Mike Lisanti is a leading entrepreneur and music artist manager known for his groundbreaking work in the industry. As the founder of MLennial, launched in April 2024, Lisanti focuses on managing DJs and record producers in the dance and bass music scenes. Before MLennial, he served as the COO of Prodigy Artists, where he played a key role in shaping the careers of top artists.
Lisanti’s career began as an independent artist, producer, and tour manager, providing him with extensive experience across various management roles. He notably revitalized Crankdat’s career through strategic data use and social media growth, increasing his TikTok followers from 2,000 to nearly 1 million and Instagram followers from 200,000 to over 500,000. Under Lisanti’s guidance, Crankdat achieved sold-out performances at Hollywood Palladium and a successful collaboration with DJ Snake on “Big Bang,” which surpassed 1 million Spotify streams.
His career also includes managing tours, curating radio shows, and contributing to major music releases. At MLennial, Lisanti oversees a roster of influential clients, including Crankdat, BARELY ALIVE, Kompany, SABAI, and MUZZ, demonstrating his commitment to nurturing talent and driving growth through innovative strategies.
Company: MLennial
We are thrilled to have you join us today, welcome to ValiantCEO Magazine’s exclusive interview! Let’s start off with a little introduction. Tell our readers a bit about yourself and your company
Mike Lisanti: My name is Mike Lisanti, and I was born and raised in Los Angeles, CA. I run an artist management company called MLennial, which originally started as a passthrough corporation while I was the COO of Prodigy Artists. When I branched out on my own, I continued using the MLennial entity for my business.
If you were in an elevator with Warren Buffett, how would you describe your company, your services or products? What makes your company different from others? What is your company’s biggest strength?
Mike Lisanti: We help artists become and remain marketable. What sets MLennial apart is our homegrown style of community that fosters a strong connection among staff and artists. Our greatest strengths are communication, transparency, and honesty—whether the feedback is what someone wants to hear or not. In the long run, this is the only way to sleep at night.
Quiet quitting, The Great Resignation, is an ongoing trend causing many businesses to struggle to keep talent engaged and motivated. Most are leaving because of their boss or their company culture. 82% of people feel unheard, undervalued, and misunderstood in the workplace. In your experience, what keeps employees happy? And how are you adapting to the current shift we see?
Mike Lisanti: From experience I have developed a keen sense of who will excel based on their own motivations and vice versa. The Human Resources skills that I’ve developed over the years have continuously driven me to understand what my team members need and want. Each year, people not only need new and different things, but they also evolve and grow into different individuals (for better or worse). With effective communication, these changes can be managed in a healthy way.
Online business keeps on surging higher than ever, B2B, B2C, online shopping, virtual meetings, remote work, Zoom medical consultations, what are your expectations for the year to come and how are you capitalizing on the tidal wave?
Mike Lisanti: I’m heavily active in the day trading space and have moderated some of the more prominent post-Covid era Discord channels. The internet trading community is notorious for having the best Discord communities on the internet. I’ve used those skills to build MLennial’s remote office called “LEGENDS.” It features hundreds of permission-protected channels and serves as an active directory for all of our clients’ favorite contractors and media contacts region-wide. This creates a unique sense of community not only for the MLennial team and artists but also for our favorite contractors, who are the first to be notified whenever we tag their corresponding roles for gigs that need to be filled anywhere in the world.
Business is all about overcoming obstacles and creating opportunities for growth. What do you see as THE real challenge right now?
Mike Lisanti: For me, the biggest challenge is scaling without sacrificing core values for short-term gains. Zooming out and making sure that any business expansion does not impact current clients and systems will always be a constant goal of mine as client-based business owner.
In your experience, what tends to be the most underestimated part of running a company? Can you share an example?
Mike Lisanti: Core values. I really think that people tend to overlook their core values (personally and professionally) to focus on “striking while the iron is hot” and expanding too quickly when they see a bit of success, rather than focusing on properly scaling and maintaining the assets and operations at hand. I have a very good eye for momentum in business and product demand. I work very hard every day to strategically know when to strike and when to sit on the sidelines for the right opportunities and money for my clients. In my humble opinion, if you can’t get a good deal for your own business, why should your clients trust you to get them a good deal for theirs?
On a lighter note, if you had the ability to pick any business superpower, what would it be and how would you put it into practice?
Mike Lisanti: Superpower name: Nerves of Steel—The ability to fully separate and control my emotions on a dime. One of the hardest things to do in business is to remove ego, FOMO, greed, and fear when making an informed, high-pressure decision. I’ve found this to be one of the most challenging things to finely tune and maintain—before, during, and after a decision has been executed.
What does “success” in 2024 mean to you? It could be on a personal or business level, please share your vision
Mike Lisanti: In my opinion, true success is the leverage and ability to walk away from deals and revenue opportunities that don’t fit your moral code for long-term value as a company and employer. This applies to anyone in any field or market as well—by having the patience and leverage to truly utilize the power of “pass.”