Navigating Cultural Identity and Aging Parents | Patrick Moran (father of 2, Robinhood, Spotify, Netflix)

Startup Dad - Patrick Moran - Final Transcript

Patrick: It's so much a part of my identity and same with my wife's identity to just be able to move around and adapt. And not only that, but even with our daughter when we were moving around she's, also traveling, we took her everywhere, so it wasn't just the moving around the homes, and she was with us in going out to dinner, whether it's like some casual type place or some, slightly uppity, whatever but she got exposed to a lot of that. Our son right now, I mean, you take him out to dinner anywhere and he treats it like, you know, I don't know, like the backyard, like, oh let's throw the football around.

Adam: Welcome to Startup Dad, the podcast where we dive deep into the lives of dads who are also leaders in the world of startups and business. I'm your host, Adam Fishman. In today's conversation, I sat down with Patrick Moran. Patrick leads growth marketing at Robinhood, and prior to that, has had an illustrious career at Houzz, Spotify, YikYak, and Netflix.

He's a husband and the father of two kids. In our conversation today, we spoke a lot about cultural identity. Patrick is from the Philippines originally, and shared his thoughts on raising kids in the U. S. as immigrant parents. As someone who has traveled around the country and the world, Patrick reflected on managing that set of values with having a son who really only knows life in one place.

We also talked about a new topic for Startup Dad. How we manage and care for our own aging parents, and especially how to do it when they live very far away. Patrick also shared his top tips for international travel with young children. He's got some great nuggets of wisdom you won't want to miss. Also Startup

Dad has a new merch store, amazing gear for all the startup dads, and moms in your life. Check it out at www.startupdadshop.com.

Adam: I would like to welcome friend of mine, Patrick Moran, to the Startup Dad podcast. Patrick, it is a pleasure to have you here today. Thank you for joining me on the show.

Patrick: Thank you so much for having me. I can't wait to have this conversation. And by the way, go Blue.

Adam: Go Blue is Right. Patrick and I, fellow University of Michigan graduates, and they just won the national championship and then proceeded to lose their head coach in the football team. So, we're all excited and elated and then a little bit of a letdown. It's like a bittersweet thing. 

Patrick: It's like what I was telling you earlier, I feel like Robert De Niro in Awakenings, you know.

Adam: I love that example, but hopefully we haven't lost everyone with our minute of football banter. So we're going to move on to, we're going to spend most of today talking about parenthood, talking about fatherhood, but to give people a sense of who you are, tell us a little bit about your professional background.

What are you doing now? have you done in your career?

Patrick: Yeah, sure. So I currently head growth marketing over at RobinHood. I basically spent the last, I used to say 10 years, but that was five years ago. So I spent I would say maybe the last decade or so in sort of marketing roles for consumer companies. So I essentially rode the wave of a lot of these you know, mobile companies that came off of iOS and Android, but it's been an amazing experience.

I got to spend time during the earlier days of Netflix where they were launching originals. I was at Spotify right before we went public. You know, and I got to experience even some companies that maybe didn't do so well. So I was at Yik Yak for a little bit and loved my time there.

But you know, sometimes these things don't go your way. And, you know, I picked up a few leadership skills along the way. And you know, now I'm in a position to,  pay off my mortgage in a much more comfortable fashion than I was in the past. So, so that's a little bit about my professional background.

Adam: I love that. I love that. Let's talk about back in time, life growing up. So where are you from originally? What was life like growing up and tell me about your family?

Patrick: Yeah, I was born in the Philippines and I grew up with, back then was more sort of middle class parents but they ended up starting a bakery business. And we ended up becoming upper class people because of the business that they built out. So very fortunate to have been born to the parents who had me, but they started the bakery business when I was three or four.

And they eventually expanded it to the US. So it was myself, my two brothers, we ended up moving to Southern California. For a handful of years, and so it was very formative in a lot of ways. One you know, I had to learn how to adapt. DEI didn't exist back then.

So the way that we had to adapt was certainly a lot more, I guess I would assume more pronounced then what it is today. We moved a lot. They were very busy. So we had to sort of learn how to take care of ourselves from homework to entertaining ourselves to, whatever wrestling that we were doing as kids.

You know, just to ensure that nobody broke any bones, but then we moved back to the Philippines. My parents expanded the business fairly sizable enough in the US that they were able to build operations here and then move the family back there so that my brothers and I could finish school over there.

It was one of the things that they just, you know, wanted to make sure that we kind of grew up with the values that they were much more accustomed to. But I think what happened there was I just had this longing for leaving the country. I just didn't feel like that's where I belong.

So right after college, I moved to New York not because I thought that that's where I would belong, but I was just like, well, all the movies were telling me to go move to New York. I watched the devil's advocate. I wanted to meet those people. And I'm being candid.

And candidly make my girlfriend, who's my wife now ended up taking a job at the UN in New York. So there was also that but yeah, was life growing up. It was a series of a lot of moving. A lot of adapting, and I think the through line, at least for me personally, in all of that was sports, so that's why I very much got, you know, very much sort of attached to playing sports, to watching sports, because that was my way to, to sort of acclimate and assimilate with, you know, with new friends and new areas.

Adam: Yeah. So you mentioned that your parents moved you and your siblings, you said two brothers, right? Back to the Philippines after coming to the United States, being in Southern California, moving around a lot because they wanted the value system that they had was more aligned with life in the Philippines than here.

What does that mean? I am pretty much a dummy when it comes to the Philippines and the cultural differences and values. So I'm just curious to hear what it is that was so different for them and why they kind of wanted to go back?

Patrick: I think there's a couple of things that was fairly important to them. I guess I can sort of break it down into maybe 3 areas to be a little bit more focused, right? So I think maybe one is probably just religion. They were Catholics and then eventually they became super Catholics.

Adam: Mm.

Patrick: So I think, you know, being in an environment where you know, maybe Catholicism isn't maybe the predominant value system around and we went to Catholic schools and to be quite frank I don't know of any other way to turn people into non Catholics. By sending them to Catholic school, that's probably the best way to throw them in the non catholic, but I think it was more that and it's sort of the surrounding sort of values that, comes with that you know,

and I think this is the second one, not that the first one isn't common but the second one is fairly common, I guess, amongst a lot of immigrants that we know the value that they put into just academic achievement is just very high. And the thing is like the school system that they wanted us to be a part of was just outside of their price range.

And not only that, but even the value system within the schools, right? Cause then you end up going to schools with just extremely rich people. And so that's in itself, you know, sort of outside of what they value. So, that's the other thing, whereas, you know, they're much more familiar with the educational system in the Philippines and, you know, just the academic rigor, I guess, that some of those educations sort of, you know, instill.

And so they were much more, comfortable with that. And I think the third thing is one of the things I think that's extremely important just within the culture and especially with my parents who are obviously old school is their first cousins are practically like their siblings.

Adam: Mm.

Patrick: So it's a massive family. So people travel in droves. And so, I don't know if this will get me into trouble, but whenever I go to Costco, I live in the South Bay. I go to Costco and you see droves of families walking around in Costco together. There's a part of my brain that's like, what are you doing?

Like, why are you taking, I mean, there's another part of my brain. It's like, well, that was me, you know, stater brothers back in the eighties with my grandparents and everything. So, you know, there's that, and I think it's just the proximity to, to family you know, that I think that they didn't really have here, that they wanted us to be a part of.

So I'm sure there's more, but, you know, it's like year after year that those three things don't happen, or those three things don't meet their standards, and then the focus becomes even more acute. And then you go through Christmas and back then, obviously, it was pre internet and people calling you collect and then, you know, everybody's celebrating on the other end of the phone and, you know, here you are grinding on, you know, freaking bakery, right? And they're just like, time to pack our bags and send these kids back home.

Adam: Yeah, I have two reactions to what you said there. The first is. I'm glad that you mentioned Costco. There is nothing more that I love than actually a solo dad trip to Costco. Love a dad trip to Costco. I will walk through Costco by myself on Father's Day as a treat to myself. So that is one thing. Second thing that you mentioned is the bakery. So funny story about that. When my brother was a young lad, he told my parents that he wanted to start a bakery and my brother's not a morning person. And he is now, but he wasn't then and they were like, you know, that's great. We really want to encourage you. And also, do you know you have to wake up very early when you run a bakery?

And he was like, well, what do you mean? And they said, well, those folks who run the bakery, they're up at like two and three in the morning starting cooking the baked goods and he was like, you know I don't want to run a bakery anymore. And so that was the end of that.

Patrick: I'd rather nightclub.

Adam: Exactly. Exactly but thank you to your parents, right? Even though they kind of dragged you around to different places does sound like they were able to provide a pretty good life for you growing up. So that's great. So tell me a little bit about, so you wanted to get out of the Philippines, you wanted to try something new, and it sounds like you escaped to New York with your then girlfriend, now wife, who I take it is also from the Philippines and now you have a wife.

You have two kids. You have a dog, which you mentioned is your favorite kid. So tell me about how did you meet your wife and tell me about your kids. And we can talk about the dog too.

Patrick: It's actually kind of interesting because the way that I actually, met my wife is very indicative. Of the culture that I grew up in, which definitely has a lot of influence into how I'm raising my kids you know, the level of influence it has, I guess, on the decisions I make.

But I'll take a step back. I'll provide a little bit of an analogy what I love about the US and about Europe. Is that when you find your tribe, the size of that tribe is significant enough where you're able to relate with people who are practically three or four degrees away from you.

All right. So for example, I'm quote unquote, right? So not necessarily me, but quote unquote, I'm from the midwest and I could be from, you know, Missouri and you could be from Michigan. And we will get along to some degree because compared to the people from the west coast or the east coast. You know, there's a certain set of values that we, you know, potentially share, but the other aspect of that dimension is that you're, you know, three or four degrees away where it's not like your parents knew each other.

It's like, oh, I know this area, or I know this place, et cetera. And I think I find the same thing when I meet a lot of, you know, just friends from Europe. The difference. So the Philippines is somewhat similar. But the circle is significantly smaller. And so it's practically 2 degrees away and that was 1 of the things that I sort of didn't like about the Philippines is that everybody sort of knows each other within the circles.

And so it's very much a situation where it's like. Oh, who are their parents? Oh, where do their parents come from? Oh, what's their last name? Oh, what's their lineage? They don't say what's their lineage, but I do have a literal translation of that in Filipino where it's like, Oh, like, that's really a question.

So going back to your original question so we were of the same circle and I accidentally met my wife in her 16th birthday. So she invited a friend and his name is Franco. And in the invitation, Franco was allowed to bring two other friends. So Franco plus two. And I happened to be the other friend.

So that's how I met her in her 16th birthday. But it wasn't like I started dating her after that.

Adam: Wasn't love at first sight.

Patrick: Not at all. Because I was more the type of person who liked going out and, you know, into sports and and maybe not so ideal boyfriend.

Yeah, I was 16 so what are you going to do? And then she was very much the ideal daughter. So there was really no attraction whatsoever. It was more like, oh, you're Franco's friend. Great. Like, okay, you know, go have some, you know, alcohol that you hid somewhere in your pants or something like this. But then we ended up going to college together and we had mutual friends and then we were, we were seatmates in philosophy in philosophy class. And she was extremely studious. She took classes very seriously. And I took math seriously, not philosophy though, And it just, the relationship kind of like blossomed from there. Oh, and by the way. Not that everybody in the Philippines owns a bakery because I don't want to, you know, provide that, perspective, but her family also owned a bakery.

Adam: Well, now the seven people that listen to this podcast are going to be very disillusioned by the careers of people in the Philippines.

Patrick: Everybody's, oh, you're part of the bakery business, you and the other 350 million people, or however many, 75 million people, but her family also owned a bakery business. And so we had fairly similar childhoods. We're sort of, you know, opposites to some degree it just sort of blossomed that way.

We had the same set of friends and, you know, her parents approved of my parents and my parents approved of her parents,

Adam: Very important. Question for you, would it have happened for the two of you if the parents didn't approve of each other? Is that a thing in the Philippines where like, that would have been like a, you know, Romeo and Juliet situation?

Patrick: It's not. As I guess, as bad as it probably was, maybe in these or earlier but it probably would have made a difference. It still happens now, but I mean, I think the other thing too, is it just Philippines is, I mean, for better or worse, we kind of consider ourselves the 51st state.

So it's about as Americanized as you can get to a small degree it probably still would have happened. I mean, I think the ship was strong enough to make it happen, but it certainly wouldn't have been as happy.

Adam: The family gatherings would have been a little less comfortable.

Patrick: Yeah.

Adam: So you met your wife at a young age, came to the States. You ended up staying here and you have a family together now. And this podcast is called Startup Dad. So we're going to talk about your kids for a bit and your thoughts on parenthood.

You have two kids. And tell me about your kids there. You have, like a decent age spread between your two kids, right?

Patrick: Yeah, I think a lot of that was just zero family planning. And then I think, yeah, just a part of it is just life. Just a lot of things in life just getting in the way. But we have a daughter. Who's very much like my wife in a lot of ways and so she's a freshman now in college and I don't know if saying this is going to give her like a complex, but I really would have wanted her to go to Michigan, but she chose not to go to Michigan, but…

Adam: As long as she didn't go to Ohio state, I think we're going to be okay. She's not there. Is she?

Patrick: No, not however, I think the contract that I do have with her is whatever it is that she wants to take up for graduate studies.

 It could be in like, you know, historical Wushu or something, just so long as she ends up in Ann Arbor. So she's a freshman in college and then we have a seven year old boy who's nothing like her in any way, shape or form and then we have an 11 year old dog in the middle who, as you alluded to, is my favorite.

Adam: I love that. I usually ask people who their favorite kid is. And in this case. It's the dog. So, you know, my kids are relatively close in age. I know a lot of people end up with kids a few years apart and things like that, that just sort of like how the sequence goes or the hormones or whatever. But the age difference between your kids is pretty sizable. How has that been challenging or beneficial to have such a huge gap in age of, you know, if your daughter's 18 and your son's seven, it's over a decade of difference between the two of them.

They probably have very few things that they could collaborate on or have in common as they were growing up. How have you thought about that? Or maybe I'm totally wrong and it was, great because you had a built in babysitter.

Patrick: I guess it also depends on from whose point of view. So, yeah, I mean, I think from us as parents, it was much more beneficial to have that gap because you know, there's certainly many different aspects to it. Right? So 1 is just economical, right? You're just in a better place in life to be able to, you know, to have 2 kids.

And then I think, yes, I mean, to your point. You know, we have like, well, we used to have a babysitter, and Henry our son, just completely adores his sister. I guess. All right. So there's also that. I think candidly, I think. It was beneficial for us as parents because you know, you learn, right?

And the thing is, like, we had time to learn. So it wasn't like we had a kid, you know, that's three years apart. I mean, these kids are practically, what, 11 years apart. So, when there's an 11 year gap, there's enough time to, you know, to absorb what you did in the first go around and sort of all the mistakes that you made…

Adam: Do a retrospective?

Patrick: Exactly. And then try to make it up on the second one. The problem is we assumed that the second one would be like the first one. And that was just I don't know if there was a much more. The more wrong assumption that we could have made and it's extremely beneficial also to our son because, you know, one, you have much more.

Yeah, I guess you have wiser, he has wiser parents and, you know, he has certainly has much more patient parents just given our age. But I mean, for our daughter, it was a little bit different. The experience is different and I don't know, I'm sure it's a mix of positive and negative, but we moved around a lot.

I moved from New York to Ann Arbor to various places in California you know, and also trying to figure out even just marriage wise, right? Like, okay, am I working? You're working? Or how are we going to do the finances if I'm going to graduate school? she got exposed to that. And I mean, I think maybe some of the positives of that are, you know, she's certainly very independent. She's obviously very self-sufficient, but we just trust her. We trust her decisions. We trust the decisions she makes at this age. And I think, you know, a lot of that maybe is just her innate sensibilities, but I think also a lot of it is coupled with the fact that she really had to fend for herself for all these years.

And so, we're like, okay, well now that this little boy is very much shielded from a lot of that we sort of wonder. You know, what's going to come out of that you know, as he grows up, like, is he ever going to move out of the house?

You know, that's the one of those things where he’s just going to be completely dependent on us. But yeah, I think those were maybe some of the things that, that at least for us that we, you know, that we've thought a lot about.

Adam: That's really interesting what you mentioned about sort of the different lived experiences, I guess, that you've had, that your daughters had, and now your son has. And you know, your daughter was kind of dragged around to some of the different places that you went just by the nature of how old you were and how much change was happening in your lives.

And then now you've settled and you live in Northern California, not too far away from me. And your son is here and only knows this place as home and so you kind of don't get that grit by osmosis, that independence, right? Of, of dragging someone around to different places and that's a bit in conflict with your own lived experience.

How has that shaped some of the decisions that you make in regard to raising your son and how do you instill that in him, even though he's not getting it via osmosis anymore.

Patrick: It's a really great question because it's so much a part of my identity and same with my wife's identity to just be able to move around and adapt. And not only that, but even with our daughter when we were moving around she's also traveling, we took her everywhere, so it wasn't just the moving around the homes, but well, I mean, my wife and I were younger, so our tolerance for alcohol was a lot higher.

And so we would have dinner out more, like significantly more. And she was with us in going out to dinner, you know, whether it's like some casual type place or some, you know. slightly uppity, like, you know, Italian place or whatever but she got exposed to a lot of that. Our son right now, I mean, you take him out to dinner anywhere and he treats it like, you know, I don't know, like the backyard, like, Oh let's throw the football around.

We can't do that. so I think there's that but I think the one thing that we are trying to emphasize and I guess, fortunately, that we're able to do at this stage in our lives is to travel. And so, you know, we try to make it a point where we travel a lot.

I mean, it's also something my wife and I love to do. But you know, he gets exposed to new areas and just gets exposed to new things, especially if it's outside of the country, so we try to get him exposed to that, but I think. Eventually, I think ideally we would want him to, I don't know, take like a two week class in, you know, some other country, you know, in the summer or, you know, or if like we go on vacation, he can, you know, do something more independent, but it's definitely something that we actively think about because one thing that we don't want is for him to think that Northern California is the only part of the world that exists,

Adam: Sure.

Patrick: You know, I mean, it seems like he likes STEM you know, which great, perfect place to be in, but, you know, at the same time, it's like, hope it's not because it's the only thing he's exposed to, you know, and so we want to expose them to so much more. So I think the travel is 1. Being able to study in places, I guess, is another.

And then I think the other thing too. Which is particularly important to me. My wife maybe not so much, but particularly important to me is to get him exposed to as many sporting activities as possible. Because the friends that you make in t ball is different from the friends you make in soccer, is different from the friends you make in basketball.

You know, there's a through line through all of them, but the types of people, the interests and things like that, I guess, differ. Candidly, if there was a cricket one, I'd get him the cricket. I just haven't found one but those are, yeah, I guess that, I guess maybe that's our way of sort of manufacturing, you know, sort of diversity of experiences despite the fact that we're now more settled in this one.

Adam: Yeah, I can see that. I can see that for sure. So I do want to ask you, and this is a little tongue in cheek, but I think you probably have good advice on this. You travel back and forth to the Philippines a lot with your family. I think that's probably pretty important to you. A lot of your family is still there, right?

And your wife's family. And so you're recently back there. I'm sure you went back and forth a lot when the kids were younger. So that's a long flight. I, as a young dad was terrified of long flights with my children. We just took our kids to Europe for the very first time because I was so terrified about long plane flights.

And now it feels like they're just at the age where they could make it. You know, what are your door busting tips for long plane flights with children? Mm hmm.

Patrick: I don't know, maybe this will inform my airport of choice, but the challenge with flying to Europe is I think a lot of the flights are in the morning or the afternoon, right? They're not the evening but that kind of like fits into it.

So I think one, if there's anything that I guess we learned from our daughter. And what's worked with our very impatient son is the way that we talk about the trip is in the element of excitement and discovery. So, wow, like, you know, it's such an exciting time to go do this. So if it's a Philippines trip, it's to go meet with family, to go to these beaches, whatever.

If it's a Europe trip, it's to actually see these things and, you know, so there's the excitement, the discovery, and a part of that is the plane trip.

And so, you know, part of that is going to the airport and, you know, the preparation goes into packing and all of that. So by nature, I think even with my daughter, there is just this positive.

And I think that that's really important. The second thing is for any of these longer flights, I really try to book it in the evening. So I try to book an evening flight because two things happen. One, you know, obviously he sleeps through the night, but the other thing is we get there in the morning, afternoon, and you're forced to deal with jetlag.

As opposed to getting there at night where you're forced to now try to figure out how you could sleep and, you know, two hours.

Right. And the thing is like, I need my daily nightly dose of everybody loves Raymond, to dose off. And I, I I can't just get into the hotel, take a shower. I was like, all right, like, how do I log into everybody's room? And then the other thing is that, I mean, obviously he gets to take his stuff with him and, you know, just to make him comfortable and things like that.

But I think just the expectation that, look, the adventure is the adventure, and one of the reasons why it's such a big adventure is because it takes so long to get there.

You know, and so, you know, I think just, okay, well, well, can you get along with everything? And I think a lot of that is is sort of psychological.

Then there's obviously, you know, his iPad and he gets to download the shows that he wants for the, like, that's the only time he gets to do that. It's the only time he gets to use headphones with the iPad. So he gets some of these rewards you know, and things like that. But other than that, yeah, I mean, especially the ones that leave in the morning, afternoon, it can get tough.

Cause then he starts to start to question what is this for? Like, well, why are we doing this?

Adam: Right. He's in the middle of something. Can't be interrupted. Can't be interrupted.

Patrick: Kicking the seat in front of him? You know?

Adam: Yeah. Oh, man. Kicking the seat. Oof. That's a tough one. Well, thank you for those door busting tips, I appreciate it.

Patrick: The one tip that my wife and I agreed not doing is giving him any sleeping pills. So it's like, you know what? No drugs. Our parents had a different philosophy in life. With this one we're like, all right, no matter what happens, no drugs. So.

Adam: Yeah, I mean, generationally, you used to have parents that would give their kids, like, a little whiskey before they'd get on the plane or something, like, that'll help you put you to sleep. Eh, it's probably not very culturally acceptable these days to do something like that.

Maybe the closest you get is melatonin.

A melatonin gummy.

Patrick: Yeah, because God forbid he likes it, then it's a problem. He has to go to random school nights, like, go to bed, well, where's my sleeping pill?

Adam: Where's my melatonin?

Patrick: Kid, you're six years old.

Adam: Yeah. You don't get that. Okay. So on a serious topic I wanted to ask you about raising your kids in the US as immigrant parents yourself, and there's sort of all this cultural identity wrapped up in that, right? Your parents moved you back to the Philippines because that was important for them.

You left the Philippines to come and assimilate more into the United States, and then you go back and forth between the two places. But, you know, your kids, I don't know how they identify. Do they identify as American, as Filipino American? So I'm just kind of curious to hear a little bit about your thoughts on how you're raising your kids and their cultural identity.

Because it's so different than like your parents and you and just kind of cascades from there.

Patrick: I guess there's a couple of layers to this. I think one layer is maybe common to most immigrants. And then there's a deeper layer in that which is very specific to, I guess, our culture in the Philippines, right? And I guess you know, sort of what's, what's common, I guess, among most immigrants is, you know, sort of the value system, right?

So, okay, well, here are the values that are important to us growing up you know, respect for parents, whatever they may be, right? A certain level of respect for parents. You know, a certain set of expectations on educational attainment you know, a certain level of expectation insofar as, what your eventual profession is going to be and things like that.

Right. Especially coming into a new country because one the bet that you're making is that I left my older situation because I'm betting that this newer situation is much better according to the values that we have. And by the way, I'm going to tell everybody about it at home through Facebook, not directly, indirectly through pictures and what have you.

People smile, right? But, That's, I guess, what's common. The interesting thing, though, about being I guess, Filipino is that the level of, I guess, association and sort of patriotism is very different. So, I guess, as a culture, we take pride in being able to assimilate, but for whatever reason, that level of pride isn't associated with being, or basically say that we're from the Philippines. It's hey, we've been able to assimilate like, hey, look at all these sports that I like, and look at all the food that, you know, and all the cultural sort of nuances that I can speak to. And

Adam: Look at how American I am now.

Patrick: Exactly, and I'll take pride in that, right?

But I won't necessarily take pride in, you know, you know, whatever, talking about, the government or, you know, the, like, the monetary system of the Philipines, whatever it is, right? And I think that finds its way down to my kids. And so, I'll talk to friends and what have you about a lot of these things you know, about how they're parenting.

A lot of them are just like, you know what, it doesn't even really matter to us. Whether they, identify themselves as Filipino American or Filipino, so long as they identify themselves as American in some way

And so the way that that then feeds into the actual behaviors is. Ok well language, right? So like how do we actually think about language? So do we actually even, you know, talk to our kids in Filipino? Most of us don't. I know there are a few that do, but most of us don't.

Because we also speak English at home just naturally.

The only difference though is that we're kind of like Australians where we have our own vernacular and we have our own like cultural nuances. Like, like, like Filipino English and we'll see that and we want our kids to learn that.

But that's different from Spanish, right?

That's different from Latin Americans, from people from Europe or people from India or even China where language plays a very big role in their culture. And that's what they speak at home. So now you have kids who are bilingual. In our household they're like fake bilingual because they know American English and like Filipino American English, so there's that, religion is also a very big deal, and even if we're not like, you know, completely outwardly Catholic, you know, there's just a lot of Catholicism, such cultural things that we're also like, okay, well, do we want our kids to be Catholic?

Like, how Catholic do we want them to become? You know, it's also these are kind of like some of the struggles that we have. My wife is a little more conservative than I am. I actually, I'm like, go explore whatever spirituality you need to explore. So long as you find something. You don't sort of discriminate against everybody else.

But my wife said, no, no, no, no, no, no. You're, you're, you're, you're going to believe in the Virgin Mary. You're going to pray the rosary, go to mass on Sunday. But those are, I guess, some of the areas where it's just kind of fascinating. But I think as far as the identity is concerned it is you talk to any Filipino parent and I think you talk to them identity and it's just one of those things where you force them to start thinking about, oh yeah, like, you know, compared to, like my son has classmates from Spain, you know, from Latin America, from obviously from India, you From China, from Korea, obviously a lot from America and there's this thing, like we are from this place.

We are from that place. They'll talk about that place with a lot of pride. And for us it's oh, did you have, you know, like Filipino food over Christmas? Like, it's a different like conversation altogether. Yeah.

Adam: That's really interesting. I wanted to stay on this topic a little bit with cultural identity. And then also, you know, it all sort of is related, but your parents are still back in the Philippines. They went back and I understand they come back and forth and visit and stuff.

Your wife's parents are in the Philippines. And what's really interesting is I've had a lot of conversations with parents lately, especially parents who are sort of our age and you and I are somewhat similarly aged in that you're sort of simultaneously raising your kids while also keeping an eye on your aging parents and you're kind of stuck in the middle.

It's like managing up and managing down and I'm really glad in our prep for this call that you brought that up because I just had this conversation with somebody else who's talking about the trials and tribulations of aging parents. And one of the things that I'm really curious to hear about from you is this sounds like maybe it's even more complicated because you have parents that don't live near you.

And so tell me a little bit about how does that dynamic play out? You know, you can't go and keep an eye on them all the time. They can't come here all the time. You have your own life here and yet. Your parents are getting older. Our parents are getting older and you're faced with the reality that like parents do need more help from their adult children at some point.

So tell me about that a little bit.

Patrick: Yeah. And I think there's a third pretty important component to that as well, which is the relationship or managing the relationship between my kids and my parents. Or managing the relationship between kids and both our sets of parents while we're still here, right? Candidly, like, with my parents it actually kind of works out well in the sense that as a family, we ended up in two absolutely fortunate, amazing spots.

The first one is that. We as siblings get along which you sort of take for granted growing up, but it starts to matter, you know, once you start to get of a certain age and. We get along really well and, I never thought in my life that I would say I look forward to seeing my siblings, but never like candidly ever up until, you know, maybe several years ago, especially during COVID when, you know, just a lot of this stuff was happening, right?

You saw the devastation that was happening to people's families. So that's one part. But the other part is that I guess we are sort of financially secure to be able to travel. And my parents are also fairly young. So, you know, every other year. And one of the things that we all look forward to as a family unit, like my siblings and my parents and their families, it's okay, well, where do we want to travel to?

Right. And so last year we went to Sweden and Norway as a family, several years ago, we went to South America, you know, and we're planning, it's just it's amazing. And so everybody looks forward to it. And my parents also go back and forth. So we see them, you know, a healthy amount and that's been wonderful and it's been great.

The challenge, I think, is more with my wife's parents, who are older than my parents, and they don't get to travel to the States as much because they have to travel to Singapore for personal reasons, right? So, there's just a handful of different things, and we have family in Singapore. And so, when we flew back to the Philippines for Christmas, they had to fly to Singapore the day after, or two days after we arrived.

And so not only had they not seen you know, our kids in years since pre COVID, but they only got to see them for one day, right? And so, you know, I think, for the most part you know, my wife is on, you know, FaceTime with them every other day. You know, just to experience everyday life, right?

 It's not for them to update each other on the status of the project or whatever, but it's more like, oh, okay, well, so what happened today? You know, just to get that sort of everyday feeling and then they get to, you know, interact with my son and everything.

But it is unfortunate because that's the relationship that my son has with them, our daughters who's older. Got to experience them a lot more because the circumstances that we were in before was certainly a little bit different, but it's a challenge and I think, you know, I'm sure my wife is constantly thinking about this a lot but yeah, I mean, her parents are getting older, so there's her relationship with them.

But then it's like, well, there's also the relationship between, you know, you know, our kids and them. Which we don't want to sort of, you know, take for granted. So it's tough. I don't know. I mean, I've been telling them, look why don't we, you know, why don't we all plan like just to like get your entire family together?

You know, we don’t have to do it next week. But you know, do it sometime, you know, maybe Thanksgiving or something. And we all fly to somewhere and, you know, we rent like an Airbnb and then that's, and then you have now you have seven months to talk about something,

Which essentially, you know, you know, crescendos into a trip or something.

But yeah, it's tough. It's tough. I feel for them, right? Like I feel for that.

Adam: Right. I was gonna make a joke that when you're all together, you can then all go to Costco together and shop and it’ll be great.

Patrick: I don't, yeah. But I don't know if, I don't know if it would be here in the us, but if it was, let's say, yeah. So let's say it was, let's say

Adam: We may not have access to a Costco.

Patrick: But here's the thing, like if it is in, let's say Singapore, oh, believe me, I will be one of the folks who's be like, all right, let's go to whatever.

You know, hawker station for food as a, you know, unit of 15, 20 people walking around. 

Adam:Move the army with you.

Patrick: Yeah, exactly.

Adam: Oh, well, I can't wait to hear the stories of that when it happens.

Patrick: I will gladly share them.

Adam: When you think about, you know, having raised, I mean, and you're still in the process of raising your daughter, although for the most part at this point, she's pretty close to being fully formed. Right. And now you're actively raising your son.

What are some of the more surprising things that you've discovered as a dad?

Patrick: Yeah there's a lot. I mean, I think one of the more surprising things and I guess it's a little bit also difficult because I would have to look very like way back to contrast not being a dad and being a dad. But I think distinctly from what I remember, it's a lot of the stuff that seeps into your value system as a dad now starts to proliferate itself outside of the household, right? And so I think that comes with good and bad. I think one, I mean, a surprise, but one, obviously, you know, you become incredibly more patient as a dad, which then sort of translates into work and, you know, and bringing that in the office. But the other thing is, and this one, I haven't been able to kick off, but just being overly prescriptive.

You know, and I think maybe a lot of that too it's just with both my dog and my son, it's like, do this is how you do it. This is step one, step two. All right. Let me guide you through step 1.5, you know, and you go to the office or, you know, all right, here's the LTV CAC.

This is how we need to do it. This is okay. There's not an average LTV CAC. We have to split it out into five, you know, but I think. That was one of the surprises, how a lot of these things in the house actually ends up sort of making its way outside of the house, and I think the other thing is just. And maybe this more is a little bit of a different dimension and more recent, but I guess, the perspective on mortality, right? So, I mean, just having had this conversation , about the parents and obviously us getting older and then you're like, okay, well, you know, at some point, your perspective, I guess, in, what you want your kids to take away from you, I guess, you know, starts to kick in because it's, you know, you're kind of like at the back half, right?

Adam: Right. What is the legacy that you're going to leave?

Patrick: Yeah. And so that was surprising to me was actually that mentality that, that would kick in.

Adam: So you and I are both product of the eighties, right? Of the parenting styles of the eighties, which are very different than the parenting styles of today. Do you ever find yourself slipping back or having to actively fight against kind of the learned behavior of being parented in a certain way versus how it is appropriate to parent kids these days.

Patrick: Absolutely. So I guess the analogy that I have for this is I guess one for the both of us being very avid sports fans. And, you know, you see either a kicker, you know, miss like a field goal or a soccer player, like miss a penalty or coach, you know, provide like a missed call or something like that.

And then, you know, as a fan, you look outside and then you take that one very specific action or decision and you're like, I would have done it differently. I would have done it this way. And it's the obvious way you would have done it. Right. But the one thing I think that we all don't necessarily take into consideration is the level of cognitive load and the amount of decisions it took to get there and the amount of like physical and emotional exertion to get there, right? And I completely like translate that into fatherhood where it's one thing for me at least. So like, all right, my wife and I talked about this and this is how we're ideally going to raise our son or our daughter.

And what have you, this is what we're going to do. And I think as you're making those decisions at your full cognitive load, well, at your, you know, you have full cognitive capacity at that point.

Adam: Right. Right. You're at a hundred percent.

Patrick: And physical capacity. But then when you're at 5%, or when you're like sort of riding red, right?

 I have to make the effort because that's when I slipped back into 80s parenting. And 80s parenting, I mean, I'm sure for you, but definitely for me was, I'm going to look at you, and if you don't follow, I'm going to scream at you, and if you don't follow that, then it's over, right? And so it's very strict, authoritative, just do what I'm telling you to do you know, and if I catch you, that's it, but if I don't catch you, fine, just keep doing whatever you're doing, just make sure I don't catch you.

You know, and it just, it slips in, right? So it's like, okay, well, you know, everybody's tired at the end of the day, and my son still wants to play. And now it's like 80s parents start to come back, right? And I think that's when that comes. So, you know, I just try to get ahead of it, but there's 5 million things going on.

But yes, it happens quite frequently. Most especially during the weeknights. Most common.

Adam: Everyone's toast. Nobody has the energy to make the best decisions with the most calm demeanor possible.

Patrick: No, the only one that makes the best decisions. In the weeknights in our household is the dog that's the only one.

Adam: I knew it was coming.

Patrick: He knows what's going on. He knows everybody's temperament, you know,

Adam: He knows I should just leave the room and go sleep for like six hours, you know? Yeah.

Patrick: He's done his thing. He's walked, whatever he's done. Like I'm going to make decisions and just absorb how, you know, this wreck of a family just, you know?

Adam: So when you think about kind of the lessons learned and. Again, also, like you mentioned, you had some reps with your daughter and you got to kind of internalize and retrospect, and then you had another kid and you're very different, but like you learned some things, right. Just like we learned from good and bad experiences at companies and stuff like that.

Have you developed any particular parenting frameworks or guardrails or anything that you fall back on or find super useful?

Patrick: I guess earlier on, there's one time where I was just a little bit. I would say a little bit concerned that my daughter wasn't picking up certain subject matter at school as quickly as, let's say, her, some of her classmates, right? And a lot of things that, I was always told is, you know, in her own time, in her own time.

And obviously, when you're younger and you're first parents, like, really? Like, in her own time? Like, that's, it sounds like a consolation prize.

But one of the things I think my wife and I ended up discovering was this thing called, I think, Erickson's Stages of Development, and I think, basically, his argument is that at certain ages people develop certain types of areas of maturity and it impacts their motivation and their learning facilities, right?

 Or sort of the way that they learn. I think in a lot of ways now maybe some of the guardrails that I have is that, okay, well at this age, let's say for my son. He's learning the consequences of making mistakes and building confidence, right? And so as opposed to trying to hammer home that he needs to get a 1600 in his SATs, you know, 10 years from now, whatever, it's okay.

Well, let's build on this particular stage because that's, you know, that's where he is in his life. Which is very different from the sort of the more linear way that I used to think before, where it's like, this person, like my daughter has to be great in sports and has to be great in academics, and I saw Tiger Woods like playing golf when he was two, so my daughter's gonna play soccer when she's three, you know, and it's like, and it doesn't work that way, because they all, there are areas, I guess, of development that needs to be established as a foundation before you build a new foundation on top of that and it took me a while to sort of figure that out, but I guess that's maybe one sort of mental framework, I guess, that we have.

Adam: I love that. And the Erikson Stages of Development. We will link to that in the show notes. That's a keeper.

Patrick: yeah, I know it's Erickson something, but I remember just reading it many years ago.

Adam: We'll find it. I have a way. There's this thing called the Internet. I don't know if you've heard of it. It exists, I'm told, on computers and also devices in our pocket. So.

Patrick: I don't know, it certainly didn't exist in the 80s when I needed it, but

Adam: This is true. This is true. All right, So partnership, super important when you have kids, super important at work, but also very hard to agree 100 percent of the time with your spouse, where is an area that you and your wife don't always agree on when it comes to parenting,

Patrick: You've basically opened up a can of worms on like…

Adam: She won't listen to this, don't worry.

Patrick: I think the one area, I guess that we really have a difficult time agreeing on is when to discipline our son because the thing is, we didn't have a lot of that practice with our daughter because she didn't require a lot of disciplining. And then the other thing too, is that again, like, you know, I was not only was I a child of the eighties.

And I am sure you could relate to this too, but I also played a lot of sports. And if your coach screams at you, you just do it.

Adam: Right.

Patrick: I had good coaches, right? It's not like I had like, you know, growing up in soccer and everything. And so I was very, I'm very much a product of that.

Whereas my wife is, you know, she didn't play sports. And her mom is very nurturing. And so you have my son who's, who I can relate to more because he's a lot like me. And so she's now dealing with a younger version of me and she goes about it from a nurturing standpoint and I'm like, that kid's not going to learn from nurturing, believe me.

Adam: Ha. He needs the tough love approach. 

Patrick: I think that's where, you know, we probably, you know, don't agree on a lot of things, but. I don't know, practice makes perfect, so eventually.

Adam: That's right. That's right. And you can't agree 100 percent of the time, but, you know, the discipline one comes up quite a bit. And sometimes it's the opposite. Sometimes you know, Dad is maybe a little bit more of the softy and mom's the disciplinarian and you got to work through that too. So yeah, that's a good perspective.

Okay. A couple more for you.

Patrick: Yeah.

Adam: What is something that you've had to give up to become a father?

Patrick: Maybe more than money?

Adam: Kids aren't free? I've been lied to my whole life, Patrick.

Patrick: I thought the bakery was going to pay for everything.

Adam: No, but all you could eat doughnuts forever.

Patrick: I think there's a certain level of personal freedom that you just have to manage. And because I grew up in, in a time where I had to fend for myself a lot, right? We were sort of left to our own devices. I, you know, I guess maybe a lot there I need very specific times during the day or even during the weekend where I'm sort of just on my own.

So that's why I, you know, like training for marathons, right? I get to zone out and sort of personal time. So I, there's a lot of sacrifices, I guess, that I've had to make from that standpoint, because even if you're just at home you know, let's say I'm training for a marathon month.

It's okay. So is my son then just going to, you know, be in front of his iPad because my wife's also exhausted. So you know, we've had to really manage through, okay, well, how do you get enough mental time to re-energize while at the same time, maintaining a certain, a healthy relationship with our kids.

You know, day in and day out. So, so I think that's probably one area.

Adam: No, that's a really great way of thinking about it. And yeah, you can't just stick the kid in front of the iPad because you want to go train for five hours anymore. It does. I mean, you could, And some people might be okay with that, but I think most are not. And the guilt is very powerful. And so you got to come up with other ways.

You got to get more creative

Patrick: Yeah, sleep early, wake up early.

Adam: Yep. Yep.

What is a mistake that you've made as a father?

Patrick: I made a lot. I mean, I think a lot I mean, I could probably associate a majority of them to assuming that the way that I was raised should, is the right way.

For better or worse, right? I mean, I think there's good and bad that, that comes out of that, but, you know, there's so many factors into that.

I mean, my parents were very young when they had me, they were building out a business, they were in new countries. And so they were facing, you know, very difficult circumstances given, and then they were raising three kids. you know, with the way that they knew how to do it. And then for me, it's like, okay, well, is that the right way?

Well, if it's not, then what's, you know, the better way. So I think a lot of the mistakes was sort of based off of that. And I think maybe, you know, sort of one mistake, I think that I continue to make that I try to just to make an effort to be very cognizant of is to assume that because my son is very much like me.

That you know, that he would respond to the way that I would parent him in the way that my dad parented me,

And he's a very, he's a unique person. He's also the son of my wife, right? So he also takes note. And so as, you know, he's also a very unique individual. You know, I've had to, you know, I guess be very specific about my parenting style in a way that he would respond you know, versus the way that I think, I would respond if I were his age, right?

Adam: Makes a lot of sense. All right, let's say people want to follow along with Patrick, find him on that thing called the internet, support you in your journey. What's the best way for people to connect with you or find you?

Patrick: Yeah. LinkedIn is great. You know, we just Patrick Moran, Robin Hood. There's another Patrick Moran who was a CMO of Canley. He's great guy. That's not me. He did not grow up in the Philippines. I can tell you that much. 

Adam: That Patrick Moran is going to get so many requests now.

Patrick: He might be a dad. I don't know. You know, but,

Adam: Yeah, we'll find out. We'll get him on the show if he is!

Patrick: Right. Yeah. And then I had a podcast, I, you know, I might still pursue it. It's called Finding Market Fit about, it's about marketing. But yeah, those are the two places that people can find me.

Adam: Well, you know, I do love that podcast. I was a guest once, Finding Market Fit. We'll make sure we link to it in the show notes. Okay. Awesome. Time for rapid fire. Are you ready, sir?

Patrick: Let’s do it.

Adam: Here are the rules of rapid fire. There are very few rules.

That is all. I ask you a question. You respond with the first thing that comes to mind and then we move on.

All right, What is the most indispensable parenting product that you have ever purchased?

Patrick: A Tesla.

Adam: I want to know how that's a parenting product, but we're going to, we'renot  going to stop there. What is the most useless parenting product that you've ever purchased?

Patrick: I don't know. Spicy junk food, it's useless as a parent.

Adam: My kids asked me the other day, if we could put spicy Cheetos, flaming hot Cheetos in the macaroni and cheese. And I said, 100 percent no, that's disgusting. Which one of your kids is your favorite?

Patrick: Oh, the middle, the dog.

Adam: Why is the dog your favorite?

Patrick: This dog, so he's a golden retriever he's one of the best looking dogs ever. yeah, when he was a lot younger, I, this is probably the closest I've ever felt to feeling like Eric from Entourage. You know, walking with Diddy Chase, but that's how I felt.

Just, people would just come up to the dog. It was amazing.

Adam: Awesome. Also, apparently the only one that listens to both you and your wife in the household.

Patrick: Yes, in the morning when we have to go and everybody has to like move along. He's the only one who's listening.

Adam: Love that. What is the most frustrating thing that has ever happened to you as a dad?

Patrick: Well, I mean, I think one of the more frustrating things as a dad, was we were living in Ann Arbor and there were signs all over the place to not turn the pipes off in the winter you know, because, well, yeah, because they would start to freeze and they could burst and the things, I didn't read any of that even if it was just all around us, but anyway the, to make a long story short, I turned off the pipes before, you know, going on vacation that Christmas.

We came back and the entire ceiling sort of, basically the pipes blew up and the ceiling kind of like just fell apart. But the interesting thing about all of that, or that was the mistake that I made. But then my daughter wrote about it in her kindergarten class and the business school newspaper picked it up.

And so I'm walking around, you know, campus and I didn't even like before I even knew that the newspaper had picked it up. Like these certain professors who couldn't, you know, who didn't know anything of me. I'm like, oh, you're the guy who like shut off the pipes during Christmas. You must not be from here or anywhere cold.

And it's like, no we're, from New York and you know, and we don't care about the pipes out there. 

Adam: Sure, so turning off the pipes and then your daughter wrote about it for kindergarten and it made the newspaper.

Patrick: The newspaper.

Adam: Oh, I love that so much. All right. Do you have a favorite age for your kids?

Patrick: I don't know. That's a good question.

Adam: What about a least favorite age

Patrick: Oh, anything up to three.

Adam: With two kids and a dog, what is your take on minivans?

Patrick: That's why I bought the Tesla.

Adam: Somebody else on the show referred to the Tesla as a minivan and I'm like, I don't think that quite counts my friend, but we'll allow it. Okay. When is it acceptable to start blasting Christmas music? I think I can still ask you this question because we are not quite out of the winter time yet.

Patrick: In the Philippines, there's a thing called the ‘ber months and the ‘ber months essentially means that as soon as the months and start to end with ‘ber, you could actually start blasting Christmas music. So, no, no joke, but Spotify Mariah Carey's Christmas song, actually spiked on September 1st, and nobody in the U.S. could figure out why.

Adam: And it's the Philippines.

Patrick: They realized it was because the Philippines started to play it on September 1st.

Adam: Oh, that is amazing. I did not know that about the ‘ber months. I just thought, oh, it must mean it's the cold months. Burr, cold. Nope. It's months that end in a B E R. Got it. Awesome. Which Disney or Pixar film are you secretly, or not so secretly, a fan of?

Patrick: So I actually started crying during Inside Out when I watched it with my daughter because it was a story about you know, a kid who was 12 who moved around and I could very much relate with it. So, and she was just like, why are you crying? Like, what's wrong with you? Why are you sobbing in this movie?

Adam: Yeah.

Patrick: But I have a soft spot for that movie.

Adam: For those who don't know, story of a kid who gets uprooted from the Midwest to move to San Francisco because her dad is starting a company and she plays ice hockey. That is the story of my life, by the way. From the Midwest. Play ice hockey, moved to San Francisco, work at startups. That's my life. I had a very similar reaction as you, you know, there's a sequel to that movie coming out.

Patrick: I am very excited.

Adam: I cannot wait. Okay. What is your worst experience assembling a children's toy or a piece of furniture?

Patrick: There was one, so we had, there was a basketball thing that, it was a basketball ring that my son and I were very excited to put together, but there was one screw that held up the pole to the base that I ended up using for the ring. And the thing is, like, the grooves of the screw ended up sort of, like peeling off because I screwed it on so hard that it didn't, you know, work when we unscrewed it to put it at the base.

So, my son has no patience. I just completely lost my lid and we just ended up, there's the end of the movie with in, in in Office Space where they beat the crap out of the printer…

Adam: Yes. With a baseball bat.

Patrick: The baseball, that was basically myself and my four year old son with the basketball hoop. And we waited for that thing for three weeks, so.

Adam: Oh, no. No. Okay, now this may be a unique answer for you because you have a golden retriever. How long can a piece of food remain on the floor in your house and you will still eat it?

Patrick: It depends on where in the house.

Adam: Okay.

Patrick: Yeah. If it's a garage, then never, but if it's a, if it's a kitchen then yeah, then it's fine.

Adam: All right. And final question for you. How many times have you said, go ask your mother this week?

Patrick: This week?

Adam: Yeah.

Patrick: I mean, I'll just average it out seven times, two of 14,

Adam: Twice a day, every day.

Patrick: Morning and evening,

Adam: I love it. All right. Well, that brings us to the end of our rapid fire around Patrick, thank you so much for joining me on Startup Dad. It's a pleasure to have you. And I really appreciated our conversation.

Patrick: Thank you so much, Adam. Had a lot of fun.

Adam: Thank you for listening to today's conversation with Patrick Moran. If you enjoyed the show, please subscribe, share, and leave me a review. It'll help other people find this podcast.

Startup Dad is a Fishman AF production with editing support from Tommy Heron. You can join a community of over 9,000 subscribers and stay up to date on my thoughts on growth, product, and parenting by subscribing to the Fishman AF newsletter, www.fishmanafnewsletter.com. Thanks for listening and see you next week.