What does it take to back a decision that may take years to prove itself?

Soon after becoming CEO of Stryker, Kevin Lobo backed a $1.6 billion acquisition of Mako, a loss-making robotics company many customers, investors and industry experts believed was unnecessary. The deal would reshape both orthopedic surgery and Stryker’s growth trajectory.

Join host Jimmy Allen of Bain & Company as Kevin explains why he saw asymmetric upside in robotic-assisted surgery, how he sustained his conviction through disappointing early results, and how one bold bet became the foundation for a repeatable acquisition model spanning more than 60 deals.

Kevin and Jimmy also explore the tension between autonomy and scale. How do you capture the advantages of size without inviting bureaucracy? What should remain decentralized, and where can shared capabilities create a real edge?

This is a conversation about repeatable growth, the cost of complexity, and the CEO’s role in helping leaders think like founders.

https://www.bain.com/founders-mentality/

LINKS

Ask for Help - Jimmy Allen - Blog [https://shorturl.at/qvzxe]

Bain & Company LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/company/bain-and-company/]

Bain & Company X [https://x.com/BainandCompany]

Jimmy Allen LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-allen-3442b/]

Kevin Lobo LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevinalobo/]

• (00:00) - Introduction
• (01:35) - The potential in robotics that no else saw
• (02:27) - Taking the $1.6 billion proposal to the board
• (03:28) - Why Stryker had to act immediately
• (05:48) - The hard part begins after the board says yes
• (06:36) - Telling Wall Street about the slow first quarter
• (08:05) - Leading through the time lag
• (08:32) - Winning over employees and building M&A credibility
• (09:37) - Cold-calling Larry Culp, former CEO of Danaher, for advice
• (10:18) - Turning mistakes into an integration playbook
• (11:16) - Discovering the "Stryker way”
• (13:09) - Are you the right parent for the company you acquire?
• (15:12) - Building a repeatable acquisition machine
• (17:09) - The outer game and inner game of growth
• (18:14) - Preserving autonomy across 22 business units
• (20:21) - Good complexity versus bad complexity
• (21:00) - What is the CEO's job in a decentralized company?
• (22:52) - Creating a team of entrepreneurs
• (24:18) - The real meaning of conviction

About the Host:

Jimmy Allen is an Advisory Partner at Bain & Company with over 35 years’ experience advising leading organizations. He’s the author of multiple best-selling books on growth and leadership and the host and founder of Bain’s Global CEO Community Forum. Jimmy is a regular speaker at global business events, including the World Economic Forum, and serves on the Botswana Economic Advisory Council. Outside of consulting, Jimmy started his own record label [Abubilla Music] in 2008 and supports Singing Wells, a project dedicated to preserving Kenyan village music.

Bain & Company:

Founder’s Mentality: The CEO Sessions is brought to you by Bain & Company, a global consultancy trusted by the world’s most influential business leaders. With decades of experience guiding organizations through growth, transformation, and leadership development, Bain’s executive insights offer what it takes to lead at scale.

Before a strategy becomes a success story, it's a judgement call.

For 35 years, Jimmy Allen has been in the room with the world's most consequential CEOs, and this season, he's bringing you inside those conversations.

Twelve leaders. Twelve moments that tested everything they thought they knew about leading. And one question that keeps coming back: it's not just what the CEO should do. It's who the CEO needs to become.

Founder's Mentality: The CEO Sessions, Season Two. Launches July 7th.

Join the Conversation:

To learn more check out the Founders Mentality website or our CEO Insights hub:
https://www.bain.com/founders-mentality/

https://www.bain.com/insights/topics/ceo-agenda

Links:

Bain & Company LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/bain-and-company/)

Bain & Company X (https://x.com/BainandCompany)

Jimmy Allen LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-allen-3442b/)

About the Host:

Jimmy Allen is an Advisory Partner at Bain & Company with over 35 years’ experience advising leading organizations. He’s the author of multiple best-selling books on growth and leadership and the host and founder of Bain’s Global CEO Community Forum. Jimmy is a regular speaker at global business events, including the World Economic Forum, and serves on the Botswana Economic Advisory Council. Outside of consulting, Jimmy started his own record label (Abubilla Music) in 2008 and supports Singing Wells, a project dedicated to preserving Kenyan village music.

Bain & Company:

Founder’s Mentality: The CEO Sessions is brought to you by Bain & Company, a global consultancy trusted by the world’s most influential business leaders. With decades of experience guiding organizations through growth, transformation, and leadership development, Bain’s executive insights offer what it takes to lead at scale.

As this season of Founder’s Mentality: The CEO Sessions comes to a close, we take a step back to ask the question that has driven every conversation: how do you lead and grow in an era of turbulence?

In this season finale, host Jimmy Allen revisits the season’s most powerful insights from the leaders of global brands and high-growth innovators, uncovering the new rules of scaling. You’ll hear from founders and CEOs who have mastered the balance between the outer game of strategy and the inner game of leadership, and how they sustain their energy in a role that never stops demanding more.

From Pizza Hut’s Aaron Powell reigniting pride in the product, to Walmart China’s Christina Zhu turning routines into joy, to Mercado Libre’s Marcos Galperin on culture, competition, and resilience, this episode gathers lessons from leaders who refuse to let complexity kill growth. Alongside them, voices like Don Katz, Sunny Verghese, Tanuja Randery, Stuart Gent, David Haines, and Pedro Arnt reveal how simplicity, focus, and relevance can turn turbulence into momentum.

Whether you’ve followed every episode or you’re just joining for the highlights, this is your crash course in the season’s biggest ideas and a blueprint for leading at scale, grounded in clarity, powered by purpose, and built to weather even the fiercest storms.

Join the Conversation:

To learn more check out the Founders Mentality website or our CEO Insights hub: https://www.bain.com/founders-mentality/

https://www.bain.com/insights/topics/ceo-agenda

Learn More:

The Changing Nature of Strategy: Reflections on Thirty Years - Article (https://www.bain.com/insights/the-changing-nature-of-strategy-reflections-on-thirty-years-fm-blog/)

Bain & Company LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/bain-and-company/)

Bain & Company X (https://x.com/BainandCompany)

Jimmy Allen LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-allen-3442b/)

About Founders Mentality

Founder’s Mentality: The CEO Sessions is a leadership podcast hosted by executive advisor and bestselling author Jimmy Allen.

Each episode features candid conversations with top CEOs, from Audible to Walmart to AWS, as well as artists, comedians, and other unconventional thinkers. Together, they share the lessons that shaped their growth, the “aha” moments that redefined their work, and the surprising ways reinvention happens at every level.

Whether you’re a CEO, an aspiring leader, or simply curious about leadership, influence, and business at scale, this podcast will challenge and inspire you, one story at a time.

About the Host:

Jimmy Allen is an Advisory Partner at Bain & Company with over 35 years’ experience advising leading organizations. He’s the author of multiple best-selling books on growth and leadership and the host and founder of Bain’s Global CEO Community Forum. Jimmy is a regular speaker at global business events, including the World Economic Forum, and serves on the Botswana Economic Advisory Council. Outside of consulting, Jimmy started his own record label (Abubilla Music) in 2008 and supports Singing Wells, a project dedicated to preserving Kenyan village music.

Bain & Company:

Founder’s Mentality: The CEO Sessions is brought to you by Bain & Company, a global consultancy trusted by the world’s most influential business leaders. With decades of experience guiding organizations through growth, transformation, and leadership development, Bain’s executive insights offer what it takes to lead at scale.