Flourishing Through Work: Leading with Courage and Kindness with Grace Zuncic

Ashish Kothari:

Grace, I am so excited to have you on our Happiness Squad podcast, my dear friend.

Grace Zuncic:

Well, thank you, Ashish. I'm very happy to be here and honored that you asked me to participate, so thank you.

Ashish Kothari:

Yeah. Well, my friend, you've had such an amazing journey, from your early childhood days to HBS, to Goldman, to Giovanni, to Cotopaxi. You worked for companies with flourishing cultures, and finally that road led you to Monetary, where the work you all are doing, what the company is about, and what you're trying to put into the world is such an exciting story.

I just want to hear from your own words. Tell me a little bit about your childhood and early beginnings. Let’s start from there and then walk us a little bit through your magical journey and all that you've learned through these last decades—in both shaping these cultures and having these cultures shape who you have become.

Grace Zuncic:

Yeah, that's great. Well, I grew up in this little town in upstate New York, in Central New York, a lake that envisioned a 16-mile long lake, a mile wide, 300 feet deep, clean and beautiful. Growing up there was a privilege. We had socioeconomic diversity in our town, but not a lot of racial diversity.

There was an innocence, a purity, a goodness. It was a “takes a village” kind of mindset—walk to school, ride your bike, feel safe, take on four or five different jobs working in town, know everybody by name, don’t lock your doors. That kind of wholesomeness really shaped who I am as a person.

I’m kind of like a small-town girl because of that experience. Every time I go back to Skinny Atlas, I feel more connected to who I really am. I’ve been taking my kids there every summer since they were born—my son is 10, my daughter is 8—to give them that sense of connection to a place where nature was a huge part of my life, along with community and doing the right thing.

It has really impacted my life. My mother grew up on a farm for part of her life. She was the first female district attorney in the city of Syracuse and a very successful environmental lawyer in the area. My dad was also an attorney, but they were the first in their families to really build this type of life for us. I’m forever grateful for it. The best of me, I think, is always there, and it’s great to be able to reconnect with it.

Ashish Kothari:

You know, the environments in which we live shape us. They provide such an important context. I just finished reading this amazing book called Shift by Ethan Cross. He talks about the importance of how one of the ways we can shift our emotions—or one of the ways our emotions and moods get locked in—is through the environments we inhabit.

o. When I moved to the US, in: 2014

So I can imagine how transformative just growing up in that feeling of connection, nature, purity, love, and safety can be. Because in today’s world, not many places like those exist.

Grace Zuncic:

Or you have to create it yourself. I continue to be so inspired by nature. There’s a bit of a history of anxiety and depression in my family, unfortunately, and I think I’ve been able to mitigate the genetic reality of that through nature—being outside, walking, gardening, being outdoors with my kids.

We were outside really for the entire duration of COVID. I have pictures of them just being outdoors every single day, and what a gift. Not everyone has that, and I don’t take it for granted, but it has definitely fueled my energy and my leadership as well. The role of nature and being outside has been huge in my life.

Ashish Kothari:

What’s so cool about this, Grace, is through all of my research many people listening might say, “Well that’s great. Wonderful. You two have access to nature. I don’t.” And I’m like, one—thank you. But you know what we know from research is this: get a plant. Everybody can have it. Some don’t even need that much water, but having just a little bit of green space around you matters.

Grace Zuncic:

Absolutely.  When I’m in New York City, I’ll take the train to Grand Central, but I’ll walk all the way to my destination. I put the heels in the bag and wear flats, which my husband jokes about all the time. But I take advantage of those micro moments all the time. Many cities have done a better job reimagining what they can do—clean spaces, outdoor paths.

New York City, where I live, has done a fabulous job with that effort. There are opportunities all around us. It doesn’t have to be the classic, “I’m going to go for a hike this morning because I live in Boulder, Colorado.” It can be smaller choices—making the decision to walk, to be outdoors, to immerse yourself in nature, however limited your access might be.

Ashish Kothari:

Yeah. And if nothing else, use what you do have access to. Close your eyes and visualize the last place that transported you.

For me, it’s the Grand Canyon. I still remember standing at the rim for the first time. I was struck by the vastness, the beauty, the timelessness, and how little space and time we truly inhabit.

You talk about awe, and you talk about this deep kind of dissolution of self, which we focus on all the time in the lap of nature. Just go do that for yourself. If you have nothing else, take yourself back to one moment in nature where it took your breath away.

Grace Zuncic:

Absolutely right.

Ashish Kothari:

Just do that. But listen, let’s go from there. I want you to walk us through a little bit of your career journey through all of these places from HBS forward. I just want to walk down the path with you and savor those moments and the learnings.

Grace Zuncic:

That sounds great. Having grown up in a town like I did, I was involved in student government and all the things you might expect, and I thought, well, I’m just going to work in politics. That’s what I wanted to do with my life.

I went to college, and that dream was shifting and fading. I remember going to a Jesuit school in Boston, Massachusetts—Boston College. I was very concerned about not making it through my freshman year. I had this crazy fear of failure. For me, growing up in a really small town like Skinny Atlas and going to Boston was a big transition and change.

I had visited Boston a couple of times growing up since we had family in the suburbs, but being there, I was worried about not making it. That insecurity fueled a tremendous work ethic through my freshman, sophomore, and junior years. I still remember how much time I spent in the library. Once I had a good grade point average freshman year, I thought, “Well, I can’t turn back now.”

But I graduated without a job and felt lost—career-wise, for many years—until Chobani changed so much of that for me. I remember going home, working as a waitress, and visiting different places to look for work.

One of the places I visited was Harvard Business School. I was on the campus interviewing to write case studies for professors. My dad pulled me aside, looked me in the eyes, and said, “Grace, don’t work here. Go to school here.” You need people in your life who give you inspiration and see something in you. I honestly never thought about business school until I went there.

I ended up going to Harvard Business School, which was a fantastic experience. After graduating, I worked at Goldman Sachs. They recruited a lot of young people out of HBS and offered a fabulous sign-on bonus, which I really needed to pay off student loans.

I joined Goldman in private wealth management, which taught me professionalism, work ethic, and client service. I gained a lot from it, but I still felt a bit lost. I was there for a paycheck at the end of the day.

I loved the firm and felt honored I could even work there, coming from small-town America to Harvard, which no one in my family had done before. But I kept thinking, “There’s something else. I don’t know what it is, but I’m going to find it.”

Sure enough, I called the 1-800 customer service number on the Chobani yogurt cup. I thought maybe Chobani would want to do business with Goldman. They were big enough by then, had a tremendous following, and the founder seemed awesome. Maybe I’d get to meet him. I made a connection through the executive assistant and over time finally had an audience with the company.

The founder said, “Grace, I don’t know why you should be here, but this feels right.” Chobani was only a 40-minute drive from where I grew up in rural upstate New York, and I felt a deep sense of emotional connection to the people who worked there. I related to them. I thought, “This is wonderful.”

I was there for 10 years, and it changed my life in so many ways. It gave me direction, purpose, and meaning. Hamdi saw things in me that I didn’t see in myself, just like my father did back on the Harvard campus.

The most meaningful thing wasn’t only working beside a founder, but also growing into my own. In the second part of my time at Chobani, I took on the HR team. Over those 10 years, I learned everything—from supply chain, brand building, and competitive dynamics, to being on top of the world and at the bottom feeling like we weren’t going to make it.

I learned about capital structure, investors, board members, management teams that came and went, how to take care of people, how to say goodbye, and how to welcome others. It put into practice everything I had read about in business school—all at once.

st sat there. This was around: 2022

I wasn’t a big Cotopaxi person. I was more into Patagonia, like everyone else. But when I looked online, I thought, “Oh my gosh, what alignment.” Most of what Cotopaxi makes is from non-virgin, repurposed, or recycled material. One percent of sales goes to the Cotopaxi Foundation, which I’m still part of today. I thought, “This is where I need to be. Something’s calling me.”

This time I reached out to the founder on LinkedIn. I told Davis how much I admired him and how excited I was to be a part of it. I joined Cotopaxi and helped during a critical time when Davis left on a mission trip with his church for a few years. I supported two women who reported to me, mentored them, and I’m so proud that they now lead in the roles I once held. They play critical leadership roles at Cotopaxi.

Then came Manna Tree Partners, where I am now. Manna Tree is doing private equity differently—not just with a focus on health and wellness companies that improve lives, but also in how we work. We are 70% female, which is unusual in private equity. What amazes me most is how we work with companies—our level of involvement, care, and interest in solving problems and helping them realize their full potential.

In my role at Manna Tree, I still wear my HR hat, a gift given to me at Chobani, but I also spend a lot of time with portfolio companies on different opportunities to help them grow, manage growth effectively, and win ultimately.

People often ask how I’ve had such an impact-focused career. I always go back to that time after school when I felt lost. I encourage people that it takes time and alignment. Much of my career aligns with that small-town girl from Skinny Atlas. It’s funny how it’s worked out, but I’ve been intentional and extremely lucky and fortunate to have had these opportunities.

Ashish Kothari:

Grace, what’s so powerful about your story is the through line in your career. One thing that sets you apart from so many others is your ability to step back, get on the balcony, and tune inward to ask, “How am I feeling?”

In today’s world, so many people live in their heads, modeling themselves around external markers of success or what looks like a successful career. But to flourish and be happy, what matters is tuning into that innate quality inside us. That really resonates.

t listening to my heart. From: 1997

I was doing work not aligned with what I cared about. It had a massive impact in the world, solved problems, generated revenue, and made clients successful, but it wasn’t my work. It was someone else’s. Now, doing this work on flourishing, I feel I’m living my personal legend. It’s what I was born to do. Life is different.

What excites me about you and Manna Tree is how you’re redefining private equity. The standard is that private equity is cold, all about numbers—firing people, cutting, and driving impact. But you’re doing it differently.

There’s something about Colorado too. We’ve been exploring a partnership with Rally Day Partners, another firm that works differently. They’re founders for founders and have an accelerator program for all their companies.

So kudos to you for finding Manna Tree and the amazing work you’re doing. If we can help teams flourish, performance will follow. Strategy combined with flourishing makes the journey lighter and more successful. If you just tell people what to do, it becomes hard and painful.

Grace Zuncic:

It’s so great you referenced Man’s Search for Meaning because that’s a book I read at a young age, and it shaped my life in many ways. I can’t remember all the details now, but I remember having a copy of it.

With Manna Tree, our mission is enabling consumers to live better, longer lives. I’ve been studying what really enables that. There’s been a tremendous amount of research on the value of relationships—on the quality of relationships.

Ashish Kothari:

 Absolutely.

Grace Zuncic:

It’s interesting because when I look at why I joined Manna Tree, I had been connected with one of the founders for many years. I think about the role that relationships can play in our careers and networks. I never anticipated I would be joining her team 10 years later.

It’s been amazing to bring these experiences I’ve had from Chobani, Cotopaxi, and other places to companies that admire those brands. They want to be like those brands, grow like them, and bring that knowledge in. It’s been hugely rewarding.

Ashish Kothari:

So let’s go there. Talk to me about these leadership principles and ways of operating that you picked up from these companies. What are some things they do really well that allow them to drive performance through flourishing cultures?

Grace Zuncic:

That’s great. Two leadership principles that are core to me are courage and kindness.

Being courageous at scale and having the courage to take a stance is one thing, but my courage has been more micro—facing difficult situations and conversations one-on-one. That’s how courage has shown up in my career. It’s been very important in HR, but also across different phases of my journey. I’ve often had to be the one to rise to the occasion on behalf of the group or to take action because I felt strongly that we needed to talk in order to do the right thing. I’ve exercised that muscle a lot.

The kindness part is just my DNA. It’s who I am. I didn’t always know if it would work to my advantage or disadvantage in a corporate environment to be kind. How would that show up in a business community? I knew I was never going to lose that element of me.

Then I read this book—I actually have a copy here on my desk—Everybody Matters by Bob Chapman and Raj Sisodia. It’s about the extraordinary power of caring for your people like family.

What I loved is that it’s not saying people are always ahead of profitability or purpose, but rather: how do you get those things to intertwine and work together? The role of leaders is to discover and work with people to help them find their highest and best use, so you can put them into roles where they will thrive.

That struck me. It’s a little different from how some people understand the concept of family in the workplace. It’s almost a duty of care we have to others—to help them realize the best versions of themselves through the organization by putting them in the right places.

That’s how I’ve translated courage and kindness practically in the workplace. It’s been rewarding, and I’ve been able to show up this way in every company I’ve worked with. I think that also says a lot about the organizations and cultures they’ve fostered.

Ashish Kothari:

 Yeah. What’s also true about your companies is their strong purpose orientation. They all stand for something. And if you’re going to walk the path of purpose, you need courage.

That’s where the Nietzsche quote in Viktor Frankl’s book is so powerful: “Those who have a why can survive anyhow.” Courage is needed to walk that path, especially in the dark, stormy nights when you wonder, “Should we take a different route?” But staying true requires courage.

Kindness is also powerful. The research on compassionate workplaces by Monica Worline and Jane Dutton, and the work by Bob Chapman, all point to the power of kindness.

Often people think kindness is soft. But some of the kindest things we can do for people is to give them the feedback they need to grow, rather than telling them everything is great.

Grace Zuncic:

Yeah. Kindness is clarity. A friend of mine gave me that line, and I think it’s very true. I agree with that.

Ashish Kothari:

And when we are kind—when we help others—and I loved your notion of helping people find their place, it resonates with Ray Dalio’s Principles. He talks about how our job is to discover each other’s strengths.

As long as we have radical candor, radical openness, and integrity, we find ways to help people get to their biggest version of themselves. It was also the core part of my “Make Flourishing Your Competitive Edge” talk.

Grace, I just don’t get it. We’re living in this mass hysteria where work is just seen as a way to earn a paycheck. Yet that’s where we spend 90,000 hours of our lives. That’s where we spend most of our time. If we want to flourish, relationships really matter—but second, it’s about how you spend your days. How can you flourish if you’re suffering through most of your day?

Grace Zuncic:

Right. And most of the day translates into the rest of your day. Many people who are struggling and feeling lost bring that home to their partners, spouses, and family members. They talk about it, and it never ends. We’re always on, with everything blinging and dinging on our phones. For those working remotely—and even those who aren’t—it has become a never-ending component of our lives.

You have to have comfort in what you’re doing: a sense of meaning, purpose, and connection. Because flourishing will happen through the work. I know we’re going to talk about this today, Ashish, but I’ll bring it up now. You had asked what programs and initiatives are fostering flourishing in the workplace.

I’ve probably seen every type of benefit program under the sun—EAP programs, apps, after-work groups, leadership development, coaching, and upskilling programs. All of these are good to have, especially in HR.

Few things feel as rewarding as an employee knocking on your door and saying, “I just wanted you to know I’m using that program, and I wanted to thank you for putting the money behind it.” So I’m not saying we don’t do these things. But ultimately, we flourish through the work.

Is everybody rowing in the same direction? Do people feel a great sense of commitment and support from their team? Do we care about one another enough to acknowledge days off and family time? Do we laugh together? Do we have joy? Do we experience that as a team? Do we cry together?

I shed a lot of tears, joy, and laughter during the hardest year of many of our careers—COVID—which I hope we talk about today. That’s the magic. You feel it daily, and you can’t imagine its absence. It’s all tied to relationships and the things that make us live better, longer lives.

If your work has purpose, and the people around you share that goal, work becomes five to ten times better. We flourish in those environments. But not everybody has them, and creating and sustaining them virtually is a new challenge that leaders need to rise to.

Ashish Kothari:

Yeah. I think what you’re talking about is where we find so much alignment. We’re spending close to $200 billion today on mental health. Most of that money is going to the fringes of the problem.

On one side, we give meditation apps, gym memberships, and benefits. On the other side, we offer EAPs and therapists to address burnout. All well and good—they have a role. But in doing so, we’re not addressing the elephant in the room: the ways we work are fundamentally broken.

I’m not being alarmist. I don’t know how else to say it. Research from Oxford shows only 20% of people are thriving in the world. When only 20% thrive, that’s not an incremental problem—it’s a fundamental gap in how workplaces have evolved.

Too often, the job is to grow shareholder wealth. Purpose is something nice on plaques. Values are just words. People are treated as resources. Low trust is the norm. Trust is at an all-time low. And we’re overloading work.

So what you talked about resonates deeply: if we want people to flourish, if we care about their mental health, let’s help them flourish through work, not outside of it.

Grace Zuncic:

Agreed. And the worst emotion to have in the workplace is fear. When people are too afraid to say how they’re feeling, or they walk into a room worried that someone is going to shoot down their ideas, it creates real harm.

People in positions of leadership and power often don’t internalize what it feels like to be across the table from them or in the room with them. But if you remove that fear and put in trust, recognition, acknowledgement, and a spirit of togetherness—where everyone has a clear role and knows they are contributing at their best—those are the magical moments.

Not all of us have had them in our careers, but when we do, we know what they feel like. We remember them. We talk about them fondly with our kids as the best decade or best two years of our work life.

You had asked when work felt purposeful for me. To talk about COVID for a moment—it’s hard to because we lost over a million lives in our country. For me to sit here and say that was the year I felt so fulfilled in work feels complicated. But I did, because I had such a strong sense of purpose every single day.

We were in virtual meetings or sitting together masked, with the clear goal of keeping people safe and keeping the business running. It was incredibly motivating. Everyone wanted to contribute to that goal. I saw people do the best work of their careers. It was magical, and everybody mattered.

Going back to that book Everybody Matters, it was clear. We were named the most innovative company in North America by Fast Company, number one, because of the human-centric approach to work during the pandemic.

And I always wondered: does it take a crisis to bring this out in people? Everyone was their best self. We had hard days and a tremendous workload. We wrote policies and procedures quickly, under the weight of the great unknown. But so much good came from it.

That year, I felt inspired and motivated every day because my role was so clear and important. If we can recreate that for people at the team level and individual level, the results would be phenomenal.

Ashish Kothari:

member March. I still have my: 2020

January, February, and March—there was a city written on almost every day, Monday through Friday. Sometimes it was a different city each day. Sometimes three cities in one week. Everything was packed. Then I remember March 12th. After that, for the rest of the year, my calendar was empty.

I used the calendar mostly as a paper record of where I was. Outlook doesn’t show it the same way. On paper, you can see it clearly. My family always gifts me a calendar with our photos, so I keep that. That year, it was the first time I had truly stopped in such a big way, just to be home.

Grace Zuncic:

Yeah.

Ashish Kothari:

There were two or three things I remember about that period. In that moment, it didn’t matter what kind of leader you were or what kind of company you ran. Whether you were for-profit, non-profit, or focused on making money—everybody was focused on people.

Grace Zuncic:

Yes.

Ashish Kothari:

And everybody, whether they liked it or not, saw the work-life barrier disappear because we were dialing in from home. We were in a shared experience of adversity beyond us.

What it unlocked was magical. It unlocked the truth that everybody matters. Everyone was oriented around keeping people safe and moving forward.

Yes, it took a crisis to get there. I hope it doesn’t take another crisis to remind us, because I already see so many moving away from that beautiful moment of hardship, but united together.

Grace Zuncic:

Yes.

Ashish Kothari:

You know, from that beautiful moment in hardship but united together that it created.

Grace Zuncic:

Yes, I entirely agree. The shift from being so committed to people for years through COVID, to now hearing “we need to get back to business and profitability,” has been real. But I think the two can work together, even if that was lost in particular industries. Certainly, many industries were deeply impacted by COVID and faced turnarounds and changes.

The dynamics of people really leaning into their work, as I saw and experienced, were inspiring.

Ashish Kothari:

Sometimes with this work, you and I are converts. We believe in it. You’ve walked this path a lot longer than I have, Grace. I’m a new convert.

Before my TEDx talk, I was presenting at an HR conference and told everyone, “I want to share this talk with you. Please give me input.” Because many people there were CHROs with 25–30 years at Fortune 500 companies. I said, “You’ve lived the walk. I’m just a 10-year acolyte on this pathway. Tell me where this doesn’t make sense or how I can make it more powerful.”

In private equity, it feels like the cutting edge of this work. Many organizations and leaders will say, “Yes, I get it in my head—higher profitability, productivity, shareholder returns from flourishing cultures. I’ve seen the data, 2–3.5% higher shareholder returns. I get it.” But still in their heart, they think, “I have to drive profits. I have to hit quarterly targets.” They’re operating from fear.

Nobody lives this more than private equity, with its focus on scale and metrics. So the question I often get is: how do you balance quantitative impact with qualitative culture building? Internally at Manna Tree, and across your portfolio companies, how do you keep that flame alive?

Grace Zuncic:

I’ve been fortunate to serve on a number of boards and be in boardrooms when these conversations are happening. I don’t think private equity firms fully understand how deeply they impact the culture of a company.

What they advocate for in the boardroom, the pressure they put on the CEO or management team—all of that trickles down. People inside the organization feel it. They’ll say, “Private equity is driving this agenda with the company.” Everything’s changed. It’s not how it used to be around here. Or there’s this sentiment within the business that it’s coming from our investors.

The purpose of private equity is to deliver returns, drive growth, and help companies and founders realize the original intent of their businesses, realize their full purpose. But doing that with a weak culture isn’t going to happen.

And usually, boards and private equity only talk about culture when it’s an issue versus continuously. That has to change. Boards should talk about it continuously. They should expect to see engagement results, meet with the head of HR, and know what they’re thinking. The pressure to make culture align with the business cannot rest on one individual who reports to the board and leaves. Everyone has to own it.

Private equity needs to hold itself more accountable to understanding culture and its metrics—whether that’s monthly engagement or, better yet, weekly engagement. I’ve heard you speak to that philosophy, Ashish, and I advocate for it where it makes sense.

That’s how I’ve come to understand it and that the transitions within a management team can deeply impact culture. When changes happen at the top, the entire organization feels it, depending on its size.

At Manna Tree, we spend a lot of time inviting conversations around engagement and ensuring roles are linked to business objectives much earlier in the investment cycle, not just showing up periodically or when those three things combined are an issue for the organization.

Ashish Kothari:

It’s so interesting. People are often blind to, or turn a blind eye to, the impact they have. Sometimes McKinsey consultants are called the “smartest guys in the room—and the wrong guys.” I think private equity folks also see themselves that way.

It’s easy to sit at the top. I’ve spent three years building a company, and I’ve learned how easy it is to create ideas and how hard it is to execute them.

In the last month, I’ve had eight conversations with some of the largest private equity firms. Everyone says, “We want to hire the right CEO and team, and then we want them to drive the impact.” But at the same time, they load them with targets.

My first question is: you have more investment in your human assets than physical assets. So what is the state of your human assets?

Most say, “We don’t care unless it’s a problem.” Exactly what you said. They don’t worry about it. But why wouldn’t you? Every strategy is executed by people.

Grace Zuncic:

A hundred percent.

Sometimes there’s too much narrow focus on particular roles. They’re important, but a lot of people in my type of role in private equity are there primarily to assess individual capabilities, talents, and recruitment of certain skills at a high level.

Those things matter, but it’s the integration of all of it—the overall culture and wellbeing of the workforce—that determines how people go along on the journey with us against the investment thesis.

It’s not just about the board level. It’s about the whole organization. And that’s something that often gets lost.

I’m new to private equity, but what has made Manna Tree different is that many of our people have been operators. They’ll say, “I know how this is going to play out in the organization, because I worked in one for 20 years.” That perspective makes a difference.

People who build their entire careers only in private equity are brilliant on deals and the technical side. They can financially engineer and create strategies on paper. But the actual work of it—the execution—is different. I’m grateful I waited to enter private equity until now. My career experiences have given me insights and credibility, because I’ve lived it. And that makes a difference.

Ashish Kothari:

It’s a lived experience. We had a word for this math that I often see play out. We used to call it cowboy math: one billion, 2% growth, 10% profit—okay, here’s the math, here’s the algorithm. We need to do pricing, open some new markets, and make this investment. Assess the team and recruit. Then we’re going to meet every quarter and push to make sure things are happening. That’s the model.

Let’s be clear, for 80%, that’s the model. But it’s missing what you just highlighted. Number one: what percentage of the organization is touched by the leadership executive team? Less than 0.1%.

In fact, when we researched burnout and flourishing, wellbeing, only about 10% of wellbeing and about 2% of the organizational factor is actually touched by the top—everything is happening in the middle.

Everything is in the middle—point number one.

The second big thing: go back to the Chobani story. There’s so little focus on development of the talent—understanding where the gaps are, putting people in the right roles. Great, you want to do pricing, procurement, and manufacturing transformations as your three big levers, and maybe some product line extensions. But it’s your people who are going to execute them.

If they’re stuck, if they can’t collaborate, if they don’t find meaning, if there’s a lack of prioritization or alignment—good luck. You might get an outcome, but it will take a lot harder and a lot longer.

Really focusing on that human asset piece is such a loss in private equity. I don’t believe capital markets—when you are public—it’s easy to do this work beautifully. But in private situations, where you have a four-plus-year holding period, you truly can transform.

And I go back, Grace, to what you said: help the company reorient to their original why—that purpose that started this journey. Use that and build a culture that allows people to grow and become the best version of themselves and of the company, and win.

Grace Zuncic:

Yes. And especially in growth private equity, which is where Manna Tree plays, the importance of this is clear. Whether the exit optionality is a public offering or a strategic sale, working in your early days on building engagement strategies, measurement tools, team-level interventions with coaching, leadership assessments, and 360s—doing that earlier in the life cycle prepares you for what’s coming down the road with bigger company expectations.

Introducing those concepts earlier is something we’re very focused on.

Ashish Kothari:

I love that. You’ve served on a lot of boards. You’ve served on the King Arthur Baking Company. You’re on the Cotopaxi Foundation. Talk to me about how your board experience has fed back into your human-centered leadership approach.

Grace Zuncic:

When I was at my desk, in my job life—and I still have that life—I had an intention in my early thirties: I really wanted to be on a board. I get calls a lot—“How did you get on your first board? How did you make it happen?” I questioned myself: is this for my résumé? Why is this so important to me? Is this just another mountain I’m climbing?

There needs to be alignment. I set that intention out into the universe, and it took me ten years until I got a call from an organization called Women on Boards. They’re focused on improving representation of women in the boardroom.

Of all companies, to have it be King Arthur—what an honor. Once I got the outreach, I hoped this would work out because it felt so right. I had been baking with King Arthur since I was a little girl with my mom, always using the product. We were trained to think that is the only flour you buy—nothing comes closer in comparison. I had grown as a core customer.

It’s amazing: a 230-year-old company, 100% employee-owned, a B Corporation, tirelessly focused on serving its core customer, innovating, taking risks, and serving its employees and people.

To be in a boardroom with genuine gender, age, and racial diversity—it’s awesome. It’s such a gift to have that be my first board opportunity, versus something I wasn’t excited about just to check a box so I could be on another board later.

The Cotopaxi Foundation is an honor too. It’s a non-for-profit board and not something Davis needed to offer me when I decided to go. The best part is that the executive director and a couple of board members are people I used to work with—they were on my team. I get to see them once a quarter, see Davis, and feel strong connectivity.

We translate 1% of revenues from Cotopaxi to meaningful grants to people living around the world in extreme poverty, notably in Latin America. We’re working with organizations that are systems changers doing amazing work in education, livelihood, and healthcare sanitation projects. It’s exciting and a great reminder of the good that business can do and its purpose. It’s great to continue to be a part of that organization.

For Manna Tree, I’m on some boards too. I’m on the board of Good Culture Cottage Cheese—what a great experience. Bringing my experience to a boardroom as an HR person is another thing Manna Tree has unlocked. The partners asked me to do it, and I’ve been fortunate to have that experience.

Ashish Kothari:

I’m going to reflect something back to you. Grace, you’ll be like, “Ashish, come on.” But this is the reality. Even as an HR person, in the end everything we create is human. You’re not just an HR person. There’s this story of “I’m just HR.” No. There is no function more important if we truly play the role of advocates for our people and help grow people.

The problem is most HR people are not like you. They think their job is to run a training program, write the policy, and make sure we don’t get into trouble. They’re not really playing the role you’re playing—being the advocate, the guide, the counselor on the importance of culture and elevating humans.

Every business is built by humans. Human resources is the most important role if we play that role. And you play that in spades, my friend.

Grace Zuncic:

That means a lot. I give Ellie Rubenstein, Ross Iverson, Steve Young, and Allie Patterson—the partners at Manna Tree—a lot of credit. I’m grateful to them because they see this role differently. They want to demonstrate to growth private equity that it’s so much more than ensuring a slot, recruiting, saving on recruitment costs, or putting someone into a Hogan assessment.

It has become so much more in the dialogue we’re fostering with our operating partners who help us on the boards we manage. CEOs can come to me and work directly with me on things they’re confronting with their management teams. It’s bringing it all together and raising the conversation in the boardroom about engagement and how people are really doing.

Are people’s highest and best use aligned? How would we answer that question? We invite that dialogue—versus only asking, “How did we do last quarter on the gross margin improvement we were expecting? Did you make it or not?”

Ashish Kothari:

Did you make it or not?

Grace Zuncic:

Exactly. This is a whole different layer. I’ve reflected a lot on this. I have worked with incredible people in HR who taught me so much. I had a team of about 50 people at Chobani and a smaller team at Cotopaxi.

I wouldn’t say this about our teams, but looking at the market holistically—now that I’m part of a lot of HR networking groups and associations—I think HR leaders are sometimes, and maybe often, too focused on process over progress. “Progress” is my middle name. If I don’t make progress in a day, I feel it. I’m hard on myself about it, but it’s a huge motivator. Sometimes that overfocus on process gets in the way of HR leaders realizing their ability to walk into any business context and speak a human strategy language.

I know it’s within many HR leaders—they’ve seen and been exposed to so much. But the unlock has to come from within. It’s a muscle that must be built. I’ve worked hard to build it with the HR leaders I’ve worked with over the years.

Ashish Kothari:

And it goes back to what you said earlier. Most people who get into this care about people; that’s why they get into it.

Grace Zuncic:

A hundred percent.

Ashish Kothari:

But the system beats you down. It does. It makes you play a much smaller role: “I am just HR. I’m just HR.” At some point you say, “Okay, fine, I’ll just do what I have to do.”

But especially in today’s world, we have to play to our fullest strength, and we have to do that through the two things your leadership journey taught you earlier: courage and kindness. Courage to stand up when somebody says, “Okay, you get 15 minutes on my agenda to do your leadership thing and then go away,” to say, “No, don’t do it. If you’re not going to role model what I’m training, don’t do it.”

The courage to have the hard conversations, and the kindness to invest in our people and share the truths that need to be shared—courage and kindness—to walk the path. They’re so critical, and we have to ground ourselves in them.

Grace Zuncic:

I agree. Well said.

Ashish Kothari:

Well, my friend, I love reading books.

Grace Zuncic:

Yes, and you remember them. You remember the minds and quotes. That’s your mind—your brilliant mind.

Ashish Kothari:

This weekend I read a book and I want to gift it to you. I’ll bring it over. You might already know about it.

I was looking for which book to read, and it was meaningful because it was my 700th book in my last tenure. I really wanted it to matter. I didn’t want to just read an old book again, even though I’ve read Man’s Search for Meaning 50 times and You Are Here 15–20 times.

I had a conversation with Rich, who runs this amazing firm called Menlo Innovations in Michigan. He talked to me about the Tugboat Institute, started by a venture capitalist who got tired of the venture capital world that was heralded from the Netscape era: go fast, grow fast.

Earlier the model was to reduce risk, build, profit, and then scale. Then it became grow, grow, grow—who cares about profit—scale fast, sell, and you’re done.

He wrote a book—by David Wharton—called Another Way. It’s based on his research on “evergreen” companies, companies that have been around for 200-plus years. King Arthurs. King Arthurs. That’s what brought it to me.

I was excited that the book found me because it reflected how we’re trying to build Happiness Squad around similar principles. These companies had four or five things that will resonate with you. They were purpose-driven. They were people-centric. They had perseverance of sticking through the hard times and walking the path. Many of them were private and decided to fund from within because they knew what external pressures would do.

It was all about growth that was paced. Every business has a natural intrinsic growth it can support.

There were many of these principles, and I thought, “That’s amazing.” You should get a copy of that book. I’ll get one for you when we see each other.

Grace Zuncic:

I would love to read that and think about it in the context of what private equity is trying to achieve, which is a good thing. How can these ideas marry together? I will be reading that.

Ashish Kothari:

There are amazing companies there. Many people think, “That’s all great, but are those small companies?” No. One of the largest evergreen companies is Enterprise—the largest, $26 billion in revenue.

Grace Zuncic:

Known for its training. Oh yeah.

Ashish Kothari:

Wegmans. There are so many of these. I thought, “This is unbelievable.” King Arthur is one of those. And if they’re not, they should join this and spread the word.

My friend, we can talk for hours. We really can. I’m going to see you here in October shortly. I’m looking forward to that.

One intent I hold in my head, heart, and spirit is for us to figure out a way to partner and take this field from engagement to flourishing—together. If we know our human assets matter, how do we measure, scale, and grow flourishing to make things happen?

Before we go there, I want to know: you can’t make companies flourish unless you are flourishing. Flourishing doesn’t happen on days when your calendar looks like a game of meeting bingo, when you’re back-to-back. You’re one of those people with so much going on—you’re on boards, you have your role within Manna Tree, you have your board role with companies, you have an amazing family, your role as a daughter. We talked about it last weekend.

What is your approach to filling your cup—to fueling yourself—that allows you to play all these roles with the caring spirit that you are?

Grace Zuncic:

That means so much to me. The little secret about me is that I’m very hard on myself internally, and I don’t always take criticism well because I feel like I’m trying so hard. That goes for my relationship with my brilliant husband, my kids, my team at MRE, and everyone I interact with.

I’ve gotten a lot better, but I recognize it as a weak point. I need to be constantly inspired—talking to people like you, reading, being out in nature, which is how we opened this conversation. Social media is tough because there’s not much there for us. It’s pretty empty. Some things are lasting and interesting, but for the most part, the thing we take for granted is our time. It is critical.

I lost my brother-in-law—a young man in his mid-forties—back in November. Two young kids, beautiful wife, lived in the Denver area. Suddenly. I was with good friends in DC when he passed away, and I thought, “My gosh, time.” I thought I would have two more decades with Neil in our family life. What a loss. It was so hard for all of us.

This conversation about time and how we spend it has become dominant in my marriage because this was my brother’s only sibling, lost so suddenly. Are we spending it right? Why are we waiting? Let’s do things now. That isn’t an extra hour on Instagram at night. That’s calling my mom. That’s planting the garden in the backyard I’ve been talking about forever and still haven’t planted.

That’s taking an hour to go for a walk and listen to one of your amazing podcasts—why not walk and listen, or run and listen?

It’s funny, I went to local community theater one night last week. I haven’t been that inspired. It was awesome. I forgot how amazing community theater is. Things like this in our life—we need to connect with them because they bring out things in us more than other distractions. That’s been important for me.

Progress is huge. We talked about that. I have to feel like I’m always making it in some dimension of my life and just being there for people and showing up as best I can. I have one-on-ones that are hard. I give disappointing news. People expected more. Or we’re delivering a positive message and they’re overjoyed and I’m overjoyed with them. Or something hard happens to them—showing empathy.

I need to be on most hours of my day for the people I’m interacting with, and that can be tiring. These resets—nature, baking, volunteering—are super important.

Thank you for the question. I’m lucky because I feel very loved as a human being. I have felt loved at work. I have felt loved by my family. I feel very loved by my children and my parents. That fuels me, and I want to give that to others.

Ashish Kothari:

From the first time I met you, take this as a reflection, a gift. We all have our essences—our core essence beyond names, titles, where we grew up. I’ve always experienced your essence as love.

Grace Zuncic:

Thank you.

Ashish Kothari:

I wanted to reflect that back to you.

Grace Zuncic:

That means a lot. Thank you. Thank you so much.

Ashish Kothari:

Thank you for joining us. Thank you for sharing such a rich experience, and thank you for being the shining light and fighter for flourishing and humans in the workplace through your rich experience across these companies and now with MRE. With every investment you’re making, you’re transforming lives—for your consumers and through the employees of the companies. That’s cool. So grateful to know you, Grace.

Grace Zuncic:

Appreciate you. I’m grateful to know you, Ashish. Thank you for today.