Entrepreneurs must be ruthless, obsessive and willing to cut corners.

Something that Justin Byam Shaw, Chairman of ESI Media, would know.

He co-owns (alongside Evgeny Lebedev) the Evening Standard & the Independent, and also co-founded the Felix Project - one of the biggest food redistribution charities in the UK!

If you've ever been in London, you'll notice the Evening Standard lying around Tube stations. It's a 100% free quality newspaper and I'd always wondered - what does it take to run it? How do you manage to keep a newspaper free on such a scale?

Well today, Justin shares it all.

He takes us through his decision to:

🔥 Study classics at Oxford University - even when everyone told him it was good for nothing!

🔥 Pivot from advertising - when he realised he was terrible at it

🔥 Drop out of British Telecom within 1 week of finding a market gap to launch his own startup - at a time when it wasn't the "cool thing" to be a founder

🔥 Buy both the Evening Standard & the Independent (alongside the Lebedevs)

And also his thoughts on:

🤔 How George Osborne faired as Editor of the Evening Standard

🤔 How to turn around failing media companies

🤔 Launching the The i newspaper (within 7 months of acquiring the Independent!)

🤔 The rise of superstar journalists turned media personalities

🤔 The media publication he'd be most interested in taking over & what he'd do differently!

Highlights:

• 4.44 Studying "good for nothing" Classics at Oxford?!
• 7:18 Being bad at advertising
• 9:27 Moving to British Telecom when it'd just privatised
• 11:34 The talent show that kickstarted Justin's entrepreneurial journey
• 12:38 Remortgaging his apartment?!
• 15:32 Expanding to 12+ countries
• 19:39 The tipping point
• 20:54 Life after acquisition
• 22:34 Arrogance
• 26:59 Being ruthless
• 29:00 Buying the Evening Standard
• 33:41 Launching The i in 7 months?!
• 36:38 Not going digital with the Evening Standard
• 38:58 Internal resistance
• 40:27 Appointing George Osborne as editor
• 45:14 What do media owners expect from their editors?
• 49:23 Journalists become media superstar personalities
• 51:59 Buzzfeed
• 53:05 If Justin could buy any newspaper publication, it'd be...
• 55:14 The Felix Project

📍Show notes: https://www.sothisismywhy.com/119

💌 Weekly STIMY Newsletter that deconstructs how you build a portfolio career to prepare yourself for the future of work: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

✍🏻 Leave a review on STIMY: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/so-this-is-my-why/id1521191442

Not everyone has to be a Steve Jobs.

The charismatic, big picture, visionary leader that everyone gravitates towards.

We also have (and need) those who execute.

Who double down on the nitty gritty and ensure that things actually get done. And well

Which brings me to today's STIMY guest: Chen Chow Yeoh.

Speak to anyone in the Southeast Asian startup scene and they'll likely have heard of Chen Chow and have a tremendous amount of respect for him.

He's an OG in the space:

• Co-Founder of Fave - one of the fastest growing fintech platform in Southeast Asia
• Co-Founder of KFit.com - which revolutionised how people approached fitness in Asia Pacific
• Regional Operations Director in APAC & COO (Malaysia) for Groupon

But he never had a plan. 😅

Chen Chow:

❌ Was one of the top 8 people who scored the worst in his English exams at Cornell University;

❌ Didn't get a promotion at Accenture (and cried about it ☹️)

❌ Landed his role at Jobstreet by chance

❌ Was rendered obsolete in Groupon when he joined - he was hired for a sales role but by the time he finished serving notice at his previous company, that role was obsolete!

But:

🔥 At Accenture, he did eventually get that promotion. By buckling down & putting in the work.

🔥 He did odd jobs at Groupon & within 3 weeks of joining, was promoted to COO!

🔥 He worked with Joel Neoh to turn Groupon Taiwan from a $1 million loss making monster to $8k in profits in 8 months!

🔥 He has never formally applied for any jobs - people always go to him

But he is not like his charismatic, visionary counterpart.

He just does the work.

Great work, in fact.

And this, is his story.

So are you ready?

Let's go 😎

Highlights:

• 2:04 Catching the 5am bus
• 2:56 Going to Cornell University
• 6:59 Failing to get a job promotion
• 8:13 A coincidental offer from Jobstreet
• 12:16 Joel Neoh
• 13:47 Why take the leap to Groupon
• 15:38 Never formally applied for a job!
• 17:36 From random jobs to COO?!
• 21:57 Inferiority or imposter syndrome?
• 24:54 Don't ask for more?!
• 27:29 How to turn a $1 million loss making business into $8k profit in 8 months in Taiwan
• 35:29 Co-Founding KFit
• 39:35 Raising $1 million from friends & family?!
• 41:11 Landing Pieter Kemps from Sequoia as an investor!
• 50:47 Turning KFit into Fave
• 54:05 Laying off 50% of staff but still being good friends with them
• 59:30 How to bring 2 company cultures together during an acquisition
• 1:01:36 China
• 1:11:55 What are Chen Chow's strongest features?
• 1:12:33 Will Chen Chow stay even though Joel has left?
• 1:14:04 A competitor Chen Chow really admires

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/118

🙊 Like STIMY? Buy us a ☕️?: https://beacons.ai/sothisismywhy 

💌 Weekly Newsletter on upcoming STIMY guests/interesting reads to make you smarter: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062 

Former US Congressman Barney Frank has been described by the New York Times as "one of the people most responsible for overhauling financial regulation after the 2008 economic crisis".

Little surprise, given that this acerbic politician was:

🔥 Member of the US House of Representatives (1981 - 2013)

🔥 Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee (2007 - 2011); and

🔥 Lead co-sponsor of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act - which introduced the greatest Wall Street reform in history.

He hit the headlines again given the Silicon Valley Bank meltdown & ironically, his role as director at the now defunct Signature Bank.

❓ But how did Barney end up in the top echelons of politics?

❓ Why did the Pope have to intervene with his appointment to the US House of Representatives?

❓ How did staying silent about being gay impact him, and why did he decide to out himself in a Boston Globe article?

❓ How does he get along with his peers?

Specifically, in his own words, "You learn how to ingratiate yourself with them and how you can help them and make them value your friendship. And that becomes particularly important when you move up."

❓And what does he think of Trump (p/s Trumplestilskin) & the upcoming US Presidential Elections?

This episode is full of gems that we can apply to our own lives (even outside of politics).

So do give it a listen, and let us know what you think!

Highlights:

• 7:39 Obsession with politics
• 14:27 Anne Frank
• 15:50 Politics in the blood?
• 19:58 Campaigning in a Republican state
• 23:07 Enjoying the things he's very good at
• 24:20 1980 campaign was the toughest race
• 26:31 Intervention from the Pope?!
• 29:24 Congress is like "high school as a freshman"
• 30:53 Do the job well, but not TOO well
• 31:51 How do you become/stay popular?
• 35:34 How do you know what's happening on the ground?
• 38:20 The Boston Globe article
• 40:43 Being willing to sacrifice his political career
• 41:52 Why did Barney keep winning by wide margins?
• 44:34 Having empathy due to being closeted for so long
• 45:33 The average American isn't homophobic?!
• 47:44 Dodd-Frank Act
• 53:28 Could the Dodd-Frank Act have done more to prevent the SVB meltdown?
• 56:01 Challenges in raising the insurance limit on bank deposits
• 58:01 Disagreeing with Senator Elizabeth Warren that the Dodd-Frank Act is to blame
• 59:46 Crypto
• 1:00:57 Where's the banking crisis headed?
• 1:02:36 The 2024 US Presidential Elections, Trumplestilkin as the most self-destructive politician he's seen in awhile
• 1:05:13 How governments can encourage crypto innovation
• 1:06:19 A mistake to be the director of Signature Bank?
• 1:10:56 Was it a mistake to partially repeal the Dodd-Frank Act?

📍Show notes: https://www.sothisismywhy.com/117

💌 Weekly STIMY Newsletter that deconstructs how you build a portfolio career to prepare yourself for the future of work: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

✍🏻 Leave a review on STIMY: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/so-this-is-my-why/id1521191442

John-Son Oei’s EPIC social enterprise was born out of guilt.

This former Rain oppa lookalike (time to check out his photos! 😏) knew the importance of giving back. Wanted to give back. 

But never did. 

And it wasn’t as though he hadn’t dabbled many things in his life prior to graduation: 

He’d worked retail with Polo Ralph Lauren, did video production, was a fitness instructor & a Marshall at Camp 5 (rock climbing) and even modeled (yes, you really want to see his photo now, don’t you? 😉). 

Yet despite all that, John-Son wanted to become a jet ski operator. A bona-fide “beach bum”, as his mother declared!

Until a toilet came along.

Because you see, he’d been told that while it was great to want to give back, he couldn’t stay idealistic for too long. 

“The moment you go into the real world, it’s a dog eat dog world.”

And that troubled John-Son: 

“It’s not that I couldn’t be a dog. To eat other dogs. But I said, is that really what life is about?”

*

The opportunity to explore this ideal came when he visited an orang asli community & discovered their need for a functionable toilet. 

He set up a Facebook group, and 64 strangers came.

Not his friends or the ones who said they were into charities, but complete & utter strangers.

And that sent John-Son down a rabbit hole.

He realised that we all need a purpose beyond ourselves. 

It wasn’t as though he, and many others, didn’t care about giving back - but that we all felt alone. And honestly, “What impact can one person have?”

As it turns out?

An EPIC amount.

*

But this won’t be a STIMY interview if we didn’t talk about the “darker sides”.

The difficulties in running EPIC as a social enterprise, figuring out their business model, convincing companies that they weren’t a “con job”, the pandemic and also, how John-Son would even question his own purpose. 

This, despite the numerous international awards and recognition showered upon him, e.g. being accepted into the Ashoka Fellowship; Forbes 30 under 30 2016; The Muhammad Ali Humanitarian Award for Dedication 2017; SME Malaysian Social Entrepreneur of the Year 2017; Tatler Malaysia—Force for Good Award; The Edge Inspiring Young Leaders Award; the Iclif Leadership Energy Award 2015; and Microsoft’s Global YouthSpark Star award. He was also Malaysia’s official flag bearer for Queen Elizabeth’s Diamond Jubilee and 2012 Commonwealth Day.

So if you want to know the realities of giving back to the community, why it’s important to have a purpose beyond ourselves and how you can do so too?

Then this is the episode for you.

Highlights:

• 3:03 Having a gentle giant for a father
• 3:52 Does God exist?
• 10:58 I had two As & failed everything else 😳
• 15:58 Aspiring to be a beach bum
• 20:30 Giving back to the community
• 22:47 Becoming Rain the KPop Superstar
• 23:46 Building a toilet
• 25:17 From toilet to a house for Pak Cihong?!
• 32:42 The realities of running a social enterprise
• 37:33 This is a con job!
• 43:33 Why is this team building?
• 46:40 Why 2012 was a really difficult year
• 51:38 The personal significance behind winning the Muhammad Ali Humanitarian Award for Dedication 2017
• 53:21 Is there something more?

📍Show notes: https://www.sothisismywhy.com/116

💌 Weekly STIMY Newsletter that deconstructs how you build a portfolio career to prepare yourself for the future of work: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

Lydia Fenet is the most powerful woman in the room.

She has sold over $1 billion dollars for nonprofits globally alongside Elton John, Jason Bourne (aka Matt Bourne), Bruce Springsteen & every other big-name superstar you can think of.

In 2018, she became Christie's Global Managing Director of Strategic Partnerships and has also:

• Been named one of New York’s most influential women by Gotham magazine;
• Appeared in Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, Vanity Fair and Town & Country;
• Published 2 books (her first book was optioned by Netflix in Feb 2022!); and
• Runs the Claim Your Confidence podcast featuring Glenn Close, Candace Nelson, Stephanie Horton, and Courtney Dauwalter.

All while leading multiple benefit auctions for the biggest names in the industry. Including Elton John's 2023 AIDS Foundation Oscar Party!

Lydia is now living the life she has always wanted.

But it wasn't.

When young, she wanted to be a lawyer just like her father. Unlike she came across a Vanity Fair article & discovered the exclusive world of Christie's.

She convinced the Matriarch of Christie's to let her join Christie's internship program.

But for the first 10 years, was told (and believed!) to not talk about money. And that "she was lucky to work there".

If you want to learn how Lydia later managed to triple her salary + gain a global title + lead a new department at Christie's, you'll have to listen to the episode!

Highlights:

• 2:47 Why Lydia is a "life in motion"
• 3:32 Network or die
• 5:30 Learning about Christie's
• 7:13 Not Sotheby's?
• 8:01 Convincing the Matriarch of Christie's, Mary Libby, to let her join the internship program
• 12:51 How Lauren Short influenced her
• 14:33 How Lydia became Christie's benefit auctioneer
• 16:27 Why Lydia did 500 mediocre auctions but never wanted to quit
• 18:20 The breakthrough
• 22:31 Leading the auction at Elton John's 2023 AIDS Foundation Oscar Party
• 25:58 Where Lydia gets her energy from
• 30:01 When Lehman Brothers collapsed but Lydia managed to save her colleague
• 34:49 Ask for what you're worth, because you're just a number on a P&L
• 41:44 How being a published author has opened doors

📍Show notes: https://www.sothisismywhy.com/115 

💌 Weekly STIMY Newsletter that deconstructs how you build a portfolio career to prepare yourself for the future of work: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

✍🏻 Leave a review on STIMY: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/so-this-is-my-why/id1521191442

Alvin Chiong's father was an opium addict.

And as for Alvin:

• Age 7: Alvin's mother abandoned the family
• Age 9: Started sniffing glue & joined the secret society to avoid being bullied
• Age 14: Left school to follow his leader
• Age 18: Became hooked on heroin & couldn't hold down a job.

Things came to a head in Thailand, where Alvin realised he needed to change his life around.

But opium addiction, while a choice, is not so easy to kick.

And it took many, many halfway houses & attempts before Alvin came clean, turned his life around (after prison!!) and became the person he is today: giving back to society, helping his former brothers find their feet & holding down jobs as a chef as tour guide at Triad Trails.

Alvin's story, like Notle Chew's story in STIMY Episode 102, is an unusual STIMY story, but one that I really want to have shared.

Because there is a lesson to be learned from everyone's life journey.

And the biggest takeaway is this: It's all about mindset & attitude.

If we insist on blaming the world & everyone else in it for our troubles, no matter how 'justified', then you will continue to be held back.

Now Alvin tells his story best, so are you ready?

Let's go!

Highlights:

• 2:53 Dysfunctional family
• 4:54 Joining the secret society
• 10:34 Fighting
• 12:57 Thailand
• 14:56 The "price" for leaving the secret society gang
• 19:04 Being friends with brothers
• 20:35 Being in prison
• 23:51 Safeguards to avoid temptation
• 26:17 Going back to prison to help
• 30:24 God
• 31:56 Common misconceptions about drug addicts
• 32:49 The secret to change
• 35:13 Knowing when a convict is telling you the truth
• 38:55 Are Singaporean laws too harsh?
• 41:41 Common struggles for members of the secret society
• 43:02 Spiritual journey & finding God
• 46:43 What Alvin is grateful for this year

📍Show notes: https://www.sothisismywhy.com/114 

💌 Weekly STIMY Newsletter that deconstructs how you build a portfolio career to prepare yourself for the future of work: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

Everyone wants to start a community while Bryan Pham (with his co-founder, Maggie Chui) has grown a global community from 0 to 200,000+ in 3 years! 😱 

#casual

Best of all?

It started as a “screw you” moment. 😅

In all seriousness, Bryan is the founder of Asian Hustle Network (“AHN”), AHNF & AHN Ventures. 

And has had quite the unconventional journey:

😮Bryan’s parents fled the Vietnam War & taught him that investments and business were taboo

😮He worked as a software engineer & realised that companies didn’t have his back; you’d be fired even if you’d been working there for 20 years!

😮He tried an Amazon selling side hustle - and lost $22k

Although:

🔥His roommate got him into property investment - and he made $200k+ from his first sale!

🔥He built a real estate investment community of 2,000 in 2 years in the Bay Area.

But for 4 years, Bryan had been thinking about his why. And found himself wanting to build something for the Asian community.

A trip to the Meiji Shrine gave his idea the spark, a rejection gave it the light (you’ll have to listen to find out what! 😏), and within 3 days of AHN being born, the Asian Hustle Network had 1,000 members.

👀 In 11 months: 60k members

👀In 1.5 years: 100k+ members

👀In 2 years: 120k+ members

Talk about fulfilling a need! 😱

But things weren’t easy: 

☹️Bryan was receiving hate messages (and wanted to quit after 8 months) 

☹️ AHN wasn’t profitable for years.

Things have since turned around

🔥AHN is incorporated in the USA, Singapore & Australia;

🔥Has its own venture fund;

🔥Also runs a non-profit fund; and

🔥Has expanded into Southeast Asia!

To learn the details of this transformation, how AHN grew from a Facebook group to a massive global super connector platform & Bryan’s lesson from launching the Hate Is A Movement, just listen to the latest episode 113 on the So This Is My Why podcast!

And do let us know what you think. 😊

Highlights:

• 2:17 Growing up with $25
• 4:02 Investments & business were taboo at home!
• 5:31 Why computer science?
• 6:45 Companies aren’t loyal 😕
• 9:43 Starting his side hustle & losing $22,000 😫
• 12:01 Getting into real estate investment
• 18:04 When you’re less reliant on your job, you start seeing what’s wrong with it
• 20:17 I don’t need to be an employee!
• 22:47 Depressed over finding the meaning of life
• 27:03 The Asian community is divided
• 31:04 Asian Hustle Network’s mission
• 32:35 Being inspired by the Meiji Shrine
• 34:33 Going viral (thanks, Subtle Asian Traits!)
• 39:14 How do you make everyone feel like they belong?
• 41:11 Wanting to quit after 8 months
• 41:43 Hate Is A Virus movement
• 45:44 Running successful events
• 48:51 The trick to networking
• 50:09 Constantly innovating
• 51:18 Becoming profitable
• 53:04 Sponsorships
• 55:00 Moving to Southeast Asia
• 57:57 Difference to EST Media
• 58:46 The Vietnamese Way
• 1:03:11 Bing Chen of Gold House

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/113 

 💌 Weekly STIMY Newsletter that deconstructs how you build a portfolio career to prepare yourself for the future of work: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

🥳STIMY episodes are now open to sponsorship! Just email sothisismywhy@gmail.com to find out more.

We've heard from Eric Sim all week.

In Part 1, we learned about his journey from working at his father's prawn noodle hawker stall to becoming the Managing Director at UBS Investment Bank.

In Part 2, Eric explains why he left it all behind, the importance of building a portfolio career, why LinkedIn & his secret to building a 2.9 million following on LinkedIn!

In today's special episode, we asked Eric questions that came from YOU, the STIMY listeners!

YOUR Questions to Eric:

• 1:10 Framework to evaluate opportunities [Lily Wu]
• 4:10 What is Eric Sim's life purpose? [Sam Huen]
• 5:12 What does the creator economy look like in 3 years & what's 1 action that people can take to best position themselves for it? [Lester Chng]
• 8:36 Lessons learned after writing his book, Small Actions Leading Your Career to Big Success [Craig Davis]

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/112-questions 

💌 Weekly STIMY Newsletter that deconstructs how you build a portfolio career to prepare yourself for the future of work: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

Eric had the world at his feet.

He had gone from selling prawn noodles at his father's hawker stall in Singapore to becoming the Managing Director of UBS Investment Bank.

So why did he throw it all away? 😱

What comes after all that?

For Eric, a lot more.

He was constantly learning skills & combining them in unique ways. From learning to sail to video editing and becoming LinkedIn's top influencer in both Singapore and China thanks to his 2.9 MILLION followers.

In this Part 2, we dive into Eric's life after banking.

How we can & should all be building a portfolio career. Why LinkedIn. His book writing journey & the crazy way he sells his books in China.

If you feel stuck in your career, or don't know how to stand out from your peers, then this is the roadmap to adopt. 😉

Highlights:

• 2:39 Why stop being the Managing Director?
• 3:53 Pursuing a portfolio career
• 5:57 The start of Eric’s LinkedIn journey in Hong Kong
• 7:45 Content pillars
• 9:13 How do you gain 2.9 million LinkedIn followers?!
• 10:01 Why LinkedIn?
• 13:59 Where’s the line?
• 16:13 Building community
• 22:16 Small Actions
• 25:20 Should I write a book?
• 26:44 Self-publication & Kinokuniya’s Kenny Chan
• 28:42 Marketing
• 30:29 What’s the China market like?

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/112-2

💌 Weekly STIMY Newsletter that deconstructs how you build a portfolio career to prepare yourself for the future of work: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

How does a shy boy with no social skills, who failed his mathematics & went to school smelling of prawns every day... become the Managing Director of UBS?

Just ask Eric Sim.

The truth is:

❌ Eric didn't just fail his maths.

He also failed his English Literature & History papers and had to work at his father's prawn noodle shop before going to school.

❌ He bombed his first job in FX Sales role at DBS Bank.

❌ He failed all his job interviews in London (which he attended wearing a chicken suit!).

But Eric's story doesn't end there.

He:

✅ Figured out how to leverage on his unique background, i.e. as the son of a hawker & bartender, to build a unique personal brand & score his first job;

✅ Found an amazing boss, Prasanna Thombre, who believed in him & gave him all the international opportunities he needed; and

✅ Built relationships that meant that his future jobs were all referred to him.

Eric learned very quickly that you need to do more than just your job to thrive.

And we talked about the cultural nuances of working in different Asian cities (including Ulaanbaatar!), what it meant to be the Managing Director, why he would go to the same restaurant x4 a week!! & how he networks to build the relationships he needs.

Highlights:

• 2.52: Forced to drink oat milk & selling prawn noodles
• 5:27 Carving potatoes was a lie!
• 6:43 Developing an inferiority complex (+ learning everything!)
• 9:16 Sending an unsolicited application to DBS Bank
• 12:35 Restarting his career at Lancaster University
• 14:36 Wearing a chicken suit for interviews at London's financial banks
• 16:15 The Asian Financial Crisis & Prasanna Thombre
• 20:53 Moving to Citi
• 23:41 Working in Shanghai & witnessing the liberalisation of China's financial sector
• 24:52 Chinese business culture
• 25:55 Cigarettes
• 28:09 The importance of being friends with all the chefs
• 30:31 Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
• 31:38 Why Eric keeps getting referrals for jobs
• 32:33 Why Citi was Eric's dream job
• 35:09 Did the wealthy look down at Eric?
• 37:11 Why being a hawker's son helped Eric as a banker
• 40:14 Meeting Hawker Chan
• 42:53 Becoming Managing Director at UBS (investment banking)
• 44:30 Was Eric a successful MD?

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/112 

💌 Weekly STIMY Newsletter that deconstructs how you build a portfolio career to prepare yourself for the future of work: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

P/S: Part 2 of Eric's episode comes out this WEDNESDAY! And we talked about why Eric left his high-flying role as Managing Director, how he built a 2.9 million LinkedIn follower count, the importance of personal branding & building a second career, and his journey as a published author in Asia and specifically, China.

Amanda Cua is the founder of Backscoop: the hottest newsletter covering all things in the Southeast Asian startup industry.

She’s only 20 years old but:

• Backscoop has already crossed 10,000 subscribers;
• Has attracted funding from Buko Ventures;
• Been featured on CNN; and
• Has moderated a Wild Digital firechat with Jaeson Ma of 88Rising & OP3N.

All this - with no college degree.

Who said COVID-19 pandemic projects can’t go far? 😉

But if you listen to this STIMY episode, you’ll soon realise that Backscoop is so much more than a mere side project. 

Amanda envisions it to be a regional media company for the people in Southeast Asian tech.

So if you’re interested in what drives Amanda, what it takes to run a newsletter that publishes x5/week (it now has a podcast!) & also what’s happening in the Southeast Asian startup space, then this is the episode for you.

Highlights:

• 7:00 Deciding to not go to university
• 10:11 Maximising her gap year
• 15:53 Cold outreach tactics
• 17:38 Launching her own startup, Backscoop
• 20:36 Why Southeast Asia (and not APAC)?
• 26:59 Researching other newsletters
• 29:58 The different iterations of Backscoop
• 31:24 Dropping Soft Serve
• 32:44 Most effective growth strategy
• 34:34 Getting over stagnant growth
• 35:56 Building a regional media company
• 37:26 Trends in the Southeast Asian tech scene
• 39:36 Accepting investment from Buko Ventures
• 43:39 Launching a new product, One More Scoop
• 44:55 What’s the value proposition?
• 47:02 Serendipity
• 49:37 Personal branding
• 53:42 Competitor that Amanda admires & why

📍Show notes: https://www.sothisismywhy.com/111

🍦Subscribe to Backscoop: https://sparklp.co/p/9c1a338c2c 

💌 Weekly STIMY Newsletter that deconstructs how you can find success & build a portfolio career on your own terms: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

✍🏻 Leave a review on STIMY: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/so-this-is-my-why/id1521191442

Welcome to Part 2 of Ian Lee's episode.

In Part 2, we talked all about how we should measure our lives. How Ian Lee pivoted from art to design then investment banking and consulting. How cancer changed his life. Why we shouldn’t make 10 year long-term plans and instead, pursue the things that interest us most in 12-18 month increments & so much more!

This episode, deals with all things web3.

From going into banking to being tasked with finding out about bitcoin, how he ended up being the Head of Crypto & Blockchain, all things decentralised social networks and what he's now trying to achieve at Syndicate.

Highlights:

• 2:26 Being ridiculed by bankers
• 4:56 Learning about Bitcoin
• 11:37 Attending Bitcoin conferences as a "suspicious" person
• 13:38 Forking the Bitcoin network with Citi coin
• 17:43 Leaving Citi
• 18:45 Being crushed by... Ethereum?!
• 24:40 Joining IDEO
• 27:15 Meeting his co-founder, Will
• 32:33 Creating the YouTube of web3 investment
• 40:15 Collectives
• 42:32 Working towards Balaji's vision of a network stake?
• 44:08 Singapore rice dishes
• 47:44 Does everyone have just 1 calling?

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/110

💌  Weekly Newsletter that deconstructs how you can find success & purpose on your own terms: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

P/S: Did you know that STIMY is on YouTube?! Please do subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/c/SoThisIsMyWhy

Ian Lee is the co-founder of Syndicate: a decentralised investing protocol & social network by the likes of A16Z, IDEO, Kleiner Perkins, Uniswap, Coinbase, Opensea, circle & Ledger. He is also the former founding member of IDEO Colab and Head of crypto & blockchain at Citi.

But before all that, he was an artist. 

Then a designer. Before pivoting into marketing & advertising, investment banking and finally, consulting.

Where he ended up being diagnosed with cancer. 

His world shrunk into 3 month timeframes, because he just didn’t know if he would live beyond each three month period. 

Ian’s worldview changed. He was and remains afraid to try new things. 

In Part 1 of Episode 110, our discussion centres around the fundamental question of: How do we measure our life?

Opening with a viral Tweet that Ian wrote, inspired by a Harvard Professor called Clayton Christensen where he learned that: 

The best strategy in life is an emergent one.

Don’t plan life in 5-10 year spans. Instead go all-in on what you have the most conviction, passion & excitement for in 12-18 month increments.

You’ll learn more, grow faster & outperform others not as into it as you.

You’ll learn how and why in this episode, and so very much more in this episode with Ian Lee.

Highlights:

• 2:41 Don’t plan your life in 5 to 10 year spans
• 3:49 Going to art school instead of science?!
• 6:07 Being diagnosed with cancer
• 7:43 Living in 2 to 3 month increments
• 9:26 Exploring rabbit holes
• 19:10 Life isn’t a linear progression
• 20:36 Letting go of his need for obsessive planning
• 22:15 Is there a place for long term vision and planning?
• 24:38 Would Ian really do anything differently?
• 27:59 Knowing when to quit
• 30:44 How to plan for a pivot
• 35:39 Juggling art and business in his CV
• 42:45 Mentors
• 48:53 Fostering relationships with mentors

P/S: Part 1 of the interview with Ian Lee comes out this Wednesday! Where we talk all about Ian’s deep dive into the world of investment banking & web3.

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/110

💌 Weekly Newsletter that deconstructs how you can find success & purpose on your own terms: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

If you want to hear from someone who: 

❓Helped purchase Lehman Brothers (US) for £1.75 billion;

❓Built out the equity practice in Europe for Barclays Capital;

❓Worked for Tony Blair, the former Prime Minister of the UK; and

❓Now works as the General Counsel in a web3 company that builds core blockchain infrastructure?

Then STIMY’s latest episode with Chrissy Hill, General Counsel at Parity Technologies, is not one you want to miss! 

Chrissy shares her journey from South Carolina into the web3 space, and some of the milestones in her career, including:

• 2:33 Being the baby of the family
• 5:23 A legacy of lawyers
• 7:26 Working at Linklaters’ London office
• 8:49 Becoming the Director of Compliance at Barclays Capital
• 13:38 Purchasing Lehman Brothers (US) for £1.75 billion
• 15:24 Working for Tony Blair at the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change
• 18:22 Working at a mission-driven organisation
• 21:21 Entering the web3 space
• 23:16 The concept of privacy
• 27:02 Working at Parity Technologies
• 31:34 What does a web3 lawyer do?
• 34:59 Regulations coming in

So if you want to know what it’s like to be a top notch lawyer in the web3 space, this episode is for you!

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/109

🙊 Like STIMY? Buy us a ☕️?: https://beacons.ai/sothisismywhy 

💌 Weekly Newsletter on upcoming STIMY guests/interesting reads to make you smarter: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062 

Leave a review on STIMY: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/so-this-is-my-why/id1521191442

It’s cool to be a YouTuber these days.

But how do you go pro?

What’s your life like?

And how much do you earn?!

To answer this over the Chinese New Year (hope everyone is feasting well!), we’ve got Gerald Sebastian - co-founder of Kok Bisa, which with 4.4 million subscribers makes them one of the biggest YouTubers in Asia!

In this episode, we learn how Gerald ended up being a full-time YouTuber, how they’ve built Kok Bisa, the kind of content that goes viral, their monetisation strategy & so much more. 

So if you wanna be a YouTuber, or just want to understand what it takes to produce the videos we binge on (don’t lie, I know you use YouTube 😝), then this is the STIMY episode for you!

Highlights:

• 2:30 Being a superhero
• 5:00 Asking questions nonstop
• 7:54 Finding his YouTube co-founder, Ketut Yoga Yudistira
• 9:54 Creating a different kind of content
• 11:19 What it takes to produce YouTube content
• 12:25 Going from 14 to 25,000 subscribers with 1 video!
• 13:35 Making videos to answer questions from the Kok Bisa audience
• 18:18 The reiteration process
• 19:21 The secret to going viral on YouTube
• 21:00 Humour
• 21:42 Indonesian meatballs
• 24:24 The importance of YouTube Shorts
• 25:25 How do you grab attention?
• 29:20 Becoming a full-time YouTuber
• 31:48 Deciding on the equity split
• 32:42 Questions to ask a potential co-founder
• 33:51 Navigating burnout & mental health issues
• 34:55 The different monetary streams they’ve created
• 36:23 How do you get sponsorship?
• 43:20 What’s next?
• 48:16 When do you use the “talking head”?

Descript: https://www.descript.com/?lmref=sjT9JA

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/108 

💌  Weekly Newsletter that deconstructs how you can find success & purpose on your own terms: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

✍🏻 Leave a review on STIMY: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/so-this-is-my-why/id1521191442

Michelle Toh is every Asian parents' dream child.

• She's ambitious.
• Has a strong sense of self.
• And will do whatever it takes to succeed - including cold pitching South China Morning Post & landing an internship in her teens!

Her initial dream was to be in fashion (she's worked at/for Elite Model Management, Hearst Magazines & HuffPost too).

Then she pivoted and ended up becoming:

😮 the Hong Kong Editor of Fortune; and

😮 writer & reporter at CNN Business

Where she has: 

🔥 hunted down super yachts belonging to Russian oligarchs

🔥 covered some of the world's biggest IPOs - e.g. Grab, DiDi, Coupang & Kuaishou Technology

🔥 conducted interviews with:

• Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel
• Netflix COO Greg Peters
• Grab Co-Founder Hooi Ling Tan 
• A16Z partner Connie Chan
• Impossible Foods President Dennis Woodside

And did I mention that Michelle is a Malaysian too?!

So:

• How did Michelle go from studying with royalty (she saw her classmate being fetched by helicopter to attend state events!) to working with the top journalists in the world?
• What is it like, really, to work at CNN?
• How does CNN handle "fake news"?
• How does she gain trust?
• And how important is personal branding (+ LinkedIn) for a journalist like Michelle?

You'll have to listen to Episode 107 of the So This Is My Why Podcast to find out. 😉

Highlights:

• 2:36 Having a strong sense of self
• 4:52 Where Michelle’s drive came from
• 7:04 Sense of inferiority
• 7:56 Working at South China Morning Post, Elite Model & a law firm
• 9:23 Cold emailing for internships!
• 9:54 The secret to cold emails
• 10:50 “I hope this finds you well”
• 12:38 Going from Harper’s Bazaar to boring old news?!
• 17:24 Going from Fortune to CNN
• 19:09 The Morning Show
• 20:32 The behind-the-scenes of working at CNN
• 23:49 Asian discrimination
• 27:11 Deciding on which stories get shared
• 28:40 Fake news! How did you spot them?
• 32:23 Hunting down a superyacht worth USD 500 million!
• 36:21 Public image
• 38:24 Building a personal brand
• 41:30 Why LinkedIn
• 42:30 How do you craft a story?
• 44:21 Mentors
• 46:20 Do you need a journalism degree?
• 38:23 Hallmarks of star journalists
• 50:42 How Michelle gains trust
• 52:07 How listeners can help Michelle

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/107 

💌 Weekly Newsletter that deconstructs how you can find success & purpose on your own terms: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

✍🏻 Leave a review on STIMY: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/so-this-is-my-why/id1521191442

Official Bio

Michelle Toh is an award-winning writer and reporter for CNN Business, based at the network's Asia Pacific headquarters in Hong Kong. She covers business and tech across APAC, writing breaking news, features and analysis about companies, startups and banks in the region.

Toh has covered some of the top stories in global business, including the disruption and inequality caused by the coronavirus pandemic, the corporate response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the crackdown in China on private enterprise, the Evergrande crisis, the US-China trade war, the fallout from the Hong Kong protests, and Huawei's battle in the United States. She has also covered the recent historic market turbulence and some of the world's biggest public offerings, including those of Grab, Didi, Kuaishou, and Coupang.

Toh has interviewed leaders of some of the world's top companies, including Tiffany CEO Alessandro Bogliolo, Galaxy Entertainment's billionaire Chairman Lui Che Woo, Netflix COO Greg Peters, Grab Co-Founder Tan Hooi Ling, Tinder CEO Elie Seidman, Yum China CEO Joey Wat, ex-Reddit CEO Ellen Pao, and Impossible Foods President Dennis Woodside. Her reporting frequently appears across CNN's digital and television platforms, and she often contributes to the network's "Meanwhile in China" newsletter.

In 2021, she led a team across six CNN bureaus on an interactive project about workplace discrimination of Asians around the world, which won an Award of Excellence from the Society of News Design.

Prior to joining CNN, Toh was the Hong Kong editor of Fortune Magazine, where she led a breaking news team, reported on business trends, and researched fundraising deals for its "Term Sheet" newsletter. Her work has also featured in publications including TIME, USA Today, the South China Morning Post and HuffPost. She has moderated and covered panels at major international conferences, such as CES in Las Vegas and Shanghai, Most Powerful Women in Laguna Niguel, California, and RISE in Hong Kong.

ICYMI (in case you missed it) features some of my favourite moments from earlier STIMY episodes.

Back in Episode 85, Dr Robin Dunbar (Emeritus Professor of Evolutionary Psychology at the University of Oxford) shares how the way boys & girls handle relationships are completely different.

The relationships that boys have is a lot more casual and club-based. If we belong to the same club, then we're friends.

Whereas for girls? Well, girls need to be interacting with each other. Sharing secrets. And if they don't, then the relationship weakens.

What do you think? 🤔

Listen to the full episode here:

🎙️Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/so-this-is-my-why/id1521191442?i=1000566279914

🎙️Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/4VuxAs76IE0wJgItPzoZHe?si=m1NsNAl6QgCk4n4sY3TTow 

🎙️Watch episodes on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSZlcS5ooyCjj_MkrmH_WhQ 

Other Links:

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/85   

💌 Sign up for the weekly STIMY newsletter: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/ebf231f605 

🪙 Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/sothisismywhy 

Please leave a review & rating here! - https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/so-this-is-my-why/id1521191442 

Xavier Desmet is the Head of Digital Natives, Startups and Unicorns for Asia at Zoom.

And in this episode, we talk about all:

• Tiger Mums (or for the French, “Jewish Mums”);
• Xav’s “WTF” moment when he realised that management consultancy wasn’t what he wanted to do with his life;
• His journey in the startup world and why he decided to leave Paris;
• Whether your life ends when you have kids;
• How words can change your brain;
• How Xav’s initial months at Microsoft were “absolute hell” and how that changed; 
• The cultural differences working in the startup world in France, Australia and Southeast Asia; and 
• So much more.

Want the details?

You’ll have to listen to Xav Desmet’s episode. 😉

Highlights:

• 2:50 We are all grown up children
• 5:35 Having a “Jewish Mum”
• 7:07 The French education system is violent & elitist
• 12:08 How entrepreneurs are viewed in France
• 13:47 Why leave management consultancy to run a startup?
• 15:38 Breakthrough moments
• 18:34 Finding like minded partners
• 21:56 The average lifespan of a startup is…?
• 28:57 Going on a 11 month sabbatical
• 34:51 How you can find the values in your life
• 37:25 The first 6 months at Microsoft were “absolute hell”
• 40:18 Four reasons Microsoft became great
• 43:26 Shutting down his startup
• 43:36 You’re a failure
• 49:33 Moving to a startup called Zoom
• 52:31 Delivering happiness
• 54:12 The difference in startup culture in France, Australia & Southeast Asia
• 58:16 Startups that Xav wants to help with
• 59:48 Mentors

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/106 

💌 Weekly STIMY Newsletter that deconstructs how you can find success on your own terms: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062

Sponsored by Descript: https://www.descript.com/?lmref=sjT9JA

Official Bio

After graduating as a Computer Science Engineer in France and completing a Postgraduate Master of Technology Management at UNSW, Xav quickly realised that his passion wasn’t in coding in C but in people, technology and entrepreneurship.

He started his career as Management Consultant in the UK but in 2005, his entrepreneurial nature led him to co-found and develop, Mome Sweet Mome, the master Franchise of Les Petits Bilingues, the first and leading network of immersive English learning centres for children from a very young age. He sold his shares in 2011 and today, Les Petits Bilingues are still the leader in France with more than 10,000 children enrolled each year. 

The same year he decided it was time to discover new horizons and moved with his wife and two new born children from Paris to Sydney, becoming also Australian in the process.

Down under, he joined Microsoft in Enterprise Strategic roles while also experimenting with ventures on the side (Perenne Investments and Solana) and becoming a sport addict through triathlons and long distance trail running.

He relocated to Singapore with his family in December 2020 during the pandemic and recently joined Zoom where he now leads the Digital Natives sales activities for Asia.

In his free time, you will find Xav influencing his family and friends to adopt a healthier and more sustainable lifestyle such as adopting a plant based diet."

Welcome to the first STIMY episode of 2023!

For the 105th episode, we're doing a little sneak peek into some of the upcoming episodes and as always, they're varied, but interesting.

With tons of insights to apply into our own lives.

We've got:

• Xav Desmet: Head of Digital Natives, Startups & Unicorn for Asia at Zoom
• Fabien Riggall: Founder & Chief Creative Officer of Secret Cinema (he took movies like Star Wars & Moulin Rouge, brought them to live & allowed the public to experience it like they were one of the characters!)
• Gerald Sebastian: One of the biggest Indonesian YouTubers with over 4.23 million subscribers
• Michelle Toh: Writer/Report at CNN
• Ian Lee: co-founder of Syndicate & the former Head of Crypto at Citibank
• Alvin Chiong: Former secret society member & heroin addict
• Enara Nazarova: VP of Metaverse at Hype
• Dr Giovanna Graziosi Casimiro: Head of Metaverse Fashion Week at Decentraland

And so much more.

I hope this gets you excited for what we have in store for 2023!

And if you've been enjoying So This Is My Why, please do leave a review. It really helps the podcast reach more people. 😍

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/105

💌 Weekly Newsletter on upcoming STIMY guests/interesting reads to make you smarter: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/acd5bd1062 

Leave a review on STIMY: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/so-this-is-my-why/id1521191442 

Welcome to Ep 104 of the So This Is My Why Podcast and this is... Goodbye! 😱

At least to 2022.

This will be the last episode of 2022 because it's time for a break :)

That said, I didn't want to sign off without sharing a little something about what STIMY has achieved, and also highlight some special moments from STIMY episodes this year.

Featured STIMY guests include:

• Ep 103: Nicole Levinson - Former VP of Marketing North America, LVMH
• Ep 102: Notle - the ex-convict who once ran Singapore's first and largest social escort businesses
• Ep 101: Adrian Tan - the King of Singapore
• Ep 99: Davy Liu - the first Chinese Disney animator, who worked on classics like the Lion King, Aladdin, Beauty & the Beast, Star Wars & the Atlantis
• Ep 95: Marja Konttinen - Marketing Director at Decentraland
• Ep 96: Aaron Tang - Country Manager of Luno
• Ep 93: Geoffrey See - founder of Poko & Choson Exchange, the largest social enterprise in North Korea
• Ep 92: General Tan Sri Borhan - retired 4 star General & former Chief of Defence Forces
• Ep 87: Phil Libin - co-founder of Evernote & mmhmm

Highlights:

• 0:00 Goodbye?!
• 3:18 Biggest advice to all young working professionals: Don't be a substitute
• 4:30 Biggest lesson from prison
• 6:29 Prison culture is a death sentence
• 8:18 Dumber than Forrest Gump
• 10:14 The biggest lesson Disney taught Davy wasn't how to draw cartoons, but to...
• 11:21 The secret sauce behind LVMH's success
• 13:23 What must all founders do all the time?!
• 14:37 Build your career like an adventure
• 16:08 The House of YES
• 17:32 Hustling for your first writing gig
• 18:30 How do you become a Huffington Post writer?
• 19:27 The challenges of building a social enterprise in North Korea
• 21:16 Feeling left behind (despite the public accolades)
• 23:13 Building Evernote felt like cheating?!
• 24:39 Anyone can love durians
• 25:40 Be cruel in order to be kind
• 26:41 The leadership style of a 4 star General

See you back on 1 January 2023!

Where I'll be sharing a sneak peek into upcoming episodes on STIMY. We’ve got YouTubers, Olympians, celebrity founders, a CNN correspondent, the CEO of one of the biggest confectioneries in town, a giant in the real estate development world, prominent politicians and so much more. 😎

It's gonna be great!

P/S: If you'd like to support what STIMY is doing, would you consider being a Patreon supporter? You can find the link here: https://www.patreon.com/sothisismywhy

📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/104

💌 Weekly Newsletter on upcoming STIMY guests/interesting reads to make you smarter: https://sothisismywhy.ck.page/ebf231f605