In this episode, Igor argues that if you want to be a successful entrepreneur, don’t do it for egotistical reasons, instead, do it because you want to add value to society in general.
Transcript
Frank Hello, everybody, we are back with the continued story of career changes. And Igor told us in the last episodes, his path from Brazil to Brazil, via California, Canada, Europe, back to Canada, no, back to Boston, back to Massachusetts, and then finally he landed in Brazil. And with that, the question, what now.
And we’re going to do this in a slightly different manner. So, while Igor will tell us his stories and his insights. When he started as a freelance copywriter, I think to creating a marketing agency to eventually selling the marketing agency.
What we’re going to do in this set of podcasts is we’re going to keep them very short. And we’re going to make them more interactive, so that Igor will give you an exercise at the end of each podcast to think about, to reflect on, and to enter a dialogue between yourself and Igor.
So enough said on my side, Igor, welcome back to the show. How are you today? How’s the weather in Curitiba? Welcome back.
Igor Thank you, Frank. I’m good. Weather is good. And I’m very excited to talk about one of my favourite subjects.
Frank You have lots of favorite subjects.
Igor Yes, I would say I have. At least 10. At least 10?
Frank Only 10. Okay.
Igor Only 10.
Frank I suppose one of your favourite subjects would be that of entrepreneurship. Am I right?
Igor Yes, exactly. That’s one of my favourites.
Frank Is it the favourite or is it just one of many?
Igor I would say one of many. It was my favourite for a long time. My top one. But as life happens and I discover new things, this rank tends to change a little bit over time. Maybe someday it will be the top one as well. But right now, I would say maybe it’s the third, fourth place. I have 10 favourite subjects, but I have hundreds of subjects I like, so it’s not a bad thing.
Frank Exactly. Okay. So in the introductory discussion we had before we went on air, we talked about definitions. And I think this is where we need to start. Entrepreneurship. Is this really the right word we should be using in what we will be talking about in the next couple of episodes?
Igor Yes, that’s a good place to start because entrepreneurship, it’s one of those terms that people borrow and use as they want. And in my opinion, it creates more confusion than helps. So, what’s entrepreneurship? Entrepreneurship basically is when you create a company.
So, when you want to build something and sell something in order to get value for yourself, you build a company. And I understand a company and I would say technically in most of countries, a company is when you have a group of people, at least two people work towards the same goal and sharing the same resource. So, this is entrepreneurship when you create a company. And these distinctions and definitions are important because if you are alone and you are excited to work in a project by yourself, or you are working in a company, within a company, and you want to explore things by yourself, it’s a great thing to do.
It’s nice. I’m not saying that’s wrong, but I wouldn’t consider that entrepreneurship because you are not creating your company. You are not the guy who has the autonomy to make decisions. You probably don’t have autonomy to choose what you offer to society. So it’s a tricky word and I prefer to use that as a company, which is a group of people working towards the same goal.
Frank Okay.
Igor That’s a technical definition, but it’s useful, believe me.
Frank So entrepreneurship, because for me, from my perspective, the company is nothing more than the legal framework. It’s a document which says that there is a legal structure. It has so much capital. It has a whole lot of legal issues with it. And that is for me the company. But you take this further, that the entrepreneurship is about the people who do something that solves problems and adds value for other people. Is that what your understanding of entrepreneurship is?
Igor Exactly. Yes. It’s a group of people working towards the same goal and share the same resource.
Frank Okay. So, we move on then and ask, well, when should somebody pursue fulfilling this goal of producing something that adds value, sharing the same resources and moving together in the same direction? When should they do this if this is still called entrepreneurship?
Igor This is an interesting question because in the first place, entrepreneurship, usually the people who will talk about entrepreneurship in social media, on TV, they want to sell you the idea that entrepreneurship is the only path possible to happiness, to a meaningful life, for financial success, which I guarantee it’s not the case. It’s one of the paths.
So it’s good to consider first place. It’s not the magic bullet that will make you happy, hitch and et cetera. And also that you not necessarily must be an entrepreneur to add value to society or to get rich. So in my point of view and from my experience, it happened with me as well. I think people would want to be an entrepreneur if to add value to society the way you want, you cannot do that by yourself.
So basically, you cannot do that by being an employee. You cannot do that by being a freelancer. You cannot do that by being a student. You have to recruit people and sell the idea to those people that you want to add value to society like that or like X, like Y, and it depends on what you are selling.
But that’s the point I think people must consider in the first place. Okay, I want to build a better product. Let’s say I want to build a better smartphone. Okay, what’s more probable to succeed on that? So should I start my company because Apple, Samsung, Motorola, they won’t do the way I want. They don’t seem to be going to the direction I think a smartphone should be going.
Or should I be a top-level director, a VP of one of those companies and I would add more value because they are in line with what I believe?
So that’s the first question people have to answer. And I think this relates to my story because I can say that with a lot of content about Brazil. And I would say as well in other parts of the world, but I don’t want to be arrogant. I don’t know 99.9% of the world.
But in Brazil, entrepreneurs, usually they are born from the necessity to be entrepreneurs. Like it’s not a choice. So, I example, I can give you my dad.
So, my dad worked for a company for over 30 years. And one day he got fired for many reasons, like economic reasons. And he was old. He didn’t have a degree. He couldn’t get a good job again. So, he had to be an entrepreneur because he had to master a skill. In his case, I will not remember the word, but he’s someone who works with metals. He built gates, windows of metal. And he had to be someone, to be an entrepreneur in this segment because he wouldn’t find anything else. And of course, you that are listening might be in this situation. And I won’t say that’s okay as well. You can be an entrepreneur if you have to be an entrepreneur.
But to be a successful one, you have to add value in a way any other company does. That’s my take on that.
Frank So the most important point, the most important takeaway is that you have to add value to other people, to society in general. That is the most important takeaway out of it.
Igor Yes. This is a fascinating thing for me because, and of course, there are always going to be exceptions. But if you think how the capitalist world works, people will pay for something they value.
Some people pay for something they don’t value in any regards. So, the way you build a company and you are successfully building a company is you have to add value that people are willing to pay for this value.
And that’s why we have companies. It seems obvious, but sometimes when I talk to young entrepreneurs and even more older people, which are considering to build a company in the late 40s, 50s, 60s, people think that only having a company is a sign of success.
Because if you have a company, you’re going to sell something, and people need to buy what they’re selling. But it’s a huge mistake because people don’t need to buy what they’re selling. They want to buy it for many other companies.
So, you have to build a company thinking on how you’re going to add value and what you can sell that other people are not selling, or you can sell something that other people are selling, but you can sell cheaper. So, it’s an important consideration as well.
Frank Okay. So, following this train of thought, and this is something that people don’t really understand. It’s really a complex topic. People also misuse the word passion. You have to be passionate about it. And Cal Newport wrote in one of his books, passion is the last thing you need. You have to be good at your job.
If you are good at what you do, then you add value. That would be a logical, a possible logical argument. And then at some point you sold your company. So, were you no longer adding value or were you no longer passionate? What’s the story behind this?
Igor Yeah. So I will answer both questions with my story. So when I started to, so I told my story in others podcast, but basically I changed completely the field I was working. So, I have a degree in dairy technology, but I didn’t see many options and a little bit by my motivation to change my career and a little bit of lucky, I went to marketing almost by parachute. So, it was unexpected to arrive in this field.
So I went, I came to Brazil to work as a freelancer, freelance copywriter. I get involved with agents of my friend. And I started to meet other entrepreneurs from the city I live in. And then I started to do a lot of freelance working. And at some point, I get so much, I got so much demand because I was doing a good job in terms of writing and in terms of strategic thinking that a lot of clients started to ask, Oh, you do that. You do that. And I started to consider, I don’t do, but I could hire someone to do for me. And I thought, like I explained it before. So, I thought, okay, so if I started to recruit people and hire people, am I going to add value to those clients? And the answer was yes.
So, I chose to hire my first employee, then the second and later things started to speed up. But one important aspect of this story is that I didn’t become an entrepreneur because I was patient about what I was doing. And that’s completely fine.
I think it’s very misleading to think that you have to love what you do for two reasons. The first one is the one you mentioned from Cal Newport. He has a really good book that has the best title, in my opinion, which is “So good they can’t ignore you”.
So his point is, okay, the way people think is you are passionate about and you’re going to be good about something. Connor Port’s argument is that you are good at something and you become passtionate about that because you are good at it. That’s his argument.
So I think when you are good at something and you put effort and energy automatically, you start to love what you do. That’s the first thing. And the second thing, in my experience, and that’s addressed the questions why I sold my company, is that I think it will change throughout your life.
I think if you grab what you are passionate about now and you think you cannot change that, I think it’s almost a formula for an unhappy life. Of course, I’m only 31 years old and my opinion might change, but I can’t imagine myself and many people I know being passionate about the same thing for 70, 75, 85 years.
So that’s something that will change. In my case, it was exactly how it happened. So, I started to hire people because I had the demand from clients. Then I fell in love for entrepreneurship because I started to study management, product marketing, market itself.
I was really fascinated about that, reading books, going to conference. It was a feedback cycle because I was good at it. So, I became more passionate, and it made me be better and so on.
But at some point, I realized that first I wasn’t so excited anymore because most of my day was dealing with bureaucratic things about hiring, about firing, about dealing with clients, making contracts.
Which wasn’t what I was good at. And I also realized that I could because my profile as an individual being, I wouldn’t add so much value as I did to build the company. So, I had around 21, 22 employees and I started to realize, okay, so if they had someone in my place, which had a different profile, a more hostile one, which is willing to do anything that’s possible to grow a company, this person will add more value than me. And that was my reasoning. So, I thought, oh, the place I am, it’s comfortable. But first thing, I’m not very excited. So, there’s an emotional motivation to sell the company.
And secondly, I think other people can do a better job than me in this position. So, I started to think about selling and that’s what happened. I sold to someone who is way more competent than me and in what I was doing in terms of being the owner of a 22 people company. That is the reasoning.
And I understand it’s hard to frame that if you are in a position different than me. But it turns out it’s very obvious when you have a successful company, you start to think, okay, what next?
Am I going to work like I’m working now? I’m going to sell the company. I’m going to bring partners. And selling the company for someone who has a successful business is a very common option.
It’s not something very unlikely or unfamiliar just to let the audience know. I’m not exceptional for that. People who have successful business think a lot about selling the company and most of them succeed.
Frank So to summarize this a little bit, it’s what you can do, what you feel comfortable doing, how successful you are at doing it. And then when you realize that you are out of your depth, then maybe it’s time to regroup and take a different alternative choice. For whatever reason, be it emotional, be it logical, be it adding value, there are many reasons for doing this. And at the end of the day, you have to be able to look at yourself in the mirror and say, I like what I see. Yeah. And not be unhappy.
Igor Yeah. And I think some good way to think about that is where you are today. You being an entrepreneur, you being a student or employee, are you adding the value that you think you are capable of?
Because if not, you should consider other things. Because it’s like talking about meaning, you want to add value where you are. I have a friend, for example, a friend who studied with me in high school, that he lives in the countryside of a state here in Brazil called Minas Gerais.
And nowadays when I meet him, he’s an artist. He lives in a very small town. He builds the arts of colours, bracelets, things like that. And he is extremely happy because he really sees value in what he does.
Because when he gives something as a gift or when someone buys a bracelet to give as a gift to her girlfriend or something like that, he really feels value on that. And that’s totally fine.
So, I think that’s the point. Like you have to feel you are adding value. Most of the problems from what I have been studying in terms of existential crisis comes because when you don’t feel you are aggregating anything to anyone, it’s quite a dangerous feeling. And just to finish my thought, something I really think about, there is this famous interview of Steve Jobs, not one of the famous ones.
It’s not very popular as the Standford Speech, but it makes a lot of sense because he says something like, when we grow up, we tend to think that life is the way it is and we can’t do that much about that. So we can move, but we can move and try not to bash in the walls and keep going in the direction that already exists. But if you think about that, and this is how Steve Jobs said that. If you think about that, there’s a lot of imperfect things about the world. If you look around, there are a lot of things that don’t work properly. There are a lot of things that work, but it’s not the best way it should work. There are things that work but harm other people. So, there are a lot of problems to solve. So, who said you are not the person able to solve this problem and add value?
That’s something I really reflect about because it’s obvious when you listen to Steve Jobs talking about that. But 99% of the time, and I’m including those persons, we don’t think there are alternatives. We think that we should pursue the way that other people pursued before us.
Frank I have to say in all the conversations that we’ve had over the last few months, there’ve been many, the one thing that stands out and that is almost like burnt into my brain now, does what I do add value? And I’m in the process of restructuring and repositioning myself. And this is like at the top of the page, does this add value?
So Igor, you’re going to give us some homework.
Igor Yes. So I thought this homework because most of the times, and not only entrepreneurship, but in life, we don’t take a decision because we fear of the outcome. And most of the times we underestimate the impact of what can happen as good thing and we overestimate what bad things may happen because we don’t like change. Our brains don’t like change. If you have food, if you have a shelter, and if you have someone around you, why do you want to change? It’s not good. Our brain doesn’t want that, surely.
So it’s hard. And there is this exercise by Tim Ferriss. There’s a TED talk about that. And there is a blog post about that if you search on Google, Fear Setting, which basically consists of you writing.
Writing, I recommend writing on paper. I think it gets easier to rationalize and make it more useful. And you’re going to write the decision you have to make, or you have been considering.
So, let’s say it’s open a business. It doesn’t have to be this one, but let’s say it’s open a business. You’re going to write, I want to write a business. And then below that, you’re going to write, what’s the worst-case scenario? So I’m going to just use example to make it clearer.
So let’s say I want to open my business and the worst thing that can happen is my business fails. I don’t get an income. Maybe I will get debt and I have to move to my parents’ house. Maybe that’s the worst-case scenario.
Okay. So, from this worst-case scenario, you’re going to write two lists. So, the first list is, okay, how you can prevent that. And you’re going to brainstorm for five, 10 minutes what you can do to prevent that.
Okay. So, in my example, I could save money. I could maybe talk to a friend and tell him that maybe I will have to move to his house if my business doesn’t work. So, I would build a list of preventable things.
And the other list you’re going to build, you’re going to spend five to 10 minutes as well. You’re going to list, okay, what you can do to repair if this worst scenario happened. And then you’re going to brainstorm.
Okay. If I have debt, so I will have to save money, maybe get a part-time job, maybe do freelancing, maybe borrow money from my parents. You have to brainstorm according to your context.
And this exercise helps you to see that the worst-case scenario, which is very likely to happen, but let’s say it happens. It’s not a big deal. You will survive for that, right?
And it also helps you to list actions that you have to take in order to be successful. So, what you have to do to prevent and what you have to do to repair if it doesn’t work.
I really recommend that exercise. I do a lot, I would say 10, 12 times a year, at least for many years. And it helps to rationalize difficult decisions because if you don’t rationalize, it will always feel heavier than it is actually. So, I really recommend that.
Frank And do you recommend to, of course it’s a very personal thing, but do you recommend to keep this list somewhere or just to write it down and then to discard it, to throw it away?
Igor Well, yeah, I don’t think there’s need to, at least for me, when I’m writing, I’m rationalizing, and I can’t discard that because I don’t have to go back. It’s all on my mind. It works like a motivational and practical step in the short term. But it’s official. For me, it’s not necessary, but it’s very personal. So, if you want to keep that, just keep it safe.
Frank Yeah. Yeah. I know what this entails. I did it in a slightly different way a good 30 years ago when I started all of this. I used to work in Frankfurt in Germany, and I took the train from home to Frankfurt main station and then to the place where I was working.
And I usually walked, and it took me through the seedy red-light district, the rundown district that was then surrounding or just sort of outside of Frankfurt station. And you saw a lot of bad things. The drug dealers, the drug addicts, the prostitutes, everything.
Yeah. And you sort of look at that and say, actually, it’s not the step from where I was to where they could be. It’s an extreme step, but it was a very visible step. So that was a very plastic way of evaluating worst-case scenario and working towards.
Didn’t actually need any writing. It just kept walking through there every now and then and just taking stock of where you are and what could happen if.
Igor, thank you very, very much for your insight, your time, and your thoughts and your words. And we will meet again and continue this discussion and this interaction. And I don’t think people will have to share their worst-case scenarios, but maybe they can share their experience of doing this and how they felt and what added value this little homework exercise.
Frank With that, we have the closing sentence added value. Igor, thank you very, very much.
Igor My pleasure. Thank you. And I hope people find it useful. And I’m happy to talk about that whoever wants.