The Hurt Hub@Davidson College recently welcomed Scott Burns, CEO and Co-Founder of Isle Data, for an engaging Hub and Spoke fireside chat with W. Spencer Mitchem Executive Director of Innovation and Entrepreneurship Liz Brigham. Hub & Spoke, a storytelling platform, aims to build a strong community of entrepreneurs and innovators by sharing the stories of Davidson alumni, students, faculty, parents, friends, and our greater community. Burns, who spent 18 years at Morningstar before pivoting to entrepreneurship, shared candid insights about building a sustainable business, the reality of startup life, and the power of data-driven decision making in K-12 education.
The Spark: A Simple Question with Complex Implications
Burns’ entrepreneurial journey began with a conversation with his sister, Dr. Catherine Burns, who works training charter school principals. During a flight together, Scott asked a deceptively simple question: “If you ask a school district official how they’re doing, how would they answer that question substantively, with data?”
The answer was troubling—they couldn’t, at least not very well.
“I found it really weird that at Morningstar, you could put $300 into a 401K and we’d give you nine pages of data analytics telling you everything about that investment,” Burns explained. “But you look at school districts—some are $500 million revenue businesses—and nobody can tell you anything about them.”
This observation became the foundation for Isle Data, a company that brings the same level of data transparency and analysis that exists in the financial world to K-12 education.
The Reality Check: Building a Sustainable Business
Burns was refreshingly honest about the challenges of entrepreneurship, particularly the gap between Silicon Valley mythology and business reality. “Building a sustainable business is hard work,” he emphasized. “Getting ten people to buy something from you when ten other people have never bought it before is one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.”
He criticized the “celebrity-ization” of founders who focus more on raising capital than building actual businesses. “At the end of the day, if you don’t build a business that will generate cash flow, then you have done nothing right,” Burns stated firmly. “The only person whose opinion matters is the customer who will actually buy it from you.”
This philosophy guided Isle Data’s bootstrapped approach. Rather than seeking venture capital, the company has focused on revenue generation and sustainable growth—harkening back to his long-term investing roots from Morningstar.
The Pivot: Finding the Real Customer
One of the most interesting aspects of Burns’ story was how his initial assumption about customers proved wrong. While he originally thought school districts would be the primary buyers, he discovered that vendors selling to school districts represented a much larger opportunity.
“There are 854 school districts in Illinois, but there are 40,000 vendors in any given year working with school districts,” Burns explained. This realization led to a strategic pivot that transformed Isle Data’s business model.
The company now provides business intelligence to vendors by analyzing public spending data that school districts are required to publish. “They’ve been doing it for like 80 years in the newspapers, and nobody thought to database that,” Burns noted, highlighting how valuable data often hides in plain sight.
The Team: Marriage-Level Commitment
Burns emphasized the critical importance of choosing the right co-founders, comparing it to marriage. His team brings complementary skills: Burns handles research and strategy, Rob (his CFO and former fraternity brother from 25 years ago) manages business operations, and Jennika (a former colleague from Morningstar) provides technical expertise with data systems.
“They have to be people you trust implicitly,” he said. “They don’t have to be the same person, and they shouldn’t be.” The team’s different perspectives—optimist, business-focused, and risk-averse—create productive tension that leads to better decisions.
Lessons in Focus and Discipline
Perhaps Burns’ most repeated piece of advice was “focus on focus”—a mantra borrowed from PitchBook founder John Gabbert. Despite having data for additional states ready to launch, Isle Data has maintained discipline by proving their model works in Illinois first.
“I’ve been sitting on the state of Indiana data now for a year and a half,” Burns revealed. “That’s the discipline, because that would be a distraction. Get the one state right, get the revenue, and prove it out.”
Practical Wisdom for Aspiring Entrepreneurs
Burns shared several key insights for students and career-changers:
On Risk and Security: As a first-generation college student from a working-class Chicago family, Burns admitted he was “super risk averse” for most of his career. “I did not ever want to have to worry about money again.” His entrepreneurial leap came only after achieving financial security.
On Customer Empathy: “If you are not helping your customer get promoted or get a bonus, they’re not going to pay you.” He recommended thinking about customers’ year-end reviews as a way to understand what truly matters to them.
On Sales Reality: “If you say ‘oh, I’m not good at sales,’ then I would tell you, don’t be a founder.” He emphasized that founders are always selling—to customers, investors, and potential employees.
On Finding Yourself in Space: Drawing from his experience training new hires, Burns warned that the biggest reason new employees fail isn’t lack of intelligence or work ethic—it’s inability to create structure for themselves in less structured work environments.
On Protecting Yourself Legally: In follow-up to the event, Burns emphasized one crucial piece of advice he wished he’d mentioned during the chat: “If you found a company, make sure that you get Executive and Directors Insurance for you and your company. This protects your personal assets should things go sour between either your partners or your early investors.” He shared a cautionary tale of another startup where the lack of this protection led to investor disputes that ultimately crushed both the company and the founder when personal assets were threatened.
The Mission Beyond Profit
While Isle Data operates as a for-profit business, Burns maintains a mission-driven perspective. When the company helps a school district save $80,000 through better vendor negotiations, that savings can fund a social worker position. “These budgets are locked,” he explained. “They have this really tough job of constantly having to balance this fixed budget.”
The company name itself reflects this interconnected mission, inspired by John Donne’s poem “For No Man is an Island.” As Burns explained, “Data is the steel thread that connects us all.”
Looking Forward
Isle Data continues to grow, recently bringing on a head of sales and expanding their research publications with help from Davidson student consultants at the Hurt Hub. The company represents roughly 20% school district clients and 80% vendor clients, providing crucial transparency in a sector that desperately needs it.
Burns’ journey from corporate executive to entrepreneur illustrates that successful startups aren’t just about big ideas or venture funding—they’re about identifying real problems, building sustainable solutions, and maintaining relentless focus on what customers will actually pay for.
The Hub and Spoke series returns periodically to share stories from Davidson’s entrepreneurial community. For more information about upcoming events and programming at the Hurt Hub, visit https://hurthub.davidson.edu/events/.
The full recording of this interview is coming soon!
