Meet Noah Dwora, CoS at Ollie and Primary Mastermind Network Founding Member
Read Noah Dwora's experience as a CoS at Ollie and the lessons learned along the way.
As Primary's CoS Mastermind Founding Member, Noah has gotten the opportunity to build strong relationships with other Chief of Staffs and crowdsource best practices to level up in his role. Interested in joining? Apply here.
Can you walk us through your career journey to date? How did your interests and/or values help shape where you landed?
I studied undergrad in Switzerland, went to Business School in London, and started my career in banking before moving to the buy-side at a multi-family office investing in Hedge Funds, Private Equity, Real Estate and Venture.
While in Switzerland, I lit my entrepreneurial fire by co-founding Zurich’s first poke chain, Kaisin, which we have since expanded to multiple locations across Switzerland.
When I moved back to New York, I joined an early stage biotech company as their Chief of Staff where I ran the day-to-day business operations with the CEO. I loved building the business from the ground up, but soon realized that I missed the relationship with the end consumer. I wanted to learn more about how to successfully scale a consumer business, which is exactly what I’m doing now at Ollie.
What advice do you have for others who are looking to transition into a CoS role?
My advice is be to be clear on what you want to get out of the CoS role as it can be very nebulous. Make sure both you and your manager are aligned on the scope of the role.
What has been the most rewarding part of the role so far?
The two most rewarding parts of my role have been:
- Working with such a passionate group of smart, driven individuals that truly care about our mission to have a material impact on pet health
- Receiving customer feedback every day on how our product has significantly improved the life of their dogs
How has networking amplified your career?
Networking has been fun, inspiring and beneficial to me. Startups are so exciting, most of us are disrupting an industry, so it’s always fascinating to me to hear about what my peers across industries are working on. It’s also a small world so building these relationships might come in handy sooner than you’d think ;)
Who is someone that you admire that you’ve learned from? How have they influenced your career, your thinking, your approach?
My CEO, Nick Stafford, is someone I look up to. He’s had such a diverse career that has enabled him to acquire so many different skills along the way. It’s fascinating to work side by side with him and learn from his experience every day. He has taught me the importance of knowing one's own superpower and building a team around you with different superpowers that are complementary. This defines our working relationship (CEO + CoS) and how we build our leadership team. He has also inspired me to look at my career in a series of chapters, and make sure I am learning what I want to be learning in each specific chapter… but most importantly: to enjoy the journey.
How has the Chief of Staff Mastermind Network helped you level up in your career?
- Networking: It’s been immensely beneficial and fun to meet so many peers with such a diverse set of experiences. Gina and Jo are exceptional community managers
- Collaboration: The Chief of Staff role can feel like a team of one at times, so having this network of tremendously competent and supportive individuals to collaborate with has been invaluable
- Leveling up: I’ve learnt so much from this network's programming. Gina and Jo make sure the content is always highly relevant and actionable. I can honestly say I’ve become a more effective Chief of Staff because of this network
Even though every Chief of Staff role is very unique and specific to one's company, we are all working through very similar challenges. For example, last year I leveraged the network to understand how peers were approaching the “return to office” policies. Currently I am gathering inputs from peers across the network on how they run their leadership team meetings more effectively as I set out to improve our own current format.
Interested in joining? Apply to join Primary's Mastermind Networks here!