Search Fund CEO on Leadership, Clarity, and Culture | Jay Steele

Jay Steele is the CEO of Focus Learning, a software company he acquired through a search fund. In this conversation with host Jake Smith, Jay gets honest about the realities of stepping into a company as a first-time CEO — the relief, the pressure, and the hard work of building a culture that lasts.He covers what "people-first" leadership really means beyond the buzzword, how he approaches high-stakes decisions using a one-way and two-way door framework, why indecision is the one answer he refuses to accept, and the personal complexity of transitioning a long-tenured founder out of the business he built.Jay also reflects on scaling from a small team to 50-plus people, what he brought from his background as a Naval officer and Amazon leader, and why he believes great work can be both deeply meaningful and genuinely fun — and why those aren't the same thing.If you're navigating a search fund acquisition, stepping into a CEO role for the first time, or building a leadership style that's both accountable and human, this episode is for you.Reframe Fix is brought to you by Workbench. Hosted by Jake Smith.