"Web 3.0 and Internet user behavior is moving towards a decentralized model."
Victoria Slingerland Tweet
Victoria Slingerland is CEO of PracticeQuiz, a website with nearly 20 million people studying for entrance and professional exams a year. Victoria’s drive to create opportunities for upward social mobility was the driving force behind the creation of PracticeQuiz. She attended The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, where she focused on Development Economics and Human Security and is a graduate of Tufts University with a BA in International Relations and Spanish.
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Welcome to your ValiantCEO exclusive interview! Let’s start with a little introduction. Tell us about yourself.
Victoria Slingerland: I’m Victoria Slingerland is CEO of PracticeQuiz.com, a website with nearly 20 million people studying for entrance and professional exams a year – most people call me Vickie. Our company is based in Boston, MA and has a mission of providing high quality cost-effective or free test prep content to the masses.
NO child ever says I want to be a CEO when I grow up. What did you want to be and how did you get to where you are today? Give us some lessons you learned along the way.
Victoria Slingerland: I’m motivated by the desire to make the world a better place – especially creating upward social mobility. In my journey, I’ve seen people who have the drive and who can find the resources they need find ways to accomplish amazing things. That was the original genesis for PracticeQuiz. I had developed some high quality business education content that wasn’t finding a paid market.
As free content it was unique and better than what else was out there. We found a business model to make that work – it wasn’t always easy. It took some time for us to learn to listen to our customers. What studiers want is more specific than you’d think, and we used a lot of energy making content that never got used. We also take a lot of pride that we’ve figured out how to be useful to people working to improve their lives through academic and professional advancement.
Tell us about your business, what does the company do? What is unique about the company?
Victoria Slingerland: PracticeQuiz makes high quality test prep content available to the masses – for free. We do this using an ad-supported model. I’d say have our own unique approach to exam study materials. We try to be funny, creative, interject humor and inspiration. We’ve had hundreds of millions of people globally study with us since we launched the site, and around 20 million every year.
How to become a CEO? Some will focus on qualities, others on degrees, how would you answer that question?
Victoria Slingerland: Our business model requires us to be efficient and scalable in many ways – with cash, with the way our team spends its time. We’re creating content others are selling for far more. We’re happy to keep the flywheel turning in terms of generating content, keeping the lights on, and generating social impact. For me, my background helps a lot. My time at Tufts (2x) made me an organized, analytical thinker. I look at data, try to be bold with ideas, and work efficiently to get to market.
Given how process driven we are, being empathetic also helps – we have to keep people excited about the mission and goals so they don’t get bogged down or disengaged when detail oriented tasks need to be performed en masse.
What are the secrets to becoming a successful CEO? Who inspires you, who are your role models and why? Illustrate your choices.
Victoria Slingerland: I don’t know I am your typical CEO, but I’m proud of the work I do. For me, defining success is crucial. It’s not always about getting every single thing done – it’s about being efficient and satisfied with progress.
As a working mom, right now I’m very inspired by Jacinda Ardern, the Prime Minister of New Zealand. She’s a fantastic leader with vision – she’s decisive, but inclusive and redirects in respectful, data-driven, and intellectually compelling ways. She cares and is passionate about her work, and I see her as a problem-solver.
Many CEOs fall into the trap of being all over the place. What are the top activities a CEO should focus on to be the best leader the company needs? Explain.
Victoria Slingerland: As a working mom, I don’t have the time to be all over the place! My job is to make sure we stay focused on the goals associated with our business models. It’s as simple as that. That means using data to identify what opportunities fit into our platform, and optimizing repeatable processes to execute and scale them. Then I’m working to keep the team motivated and energized alongside a winning design.
Staying focused on that is extremely important. My co-founder is/was an ideas person and CEO getting him to stay focused is/was a very important part our organization staying on track.
The Covid-19 Pandemic put the leadership skills of many to the test, what were some of the most difficult challenges that you faced as a CEO/Leader in the past year? Please list and explain in detail.
Victoria Slingerland: I’m a Mom of 3 children who had a newborn during the pandemic. During this time, I also assumed the CEO role of PracticeQuiz and re-invigorated both our social mission and grown the company through new channels. While I’ve always worked hard, I’ve shifted my mindset around success to be much more focused on balance. One of the most significant changes has been a positive mindset change towards a willingness to automate and delegate rather than my output.
In some cases, this means giving up profit margin or my own instincts to spend a lot of time at my desk working. We really made choices not to pursue opportunities because our team’s bandwidth didn’t allow for it, and we had to get around as team to being OK with that.
What are some of the greatest mistakes you’ve noticed some business leaders made during these unprecedented times? What are the takeaways you gleaned from those mistakes?
Victoria Slingerland: I think being remote resulted in distance between leaders and their teams. It made it easier to think of people in abstract terms. That’s a big driver behind The Great Resignation. If you aren’t connected with the mission of the company, and the people you work with, your employment decision will come down to money and role. Many small and medium size companies like us can’t compete with big tech, especially now that they can hire anyone from anywhere. It’s crucial to stay connected and communicate you care about your people and business partners.
In your opinion, what changes played the most critical role in enabling your business to survive/remain profitable, or maybe even thrive? What lessons did all this teach you?
Victoria Slingerland: The initial iteration of our business was a bust, but we learned from the failure. I come from a finance background, and what I learned was that it’s better to have a portfolio of reasonable bets rather than have your eggs in one basket. That insight led to a pivot in our business model to create more diverse content. That’s what’s worked and scaled for us.
What is the #1 most pressing challenge you’re trying to solve in your business right now?
Victoria Slingerland: We are a curated content company, but Web 3.0 and Internet user behavior is moving towards a decentralized model. We’re seeing more competition pop up there and it’s hard to compete with the proliferation of content, and the shift towards conversations happening in places away from traditional website. People are studying and collaborating in areas like Discord. We have to figure out how to make our platform more open and inclusive to continue to succeed.
You already shared a lot of insights with our readers and we thank you for your generosity. Normally, leaders are asked about their most useful qualities but let’s change things up a bit. What is the most useless skill you have learned, at school or during your career?
Victoria Slingerland: Well, something related came up recently, I’d say something I haven’t used traditional negotiation training. Relationships are important to me. I can’t recall a time when I had to use the hardline negotiation tactics they teach in business classes. It’s much more about being transparent and fair.
Thank you so much for your time but before we finish things off, we do have one more question. We will select these answers for our ValiantCEO Award 2021 edition. The best answers will be selected to challenge the award.
Share with us one of the most difficult decisions you had to make, this past year 2021, for your company that benefited your employees or customers. What made this decision so difficult and what were the positive impacts?
Victoria Slingerland: The hardest decision we made this year was to shelve a significant amount of work we knew would be profitable because it would have exhausted our team (including myself). The pandemic isn’t about maximizing profits – it’s about spending time and supporting those you care about.
Jed Morley, VIP Contributor to ValiantCEO and the host of this interview would like to thank Victoria Slingerland for taking the time to do this interview and share her knowledge and experience with our readers.
If you would like to get in touch with Victoria Slingerland or her company, you can do it through her – Linkedin Page
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