1
00:00:01,400 --> 00:00:10,000
Speaker 1: Afrols at San Francisco, California. Jessica Matthews, founder and CEO

2
00:00:10,039 --> 00:00:12,719
Speaker 1: at Uncharted Power, is on the main stage and is

3
00:00:12,800 --> 00:00:17,000
Speaker 1: in the fireside chat. Her sustainable energy technology company is

4
00:00:17,000 --> 00:00:20,280
Speaker 1: growing very quickly. She's learned a lot about team building,

5
00:00:20,280 --> 00:00:23,440
Speaker 1: which she discusses as well as realizing her own power

6
00:00:23,480 --> 00:00:27,120
Speaker 1: to overcome big problems in solved complex issues even without

7
00:00:27,120 --> 00:00:29,440
Speaker 1: the same credentials as the next person. What I can

8
00:00:29,480 --> 00:00:31,319
Speaker 1: tell you is not what I did, which were just

9
00:00:31,400 --> 00:00:33,880
Speaker 1: several mistakes. I can tell you what I've learned from them.

10
00:00:33,920 --> 00:00:36,879
Speaker 1: The biggest mistake I made and that I have to

11
00:00:36,880 --> 00:00:40,000
Speaker 1: really work on every day despite the learnings, is this

12
00:00:40,040 --> 00:00:45,879
Speaker 1: assumption that I can't do what's needed. Like me, I

13
00:00:45,880 --> 00:00:47,760
Speaker 1: don't have the ability to do what needs to scale

14
00:00:47,800 --> 00:00:51,320
Speaker 1: my company because I didn't have this fancier experience or

15
00:00:51,320 --> 00:00:55,320
Speaker 1: I didn't do this fancy thing. The reality is when

16
00:00:55,320 --> 00:00:58,400
Speaker 1: you're building something that's really innovative, there is no right

17
00:00:58,400 --> 00:01:00,760
Speaker 1: way to do it. There's only a way to think

18
00:01:00,760 --> 00:01:05,840
Speaker 1: and feel about it, which is unbelievable. So persistent passion

19
00:01:06,680 --> 00:01:08,840
Speaker 1: and what I found like I would hire these high

20
00:01:08,840 --> 00:01:11,240
Speaker 1: polluted people from these fancy companies and bring them in

21
00:01:11,840 --> 00:01:13,800
Speaker 1: and they'd be basic as hell, and I'd be like,

22
00:01:13,840 --> 00:01:15,960
Speaker 1: why are you so basic? I don't get it, Like

23
00:01:16,240 --> 00:01:17,600
Speaker 1: I don't have a degree in this and I'm about

24
00:01:17,600 --> 00:01:19,720
Speaker 1: to google my way to being significantly better than you.

25
00:01:20,000 --> 00:01:24,720
Speaker 1: It's because no, and it's because like they you know,

26
00:01:24,760 --> 00:01:27,000
Speaker 1: and even Richard Branson will say this stuff. It's like, yo,

27
00:01:27,120 --> 00:01:30,280
Speaker 1: hire for culture, not not for skill set. A smart

28
00:01:30,319 --> 00:01:32,960
Speaker 1: person can learn almost anything, or you can have a

29
00:01:33,000 --> 00:01:35,720
Speaker 1: consultant and ask them questions. But when you bring on

30
00:01:35,760 --> 00:01:38,480
Speaker 1: the team and they think they have the skill set

31
00:01:38,600 --> 00:01:41,480
Speaker 1: but they don't have the culture. When things change, when

32
00:01:41,480 --> 00:01:44,720
Speaker 1: you have to deal with certain scenarios, it can be

33
00:01:44,800 --> 00:01:47,360
Speaker 1: tough for them. And so we at one point, we're

34
00:01:47,440 --> 00:01:49,760
Speaker 1: almost twenty five, and we're right now down to six

35
00:01:49,800 --> 00:01:51,480
Speaker 1: team because I just know that there were a lot

36
00:01:51,480 --> 00:01:56,080
Speaker 1: of basic people eating up my burnery. I'm with Lucas,

37
00:01:56,320 --> 00:01:59,680
Speaker 1: Mrs Black Tech, Dream Money. I'm gonna answer you to

38
00:01:59,760 --> 00:02:01,360
Speaker 1: She just some of the biggest names, some of the

39
00:02:01,400 --> 00:02:04,840
Speaker 1: brightest minds and brilliant ideas. If you're black in building

40
00:02:04,960 --> 00:02:08,040
Speaker 1: or simply using tech to secure your bag, this podcast

41
00:02:08,160 --> 00:02:16,160
Speaker 1: is for you. Terror Read is founder a apps without code,

42
00:02:16,400 --> 00:02:19,200
Speaker 1: you know, online learning platform which teaches anyone how they

43
00:02:19,240 --> 00:02:21,079
Speaker 1: can build and launch an app to any of the

44
00:02:21,120 --> 00:02:24,640
Speaker 1: big platforms like Apple's App Store and Google Play. However

45
00:02:24,760 --> 00:02:28,279
Speaker 1: without writing a line of code. She's a big evangelist

46
00:02:28,320 --> 00:02:30,800
Speaker 1: of the idea that technology has advanced to such a

47
00:02:30,840 --> 00:02:33,960
Speaker 1: place where building an app is the easy part. However,

48
00:02:34,320 --> 00:02:37,200
Speaker 1: I asked her about being that is so easy? Are

49
00:02:37,240 --> 00:02:39,400
Speaker 1: there still any real excuses to be used for an

50
00:02:39,520 --> 00:02:43,320
Speaker 1: entrepreneur to not have their app idea done? Oh? Well,

51
00:02:43,400 --> 00:02:46,240
Speaker 1: I mean they're all kinds of excuses for people not

52
00:02:46,960 --> 00:02:50,119
Speaker 1: doing stuff and launching their ideas that they have. So yes,

53
00:02:50,160 --> 00:02:53,200
Speaker 1: there are excuses. There's always an excuse. But in terms

54
00:02:53,240 --> 00:02:56,679
Speaker 1: of technology and like I can't do it, it's it's

55
00:02:56,720 --> 00:03:01,320
Speaker 1: possible now. Yeah, So much has changed over the past

56
00:03:01,480 --> 00:03:04,840
Speaker 1: really like five years about what is possible to build.

57
00:03:04,960 --> 00:03:08,200
Speaker 1: And I've gotten to really see and and largely usher

58
00:03:08,280 --> 00:03:12,240
Speaker 1: in this whole new wave of people building things and

59
00:03:12,320 --> 00:03:15,240
Speaker 1: building their ideas, their app ideas without having to have

60
00:03:15,280 --> 00:03:18,640
Speaker 1: a computer science degree or pay twenty dollars to hire

61
00:03:18,680 --> 00:03:20,799
Speaker 1: a developer to build it for them. Like people can

62
00:03:20,840 --> 00:03:24,320
Speaker 1: really build their products themselves now without code and using

63
00:03:24,320 --> 00:03:26,560
Speaker 1: after that code techniques. Yeah, I mean you said, so

64
00:03:26,680 --> 00:03:28,520
Speaker 1: much has changed over the past couple of years. What

65
00:03:28,600 --> 00:03:31,720
Speaker 1: has changed that allows somebody who does not have a

66
00:03:31,760 --> 00:03:34,320
Speaker 1: technical background didn't start coding at two and a half

67
00:03:34,400 --> 00:03:39,320
Speaker 1: years old, that's right. What happened so before it used

68
00:03:39,360 --> 00:03:41,120
Speaker 1: to be that if you had an idea for an

69
00:03:41,160 --> 00:03:43,640
Speaker 1: app or an online business. And really, by the way,

70
00:03:43,680 --> 00:03:47,240
Speaker 1: an app is just something that you log into. So

71
00:03:47,280 --> 00:03:49,040
Speaker 1: if it has a user name and a password that

72
00:03:49,080 --> 00:03:50,840
Speaker 1: you can log into, it's an app. Even if it's

73
00:03:50,840 --> 00:03:53,240
Speaker 1: on your computer, it's an app. So sometimes we think

74
00:03:53,280 --> 00:03:55,600
Speaker 1: about apps is just the thing that's in the app

75
00:03:55,640 --> 00:03:58,360
Speaker 1: store that you download, but we use apps all day

76
00:03:58,440 --> 00:04:00,840
Speaker 1: every day. If you log into it it I can't

77
00:04:00,840 --> 00:04:03,000
Speaker 1: even keep track of all my passwords. Sometimes if you

78
00:04:03,000 --> 00:04:05,320
Speaker 1: log into it, it's an app, right. So so if

79
00:04:05,320 --> 00:04:08,120
Speaker 1: you had an idea for something that someone would log into,

80
00:04:08,440 --> 00:04:10,680
Speaker 1: you would have had a couple options. Before you have

81
00:04:10,760 --> 00:04:13,520
Speaker 1: had to hire someone to build it for you, and

82
00:04:13,640 --> 00:04:15,960
Speaker 1: usually pricing for that starts at twenty k and up.

83
00:04:16,839 --> 00:04:20,279
Speaker 1: Or you would have to find someone to be your

84
00:04:20,360 --> 00:04:22,760
Speaker 1: tech business partner. And there's nothing wrong with that, but

85
00:04:22,839 --> 00:04:24,640
Speaker 1: you want to get someone that you trust and not

86
00:04:24,760 --> 00:04:28,000
Speaker 1: rush that process. And not everybody has network so that

87
00:04:28,040 --> 00:04:30,400
Speaker 1: they know a bunch of developers and coders to make

88
00:04:30,400 --> 00:04:32,400
Speaker 1: an app for you, or you would have to learn

89
00:04:32,440 --> 00:04:34,560
Speaker 1: to code um which again nothing wrong with it, It

90
00:04:34,640 --> 00:04:36,800
Speaker 1: just takes a few years for most people to get

91
00:04:36,800 --> 00:04:40,039
Speaker 1: to a proficiency level. And technology moves so fast that

92
00:04:40,120 --> 00:04:42,400
Speaker 1: you spending two years just to learn a new skill

93
00:04:42,440 --> 00:04:45,880
Speaker 1: before you start. Like that idea is gone. And so

94
00:04:46,200 --> 00:04:50,440
Speaker 1: you used to have those options. And what changed is

95
00:04:50,640 --> 00:04:54,640
Speaker 1: that the platforms, the software available to let people build

96
00:04:54,680 --> 00:04:57,800
Speaker 1: apps changed. Before you used to need to know a

97
00:04:57,800 --> 00:05:00,440
Speaker 1: coding language to do it, and now all you can

98
00:05:00,480 --> 00:05:02,800
Speaker 1: build apps in English. So the way that works is

99
00:05:02,839 --> 00:05:05,840
Speaker 1: you design the app by drag, drop, point, click, you

100
00:05:05,960 --> 00:05:08,200
Speaker 1: like like you're making a power point presentation. You put

101
00:05:08,200 --> 00:05:10,200
Speaker 1: what you want on the page, and then you tell

102
00:05:10,240 --> 00:05:12,560
Speaker 1: the app what to do in English, so like it

103
00:05:12,640 --> 00:05:15,760
Speaker 1: literally says if the user clicks the button, then log

104
00:05:15,880 --> 00:05:18,400
Speaker 1: them in. And it says that in English is opposed

105
00:05:18,440 --> 00:05:20,279
Speaker 1: to you having to learn a whole another language to

106
00:05:20,320 --> 00:05:22,799
Speaker 1: tell the app what to do. So you write these

107
00:05:22,920 --> 00:05:26,200
Speaker 1: logic statements, and the logic statements tell the app what

108
00:05:26,360 --> 00:05:29,200
Speaker 1: to do, and that's what's changed. So there's so many

109
00:05:29,240 --> 00:05:32,039
Speaker 1: people who I would imagine come to you and say, hey,

110
00:05:32,160 --> 00:05:35,039
Speaker 1: I hear you saying all this stuff. That sounds good,

111
00:05:35,080 --> 00:05:38,680
Speaker 1: but you know, I still have a problem opening the PDF, right,

112
00:05:38,720 --> 00:05:42,479
Speaker 1: and so like like what kind of person is best

113
00:05:42,520 --> 00:05:45,440
Speaker 1: suited to be building an app without code? And what

114
00:05:45,520 --> 00:05:48,559
Speaker 1: kind of person should still just leave it to somebody else?

115
00:05:48,760 --> 00:05:53,880
Speaker 1: You know the question? Great question. Okay, So there's some

116
00:05:54,080 --> 00:05:58,480
Speaker 1: basic just tech skills competency that it helps to have.

117
00:05:58,720 --> 00:06:03,000
Speaker 1: For example, like your if answering your email is hard,

118
00:06:03,360 --> 00:06:05,800
Speaker 1: you should outsource it. Somebody else can do it for you.

119
00:06:05,800 --> 00:06:09,120
Speaker 1: You have other zones of genius, right, And that's just

120
00:06:09,160 --> 00:06:10,840
Speaker 1: like real talk, like there are other people who can

121
00:06:10,880 --> 00:06:13,640
Speaker 1: do it for you. I still think you should have

122
00:06:13,800 --> 00:06:16,880
Speaker 1: someone else build it without code, particularly you're just starting.

123
00:06:17,120 --> 00:06:19,039
Speaker 1: You can have someone else build it without code for

124
00:06:19,120 --> 00:06:22,000
Speaker 1: you because that way it gets done in a fraction

125
00:06:22,040 --> 00:06:23,400
Speaker 1: of the time and the fraction of the cost. You

126
00:06:23,440 --> 00:06:26,120
Speaker 1: still want that, um, but you may hire someone else

127
00:06:26,160 --> 00:06:29,080
Speaker 1: to do it for you. Um. There's also some just

128
00:06:29,200 --> 00:06:32,880
Speaker 1: like general logic skills it helps to have. So I

129
00:06:32,920 --> 00:06:35,719
Speaker 1: just gave an example earlier, whereas like if the user

130
00:06:35,800 --> 00:06:38,800
Speaker 1: clicks the button, then log them in the concept of

131
00:06:38,880 --> 00:06:44,280
Speaker 1: if this then that there are some professions where even

132
00:06:44,320 --> 00:06:46,640
Speaker 1: if you've never built an app, like because you do

133
00:06:46,680 --> 00:06:48,479
Speaker 1: this kind of thing at work, people pick it up

134
00:06:48,560 --> 00:06:51,640
Speaker 1: so fast. So like, for example, um, if you use

135
00:06:51,760 --> 00:06:55,080
Speaker 1: Excel at all, like it'll be a breeze and easy.

136
00:06:55,160 --> 00:06:58,560
Speaker 1: You do lots of logic and Excel right. If you

137
00:06:58,720 --> 00:07:02,080
Speaker 1: are you have part of your job is to give

138
00:07:02,080 --> 00:07:06,279
Speaker 1: people detailed instructions, you'll be good at it. Um people

139
00:07:06,279 --> 00:07:08,719
Speaker 1: who have people have like logical a lot of critical

140
00:07:08,760 --> 00:07:11,840
Speaker 1: thinking in their work. There's some roles where like there's

141
00:07:11,840 --> 00:07:14,360
Speaker 1: a little bit of a larger gap. For example, like

142
00:07:14,360 --> 00:07:18,320
Speaker 1: when I talk to people who are artists right where

143
00:07:18,360 --> 00:07:22,440
Speaker 1: it's all full free form creativity. The computer is not

144
00:07:22,640 --> 00:07:26,040
Speaker 1: smart enough to understand your free form creativity ideas. So

145
00:07:26,080 --> 00:07:28,119
Speaker 1: you're gonna have to give it like step by step

146
00:07:28,160 --> 00:07:31,200
Speaker 1: instructions which you can totally learn. But like people who

147
00:07:31,320 --> 00:07:33,840
Speaker 1: for example, are struggling with the email and getting your

148
00:07:33,840 --> 00:07:37,400
Speaker 1: email open outsource that use your Zonner genius for something else.

149
00:07:38,200 --> 00:07:40,840
Speaker 1: So I wonder, like, is there a certain type of

150
00:07:40,880 --> 00:07:42,960
Speaker 1: app that I can build without code? Because I wonder

151
00:07:43,000 --> 00:07:45,560
Speaker 1: if if I wanted to make the next TikTok, could

152
00:07:45,640 --> 00:07:49,080
Speaker 1: I do that without learning how to code? Versus if

153
00:07:49,120 --> 00:07:51,160
Speaker 1: I was trying to make you know, a spreadsheet versus

154
00:07:51,240 --> 00:07:53,480
Speaker 1: you know, kind of kind of, I would imagine there's

155
00:07:53,520 --> 00:07:55,920
Speaker 1: probably some limitations or no, you can tell me no,

156
00:07:56,120 --> 00:07:59,120
Speaker 1: there are limitations. So it's probably easier for me to

157
00:07:59,240 --> 00:08:02,160
Speaker 1: tell you what you can't do then to tell you

158
00:08:02,200 --> 00:08:05,559
Speaker 1: what you can do, because most stuff you can do now.

159
00:08:06,040 --> 00:08:09,400
Speaker 1: And I'll preface this by saying that every time people

160
00:08:09,440 --> 00:08:12,520
Speaker 1: ask me a question about what you can't do without code,

161
00:08:12,880 --> 00:08:16,080
Speaker 1: like the next month, someone comes out with the software

162
00:08:16,160 --> 00:08:20,640
Speaker 1: that allows you to do this, So it does change. Um.

163
00:08:20,760 --> 00:08:24,000
Speaker 1: For example, I used to say that, like augmented reality

164
00:08:24,400 --> 00:08:27,200
Speaker 1: not really possible yet without code, Like I'm sure someone's

165
00:08:27,200 --> 00:08:30,320
Speaker 1: working on it, but not yet possible, but it's now possible. Actually,

166
00:08:30,320 --> 00:08:33,280
Speaker 1: Facebook has a tool called spark a R which allows

167
00:08:33,320 --> 00:08:35,960
Speaker 1: you to build augmented reality apps without codes, So like

168
00:08:36,000 --> 00:08:38,520
Speaker 1: that's no longer true. So I say that to say that,

169
00:08:38,600 --> 00:08:42,600
Speaker 1: like if someone launches something this this space is developing quickly,

170
00:08:42,640 --> 00:08:45,199
Speaker 1: so like people will launch stuff, um, the things that

171
00:08:45,240 --> 00:08:49,199
Speaker 1: are still hard to do without code. Emoji apps, you

172
00:08:49,240 --> 00:08:51,560
Speaker 1: know those apps were like you create your own emojis

173
00:08:51,600 --> 00:08:55,240
Speaker 1: and they embed into your keyboard. Still hard to do

174
00:08:55,400 --> 00:09:00,600
Speaker 1: without code, um. Virtual reality so not into the reality.

175
00:09:00,600 --> 00:09:03,480
Speaker 1: Augmented reality is where like let's say you hold up

176
00:09:03,520 --> 00:09:06,160
Speaker 1: your phone and it puts like we see this a

177
00:09:06,160 --> 00:09:09,280
Speaker 1: lot and like snapchatter chick or TikTok or filters. Right,

178
00:09:09,320 --> 00:09:12,480
Speaker 1: that's a that's an augmented reality. You still see some

179
00:09:12,720 --> 00:09:15,000
Speaker 1: the normal thing through the camera, but you put a

180
00:09:15,040 --> 00:09:17,040
Speaker 1: hat on top of the person's head or you you

181
00:09:17,080 --> 00:09:20,520
Speaker 1: augment what's actually happening in reality. UM, so that now

182
00:09:20,679 --> 00:09:23,960
Speaker 1: is actually possible. Virtual reality is where like you have

183
00:09:24,080 --> 00:09:27,280
Speaker 1: like a headset, for example, and you change the whole world.

184
00:09:27,320 --> 00:09:29,920
Speaker 1: Your whole world is now you're in a different land. Right.

185
00:09:29,960 --> 00:09:33,000
Speaker 1: So virtual reality still I haven't seen a lot of

186
00:09:33,040 --> 00:09:35,760
Speaker 1: really good tools for no code with virtual reality, augmented

187
00:09:35,760 --> 00:09:40,640
Speaker 1: reality yet virtual reality now, UM what else? Um, there

188
00:09:40,640 --> 00:09:45,960
Speaker 1: are some limitations in like UM and this kind of

189
00:09:46,000 --> 00:09:52,280
Speaker 1: depends on the tool in UM. Cryptocurrency thus far without

190
00:09:52,360 --> 00:09:57,120
Speaker 1: code and really plugging into cryptocurrency platforms and doing cryptocurrency

191
00:09:57,160 --> 00:10:00,640
Speaker 1: deals and transactions and letting people pay in cryptocurrency, that

192
00:10:00,840 --> 00:10:05,480
Speaker 1: still is not amazingly smooth without code. But those those

193
00:10:05,480 --> 00:10:08,680
Speaker 1: are the biggest areas that I see people stuck with.

194
00:10:09,160 --> 00:10:11,160
Speaker 1: And there used to be other areas, and then someone

195
00:10:11,200 --> 00:10:13,120
Speaker 1: came out with a tool, so like things you can

196
00:10:13,280 --> 00:10:17,040
Speaker 1: do UM and actually we have like a couple common

197
00:10:17,240 --> 00:10:21,160
Speaker 1: structures that we find most people's app ideas fall into

198
00:10:21,600 --> 00:10:24,880
Speaker 1: UM and these are all totally possible. So most of

199
00:10:24,880 --> 00:10:28,640
Speaker 1: the time UM many app ideas will give you the categories,

200
00:10:28,880 --> 00:10:32,720
Speaker 1: so they will an app that recommends things right, think

201
00:10:32,840 --> 00:10:36,440
Speaker 1: like Tender for example, where it's giving you recommendations based

202
00:10:36,440 --> 00:10:40,000
Speaker 1: on something. An app that gives you like a community,

203
00:10:40,080 --> 00:10:43,920
Speaker 1: so think like Facebook, think TikTok, think Instagram like a

204
00:10:44,000 --> 00:10:47,800
Speaker 1: community based app really good for building without code. UM

205
00:10:47,840 --> 00:10:50,760
Speaker 1: A marketplace app where people are like buying and selling

206
00:10:51,080 --> 00:10:54,120
Speaker 1: things from each other, think like Airbnb people can buy

207
00:10:54,120 --> 00:10:57,679
Speaker 1: and sell. Also a UM I would call it like

208
00:10:57,760 --> 00:11:01,400
Speaker 1: a service tracking app, so think like Uber where you

209
00:11:01,480 --> 00:11:04,199
Speaker 1: like book a thing and you can track the progress,

210
00:11:04,400 --> 00:11:07,200
Speaker 1: or even like Domino's pizza tracker. Like those are like

211
00:11:07,320 --> 00:11:11,880
Speaker 1: examples of those sorts of tracking service tracking UM I

212
00:11:11,880 --> 00:11:18,520
Speaker 1: think like also UM tracking of a like numbers or metrics,

213
00:11:18,559 --> 00:11:21,959
Speaker 1: so think like Fitbit or even like Salesforce where you're

214
00:11:21,960 --> 00:11:27,000
Speaker 1: tracking the progress or process of a transaction, a sale

215
00:11:27,760 --> 00:11:29,920
Speaker 1: of your health whatever that might be. What am I

216
00:11:30,000 --> 00:11:35,080
Speaker 1: forgetting here missing those are really common ones. There's a

217
00:11:35,120 --> 00:11:37,520
Speaker 1: couple more that we often have people fall into. But

218
00:11:37,559 --> 00:11:39,520
Speaker 1: like those are things you totally can do, and I

219
00:11:39,520 --> 00:11:44,080
Speaker 1: would count consider those things like easy to do without code. Now, yeah,

220
00:11:44,920 --> 00:11:47,400
Speaker 1: at what point do you think it will we will

221
00:11:47,440 --> 00:11:49,880
Speaker 1: get to the place where we don't feel like we

222
00:11:49,960 --> 00:11:51,719
Speaker 1: have to tell our kids and our young people go

223
00:11:51,920 --> 00:11:57,320
Speaker 1: learn to code because no code has gotten so sophisticated

224
00:11:57,880 --> 00:12:00,600
Speaker 1: where you don't have to go get the engineering situation

225
00:12:00,600 --> 00:12:02,520
Speaker 1: is are we still like a decade out, two decades

226
00:12:02,640 --> 00:12:04,360
Speaker 1: or we a couple of years out or would that

227
00:12:04,440 --> 00:12:08,400
Speaker 1: always be that you still know that we should be

228
00:12:08,440 --> 00:12:11,160
Speaker 1: doing that period, Like there is a movement where it's

229
00:12:11,240 --> 00:12:14,240
Speaker 1: like everybody go learn to code. Like I recognize that,

230
00:12:14,320 --> 00:12:16,839
Speaker 1: particularly for folks of color, we're like, oh, look that's

231
00:12:16,840 --> 00:12:19,360
Speaker 1: where the money job is. Everybody should go learn to code.

232
00:12:19,640 --> 00:12:24,000
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's the right narrative. Um, in

233
00:12:24,080 --> 00:12:25,800
Speaker 1: the same way that I don't know it's the right

234
00:12:25,840 --> 00:12:29,240
Speaker 1: narrative that like when we say everybody should be a doctor, right,

235
00:12:29,240 --> 00:12:31,560
Speaker 1: that's that's where the money is. I think when we

236
00:12:31,600 --> 00:12:34,480
Speaker 1: do that, particularly as people of color, we end up

237
00:12:34,520 --> 00:12:37,120
Speaker 1: being like behind the curve because by the time the

238
00:12:37,200 --> 00:12:41,440
Speaker 1: generation whoever is giving that recommendation realizes that that's where

239
00:12:41,440 --> 00:12:43,600
Speaker 1: the money is. That next generation, like the money is

240
00:12:43,679 --> 00:12:47,120
Speaker 1: moved to a different kind of place. So, UM, while

241
00:12:47,200 --> 00:12:49,000
Speaker 1: I don't think it's a bad thing to be a developer,

242
00:12:49,040 --> 00:12:51,920
Speaker 1: to be clear, UM, I think we really want to

243
00:12:51,920 --> 00:12:54,360
Speaker 1: teach people how to be in our people, particularly how

244
00:12:54,400 --> 00:12:58,040
Speaker 1: to be good problem solvers. UM. The concept of thinking

245
00:12:58,080 --> 00:13:01,679
Speaker 1: like an engineer, that part is useful regardless of what

246
00:13:01,720 --> 00:13:04,240
Speaker 1: you do. And when I say thinking like an engineer,

247
00:13:04,640 --> 00:13:07,680
Speaker 1: I really mean in this scenario, like there there is

248
00:13:07,720 --> 00:13:10,880
Speaker 1: a sequence of events that need to happen, and there's

249
00:13:10,920 --> 00:13:13,360
Speaker 1: a logic behind those sequence of events. And if you

250
00:13:13,400 --> 00:13:16,760
Speaker 1: want to go be a lawyer and use that um knowledge,

251
00:13:16,800 --> 00:13:18,559
Speaker 1: if you want to go be a developer and use

252
00:13:18,559 --> 00:13:20,559
Speaker 1: that knowledge, if you want to go be an artist

253
00:13:20,679 --> 00:13:23,559
Speaker 1: and use that knowledge, that's still relevant. So I'm not

254
00:13:23,760 --> 00:13:26,760
Speaker 1: a huge backer of like this whole everybody should code

255
00:13:26,800 --> 00:13:31,560
Speaker 1: movement in the first place. UM. I think that the distinction, though,

256
00:13:31,640 --> 00:13:35,679
Speaker 1: to directly answer your question, is depending on if you're

257
00:13:35,679 --> 00:13:37,560
Speaker 1: trying to get a job in tech or you're trying

258
00:13:37,600 --> 00:13:40,640
Speaker 1: to do entrepreneurship in tech. All right, So if you're

259
00:13:40,640 --> 00:13:42,840
Speaker 1: trying to get a job, you still need to learn

260
00:13:42,840 --> 00:13:45,400
Speaker 1: to code. There are not enough companies yet who are

261
00:13:45,480 --> 00:13:49,160
Speaker 1: hiring no code developers. They're more and more. So if

262
00:13:49,200 --> 00:13:51,760
Speaker 1: you go on like upwork, for example, you see all

263
00:13:51,760 --> 00:13:55,200
Speaker 1: these job postings for no code developers. Now, um, but

264
00:13:55,400 --> 00:13:58,360
Speaker 1: most big companies are looking for you to code, all right,

265
00:13:58,360 --> 00:14:00,880
Speaker 1: So if that's the goal, go learn to code. If

266
00:14:00,960 --> 00:14:06,440
Speaker 1: your goal is entrepreneurship, and particularly if you're not technical already,

267
00:14:06,520 --> 00:14:10,640
Speaker 1: like you're not technical, you're interested in entrepreneurship, it may

268
00:14:10,679 --> 00:14:13,640
Speaker 1: not make sense to go spend years learning a new

269
00:14:13,720 --> 00:14:17,680
Speaker 1: skill set when you probably ultimately in the company that

270
00:14:17,760 --> 00:14:20,280
Speaker 1: you build will be doing something else, like you might

271
00:14:20,320 --> 00:14:22,960
Speaker 1: be the CEO and at some point not coding at all.

272
00:14:23,040 --> 00:14:25,160
Speaker 1: And in that scenario, your goal is to get as

273
00:14:25,240 --> 00:14:29,320
Speaker 1: quickly to paying customers as possible, and so whatever way

274
00:14:29,360 --> 00:14:31,040
Speaker 1: you can do that, usually no code will get you

275
00:14:31,080 --> 00:14:33,280
Speaker 1: there much faster, if that makes more sense. So if

276
00:14:33,280 --> 00:14:36,120
Speaker 1: it's about job, definitely still have to go learn to code.

277
00:14:36,240 --> 00:14:41,040
Speaker 1: I think we're five maybe ten years out plus from

278
00:14:41,040 --> 00:14:44,760
Speaker 1: that changing. Um, just because of how no code has

279
00:14:44,760 --> 00:14:47,520
Speaker 1: gotten popularized, and I think how we're talking about it.

280
00:14:47,600 --> 00:14:50,360
Speaker 1: I don't think that the no Code community and space

281
00:14:50,400 --> 00:14:53,440
Speaker 1: has done a great job talking about what no Code

282
00:14:53,560 --> 00:14:57,240
Speaker 1: is such that it's gotten the adoption that it deserves. Yeah,

283
00:14:57,320 --> 00:14:59,640
Speaker 1: and you know what's so interesting to me is you

284
00:14:59,680 --> 00:15:01,880
Speaker 1: didn't it into this wanting to be an entrepreneur. You

285
00:15:01,880 --> 00:15:04,840
Speaker 1: didn't see yourself as an entrepreneur, you know, growing up,

286
00:15:04,880 --> 00:15:08,160
Speaker 1: and now you're running this big business, this online platform,

287
00:15:08,200 --> 00:15:10,400
Speaker 1: teaching people how to do this, and a lot of

288
00:15:10,440 --> 00:15:13,200
Speaker 1: folks who will be building these apps that you're that

289
00:15:13,320 --> 00:15:17,480
Speaker 1: you're evangelizing don't see themselves as people who build apps.

290
00:15:17,800 --> 00:15:20,400
Speaker 1: So how do you how do you think about, you know,

291
00:15:20,520 --> 00:15:24,720
Speaker 1: reframing um your own mental process to be able to

292
00:15:24,760 --> 00:15:27,800
Speaker 1: be successful, because if I'm just trying to run my

293
00:15:27,880 --> 00:15:30,800
Speaker 1: small grocery store, now I'm building this app, you know,

294
00:15:30,880 --> 00:15:33,480
Speaker 1: there's other things that go into that, you know, to

295
00:15:33,520 --> 00:15:36,000
Speaker 1: find success versus just let me throw this up on

296
00:15:36,040 --> 00:15:39,440
Speaker 1: app store real quick and move on. Yes. Absolutely, I

297
00:15:39,440 --> 00:15:42,040
Speaker 1: always tell people that they should build a business that

298
00:15:42,160 --> 00:15:44,600
Speaker 1: happens to have an app, not an app that happens

299
00:15:44,640 --> 00:15:47,680
Speaker 1: to have a business. The business comes first, right, and

300
00:15:47,720 --> 00:15:50,280
Speaker 1: the app is just a tool that delivers it to people.

301
00:15:50,760 --> 00:15:53,560
Speaker 1: In fact, a lot of the times it's not even

302
00:15:53,720 --> 00:15:55,960
Speaker 1: useful to market. If you have an app idea, it's

303
00:15:55,960 --> 00:15:58,560
Speaker 1: not even useful to market it as an app because

304
00:15:58,680 --> 00:16:01,400
Speaker 1: in people's head or as just an app quote unquote,

305
00:16:01,760 --> 00:16:05,080
Speaker 1: because in people's heads when people hear app, they think

306
00:16:05,240 --> 00:16:10,840
Speaker 1: free cents, two dollars, ten dollars, some low price point, um.

307
00:16:10,880 --> 00:16:13,640
Speaker 1: But if they hear something else, right, other energy, to

308
00:16:13,680 --> 00:16:18,080
Speaker 1: hear education, to hear services, all these other things experiences

309
00:16:18,120 --> 00:16:20,480
Speaker 1: we think are expensive. App we think it's cheap. So

310
00:16:20,920 --> 00:16:23,040
Speaker 1: even if you're building an app, you may not even

311
00:16:23,040 --> 00:16:25,240
Speaker 1: want to position it that way. And that's where your

312
00:16:25,320 --> 00:16:30,360
Speaker 1: point about other skill sets comes in, because if all

313
00:16:30,440 --> 00:16:32,760
Speaker 1: you're good at is building the app, you're gonna have

314
00:16:32,800 --> 00:16:35,440
Speaker 1: some trouble because you won't make much money from it

315
00:16:35,480 --> 00:16:38,520
Speaker 1: and really won't have a thriving business itself sustaining. What

316
00:16:38,640 --> 00:16:40,840
Speaker 1: you really want to be thinking about is what business

317
00:16:40,880 --> 00:16:43,320
Speaker 1: you build around this thing. And for me, I had

318
00:16:43,400 --> 00:16:46,560
Speaker 1: started to my background isn't working in tech. I worked

319
00:16:46,600 --> 00:16:50,200
Speaker 1: at Google, four squared, Microsoft before becoming a full time entrepreneur,

320
00:16:50,360 --> 00:16:52,560
Speaker 1: but I was working on the business and marketing side,

321
00:16:52,560 --> 00:16:55,200
Speaker 1: so I was not developing any apps, um, And I

322
00:16:55,280 --> 00:16:57,480
Speaker 1: was not planning to be an entrepreneur like you're saying,

323
00:16:57,560 --> 00:17:00,720
Speaker 1: I my plan originally was to climb the corporate ladder.

324
00:17:00,760 --> 00:17:03,640
Speaker 1: The only reason, the only reason that I built an

325
00:17:03,640 --> 00:17:05,959
Speaker 1: app was because I was working at the time at

326
00:17:05,960 --> 00:17:08,080
Speaker 1: Microsoft and I felt like there was a lot of

327
00:17:08,080 --> 00:17:13,280
Speaker 1: bureaucracy in my job and I wanted like another creative outlet,

328
00:17:13,760 --> 00:17:16,720
Speaker 1: that something I had control of more as opposed to

329
00:17:16,720 --> 00:17:18,919
Speaker 1: sort of like the politics playing that I was feeling

330
00:17:18,920 --> 00:17:21,960
Speaker 1: frustrated with at work. That's why I built my first app.

331
00:17:22,040 --> 00:17:25,359
Speaker 1: I wanted like another creative outlet, and I didn't have

332
00:17:25,520 --> 00:17:28,359
Speaker 1: those words at the time, and I can look back

333
00:17:28,400 --> 00:17:30,080
Speaker 1: and say, oh, that's what it was. I was just

334
00:17:30,119 --> 00:17:32,680
Speaker 1: looking for like something that I could like create and build.

335
00:17:32,720 --> 00:17:35,600
Speaker 1: I'd like to make things um But really I think

336
00:17:35,600 --> 00:17:38,040
Speaker 1: at the time, I just felt like I like to

337
00:17:38,040 --> 00:17:41,080
Speaker 1: solve hard problems. There was something about the challenge of

338
00:17:41,119 --> 00:17:43,720
Speaker 1: putting something out there into the world that I made

339
00:17:44,160 --> 00:17:46,399
Speaker 1: that feels cool and exciting and like, let me go

340
00:17:46,520 --> 00:17:49,320
Speaker 1: check that out. That's probably closer to the words that

341
00:17:49,400 --> 00:17:52,400
Speaker 1: I had at the time. And so I think that

342
00:17:52,600 --> 00:17:54,440
Speaker 1: I did not think of myself as an entrepreneur. I

343
00:17:54,440 --> 00:17:56,399
Speaker 1: don't think it's that important that when you start you

344
00:17:56,440 --> 00:17:59,679
Speaker 1: think of yourself as a hotshot entrepreneur. Um. But I

345
00:17:59,720 --> 00:18:02,399
Speaker 1: do think it's important that you think about how you're

346
00:18:02,400 --> 00:18:04,720
Speaker 1: going to make money with the business, and is this

347
00:18:04,840 --> 00:18:07,720
Speaker 1: an idea that people are willing to pay for? And

348
00:18:07,960 --> 00:18:13,280
Speaker 1: why is this idea a good use of my unfair advantage.

349
00:18:13,280 --> 00:18:15,439
Speaker 1: When I say unfair advantage, I mean something that you

350
00:18:15,760 --> 00:18:19,359
Speaker 1: already know something about. I often see entrepreneurs launch something

351
00:18:19,400 --> 00:18:22,439
Speaker 1: and they're like, no, absolutely nothing about the industry that

352
00:18:22,440 --> 00:18:24,640
Speaker 1: they're launching the app in or a launching the business.

353
00:18:24,680 --> 00:18:27,560
Speaker 1: And it's not a bad thing to do. It just

354
00:18:27,720 --> 00:18:30,600
Speaker 1: means you're not leveraging your unfair advantage, which is something

355
00:18:30,640 --> 00:18:32,600
Speaker 1: you already know something about. So those are all the

356
00:18:32,640 --> 00:18:35,720
Speaker 1: like business skills and things that surround the app that

357
00:18:35,800 --> 00:18:38,479
Speaker 1: many people who are non technical they already sort of

358
00:18:38,520 --> 00:18:43,000
Speaker 1: have as their common sense and are refining even more. Um,

359
00:18:43,040 --> 00:18:45,040
Speaker 1: those are the things that really make a big difference.

360
00:18:45,040 --> 00:18:47,000
Speaker 1: At least for me, has made a really big difference

361
00:18:47,000 --> 00:18:49,760
Speaker 1: in my business success. The app building piece has been

362
00:18:49,800 --> 00:18:52,080
Speaker 1: just an extra thing that has enabled me to have

363
00:18:52,680 --> 00:18:55,840
Speaker 1: reach and be able to enter tech in a different way. Yeah,

364
00:18:55,840 --> 00:18:58,040
Speaker 1: and let's go in there, because I wanted to ask

365
00:18:58,040 --> 00:19:00,600
Speaker 1: you this is how do I know, Like, what is

366
00:19:00,600 --> 00:19:03,960
Speaker 1: that process that you teach people on to say, how

367
00:19:03,960 --> 00:19:06,960
Speaker 1: to determine if this is a viable app idea in

368
00:19:07,000 --> 00:19:09,159
Speaker 1: the first place, Because so many people will come to

369
00:19:09,160 --> 00:19:11,920
Speaker 1: you be like I got an idea. What's the process

370
00:19:11,960 --> 00:19:14,160
Speaker 1: you go through to to walk them through and say,

371
00:19:14,320 --> 00:19:17,159
Speaker 1: let's find out if this is actually an idea versus

372
00:19:17,160 --> 00:19:20,200
Speaker 1: just something you and your mom said it was fantastic. Yeah,

373
00:19:20,280 --> 00:19:22,760
Speaker 1: that's right, that's right. Okay. So there's two parts to

374
00:19:22,800 --> 00:19:25,800
Speaker 1: the process. The first is just coming up with the

375
00:19:25,880 --> 00:19:27,760
Speaker 1: idea in the first place, and then the second is

376
00:19:27,800 --> 00:19:30,159
Speaker 1: exactly what you're mentioning, which is going to test it

377
00:19:30,200 --> 00:19:33,040
Speaker 1: and validate it to make sure this is something that

378
00:19:33,080 --> 00:19:35,840
Speaker 1: will make the kind of business that you want. So

379
00:19:35,960 --> 00:19:38,040
Speaker 1: the first step I usually encourage people like call it

380
00:19:38,080 --> 00:19:41,720
Speaker 1: a smart idea formula, but to walk through a series

381
00:19:41,800 --> 00:19:44,399
Speaker 1: of three questions for themselves to come up with an

382
00:19:44,440 --> 00:19:48,040
Speaker 1: app idea that leverages their unfair advantage in the first place.

383
00:19:48,560 --> 00:19:50,960
Speaker 1: So the first question to ask yourself is an easy one.

384
00:19:51,119 --> 00:19:53,120
Speaker 1: It's like what do I do for work? You could

385
00:19:53,119 --> 00:19:55,280
Speaker 1: also do the same process with what you do as

386
00:19:55,320 --> 00:19:59,199
Speaker 1: a hobby, So like, what's my hobby? Because starting there

387
00:19:59,240 --> 00:20:02,520
Speaker 1: allows us to build something around something you already know

388
00:20:02,680 --> 00:20:05,400
Speaker 1: something about. You know more about it than I do, right,

389
00:20:05,680 --> 00:20:09,200
Speaker 1: And so we start there. Then the second question is

390
00:20:09,800 --> 00:20:12,800
Speaker 1: what is one thing that is hard or time consuming

391
00:20:12,840 --> 00:20:15,239
Speaker 1: about what you do for work or what you do

392
00:20:15,320 --> 00:20:17,159
Speaker 1: for a hobby. We all have parts of our jobs

393
00:20:17,160 --> 00:20:18,879
Speaker 1: that were like, oh, I gotta do this part again,

394
00:20:18,920 --> 00:20:20,560
Speaker 1: it's just kind of like annoying, I've got to do

395
00:20:20,640 --> 00:20:23,720
Speaker 1: this right, or even things that your boss is complaining

396
00:20:23,760 --> 00:20:26,640
Speaker 1: about that you just repetitive prophecies, or things that are

397
00:20:26,680 --> 00:20:29,760
Speaker 1: hard or time consuming. Even if you're a full time parent,

398
00:20:29,920 --> 00:20:31,560
Speaker 1: right figuring out what your kids are going to be

399
00:20:31,600 --> 00:20:34,880
Speaker 1: doing for that day is harder time consuming. And so

400
00:20:35,000 --> 00:20:38,399
Speaker 1: the third question to ask yourself then is if you

401
00:20:38,560 --> 00:20:41,760
Speaker 1: built an app to alleviate that stress of the thing

402
00:20:41,800 --> 00:20:45,199
Speaker 1: that's harder time consuming, what could the app do and

403
00:20:45,200 --> 00:20:48,000
Speaker 1: to start brainstorming there, that's the place to sort of

404
00:20:48,000 --> 00:20:50,359
Speaker 1: focus your brain storm around around what you do for

405
00:20:50,440 --> 00:20:54,159
Speaker 1: work or hobby, something you know something about and what's harder,

406
00:20:54,160 --> 00:20:57,720
Speaker 1: time consuming and what you could build there. That's the

407
00:20:57,760 --> 00:21:00,240
Speaker 1: place to start. Another way to think about that, like

408
00:21:00,280 --> 00:21:03,040
Speaker 1: if I hired an assistant to help me with my

409
00:21:03,160 --> 00:21:05,760
Speaker 1: job what would I have them do? Because the chances

410
00:21:05,800 --> 00:21:08,320
Speaker 1: are whatever you would have them do, that's the thing

411
00:21:08,440 --> 00:21:11,439
Speaker 1: that you should build something around, so that points you

412
00:21:11,440 --> 00:21:13,840
Speaker 1: in the right direction. That's the first step. So let

413
00:21:13,920 --> 00:21:17,120
Speaker 1: let's talk about So let's say I have an app. Now, yeah,

414
00:21:17,119 --> 00:21:18,959
Speaker 1: how do I get people to download? Because it's one

415
00:21:18,960 --> 00:21:21,600
Speaker 1: thing to have the app, the whole other thing to

416
00:21:21,680 --> 00:21:27,920
Speaker 1: get people to actually quick download. Yes, absolutely, absolutely, So

417
00:21:28,119 --> 00:21:29,920
Speaker 1: I think that there are a couple of different really

418
00:21:29,920 --> 00:21:32,600
Speaker 1: good ways to get word out about your app. One

419
00:21:32,640 --> 00:21:35,760
Speaker 1: of the things that we do actually in our boot

420
00:21:35,760 --> 00:21:38,560
Speaker 1: camp program is we've teach people different ways to find

421
00:21:38,600 --> 00:21:41,720
Speaker 1: folks and communities of people on social media. So that

422
00:21:41,760 --> 00:21:45,360
Speaker 1: could be like faithbook groups that could be on LinkedIn.

423
00:21:45,560 --> 00:21:49,119
Speaker 1: People are all over the place, self identifying themselves on Twitter,

424
00:21:49,280 --> 00:21:51,920
Speaker 1: different things that they're posting about, and so we show

425
00:21:51,960 --> 00:21:54,399
Speaker 1: a lot of our students how to get those first

426
00:21:54,400 --> 00:21:57,280
Speaker 1: customers by reaching out in some of those places. But

427
00:21:57,359 --> 00:21:59,680
Speaker 1: you want to find where the hubs of your customers

428
00:21:59,680 --> 00:22:01,640
Speaker 1: are with means that you first have to get really

429
00:22:01,680 --> 00:22:04,960
Speaker 1: specific about who the heck they are. So if you're like, oh,

430
00:22:05,040 --> 00:22:07,359
Speaker 1: my app is for everyone, it's like that's one of

431
00:22:07,400 --> 00:22:10,520
Speaker 1: the number one rookie things that I hear people say, like, oh,

432
00:22:10,560 --> 00:22:14,560
Speaker 1: it's for everybody. You really want to be specific, because

433
00:22:14,600 --> 00:22:17,160
Speaker 1: when you're specific, you can go find those groups of people.

434
00:22:17,160 --> 00:22:19,399
Speaker 1: I guarantee you there's a Facebook group for that. I

435
00:22:19,440 --> 00:22:22,000
Speaker 1: guarantee you there's a meetup dot com group for that.

436
00:22:22,240 --> 00:22:24,199
Speaker 1: I guarantee you there's a bunch of people posting on

437
00:22:24,240 --> 00:22:26,760
Speaker 1: Twitter about that. And so those are some really good

438
00:22:26,760 --> 00:22:30,920
Speaker 1: places to find people. You should not assume that if

439
00:22:30,920 --> 00:22:32,640
Speaker 1: you put your app in the app store, people will

440
00:22:32,640 --> 00:22:35,320
Speaker 1: find you. That used to be the case when like

441
00:22:35,440 --> 00:22:37,720
Speaker 1: apps were first coming out an app store, just because

442
00:22:37,760 --> 00:22:40,440
Speaker 1: you were in the app store, you'd be discovered. Now

443
00:22:40,600 --> 00:22:42,600
Speaker 1: you're likely going to be at the very bottom of

444
00:22:42,640 --> 00:22:44,880
Speaker 1: the list, and so you should assume that you're doing

445
00:22:45,000 --> 00:22:47,560
Speaker 1: all of your own marketing and footwork and outreach to

446
00:22:47,560 --> 00:22:51,040
Speaker 1: get people to you. In fact, I actually usually encourage

447
00:22:51,080 --> 00:22:53,440
Speaker 1: the students that I work with, like, let's not even

448
00:22:53,520 --> 00:22:55,719
Speaker 1: worry about the app store for a minute. It's not

449
00:22:55,800 --> 00:22:58,120
Speaker 1: really going to help us. Let's launch a web app

450
00:22:58,200 --> 00:23:00,040
Speaker 1: so that someone can use it on any device, so

451
00:23:00,080 --> 00:23:03,119
Speaker 1: you can use it on iPhone, Android, BlackBerry, if you have,

452
00:23:03,200 --> 00:23:05,680
Speaker 1: on whatever device, because we're gonna have to give them

453
00:23:05,720 --> 00:23:09,480
Speaker 1: the link to it anyway. Um, how do you get

454
00:23:09,800 --> 00:23:15,440
Speaker 1: non technical people to specifically think about like utilizing existing

455
00:23:15,480 --> 00:23:17,840
Speaker 1: tech versus building their own thing, because there's so many

456
00:23:17,840 --> 00:23:19,680
Speaker 1: people like you, Like, there's things like if you're trying

457
00:23:19,720 --> 00:23:22,639
Speaker 1: to automate the process, you don't always have to build that.

458
00:23:22,680 --> 00:23:24,679
Speaker 1: You can use something like zappi are or you know, like,

459
00:23:24,720 --> 00:23:26,520
Speaker 1: how do you get them to think about, Okay, look,

460
00:23:26,640 --> 00:23:29,120
Speaker 1: if you're not really trying to build a situation off

461
00:23:29,119 --> 00:23:32,600
Speaker 1: of this and there's tech availance, let's probably figure out

462
00:23:32,720 --> 00:23:35,520
Speaker 1: to leverage tech that's already out here. Yeah. No, I

463
00:23:35,520 --> 00:23:38,880
Speaker 1: mean the foundation of everything that I do is leveraging

464
00:23:38,880 --> 00:23:41,080
Speaker 1: tech that's already out there. And I can give you

465
00:23:41,119 --> 00:23:47,480
Speaker 1: actually a story about this because my first app idea, UM,

466
00:23:47,520 --> 00:23:50,120
Speaker 1: I was working at Microsoft at the time, I had

467
00:23:50,160 --> 00:23:52,280
Speaker 1: just moved into a new apartment and I was thinking

468
00:23:52,320 --> 00:23:56,240
Speaker 1: about art in my home. And so my very first

469
00:23:56,240 --> 00:24:00,199
Speaker 1: startup was called Collecto, and I built an algorithm, Ultimate lead,

470
00:24:00,280 --> 00:24:03,480
Speaker 1: to match people to artwork based on their taste. But

471
00:24:03,600 --> 00:24:06,080
Speaker 1: when I first was starting, I was like, Okay, I

472
00:24:06,200 --> 00:24:09,119
Speaker 1: have a very few resources and very little budget to

473
00:24:09,119 --> 00:24:12,800
Speaker 1: get this going. So what existing tools can I use

474
00:24:12,880 --> 00:24:15,320
Speaker 1: to make this happen. And what I ended up doing

475
00:24:15,400 --> 00:24:18,840
Speaker 1: is I used a tool called survey GisMo, the surveying tool,

476
00:24:19,400 --> 00:24:23,159
Speaker 1: and surveys have this I U I used survey GisMo

477
00:24:23,200 --> 00:24:25,880
Speaker 1: in an unintended way, so this is not how you're

478
00:24:25,920 --> 00:24:28,080
Speaker 1: supposed to use survey GisMo, but it got me what

479
00:24:28,119 --> 00:24:32,720
Speaker 1: I needed. So surveys have like show hide logic. So

480
00:24:32,840 --> 00:24:35,520
Speaker 1: an example of this is like it'll ask you to

481
00:24:35,640 --> 00:24:37,880
Speaker 1: survey and I'll say what's your favorite color? And it's

482
00:24:37,920 --> 00:24:41,040
Speaker 1: multiple choice, and you say purple, and then it'll ask

483
00:24:41,119 --> 00:24:44,440
Speaker 1: you a follow up question. The next question is referencing

484
00:24:44,480 --> 00:24:48,200
Speaker 1: your answer, so it'll say, great, what do you Why

485
00:24:48,200 --> 00:24:51,040
Speaker 1: do you like purple? And what it's doing is it's

486
00:24:51,119 --> 00:24:54,160
Speaker 1: showing you the purple question and it's the purple follow

487
00:24:54,240 --> 00:24:56,720
Speaker 1: up question and it's hiding the blue follow up question.

488
00:24:57,000 --> 00:24:59,120
Speaker 1: That's what it's doing. It's showing and hiding the right thing.

489
00:24:59,680 --> 00:25:03,600
Speaker 1: So what I did was I used that technology, um

490
00:25:03,640 --> 00:25:06,960
Speaker 1: that show and hide component the survey to fill in

491
00:25:07,080 --> 00:25:10,439
Speaker 1: a bunch of art, pieces of art into the survey.

492
00:25:10,480 --> 00:25:12,520
Speaker 1: So each survey question was like a piece of art

493
00:25:12,560 --> 00:25:15,280
Speaker 1: and essentially, do you like this, yes or no? And

494
00:25:15,320 --> 00:25:17,640
Speaker 1: if people said that they liked photography, I would show

495
00:25:17,640 --> 00:25:20,400
Speaker 1: all the photography and hide everything else. Or if they

496
00:25:20,440 --> 00:25:25,119
Speaker 1: liked paintings that were abstract expressionist with a budget of

497
00:25:25,240 --> 00:25:27,320
Speaker 1: under five hundred dollars, I would show that and hide

498
00:25:27,320 --> 00:25:30,240
Speaker 1: everything else. So it was automatically doing the show and

499
00:25:30,320 --> 00:25:32,919
Speaker 1: hide logic. And that was the very first version of

500
00:25:32,960 --> 00:25:35,320
Speaker 1: the product. It was like not an actual app. It

501
00:25:35,400 --> 00:25:37,760
Speaker 1: was like a survey that I built. People actually thought

502
00:25:37,840 --> 00:25:39,360
Speaker 1: it was an app. People would respond to like, oh

503
00:25:39,359 --> 00:25:41,560
Speaker 1: my gosh, it's your app is so cool. And that

504
00:25:41,680 --> 00:25:44,199
Speaker 1: first version of the product that I built maybe my

505
00:25:44,240 --> 00:25:46,960
Speaker 1: first thirty five thousand dollars in revenue, and it also

506
00:25:47,040 --> 00:25:50,040
Speaker 1: got me a hundred thousand dollar investment from five hundred Startups,

507
00:25:50,160 --> 00:25:53,040
Speaker 1: just a top tech accelerator in Silicon Valley. Like I

508
00:25:53,080 --> 00:25:56,399
Speaker 1: remember my interview for a five hundred startups where we

509
00:25:56,440 --> 00:25:58,040
Speaker 1: got to the part where we were talking about the

510
00:25:58,040 --> 00:26:00,800
Speaker 1: tech because at that point I still was using that

511
00:26:00,960 --> 00:26:03,280
Speaker 1: survey tool to make my first money. We we moved

512
00:26:03,280 --> 00:26:06,800
Speaker 1: on to more sophisticated no code tools after that, um,

513
00:26:06,880 --> 00:26:10,040
Speaker 1: but I remember the part of the interview where they

514
00:26:10,160 --> 00:26:14,639
Speaker 1: asked me, you have a technical found co founder, like

515
00:26:14,720 --> 00:26:18,680
Speaker 1: who's developing this how's that part going? And I was like, Okay, Harry,

516
00:26:18,760 --> 00:26:20,280
Speaker 1: I've got to explain this. And I was kind of

517
00:26:20,320 --> 00:26:22,600
Speaker 1: nervous about it because at the time, even more so

518
00:26:22,640 --> 00:26:24,840
Speaker 1: than now, it was like, you have to have a

519
00:26:24,880 --> 00:26:28,520
Speaker 1: tech co founder, you have to have a CTO, and

520
00:26:28,600 --> 00:26:31,040
Speaker 1: that was the culture. And so I explained to them

521
00:26:31,080 --> 00:26:34,119
Speaker 1: how I used a survey and how we'd use existing

522
00:26:34,320 --> 00:26:37,240
Speaker 1: off the shelf tools, things that already existed to build

523
00:26:37,240 --> 00:26:39,760
Speaker 1: the product. And then I quickly pivoted it too, and

524
00:26:39,800 --> 00:26:41,960
Speaker 1: here's the revenue that we've made this far, and here's

525
00:26:42,000 --> 00:26:45,960
Speaker 1: all our excited customers, right. And I remember that the

526
00:26:46,080 --> 00:26:48,360
Speaker 1: partners who were in the interview, they looked at each

527
00:26:48,359 --> 00:26:51,679
Speaker 1: other and they nodded, because what was clear was it

528
00:26:51,760 --> 00:26:54,040
Speaker 1: this person was going to figure this out no matter what.

529
00:26:54,280 --> 00:26:56,000
Speaker 1: We can help her with the other stuff, but like,

530
00:26:56,119 --> 00:26:58,520
Speaker 1: she's got grit and she's gonna use the tools that

531
00:26:58,600 --> 00:27:00,399
Speaker 1: already are out there to figure it out. I think

532
00:27:00,440 --> 00:27:03,199
Speaker 1: it actually works to my advantage. And that was the

533
00:27:03,240 --> 00:27:06,280
Speaker 1: beginning of me looking at no code tools. I eventually

534
00:27:06,320 --> 00:27:09,239
Speaker 1: wanted to get more sophisticated and found other tools. At

535
00:27:09,240 --> 00:27:11,520
Speaker 1: the time, I use a tool called Bubble to build

536
00:27:11,520 --> 00:27:14,240
Speaker 1: the next version of the product um but that was

537
00:27:14,280 --> 00:27:16,959
Speaker 1: how I started. I use existing tools that were already

538
00:27:17,000 --> 00:27:21,520
Speaker 1: out there to get my first version built. It's particularly

539
00:27:21,520 --> 00:27:23,720
Speaker 1: and I've asked almost everybody in the podcast this question

540
00:27:23,720 --> 00:27:26,560
Speaker 1: because it's it's so important to me. It's particularly in

541
00:27:26,640 --> 00:27:30,359
Speaker 1: this moment um, this COVID you know, hopefully end of

542
00:27:30,400 --> 00:27:34,400
Speaker 1: COVID moment, this you know, um social unrest moment where

543
00:27:34,400 --> 00:27:37,560
Speaker 1: we're trying to figure out, you know, our new social discourse,

544
00:27:37,600 --> 00:27:40,040
Speaker 1: a new way of dealing with each other. How important

545
00:27:40,200 --> 00:27:43,960
Speaker 1: is this moment for black entrepreneurs who I'm looking for,

546
00:27:44,280 --> 00:27:47,840
Speaker 1: you know, opportunities to scale their business and looking for

547
00:27:47,920 --> 00:27:50,560
Speaker 1: opportunities to do business better. How important is it that

548
00:27:50,600 --> 00:27:53,240
Speaker 1: they don't miss out on the opportunity right now to

549
00:27:53,320 --> 00:27:56,720
Speaker 1: be able to do their thing? Oh man, I mean, so,

550
00:27:57,280 --> 00:28:06,480
Speaker 1: the reality is that during crisis and or recessions, that's

551
00:28:06,560 --> 00:28:11,280
Speaker 1: when people society, individuals in society make their next level up.

552
00:28:11,600 --> 00:28:14,479
Speaker 1: Like that's the reality of how wealth gets generated. So

553
00:28:14,560 --> 00:28:17,520
Speaker 1: people say that, like during a recession, you go from

554
00:28:17,600 --> 00:28:20,639
Speaker 1: economy to first class, or you go from first class

555
00:28:20,680 --> 00:28:23,119
Speaker 1: to a private jet, Like that's the opportunity, that's the

556
00:28:23,160 --> 00:28:26,640
Speaker 1: window is usually during a recession because things in industries

557
00:28:26,680 --> 00:28:29,920
Speaker 1: are all being shaken up, and so there's all this opportunity, right,

558
00:28:29,960 --> 00:28:33,720
Speaker 1: and so yes, you will not meet the opportunity at

559
00:28:33,760 --> 00:28:36,879
Speaker 1: every recession, in every crisis to make that jump, but

560
00:28:37,040 --> 00:28:40,240
Speaker 1: there are huge opportunities there, and so particularly for folks

561
00:28:40,240 --> 00:28:42,800
Speaker 1: of color, for black folks, like, we need to make

562
00:28:42,840 --> 00:28:45,800
Speaker 1: those jumps, right, We need to be thinking about those

563
00:28:45,800 --> 00:28:48,240
Speaker 1: opportunities and making the most out of those time periods.

564
00:28:48,240 --> 00:28:50,160
Speaker 1: Who I would say, even though we're sort of at

565
00:28:50,200 --> 00:28:53,480
Speaker 1: the hopefully end of this period, we're still in it.

566
00:28:54,000 --> 00:28:57,280
Speaker 1: And this is not the time to be like, you

567
00:28:57,320 --> 00:28:59,720
Speaker 1: know what, like I'm gonna play it safe, like I'm

568
00:28:59,720 --> 00:29:02,080
Speaker 1: just really not going to launch that thing that I've

569
00:29:02,080 --> 00:29:04,400
Speaker 1: been thinking of, Like this is the time for the risk.

570
00:29:04,480 --> 00:29:06,560
Speaker 1: It feel and it feels the opposite. That's the tricky

571
00:29:06,600 --> 00:29:09,760
Speaker 1: part about it. It feels like the time to be like,

572
00:29:09,800 --> 00:29:11,960
Speaker 1: you know what, let me not take risks right now.

573
00:29:12,000 --> 00:29:15,240
Speaker 1: A lot's going crazy in the world. No, this is

574
00:29:15,280 --> 00:29:18,560
Speaker 1: the time where actually people are making these seismic shifts

575
00:29:18,600 --> 00:29:23,160
Speaker 1: in their own income, wealth class, and so this is

576
00:29:23,200 --> 00:29:25,400
Speaker 1: the time, this is the moment right now for us

577
00:29:25,440 --> 00:29:26,840
Speaker 1: to be like, you know what, I'm gonna take a

578
00:29:26,880 --> 00:29:44,600
Speaker 1: staff at That Idea. Yeah. Black Tech Green Money is

579
00:29:44,600 --> 00:29:46,800
Speaker 1: a production of Black and the Afro Tech on the

580
00:29:46,840 --> 00:29:50,200
Speaker 1: Black Effect podcast network in My Heart Media and it's

581
00:29:50,240 --> 00:29:53,920
Speaker 1: produced by Morgan Dubon and Me with Lucas, with additional

582
00:29:53,960 --> 00:29:57,960
Speaker 1: production support by Love Beach, raveneer Boy. Special thank you

583
00:29:57,960 --> 00:30:00,400
Speaker 1: to Michael Davids since the car savan Yon you know

584
00:30:00,520 --> 00:30:03,920
Speaker 1: like the Wine. Yes that's his real name. Learn more

585
00:30:03,920 --> 00:30:06,280
Speaker 1: about my guests and other tech disruptres that innovators at

586
00:30:06,320 --> 00:30:09,520
Speaker 1: afrotech dot com. The video version of this episode would

587
00:30:09,560 --> 00:30:11,800
Speaker 1: drop the Black Tech Green Money on YouTube next week,

588
00:30:11,840 --> 00:30:14,960
Speaker 1: so tap in, enjoy your Black Tech Green Money, leave

589
00:30:15,040 --> 00:30:18,680
Speaker 1: us a five star rating on iTunes. Go get your money.

590
00:30:20,040 --> 00:30:20,680
Speaker 1: Peace of luck,