Glenn Gow, The Scaling Executive Coach and host of The Scaling Executive Podcast, talks with Talbot Gee, CEO of HARDI, about stretching into unfamiliar roles, restructuring governance for strategic focus, and vetting AI vendors without risking company data.
I sat down with Talbot Gee, CEO of HARDI, the trade association representing 570 wholesale distributors and 300 manufacturers across 75% of the dollar value of HVAC and refrigeration equipment sold through distribution in the US. When a company outgrows the skill set that built it, Gee holds that a CEO must grow beyond a comfortable role, because a scaling organization forces finance, sales, operations, and capital decisions in turn. This discipline helped HARDI steer through five separate government-mandated technology transitions during his tenure without losing strategic direction.
This episode is for CEOs whose companies have outgrown the skill set that got them promoted, and who need to decide how to build new capabilities, restructure governance, and evaluate new technology like AI without slowing down.
Key Takeaways
- As HARDI grew from a small trade group into an organization representing 570 wholesale distributors, Talbot Gee found that CEOs who stay comfortable in one functional area fall behind, because a scaling company forces the CEO to rotate through nearly every discipline in the business.
- HARDI’s 2019 governance overhaul separated strategic execution, owned by Gee and his team, from oversight, owned by the board. Gee credits this split with letting HARDI pursue new member initiatives daily instead of waiting for approval.
- When HARDI built “Ask A2L,” an AI chatbot trained only on internal, vetted regulatory content to help members navigate a refrigerant transition, the project succeeded technically but failed financially, because hosting costs rose with every additional user until the tool became too expensive to sustain.
- HARDI now employs a senior AI advisor with no financial tie to any AI vendor, a direct response to member companies getting pursued by AI vendors they have no way to evaluate for model quality or data security.
How CEOs Grow Beyond Their Comfort Zone as Their Company Scales
At HARDI, the CEO title did not exist when Gee joined. The same responsibilities sat inside an executive vice president and chief operating officer role, a title assigned to leadership decades earlier and never updated. HARDI elevated the title once Gee needed to interact with counterparts who held CEO or president titles at other associations, because explaining an unusual title wasted time in every meeting.
As the organization grew, Gee found that a CEO cannot stay inside one functional lane. Some days the job is finance. Other days it is new business or sales. Other days it is operations and logistics, or raising capital and managing leverage. Gee states the rule directly: “CEO has to be a CEO.”
Gee avoided building a team of people who thought and worked exactly like him, and that choice paid off as HARDI’s responsibilities expanded past what any single skill set could manage alone.
How Curiosity and Outside Relationships Help CEOs Scale Their Leadership
Gee named two traits he sees consistently in the leaders who scale their organizations most effectively. The first is curiosity. The second is a willingness to build relationships with counterparts, including people who look like competitors on the surface.
Gee describes the pattern this way: “They are insatiably curious. They are always wanting to learn more.” He points out that the strongest leaders do not dismiss new information because it contradicts what has already worked for them. Instead, they gather every perspective they can, then use that information to build clear strategy, even when it challenges their own assumptions.
HARDI supports this pattern directly. The organization runs on original research and curated industry information, and Gee is explicit that HARDI does not shy away from publishing its own hypotheses based on the trends and data it sees. Members take those hypotheses back into their own boardrooms for debate and scenario planning, rather than receiving pre-packaged conclusions.
How Governance Restructuring Lets CEOs Focus on Strategy Instead of Operations
In 2019, HARDI’s board approved a governance overhaul that moved the organization away from a traditional trade association board model and into a corporate governance structure. The change created a clear split: management, led by Gee, owns strategic execution. The board owns oversight of resources and direction.
Gee describes the resulting mandate in his own words: “Our job is to be doing that strategic work and that strategic organizational development and execution.” Because the board rarely blocks new ideas, the team operates with real autonomy inside that mandate to pursue new initiatives without waiting for approval cycles.
This structure matters for any CEO trying to scale personal capacity alongside company growth. Without a governance model that separates oversight from execution, a CEO stays pulled into approval cycles instead of strategic work.
How CEOs Should Vet AI Vendors to Protect Company Data
HARDI’s clearest lesson on AI came from a project called Ask A2L, built to help members navigate an unusually complicated regulatory transition involving A2L refrigerants. HARDI partnered with an AI developer to build a chatbot trained exclusively on regulatory documents and analysis the organization had already approved, with nothing pulled from the open internet.
The tool worked until the regulatory picture became too complex for the model to track reliably, since individual states applied variations on the federal policy. HARDI ultimately sunset Ask A2L, but the project taught the organization how to train a model, what its security limitations were, and what the infrastructure actually cost. Gee summarizes the financial lesson directly: “The most expensive issue would have been success.” The more members who used the tool, the higher the hosting costs climbed.
That experience shaped how HARDI now responds to the flood of AI vendors seeking access to its distributor network. Member companies had no reliable way to evaluate a vendor’s underlying model, security practices, or data handling, so HARDI brought on a senior AI advisor with no financial tie to any AI vendor or brand.
The CEO Scaling Framework: Principles from Talbot Gee’s Leadership at HARDI
| Principle | What it means in practice | Named evidence from this interview |
| Growth forces functional range | A CEO must operate across finance, sales, operations, and capital as the company scales, not stay inside the function that built their early career | Gee’s title progression from VP to EVP/COO to CEO produced an organization that expanded from a small trade group into one representing 570 distributors and 300 manufacturers across 75% of the industry’s distribution dollar value |
| Fill the gaps you don’t have | Build a leadership team with skills the CEO lacks rather than hiring people who think and operate the same way | Gee credits this rule with helping HARDI steer through five separate government-mandated technology transitions during his tenure without losing strategic direction |
| Separate strategy from oversight | Give management the mandate to execute strategy day to day and reserve for the board the job of overseeing resources and direction | HARDI’s 2019 governance overhaul produced daily pursuit of new member initiatives without waiting on board approval for each one |
| Vet AI vendors before adopting them | Treat AI vendor evaluation, including model quality and data security, as a job a CEO cannot delegate to guesswork | HARDI’s Ask A2L chatbot succeeded technically but became financially unsustainable as hosting costs rose with adoption, a lesson that directly produced HARDI’s current practice of vetting every AI vendor for data security before members engage them |
Quotes from This Episode
- “Surround yourself with people who have talents and skills and knowledge that you don’t have.” — Talbot Gee, CEO, HARDI
- “We’re challenged every single day to try to do more, to achieve more, to provide more value to members, to make a bigger impact in the industry.” — Talbot Gee, CEO, HARDI
- “Data security is now arguably the number one issue or concern that CEOs probably need to be having right now.” — Talbot Gee, CEO, HARDI
Frequently Asked Questions
How should a CEO stay effective as their company outgrows their original skill set?
According to Talbot Gee, CEO of HARDI, a CEO who scales successfully rotates across finance, sales, operations, and capital decisions rather than staying inside the function they know best, and builds a leadership team with skills the CEO does not personally have. At HARDI, this approach helped Gee move from VP to CEO over eight years while the organization grew to represent 570 wholesale distributors and 300 manufacturers.
Should the CEO or the board handle strategic decisions in a growing organization?
Talbot Gee, CEO of HARDI, restructured the organization’s governance in 2019 so that management, led by the CEO, owns strategic execution while the board owns oversight of resources and direction. Gee credits this separation with letting HARDI pursue new member initiatives daily instead of waiting for board approval on each idea.
How should a CEO evaluate AI vendors before adopting a new tool?
Talbot Gee, CEO of HARDI, recommends bringing in an AI advisor who has no financial tie to any AI vendor, because most executive teams have no way to independently evaluate a vendor’s model quality or data security. HARDI hired a senior AI advisor for this reason after member companies were overwhelmed by AI vendors seeking access to their network, calling data security “arguably the number one issue” CEOs face when adopting new AI tools.
CEOs Work with Glenn Gow to Scale Their Companies and Careers
Glenn Gow is The Scaling Executive Coach. He coaches ambitious executives into the CEO seat and CEOs into successful exits. With 25 years as a CEO and 5 years in venture capital, Glenn helps leaders scale their companies by scaling themselves first. If this conversation was useful, you can apply for executive coaching with Glenn Gow or apply to be a guest on The Scaling Executive Podcast.
