're different on.
[00:07:09] Amit Shah: And so when you talk about how we, how we bring that together, it's never been more true to me that a shared set of values is what matters the most. I think for both B, Jill and I, we have a very strong shared set of values that overlap very consistently. And what we desire out of our lives and for our children is similar enough that even when you take these very different approaches to get there, you know, her probably with a lot less structure and a lot more creativity and all, and me with a lot of structure it still works out pretty well.
[00:07:39] Amit Shah: So the first thing I'll say is that that shared set of values is something that's key. It's something that we try to talk about. Consciously, and it is also something that we are lucky to have subconsciously. Like I think we were raised in a surprisingly similar set of ways, despite a very different upbringing,
[00:07:57] Amit Shah: and so that I think is, is at the core. And then because I'm the ops guy, I'm gonna tell you about the logistics of how it works. logistically, you know, what does the partnership look like? I very much live by the one calendar rule. And so if you work with me and you have access to my calendar, you'll see things on the calendar.
[00:08:14] Amit Shah: Like this afternoon I'm on for pickup I need to know where I need to be when. And so, that is something as simple as that. But we spend, a real amount of time on Sunday nights, looking at the next two to three weeks and trying to make sure that we understand where everybody needs to be.
[00:08:28] Amit Shah: Literally the blocking and tackling of who needs to be, where, who's gonna be. Doing what? along with that, there are some real trade-offs. I would say I have traveled a lot less, than I used to pre-kids. and we had our kids during COVID. And so
[00:08:41] Amit Shah: Over the last few years, it's become more of a thing as travel has picked up and all. And there are real times where I'm like, look, I just can't take that trip. We try our best to have one of us at home every night. given that is a value that we try to hold, hold dear, we like there trade offs that are made and to her credit, she's also said no to some things.
[00:09:01] Amit Shah: I think it's much harder for the CEO to say no. and so that's just a reality that we live with and, there's some trade-offs and, and often I'm making them a little bit more, I think another thing that I'll, that I have to mention is just how strong of a support system we have.
[00:09:16] Amit Shah: Bijal became the CEO kind of after we had our second child. And it was a little bit of a, urgent situation. Like it wasn't like she was planning to become CEO and there the job came, she became CEO.
[00:09:29] Amit Shah: she was, by the way, on maternity leave at the time and I had just gone back to work from paternity leave. And so, we really limped through the back half of that year a little bit. we didn't take the time to figure out what we needed to make that happen.
[00:09:40] Amit Shah: It was happening so fast, we just did it. and towards the end of that year, we made a pretty conscious decision that we were like, Hey, we just need to invest in this to, to the conscious decision making point of like, if we want all of this to be true. We just, we need to rethink how we think about childcare and what we're spending our time and resources on.
[00:10:00] Amit Shah: And so we have an incredible support system that. It starts with, a nanny house manager. her name is Rachel. She is incredible. She's been with us for years. I certainly feel like she loves our children in a way that I'm very grateful for.. We also have an adopted set, an adopted family here.
[00:10:19] Amit Shah: Like there are folks, neither of us are from Denver, but uh, we have a, an adopted set of grandparents you know, a and auntie and Frank uncle, we call them. They, they take great care of us and, uh, and we, we will call on them. And then we live in a neighborhood where there are other parents that have kids that are around our age.
[00:10:35] Amit Shah: And, and like that community has been solid too. The kids' daycare community, the, that, the daycare that they go to. Community has been great. So we do rely heavily on all those other communities to kind of help fill in the gaps along the way. Uh, and so again, I'll go through like the one calendar where 60% is the blocking and talent and tackling a little bit more investment in the problem.
[00:10:56] Amit Shah: And then the broader community to help support. we also of course have families, grandparents, my sister, her sister will fly folks in every now and then if we really need that level of support. But, yeah, that, that's kind of how how we think about it
[00:11:08] Amit Shah: and make it work.
[00:11:09] Adam Fishman: Thanks for that summary. There's a couple of things in there that I wanted to go a little bit deeper on, and one is, I want to talk about the shared set of values. 'cause you mentioned that that's a really important starting point. And I think this is probably something that you and your wife, I'm sure you worked on or talked about this, like maybe years before your kids were even born. and then you kind of have to revisit that probably as you're starting to build a family because you now have this value system that is gonna get projected onto two more humans, you know? And so like, tell me about what, what falls into that shared set of values and like, is this something that you explicitly talked about at some point in time?
[00:11:42] Adam Fishman: Or it just kind of like things came up and you sort of backed into, well, eh, let's, how should we think about this? You know.
[00:11:50] Amit Shah: it's a little bit of both. A little bit of came up organically and explicitly talked about it. we had been dating through both of our business school experiences and, I went to Stanford for business school, and there's a huge emphasis at Stanford on interpersonal dynamics, as it relates to leadership, values driven leadership,
[00:12:08] Adam Fishman: Did you, take the touchy feely course
[00:12:10] Amit Shah: this is exactly where I was going, where I was in touchy feely. While we were dating and she was living at the time she was living in San Francisco. So, you know, a little bit away. Uh, but she would come down to Palo Alto a fair amount and spend time with us. And over the course of that quarter, she would basically like, what is happening to my boyfriend?
[00:12:27] Amit Shah: Like, like, how is he? But it, you know, it was, it was an incredible course and an incredible experience. and then she went to business school. She ended up going to the East Coast. She was at MIT, uh, and they didn't have as much of a, focus on that, but it was still a key part, like the values driven leadership and all.
[00:12:41] Amit Shah: So some of it is we happen to have these life experiences that weren't necessarily in our relationship, but that forced us to talk about those things as we'd of course talk about what we were doing in school and what was happening in touchy feely or, the courses that she was taking. that was something that was.
[00:12:58] Amit Shah: Kinda subconscious, not intentional. That became intentional 'cause we would talk about it and we saw the value of talking about it right after a quarter of touchy feel, you're like, actually talking about these things helps drive a lot more alignment. And I want a very healthy, happy marriage where we could talk about these things.
[00:13:15] Amit Shah: And so we would talk about them. Uh, and so that's where some of the explicit discussion came in. before we got married, we also, had an explicit discussion. I don't remember. I mean, it's long enough ago where I don't remember that all of it. But
[00:13:28] Amit Shah: I'm a structured guy and I'm like, I wanna make sure I make good decisions. So there are like those questionnaires that you find, and I'm not talking about like the five question, you know, magazine questionnaire, but there are those slightly deeper, uh, like from the Gottman Institute, they're researchers that have researched relationships and marriage for decades and, you know, and so and so we did go through some of those.
[00:13:48] Amit Shah: and established a set of values, and they weren't values, like put up on the wall, two words kind of things. They were just like, do we think about this the same way? then as we got married and decided that we wanted to start a family,we took some of the practices that you would do at a startup, and I know that sounds, but we, I have these cards.
[00:14:06] Amit Shah: I don't, I don't seem to have them at my desk here, but I have these cards that are values cards. And the way you work with them is you put 'em down and you start to pick the ones that, you know, resonate as at a first pass. Then you, you kind of, pick your values from that. Uh, we use those cards.
[00:14:20] Amit Shah: We were like, Hey, like what are the values we wanna impart, impart on our kids and use those cards? And came up with a list. It was a list of like six or seven. And as you can tell, I don't remember what all of them are, and I'll get to that in a minute, but that was a super intentional process. We were like, yeah, this is what we want.
[00:14:35] Amit Shah: Our kids are. and then we had kids and like, you know, when you have a baby, it's like the values I chose did not, did not impact the way I was trying to put the baby to sleep or put the, you know, feed the baby the bottle. Like, I turns out that those values probably come into play a little bit later.
[00:14:49] Amit Shah: but as our daughter who's our first got a little bit older and, you know, we started to think about how we were showing up around them, I can't even tell you exactly how we landed there, but we ended up getting to kind, curious and persistent. We were like, these are three things that we feel really strongly about that we want to both, Show to our kids, but also have them consciously try to become. and so that's where we landed on those values, that we wanna impart on our kids. And I will tell you, and I want everyone to hear this very, it does not mean that I, I believe I am kind, curious, and persistent all the time.
[00:15:24] Amit Shah: I could be kinder and have more curiosity and be more persistent in my life.
[00:15:28] Amit Shah: but these are, these are values that are important to us. And are they the only values as our children go through the rest of life? Probably not. but they are the ones that,for now we think are really important for our family and for our kids to see and experience. And so that's kind of where we are today.
[00:15:42] Amit Shah: And I certainly expect this values discussion to continue. And I've liked the way it's happened. There's some level, as I shared of conscious choosing intentionality, and then there's some level of like, this is where we are.
[00:15:51] Adam Fishman: I wanted to ask you one more thing that you mentioned, which is like this idea of having a nanny house manager that's been with you for a long time.
[00:15:57] Adam Fishman: So one, kudos to finding somebody that's like fit in like a glove to the family. I'm curious, like, how did you find this person? Because people listening to this may be like, Ooh, I want that. I mean, this is almost like, you know, another member of the family, right?
[00:16:14] Adam Fishman: And so how did you find this person and, bring her in to the fold?
[00:16:20] Amit Shah: she's totally another member of the family for us. at least that's how we view her. And I, I would, I, I believe she would say the same. I will share and then I will say, listeners, you might be disappointed because I'm not sure this hack will exist for you, by the way, we had a great nanny when our first daughter after she was born, that we literally just found through a Facebook group that was going well.
[00:16:43] Amit Shah: this nanny ended up getting a job that was wonderful and wanted to move on. And so it was right around the time we were having our second, so we were actually in a little bit of a freak out mode. And it just so happened that my wife's longtime executive assistant, has a twin sister who studied early childhood development and was working in a preschool and was looking to lead the preschool.
[00:17:07] Amit Shah: my wife's long-term executive assistant, she was like, Hey, like I love, you know, Sarah as my EA
[00:17:12] Adam Fishman: What if it didn't work out or
[00:17:14] Amit Shah: doesn't work out. Exactly. What we did is we had, Rachel come, Sarah's sister Rachel come for a little bit and just like, we needed help when our second was first born.
[00:17:23] Amit Shah: And so, like, we just had her come and she was so wonderful and the comfort level we had with her. To your point, it was another member of the family and. we by the way at this time We were still looking for another person.
[00:17:35] Amit Shah: We were like, 'cause we were worried about this dynamic. Then after a few months, you know, we really were just like, we are just very grateful for how she takes care of the kids, how she takes care of us, how she takes care of the, the family, the house. at that time we had parents visiting a lot too.
[00:17:51] Amit Shah: And, you know, we're an Indian family. We really care a lot about, our parents and our family feeling like they can be a part of it. And they all felt pretty comfortable and happy with her too. And so we just felt like we, we needed to have a more explicit conversation. So we did, we sat down an explicit conversation with both of them and, hey, like in the world, in a world where this doesn't work out, will it still work out?
[00:18:10] Amit Shah: You know, and we kind of talked about everything that could go wrong. and I'm really grateful to say, you know, two and a half, almost three years later, like so far, everything has gone mainly right. It's been honestly an extra superpower to have. The woman that knows my wife's schedule better than my wife also, like talk to our nanny like often, right?
[00:18:32] Amit Shah: Like they're sisters, they can talk. that's another hack I didn't share my EA that's one thing that we said when I was bringing you is, hey, you gotta coordinate with Sarah and Rachel too.
[00:18:42] Amit Shah: And so you guys should like have some, you know, you should make sure
[00:18:46] Adam Fishman: Have a WhatsApp group or something. Yeah.
[00:18:47] Amit Shah: yeah, you should make sure that if I am, if I have to be somewhere and Bijal’s gotta be somewhere and Bijal and I haven't identified it, please identify it for us. Like, you know, and that's happened before by the way, where it's like, oh wait, like this date, like, we'll get the email in both of our inboxes.
[00:19:00] Amit Shah: It's like, Hey, you guys should talk about this date. that's how we found her and it's worked out great and You know, super, super grateful, for her and, uh, and honestly for the situation and feel very lucky
[00:19:12] Adam Fishman: Yeah. Wow. What an amazing story too. Like that is, you're right, that hack's probably not gonna work for most people. I think probably most, you know, people don't know an ea with a twin sister or twin,
[00:19:24] Adam Fishman: but, uh, but what a story.
[00:19:25] Adam Fishman: so, so cool. I am curious, you know, we talked a little bit about balance and sort of saying no to things and you know, how have you approached being a dad as an executive?
[00:19:38] Adam Fishman: So do you, do you talk to your team about this? Like, about like, oh, I gotta go 'cause I'm picking up. You know, one of my kids at this, this thing, like, does that come up? do you sort of like wear your, wear your fatherhood on your sleeve, so to speak?
[00:19:54] Amit Shah: Adam, this is the same background I use when I, when I'm on Zoom calls for work.
[00:19:58] Amit Shah: but, you know, they're pictures of my family behind me. And so, yeah, I I, I'm pretty upfront about it.
[00:20:03] Amit Shah: This goes back to, there are a couple things about me that people that know me well will tell you. One is I, the, what I already shared, I lived the one calendar life. So if the next thing on my calendars, I've got pick up my kids and you're, if you happen to be on the call with me, I'll say, I gotta go. I gotta pick up my kids.
[00:20:16] Amit Shah: two is, uh, I have a hard time not being really candid about what I'm thinking. Like it's, that's just how I, I I show up. And so yeah, if that's what's on my mind, I will share it. I present to the entire company from time to time.
[00:20:31] Amit Shah: Again, same background, same thing. I'm very grateful to work at a highly mission-driven company where I feel like the work we do is improving the quality of life for people, and therefore, the time I spend away from my family away, I'm air quoing away. But, you know, in, in, in front of the screen versus in front of, in front of them, is time that I think is incredibly well spent if it's pushing our mission forward.
[00:20:56] Amit Shah: And I shared that at the company level. I said, look, like, you know, I love what we do, and, and I'm here, here to do that. And so I do, kind of try to be as authentic as possible, you know, as you've already identified, being dad has its challenges. It's not like I honestly couldn't spend all day, every day with my kids and feel totally fulfilled.
[00:21:16] Amit Shah: That is also a fact. I mean, I, I, I love them and love spending time with them. And, uh, I get a lot of joy and fulfillment out of the other work I get to do. I like to think about work-life alignment more than work-life balance. even today, it's not a 50 50 balance for me or, It's not in balance, but I feel super aligned with where I'm allocating my time.
[00:21:36] Adam Fishman: It's kinda like a seesaw in some
[00:21:38] Adam Fishman: regards. Like there are some days of the week or weeks of the year where like that seesaw is gonna tilt in one direction or the other,
[00:21:45] Adam Fishman: and
[00:21:46] Adam Fishman: it evens out. So, so I want to come back to the thing that, that I, I said I was gonna come back to, which is, you know, learning and resilience are two very important themes in your life for your kids. you mentioned the value system and things like that. now your kids are foreign too, so let's caveat like you're not teaching them, you know, Latin or, uh, calculus or
[00:22:06] Adam Fishman: I'm not teaching them math calculus. Let's just be clear
[00:22:08] Adam Fishman: but how do you encourage learning in your kids and then separately, how do you teach them about resilience?
[00:22:16] Amit Shah: listeners, please, please drop me a line if you have a great answer to Adam's question. I unfortunately won't get it fast enough to answer with your answer, so I will use mine. But, uh, suffice it to say it's something that I am constantly thinking about and trying to figure out. I think on the learning front, it is
[00:22:34] Amit Shah: A joy for learning both with them and, to them, you know, so the, I'll start with the, to them. Like, we read a lot. I try to spend a lot of time reading to them. Our 4-year-old is starting to do the early reader books, and so I get excited about doing that with her. And when she does it, we like celebrate it.
[00:22:56] Amit Shah: again, probably more our 4-year-old, even our 2-year-old, puzzles games, like figuring things out together, is something that we invest time in and create, try to create joy out of. And so I think that is part of the, the learning process. The with them is, look, I haven't been successful at this yet, but there are things that I've tried to learn with them.
[00:23:16] Amit Shah: Like, for example, I used to play guitar growing up and then I haven't touched it. In a very long time. And so I practically, I don't play guitar anymore. Like that's the, the fact. But our daughter seems to love musical instruments. And so for a while I signed up for guitar classes together. Now it turned out she was too young, wasn't like really into it, couldn't really pay attention.
[00:23:37] Amit Shah: And she was like, but I tried to be like, look like I'm going to try to learn something and like you can learn it too. she's gotten into piano a little bit, so she started to do that. I've started to like tinker around there and try to try to be like, look like I don't know this any better than you.
[00:23:50] Amit Shah: Like, let's do it together. And so, I'm hoping that over the years, I don't know what it'll be, but there'll be something that we will learn together. and I'm hoping that that's gonna be a cool experience for her. That, hey, like, just 'cause you're an adult doesn't mean that like learning has stopped.
[00:24:04] Amit Shah: we talk about the curiosity value, Our 2-year-old does not get it at all. I try to ask questions like, oh, like what's a time you were curious? And, last night he said, it was when he hugged me, which is so cute, but that's not an example of curiosity, but my daughter kind of gets it.
[00:24:20] Amit Shah: She's starting to be like, oh yeah, like I learned about this at school today. And it's, you know, and I ask this question and I've tried to relate it to behaviors. I'm like, oh, when you want to know more about something and you ask a question, that's curiosity. and so that's kind of cool to see that like she can start to say, okay, this is an action or a behavior that I can tie to this thing that dad is, and mom are always is they're always talking about.
[00:24:41] Amit Shah: and then resilience I think is, I think saying no, you know, and I think feeling comfortable with hey, saying, no, it's okay. You know, our 2-year-old is still in the kind of a slightly tantrum phase, and he will tantrum and we will try to work it through the tantrum, but we will not give up on the, no.
[00:24:57] Amit Shah: And I, that's a small example, but without going into my childhood and all, like resilience came to me, you know, we moved a lot as kids and there were other things that happened as I was growing up where resilience was something I had to develop because of the environmental factors that were, that were going on.
[00:25:14] Amit Shah: my kids probably don't have that in the, in the same way, but that doesn't mean that everything has to feel like it's on Easy Street. we try to be pretty firm in our. Boundaries and No, and, and, and help the kids work through that.
[00:25:26] Adam Fishman: you know, not that I'm a particular expert on this, but I think, you know, that example that you gave of no, and then kind of sticking to it and letting them experience some disappointment, like that's a perfectly age appropriate example of teaching resilience. Like, I think that's, that's great.
[00:25:40] Adam Fishman: You know, you're not like dropping 'em off in the forest and asking them to walk home or anything like that. That
[00:25:45] Adam Fishman: comes later. That comes later. there's one other thing that you mentioned, uh, there, which was this idea of learning guitar with your, with your daughter. And even though she was a little bit young for it, you know, that reminded me of the conversation I had with Todd Francis, uh, who's a VC a long time ago on this show.
[00:26:03] Adam Fishman: And he talked about like, one of the greatest ways to build. long-term lasting memories with your kids is doing something with them that puts you on equal footing. So like learning guitar, you know, or learning something that you don't know and your kid certainly doesn't know is like a great, a great way to do that.
[00:26:20] Adam Fishman: So I think you're, you're kind of, you probably didn't see that episode with Todd, but like that's a great example of like, but she'll probably remember when she took guitar lessons, even though it, you know, it didn't end up with her learning guitar, but now it's a piano. So,
[00:26:33] Adam Fishman: what's something that one of your kids that you've like, watched them learn recently that really like, made you light up or, or surprised you?
[00:26:42] Amit Shah: One recent, very recently is our 2-year-old. It is funny 'cause it's getting cold now, but he, all summer, I tried to get him to Scooter, you know, I was like, Hey, you got this little scooter and you know, walk the dog, do you wanna a scooter with me? You know, and he would literally go like half a block and be like, I'm done.
[00:26:58] Amit Shah: I don't
[00:26:58] Adam Fishman: That you had to carry the scooter and maybe
[00:27:00] Amit Shah: Carry the scooter. Classic dad. Like, I had the dog, the scooter holding his hand. I'm just like, you know. all of a sudden, over the last few weeks, he just loves scooting. And he went from cautious, kinda like, you know, a couple of pegs. And now he'll go down a hill and he'll, kick his back leg up oh, the other thing was you just like run into the, you know, side of the sidewalk, right?
[00:27:22] Amit Shah: Like the grass But he's kind of figured out how to turn and move his body and all. And it has happened at such a rate. And totally on his timeline, like literally all summer, Hey, you wanna go scooter with me? Like, you wanna scoot everyone, walk the dog.
[00:27:36] Amit Shah: You wanna scooter? I don't want, you know, get his helmet on and literally like, you know, five minutes later, hey, take the helmet off and carrying the helmet and the scooter. And, and now he's like totally into it. We walk the dog together, him on the scooter, me with the dog. He did the whole like loop. no complaints.
[00:27:53] Amit Shah: Went up the hill, went down the hill, went, you know, all that kind of stuff. And so that's, it's just cool and it's cool to watch him get joy out of it and to see how him maneuver his body to be able to stay on it. that's been fun. A, a very fun recent one, with my daughter.
[00:28:08] Amit Shah: It's, it's honestly been just watching her learn how to read. again, those early beginner books, we started on them a while back and you could see the skill development where now we're on the later. ones of the early beginner books, and she can pick up a new one and actually get through a fair amount of it.
[00:28:27] Amit Shah: Just sounding out the words where, again, the first times like that wasn't the case. So, so yeah, it's been, it's been super fun. It,
[00:28:34] Adam Fishman: Yeah. Watching a kid learn to read is like incredible because it's like probably the most critical skill as a human being that you could ever learn and you like get this front row seat to somebody doing that. It's pretty
[00:28:47] Adam Fishman: amazing. also, I love the fact that your son is now coming into scooter riding like, right as the sidewalks are about to be super icy and like, just, just treacherous out there.
[00:28:57] Adam Fishman: So,
[00:28:58] Amit Shah: Like, another thing that's annoying is two months ago or a month ago, if he wanted to go scootering is just like, yeah, put your shoes on, let's go out. Now it's like, put your jacket on and like put socks on. And then he doesn't wanna put socks on and you're just like, oh my God.
[00:29:11] Amit Shah: It's like, you know, 44 degrees outside
[00:29:13] Amit Shah: the real talk here is that, yeah, if you had done this two months ago when the sun was setting after bedtime and all, we'd have all this time to scooter. And now it's like,
[00:29:22] Amit Shah: I'm lazy to put his socks on, guys. I'm just telling, listen, I, putting kids socks on is not something I enjoy.
[00:29:28] Adam Fishman: No, it's, it's a, it's a lesson in resilience for
[00:29:30] Adam Fishman: you actually is what it is. So getting the coat on and the socks and all the things. so let's say there's a, super career focused executive out there,
[00:29:39] Adam Fishman: or they're on the cusp, they're kind of progressing and trending in that direction like you were.
[00:29:43] Adam Fishman: and they're contemplating starting a family, but they're, you know, worried like many people who listen to this show are concerned. They don't know what it's like. Right.
[00:29:52] Adam Fishman: It's really hard to know what it's like to be a parent until you become one.
[00:29:55] Adam Fishman: do you have any advice that you would give them or offer to them, or, or like a pep talk or anything like that?
[00:30:00] Amit Shah: I guess this is a form of advice here. Here are the things that come to mind in that situation. Number one is to look forward and to. Think about what you want over the next period of time, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 years.
[00:30:15] Amit Shah: I'll go back to for Bijal and I, we always wanted a family. I always wanted to be a dad. my dad was an executive at companies growing up, so I also didn't see it as a this or that. he was an exec and I have a great relationship with my dad. I mean, to this day, I call him most mornings.
[00:30:30] Amit Shah: And, it didn't feel to me like it had to be one or the other ever. and so look forward and if that is what you are seeking, then you can do that. You can have a great family life and have children, and you can be an executive. The second point is that's not without its trade-offs.
[00:30:47] Amit Shah: I saw my dad make trade-offs growing up. both in his career and, and for us and, and then both, you know, with us and for his career, Bijal and I don't have a burgeoning social life. We have a good social life. We have friends, we have close friends who have both, who have kids of similar ages and who don't have kids.
[00:31:05] Amit Shah: And, but I will admit that they are our close friends because they're kind enough to fit into our schedule often and do the, do things with us in ways that, is easier for us,
[00:31:16] Amit Shah: but if any of our friends are listening, I'm very grateful for that, that we have that. Uh, and they're all within a couple, you know, a couple miles too. Like, no one's too far. And, and so it makes it easier logistically. But like, if we were like, Hey, we wanna have a bunch of friends and, you know, and, and hang out with them all the time, that's a real trade off.
[00:31:33] Amit Shah: I think networking real talk here. I don't say yes to add networking dinners anymore. I don't go to happy hours. I would love to, I love a good happy hour and I love meeting people and all, it's pretty much like if there's not a direct tie where I have to do this for work, I probably am not gonna do it.
[00:31:48] Amit Shah: and that's a real trade off. And some of those things are in both enjoyable and good for your career. And again, it's a trade off. You, you just have to like, kind of consciously know that, hey, like that kind of stuff is, is not gonna happen. again, 0.1 is look forward and see what you want and you can do those things.
[00:32:04] Amit Shah: And 0.2 is when you look forward and you see what you want. If it turns out being you want to have a family and have this career, then there will be real trade-offs. And then maybe the last thing I'll say is being an executive at different places, at different startups, at different, growth companies or.
[00:32:22] Amit Shah: It's just different. And so it's hard for melike it has worked for Bijal and I in the context that we are in for now. we are also pretty wide-eyed about like every six months is a different six months. We are at growth companies. The companies change, our jobs change, and by the way, our kids change.
[00:32:41] Amit Shah: there might be a moment at which it is no longer working. And I think the, the most important thing. That you can do is be real with yourself about that, so that when that moment comes and I'm like knocking on wood and
[00:32:56] Amit Shah: praying to the good Lord, that, that is not close for us 'cause we're enjoying what we're doing.
[00:32:59] Amit Shah: But when that moment comes, you've gotta be able to recognize it and then figure out what next set of trade offs you're gonna make. and we're not there yet. So I can't speak from experience on that, but I can say that like at least we pretty much know that, that day will come where like this, version of being able to do it all might not be real for us anymore.
[00:33:16] Amit Shah: And when that day comes, you know, both of us feel pretty strongly that we, hey, we're in that moment. The, the priority list is what's best for us, what's best for our kids, what's best for our careers. now you could have a different priority. You could be like, what's best for my career?
[00:33:27] Amit Shah: What's best for my kids? What's best for me? but we have pretty much aligned on, hey, that's how we wanna think about this. if we get there, and that's how we think about it. Even in the micro moments where it's like, oh, like. Both of us have to be gone on this day. Okay. how are we gonna manage that?
[00:33:40] Amit Shah: Like, we think about it in the micro moments and we think about it in the macro moments. And I think,we're not always right. but that's how we've kind of managed it. And that would be my advice is just be very conscientious that there are trade-offs and there might be bigger tradeoffs moving forward.
[00:33:52] Amit Shah: And if you can wrap your head around that and at least feel like, okay, when that happens, I'm gonna be able to be real and make those tradeoffs. Then hopefully you're in the right direction. I
[00:34:02] Amit Shah: don't know. Our kids are four and two,
[00:34:04] Adam Fishman: Well, you'll find out over the arc of time,
[00:34:06] Adam Fishman: no, I love what you're saying there. especially that last point about, you know, you mentioned the company is very malleable and fluid and changes, and then also your family life. It's almost like, you know, at work we have to revisit for an executive, we have to revisit like, how is this business operating?
[00:34:21] Adam Fishman: Are we doing the right things? Does this process make sense anymore now for the size that we are or what we're focused on, or whatever. And you almost have to do that same introspection with your family on a regular basis because, your kids are growing maybe even faster than the company because
[00:34:36] Adam Fishman: the developmental leaps are
[00:34:38] Adam Fishman: massive in six month time
[00:34:39] Adam Fishman: windows.
[00:34:40] Adam Fishman: So yeah, I really like that point. it always amazes me the parallels between like how you think about growing and evolving a company and like your family. So
[00:34:49] Amit Shah: One of the cool things that has happened at Virta, for me is that I've been there for nine years and I have had a lot of teammates that have gone through the growth startup, journey with me and have gone through their parenting with me. I just immediately off the top of my head, like including my.
[00:35:07] Amit Shah: Boss, the CEO, you know, his kids are older than mine, but he had children, kind of early in Verde's history. And he is both a dad and the CEO. And so, I always felt super supported. I never felt like I had to choose between being a dad and, and my job. he, to his credit, was authentic about it.
[00:35:24] Amit Shah: And, for Bijal, her, the former CEO, she was the co-founder and CEO and she had her kids while she was CEO, you know. And so so that's just another dynamic that was real for us, that honestly works in our favor, right? Like, we're surrounded by people that are going through the same thing and they want kind of a similar thing, right?
[00:35:43] Amit Shah: My boss is CEO of Virta, and he's a dad, and he's both of those things, you know, and her boss was CEO of guild and was a mom, and was both of those things. And so, back to the community point, that work community is important too. and we again, have been, blessed around that,
[00:35:57] Adam Fishman: that's awesome. I wanted to, in a second, I want to ask you about parenting frameworks. We talked about a couple, but first I just wanted ask you kind of a fun question, which is, you mentioned your daughter is learning to read.
[00:36:08] Adam Fishman: but what is your favorite book to read to your, to your kids?
[00:36:11] Adam Fishman: Or maybe each one of them has a favorite?
[00:36:14] Amit Shah: the first set of things that I've loved reading to the kids is there's this company called Wonder Ably, and I'm not getting a, a spiff from them for this, but there's this company called Wonder Ably, and actually friends bought us these books when our daughter was first born, and they basically personalized the book with the kid's name.
[00:36:30] Amit Shah: it's like, you know, 10 little Aons or whatever, like, it's like, uh, and I really love reading those. I definitely have them memorized, but it's like cool when the kids are younger, to have them be like, oh, my name's in the book. And like, they just get excited about that. So I, I've enjoyed those.
[00:36:46] Amit Shah: another friend gave us this set of books,they're called, they're like. Such and such is my superpower. So it's kindness is my superpower. Confidence is my superpower, patience is my superpower. so far the kids have really gravitated towards the kindness and the, confidence ones.
[00:37:01] Amit Shah: our older one, our younger one, not as much. So those, that's another set. I love reading those. they also bring to life some of these values discussions that you and I were having a little bit earlier where it's, you know, it's for slightly older kids than our kids. but our daughter definitely kind of gets it.
[00:37:18] Amit Shah: Uh, and so that's been cool. And then just the straight fun one. that I love to read and I don't know why is giraffes can't dance.
[00:37:27] Amit Shah: there was a day where you could sign up to read to the preschool class and Adam, I might have bought a giraffe costume off of Amazon and wor it to preschool class to read Giraffes Can't Dance
[00:37:40] Amit Shah: And you know, here's the funny thing, the kids don't like it that much when I read it, but I like that book so much.
[00:37:46] Amit Shah: Gerald is Dancing Baby, get to that end.
[00:37:49] Amit Shah: And Gerald is dancing and
[00:37:50] Amit Shah: he's having a good time and I'm like,
[00:37:52] Adam Fishman: You're like, okay, kids, we're only gonna read this three times tonight. I
[00:37:55] Adam Fishman: promise. Like I
[00:37:56] Amit Shah: Yeah.
[00:37:57] Amit Shah: I mean, we have a long, we've been, uh, there, I mean, there's so many others I can mention that we read that are in regular rotation, but the one that I, I don't know why I just, I like the book a lot and I will ask to read it to them and then I'll kind of force it on them.
[00:38:10] Amit Shah: That's how I know I like it, where I'm like, even if they don't wanna hear me read this, I'm gonna
[00:38:13] Amit Shah: read this
[00:38:14] Adam Fishman: very important follow up here on that. is there photo evidence of you in the giraffe costume at the preschool? And then also what will it take for us to make that the episode art for
[00:38:27] Adam Fishman: this particular show?
[00:38:29] Amit Shah: I believe there is because I, I, I'm pretty sure the preschool, took a picture. I will have to find it. And if I can, you know, maybe we can,
[00:38:39] Adam Fishman: Okay. Well, I wanna talk about values, uh, and parenting frameworks and stuff. And so you've mentioned a couple, you know, one calendar.
[00:38:49] Adam Fishman: We hear that a lot on this show. That makes a ton of sense. my own personal calendar. Like if it's not on the calendar, I don't know that I'm doing it.
[00:38:56] Adam Fishman: it must be there.
[00:38:57] Adam Fishman: and then the second one that we talked about is the values that you have. Kind, curious, persistent, and a little bit about how you're teaching your kids.
[00:39:03] Adam Fishman: Those, I think those are great. you have two more that I wanted to cover. One is move the ball forward,
[00:39:10] Adam Fishman: and then the other one is work on yourself to work on your kids. So tell me about move the ball forward.
[00:39:17] Amit Shah: The easiest manifestation of this that I, that I have is like us getting out the door in the morning.
[00:39:22] Amit Shah: There are an array of things that need to happen to get out the door. You know, the kids need to change diaper, brush teeth, drink milk, eat breakfast, change their clothes, put the lunches in the bag, get in the car seats, buckle the car, seats, get out the door.
[00:39:37] Amit Shah: what is kind of cool is like at any given point, the children will want mommy to do something or daddy's in it. Bijal and I both know what needs to get done. And like whoever's in full position tries to do the next thing. It's like, hey, the next thing is Samir's gotta brush her hair, whatever.
[00:39:52] Amit Shah: Like, there's like, there's just like, we got to keep moving. And so, that is the very physical daily manifestation to move the ball forward is if, like, if the next thing that needs to, you know, what the next thing that needs to happen is like. Just, just move it, move it forward. the more ethereal, like the more like, hey, like we move it forward is both of us.
[00:40:11] Amit Shah: I think, I know we've talked about it. this goes back to the shared values, us talking a little bit more, and we have a sense as to like, hey, like this is what we want for our kids, with our kids, et cetera. and so we do talk about that, and that's everything from signing them up for classes.
[00:40:27] Amit Shah: Like, Hey, we wanna assign her up for a dance class or a soccer class, or, which, by the way, soccer was an interesting one. I, I ran more than she did for that entire six week period.
[00:40:37] Amit Shah: there's no way that she's not into it, you know? I wanted her to be into it so bad, but not, and both of us are busy enough where, If we didn't have that, I feel like a lot of, a lot more would get dropped. I'm not saying every things don't get dropped, but there's a little bit of, if you get plugged in, you have enough context to do the next thing.
[00:40:56] Amit Shah: And some of it also comes with like, there's not that much questioning of the last step, and we're in a very nice spot.
[00:41:01] Amit Shah: Our kids are four and two, so it's like if you erase the last step, it's not a be like if I, if they're wearing the wrong thing to school, Bijal's not like, I can't believe you put them in, whatever. also we let the kids pick their own clothes.
[00:41:11] Amit Shah: not even a good example, but I, you know, you know what I mean? Like there's not that much questioning of
[00:41:14] Amit Shah: what the last step was.
[00:41:16] Adam Fishman: By the way, my, my son wore pajamas to preschool for almost the entirety of his preschool career. So like, whatever,
[00:41:23] Adam Fishman: eventually kids figure this out on their own and they, you know, peer pressure gets them wearing somewhat normal clothes, but, so
[00:41:29] Amit Shah: We're not like, wear a dress, wear pink. and for whatever reason, her and her friends in preschool are like, dress girls. And they like, she, so she wears a dress every day. And in the winter again, we're just like, you have to wear pants underneath, like it's cold.
[00:41:44] Amit Shah: So you just have to wear pants underneath and you have to wear a long sleeve on top. And if that's a long sleeve dress, then maybe you're okay. and she abides by the rule and like yesterday she hit straight up, had two outfits on, she had, sweatpants and a sweatshirt. And, but in between it was like the dress was on, there were sweatpants on underneath and a sweatshirt on top.
[00:42:00] Amit Shah: And I was like, you go girl. Like you go. You got it. And so anyway, all that's to say that, that's what I mean by move the ball forward and.
[00:42:06] Amit Shah: In general, we're able to do that. and I think as it applies to work, I would say I'm very grateful to have a team, that is also move the ball forward. You know,
[00:42:16] Adam Fishman: What about that second one of work on yourself to work on your kids? That one's I found really interesting. So what, what does that mean?
[00:42:23] Amit Shah: I'll just go to like the kind cheer, persistent. I have opportunities to be more kind and I will tell you at the end of the day when I ask my kids an example of when they were kind, it's very helpful for me to share an example of when I was kind and when I reflect on the day and I find that I don't have that many examples, I'm embarrassed, you know, I'm like, these are things that I want for you and I think are important.
[00:42:48] Amit Shah: and that has been a really, really helpful kindness. you know, is one, curiosity, persistence. But I mean, there are all kinds of things like this where I have found that as a dad, what I want for my kids is slightly different than the way I show up in the world. And I think that a relatively unhealthy thing for me to do would be to ignore that and say, oh, well do what I say, not what I
[00:43:14] Amit Shah: do. because I, I look back on my life and I, you know, turns out I did, I did what my dad said, but I'm more, if I think reflect on the type of person I'm, I'm more similar to what he did, you know? Uh, and I'm grateful for that, by the way. He's great. Dad
[00:43:29] Amit Shah: I'm pretty confident that the kids are picking up what I do in equal parts with what I say.
[00:43:36] Amit Shah: And so if I don't endeavor to be better at the things I do, how much curiosity and persistence is actually there if I'm not curious and persistent to improve myself, you know?
[00:43:46] Amit Shah: that's really it. you know, and I, and I think that, again, I from Stanford, where interpersonal dynamics is important and a lot of this, is important. I think there are really two things that matter in business.
[00:43:59] Amit Shah: I'll put it in the business context. I put it in the life context. The two things that I think make a great business over a period of time, or one that are a real focus on your end user and the customer, the person for whom you're delivering something. And two, our systems to get 1% better. Every single day, month, year.
[00:44:16] Amit Shah: Like if you have a system that helps you get better and you pair those two things, then you're always gonna have a better thing for your customer over time and better thing, more value. in life it's somewhat similar, maybe I'll start with a second.
[00:44:27] Amit Shah: Like, finding systems to help you get 1% better, is really important. Paired with that, I think there are real trade offs. So you have to pick the things that you wanna get better at. I don't believe it's possible. At least for me, it's not possible to get better at everything all at once. And so you have to say, Hey, look, I'm gonna invest in these things to get better.
[00:44:44] Amit Shah: and I try to be thoughtful about what those things are. but yeah, I think that system, having some process to, self discovery and development, I think is pretty important.
[00:44:52] Adam Fishman: Yeah. Great. you mentioning business is kind of a interesting segue into this next topic, which there's a little Venn diagram overlap here. So you work at a health company that's devoted to weight loss, reducing rates of diabetes, and helping people manage their health without, you know, a whole bunch of drugs,
[00:45:11] Adam Fishman: right? Not that that doesn't work for some people, but like, that's the mission of your company, right?
[00:45:16] Amit Shah: Our mission is to reverse metabolic disease in a billion people, and reversal to us is solving our metabolic health crisis in this country. Again, 93% of adults in America have some metabolic disease, is to solve it with at the root cause of its problem, which is food and nutrition, not solving it with drugs.
[00:45:35] Amit Shah: So we get people off of those drugs for the most part, and help them live longer, healthier, happier lives.
[00:45:41] Adam Fishman: Yeah. Love that. So thank you,
[00:45:43] Adam Fishman: I was not nearly as good at, at extolling the mission of the company as you were.
[00:45:47] Adam Fishman: so you talk about nutrition and food, how has that impacted how you approach nutrition and health choices with your own kids?
[00:45:56] Amit Shah: this is one of the areas where, I feel strongly and have found myself just trying to live in the real world.
[00:46:05] Amit Shah: not to be overly controversial, but I think sugar is terrible. when I joined Virta nine years ago, which is pre us having kids, I tried the Virta treatment, the Virta method.
[00:46:14] Amit Shah: right after we got married. And I remember telling Bijal, yeah, I'm gonna try it for a month. Again, I'll go back to, I have a value around if I, we wanna deliver the best thing for the customer.
[00:46:22] Amit Shah: And after a month I felt really good. So I did it for another month and I joined in like, uh, September and, and basically not conscious decision, but I ended up doing it all the way through Thanksgiving. And by then I had lost, 10, 12 pounds. Uh, was feeling really healthy, et cetera. I was home for a week, ate all the normal things that I used to eat and, and I felt really kind of crappy when I got back.
[00:46:49] Amit Shah: I had re, I regained a couple pounds, but it wasn't the weight gain. Like, I just really didn't feel as good. Again, hit Christmas, went to visit Bijal's family, and, and it wasn't until after Christmas I was like, whoa, like I'm gonna do this. turns out this lifestyle is like, makes me feel so much better all the time.
[00:47:05] Amit Shah: Why am I not doing this? And so then I went pretty low carb, you know, focused on being in nutritional ketosis, which is, you know, making fat my primary fuel source and all. And it has been life changing for me. Like I have, you know, I've kept 20 pounds off. I feel super healthy. I'm wearing this Aura ring.
[00:47:22] Amit Shah: If you're on YouTube, it says, I'm almost a full decade younger than I actually am, you know? And, and so it's been, it's been great. and by the way, I work in a space where I see this all the time. I see people change their life with this all the time. So what you eat is very important, to me.
[00:47:36] Amit Shah: like, I feel like it's such a big thing that you can control that actually. And so we have, we have a real considered effort in our house to reduce the amount of just straight sugar consumption now. It turns out we're two smaller Indian humans and our children are very small on the growth curve.
[00:47:53] Amit Shah: And so if they are going to eat pancakes with syrup, that's probably a fine thing to give them at this stage. And so there is this balance. I guess I, I, I'm kind of joking about it a little bit, but I, it's been a struggle. I generally try to prioritize healthy foods, prioritize things, and we have a four and a 2-year-old and they prioritize the other things.
[00:48:13] Amit Shah: that has been a constant balance for us. then I think back on my childhood and I was like, wow, like I ate sugar all the time and that's not because my parents didn't love me. It's like, you know, that was very normal at that time. And so, I try to hold all that in my head and say as they get older, we'll just try to make sure we continue to teach them about the importance of nutrition and listening to your body and health and all.
[00:48:32] Amit Shah: And there'll be a time for that. And so, It is a balance. I constantly find myself like checking myself and being like, it's fine. You know, in this context it's probably fine in this, you know, in this context. But I do, we do try to avoid the, you know, here's a sweet treat, we do try to avoid a little bit of the glorification like, Halloween is very tough.
[00:48:52] Amit Shah: we did some candy this year. I've, we've done glow sticks and stickers and, uh, I just feel like it's just a very, you know, it's an interesting holiday. Like, you know, I think, I think people, kids getting just tons of sugar that they should not consume.
[00:49:07] Amit Shah: no kid should consume all this sugar. Even if it's over the course of like a couple months. Here
[00:49:11] Adam Fishman: you're not trying to deprive your kids of all fun and joy of childhood, right. You're, you're just making smarter, maybe more measured choices and teaching them about part of the learning thing that you mentioned is like teaching them about how the body responds to this stuff, you know,
[00:49:25] Adam Fishman: which you have some authority on because of what you do for work.
[00:49:29] Adam Fishman: So,
[00:49:30] Adam Fishman: That's great. Okay. I have, uh, just a handful of more questions for you. what is something that you and your wife are still negotiating over when it comes to parenting? I love asking this question to people.
[00:49:42] Amit Shah: there are two things that came to mind, and so I'll just candidly share them. One is the, they look at what you do, not what you say.
[00:49:49] Amit Shah: And they're little things like I like things put away and all my wife is way more creative.
[00:49:54] Amit Shah: but she doesn't like to put things away at the same rate.
[00:49:57] Amit Shah: And so there is a constant negotiation where I'm like, yeah. Again, when the kids come home, we're like, take your shoes off, put 'em in the cubby. And then I'm like, honey, your shoes are not in the cubby like that. It would be helpful if they saw that. So that's like a constant negotiation. Both a funny one, but it could get, you know, it gets tense at times where, you know, she's like, I just like,a bajillion things going on.
[00:50:15] Amit Shah: Like, this is the thing. and then another one that again, we're in constant negotiation on is like, is the calendaring. that's actually more of a positive one. Again, it like forces us to reprioritize, deprioritize, think through. but there is like real work around that.
[00:50:30] Amit Shah: and I would be dishonest to say there aren't times where like either one of us, her or me, feels like, we're like, oh, we gotta like, figure this out. And like, oh, I got, I can't do this thing that I thought I was gonna be able to do. and so that, that's another one. But,thankfully I, I, I do really feel like we have a good partnership around
[00:50:44] Amit Shah: it.
[00:50:44] Adam Fishman: Yeah. Awesome.
[00:50:45] Adam Fishman: Okay. I want to end with two things, which is, one is you have a bit of a contrarian dad take, uh, but I understand that you are surprised or you have been surprised by how much you love buying your kids clothes,
[00:50:57] Adam Fishman: tell me about buying your kids' clothes and what was surprising about this?
[00:50:59] Amit Shah: I don't like to shop and I don't like to buy my own clothes. the kids' clothes, I don't know, there's something about the cuteness and like, some of 'em are punny
[00:51:07] Amit Shah: I could go to the Cat and Jack section of Target and like, there's, it's just like cute.
[00:51:11] Amit Shah: And so, yeah, I realize this with my daughter, like we'd go to Target or something, I'd just be like, I gotta buy these clothes for you. Like, they're so cute. And then like, just seeing them in them. So, yeah. it's kind of extended with to my son too. And then. I bought, like matching Harry Potter PJ's one time for everybody in the family.
[00:51:28] Amit Shah: I don't know, I, I do not like shopping for myself or whatever, but kids' clothing, it's just cute
[00:51:35] Amit Shah: and I enjoy it
[00:51:37] Adam Fishman: I love that. And by the way, it is, it is very addictive to go to the Cat and Jack section of Target.
[00:51:41] Adam Fishman: You just don't wanna leave. You're like, oh,
[00:51:43] Amit Shah: And it's like, is like these, these shirts, they know, right? There's like, it's like $6 or like $4
[00:51:49] Amit Shah: for a t-shirt the kid's gonna wear it like seven times, they're gonna get paint all over it, you know? And so you don't feel that bad buying like, you know, five, $4 t-shirts.
[00:51:57] Amit Shah: You know, you're just like, yeah, cool. Let's do this thing, you
[00:51:59] Amit Shah: know?
[00:52:00] Adam Fishman: okay. Last thing, uh, I really love this. I asked you in advance like, what's something that's sort of indicative of the way that you live and operate? And you told me this quote, people and your kids don't care how much you know until they know how much you care. So tell me about that. That seems like a life philosophy for you.
[00:52:21] Amit Shah: That is a life philosophy. and again, I'll go back to the thing I've said. I'm a student as much as, uh, as much as anyone else. So I haven't, I haven't licked this one or nailed it. as I reflect on people that have been influential in my life and as I reflect on the type of person I wanna be, people, feeling cared for, people, feeling like you're there for them, like you're on their side, like you're part of their team.
[00:52:42] Amit Shah: Like that, that to me is what has been very valuable to me. there are a lot of ways to do something. There's a lot of good advice out there. Between AI tools and books and like, you know, the right answer is often out there. it's the support and the, kinda human connection that I think people are, are seeking.
[00:53:01] Amit Shah: And so, and I think, I don't know, I don't have older kids yet, but my understanding as kids get older, especially in that middle school age, which I'm shuddering to even consider though I know Adam, you're
[00:53:12] Amit Shah: maybe closer. my understanding is like, yeah, like kids are going through a lot of changes and I'm not gonna know about all of 'em.
[00:53:18] Amit Shah: I mean, my parents certainly didn't know about all, all, all of mine. And, and I had a very close relationship with my parents and I, and loved them and felt loved by them. But, you know, I wasn't gonna share everything. And so knowing that they cared is probably what got me through. and by the way, the way you care is, it could be weird, right?
[00:53:37] Amit Shah: Like, some of the way my care shows up is in anger and frustration.
[00:53:42] Amit Shah: It's a real thing because I feel it and I get angry and frustrated, but it's because I care and I, it's not an excuse for it, you know? And teammates, Roberto are listening who've seen me get angry and frustrated like, oh, now he thinks it's okay.
[00:53:53] Amit Shah: No, no, no. That's not what I mean. But it is because I care. And I think that, you know, showing that you care, I believe it to be a superpower. not a liability.
[00:54:02] Adam Fishman: Awesome. Well, that sounds a gr like a great place to, to end the, uh, pre lightening round version of this program. How can people follow along, uh, or be helpful to you if they're listening to this and wanna, get more involved?
[00:54:17] Amit Shah: please look me up on LinkedIn. I'm just Amit@virtahealth.com if you wanna email me there. and I'm always curious about what people are doing to balance and align their life and career. and if you or anyone you know, uh, suffers from any metabolic disease, then please look us up.
[00:54:34] Amit Shah: At Virta, if you have an idea on how to be a better parent, then I'm all ears.
[00:54:37] Adam Fishman: All right. Awesome, awesome. Well, thank you. We will direct people to Virta and to you on LinkedIn. do you have a few minutes for lightning round?
[00:54:46] Amit Shah: I think I could do, what, what do you think? Like five
[00:54:48] Adam Fishman: Five minutes.
[00:54:49] Adam Fishman: Okay. ready? Here we go.
[00:54:51] Adam Fishman: What is the most indispensable parenting product you've ever purchased?
[00:54:55] Amit Shah: I'm gonna have to go with the baby bza. Someone gave this to us and making bottles in the middle of the night got so much better.
[00:55:00] Adam Fishman: Awesome. What is the most useless parenting product you've ever purchased?
[00:55:04] Amit Shah: I hate diaper genies. I hate diaper genies. hate genies.
[00:55:07] Adam Fishman: What is the weirdest thing that you've found in your kids' pockets or in the washing machine? I.
[00:55:12] Amit Shah: Our daughter just constantly has papers just like, like, just like so much. I'm like, how do you generate this much paper in preschool?
[00:55:20] Adam Fishman: Yes. Okay. True or false, there's only one correct way to load a dishwasher.
[00:55:25] Amit Shah: I think I have to say true
[00:55:28] Amit Shah: Adam.
[00:55:29] Adam Fishman: Is it? Whose, whose way is it?
[00:55:32] Amit Shah: the boss, my wife,
[00:55:34] Adam Fishman: Okay, great. Uh, what is your signature? Dad's superpower? Clearly it's not loading the dishwasher.
[00:55:40] Amit Shah: not loading the dishwasher. Uh, my signature dad superpower is, rolling on the floor with the kids, just like getting down to their level and releasing. All
[00:55:53] Adam Fishman: Okay. What is the crazier block of time in your house? 6:00 AM to 8:00 AM or 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM.
[00:55:59] Amit Shah: 6:00 AM to 8:00 AM
[00:56:00] Adam Fishman: Okay. If your kids had to describe you in one word, what would it be?
[00:56:05] Amit Shah: silly.
[00:56:05] Adam Fishman: All right. What is the strangest food that your kids have ever made you try?
[00:56:12] Amit Shah: We're not there yet.
[00:56:12] Adam Fishman: Okay. Alright. What is the most difficult kids DV show you've ever had to sit through?
[00:56:18] Amit Shah: This is gonna hurt them. Uh, I don't like Peppa Pig that much,
[00:56:21] Adam Fishman: Oh, okay.
[00:56:23] Amit Shah: but it
[00:56:24] Amit Shah: is their choice. They like, they love Peppa Pig. Uh, and maybe it's 'cause they love it so much. And I've seen, like, we've seen every
[00:56:31] Adam Fishman: Seen every episode? What is your favorite kid's movie?
[00:56:35] Amit Shah: we've been hitting the classics in our home,
[00:56:37] Adam Fishman:
[00:56:37] Amit Shah: and big fans of Aladdin right now.
[00:56:39] Adam Fishman: Ooh, love that movie. there was a period of time where I knew every word to that movie, What nostalgic movie can you just not wait to force your kids to watch when they're old enough?
[00:56:49] Adam Fishman: probably like Lion King
[00:56:51] Amit Shah: I was really into Lion King growing up.
[00:56:53] Adam Fishman: All right. have you started telling your kids back in my day stories yet?
[00:56:58] Amit Shah: Unfortunately. Yes.
[00:57:01] Adam Fishman: Start 'em young, huh?
[00:57:02] Amit Shah: Yeah.
[00:57:03] Amit Shah: Yeah. Anytime there's a screen in front of their face, I,
[00:57:05] Adam Fishman: Yes.do you have a favorite dad hack for road trips or flights with a four and a 2-year-old
[00:57:13] Amit Shah: My wife has extreme patience.
[00:57:16] Amit Shah: So my dad hack is Mary, a wonderful spouse that has extreme
[00:57:19] Amit Shah: patience. we've gotten into the iPad Khan Academy. We try to load it with an academy kids and then some TV shows that we like. but this is one where I want listeners to email me. Well, by the time this drops, it might be past, but we are going to India as a family
[00:57:34] Adam Fishman: Oh
[00:57:34] Adam Fishman: boy.
[00:57:34] Amit Shah: winter, and I'm, you have ideas?
[00:57:37] Adam Fishman: do have a few episodes with people who have traveled to and from India, so I'll
[00:57:40] Adam Fishman: send you those. okay. Finally, what is your take on minivans?
[00:57:46] Amit Shah: A huge fan. Okay. We have an SUV that has a third row and it was, we love the car. It was the worst decision because with car seats, you need adults to sit in the third row and you should just have a minivan.
[00:57:57] Adam Fishman: Um, okay. Well, Amit, thank you so much for joining me on, uh, startup Dad today. It was really fun having this conversation and I wish you and your wife and your family all the best and, uh, all the best of Virta Health too. It's a great
[00:58:09] Amit Shah: Thank you so much Adam. Thanks for having me. It was, this is one of the most fun things I've done. I appreciate it.
[00:58:14] Amit Shah: Thank you.
[00:58:15] Adam Fishman: Okay.
[00:58:15] Adam Fishman: Thank you for listening to today's episode with Amit Shaw. You can subscribe and watch the show on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. Visit www.startupdadpod.com to learn more and browse past episodes. Thanks for listening, and see you next week.