0:06

So I'm delighted to welcome to show

0:08

today Rajiv . He's

0:10

built a 300 person business in one

0:12

and a half years . He's the Plan B

0:14

success podcast host and he's helped

0:16

four VC back companies through exit

0:18

. Welcome , rajiv .

0:21

Well , thank you so much . Thanks for having me .

0:23

So lots of good things happening today

0:26

, but we're going to jump in my coaching time machine

0:28

and go back to time they weren't . When

0:30

are we going back to ?

0:32

Sure , you know I went through school

0:34

, I went to grad school , I did an MBA

0:36

back in 1994

0:38

, 93 , 94 and

0:40

back in India actually

0:43

, and at this time MBA

0:45

wasn't what it is today or

0:48

what it's come to be today , so

0:50

not a lot of people knew about it and the

0:52

few that did it ended up taking

0:54

a cushy job with an MNC . You

0:57

know I decided there was more to it and

0:59

you know I kind of stumbled across a

1:01

company that came to India

1:04

dealing in direct marketing

1:06

which was very new for me , and this was the

1:08

time when India was opening its doors to

1:10

foreign companies coming in and

1:12

this was a Canadian company that dealt with

1:14

consumer durables , you know

1:16

, stuff like books , kitchenware

1:19

, toys , gifts , that kind of stuff

1:21

. And then they had this very cool two

1:24

minute pitch that they taught you and

1:26

then this concept of law of averages

1:28

, that if you go and meet 300 people a day

1:30

you're bound to get about 30

1:33

S's , and that's what

1:35

they taught you . And you know I

1:38

took some training with them . And then one

1:40

thing led to another and

1:42

I started doing that and I ended up doing that for

1:44

about a year and a half , which

1:47

was very different from what all my other

1:50

you know colleagues were doing , you

1:52

know who were finding the next corporate

1:54

job that they could , and I

1:56

believe that really helped me . That stood

1:58

me in good stead . It was very hard training going

2:01

door to door , lugging a bag eight

2:03

hours a day or sometimes more . It

2:06

was very hard training . You

2:09

know a lot of people would tell you you don't need

2:11

an MBA to do that , but to

2:13

date I believe that was the foundation

2:16

of whatever else I've done in my life and

2:18

it's helped me in good stead .

2:20

And so how is sorry just set the scene

2:23

then . So you've done

2:25

the MBA puts you . It's a very sort

2:27

of most employable people out there . All

2:30

of your classmates are going on to work for sort

2:32

of multinational corporations or sort

2:34

of blue ship companies and

2:36

you've made this choice to go and work

2:39

for yourself . Effectively , it's an overseas

2:41

company but it's kind of performance

2:44

only .

2:45

Yeah , absolutely . You know , I remember my very

2:47

first day in training , like there

2:49

was an American guy who actually trained me and

2:52

I just followed him , I just

2:54

watched what he did throughout the day

2:56

and I think we ended up selling like 12

2:59

pieces of we were selling books that time

3:01

so 12 pieces . And then we

3:03

came back and the next day I was on my own and

3:07

I think about two hours in the day , you

3:09

know , I had some very rude

3:11

kind of interactions where people

3:13

you know just slammed

3:15

doors on my faces and I

3:18

just said , hey , this is not for me . And I came back

3:20

, I remember that , and

3:22

he sat me down , gave me

3:24

a bottle of water and he said , hey , it's your choice

3:26

. You gotta make a choice here . If

3:28

you decide to keep being hard

3:31

on these negatives and then letting them not

3:33

affect you , then you will

3:36

continue to do well . Otherwise , your history

3:38

and then that kind of struck a chord

3:40

with me like you know , maybe I'm giving up too

3:42

easily and then I just followed what he said

3:44

. That day I went back and I worked the entire

3:46

day . I ended up selling a

3:48

couple of pieces , not 30 , but

3:51

then it kind

3:53

of gave me that stickiness to keep going

3:55

to keep doing it again and again

3:57

.

4:02

So how did it feel when you were sitting back in his office

4:04

? You made this choice

4:06

, which was

4:10

painful sort of financially

4:12

and socially , I imagine at the

4:14

time , and like I'm

4:17

done like two hours ago

4:19

.

4:19

I'm done .

4:20

What was going through your head ?

4:23

I think , you know , I was very young at

4:25

the time and then , obviously

4:29

, from an experience standpoint , there

4:31

was , you know , didn't have

4:33

a lot of people shouting in my face , right

4:35

? So I'm here knocking

4:37

doors and some people are

4:39

, you know , respectfully

4:41

saying no , some people not so

4:43

respectfully , and some people just slam the door

4:46

on your face and some people scream at

4:48

you . That's what you face in sales all

4:51

day long , depending on what

4:53

the other person is going through . And

4:55

if you carry , you

4:58

know , everybody has a self concept , image

5:00

of themselves and there's a probability

5:02

of a certain amount of ego mixed in . And

5:05

you know , if you tell yourself , hey , you know

5:07

, I'm the smart kid with an MBA , and

5:10

then this somebody just shut

5:13

the door on my face , then you're bound

5:15

to feel the way I felt . And

5:18

I think that's exactly what happened . Having

5:21

never faced it and then having

5:23

faced rude rejection one after

5:25

the other while I

5:27

was just still struggling to get my

5:29

pitch right , was

5:32

very overwhelming and

5:34

I told myself , do I really need to do this ? I can

5:36

go and get that cushy job out there . And then I

5:38

came back . But I think that pep talk

5:41

that my coach gave me and sat me

5:43

down , the matter of fact kind of talk

5:45

and not trying to

5:48

comfort me , and that kind of stuff . That

5:50

was an awakening too . My

5:53

expectation was my coach was going to

5:55

be on my side and tell

5:57

me kind

6:00

of side with me , kind of comfort

6:02

me , and all which he did . He basically

6:04

gave me a bottle of water and he put the matter

6:06

of fact straight to my face , which

6:09

kind of you know , kind of it felt like

6:11

a wake up call where he's telling you are

6:13

you going to give up so easily ? You haven't even

6:15

tried it out .

6:17

But I think it's kind of amazing that in

6:19

many ways you came into this first day

6:21

with a

6:24

clear idea of what you wanted to achieve from

6:26

it . You

6:28

brought into it sort of a

6:30

life of success up to that point , like

6:33

you said sort of doing an MBA

6:35

top of your class . Choice

6:37

of roles and actually

6:40

you came to like to degree . Lack of

6:42

family support around this choice , lack of social

6:44

support around this choice , and every

6:46

and plenty of plenty of really

6:48

great other opportunities on the table . I could be

6:50

so easy to go okay , I can go and work for anybody

6:52

. It's kind

6:55

of amazing that you managed , in the space of

6:57

that conversation

6:59

, to break through all that conditioning

7:02

and go . No , I am

7:05

going to stay on this path .

7:07

Absolutely so . Like you said , right

7:10

, you're right , there were social norms

7:12

and you know a lot of my classmates

7:14

and friends kind of looked at me with horror

7:16

, saying why would you lug a bag

7:19

and go door to door ? You know , why

7:21

did you come and do an MBA ? If that's what

7:23

you wanted to do ? But there was more to it than that

7:25

right . And then the appeal of kind of being able

7:28

to run your own business , to be able to

7:30

learn how to build a team , you

7:32

know , through the company that I

7:34

was working with , and then have the opportunity

7:36

to run your own business the way you

7:38

see fit , you know those were

7:40

all factors that kind of helped

7:43

make that right decision , you know

7:46

, and obviously my parents didn't

7:48

think very highly of my choice

7:50

of an occupation at that

7:52

point in time , you know , if I

7:54

kind of crossed paths with a friend

7:56

or a relative out there , while on

7:58

the field I've had people

8:00

walking away , kind of playing

8:03

ignorant , you know . So you

8:05

have all of that and I think all of that

8:07

kind of helps you just

8:09

build a more resilient you .

8:12

Would you say that resilience is now your superpower

8:14

.

8:16

I would say so absolutely . You know , I

8:18

think I've been a pretty resilient guy throughout

8:20

my career . I've had my share

8:22

of ups and downs but

8:24

you know , I don't let anything

8:26

affect me that much . I take it

8:28

in stride , based on the moment , and

8:30

then try to be rational about the decision to

8:32

take and move on . I don't

8:34

let things affect me personally as

8:37

far as possible , and

8:40

I think all of these are learned skills and

8:42

I attributed to back to that a year and a half

8:44

out on the field . You know , I've had days when I've

8:47

gone hungry and

8:49

I've had days when I've done really

8:51

well and a lot

8:53

of those stories keep coming back to me

8:55

no matter where I am in my career

8:57

. Like you know , let's say right now , like Inceptio

9:00

is the company . Inceptio Ventures is the company

9:02

that we have founded and we are running

9:04

and we are in the process of raising funds

9:07

for one of the ventures under it . And

9:10

I go through the same thing . I go through sending

9:12

my pitch deck out . I go through talking

9:14

to people . I go through , but

9:16

not every pitch that we do not

9:19

. Every investor that we

9:21

talk to is going to say yes and

9:23

just prepares me that much more

9:25

. You know I just go through the pitches , take

9:27

my learnings from it and then try to improve

9:30

the next one that I do .

9:33

Hopefully fewer people slamming the door in your face

9:35

with the reed words .

9:37

Oh , yeah , yeah , obviously you get good at it . Right

9:39

, you're in control , like when you

9:41

do the . Enough of this , then you know how to control

9:44

and how to make sure that the doors

9:46

don't get slammed in your face

9:48

?

9:49

Yeah , but it sounds very comparable in terms

9:51

of do you think you can break

9:53

it down to like , as your mentor at times

9:55

said , do 300 pitches

9:58

to get 30 ? Do you

10:00

think it's even similar when it comes to getting investment

10:02

?

10:04

I believe . So there are a couple of things right . So

10:06

one is obviously you kind of the

10:09

company or the product that you're out to launch

10:11

. You know you do a lot of work on

10:14

understanding why you believe it

10:16

will be successful . Then

10:18

you also play the devil's advocate in

10:20

trying to say that . What are the reservations

10:22

that I could come across ? And you got to be very

10:24

pragmatic about it and I think

10:27

I learn a lot more from the questions

10:29

that investors have , from the

10:31

reasons that they look to find in

10:33

order to say no , because that

10:36

kind of helps me

10:38

get better and better at

10:41

the solution that I put forward

10:43

and the reasons I give them as to why

10:45

they should invest . It just

10:47

makes it that much more . Same thing , like the

10:49

two-minute pitch that I told you out there . Right

10:51

, you get so good at it after a while that

10:55

you just get it done in two minutes and you

10:57

take a yes or a no and then you move on . You don't worry

11:00

about whether it's a yes or a no . If it's

11:02

a yes , great , you made a sale . If it's a no

11:04

, thank you very much . And then you move

11:06

on .

11:07

Because that's something that comes up with founders

11:09

time and time again which is just that

11:11

you are constantly punched

11:14

in the face by events happening

11:16

to you , and sometimes that and sometimes

11:19

it's actually like over success

11:21

can also kind of throw you

11:23

as well . What

11:26

you seem to be saying is just this kind of take

11:29

the yes or the no and

11:32

move on constantly , treat

11:35

them both the same .

11:37

Absolutely . And then to your point . Founders

11:40

face it all day , and I think founders actually

11:42

have to be much more better prepared

11:44

than they generally are

11:46

. Think about it you

11:48

don't know how long your runway is going to last

11:51

. You don't know where that next round of funding

11:53

is going to come from , so you got to be as prepared

11:55

as possible in order to make

11:58

sure that you have the longest runway

12:00

possible . As you look to

12:02

grow on the one side , keep

12:04

your business stable or balance

12:06

your business , and then bring in investments on

12:09

the other side Goes back

12:11

to the same thing on the days on the field . There were

12:13

some days that I did phenomenally well , and

12:16

those are the days where you put a little bit of money

12:18

away for a rainy day . But at the

12:20

same time , there were some days where I didn't do well

12:22

at all . There were days when

12:25

I had to look under my mattress to find a couple

12:27

of coins so I could go out and grab

12:29

something for dinner . So same thing

12:31

with the founder .

12:32

We had a box episode about a year ago now . It's

12:34

actually talking about dealing with uncertainty

12:36

. I think this is a message that comes up time

12:38

and time again , which is absolutely

12:40

it's not what you do in the moment . It's what you've

12:42

done to prepare for that moment .

12:44

Absolutely . And then , like I say

12:47

that , I always like to say that one thing's

12:49

for certain and that uncertainty

12:51

that's going to come . So know

12:53

for a fact that it's there

12:56

and prepare your best and

12:58

that's the best you can do . And

13:00

then everything flows with time . You

13:04

never know . You might be out there

13:06

pitching your company

13:08

out to several investors and

13:10

before you know there

13:13

I've had instances where support

13:16

comes from totally unwarranted

13:19

areas . You would have thought that somebody

13:21

just brushed you away and walked away

13:23

and then six months later or a year later they

13:25

come looking for you . So

13:27

that does tend to happen . So never burn your

13:29

bridges . Make sure that

13:31

you're doing the most

13:34

sincere effort that you can put forth and

13:37

then keep going .

13:38

So , perhaps we should just follow this journey

13:40

of resilience through your career

13:43

because it feels like you've done some really cool

13:46

stuff . So step

13:48

one building this

13:50

300 person business

13:52

in a year and a half straight

13:55

out of grad school . It's pretty cool . And

13:58

then you decided to go

14:00

to the US . What happened then ? I got

14:03

married .

14:04

So what happened was I was

14:06

running my business . It was

14:08

running very successfully . Then

14:10

I got married and my hours were crazy

14:13

during the time that I ran

14:15

and grew this business . So I would

14:18

be out there till about 12

14:20

, one ish at night and then six

14:22

o'clock in the morning I would be back running

14:24

the business and obviously my wife didn't like it

14:26

. So I decided I would make her a part of it , which

14:29

we did , and then for almost about

14:32

a year or so we worked on it

14:34

together . But , like I said , this was the

14:36

time where technology was taking off

14:38

in India and it was very evident to

14:42

me that the next big thing out there has

14:44

to be related to technology . So

14:47

, having gone to school , having

14:49

graduated , before technology hit the

14:51

schools in India , I started going

14:54

out for some private classes , took my classes

14:56

in learning

14:58

C , c++ at the point in time

15:00

, html , these kinds of things , very

15:03

basic things at that point in time , and

15:05

very quickly figured out that my

15:07

interest was not in programming I was not made

15:10

out to be a programmer . But

15:12

then the other aspects of technology

15:14

, such as business analysis , project management

15:17

, these things started Attracting

15:19

my attention . Then I was definitely attracted

15:21

towards the business development aspect of it . I

15:24

ended up Working with a company

15:26

just to gain , gain exposure and

15:28

opening up their exports division for

15:31

Pan Asia Middle East . And

15:33

then it became evident to me that

15:35

I really needed to get some grounded education

15:38

in the tech space , and

15:40

which meant going back to school . And

15:43

then I asked myself what better Way

15:45

to do it . Then , you know , go to grad school

15:47

all over again In

15:50

the US .

15:51

I'm curious after sort of MBA one

15:53

, you decide to go very left field and go

15:55

Door-to-door at the time , I'm

15:58

guess . I'm guessing might have gone left field

16:00

again after MBA two . Is that , is that

16:02

for ?

16:04

Yeah , so you know , I sold the company

16:06

by the way , the one that

16:08

I was running there for a direct marketing

16:11

once I made the decision to come to the

16:13

US , and then I had to go through my exams , like

16:15

I said , and then , very you

16:18

know , obviously you know even my one of

16:20

my interview questions was hey , you already have an MBA

16:22

, why do you want to go back and get an MBA

16:24

? That was a visa question that I was asked and I

16:26

told them hey , the MBA that I have

16:28

back in India is in Marketing

16:31

and finance and this is a totally different specialization

16:33

and that's why I'm going there to get it .

16:36

And and so what did you post

16:39

MBA ? What was ? What was your

16:41

next move ?

16:43

Well , post MBA , you know , I

16:45

really didn't know where to start , but

16:47

I knew I had to start , start

16:49

with a job in the US . And this time this

16:51

is the time that 9-11 happened , you

16:54

know , it was very clear . You know , I kind of felt

16:56

, okay , this is it . You know , nobody's going to start give

16:58

jobs anymore . My experience

17:00

from India , all the stuff that I did on the entrepreneur

17:03

, it's I didn't matter and any

17:05

Didn't had , didn't hold

17:07

any water at all in the US . But and

17:09

I'm talking back in 2000 , 2001

17:11

, that kind of a time frame Nobody cared about what

17:13

you did outside of the US

17:15

shores . So it became very

17:17

evident to me that I had to take a pretty

17:20

much , you know , get

17:22

the lowest job that I can find

17:24

. And I started as a business analyst and

17:26

then I kind of , over

17:28

the years , I've built a career in that space .

17:31

Hmm , and what

17:34

? Where do you think this

17:36

resilience has

17:39

paid the biggest dividend along that journey

17:42

?

17:44

Yeah . So I Think

17:47

, throughout the journey , right like I mean , I came to

17:49

the US , for instance , I came with a hundred dollar

17:51

bill , that's what I had in my hand and I had

17:54

a check for my first semester fees . That's

17:56

all I came with and two backs . I

17:58

had no idea where I was gonna live , I

18:00

had no idea how I would pay

18:02

for housing , I

18:04

had no idea where my next semester fees

18:07

was going to come from nothing I

18:09

just came and that was , I think . Yeah

18:11

, I think generally I have a pretty positive bent

18:13

of mind and I know that if things do

18:16

go negative then I'll work them through

18:18

. That's the resilience piece . That's how

18:20

I came . You know , the first thing that I did

18:22

is I got into the university , I found a

18:24

friend and then , through him , access

18:26

to a printer , printed about 50 different

18:29

50 copies of my resume

18:31

and then went door-to-door in the university

18:33

, department to department , dropping my resume

18:35

, saying , hey , if you've got a job , I'm the guy

18:37

. You know , any kind of internships

18:40

, research or teaching internships

18:42

, I'm happy to do that . And

18:45

then you know there were other

18:47

guys , right , I was doing an MBA . They were computer science

18:49

guys and all mechanical engineering guys , civil

18:52

engineering guys and I

18:54

for about a month , really

18:56

nothing much happened . I was still trying to

18:58

contact professors and all that . And

19:01

I had housing With

19:03

another guy who actually

19:05

had a bed empty because the guy who

19:08

occupied that bed had gone to India . He

19:10

said , hey , he's coming back in 15 days . You

19:12

got to make arrangements for yourself in 15 days

19:14

. So I had 15 days , and so

19:17

you know , all I would do is go to the university

19:20

and try to meet professors or departments

19:22

and try to find something . And I was

19:24

the last guy to get a scholarship , by the way , because

19:26

everybody else got it before me . And

19:28

what happened was the Department of

19:30

Human Resources , I

19:33

think they

19:35

invited me over and they said , hey , can you

19:37

tutor people ? And I said , yeah

19:39

, I can . You know , I have an MBA . What

19:41

kind of tutoring do you need ? They asked what

19:43

subjects can you tutor ? I said what kind of subjects

19:46

do they need tutored in ? And

19:48

then they would talk about math , physics , chemistry

19:50

, organizational behavior

19:53

, economics , all of

19:55

these things , and I said anything . Then

19:57

they said can you teach anything ? I said , absolutely

19:59

. So that's where I started . I started with

20:01

a tutoring scholarship

20:03

they gave me , which meant that part

20:06

of my fees was paid , and then I was making

20:08

enough to pay the next

20:10

semester fees , and then I just barely

20:12

had enough to survive . And then

20:14

the next thing , like you said , was OK

20:17

, now I had my wife back in India and then the next

20:19

important thing for me was to get her over here . So

20:21

once I found a job , I then

20:24

needed to do my H1 . And

20:27

then I went with a startup

20:29

out in New Jersey . Some guy who

20:31

was basically doing body shopping worked

20:33

with him for three months , very quickly realized I'm

20:35

not going to go anywhere there . He didn't pay me for

20:38

those three months , and then I

20:41

started applying for jobs . And

20:44

then I had another opportunity where they interviewed

20:46

me , which was this BPO company , and

20:48

they said , hey , we'll give you a business analyst

20:50

job , starting level . And I'm like , ok , great , I'll

20:52

take it . Will you sponsor my visa

20:54

? They said , yeah , we'll do that . And then that

20:56

was it . That was more important for me . So

20:58

that's how I you know something's going to happen

21:01

. You know you're going to make it happen . You

21:03

believe in yourself , and then you have this positive

21:06

notion about yourself that , no matter how hard

21:08

it gets , you will crack it through , and

21:11

that's all . That's resilience and that's

21:13

, that's a conviction in yourself , and that's

21:15

all you need in order to continue

21:18

down the journey that you take .

21:20

Conviction was the word actually , just as you just said , it

21:22

was just kind of mine because it sounds like it's not just

21:24

resilience , because resilience

21:27

is kind of being ready for stuff to go wrong and

21:29

for doing what it does Right , but

21:32

there's a really strong sense of conviction that's

21:34

come out here in terms of taking

21:36

the road less traveled and really backing yourself

21:38

. So going door to door

21:41

against the social pressure , going

21:44

to the US with basically

21:47

one semester's fees and not

21:49

knowing where you're going to live is quite a high , high

21:51

vulnerability situation and leaving your wife behind

21:54

. It seems to be the marriage of conviction

21:56

and resilience . That seems to be superpower

21:59

Absolutely . Where

22:02

do you think this really strong

22:04

conviction came from ?

22:07

Knowing that , if things

22:09

go wrong , and you still have yourself to

22:11

believe in . I think that that's

22:13

very , very , very important . I

22:16

believe that's a crucial skill

22:19

that anybody needs to develop , because

22:21

, at the end of the day , you have just you yourself

22:24

, and every door that

22:26

you open is because of you . And

22:29

that's where conviction that's what I believe

22:31

is conviction and having

22:33

a high sense of that will

22:35

see you through the most troubling

22:37

of times .

22:40

And if we highlight this , day

22:43

one of door to door , is the moment of just

22:45

way resilience journey really

22:47

kicked in . Where

22:50

would you identify

22:52

day one of your conviction journey

22:54

kicking in ? Do

22:56

you remember a shift or do you think science always

22:58

been there with you ?

23:01

I think it's always been there . So , for instance

23:03

, let's take a look at the

23:05

journey that I took during my MBA

23:07

. I've

23:10

kind of been a guy who didn't

23:12

want to take money from my parents

23:14

for my education . The same

23:16

thing happened there . So my MBA , back

23:18

in India , the first semester fees what

23:21

my parents sent me with , and by semester

23:23

two I didn't want to take their money . I

23:26

had to find something to do myself

23:28

. And then , while studying and I was

23:30

doing an MBA in the mornings , I

23:32

was doing another master's degree in the evenings

23:35

and then between those times I really

23:37

wanted to find something where I could make money

23:39

. And then when I heard

23:41

about this company coming and doing that , I

23:43

was pretty curious , Because that was never

23:45

heard of in India . But

23:47

to be self-dependent I was

23:50

was something that was always there within

23:52

me and I think that's

23:55

where the beginning of that

23:57

conviction came from .

23:59

Well , thank you so much for sharing

24:01

and congrats on the

24:03

journey . It's been awesome , thank you .

24:05

Absolutely . You know one thing , that one

24:07

other thing that comes to mind is you

24:09

know , I've heard this a lot about myself

24:12

, where a lot of people think I'm a very

24:14

calm , tranquil guy above

24:16

with a strong presence , and I heard it yesterday too

24:18

when I was thinking about it . You know

24:20

what do they mean by that . Now

24:23

it kind of you know when we talk about conviction

24:25

, and you know resilience

24:27

and kind of being positive

24:30

, you know , now it makes sense

24:32

that you know , when you know that when

24:35

odds are against you and you're ready to

24:37

fight through the odds and you know that on the other

24:39

side of the odds is what you want

24:41

, then why worry

24:44

or why get anxious than

24:47

focus your energies on fighting the fight and getting there ? I

24:49

think that's what the calmness is about .

24:53

Your story really resonates with what

24:55

I believe in too . As

24:59

you heard today , coaching opens up a whole

25:01

range of insights and areas

25:04

to explore . If

25:06

you have a potential moment to revisit and the podcast , or

25:08

just want to learn more about coaching , look

25:12

in for a 30 minute chat with me at

25:14

peer-effectcom .