Episode 17 - Sunglasses, Hard Truths, and Building What Matters with Mike Malloy
Mike Malloy has been a Deloitte consultant, a traveling sunglasses salesman, a startup CEO, an incubator program director, an adjunct professor, and for eleven years an Entrepreneur in Residence at Georgetown University. He raised more than $500,000 for a social enterprise sunglasses company, went bankrupt at 30 when it crashed, moved into his parents' basement, and went on to build Malloy Industries, a fractional executive firm backed by a network of roughly 600 relentlessly generous fractionals. This conversation covers how to delegate outcomes instead of tasks, why generosity compounds when you stop keeping score, and the customer discovery questions that separate real pain from polite interest.
Today Mike is founder and CEO of Malloy Industries, leads a core team of 12, and still holds office hours, runs pitch competitions, and guest lectures at Georgetown, where he has helped recruit other EIRs. His path is anything but standard: he enrolled in a computer science master's program primarily to keep playing Ultimate Frisbee, coached the Georgetown A team to the national championship tournament, built his business around his son's nap schedule, and picked up needlepoint during COVID. Essential listening for founders wearing too many hats, EIRs who mentor at career inflection points, and anyone who wants the unglamorous truth about what failure actually teaches.
Chapters:
[00:00:00] Opening: 80% Done by Somebody Else
[00:01:20] Meet Mike Malloy
[00:02:39] Computer Science, Deloitte, and Automobile University
[00:07:45] Stories, Not Prescriptions
[00:10:26] Delegation and the 10-80-10 Rule
[00:14:41] Relentlessly Generous on Any Given Tuesday
[00:21:27] The Helpful Resources Folder
[00:23:04] Becoming an EIR at Georgetown
[00:27:22] Frisbee as Leadership Training
[00:31:19] Bankrupt at 30
[00:34:44] Martina, Max, and Building Beyond Billable Hours
[00:38:13] Customer Discovery: Ask What They Already Spent
[00:42:05] The Birth of Malloy Industries
[00:46:05] Signals of Real Pain and the Five Stages of Awareness
[00:54:29] The Dream EIR Role and No Sevens Allowed
[00:58:25] Book Pick and What Was Most Useful
[01:01:39] Needlepoint
[01:03:00] How to Help Mike and Where to Find Him
[01:05:15] Host Debrief
Key Takeaways:
Today Mike is founder and CEO of Malloy Industries, leads a core team of 12, and still holds office hours, runs pitch competitions, and guest lectures at Georgetown, where he has helped recruit other EIRs. His path is anything but standard: he enrolled in a computer science master's program primarily to keep playing Ultimate Frisbee, coached the Georgetown A team to the national championship tournament, built his business around his son's nap schedule, and picked up needlepoint during COVID. Essential listening for founders wearing too many hats, EIRs who mentor at career inflection points, and anyone who wants the unglamorous truth about what failure actually teaches.
Chapters:
[00:00:00] Opening: 80% Done by Somebody Else
[00:01:20] Meet Mike Malloy
[00:02:39] Computer Science, Deloitte, and Automobile University
[00:07:45] Stories, Not Prescriptions
[00:10:26] Delegation and the 10-80-10 Rule
[00:14:41] Relentlessly Generous on Any Given Tuesday
[00:21:27] The Helpful Resources Folder
[00:23:04] Becoming an EIR at Georgetown
[00:27:22] Frisbee as Leadership Training
[00:31:19] Bankrupt at 30
[00:34:44] Martina, Max, and Building Beyond Billable Hours
[00:38:13] Customer Discovery: Ask What They Already Spent
[00:42:05] The Birth of Malloy Industries
[00:46:05] Signals of Real Pain and the Five Stages of Awareness
[00:54:29] The Dream EIR Role and No Sevens Allowed
[00:58:25] Book Pick and What Was Most Useful
[01:01:39] Needlepoint
[01:03:00] How to Help Mike and Where to Find Him
[01:05:15] Host Debrief
Key Takeaways:
- Delegate outcomes, not tasks. Mike's 10-80-10 rule: be present for the first 10 percent to define what done looks like and why it matters, step away for the 80 percent while the team owns it, then return for the last 10 percent to review. If the result misses, you probably did a poor job delegating, and 80 percent done by somebody else is still 100 percent awesome.
- Tell stories, not prescriptions. EIRs have been around the block, but results vary and every founder is different. Share what you tried, what failed, and what worked, then let the founder adapt it to their own situation.
- Generosity compounds when you stop keeping score. Curate a helpful resources folder, drip resources one a week instead of seventeen at once, and never expect the person you help to be the one who pays you back. Stay open to receiving too, or you will burn out.
- Ask what they already spent, not whether they would buy. In the past twelve months, how much money have you spent solving this problem? Ask for their most expensive problem, since expensive implies a budget, and ask when the latest is they would want to start. Sell it to someone before you build the landing page.
- You are not your business. Mike went bankrupt a year into his EIR role and asked to be fired; Jeff Reed told him he was now more qualified. His weekly check-in, one to ten personally and one to ten professionally with no sevens allowed, is how he keeps the two separate before something terrible happens.
Notable Quotes:
[00:17:26] "It's really important that you don't expect the person you help to be the person who then pays you back." - Mike Malloy
[00:30:04] "You can't have silos in your own life if you're gonna connect the dots for others." - Ilya Tabakh
[00:31:53] "There's for-profits, there's nonprofits, and then there's no profits. And I went bankrupt at 30." - Mike Malloy
[00:33:08] "Because I've ridden the ride all the way down, I have the utmost empathy for entrepreneurs. You're my tribe." - Mike Malloy
[00:56:34] "I was my business. My business was me. I was a one in both." - Mike Malloy
Organizations & Resources Mentioned:
Malloy Industries: https://www.malloyindustries.com
Georgetown University Entrepreneurship: https://entrepreneurship.georgetown.edu
Deloitte: https://www.deloitte.com
Boston College: https://www.bc.edu
Halcyon: https://halcyonhouse.org
DC Breeze: https://www.thedcbreeze.com
Who Not How by Dan Sullivan and the Strategic Coach Impact Filter: https://www.strategiccoach.com
Buy Back Your Time by Dan Martell: https://www.buybackyourtime.com
The Go-Giver by Bob Burg and John David Mann: https://thegogiver.com
What Got You Here Won't Get You There by Marshall Goldsmith: https://marshallgoldsmith.com
Flourish by Daniel Coyle: https://danielcoyle.com
Zig Ziglar: https://www.ziglar.com
Loom: https://www.loom.com
Scribe: https://scribehow.com
Coro: https://www.coro.net
🔗 Connect with Mike Malloy:
▪️ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mwmalloy/
▪️ Website: malloyindustries.com
🔗 Connect with EIR Live
▪️ Terrance Orr on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/terranceorr
▪️ Ilya Tabakh on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/ilyatabakh
▪️ Website: eir.live
▪️ LinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/eirlive
▪️ YouTube: youtube.com/@EIRLive
▪️ X/Twitter: twitter.com/EIRLive_show
▪️ Suggest Guest - https://forms.gle/FQrBHoM3sU18gF3y8
🎧 Listen to the Episode:
▪️ YouTube: https://youtu.be/RB6pwQoFUEk
▪️ Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/eir-live/id1767045066
▪️ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2TBj8ZLbHQMnaeK6dOh23P
▪️ All Platforms: https://podcast.eir.live
Subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts and join us as we explore the real stories behind entrepreneurship in residence!
- (00:00) - Opening: 80% Done by Somebody Else
- (01:20) - Meet Mike Malloy
- (02:39) - Computer Science, Deloitte, and Automobile University
- (07:45) - Stories, Not Prescriptions
- (10:26) - Delegation and the 10-80-10 Rule
- (14:41) - Relentlessly Generous on Any Given Tuesday
- (21:27) - The Helpful Resources Folder
- (23:04) - Becoming an EIR at Georgetown
- (27:22) - Frisbee as Leadership Training
- (31:19) - Bankrupt at 30
- (34:44) - Martina, Max, and Building Beyond Billable Hours
- (38:13) - Customer Discovery: Ask What They Already Spent
- (42:05) - The Birth of Malloy Industries
- (46:05) - Signals of Real Pain and the Five Stages of Awareness
- (54:29) - The Dream EIR Role and No Sevens Allowed
- (58:25) - Book Pick and What Was Most Useful
- (01:01:39) - Needlepoint
- (01:03:00) - How to Help Mike and Where to Find Him
- (01:05:15) - Host Debrief
Creators and Guests
Host
Ilya Tabakh
Infrastructure Innovation Strategist | Building the Future of AI & Energy Systems | Co-host @ EIR Live & Powering the AI Stack 🎙️
Host
Terrance Orr
EIR & Fractional Executive | Strategic Advisor | Founder-CEO Coach | Ecosystem Builder | Co-Host, EIR Live🎙️
Guest
Mike Malloy
Mike Malloy is the Founder and CEO of Malloy Industries. We help scaling B2B companies diagnose what’s stalling growth, build a prioritized 12‑month action plan, and get a vetted fractional executive in seat—typically within 6 weeks. Mike has spent 15+ years in the DC/MD/VA startup ecosystem, supporting founders through commercialization, growth, and the leadership decisions that determine whether momentum compounds or stalls.
