 Live from San Francisco, celebrating 10 years of high-tech coverage, it's theCUBE. Covering VMworld 2019, brought to you by VMware and its ecosystem partners. Welcome back, everyone, to theCUBE live coverage here in San Francisco, California. We're in the Moscone North Lobby for VMworld 2019. Dave's our 10th year covering with some great guests. Three days of wall-to-wall coverage. Got an amazing segment right here. Rob Stamman, who's the president's COO of Cohesity. Dave Solo, president and CEO of the Special Olympics Northern California. Thanks for coming on, thanks for spending the time. Thanks for doing this. Thank you for having us. Thanks for having us, Tom. It's amazing. So set the table, why are we here? What are we talking about? What's the purpose here? I know why. Why don't we need to set it up for us? Yeah, absolutely. I've been involved with Special Olympics for several years now, one of my former company, NetApp. Matt Thompson over at Adobe called me and said we got this high-tech challenge, Rob. We've never sold it out and we wanted, we want to get more companies involved. Will you help out? And the answer was absolutely. And that led to David asking me to be on the board. So I've been involved with David and the team for an awful long time. Cohesity, when I joined the company, some of the folks there knew of my involvement. It said we'd like to start participating as well, which has led to what we're doing here at VMworld. David, talk about Special Olympics, quick mission. For sure. Let people know about it before the folks met. Might not give an update. For sure, John. So Special Olympics enriches the lives of children and adults with intellectual disabilities. And so in our footprint in Northern California, we serve over 23,000 athletes, ages eight and above. And it's interesting, there's a lot of misconceptions. People will say to me, that's a great event that you do every four years. And they're referring to world games, the Special Olympics world games, where athletes from all over the world get to come and compete. But locally through the state programs, hundreds of competitions happen each and every year. And in Northern California, we have over 400 competitions per year and 14 different sports. Provides a wonderful array of opportunities for athletes to demonstrate what they can do when given the opportunity to do so. Talk about the community aspect of it, because I think what's interesting is, you know, obviously what's on TV and what's in the mainstream press, it's more reach people that can be known for that. But it's deeper than as you pointed out. But talk about the community aspect. You got volunteers, people, individuals involved. Yeah. Talk about the makeup of the network. No, it's an incredible network. I think we've really broadened and expanded our reach over the last 10 years. It used to be we were known primarily for our sports programming. So now we have inclusive education and health programs and we're able to bring together people with and without intellectual disabilities through those mediums. So we provide resources to schools in education and they run Special Olympics programming during the school day. So educators want to have us because we're improving school campuses, reducing bullying, enhancing social emotional learning, and so the work that we're doing is so critical with that community. And then in the area of health, we have inclusive health. So now we've got health and medical professionals that are now providing health screenings for our athletes. So some of the younger volunteers that we get that they're wanting to make a career in the medical field, they're exposed to our population, right? And so they learn more about their specific health needs. So it's really about changing people's attitudes. And so this community of supporters, volunteers, health professionals, education, really our goal is to change people's attitudes fundamentally worldwide about people with intellectual disabilities and really kind of produce inclusive mindsets, we call it, really promote understanding. If I may, I just have to add that I really think what David and his team does and folks that support Special Olympics around the world, they're not changing attitudes, they're changing lives, lives of the athletes, lives of the people that work with the athletes, lives of the families. You go to these events and they're something special. They are a lot of fun and when you get involved and you see it, it definitely touches your heart and you realize we could be doing so much more. We could be doing so much more. I'm struck by, clearly there's a passion thread here and then David, your background is really interesting to me because you were an accomplished student athlete, played football and then you started a career in nonprofit right away. And now, Rob, he was somebody you would have hired, right? It was like the perfect profile. Student athlete, you know, a magnicum laude, I want this guy on my team, my hard driving student. How did you get into this and describe the background of that? No, for sure, so with nonprofit work, I kind of started out, I was working for Boys and Girls Clubs of America, raising money to go to grad school to be a history professor of all things and so I got involved with the Boys and Girls Club. With Special Olympics, when the opportunity came, what was unique about it is really about how sports changes people's lives. Growing up, my father left me when I was 10 years old and so it was my coaches, they were the ones that really, if it wasn't for them, I don't know that I would be here today so they really took an active role in my life. So I've been very passionate. I believe sports is a catalyst for social change. It changed my life and provided an opportunity for me to be successful and so that's what I want to help give back to our athletes. So it's interesting, it proves it takes a village and these experiences change its lives. I think this is the big story and it points to that the sports is one element of other things, healthcare. So you start getting connected in, this is where the magic happens. This is the key. Yeah, some of the stories that were ever just phenomenal. I think society focuses on what our athletes can't do and dwells on the disability. We don't do that. So we're passionate about showcasing what they can do and having our volunteer certified trained coaches work with our athletes to really help them get to the next level so they can be successful not only on the field, but off the field. So I mean, I gotta- How do people get involved? Talk about the, first of all, you're in Northern California so that's your territory, your area. But people, how do they get involved? They want to be, share some points of touch. Yeah, for sure. So a couple of key points of touch would be, number one, we have over 20,000 volunteers in our footprint. We have a tremendous need for volunteers, both globally and here locally with Special Olympics Northern California. Number two is from a donor standpoint. So everything that we do for our athletes is completely free and we're able to do that because of the support of our community partners, our corporate partners like Cohesity, individual supporters, foundations, we're able to do that because of them. So either someone could go to the global website SpecialOlympics.org or come to www.sonc.org for Northern California and we're always looking for volunteers, donors, community supporters and we're also looking for board members, particularly from the tech sector, senior executives in the tech sector. It's just when you say change lives for the people involved, that also includes the people who volunteer. I'm sure the people that want to make a difference whether you're taking a senior approach rather than you're in, or your employees who want to give back. So talk about the lives changing impact there because there's a corporate angle here that's not a for profit thing, it's a for good thing. Oh this is for a good thing and the other thing I'd add to that is we touched briefly on Boys and Girls Clubs of America. These are all great organizations. I know Pat and his keynote this morning touched on giving back. This is an opportunity, we are all blessed we should give back. But the whole notion of getting more involved in touching lives, I'll start with my two boys. They went to Summer Games in UC Davis three or four years ago now. Both of them are good runners and they had some other kids on the high school team go with them. They were incredibly impressed. They had a lot of fun. A little banter with the athletes and there's some athletes out there that will just touch your heart. The gun goes off for the start and they're already got the arms up curing away and there's others. They're incredibly talented athletes as well. And so it just, it opens your eyes of what is possible. The other thing I touched on is self esteem matters for every one of us. Whether you have a disability or not whether you're young or my age, it matters. For someone to tell you that you are good you are really worthy. Your hard work is paying off. You see these athletes when they finish a race or accomplish something, they couldn't be more proud. Going to these events, it will want, you will want to get involved, John. That's what typically happens. It sounds like cube coverage is going to be making its way to these events. Yeah. Eventually. Yeah, what's the next venue? We would love to have you guys. We would love to have you. People that got this from the NHL, MLB, NFL, Masters, golf tournaments. We have to get a pro circuit going on here. We'd love to have you guys there. We'd love to have you. No, it'd be wonderful, yeah. This is a really great cause. Any final thoughts, again, back for people who want to get involved in the North, Northern California, your group. What can you offer people? No, I think we offer people a tangible way, especially when we think of the tech sector and we think of the employees and the millennials and a hands-on way for people to come out to our regional competitions and actually engage with our athletes and to volunteer and be hands-on and actually see where your money goes. See that it's something tangible and you're helping provide that venue for our athletes to be successful. One of the things I didn't mention that we're really proud of, so we have athletes that are college students, we have athletes that are full-time employees, married couples, and then we have a published poet, but in the last couple months, we have an athlete that passed the bar exam, who is now going to be a practicing attorney. And so that really shows the... You know, one of the things I think you guys are hitting on here, Rob, I know you guys do a lot with your company. You guys are even donating one of your tech sessions for a survey that John Troyer's team did around tech burnout. You know, people get, and even my kids, they go to Palo Alto High School and a lot of high schools will like this now where people get stressed out of the weirdest things. This is the kind of thing that getting involved in these community events like this really could help everybody. Chill out a little bit, really take a load off, work with people, see the connection, see the impact. It's a burnout tactic option. It's also a way to relieve some stress, feel good about it. The employers of Cohesity, when they came to me and said they wanted to get more involved, they didn't do it because of me. They did it because they're excited about working with Special Olympics, and they're beaming, meeting some of the athletes tonight. We'll spend some time with a bunch of athletes going in the baseball game tonight, Hamilton tomorrow night, their families as well. We couldn't be more excited, but I agree with you. You look at all the stresses in our lives, and I think this notion of what you do, who you deal with, and how you give back is really, really important. I think that give back piece. I think more of us allowing employees to do that, helping our children in school understand it's really important. The value is just absolutely incredible. Well, I think you guys are making a great point because we've both been involved in youth sports all our lives, and it's kind of become twisted where you've got kids' needs and parents' needs, and the parents trying to meet them in the middle, and that's not the way it should be. Your initiatives, I mean, it underscores what it's really all about. Self-esteem, having fun, supporting your teammates and the broader community. Yeah, but they want to compete and win, too, that they're in there. You see some of those players, I mean, they're hard, I've seen some hardcore competition there. No doubt, but how old do they start? So, eight years old, we started at eight, and we have an athlete that's 81 that participates in Bochi. Yeah, so, okay, so that's awesome. It's appropriate. How you guys? I know, I know, yeah. But so the reason I mentioned, because having studied this a lot, it's like 12 years old is the crossover point where people start to get crazy, and if you start before then, in other words, oh, this kid is nine, but he's not that good. I mean, who can tell about a nine-year-old? Michael Jordan got cut from his freshman basketball team, so it just goes to show you. So I think that, again, the values that you guys are promoting are worthy, so thank you. It makes me feel better about what we're doing at Cohesity. It really does. Thanks for doing this. Being able to put two things I'm really passionate about together. This is pretty special for me. I think my head, Aaron, our founder, and the rest of the company, and Dave and the team, they just do a fantastic job. I just want to make sure we keep building on it. Congratulations. Great to get the word out. Congratulations on all your hard work. It's awesome. Cube coverage, live in San Francisco. We'll be back with more after this short break.