Matt Homann’s passion is helping people collaborate, think differently and do amazing things. He’s the CEO of Kendeo, founder of Filament and LexThink and co-founder of InvisibleGirlfriend.com. Though Matt suffers from a self-diagnosed case of “Idea Surplus Disorder,” his ventures share one thing in common: a focus on creative ways to solve difficult problems. For example: Kendeo draws pictures of hard-to-understand things for smart companies, and uses those pictures to build visual tools, facilitate engaging meetings and design creative workshops that help people think, meet & learn together better. InvisibleGirlfriend.com and InvisibleBoyfriend.com are online services that provide credible virtual and real-world social proof to help people avoid the societal stigma of living their lives relationship-free. Filament (launching in early 2015) will deliver the country’s most creative and collaborative in-person trainings, meetings and workshops by merging innovative facilitation techniques, great design and a killer space in downtown St. Louis. LexThink was the world’s first legal innovation consultancy, and continues to help lawyers and firms move outside their comfort zones to become more profitable and serve clients better. A recovering lawyer, Matt continues to author the award-winning legal blog “the [non]billable hour.” In 2009, Matt was named a “Legal Rebel” by the American Bar Association Journal. In 2012, he was elected a fellow of the College of Law Practice Management and also named one of the fifty most innovative thinkers in the legal industry by FastCase. Matt grew up in Highland, Illinois, but now lives in St. Louis with his wife, Jessica and daughter, Grace.

http://kendeollc.com/#welcome

http://www.lexthinkllc.com/

https://invisiblegirlfriend.com/

Matt came on the show just a week after making the beta version of his service available – and tens of thousands of accounts had already been made! On the show, he spoke about how there are very real uses for a virtual significant other in today’s society, from family members not accepting of sexual identity to divorcees who are tired of questions. His discussion centered on the very early stages of founding a new app, and how to not just make a good product, but learn rapidly from customers and from people displeased with the service to improve. For example, a major change was that InvisibleGirlfriend began with an algorithm responding to text messages, but it just didn’t seem real, and they took a big step to take technology out of the equation to an extent, and put a real person at the other end – teams of people respond to the messages constantly such that it feels like a conversation with a real person, because it is! It’s vital to understand that a start-up isn’t just about being the best with technology, it’s about solving problems in clever new ways.