Speaker 1: Hey, guys, welcome to another episode of Eating While Broke.
Speaker 1: I'm your host, Colleen Witt, and today I'm very excited
Speaker 1: we have a very special guest we've met years ago.
Speaker 1: This is Abraham Jenkins, also known as AJ. So we
Speaker 1: will not be referring to you as Abraham throughout the episode.
Speaker 2: Whatever you want to call.
Speaker 1: Me Abraham AJ. Sorry, see I'm already messing up. AJ
Speaker 1: is the CEO of Launchpad Software. Yes, thank you, and
Speaker 1: can you give our guests a little insight of what
Speaker 1: launch Pad Software is.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I run a technology company. We're a software
Speaker 2: company that helps government agencies, nonprofit agencies improve the lives
Speaker 2: of people in the community. We work with a lot
Speaker 2: of large cities and states. Los Angeles here in LA
Speaker 2: is one of our customers and they use our software
Speaker 2: to help deliver job training services, employment services, homeless services,
Speaker 2: veteran services. So we're just trying to think of a smarter,
Speaker 2: more innovative way to get services to people in the community.
Speaker 2: And as an entrepreneur, technology was the first and best way.
Speaker 2: But yeah, the technical term is where a SAS company
Speaker 2: enterprise SaaS. For those business folks out there who are
Speaker 2: in the technology space, that's what we do. Anybody, if
Speaker 2: you're unemployed, or if you've got a single mom out
Speaker 2: there that maybe is housing and secure, or you have
Speaker 2: a young guy we call them opportunity youth that's dropped
Speaker 2: out of high school and needs some direction. There are
Speaker 2: a lot of programs out there that these individuals can
Speaker 2: get access to, and there's a lot of money that's
Speaker 2: being invested in these communities, and so what we try
Speaker 2: to do is use technology to make it easier for
Speaker 2: these individuals to get these services, whether it's through a
Speaker 2: mobile app, whether it's helping the nonprofits track all of
Speaker 2: those individuals. We our software is tracking probably in the
Speaker 2: tunes of several million individuals across the country internationally because
Speaker 2: we have customers in the UK and Bermuda. But essentially
Speaker 2: it's like you are falling on hard times. There is
Speaker 2: a social safety net out there, that's social safety nets
Speaker 2: at risk right now unfortunately, but there are billions of
Speaker 2: dollars being invested to help you, and we want to
Speaker 2: use technology to make it easier for people to get
Speaker 2: access to those services.
Speaker 1: Yes, but Launchpad, your actual client is like a nonprofit
Speaker 1: or a government agency, right, so what services do you
Speaker 1: provide for that agency.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So primarily we sell to government agencies, so state
Speaker 2: and local municipalities. I mentioned the city of Los Angeles.
Speaker 2: In fact, we have over three hundred government and nonprofit
Speaker 2: agencies across thirty five state that use our software and
Speaker 2: they A lot of this stuff is maybe more of
Speaker 2: the technical and bold. But you think of companies like Oracle.
Speaker 2: Oracle is the data base behind the Internet and now
Speaker 2: the database behind AI. You think of Amazon Aws as
Speaker 2: the cloud that runs all of your apps. Anytime you're
Speaker 2: getting these services from the community, there's a there's a
Speaker 2: cloud behind is a system behind it, and we're one
Speaker 2: of those systems.
Speaker 1: A cloud software applications. So you house all the data
Speaker 1: exactly okay, perfect, So you're like the encyclopedia behind a company,
Speaker 1: like the stuff that we don't want to see or
Speaker 1: be a part of, but you're the organization structure behind
Speaker 1: it exactly in the cloud technic technically speaking, it's.
Speaker 2: We're one hundred percent in the cloud. Yes, we're one
Speaker 2: hundred percent in the cloud. We've always been in the cloud.
Speaker 2: We were one of the first and that's why we
Speaker 2: were really successful. When I started the company Gosh eleven
Speaker 2: twelve years ago, we were one of the first to
Speaker 2: bring truly cloud SaaS software to government agencies. Now we're
Speaker 2: bringing AI into it, right, And think of it this way.
Speaker 2: When you go to the bank and you're want to
Speaker 2: know how much money is in your account or what
Speaker 2: investments you want to get, there's software that runs all
Speaker 2: of that.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: There's a great book out there called Software Eating the World. Right,
Speaker 2: So we're doing the same thing, but we're trying to
Speaker 2: do it to have a social good. Right. If you
Speaker 2: can have software that can help people with investments, get
Speaker 2: a mortgage, buy a house, get healthcare, we want to
Speaker 2: use the same strategy and technology to help people get
Speaker 2: job training, get if they're housing and secure, get into
Speaker 2: a house, get connected with grants, get job training or education.
Speaker 2: We're doing all of.
Speaker 1: That, but you guys catered to the companies, not the
Speaker 1: end user, right, Yes, so I would just for listeners,
Speaker 1: if you're in a housing deficit, you don't go on
Speaker 1: launch Pad software to find housing. There are agencies that
Speaker 1: support that are in business with you, and they're using
Speaker 1: your services, not actual individuals on the street.
Speaker 2: Well, actually, yeah, the individuals on the street are using
Speaker 2: our software. They just don't know it. So they're logging in,
Speaker 2: for example, like Detroit at work, the City of Detroit.
Speaker 2: They're logging in that website. All of that's powered by
Speaker 2: our company. Okay, yeah, so they're using it, and sometimes
Speaker 2: we have a little thing down there. But we are
Speaker 2: not trying to be the brand to the consumer. We
Speaker 2: want to help empower all of these agencies that are
Speaker 2: really it's their job to do the work. We want
Speaker 2: to empower them. So San Francisco's a job's portal. We
Speaker 2: log into the City of San Francisco's jobs portal, which
Speaker 2: is free. I don't want to say a competitor to
Speaker 2: Zip recruiter. It's an alternative. You log into SF jobs portal.
Speaker 2: That's launch Pad. Wow.
Speaker 1: That okay, now I have a better understanding, don't You're
Speaker 1: like what? I just want everyone to understand fully like
Speaker 1: what they're what Launchpad software really is, especially because, like
Speaker 1: you said, you're not branding yourself to the naked eye,
Speaker 1: so we really wouldn't know. But before we get into
Speaker 1: all that, I go ahead. I can feel and sense
Speaker 1: that oil is hot. But what are you going to
Speaker 1: have me eating today?
Speaker 2: Yes, so my understanding this is eating while broke yes,
Speaker 2: thank god, I'm no longer broke, but I can remember
Speaker 2: the days when I was starting, and so it is.
Speaker 2: I saw a lot of people having fancy meals on
Speaker 2: your show.
Speaker 1: There's a handful of them.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, we're not gonna I'm not trying to impress
Speaker 2: anybody with the food today because when but I think
Speaker 2: people will definitely relate. We're gonna be doing chicken tiketos
Speaker 2: today and we're gonna be cooking them, heating them up.
Speaker 2: You know, it's not so much about the prep of
Speaker 2: the food. I also want to highlight the condiments, what's
Speaker 2: easy to grab, what's easy, and also maybe what's not
Speaker 2: necessarily convenient, but what you had in your pantry, what
Speaker 2: you could afford. So we got chicken tiketos these do
Speaker 2: you want me to say where they came from? Are?
Speaker 2: Probably not?
Speaker 1: That's fine, yea.
Speaker 2: So chicken tiketos gonna we're gonna cook these. And then
Speaker 2: we've got obviously olive oil. I like to cook with
Speaker 2: olive oil, and I do a lot of cooking at home.
Speaker 2: But my kids will never eat this stuff. I'll give
Speaker 2: them chicken tiktos. They want salmon, they want yeah, and
Speaker 2: then we've got mayonnaise, so this is our sauce mayonnaise.
Speaker 2: And then we got we're in California, we got to
Speaker 2: have the top of to so we got top of
Speaker 2: t O.
Speaker 1: So it was just three ingredients. Yes, now I did
Speaker 1: notice that you weren't making them fresh, so I take
Speaker 1: it back in the day. They were frozen.
Speaker 2: Also, they were frozen also, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I
Speaker 2: was trying to understand who, when you're hustling and when
Speaker 2: we're trying to build a business, who has time to
Speaker 2: sit and cook. I gotta cook and I gotta go,
Speaker 2: got to keep going. And I remember we we specifically
Speaker 2: made these. I was living in a we had a
Speaker 2: three bedroom house. There was five guys. This is down
Speaker 2: in Orange County, the OC, and I was I just
Speaker 2: got out of I got my first sales job, and
Speaker 2: all of the guys that were living with me, my
Speaker 2: brother was there. My brother shout out to Jeremy. He's
Speaker 2: a college university profession now PhD in math. We we
Speaker 2: were all just trying to hustle, so it was like, hey,
Speaker 2: what can we buy. It's cheap. We bought the big
Speaker 2: box at Taketo's, and all five guys would eat. We'd
Speaker 2: take the taketos, throw them out, cook them, eat them up.
Speaker 2: I literally we all sit down like a family meal.
Speaker 2: We'd have the mayonnaise and the hot sauce, okay, and
Speaker 2: we'd have I won't tell you what we're drinking, but
Speaker 2: you know this is what we ate.
Speaker 1: Okay. So I get started, Go ahead and get started,
Speaker 1: because lunchtime in.
Speaker 2: Real time, guys, it's real time. That is right. Lunch today,
Speaker 2: that is right. And one of the things I love you.
Speaker 2: First of all, I'm originally from Oregon, Portland, Oregon, but
Speaker 2: I really grew up in southern California. I love Mexican food.
Speaker 2: I love Mexican food. My team will tell you. It's
Speaker 2: like I've always wanted tacos or tiketos.
Speaker 1: I like flouters. I was excited because originally I thought
Speaker 1: you got to do flous and I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: I love them.
Speaker 2: Oh no, I'm sorry, sorry, I.
Speaker 1: Was going to learn how to make them today. I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: disappoint Yeah, that'll be for another day.
Speaker 2: Another day. I think you got to have another spin
Speaker 2: off of eating while not eating.
Speaker 1: I know everyone wants to do the luxury, the luxury,
Speaker 1: you know, I should do it because I'd probably lobs
Speaker 1: during crab all the good food.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, so I'm probably putting too many in here.
Speaker 1: No, that's good, and I'll turn the heat out, Yes
Speaker 1: for sure. I know you already started talking about this,
Speaker 1: about you and your four other buddies living in this house.
Speaker 1: You said that this was when you got one of
Speaker 1: your first sales jobs. So I take you and your
Speaker 1: buddies weren't working on Launchpad. No, it was Launchpad even
Speaker 1: a concept at that point.
Speaker 2: It wasn't. No, I started my first company. So this
Speaker 2: is my third company that I've had and sold my
Speaker 2: first one. Second company was more of consulting. I didn't start.
Speaker 2: I started that in two thousand and six. So this
Speaker 2: is and I'm dating myself, but we're going back to
Speaker 2: the nineties here. We were fresh out of high school.
Speaker 2: Dropped out of high school. We'll get into that later.
Speaker 2: Actually I didn't drop out. They kicked me out. I'll
Speaker 2: make that distinction. But no, it was I was working
Speaker 2: a So the backstory was in high school, I was
Speaker 2: a troublemaker. Hands down. My son's here. I gotta be
Speaker 2: careful what I say.
Speaker 1: No, say it all.
Speaker 2: I gotta say it all. Yeah, so I did not
Speaker 2: have a good high school experience. I was. I grew
Speaker 2: up in a single parent household, my mom my dad, unfortunately,
Speaker 2: and both my parents have passed. My mom actually passed
Speaker 2: away back in July. Yeah, you said people might cry
Speaker 2: on this episode. That will get me going. But grew
Speaker 2: up in a single mom household. My mom raised five
Speaker 2: kids on her own. She was disabled. She had a
Speaker 2: brain aneurysm, and it was undiagnosed until nineteen ninety five.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, she moved, We moved from.
Speaker 1: What are the side effects of a brain asroom? How
Speaker 1: she was undiagnosed for so long.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Probably the most famous person who had a brain
Speaker 2: aneurysm that we could remember recently as doctor dre If
Speaker 2: anybody remembers, he was rushed to the hospital a few
Speaker 2: years ago basically was having intense pain or I don't
Speaker 2: know the symptoms that he was experiencing, but she was.
Speaker 1: But your mom was experiencing symptoms like pain and all
Speaker 1: that pain while she was raising the five kids. Yes, wow, Yes,
Speaker 1: And then your father, just a lightly touch on did
Speaker 1: he passed when you guys were young or something?
Speaker 2: No, my dad passed in twenty ten and my dad
Speaker 2: was an ex football player, played for and my uncle
Speaker 2: both played for Arizona State. They were they're both in
Speaker 2: the Hall of Fame bart and John Jenkins, and my
Speaker 2: dad then went both of them got drafted to the
Speaker 2: NFL early early days. So I'd sell this is this
Speaker 2: was leather helmet days. I'm the youngest. I'm actually I
Speaker 2: have a blended family. I'm a mixed race for both
Speaker 2: mixed race. Yeah, yeah, I got a blended family. And
Speaker 2: he so he was drafted Chicago Bears and played a
Speaker 2: couple of years and wanted to get into urban planning.
Speaker 2: So he got his degree from Arizona State and eventually
Speaker 2: found his way up to Oregon and met my mom
Speaker 2: and all that. But yeah, he was around, but he
Speaker 2: wasn't in my life type of thing.
Speaker 1: Okay, So he was around your mom was, I guess
Speaker 1: you got they were separated from early.
Speaker 2: On or my parents never married. They I remember probably
Speaker 2: my dad was in the house till I was about
Speaker 2: five years old. And my dad was a wonderful person
Speaker 2: and just an amazing, beautiful person. I think I got
Speaker 2: a lot of my definitely got my entrepreneurial bug from him. Okay,
Speaker 2: and because he started different ventures and different things. And
Speaker 2: also from both my parents, I got the passion for
Speaker 2: help in the community because my mom, when she was
Speaker 2: healthy actually in the sixties, marched with Seesar chabez Andelos
Speaker 2: witha in the farm workers movement. But yeah, my parents
Speaker 2: never married. We were grew up in Portland. In fact,
Speaker 2: when I was born, and I was born with a
Speaker 2: disability as well, it's nothing that was, but I was
Speaker 2: born with what I won't get too much into it,
Speaker 2: but it was resolved at birth. But I was in
Speaker 2: the hospital for six months and then when I got
Speaker 2: out of the hospital, my mom and the family we
Speaker 2: didn't have a place to live, so we lived in
Speaker 2: a woman's shelter up in northeast Portland for many years
Speaker 2: or not many years, but we lived there for several months.
Speaker 1: Okay, And I take this as before your dad was
Speaker 1: in the NFL.
Speaker 2: Or yeah, because I'm the youngest of okay, Yeah, so
Speaker 2: my dad he was in the NFL in like the
Speaker 2: early seventies, Okay, because I'm the youngest of eleven and
Speaker 2: so yeah, my dad had.
Speaker 1: Eleven eleven kids and then five of them with your mom.
Speaker 2: No, two of them were with my mom. My mom
Speaker 2: had three other kids with other marriages.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, okay, so blended, definitely blended family. Okay, Okay,
Speaker 1: you were saying blended, I thought you meant a biracial
Speaker 1: that too. That's what I was thinking about. Okay. So
Speaker 1: now we have a gist of your upbringing. You say,
Speaker 1: now in high school you are a little bit of
Speaker 1: a challenge. Can you can do? You know where that
Speaker 1: challenging side of you came from?
Speaker 2: Yeah, one hundred percent. So I'm the stereotypical grew up
Speaker 2: with ADHD kid, you know what I mean. I was
Speaker 2: like getting I got kicked out of I got expelled
Speaker 2: or kicked out of every school, kindergarten. They gave me
Speaker 2: my own desk or office in kindergarten, like when all
Speaker 2: the kids were playing on the jungle gym and stuff.
Speaker 2: I had a cubicle in the kitchen at kindergarten.
Speaker 1: And then did they know you had ADHD at the time. No,
Speaker 1: you discovered that later.
Speaker 2: This was the eighties. It was just he was the
Speaker 2: bad kid, he was the troublemaker and so yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: and then in second grade they that school kicked me
Speaker 2: out and I had to go to what was called
Speaker 2: a farm school, and this is out in Oregon Portland,
Speaker 2: and so it was a little more rural, rural. And
Speaker 2: I went to a farm school for a year and
Speaker 2: it was like we had cows and it was in
Speaker 2: a farmhouse and these were all the quote unquote bad kids.
Speaker 2: And went there for about a year and then I
Speaker 2: went back to the school that I was at, and
Speaker 2: then the family at that part started breaking apart. My
Speaker 2: dad left I was six or seven. He was in
Speaker 2: and out of the house, like permanently left, and my
Speaker 2: mom at that point decided we were living pretty hand
Speaker 2: in mouth. At that point, we were living in my
Speaker 2: grandfather's house. But it was like an old house that
Speaker 2: was like literally was needed to be condemned. It was
Speaker 2: like they're going to tear this house down. So my
Speaker 2: mom was trying to figure out, like what to do.
Speaker 2: I know, she got a little bit of mone from
Speaker 2: the selling of that house because her and her siblings
Speaker 2: had owned the property and so they sold it. Got
Speaker 2: a little bit of money from that, and with that
Speaker 2: we lived on that for about a year. We moved
Speaker 2: to an apartment in Lake Oswego, Oregon. If anybody my
Speaker 2: Oregon folks out there, and I remember going to that apartment.
Speaker 2: We had no furniture. We had one TV in the corner,
Speaker 2: and my brother and I slept on mats on the floor.
Speaker 2: We couldn't afford furniture. Yeah, and so yeah, that it
Speaker 2: was for us. It was adventurous.
Speaker 1: Your mom positioned it as we're going through a new adventure.
Speaker 1: She didn't highlight that you guys were struggling.
Speaker 2: We always struggled. There was no frame of reference of
Speaker 2: not struggling. Yeah, I mean, it wasn't like, oh, this
Speaker 2: was just my mom's Hey, this is what we're doing.
Speaker 2: We're going to move through this apartment. And what she
Speaker 2: was doing actually, which was amazing, I'm gonna grab my
Speaker 2: water down here, which was I think, which was a
Speaker 2: blessing and really what I think my mom for my
Speaker 2: mom was a scrappy Scottish woman. She was like that
Speaker 2: time she actually worked as a computer engineer. She was
Speaker 2: one of the first software engineers for this company called Tectronics,
Speaker 2: and they literally told her they didn't hire women, and
Speaker 2: she just pushed and pushed her way into this job. Paul,
Speaker 2: while she had this brain aneurysm that was undiagnosed. Mom
Speaker 2: found a way, you know what I mean, I really
Speaker 2: see it as like the beginning of this California dream
Speaker 2: for us because my mom was dealing with and I
Speaker 2: mentioned earlier off camera. My mom passed away in July,
Speaker 2: and she was eighty four years old, and I think
Speaker 2: the story of her life was her bringing us out
Speaker 2: of Oregon. Nothing wrong with Oregon. I love Orgon, it's
Speaker 2: my roots. But she brought us to California, and this
Speaker 2: California dream just became a reality. We were I know
Speaker 2: she was going through depression while she was up there
Speaker 2: taking care of us. My oldest brother was out of
Speaker 2: the house. He was like sixteen at the time or
Speaker 2: something on his own. My two sisters, who are half sisters,
Speaker 2: their father was abusive, and so she left that and
Speaker 2: tried to get the girls, but lost the girls and
Speaker 2: was not able to get them my older sisters, so
Speaker 2: they became alienated from my mom. And my older brother, Tristan,
Speaker 2: who's an amazing guy, said to my mom, and he
Speaker 2: said this at the funeral. He said, he calls her Gene.
Speaker 2: He said, Gene, you've got to take care of these
Speaker 2: other boys, these two boys that you have, me and
Speaker 2: my brother Jeremy. And so she applied to schools all
Speaker 2: throughout the United States to study get her master's degree
Speaker 2: and a PhD. One because she's an academic. She loved
Speaker 2: to teach. And then two she knew that it would
Speaker 2: be a livelihood that she would be able to take
Speaker 2: care of us because she would get school loans and yeah,
Speaker 2: and we wouldn't be on the streets anymore. So she
Speaker 2: applied to three universities, or she got accepted to three
Speaker 2: Texas University of Texas, Santa Barbara, and UC Irvine. Okay,
Speaker 2: And my uncle, her brother at the time, had a business.
Speaker 2: He was also in technology space. He had a software
Speaker 2: company that he started in Irvine, and he said, you
Speaker 2: need to come to Irvine. You need to come down
Speaker 2: here to Irvine. Shout out to Irvine, the IVC, Yeah,
Speaker 2: the Tech Post.
Speaker 1: I have a cousin that went to that school.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you see, I shout out. And it was just
Speaker 2: amazing because I remember one day we packed everything up
Speaker 2: in the back of a nineteen seventy six Volvo and
Speaker 2: did one of those small little U haul trailers. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and we're She's like, all right, we're leaving. And she
Speaker 2: didn't tell my dad, she didn't tell anybody. She just
Speaker 2: packed everything up, me and my brother, Like they said,
Speaker 2: the older the other kids are out of the house,
Speaker 2: and we just drove down from Oregon, down the five,
Speaker 2: down the one on one, all these little scenic routes.
Speaker 2: I just remember driving through these little towns and stuff.
Speaker 2: And I remember one time my mom saying, she's just
Speaker 2: she's the guys, I spent all the money we have
Speaker 2: on this. She's we're gonna make it. Wow, We're gonna
Speaker 2: make it.
Speaker 1: Did you guys end up going to live with your
Speaker 1: uncle at that point?
Speaker 2: I never lived with my uncle. Oh, okay, No, I
Speaker 2: never I lived while my mom was stuff ready. Yeah, No,
Speaker 2: she took us with her.
Speaker 1: No, she took you guys. But it's Irvine. But you
Speaker 1: said your uncle had a company out there.
Speaker 2: Oh no, no, I didn't go because he had a
Speaker 2: company out there in the eighties and then he sold
Speaker 2: it his share and then moved to San Diego.
Speaker 1: Okay, but she came closer this way.
Speaker 2: I recommended coming to Irvine. He was, so they had
Speaker 2: a conversation. She came down. In fact, this earlier in
Speaker 2: the summer, if I recall, she came down to San Diego,
Speaker 2: and I went and stayed with my dad for a summer,
Speaker 2: which was an amazing It was like that's where I
Speaker 2: really started to connect with my pops.
Speaker 1: Okay, but technology seems to be running fluid in your family.
Speaker 2: I think technology does. I come from a family of
Speaker 2: builders though my construction My dad was an urban planner
Speaker 2: development over him. When I did have time with him,
Speaker 2: we would drive around. At least I didn't go and
Speaker 2: I would drive around. He would drive me around in
Speaker 2: his pickup truck and we'd drive around MLK Boulevard and
Speaker 2: all and he'd have these houses that he's designing or
Speaker 2: building and stuff. And we had success with some things.
Speaker 2: He never had breakout, Yeah, multi million dollar business, but
Speaker 2: he got houses built. And what I got from my dad, Colleen,
Speaker 2: was he never tried to just do it for a profit.
Speaker 2: He built houses. He wanted to train people. In fact,
Speaker 2: I remember he would take me and he would go
Speaker 2: and get homeless guys and teach them the construction trade
Speaker 2: nice and put them on the job nice.
Speaker 1: I like that. Yeah, So let's skip ahead. So you
Speaker 1: getting your first sales job. We skipped high school. High school,
Speaker 1: you were labeled, I'm guessing a problem child.
Speaker 2: So I not just a problem child. In high school.
Speaker 2: I got arrested four times in one year in high school, Okay,
Speaker 2: and it was And I'm just saying this because I'll
Speaker 2: say the message that I want to do and people
Speaker 2: I really want to speak to are those young kids
Speaker 2: who are feel like they're on the wrong path. I
Speaker 2: really want them to understand that sometimes there's a turning
Speaker 2: point in your life. And so I got arrested four times,
Speaker 2: and I got arrested on school. That was the it
Speaker 2: for me. It was my junior year. Got into a fight,
Speaker 2: was running with I would say I was running with
Speaker 2: the right crowd for sure. These are guys that I
Speaker 2: still hang out with today. But because we were black
Speaker 2: and brown, we were in a community that didn't look
Speaker 2: we didn't look like that Irvine. They and I got
Speaker 2: into a fight and the teacher tried to break it up,
Speaker 2: and the teacher claimed I punched him, and I don't
Speaker 2: recall doing that, but I'm just going to say I
Speaker 2: didn't do the right thing. Yeah, And so we left,
Speaker 2: all of us just scattered. I came back to the
Speaker 2: school and the principal pulled me into the office and said, hey,
Speaker 2: we just want you to wait. We want to find
Speaker 2: out what's going on? They didn't. They called my mom,
Speaker 2: but they didn't let my mom see me. And I
Speaker 2: waited till the end of school to get out, right
Speaker 2: until the bell rang. The bell rang, police officers walked in,
Speaker 2: handcuffed me, purp walked me in front of the entire school,
Speaker 2: my girlfriend at the time, my friends, they were just shocked.
Speaker 2: And I got arrested. That was like my fourth arrest,
Speaker 2: I don't remember. And they I had like a literally
Speaker 2: like a hearing at the school. It was a I
Speaker 2: don't know what you call it, like a court case,
Speaker 2: and they said you're expelled from high school. And I
Speaker 2: was sixteen years old, and I'm like, what the heck? Like,
Speaker 2: I didn't want to leave high school. Yeah, I was
Speaker 2: a terrible student. I didn't study. I was d's and f's,
Speaker 2: but I didn't want to leave. Yeah, So I got
Speaker 2: expelled and they, fortunately my mom at the time and
Speaker 2: some other guidance people, I got put into a school
Speaker 2: with the gang members and the pregnant students, and there
Speaker 2: was a teacher there. Her name was Marcy, and she
Speaker 2: was like, AJ, you're different, you don't need to be here,
Speaker 2: and she mentored me and literally from then on I
Speaker 2: got straight a's.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: Straight a's. I never had as in my life.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: And come to find out, and we talked about the
Speaker 2: ADHD thing. I was evaluated when I was in first grade,
Speaker 2: and they said, yeah, he's got behavioral issues, he's got
Speaker 2: all this. I was two grades I tested in first grade,
Speaker 2: two grades ahead in math and language. But all along
Speaker 2: everybody told me I was a bad kid.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you started to really believe that.
Speaker 2: You believe it, you become it. You're trying to survive
Speaker 2: how people.
Speaker 1: Are receiving you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the teachers are treating you that sort of thing.
Speaker 2: So I started getting straight a's and I'm like, I
Speaker 2: was doing all my own. I'm like, this is easy. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and fortune I did so well that year I went
Speaker 2: to the other high school in Irvine and I reapplied
Speaker 2: and they gave me a shot. They said, well, it
Speaker 2: was Irvine High School. I'm gonna put people on blast
Speaker 2: year University high School and Irvine expelled me, guys, but
Speaker 2: Irvine High School said, hey, we're going to give you
Speaker 2: a shot. And that was an amazing year for me
Speaker 2: because not only then I got straight a's in high
Speaker 2: school like a normal high school. I had two jobs.
Speaker 2: I worked a job in the morning and buildings. I
Speaker 2: went to school, and then I worked a job in
Speaker 2: the evening, and I bought a car, and I was
Speaker 2: the first one in all of my crew, literally because
Speaker 2: my mom said, hey, we were on welfare all this time,
Speaker 2: and she's I don't want you guys on welfare when
Speaker 2: this summer I was seventeen. She said, you guys have
Speaker 2: to move out. So I was seventeen when I graduated
Speaker 2: high school. I graduated when I was seventeen.
Speaker 1: She didn't watch a welfare but she kicked you all out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, She's like, you got to go make your own way. Okay,
Speaker 2: So my my brother came to me, and he's because
Speaker 2: he had graduated a year earlier. He is a year older.
Speaker 2: I told you, I like stuff overcook So I'm going
Speaker 2: to turn this down, probably turn it off.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I had a job. I just bought my first
Speaker 2: car h school and paid cash and had a couple
Speaker 2: other little businesses I was doing. And I graduated high school.
Speaker 2: I had an apartment my first we had four guys
Speaker 2: in there. Yeah, but I had my own apartment. I
Speaker 2: had two jobs, I had a car, Like I was doing,
Speaker 2: I was doing. Never looked back.
Speaker 1: All right, So that the lady that mentored you are
Speaker 1: do you still have a decent relationship with her.
Speaker 2: I don't know where she's at, but she was.
Speaker 1: A pivotal yeah, point in your life. I'm sure your
Speaker 1: mom was just beyond relieve that someone cracked.
Speaker 2: The code exactly. Yes, she said, something clicked because I
Speaker 2: got arrested the year before, I got arrested in Santa Ana.
Speaker 2: I got arrested in Irvine twice. I got arrested. I
Speaker 2: told you what on college campus or on my high
Speaker 2: school campus. I don't like to say this, but I was.
Speaker 2: I was at a I threw a party out in
Speaker 2: Orange County, and I was always in the scene and a
Speaker 2: lot of music. Loved hip hop, and unfortunately, one of
Speaker 2: the guys that came there, we had a bunch of
Speaker 2: gangsters that came and one of the guys got killed
Speaker 2: at my party.
Speaker 1: Oh no, that's not good.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's not good. No. I watched. I was sixteen
Speaker 2: years old, and I watched this young guy. In fact,
Speaker 2: I was like talking to him before the party, and
Speaker 2: I watched this young guy get murdered. And my brother
Speaker 2: and I we tried to save them, and there was
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna say which gang or whatever of that,
Speaker 2: but there was a bunch of gangsters around and I
Speaker 2: pulled my brother and said, we're not like, we can't
Speaker 2: do anything. Yeah, And so I was in a lot
Speaker 2: of I would say the devil or whatever it was,
Speaker 2: definitely had was trying to pull me back. So life
Speaker 2: is crazy. Yeah, life is crazy.
Speaker 1: So after the high school you start pivoting your life
Speaker 1: in a positive direction, where does the entrepreneurship start to
Speaker 1: creep in because you're working jobs.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think I'm one of those that was born
Speaker 2: an entrepreneur because I had businesses, like official businesses where
Speaker 2: I register corporation. I didn't do till I was twenty
Speaker 2: three point four, but I had businesses all throughout height.
Speaker 2: I was that kid in school that was selling something
Speaker 2: to somebody.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I would say I was born an entrepreneur.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And at this point, you're on your own, you're living
Speaker 1: with these guys, you have your first sales job. At
Speaker 1: what point does entrepreneur twenty three twenty four start taking over?
Speaker 2: Yeah? It was so I worked at a job in
Speaker 2: high school. It's FedEx now, not the delivery part, but
Speaker 2: like the office part, and it used to be called Kinkos.
Speaker 2: And I got a job that summer that I was
Speaker 2: out of school, or that year that I was doing
Speaker 2: homeschool and applied and I went in there every day
Speaker 2: for like weeks actually his months. And another lady by
Speaker 2: the name of Marci. I don't know what it is
Speaker 2: with Marcy's our angels out there, but she's, man, you
Speaker 2: just keep coming in here. We can't get rid of you.
Speaker 2: And I'm like, I'm just looking for a job. And
Speaker 2: so they created a job for me and I would
Speaker 2: be working on the copying machines, I clean up, I
Speaker 2: did all of these things. I saw. The guy who
Speaker 2: owned he Kinkos was owned by another guy in Santa
Speaker 2: Barbara and he sold it for over a billion dollars.
Speaker 2: But there was a friend. There was a group of
Speaker 2: Kinkos in Orange County that were privately owned by another group.
Speaker 2: Guy's name was Rolin and oh gosh, Rollin and Charlotte,
Speaker 2: I think, not quite sure. They lived in Laguna Beach. Yes,
Speaker 2: Rollin would walk in and he was like this six
Speaker 2: foot nine tall, older white guy with a ponytail, and
Speaker 2: literally would have a stash of one hundred dollars bills
Speaker 2: his sert pocket. I'm like, who does that? And so
Speaker 2: I would meet Rolin. I'm like, I'm like asking questions
Speaker 2: and all that, and he just pull out one hundred
Speaker 2: dollars bills to pay for stuff. And he had these
Speaker 2: two other guys that would come in and they were
Speaker 2: dressed in like nice shirts and ties, and I'm like,
Speaker 2: I want to be like these guys. And I would
Speaker 2: and I'd ask, we're all on, what do they do?
Speaker 2: And they're at sales? Oh, yeah, they're in sales. And
Speaker 2: I'm like, okay. And then my mom said to me
Speaker 2: one time, she said, hey, she goes, you need to
Speaker 2: go into sales because one day you'll be a CEO.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: And when I won't get into my mom's relationship, we
Speaker 2: were not we were close because she provided for us,
Speaker 2: we weren't. I think she had lost a lot in
Speaker 2: her life pustionally, and so we were not close emotionally.
Speaker 2: But the one thing she said to me, she's you
Speaker 2: need to go into sales because I think you could
Speaker 2: be you be an entrepreneur. Yeah, And that was the spark.
Speaker 1: And looking at that statement, that's a very I think,
Speaker 1: very factual statement that if you are going to go
Speaker 1: into entrepreneurship, being able to sell is definitely like a
Speaker 1: number one skill.
Speaker 2: You gotta sell something you got.
Speaker 1: You got to be able to sell you all.
Speaker 2: I've got to sell and sell yourself.
Speaker 1: Okay, so you're in sales's okay, your first company? What
Speaker 1: is that first company?
Speaker 2: Yeah? So that was launch Pad Career. There was a
Speaker 2: staffing company I started in two thousand and six, okay,
Speaker 2: and I had worked in. I got into staffing worked
Speaker 2: in so anybody who's familiar staffing, it's employment services. It's
Speaker 2: helping people find jobs, very related to what we do now.
Speaker 2: And I worked at this company since two thousand built
Speaker 2: myself up. Actually became the top sales rep in the country.
Speaker 2: They had an annual war and I had no idea.
Speaker 2: I got invited to this thing in Newport Beach and
Speaker 2: it was out at the Higatt in Newport Beach. They
Speaker 2: surprised me. The CEO of the company called my name out.
Speaker 2: He's their top sales rep, Abraham Jenkins. I'm like what Yeah,
Speaker 2: I was blowing like like this is crazy. He did
Speaker 2: really well in sales, and I'm like, I want to
Speaker 2: start my own company. So I went to the owner
Speaker 2: of the company, or not the owner. Bob McDonald was
Speaker 2: the owner of Remedy Staffing. He had passed away. Paul
Speaker 2: Mike Has took over as the chairman, and then Greg Palmer,
Speaker 2: who was a mentor of mine, was the president and COO,
Speaker 2: and I went I approached them and I'm like, hey,
Speaker 2: I want to own I want to buy a franchise.
Speaker 2: I'm like, I know you got franchises. I want to
Speaker 2: buy one. I went around and raised money to buy
Speaker 2: the franchise, tried to negotiate with a couple of locations,
Speaker 2: and the Las Vegas location was the one that became
Speaker 2: like the best chance. I had everything ready to buy
Speaker 2: this franchise. I had the money lined up, I had
Speaker 2: the systems, I had where I was going to go,
Speaker 2: all of that, and then last minute the guy pulled out,
Speaker 2: he's I don't want to sell. Oh no, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: That must have been devastating. So then my guess is
Speaker 1: that's when you were like, ah, now that I raised
Speaker 1: the money, might as well going business for myself exactly.
Speaker 2: And my investor at the time was still it was
Speaker 2: also an investor in my software company. Let's just do
Speaker 2: our own thing.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: So I packed up everything, drove out to Las Vegas
Speaker 2: where we were going to open up, and like literally
Speaker 2: drove out to got an apartment, drove out, and then
Speaker 2: the next day I'm out there calling on businesses And.
Speaker 1: Did you become that guy's competitor at that point? Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: did you put him out of business? No? Today I
Speaker 1: had to go for God, but you became his competitor.
Speaker 1: So okay, yeah, that's good. That's good enough. Are you
Speaker 1: going to feed me today?
Speaker 2: I'm waiting for you to say feed us. Okay, So
Speaker 2: let me give me your plate, and I probably should
Speaker 2: taste it first to make sure.
Speaker 1: That it's ready to go, but I'm pretty sure it's good.
Speaker 2: I'm start with you. I gotta do the condiments and
Speaker 2: all that stuff. We got to do the whole thing.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna stand up again.
Speaker 1: Okay, you're going to stand up?
Speaker 2: Okay, all right? All right? Yeah, put that there. Let
Speaker 2: me get your plate ready. So back to the food,
Speaker 2: chicken teketos. I'm excited about this because I would eat
Speaker 2: this today.
Speaker 1: You go today.
Speaker 2: So the mayonnaise, Okay, again, this is not fancy food.
Speaker 2: Anybody out there thinks if you're struggling, you're having fancy
Speaker 2: food here.
Speaker 1: I'll try to do it on this plate too. This
Speaker 1: is your plate, I know, I'll just okay, so you
Speaker 1: got the mayo.
Speaker 2: Got the mayo. Look, top of tier makes everything better.
Speaker 2: Top of TiO if you want to. If you want
Speaker 2: to sponsor me, we're playing down for that. Yeah. I'm
Speaker 2: loyal to brands. I am very loyal to brands, and
Speaker 2: I'm just gonna show you just as well. If you
Speaker 2: can't get Top of TiO, go get yourself some delferno
Speaker 2: from Del Taco. Ok Look, I got my.
Speaker 1: Brain, brought all the ingredients I brought.
Speaker 2: I brought all the ingredients. I asked for extra. If
Speaker 2: you are struggling, don't go out and buy Top of TiO.
Speaker 2: Go to Del Taco, get yourself a seventy nine cent
Speaker 2: or a dollar twenty nine taco and ask for extras.
Speaker 1: Nowadays they charge for these extra sauces, do they? I think? So?
Speaker 2: Okay, that's up here in LA in Orange County, we
Speaker 2: still give state away.
Speaker 1: They sail charge and ask for extra anything.
Speaker 2: Yes, okay, let me get this was your plate?
Speaker 1: Okay, hair, let's switch and I put do.
Speaker 2: You like spicy food? Because that delferno is a little bit.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna try it. I'm just gonna mix it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you can mix it up. I'm gonna put delferno
Speaker 2: on mine.
Speaker 1: I'm hungry and I'm excited to eat these. Even though
Speaker 1: I thought these were gonna be freshly made. It's fine.
Speaker 2: I could have made him fresh you know what I
Speaker 2: could have gone. That would have taken longer us.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't know. I'm gonna go like this.
Speaker 2: You're doing that the right way?
Speaker 1: Is that how you do it? Really?
Speaker 2: When you do it?
Speaker 1: Okay?
Speaker 2: Now this is health conscious.
Speaker 1: Now you don't eat this every day?
Speaker 2: Yeah? This is cheers, this is yeah. Oh man, the sauce. See,
Speaker 2: people don't know the man, I'm telling you. Wow, did
Speaker 2: you go home with the sauce we made? We invented
Speaker 2: this sauce. There's mayonnaise and hot sauce. Wow, it was
Speaker 2: really good.
Speaker 1: I would eat this.
Speaker 2: I missed this.
Speaker 1: Would you make your son try it?
Speaker 2: Of course? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Yeah, he loves and I would love to see his
Speaker 1: reaction trying this. Eat this sauce though.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, my kid love spicy food. Okay yep.
Speaker 1: AJ does not get a rating on the food because
Speaker 1: he did not cook it fresh. But as far as
Speaker 1: this sauce, guys, if you do not have salsa in
Speaker 1: sour cream at home, or if you just want to
Speaker 1: switch it up Mayo with the top of Teo and
Speaker 1: the Del Taco sauce, this is a definite win. I
Speaker 1: would have never thought to do this.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I have a point behind making it fresh.
Speaker 2: And I said this off cameras. I didn't have time
Speaker 2: to cook. Back in the day, we did not have time.
Speaker 2: It was school, it was job, it was business. It
Speaker 2: still is like that for me now, but I have
Speaker 2: I'm not going to both have people that cook for
Speaker 2: me now and kids that people watch the kids unless
Speaker 2: I'm wanting to do like a Friday nights. I like
Speaker 2: to cook. Friday nights. I like to cook. But we
Speaker 2: did not have time. Everybody was like in the house.
Speaker 2: Nobody was sitting in the house, sitting around. Everybody was like,
Speaker 2: I gotta be here, I gotta be there, gotta go.
Speaker 1: So your first company, the staffing company, the.
Speaker 2: Launch Launch Pack Career Careers.
Speaker 1: That company is around for how many years?
Speaker 2: That was from two thousand and five. We incorporated in
Speaker 2: two thousand and five and exited the business in two
Speaker 2: thousand and seven.
Speaker 1: Okay, so you sold the business.
Speaker 2: Yes to our customers. So our customers we were having
Speaker 2: we would send people out on temporary assignments, and we
Speaker 2: basically got offers from the customers, our clients that said, hey,
Speaker 2: we want to buy out all your contracts, and so
Speaker 2: we had an opportunity to just sell out all of
Speaker 2: the people that were on assignment. And it's not quite
Speaker 2: what we would consider an aqua hype. It was more
Speaker 2: of they just bought out all the contracts and we're like, yep,
Speaker 2: And the Great Recession was starting to happen too, so
Speaker 2: it was a it was a good timing for us
Speaker 2: because we knew it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, recession, Yeah remember that.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So after that, you get this chunk of money. You're
Speaker 1: feeling yourself. I'm sure, chunk of money. Money, you're feeling yourself.
Speaker 1: You're in Vegas.
Speaker 2: So at that time I opened three offices, so we
Speaker 2: had Las Vegas and we had two in Orange County.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, so you're out here, you sold this company.
Speaker 1: What's your next play? And I know you're not just
Speaker 1: sitting relaxing for the next year.
Speaker 2: No, it was it was not a chunk of mons.
Speaker 2: This was the Great Recession, and everybody, I think was
Speaker 2: just shocked at what's going on, and we were too,
Speaker 2: But at the time, I was also involved in politics
Speaker 2: at the time campaign and a lot of the government
Speaker 2: agencies because they knew I knew employment and how to
Speaker 2: help people with getting jobs and careers, a lot of
Speaker 2: them reached out to me because Orange County, Ana Anaheim,
Speaker 2: Los Angeles, San Francisco, all of these government agencies or
Speaker 2: city governments were trying to help people get employed because
Speaker 2: it was just massive layoffs. And so I, through my network,
Speaker 2: started getting consulting engagements. So that's when I started a
Speaker 2: company called Workforce two point zero, which was to consult
Speaker 2: with these agencies to help them get people reemployed. Okay, yeah,
Speaker 2: So we ended up getting contracts in Orange County in
Speaker 2: Los Angeles too, and this is when I learned about
Speaker 2: workforce development and how they actually do help you with
Speaker 2: job training and employment. And so I got these contracts,
Speaker 2: and one in particular we got with the County of
Speaker 2: Los Angeles to help people who are on welfare get reemployed.
Speaker 2: Set up an office in South LA. We would drive
Speaker 2: in South LA every day from Orange County and would
Speaker 2: help basically people would come in that are on welfare
Speaker 2: and we'd go find them a job. Okay, And I
Speaker 2: did that for about a year and a half. We
Speaker 2: got a bunch of contracts and at that point, this
Speaker 2: is when I started the technology company because I had
Speaker 2: software in my staffing company. We ran the business with software. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and so I realized like I should be doing the
Speaker 2: same thing in this consulting engagement. Ok So we built software.
Speaker 1: Keep saying we, I'm sorry, why are you keep saying
Speaker 1: that we? Are you referencing the company? Are you referencing
Speaker 1: a partner the team?
Speaker 2: I have partners. Whenever you're doing something, you're doing it
Speaker 2: with we you're doing it with.
Speaker 1: I just wanted to clarify, I thought, But I was like,
Speaker 1: just make sure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've got partners. Ian Connell is our CFN. He's
Speaker 2: an investor and owner, and then Melissa as well as
Speaker 2: my business partner, and so they but I also had employee.
Speaker 2: I had a guy named Charles at the time, and
Speaker 2: then Alyssa. When I say we, it's it's your team,
Speaker 2: it's a team. It's a team, especially when I'm talking
Speaker 2: about the things that we're doing. Right, I started a company, sure,
Speaker 2: but we're building this thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So we set up an office in South LA and
Speaker 2: basically we built the software. And this is when I'll
Speaker 2: talk about companies we worked with. We ended up building
Speaker 2: the software on Salesforce, and we as we started getting
Speaker 2: more and more traction with these consulting engagements and using
Speaker 2: this software and showing, like the City of Long Beach,
Speaker 2: City of LA, how we were helping all these people
Speaker 2: get employed.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: They were like, we love what you're doing with the program,
Speaker 2: but we love the software even more.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And at the time, you guys were using Salesforce.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, and we are still on Salesforce.
Speaker 1: Okay, because I was gonna say Salesforce is hey, miss, Like,
Speaker 1: I've worked with Salesforce within organizations and it does the trick,
Speaker 1: but then sometimes it doesn't do the trick. It can
Speaker 1: be a little funky.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So we use them. Same as people build software
Speaker 2: on Amazon Oracle, or if they're building on Google Cloud,
Speaker 2: or if they're building it on Microsoft. We decided to
Speaker 2: build it on Salesforce. And its actually was really successful
Speaker 2: because at the time they were just getting into the
Speaker 2: government space and so we were able to ride that
Speaker 2: wave a little bit and exactly what you talked about,
Speaker 2: Calleen is that they weren't building it for these specific
Speaker 2: program That's what we did, Okay, So we designed it
Speaker 2: and we built our own IP on top of it. Specifically,
Speaker 2: IP is intellectual property for anybody out there, own your software,
Speaker 2: own your.
Speaker 1: So I didn't know. So you built on top of Salesforce?
Speaker 1: Is that what you're saying.
Speaker 2: I only get too technical. There's contracts and all of
Speaker 2: that stuff that's related to it. I'm not that could
Speaker 2: go down another path, but the short answer is it's
Speaker 2: our software, it's our IP. And people do the same
Speaker 2: thing when they build on Google Cloud or Amazon. They're
Speaker 2: just the infrastructure, but we're sitting on top of that.
Speaker 1: Wow. Yeah, I love the tech industry for that though.
Speaker 1: I feel like it's very much like open source built
Speaker 1: that's not as much hater raid as I'd say other industries.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, I'm just going to tell everybody this, especially
Speaker 2: we're here in LA and the media technology is taking
Speaker 2: over everything.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah it is and it has been for a while.
Speaker 2: And don't sleep on AI. Yeah, don't sleep on AI.
Speaker 1: I don't think anyone's sleeping on it now. People are
Speaker 1: like hooked to it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they're hooked to it as a consumer. Yeah, but
Speaker 2: thirty five percent of white collar jobs are going to
Speaker 2: be taken over by AI, the restaurant industry media. I
Speaker 2: was just we're driving up here and listening to listen
Speaker 2: to Big Boy and they were playing songs that were
Speaker 2: one hundred percent AI created.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the game has changed.
Speaker 1: The game has changed. Now, how do you feel about
Speaker 1: the plumbing and electrical and the AC and all these
Speaker 1: other careers that are going to be booming. Do you
Speaker 1: think that the demand and the costs for these jobs
Speaker 1: are going to be a lot more because it's going
Speaker 1: to be one of the few industries that are like
Speaker 1: you can't I doubt AI can replace it.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, I think there's two things. Yeah, people are
Speaker 2: flooding into the trades. People are flooding into trades. One,
Speaker 2: you don't have to get a four year degree, and
Speaker 2: you can make six figures and above in the trades.
Speaker 2: And I've got a guy who's an exterminator comes to
Speaker 2: my house every quarter and I'm sure he's probably pulling
Speaker 2: in above six figures, you know what I mean? So
Speaker 2: you know, do what you love first. Yeah, but just understand,
Speaker 2: if you're just looking for a job somewhere pushing paper.
Speaker 2: You're going to be unemployed. Not in five years, You're
Speaker 2: going to be unemployed this year or next year. It's
Speaker 2: coming fast. I know people, and I'm not trying to
Speaker 2: scare people, but I wanted to talk about this is
Speaker 2: under in under a year. In under a year. I
Speaker 2: know folks who work for Taco Bell and who are
Speaker 2: developing the AI drive through, and they're piloting it right.
Speaker 1: But even though okay, they can do the AI drive through,
Speaker 1: but who can actually prepare the food?
Speaker 2: The machines are going to prepare the food? You think
Speaker 2: so hundred percent you didn't need me to cook this thing.
Speaker 2: By the way, the machine will cook this thing eventually,
Speaker 2: one hundred percent. There are restaurants now that are one
Speaker 2: hundred percent automated in terms of making the burger one
Speaker 2: yes and Sam Francisco. I don't know the name of it,
Speaker 2: but there you know, I was.
Speaker 1: About to ask you. People are going to out be
Speaker 1: out there right now, Google.
Speaker 2: Automated under they're going to be making the food the
Speaker 2: restaurant into We're not talking about fine dining, we're talking
Speaker 2: about entry. And so I came from a conference up
Speaker 2: in Monterey and we were talking about this is that
Speaker 2: the entry level job is being eliminated. I talked about
Speaker 2: the entry level job that I got into, the entry
Speaker 2: level job we all had one. That job is being eliminated.
Speaker 1: I believe that. So I tell my friends, like marketing,
Speaker 1: I have a marketing sales background. Marketing and sales, we're done,
Speaker 1: let's go become a nurser. Do this because we out
Speaker 1: we got about six months left.
Speaker 2: I don't think so on marketing and sales because you
Speaker 2: can use the AI tools to do. If you can
Speaker 2: use the AI tools in your career, you'll be able
Speaker 2: to ride the way.
Speaker 1: But I will say this though, companies and organizations like
Speaker 1: remember your photoshop and now we have Canva with shout
Speaker 1: outs to Canva genius lady. Now companies are like, we
Speaker 1: can have our intern creator now. So that's why I say,
Speaker 1: like marketing, like some of those things are definitely going
Speaker 1: to be if you're a company, just shove it on
Speaker 1: your intern.
Speaker 2: You can't be a graphic designer, you can't be In fact,
Speaker 2: we just updated our website, launched a new website, and
Speaker 2: I had one guy do it. Yeah, we had contractors,
Speaker 2: but it was we used AI to create images, write content.
Speaker 2: We did so much, so it's the world is crazy.
Speaker 1: It's going a trick question though. I have a love
Speaker 1: hate relationship with social media, But now that everything is
Speaker 1: automated and everything's AI related, I'm my hope is that
Speaker 1: social media disbands eventually because all you're going to see
Speaker 1: is populated content AI content from AI photos to AI
Speaker 1: video to and did Drake really say this? Did Biggie
Speaker 1: really say this? Because they have all these voices and stuff.
Speaker 1: Now this platform that used to be like organic is
Speaker 1: now going to be we all know it's a consistency
Speaker 1: numbers game. Eventually, I would imagine that it would fade
Speaker 1: to black. What are your thought that.
Speaker 2: The world is still about attention and getting It's how
Speaker 2: do you get people's attention? I do think and I'm
Speaker 2: gonna believe it like you, I think the in person
Speaker 2: is going to be much more valuable. I think in
Speaker 2: person events, in person media concerts, people are gonna want
Speaker 2: the real thing. I think it's unfortunate a lot of
Speaker 2: people are stuck in the consumer mindset, just stuck to
Speaker 2: their phones and doom scrolling. So those folks, if they
Speaker 2: we're going to have a separation between the haves and
Speaker 2: the have not. So that's gonna get worse. It's gonna
Speaker 2: get exacerbated, and the consumer class is going to They're
Speaker 2: going to lose their jobs. Government is probably gonna have
Speaker 2: some form of ongoing welfare what they call it, but
Speaker 2: it's basically based based universal basic income UBI. So you're
Speaker 2: gonna have a lot of folks that are just going
Speaker 2: to be consumers, and the ones who are going to
Speaker 2: be able to be in the middle class and hopefully
Speaker 2: in the upper class are going to have to be
Speaker 2: creators and use these technologies, use these tools. Yeah, it's
Speaker 2: it's getting scary out there. I don't let my kids
Speaker 2: on social media. I don't let them on I just talked.
Speaker 1: To a girl before you came in who influencer, and
Speaker 1: she said that her thirteen year old has all these
Speaker 1: issues and a lot of the challenges are coming from
Speaker 1: just exposure to social media. I'm like, WHOA. But I
Speaker 1: also think YouTube kids is not becoming safe either, because
Speaker 1: I'm seeing my daughter who's four say words like kill
Speaker 1: or something. I'm like, oh wow, I'm like, where has
Speaker 1: anyone ever used that word? Like the little words where
Speaker 1: You're like, where do you even find that word or
Speaker 1: how do you use that word? And so I was like,
Speaker 1: it's got to be. And this young lady was saying
Speaker 1: earlier that it doesn't matter how many restrictions you put.
Speaker 1: Still stuff is sliding through.
Speaker 2: You just can't put them. You can't let them have
Speaker 2: the devices. And I'm older than you, but I grew
Speaker 2: up we had no devices.
Speaker 1: No we didn't.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we didn't have We're going back and you talk
Speaker 2: to parents that their kids go to school up in
Speaker 2: Silicon Valley, the Bear, they're on paper and pen they're
Speaker 2: doing every like the private schools of these kids, of
Speaker 2: the kids of the techies. Yeah, they're offline, Yeah, because
Speaker 2: they understand that they have to be able to build
Speaker 2: those foundational like.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I agree with that. Yeah, And I will
Speaker 1: say this, so back what they what you were saying
Speaker 1: about the techies. I had my daughter in private school Montssori.
Speaker 1: This year was the first year I'm putting her in
Speaker 1: public and my gosh, you can actually see the difference immediately,
Speaker 1: just in the regiments, the teachings. The bar is so
Speaker 1: much lower. And it's like, on one hand, you're saving money,
Speaker 1: but you look at the difference and you're like, oh
Speaker 1: my gosh, is it even worth it? Like, in my
Speaker 1: personal opinion, definitely not. You do what you gotta do
Speaker 1: in that moment. But I see it, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: so that's that's what I was paying for. Okay, see
Speaker 1: it's different. But yeah, just the second second what you
Speaker 1: were saying. But thank you so much for taking time
Speaker 1: out of here crazy schedule to come all the way
Speaker 1: down here. You had a nice drive.
Speaker 2: Uh it's la So no, we didn't. No, yeah, we
Speaker 2: came a long way, but we did that for you.
Speaker 2: Congratulations on your podcast. I really remember seeing you five
Speaker 2: years ago or something, and you've built something truly amazing.
Speaker 2: And so I'm a big fan and I'm a supporter,
Speaker 2: So thank you for inviting me.
Speaker 1: I appreciate you joining season five.
Speaker 2: Yeah five, you can't wait season ten And yeah, I
Speaker 2: don't know if.
Speaker 1: We're going to go all the way to season ten.
Speaker 1: There's only so many executives. But I will say this,
Speaker 1: I am working on a book and I've been taking
Speaker 1: I've been spending the last couple months with the help
Speaker 1: of a it's definitely cut it down transcribing all the interviews.
Speaker 1: And I was telling my little brother the other day, Well,
Speaker 1: all of you guys collectively have in common when it
Speaker 1: comes to what the secret ingredient is to growth. Out
Speaker 1: of one hundred and fifty interviews, I would think that
Speaker 1: what's the foundation to growth?
Speaker 2: I guess that's how I think it's perseverance or persistence.
Speaker 1: I was thinking perseverance. I've had people come up to
Speaker 1: me like, oh, the book definitely, faith is the number
Speaker 1: one consistent thing. And I told my brother the answer
Speaker 1: to this and then he was like, ohh and I've
Speaker 1: told other people because I thought it was very interesting.
Speaker 1: The number one foundation to growth is honesty, truth, radical
Speaker 1: truth with self. And I was like, but then if
Speaker 1: you think about it, in order for you to grow,
Speaker 1: even with you being labeled as a bad kid or
Speaker 1: what have you, right, at some points you sit down
Speaker 1: right and you have this raw.
Speaker 2: Radical truth, self awareness.
Speaker 1: Self awareness like no lying, no buffer, with just you.
Speaker 1: That is actually the foundation. And then obviously the other
Speaker 1: things that you're listing are definitely relevant. But I just
Speaker 1: thought it was very unique that the gospel was.
Speaker 2: That's a spiritual conversation and I know you're at time,
Speaker 2: but it's there's a bigger you out there and there's
Speaker 2: a bigger you in there if you can have that
Speaker 2: self awareness and you can really self actualization, and that's
Speaker 2: a journey we're all on. I'm a person of faith.
Speaker 2: That's my journey now, is like this. We all have
Speaker 2: a bigger dream and a bigger vision, and if you
Speaker 2: ask yourself why you're not achieving it, then the answers
Speaker 2: start to come to you. And I'm a personal face,
Speaker 2: so I pray every day over myself, but over my
Speaker 2: family that will have those breakthroughs.
Speaker 1: Do you think in your journey though, there was those
Speaker 1: moments of radical truth with self.
Speaker 2: When I got expelled from high school was a big
Speaker 2: radical truth. And I think over the past few years,
Speaker 2: with my family and all of that, I've had another one.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, yeah, so I love it all right, cool,
Speaker 1: Thank you guys for tuning in. You guys can I
Speaker 1: guess you will be going on different random sites and
Speaker 1: you will not even know you are using launch Pad software.
Speaker 1: But it does exist. And the companies that you guys
Speaker 1: cater to are more mission based, aligned with your mission.
Speaker 2: They're all aligned with our mission.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're all aligned with it helping the community.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I just go out there if you're needing help,
Speaker 2: if you're unemployed or whatever. There's resources out there for you,
Speaker 2: and you can always connect with me online and I
Speaker 2: can help connect you.
Speaker 1: All right, guys, thanks, peace out, all right,