The Jennifer Kamara Podcast

Amy: when I left it was like 20,000 people. So it went from like, you know, 500 to 20,000 in, in like three years. And um, just like the scale at which they operated, the pace at which they launched new cities and new products was very breathtaking.

Hey everyone. Today I talk with Amy Sun. She's the co-founder of briefly.ai, and prior to that, she was the first growth partner at Sequoia, before which she worked at Microsoft, Facebook, and Uber. We talk all things working in tech, vc, and founding a startup, as well as lessons and tips for other founders out there.

Jenny: Amy, it's so great. to have you here. I love to get started with each of our guests with getting a fuller understanding of what growing up was like for them and what their formative experiences were.

So would you share with us

Amy: Sure. Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. It's so great to.

Jenny: our

pleasure?

Amy: you, uh, after a pretty crazy, uh, couple of weeks and yeah. Um, so I am the child of immigrants. My parents immigrated to Boston, uh, from China. You know, after the cultural revolution. I was born in the us. I am the only child. Uh, so take that, you know what you made.

And I grew up in the Boston area. Uh, when my. Moved to the us. They moved here with, with pretty much nothing. Um, came here for grad school as the only, one of the only avenues to get a visa, uh, out of communist China at the time. And, uh, I grew up in the dorms of Northeastern, uh, in, in Boston. You know, we actually had.

Six people living in a one bedroom, and I was a baby at the time, so my grandparents were able to come out of China after, you know, the Tiananmen Square massacre. Um, they were able to get refugee visas, the us. Um, my uncle also moved, uh, to the US after, um, to, for grad school as well in Boston and my. And me.

And so we all shared a, uh, we all shared a tiny, uh, dorm for the first like years of my life, but I was, you know, very surrounded by love and, and it was also very motivating for me, very formative. Uh, even though I don't have that many memories of, of that time in particular, the fact that my family like gave up everything for.

Me to have a better life in the us. I just had a very deep impact, uh, on me growing up and a really deep sense of responsibility to like, take every opportunity, like take nothing for granted, uh, and make sure that, you know, their sacrifices were worthwhile, . Uh, and um, and also just a sense of optimism, um, that you can make a better future for yourself and your children, um, through the decisions.

That you make, that, you know, sometimes it does take, like giving up everything that you've known, uh, your whole life, um, and going, you know, after your dreams basically. So definitely very much the American dream of like my parents coming, uh, over to the us. But, uh, it als instilled in me like a, a great sense of like optimism and opportu.

Jenny: Oh, absolutely. So we've talked about being, an immigrant. I myself am an immigrant and it's so crazy that you bring up that story cuz my parents, they met in grad school in Ukraine and they also, it must be a thing about grad school, they also lived in one room and granted it was just, , my dad, my mom and my brother.

Uh, and I remember these. I wasn't here, he's 12 years older than me, my brother is, but I remember their stories and like you, how you're describing the optimism. They always talk about how that was such a fun, fun time for them. Like when they had so little and they were raising my brother and trying to make sure they could create a better life for him.

Sounds like a lot of what you're describing in your experience with your parents and what they transitioned onto you. How did that experience then lead to your like, interest in Tech

Amy: Oh that is, um, good question. . Uh, so I think

Jenny: How much . , time do we have?

Amy: I would say a fixed mindset versus a growth mindset, right? It's like you, you know, like, just like you knew, your parents knew that when they're all in that one bedroom apartment, that it's temporary, right? It's not like you don't have, you're not gonna, this is not gonna be your life forever.

And that's the beauty of a, like the US is like, you can make the future that you want for yourself or.

Jenny: Mm-hmm.

Amy: degree there are a lot of

limitations as well, but, uh, the, this, like that, you know, you can affect change in the world. Um, and I know that, you know, the US is not perfect by any means. Economic mobility is not equal amongst everyone in the us.

However, it is better than a lot of other places, especially. Communist regimes, , uh, in, in overseas. But, uh, in terms of my interest in technology, like growing up, technology was very much a part of my life. My parents, uh, they were engineers, so I was exposed to it from a young age. Even though they weren't necessarily software engineers, they actually switched into being software engineers, uh, during.

the.com, like sort of boom and bust. So I, you know, even though I was a child, I was like, I remember like the heyday of like the.com, like how exciting that was. And then I do remember it all coming down as well. And like, you know, the layoffs and like the sort of subsequent fallout, but then the sort of rejuvenation of technology again.

Um, with much more real products, real more real business models. . I just, I found it to be so exciting. I think it had a lot to do with when I, um, went to college and grew up as well. It was like the iPhone came out in while I, my, like first year of, or my, like, Senior year of high school, first year of college, like that year.

And I just remember how exciting it was. Like, you know, my friends camped out in front of the Apple store and like watching like I, yeah, just like. . It just, all of these new technologies were truly transforming the way that I live my life as like a normal person, you know? And, and I, and I think I was especially impressionable, like during those times with my high school and college experiences, and it just made me wanna be a part of it.

It was like that very exciting, like, oh, like Silicon Valley things are happening there. Like it's transforming the way that we lived, like I was living. Seattle, uh, when, and I, I grew up in Boston, did not have a car. Uh, I was in high school because our school didn't even have enough parking for the students.

So like, you know, public transportation was how I got around with me and my friends when I was in high school. And, uh, in college we were also, you know, in Cambridge, so we didn't the, the cobblestone roads. There's also no parking for anyone. And so I didn't really get to drive, um, growing up. And I remember moving out west.

My first job after school was at Microsoft. Uh, and I. Realized that it's actually very hard to like get around a city with Seattle without a car. Taxis only go so far and, uh, the public transit system wasn't great. And I just remember like when Uber came out, it like just fundamentally changed my own life from such a.

Like I, all of a sudden I could like go places outside of downtown and like not have to worry about not getting a ride back. Like I didn't ever have to worry about missing my flight, which actually used to happen a lot because the taxi just like show up and I was like, wow, like these techno like this really, it's very, it's crazy how it's just, yeah, it's like internet and software, but it can just impact, have like such a big impact on how we live our day-to-day lives.

That it was an industry. I would, I was like very excited to be a.

Jenny: I totally feel everything you're saying. It's wild how much they're changing our world and what a time to be alive. And then, right now we talk about Chatri tea, and I know that your, your company right now is in the AI space, so it's. So much to talk about here. Uh, okay. So let me give folks some context.

So you grew up in Boston, you went to Harvard, and then like you said, you moved to the west coast. You started out your career at Microsoft, and then I also know that you worked as a.

PM at Facebook and then Uber. So did the tech route. And then you became the first female growth partner at Sequoia, and we're investing in startups.

And today you are the co-founder of briefly.ai, which you'll share more with us. You still invest. You're a mom. You live in Austin, so. All of these things going on, but would love to get started briefly with just your experience in tech, so working in Microsoft, Facebook, and Uber, and what you learned specifically with the lens of what it is, what it means to build something from scratch while you were in these larger organizations.

Amy: Yes. Yeah. Having to give you the, the sort of brief version of, uh, my, my tech career. So I, yeah. I knew I wanted to get into not technology, but I was not an engineer by trade. I did not, uh, study computer science. Um, Microsoft had a wonderful program. For like product marketing managers, uh, and uh, did not require technical background, was also very interested with what Microsoft was doing.

I mean, their software was a part of my life for basically as long as I used computers. Right. And, um, yeah, I think that was also part of why I got into technology earlier. Uh, it's just, it all happened while I was growing up. Right. We went from, you know, using those. Apple green kind of computers to laptops like MacBook Air when I was in

Jenny: That you can take with you on the plane, and even work on the plane with it. And then when we don't have internet on the plane, we get upset when it's like we're literally on these flying chairs doing work.

Amy: oh, yeah. But I, I do, I was talking to like, I, like, it's, I'm not, okay, I'm dating myself, but I don't think I'm that old. Right. . But I did use floppy discs

Jenny: Yeah. Speak too. Me too.

Amy: Yeah, I used real floppy . It was really hard to get a paper that you wrote at home to school, actually. You wanted to keep working on it at the school library.

So, yeah, so the,

Jenny: changed. Amy.

Amy: very crazy. Um, so it went, moved to Seattle, um, worked on Microsoft, uh, windows, like the launch of the surface tablets. Um, but I think I realized then I was like, wow, this is like a really big company, you know? And then, felt the lure of like Silicon Valley and startups and like working on small teams and you know, building something that grew really quickly.

And, uh, yeah. And Uber, I, as I mentioned, like it was just a product that personally changed my life so much so. I just dropped my resume to, to Uber and like, hope for the best and like they did give me a call. And, uh, I ended up being one of the first, uh, members of the, like, I guess one of the first growth marketers, um, at the company.

That was a new team that was just being formed. The growth team was like an extremely new team as well. And for Uber. Uh, the problem, well the, the challenge was, , they were launching peer-to-peer ridesharing for the first time. So up until that point, all ridesharing had just been black cars and like licensed drivers like limousines and uh, like Lincoln Town Cars, who remember those.

And, uh, they were for the first time, like anyone could go on the platform and, um, drive other people around. And they were, the challenge was like, how do we create this change in behavior? How do we convince people to.

Jenny: to. trust this random driver of your life. I

Amy: Oh yeah. And who to like, stop doing what you're doing in terms like, instead of working at McDonald's, why don't you just drive strangers around in your car?

And you know that that was, and that was like kind of the challenge post to the growth marketing team. Uh, and literally my first job at Uber was posting jobs on Craigslist. I would. Like, I would make like thousands of Craigslist posts across all these cities and like copy paste them, , uh, and no, actually they worked for a driver.

So, uh, then I ended up doing a lot of ev other things cause the company was growing so quickly. It was about 150 people in San Francisco and probably 500 people globally at the time that I joined. And during those few years that I was there, I was there for like three and a half years. Uh, it scaled.

being the sort of global like that it is. I, I think now it's probably like, when I left it was like 20,000 people. So it went from like, you know, 500 to 20,000 in, in like three years. And um, just like the scale at which they operated, the pace at which they launched new cities and new products was very breathtaking.

And you know, I think that's a memory, like that memory of working there and like the people that I met and the people. people who are still like my very good friends today or my teammates today. Um, I'll remember like that experience forever as like an extremely like formative one, uh, in my career. Like in a time where I learned probably the most about startups and you know, what it takes to scale a company.

Jenny: I have to ask Amy, you bring up the breadth of scale that they were able to achieve in so little time? We talk about some of like going into a new market, into a new city and just starting to operate on it. We know Uber had to deal with various governments, local governments, et cetera, things like that, but huge scale that they were able to accomplish definitely change our lives.

What things, or like, one to two things do you feel? were so important in achieving that at that stage while you were there.

Amy: I think one thing that is very different about Uber's business and like say Google's business is that every city has to be launched separately. And the fact that you're doing very well in one city doesn't really. impact how well you'll do in the next.

So like that pace of like of growth is not just like a, oh, it's on the internet and it went viral and it's going like really well. It was like a very deliberate plan to like execution game. Like you have to go, like every city has to be launched, like every, like one has to be executing at a hundred percent in that city.

You know, every city has different regulators. Every city has different like dynamics with like the drivers and the riders and like the different maps. Like there's like weird nuances like Boston, like Boston has this like huge underground. Tunnel that's like under the ocean, it's under the Boston Harbor and that like ruins the gps.

So there's like all these little weird intricacies of every single city and that you don't really realize like, oh, like credit card penetration isn't great in South America or in like a lot of African countries, people don't use addresses the same way they use in the US and the maps are all different.

And so like all of, with all that in mind, I think just. empowering each indivi like individual team with all of the tools and metrics that they need. Uh, but like holding them to like the same universal standard and like all and like creating that. System of incentives was something I think Uber did a phenomenal job at, and I don't really think I've seen replicated anywhere else where every like local team was basically operating like their own business, but they were held accountable and there was a system of like incentives across the whole company such that everyone was able to operate independently, but like hold the.

to this higher standard at the same time, cuz I don't think it would've worked if they weren't empowered fully. Right. If like the San Francisco model was like copy pasted to all these other cities, it just wouldn't have worked. Um, so actually being able to be like, you know what, like local person who's, you know, not on the C-suite in the Bay Area, like I.

Fully trust you to own your own P N L and the p n l was kind of the way that they were held accountable, right? Like, can your city be profitable? Can you grow? Because like that's how they get more resources from hq. So I think that that was like a really. Like different but important move that Uber made.

Um, that, and then as a result, there's, I think there's like been so many amazing entrepreneurs that came out of the alumni network and I think that's part of it. Like so many individuals were empowered at that company to think about like their businesses from end to end. You weren't just, you know, executing on a sliver of a feature like you were owning a business.

Jenny: It makes me think about, trusting your employees with more and allowing them to take on more will allow them to rise to the challenge, but I'm sure there's so much more to dig into there.

Amy: Yeah, it's a combination. It's like you give them the responsibility, but you also hold them like extremely accountable and you are, and I think, uh, Travis was like very, very good at that, of like, if you aren't performing, you know, then it, you know, people know. He knows. Yeah. Yeah.

Jenny: I wanted to hear about what you'd learned there while you were there, but you, I don't know if it makes sense to talk about your experience at Facebook first and then what you learned in tech in general.

Amy: Yeah, so Facebook was very different. Uh, I joined because I was very interested by, uh, ar uh, and that set of technology. So I w uh, joined the stories team, um, to build out that product. So it was still a new product at the time. Uh, and, uh, being part of that team was also very fun, like, Tur like a, a net new product within, um, the family of apps at Facebook.

That is all video and augmented reality and just like a new format of also extremely different than working at Uber. And it also kind of made me realize, you know, for all the flaws that Uber had, like, you know, Sort of from its rapid scale, it's like, you know, not every company has all the answers, like every company does have its own fair share of problems.

Like, it just really hard to operate at that, uh, level of scale, uh, and without any sort of like large, crazy challenges. But that was a very fun product to build. Um, and like, and also like it kind of. , it was very different than the how, like, how to scale a product at Facebook was very different than, than Uber.

And it kind of

made me

Jenny: that? Was it like

structurally? Cuz I know Facebook used to have a more flat, org. Was

that different from

Uber siloed

Amy: Uh, I think it, it's very much the nature of the product. So with Facebook you can just be like, I'm going to ship this product. To like 50% of users and it would go to a billion people. Right. Versus that Uber. If you were like, I have a feature and I wanna roll it out, I have to go and talk to all of these cities, like make sure that the driver operations managers like know about this new product, how to like that the drivers are trained on it, like say, and.

They know how to deal with it. It's just because every city is so localized, every, the product is so operationally heavy. It's not like, oh, you could just like ship this and then the, like the, everyone will know exactly what to do. It has a very real like human impact in every single city. So like, like shipping something very big, like for example like Uber pool like that, like that product team had to go out to all these cities, like train these people, like really understand how like the kinds of problems that could arise, like how to deal with, how to train drivers, how to talk to rider about it.

Like there's just so much. It's like complicated, um, human, uh, sort of aspects of moving humans around into the world versus with Facebook, like you can just like make a video about how to use stories and then it'll appear in people's apps, and then they'll either use it or they won't and like, oh, it's a new filter.

It makes you look like a cat or something. And it's, uh, it, it, I was like, oh, wow. It's the, so the scale of software is, is pretty amazing. And all of a sudden, you know, a billion people. You know, you like it's in their app, right? And, and all of a sudden you can, you're like, oh, we have like a, you know, scaling from like scaling from a million to a hundred million is much more just about like the quality of the

Jenny: Right. And I imagine that potentially allows Facebook to iterate pretty quickly because they get such a huge sample size on any feature they wanna test.

Amy: it is amazing like what they built in terms of internal, like AP testing, like I guess anyone can be having a extremely different version of the app at any given time because like every team has access to like all of these. Like, it's basically tests like, oh, maybe I'm in a 1% test for like this new feature and I'm in a like 10% test for this other feature.

And like every team and you can see the impact it has on everything else. So they've done a really good job in terms of the testing infrastructure and, and making, like making sure that you can turn things off and on really.

Jenny: Yeah. So I'm hearing that you learned autonomy and creativity at Uber in that like market, go to market type of role, and then at Facebook. Definitely lots of testing, iterating quickly. What else? What else would you say you learned

Amy: So I was there for much, uh, a shorter amount of time. Um, so I was there for only, only a year. But yeah, like, and then just, you know, the scale, like the global scale.

Facebook, it's like even great, you know, Uber had a lot of scale, but like Facebook really like the number of users there, and the retention between users is just extremely, uh, quiet.

Jenny: Was there any difference in the culture of the companies?

Amy: There, was, and I, I left Uber at a time, or, uh, it was like a very turbulent time in terms of the culture, right. , you know, the, there's a lot happening in 2017 that led to a lot of executive departures, including Travis and like the, like some issues with the board and, and everything like that. And, you know, honestly having also worked at Facebook and Microsoft, um, I think Uber was like unfairly targeted.

Um, for like, it, it wasn't. As bad as it, and I, I will speak to my own experiences, right? And not everyone else's experiences, but it, like the culture was intense, but it wasn't like negligent and it wasn't like sort of orders of magnitude different than any other tech company, I would say. Yeah. Even, yeah.

As, and I've seen a lot of tech companies now, uh, , uh, and so, uh, yeah, but I would say the culture, because Uber had a very operationally heavy business. I think that, and it also has very thin margins compared to like a software company like Facebook, which is, you know, has a lot of social media market share.

Um, like they can afford to have, you know, more well,

Things are changing now, but they could afford to have a lot more, um, you know, teams working on similar things or like a lot of products that didn't, that, you know, a lot of experimentation with things that didn't necessarily end up like making into the product, or even if it did make it into the product.

Like it was kind of an oh, like a nice to have feature, which is for Uber, I think the margins are much more important. Um, and especially, you know, now that they're a public company, just like very like optimizing things like pretty ruthlessly.

Jenny: Yeah, and again, like to your point, sometimes things get unfairly judged or unfairly scrutinized, like with a super detailed lens. I think it's tough in any situation when someone is scaling a company or a team is scaling a company So quickly. There's only so much, you know, like you're.

Constantly evolving and growing and sometimes mistakes do happen. Not to say any of the sexist or offensive or hostile things. Not to pardon those, but I think folks are learning too as they grow. And there are nuances that I definitely am not aware of in that situation. Okay. Would love to talk about your experience in vbc, which is completely.

what led you to explore VC and investing in startups and how was your time? What was your experience like?

Amy: So it was a bit of a like accident. I would say that I ended up in venture capital. I love. Working in product. Um, so I, career-wise, I started off in product marketing. I switched into product management, uh, while I was at Uber, uh, was also product management, uh, Facebook. And I really loved that job. Like I, I loved like working with designers and engineers and other product teams like.

Try like talking to customers, like trying to figure out what we should be building and like helping the team actually get it to market and, and seeing its success. And I thought that that was like the path that I was gonna take from our entire career. I knew I did want to be a founder at one point, um, and I was like, oh, product management like very, makes a lot of sense.

Uh, as a pathway, uh, to that and venture capital kind of like. I, I didn't even know what like venture capitalist really did. Um, I would say like for the most of my career. Uh, and, but I was approached by someone, um, who worked at Sequoia and they were looking for an investor that had product and growth. Uh, experience which to join the growth stage and investing team.

Um, so I started talking to them, uh, and at like, I honestly did not know why I was talking to them. I thought that they wanted me to like, advise their portfolio

companies or something . Um, and they're like, no, we're, we're, we're looking for an investor for a team. And I was like, oh my gosh, I've never really invested

You know what I mean? I've account of like, you and I didn't really have any money at the time. Right. And. . Yeah. So I started talking to them and, uh, like I, honestly, I'm still surprised. I like ended up getting a job on the growth stage, uh, investing team, and then I dove right in and I was like, so in the deep end, I like had really, like, I don't think I had a, a very deep understanding of exactly how it worked when I joined, um, the team.

But it was such a good learning experience, I would say

like, Diving right in and just starting to talk to like all of these companies, like meeting like the most amazing founders, learning about industries I knew nothing about, but like had to become an expert in, in, in like a week. Um, and so it was like very, very interesting.

Jenny: the fire hose, but,

Amy: Yeah, exactly. Um, . So that was, uh, so yeah, made some investments while I was there and like the team there was also very great. Um, and it was, yeah, it was a very interesting, uh, experience, but it kind of like, it is very far removed from building things and like building and technology and, and I do think I, I, I really missed that aspect cuz uh, I would say like investing is a combin.

Between like a sales job and a like investment, like Yeah, like a, like a hedge fund job. Right? It's like, it's very similar to like, it's much more similar to those functions than it is to like actually being a founder. And, and I missed it. Like, I missed like, you know, being on a team, like figuring out what kind of product to build and like, Creating designs and like jamming and, and getting something into the hands of customers and like measuring how it, it does and like, uh, and, and I think that, but I do think that the just be like understanding venture capital and like having been in that.

Like really did help me like understand like what kind of company I wanted to build and, and it just exposed me to so many different types of startups,

uh, and so many different types of founders.

Jenny: Yeah. And they say, try everything at least once. And you tried it and learned that, you know, this isn't what you wanna be doing long term, but you definitely had your lessons while you were there.

Amy: Yeah, I think just being exposed to the whole, the wide array array of, uh, founders and uh, companies was like very inspiring for me personally. Like it was, it was like, wow, those are the, that's like. Who I want to be like, you know, I want to be like, oh, the founders that really took a shot and took a risk and uh, did something really, really hard.

And, you know, sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Um, and, and I think one thing that's like a common misconception about startups from the seat of venture capital or just from the seat of the bystander who's like interested in technology but not, you know, Building a company for themselves is that the story goes something like, oh, you had this person, and they have like a, a deep problem and it just sits with them and, and then they build, you know, they, then they have this moment of clarity and they're like, aha.

Like that is the product. And then they go off and build it and, and it works. And they're off to the races. I, I realize now after I talk to a lot of founders from the founder side of the table instead of the VC side of the table, that that's not really how it works at all, and that a lot of founders just like try a whole bunch of things.

And like the experimentation, like the scientific method is like what is like the important thing to finding success more so than like this sort of. , like personal problem plus like headstrong, like need to, uh, to like see that one thing succeed. Um, and like yeah, a lot of the products that are very successful now like are the results of the like rapid iteration more so than, uh, like this moment, this like aha moment.

Uh, and that's something that I didn't learn until after, until I actually started, uh, the company. Um, and. Yeah, and so briefly, like we use, uh, AI to create like meeting summaries, follow ups. We automatically write your follow up emails for you based on the transcript and the summary, so you can save a lot of time.

And like I spent a lot of time taking notes, as an investor, I would take notes like during the meetings and then, you know, you have to follow up afterwards, right? So there's a lot of. Like, who did I meet that week? And like, oh, like what? Like there's, it's just hours of

Jenny: Yeah.

What are the

takeaways? How do you make those personal to them?

Amy: Exactly. And like, how do I remember all the key things that were said during the meeting And um,

Jenny: Consultants, all the consultants that are listening can relate to this as well.

Amy: Yes, basically. And like, what can, how can we make this as easy for you as possible? And just like with the click of a button, like automate all your follow ups and have a rec a record of everything that you've done, um, in that meeting and, and all the key insights that were said, like grouped by topics. So it's like very easy for you to read.

So that's what we're building it briefly. Um, and I could say that like, oh, this is because like, I personally have like, Pain with note taking. Well, it was true. I have, but it's also, we also tried a whole bunch of things and uh,

Jenny: I love this as this part of your story. You guys pivoted.

Amy: yeah, we did. And, you know, and I'm not, you know, ashamed and I think I'm very glad that we had the experiences building the other products, like grateful for all the customers that, you know, gave us a shot.

But ultimately, like, I think you have to make a decision about. , like what kind of a bi, like is this a business or not? And I think by building a company, like I think you can only really learn this by like actually trying and like building a company. It's not about like, you can kind of get caught up in what.

a startup is, but in the end of the day, like you need to build a business like you're building a business. Like it has to like generate more cash than you're spending. And like it's very easy to get caught up in like stuff that you think a a tech company is, but you're like, oh, like we need to have, like these are all the things that we need to have.

Like this is what our leadership team looks like and this is what, you know, our brand is and this is what you know, our all of. Like all the things that you're like, oh, these are the things that I think make up a company, but at the core of it, you just need to. Build a product that people are willing to pay for.

And it has to be, they have to be willing to pay for it more than like you spend like building it and selling it. And it's like, if you don't have that, then what do you have? ? Like, what, what is this collection of people working on a project? You know? It, it like becomes like a project and not like a real company.

Uh, and so I think learning. Was, I, I think it's very easy for first line founders to get caught up in kind of the idea

of what a startup is. Um, but to like, and, and somehow that like takes them a little bit away from like the sort of dire need to like build a business that produces

cash flows

Jenny: these. , these. , are great points you're making. I think founders all need to take a really hard look in the mirror. To your point of are you creating a product or a service that people need and need enough that they want to pay for or are using? And there's this great book, the Mom test. About how

to go about doing customer interviews.

And most people are very nice to you and are saying all these lovely things. Oh, yeah, I would use it, but will they actually pay for it? And when it comes down to it, do they actually need your product? It's super important to get to the bottom up. And then the other point that you made of. like needing to pivot.

And so many found like absolutely not something to be ashamed of. It means like changing your mind is smart. There're like, Adam Grant has a book about it. Go read, go read this book. How to Change Your Mind. Uh, and Albert Einstein's quote, right, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

And I would say pivoting is kind of the extension of what we described. Really going after, who are your customers? Do they need this? What else would they need? And how do you, uh, tailor your product offering to serve them best? Maybe it's a different way in which you're, you're serving them that makes it easier for them.

Or maybe you're providing so many added features that.

they didn't have before but needed, but just. Figuring out that pivot. I'd love to talk about your pivot. So I, and it is a, it's a tough decision to make, to say, to look at yourself in the mirror and say, you know what? This isn't working. We're gonna change.

I know lots of folks also struggle with needing to tell investors, but again, hopefully if you have great investors and you have open communication, you can bring them along with you. on the journey, or maybe that's not the best decision for your team, et cetera, but just for founders, I know so many founders are going through it and it's, it's a normal thing to go through.

Would love to hear your story of how you handled your pivot in any lessons or tips for folks,

Amy: Yes. And so we started off the company building a video coaching platform, uh, and. Sort of in the height of the pandemic as well. And so the sort of thesis was that, uh, a lot of, like these in-person, like coaching businesses would move online. And that, uh, the best way to do that at scale. Uh, it's like you could actually provide personal coaching at scale for the coaches.

Um, if you had to be. An asynchronous coaching platform. So the way that it worked was we built this like video platform where you could send videos of yourself to the coach, and the coach could like add voiceovers and annotations on top of the videos to like, give you feedback on how you're doing. So you could actually watch a video of yourself alongside this expert feedback.

And that's like how you would get better. And um, and yeah, I love the product. Like it was like a, like a, A great video product. Like I myself got better at a lot of things I was working on, including like squats and my headstands like through the platform. Um, but ultimately like, it like was very hard for us to make unit economics work, especially, you know, as things returned to in person.

We just saw like the demand shift away from digital. Um, Way back to in person. And all of a sudden, like customer acquisition like became very difficult. And it was like all of a sudden we had to pay for customers, but we, our take rate was not that high. And so like the economics of the business, like all of a sudden became like, it just didn't make sense.

And I learned a lot from that. And I, I would say we did a lot of things wrong. Like we built way too much before we actually. Launched the product and we, and I think I had this like fear of like rejection or like fear that it wouldn't work out. And so like we ended up like sort of building it in stealth for too long versus, but yeah, the thing I learned from that is like, That is only like sort of delaying the thing that you need to learn, like you need to learn has a start up with like limited runway.

You have to learn as quickly as you can. And by not getting your idea out there for validation, then you are just not learning as quickly. Cuz of course everyone, like the mom tests, like everyone that you talk to is gonna tell your ideas. Good. Cause I don't wanna hurt your feelings and tell your ideas bad.

It's like you wouldn't tell someone their baby is like ugly and. , but like you need, but like when you ask people to pay and they don't pay, then that's the truth, right? That's like the real, and you need to get to the truth as quickly as possible. So like one thing that we are doing differently now is we are like shipping products before they're built rather than the opposite.

That rather than like building for a while and then releasing it. Because then you get the real, like, because building a product. , it's easier than selling a product. And if you can figure out a product that you can sell, then that's the harder thing, right? And, um, and, uh, yeah, so the, the, I think that validating that you can sell the product before you commit all this time and money to actually building it and figuring out what to build is the better

Jenny: Totally. And what I'm hearing too, in that, and it's something I think we all feel is a fear of failure, but what we need to do is reframe this relationship of, you know what? I may ship this product. You know what? Maybe it's not ready. Maybe I'll be a little embarrassed, but I'm gonna learn something.

It's an opportunity for growth and just really, in developing a close relationship with failure and seeing it in a positive light as opposed to a light of, ah, this might hurt me, et cetera. And all entrepreneurs, it's a work in progress, so it's a very normal feeling and I don't think anyone is born not afraid of that feeling.

So it's very normal thing.

Amy: Yeah. And it's like something I think is that it's almost like conditioned, uh, into a lot of people, including myself, to be a little bit afraid of the failure. Like, but it doesn't, but the, yeah, like, you know the adage like, you miss all the shots that you don't take. Right? Like prolonging it will do nothing for

Jenny: yeah.

Amy: You might as well learn quickly, then learn

Jenny: Yeah. And it's also our body's protection of us, our bodies. It's our mind's way of trying to prevent us from dying, which is where this all came from, . So again, it's very normal. Like I feel it, you feel it, this and that person. It's a very normal feeling

Amy: Yeah, back in the day I was like, oh, should I go and attack this buffalo?

Jenny: Right. And now

Amy: sure. Just launching software, you know, it's not, it's not gonna be the end of the world. Like it's just software.

That's something I remember, like my first boss actually at Microsoft told me, I guess I was like super stressed about something.

I like literally don't remember what it was, but I was like very stressed about something and she was, , we're just selling software. Like it's, you know, it's .

Jenny: yes.

Amy: It's not, it's not like someone's life. It's on the line. I know you talked to Sadan earlier, like literally people's, like he was, people's lives were in his hands.

Right? And it's like, that's not us. Like we were just selling software and it's, it's different for different products. Like I think the stakes were higher with Uber cause we were moving humans through space, right? Like you were like, oh, like these people,

like there are lives. Dependent on our software . Um, and sometimes, uh, and sometimes there aren't, right?

And

it's like, it's,

Jenny: totally. And maintaining a healthy perspective.

Amy: yes.

Jenny: Amy, another topic I'd love to chat with you about is the ruthless prioritization that's necessary as a founder, and then on top of that, you have the amazing perspective as a mom founder. , and I'm sure this is also a work in progress.

Nobody's born out of the womb knowing exactly how to ruthlessly prioritize, and it's a journey for each of us. So would love your perspective of what you've learned

Amy: yes. Uh, I mean, so as your resources are very limited, um, at a startup, it's not like a company like Facebook where you have like sort of unlimited time and unlimited resources to like figure things out. Like you have a very limited amount of money, limited amount of people, and so you basically can test one thing at a time.

Um, and just like figuring out what to test, what, how, like what is the least that you can do in order to like, Get information about this topic is something that is like very, yeah. It, it just, it, it is a forcing function and I actually think that starting out with less money is better. Right. Because you're like, I, it's more of a forcing function for you to test, like the most important thing that it's like the key driver of your business of like whether or not you even have a business.

Right. Um, So I think that is one key difference from like working at a startup than working at a tech company. And I think that's also why a lot of tech companies are, like large tech companies will like, have like, you know, internal incubation for startups. They're like, oh, we're building a startup within a big company.

And a lot of times that doesn't work because there's too much time, there's too much money, there's too many resources. Like you need that like desperation, for it to work.

Jenny: Spacity is the mother of invention. Heck yeah. And it's the reason why some of the most transformative companies came out of economic crises, like Airbnb and Uber, et cetera.

Amy: Yeah. And actually if you think about the non-software internet inventions that changed like our country, like a lot of it came from war,

right? Like after World War ii, like that was a huge like, Technology. Boom. Right? Because it's like so necessary to innovate, right? It's like a life or death situation.

And like a lot of the sort of physical technologies that we have, in aerospace or you know, all of these like in things that we take for granted now, like it, those even in medicine, right? Like came from like very difficult times.

Jenny: Yeah,

Amy: And also the motherhood you mentioned, like that is also a forcing function.

Cause all of a sudden you have like no time .

Jenny: Yeah. I, don't even know how you do it. Can you help me wrap my head around

Amy: I, I, I'm just extremely . It's a lot of delegation, a lot of being very tired and like thinking that you can't do it. But then also just realizing that. .

Jenny: Again.

Amy: A lot of people have kids, like the majority of people have kids, and like if you wanna support female founders, you have to support founders who are mothers, because most women are gonna go through this at some point in their life.

And I think it also made me realize like what I was willing to sacrifice for my career and what I'm not willing to sacrifice. Right. It's like if, like what is at what expense, right? It's like I'm like, I'm not willing to give.

Like my family, um, and like this, like, like I love my son so much. Like more than like anything.

And uh, and like, yeah, of course I'm not willing to give that up for like

Jenny: Yeah.

And it's so evident in your smile and the twinkle in your eye right now as you're talking. Anyone's not watching it. On YouTube.

Amy: And other people have made it work. Um, so shout out to a mom founder group. I'm in the, I found this mom founder group called BC Pack Moms, and it was like, yeah, it's, a lot of women are going through this. I think at first I thought, I was like, this is gonna be impossible. Like the, there's no way that these two things like are compatible in any way, but a lot of.

a lot of women are doing it. And, um, and it is possible, and I think a lot of it is like, okay, can we pave the way, can we change the narrative so that it's not something that like women feel discouraged by? And, and I've heard this a lot, you know, as I'm trying to hire, I heard a lot of people say like, oh, I don't wanna join a startup, or I don't wanna start a company because I want more stability because I want to start a family.

And I'm like, oh, like in people's minds, these two things are just not. Compatible. But that's not true. Like, it is possible. It is very hard, but it, you know, it's possible. And, uh, and like, yeah, if, if our parents could live in a one bedroom apartment and like hustle through that, like then I can start a company and have a baby.

Like he lives a better, like he, he has more, he has more,

like he have more resources, he has more space. You know, like it is, like it, it's actually. , like people have made it work for generations and we can make it work now.

Jenny: Yeah.

absolutely. And so much too of what I'm hearing in terms of how you're managing is I heard delegation, which is sim. Easier said than done. I know so many startup founders just struggle with this is feeling like their startup is their baby and they wanna do everything themselves. But this is a huge, huge tip, folks.

It's really important to delegate and bring your team along with you. So curious. Any tips for delegation for folks? And then I heard time and I imagine just given your prioritization of your family and your kids, you probably are so much more efficient and effective. in how you. spend your time than most folks I know.

In my experience, at least the moms are, they, it's like an hour is like five hours of time. They get so much done

in the same time. So

Amy: Yeah. Thank you. Free time is precious. Um, I, yeah, I definitely think that, yeah, you realize that how precious, like free time is, uh, or just your time in general. And in terms of delegation, I mean, my belief is that, you know, as a startup founder, there's like actually a very small number of things that you do that will have, that will really matter and have a impact on the trajectory of your business.

If you could spend your time thinking about those things, and they're usually the big decisions on. the direction of the product, how you go to. and all the other tasks that you fill up during your day. Do you need to do those yourself? You know, does it like, are you even the best person to do that task at your team?

You know, like there's just so many like pieces of busy work and I actually believe that a lot of that will be automated in time with ai, maybe in a short amount of time, than we think, but like what are the most important things for you to do as a founder? I know it's different for every business, but it's like Yeah, the decision.

What direction the team is going in and how we get there. Um, the decision on decisions on how you go to market. Maybe a lot of large customer sales are dependent on the founder and your relationships, but like everything else, like do you really need to be in there, like prioritizing tickets? Like do you need to be, you know, filling?

There's just like a lot of. Things that like someone else on your team could, may probably be able to do better than you.

And you know, that's okay. It's okay to let go of those things. Um, and, and I do think like a lot of times, like as the founder, you think that you, you have to do it, but you don't, you know, and, and I think just as you try and, and see, like if sometimes you, you can delegate and it doesn't work out and you're like, oh, actually I have to do this.

But I think a lot of things you can. Trust other people and, and they end up doing a good job. And you can even outsource it. You know, you can outsource it. And like I know a lot of founders outsource their inboxes or their calendars or you know, everything in between. Um, and know,

Jenny: Lot.

Amy: just as

Jenny: of resources. .

Absolutely. It makes me think of better done than perfect. And sometimes when we push things off and off and off and off, maybe you just take them off your to-do list, uh, in general and like you're prioritizing the things that actually are moving the needle. Amy, this has been amazing.

I wanna get you outta here soon, but I would love. Have us wrap up with, given all we discussed, you're building briefly, you're a mom, you're investing BC moms. Shout out and we'll link briefly in the comments for folks to check out what's important to you these days. I feel like you're great ed strategy and prioritization, so I'm so curious about your thoughts on this one.

Amy: So I've been thinking a lot about this, like what is important to me these days? I think, I guess for the business that we are, You know, adding as much value to our customers as we can. But for me, uh, a priority for me personally is to like spend a little bit of time for myself, ,

because I, in the past year, I have not spent pretty much any time for myself between the baby and the company.

So that's like a priority for me right now, like finding some. Time. Just the, I don't know, just to think about things and to remember the things that I really enjoy outside of Momming and work. Um, and, you know, giving a, yeah, like giving myself a little bit of a break cause it's been a bit crazy. Um, I guess by the time this podcast airs, it will be a different time, but, uh, the last couple of weeks has been pretty intense as a founder with all the.

Banking, drama and with all, and we were also, uh, doing South by Southwest at the same time.

So it was, it was, a lot of it was, it's been a lot. And so, so sometimes like taking a little bit of time

to do things for myself, uh,

Jenny: Yeah. And that, that's so helpful, right? it's like as much about the recovery as in the work that we put in and like just getting time to be a more balanced version of yourself allows you to bring so much more back to your son and. your work and even your teammates, you're just a more whole full version of yourself.

I hope you get to find the time rejig things around to be able to spend more time with Amy.

Amy: Thank you. I hope so too. I'll keep you posted.

Jenny: Amazing. All right, Amy, this was lovely. We'll catch you next time.

Amy: Awesome. Have a great one.