The Tech-Recruitment Entrepreneur: How Gary Izunwa Built A Game Changing Recruitment Platform

0:02Tangent as is today is like a job referral platform that makes referrals accessible to everyone and not just the privilege to view with the best network. So, you know, you're nine times more likely to get hired if you're referred. 82 % of companies rank referrals as their best hiring channel. All of this is incredible and amazing if you have a professional network, right? But if you come from a background like mine, chances are you don't know people that work at LinkedIn or Meta or Google or Microsoft or whatever it is. And so you can't get referred into these companies and that affects your career outcomes despite your potential and talent.

0:34Gary Azunwa is the co-founder of Tangent, a job referral platform which champions social mobility. Gary got the idea after realizing how important networking is for securing jobs. The startup has thus far raised$1 million from investors, including Atomico, Ada Ventures, and Google's Black Founders Fund. So just noticing that this is how a lot of hiring is kind of conducted through, not just LinkedIn and tech companies in general, and realizing that it was only really available to a select few of people that had privileged networks of people that were in these companies. I just felt it had to be something that made this a lot fairer.

1:11You need to know the right people, because job referrals are completely predicated on who you know. You were able to extend the$65K to pay the founders and also build up the product. For one year. Wow. I actually don't know how he did that. A lot of founders, they have the fear of failure. Do you get this type of fear?

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2:37Thank you. Good morning, Gary. Good morning, Alberto. How are you? I'm very good. How are you? I'm good. I'm ready for this conversation. I don't know what to expect, but look, let's see what happens. Let's dive into it. So right now, you are a successful entrepreneur. And a successful entrepreneur to me means a person that was able to implement a product or a service in the market by raising considerable amounts of capital from well-reputed investors and you're generating employment. So this is your picture today. But this wasn't always the case for you. So you come from a low-income, single parenting background.

3:20Yeah, yeah. This must have shaped the way that you see the world. How do you see the world? how do i see the world um quite optimistic i think the world needs a lot of change it's i think that it's quite unfair in the sense that kind of what you're born into determines your life outcomes or career outcomes um like almost in my mind fact there's like a whole litany of stats that suggest that it's just so frustrating though right because no one has any influence or bearing over the context that they're born into, right? Your parents meet, they make love, and then the financial and social kind of context that they're born in determine where you kind of end up in life.

4:03And that just frustrates me so much. So I feel like there's a lot of inequity, there's a lot of inequality in the world, and that influences our life due to no bearing of our own. I'm optimistic that that can change with mission-driven purposeful entrepreneurship. On a wide scale, oh, you can lead to big systems change. So hopeful, I'd say. When you grow up without money, sometimes money can mean a lot to you because you don't have it. And sometimes the opposite means very little to you because you prioritize other aspects in life. Yeah. In your case, in your mid-20s, you left a very well-paying job.

4:45They were paying you six figures and for that age is a lot of money. Right. And you went to work for the government for a social mobility program for a fraction of the salary. So it seems to me that money doesn't matter that much to you. What's money to you? Good question. I think I want to preface some things like, yeah, I did grow up low income. I did grow up in a single parent family and free school meals and so forth. That, you know, I didn't grow up in destitution. You know, we weren't homeless. We had no meals. And I think it's important to say that, you know, I had a single parent. but you know was definitely had unconditional love I think oftentimes people might conflate low income with like you know just complete and utter like destitution like you're you know your parents don't love you have time for everything's bad and that that wasn't the case to me I had a very supportive mom who pushed me and challenged me in many ways and in some ways people have all the money in the world don't have that you know and so I was privileged and rich in other ways but definitely not in in money and that does have an impact on your life right and yeah I'd gone through that now I've gone through an upwardly mobile journey so I did well in school got all my A-levels, you know, traveled the world, did a gap year off, and then, you know, somehow landed a great graduate job at LinkedIn, like completely changed my life, like in so many ways, from obviously earning potential, network growth, belief in myself, my friends, was, yeah, it was three and a half years, it's a phenomenal company, I'm so very lucky to have started my career there.

6:08I suppose what was happening at the time at LinkedIn was that, yes, I come from, you know, the background I do, low income, single parent family, etc. Now I'm earning, you know, six figures, because at the age of 24, which for me growing up, what I had started was crazy. And not only that, LinkedIn gives you free food. We had an on-site masseuse. We had a free gym. It was amazing. So I was very fortunate to work there. But I was based in Dublin. I had to move to Dublin to work at LinkedIn. And I'm obviously from London. And every eight or so weeks, I would go from Dublin back to London to see my family, see my friends.

6:43And there was this interesting experience. almost every time whereby, you know, I was living in Dublin and I was in this amazing apartment, I can go on lovely holidays and stay in the best hotels, but I'd come home and I'd realise that, you know, my immediate family's life hadn't changed. And the people I went to school with, their lives hadn't changed. It was a really kind of sudden realisation over these trips that, you know, I'm socially mobile, but not enough to bring the people that I care about up with me. And after kind of making that journey a number of times, I just felt so compelled to kind of have more of an impactful career because I was coming home and seeing my friends and family work really hard I do like hard work and talent is not enough to be successful in this life you can get into that it's not because I see people doing all the time but not knowing how to or having the capital to allow you to make mistakes and then learn and then do what's right is oftentimes kind of a purveyor of success in my mind and having been socially mobile myself and learn how to navigate these foreign corporate spaces I felt that I had a lot to learn I'd learn a lot that I could share others from black brands like mine to help them also be socially mobile i really felt like it was my duty you know if not me then who and so that was part of the decision to you know quit linkedin my six-figure salary taking 80 salary reduction and move to the british council to lead social mobility programs um so a roundabout way of saying does what is money to me it is important i've been poor i don't want to be poor again you know it's important i i like nice things but for me it's how do i get to a point where i'm earning good money how am i what vehicle is allowing me to live the life that i want and that's mission-driven entrepreneurship for me at linkedin you must have seen or identified a gap in one way or another because right now you founded a recruitment platform and by definition linkedin is pretty much covering that space.

8:32So what is it that you saw or what is it that you didn't see in that workspace that you thought I need to do something about it? Yeah, so I think everything kind of stems from my, I do see things through a lens of like kind of social inequality and so forth. So I had to like hustle and grind if you like to get into LinkedIn. It's just really kind of roundabout way to do it, but managed to get in. And then when I got into the company, I'd learned that, you know pretty much everyone or a good proportion of people were referred I didn't even know what an employer or job referral was until I got into LinkedIn right up until then I thought the only way you could get a job was you apply for jobs online now that is the way to get a job and actually since building tangent that is the way pretty much every job seeker from back like mine thinks you can get a job they don't think there's anything else and so I was stunned I was like everyone's getting referred or you know people would say you know my friend or my friend of a friend.

9:23Like it wasn't even like it was their friend that I'd refer. Then they'd been introduced, you know, the people that were referring the minimum were two or three degrees separated. It wasn't even really strong relationships that people were being introduced to these companies. And so I saw that and realized that, you know, the way to get into these tech companies, it's not just like, you know, working really hard, getting a good degree, getting good grades, and then like jobs will come. You need to know the right people because job referrals are completely predicated on who you know. It's like not even, and to be honest, I was working at LinkedIn and it's an amazing company, but like a lot of people there are quite average.

9:54They're not that amazing, but they have people that sponsor them almost, and throw them in and support them through the interview process and they allow these amazing jobs that can provide life-changing opportunities and incomes that people who really do well in these roles and really appreciate the opportunities never even get to that stage because they don't know people there. And so just noticing that this is how a lot of hiring is kind of conducted through, not just LinkedIn and tech companies in general, and realizing that it was only really available to a select few of people that had privileged networks or people that were in these companies, I just felt it had to be something that made this a lot fairer.

10:29So this is the gap you identified. So effectively, you start working for a company and you see that there are a lot of people that are not as talented working for that company and that perhaps the reason why they landed that job is because they were sponsored or they were introduced by the right person. It wasn't even that just they're not as talented. like there are a few people that I just thought like, you know, you've really hit the jackpot here because you're not amazing. And like LinkedIn is amazing and you've kind of got through. But it was more so like, this is the way to get hired in these companies.

10:58Like if you got onto LinkedIn and you came in through like applying for a job that they had, like I'd be stunned because the way to get hired in tech companies generally is you get referred or the recruitment team, the tenant acquisition team is using LinkedIn tools to passively source candidates. Like that is the way to get a job. but either a recruiter is reaching out to you or you're getting referred. Getting into an amazing tech company, it just doesn't happen. And so I just realized, actually, if you want to work on a company like this, you have to access one of these two channels. And I just saw the opportunity of making at least the former, the referrals more accessible.

11:33So aside from you identifying this gap in your corporate experience, did the experience in working for a big company actually help you to build up an entrepreneurial mindset? I think for me, like definitely in many ways, like, how do I say this? I mean, one, I obviously identify the problem that I am existing to solve through working there. And I think that happens often. I think a lot of founders do work in these bigger companies, see inefficiencies in systems and processes, and then believe that they can, you know, make those better and start their own thing. And I feel like you have an opportunity to spot more of those inefficiencies in big companies because there are just a lot of them.

12:18There's a lot of things to see. So I think, yeah, that definitely has speeded me onto this journey. But in many cases, it's also helped me get onto the journey, right? So obviously, I spotted the idea and the problem for it. But even things like I was working in the sales team at LinkedIn, I was very good at it. So by the time I'd left LinkedIn, I already had, you know, had a bucket of money saved up, which then actually provided me the comfort to take risk. I really believe that to be an entrepreneur, you have to have a high appetite for risk. But in my mind, risk propensity is strongly correlated with privilege.

12:56You're more likely to take risks that can affect your life if the consequence of that risk not going well is not significant. And oftentimes that means, you know, you're not going to be homeless, you're going to have a roof over your head. And I directly experienced that because I had this amazing job I had a lot of money saved it all so I knew that even if I do quit this I'm not going to live lavishly I'm going to have a roof over my head I'm going to be able to like eat and that is enough comfort for me to at least try and so going into a big company like LinkedIn that offers salaries and incomes like they do really has helped me on that entrepreneurial to take that initial risk and then even further than that so obviously spotting the idea giving me the income to then save up to then feel like I can even try even after that it's a lot of the I did really well at LinkedIn I had a great brand.

13:41A lot of my investors were people from LinkedIn. So the people that invested in Tangent to give me the chance to build this and realize my dreams, it came from working at a company where not just I, other people earn lots of money, you know? And so a good chunk of our fundraise came from the network that I was able to cultivate from working at a big organization. So look, I'm sure, you know, you can obviously start companies if you work in smaller companies and startups and grow them. There's no one way. But for me, it had a lot of benefits. when you applied for the job did you apply with the mindset of staying in the corporate world for a long time so that was the career you wanted to follow or you applied already knowing that you want to get some experience but at some point do your own thing that's a good question i always felt i would do something entrepreneurial but didn't know when how whatever like i always felt that i used to watch shows like you know dragon's den when i was younger and the apprentice and that just seemed really cool that you can have ideas, pitch them, raise investment.

14:39And like, you know, that just seemed cool. And I did a few like entrepreneurial things when I was younger, not crazy, but sold some stuff and made some money. And so I like making money, but didn't know when, how. And then tying in with the background I've come from, you know, when you come from a low-income background, at least from the people I speak to and understand, your core motivation is just to improve your life circumstances. You just want to earn money and, you know, give back to your parents who've sacrificed a lot for you. And as I was getting older, the core way to do that was just to get into a good company and get a good job.

15:13And I did that. And it was only as I became more aware to kind of the inequalities in the world and some of the inefficiencies that I started to think about entrepreneurship more actively. But I didn't get into LinkedIn thinking, I'm going to use this as a stepping stone. I actually think people should think that way more often. I think people can think actually, and what I love about LinkedIn is, it's a very special place. when you join they have this thing called introduction it's like a two or three day I don't know kind of camp or whatever where you join the company and they almost they'll directly say to you that you know we know you're not going to stay here forever like it's probably not best to you if you do but the promise and almost the contract that we're getting into here is that we're going to make sure that you're going to leave LinkedIn a better professional based on the opportunities and the work that you'll do and our promise and what we expect back from you is that you're going to when you leave you'll leave LinkedIn better than you came in based on what you've done.

16:06So it almost encourages you to kind of like think. Almost, right? And feel comfortable with that. And I think if people will get into these companies like LinkedIn or the other, you know, mag seven companies thinking actually, what can I, this is amazing. What can I get out of this to maybe, you know, get me on a path to something else that I want? I think people can't get into these companies, don't really think that. And then, you know, almost like the golden handcuffs because life is really good when you're working at these companies, you almost end up staying forever. When they actually, if you came in for a few years, took what you needed and then apply that to something bigger, you can probably achieve more.

16:36So yeah, I didn't go in with the idea of I'm going to use as a stepping stone. It kind of organically and naturally became that way. But I don't know how I would be doing what I would do if I hadn't started LinkedIn. I wouldn't even be possible. Would you advise an aspiring entrepreneur to get corporate experience before doing this? I think specifically for people from backgrounds like mine, people that don't come from money, I would say yes because, and even more specifically, again, I'm only speaking from my personal experience and that's anecdotal and there's a million ways to do anything. But from my experience, getting into a great tech company and actually specifically working in tech sales, because that's what allowed me to earn a lot of money very quickly.

17:13I was good and I was in commissions and so forth. So I was able to earn that type of income at a relatively young age and then save that money, which I then used to give me that comfort to take the risks to stop my company, et cetera, et cetera. I think so. I think that if you don't come from money, I really do believe that risk is required to be an entrepreneur. but as I mentioned already risk propensity is really aligned to your economic privilege you're more likely to take risk and start a company if you have money to help you make that risk right and so if you don't have that and actually get into a company that can pay you that money as soon as possible so then you can use that stepping stone to get to pursue whatever you want so in my experience that's what happens so I would say yes but I'm sure there'll be others that start companies in different ways I think similarly to you I think that almost everyone in whatever industry that they want to venture themselves, they could benefit from having some corporate experience.

18:06Having said that, I don't think extensive corporate experience is beneficial to becoming an entrepreneur for two reasons. The first one is what you were mentioning. Perhaps you can get too comfortable in getting a very steady, stable job, seeing a steady growth, not super incremental, but steady. And at the same time, that nine to five, So that level of responsibility gets off your shoulders, you know, at 5, 6 p.m. So you can get used to that. And the second reason why I think you might be disencouraged in a way to launch your own business if you stay too long in the corporate world is because the more you work for a big company, the more complexities you see in business because you get more exposed to different business units or the different competitors or how the taste and preferences of your consumer, they change very rapidly and how do you need to react to those changes so you start seeing the complexities of how a business really looks like and to a normal healthy human brain the more complexities you give it the more um against you're going to be to be venturing something by yourself without all the support that you have from a big corporation so i think that if you stay very long you're going to get very paralyzed by identifying all of these different problems but definitely when I have a kid hopefully more than one kid and if they want to become entrepreneurs I would advise them to get some corporate experience I agree I was at LinkedIn for three and a half years and that was the perfect amount of time I was offered promotion just before I was leaving had I taken that I think it would have just made it that's more money, more responsibility I was definitely on a track at LinkedIn when I left the VP of HR and the country manager all sat me down saying we don't want you to leave kind of thing is, and if I stayed longer, it would just have been harder and harder.

19:55So I think, yeah, there is a time, I think. And I think it's really just asking people candidly ask themselves, like, how can I leverage my time at this company to get what I want, which is whatever that is, right? If you just candidly ask yourself, it will kind of force you to think about it, which I don't think people will ask themselves because they don't even know to ask, but in many ways, I agree.

20:19Your company. Yes. tangent what is it and why should anyone care so at a high level tangent as is today is like a job referral platform that makes referrals accessible to everyone and not just the privileged few with the best network so you know you're nine times more likely to get hired if you're referred 82 percent of companies rank referrals as their best hiring channel all of this is incredible and amazing if you have a professional network right but if you come from a background like mine chances are you don't know people that work at LinkedIn or Meta or Google or Microsoft or whatever it is and so you can't get referred into these companies and that affects your career outcomes despite your potential and talent because that's everywhere it's not just in a small group of people and so what we do at Tangent is we just solve that by connecting job seekers specifically from backgrounds like mine to employees within these companies who can mentor support if they have any open roles but they believe people on Tangent they've met because we always encourage people to have calls to get to know each other are good for they can even potentially refer them in so that's us today at a high level um why should anyone care there's obviously kind of a few different reasons and when i think about social mobility at a broader level i think there's three kind of reasons why it matters one is obviously like the moral reason it's just like the right thing to do i think everyone should have equal access to opportunity i'm definitely all about equality of opportunity i think that's right but that doesn't be the needle enough in many cases, right?

21:47So there is an economic imperative, I believe. I forget the stats now, but I think it's, I think the BCG and the Sutton trusted a study a while ago now and they found that the UK loses out on, I think, £140 billion of GDP per year based on low social mobility. You know, the idea being that, you know, if we can remove the barriers to opportunity, then the best people can get those jobs. When the best people are in those jobs, they perform better. So when they perform better, companies will perform better, have buy-in profits, dividends, etc. And those go back into the public wallet, being rested into the country, etc.

22:22A very simplified way, right? But right now, there are a lot of barriers that prevent people to get into opportunities. So we're not even being as prosperous as we can be because of that. So I actually think social mobility makes for good economic policy. That's kind of one piece of it. And then the third piece, I believe, is what anyone should care about this. And as tomorrow is the right thing to do, there is an economic element to this as well. Right. It's what I call kind of like the social imperative in the sense that, you know, we're seeing a rapid rise in populism and, you know, in the last kind of decade or so.

22:55You know, I think what we've often seen is that countries oftentimes pursue the common good. Right. What's good for the country? And the common good is typically seen or looked for a lens of GDP growth. right and so what that's meant in the last 20 30 years is that countries have looked to offshore talent look for inefficient efficiencies and processes right that mean a rise in globalization we can offshore we can move manufacturing from one country down because it's cheaper we can offshore talent rolls over there and what this has done is that it's grown GDP because countries companies are more profitable they're you know they're performing better countries perform better which is good, but that oftentimes comes at the expense of people that, you know, if you think about manufacturing jobs, when you move that overseas, there's a whole swath of people that are in a country that used to do those jobs that just are out of work now, right?

23:45And so the lens of looking through the common good as a lens through an economic lens, kind of like, almost, yeah, it wipes out opportunities for people, if this makes sense. And what we're seeing is a rise in populism. and what's happening now is there could be one tax policy or one tax proposal or one kind of policy proposal which now then leads to like unrest in countries. We saw it in France, the Gillet-Jean protests. It was like, you know, a potential tax suggestion that the working class did not like and then we're seeing protests everywhere. We've seen it in Colombia, we've seen it in Kazakhstan.

24:19I believe there was something similar in Kenya recently. There was always like where the working class has almost been marginalized so much it takes one policy or something that can marginalize them Thursday further and then there's like unrest on the streets. And I think we're going to see this to continue if we don't focus on this topic more. So there's the moral imperative. That's why people should care. There's definitely an economic imperative to it. But I believe the actual social fabric that ties communities and countries together is being eroded by not focusing on this. And if we do that, I think that will bring people closer together.

24:51I think the mission of your business, of your company is very inspirational. So my chapeau to you, my deepest respects. Thank you. You're trying to narrow the gap in between the rich and the poor and basically giving the poor more opportunities to land well-paying jobs. I think that's beautiful and that's very respectable. Yeah. I'm going to softly challenge the barriers to entry to land a job. So your idea right now evolves around the discontent of being able to land a job because you come from a more privileged background and because you come from a more privileged background, you have access to a wider and better network.

25:31So if you know the right person, they're going to connect you with this company and effectively you should have a smoother transition into the company. While I think that might be the case in some markets, in some countries, like for example in the US, I think, in my opinion, here in the UK, and I would like to get your opinion on this, here in the UK is more merit-based, especially because if you're looking to land a job right after your university, they're looking mainly at your grades and what type of studies you did and also the university. So how good was your university? And if I'm not mistaken, in order for one to get into a good university, you don't need to know someone within the university.

26:14I think you can get into a fantastic university, probably one of the best ones in the country. if you have very good grades. I think we see people right now in government that come from very low-income backgrounds that landed, I don't know, they went to study, for example, Oxford or Cambridge. So I see more the barrier perhaps in the education more than having access to the right network to be able to land a job. Sure, sure. How the education is maybe more related to people that don't have a more privileged background. That's where my question is for you. Do you think there's a correlation there?

26:56Or are you still fixed with the idea that even if you are coming from a poor background and you land in a good university, your chances to get into a very good job are lower than someone that went to a more mediocre university, but then is able to land that job in LinkedIn? Yeah. Oh, cool. Great, great question. So a few thoughts. So one suggestion I'd say is read this book. It's called Pedigree, How Elite Students Get Elite Jobs. And it really talks about the funnel, right, of someone who's born in an elite background. They get into elite schools, as in like high schools and so forth, or universities, and then how that then feeds into jobs.

27:37So that's like one thing. I would definitely suggest anyone read that. It's a really good book, quite entertaining. so I think I would really push back and think I think the UK is the classist country in the world I mean it definitely exists in the US but like we are class is rooted in this country and it's like there isn't anywhere I think is more classist to your point around so yeah I don't I don't think we live in a meritocracy I think you can buy merit merit can be bought you know good grades can be bought through extracurricular extra tuition and so forth. When you look at the types of people that get into, start from the beginning, right?

28:18To get into a great university, Oxbridge, LSE, whatever, it's not just grades. It's not, you know, you can look at the Ivy League as well. And I think in the US, it's even more so about, you know, recruited athletes and what sports are doing. And oftentimes to, so, you know, grades is one thing. If we control for grades, actually, and that was the only thing that these universities, which often are feeders into the best companies, was the purveyor of those opportunities. And I think it would be actually a lot more diverse. But actually, to get into a great university, they're looking, you know, in the UK anyways, we have a personal statement or whatever.

28:50That ties in, you know, to have a good one, you have to have extracurricular activities, particularly interests and tastes. And oftentimes to cultivate a certain, you know, interest or taste and be really good at it, that requires money. That requires effort and time. That requires someone to take you to... Can you give me an example of one of those interests? It could be any extracurricular activity. That could be swimming. It could be hockey. It could be rowing. All these things, one, require a cost, and they also require time, right? Like you need to have someone to take you to your swimming lessons, which ideally, if you're doing it, to be really meritorious and good at it, to teach you the skills that people want, teamwork, communication, et cetera.

29:30You need to do it for a prolonged time. That requires money, right, to do so. So all these things that are factors that determine or influence whether you get into a university or not really run extra curricular activities, extra tuition and so forth, even writing a personal statement because people are definitely getting help to do that. There's a financial kind of element to doing that, which isn't accessible to everyone, right? If you're looking at the people that do get into a lot of these good universities, they do come from certain income backgrounds because what they're looking for in these universities are factors or attributes that are rooted in, you know, influenced by the capital that you have or how much you can be, your parents basically can invest in your education.

30:16You know, there's a reason why people that go to private schools are way more overrepresented at certain universities and then also into top jobs. You know, only 7 % of this country goes to private schools, but almost in every industry ever, anywhere, where they're significantly, from like the judiciary, which is like 70 % private school to like even actors, 69 % or so of British Oscar winners went to private schools, but they're only 7 % of the country. How does that make sense? Because actually you need money to kind of, you know, give you these opportunities. So I think there's an element there of thinking about, if you go further away from jobs and even university, how do you even get into them?

30:53And there's a real time and economic, you know, financial investment that gets you into those places. And then let's say you get in, right? Like you get into a good university because you've worked really hard and you managed to, you know, do whatever to get into Oxbridge or just, you know, any university that's in the top 30, top 40. There's a really good book, again, called The Class Ceiling, Why It Pays to Be Privileged by Sam Friedman and Daniel Orison. And they've crunched the data, right? And they've done all the numbers. And they found two really interesting things. They found one is that if you are a less privileged graduate, with a first class degree, you are still less likely to enter into a top occupation than a privileged graduate with a 2.2.

31:38Now that doesn't make any sense to me. That is a complete stark rejoinder to the idea of education being like the all leveler, right? That's complete meritocracy. So if you can get the best type of grade in a degree and you're still less likely to enter a top job than someone that got two scores lower than you. Do you know how old is that a statistic? So the book came out in 2019. so let's say the last five years, right? That's when the book came out. So, and I cannot see anything that would have changed that significantly. Definitely not post-COVID. So yeah, you're less likely, even if you get a top degree, and you can ask like why, because you can look at the top employers that have very robust graduate schemes.

32:16That's the case, but there are, most companies aren't big, you know, hundreds of thousands, most companies are small businesses. And at that point, you can still get a 2-2 leverage or network and get into some of these great companies, right? But even past just getting a first-class degree, even at the apex of education right you've gone to you come from a low-income background you've worked you've had support from some charities whatever you got into oxbridge a privileged a less privileged oxbridge graduate will earn five thousand pounds less in any type of job than a privileged oxbridge graduate from this you know in the same degree or whatever so even when you get into a great university you're still going to earn less than your peers who were privileged and there's so many reasons right right because this this piece of information didn't um control for like the same company because like we could have we could both be accountants right i could have gone to oxford we both now got into a great accountancy graduate program but you're more likely to get onto one at ey and i'm more likely to get onto one down the local high street which would pay you more and me less but the idea being that even once you've got into the best universities in the world there's still an income disparity for people from less privileged backgrounds.

33:24And so, yeah, it all comes down to me, like, not just definitely who you know, but also even further down that or earlier in the journey. It's the level of financial investment that can go into your education, your extracurricular activities that can really, really makes a difference on getting to a university, which then determines what type of job you've got. Because obviously, again, you have a lot of the companies who then come to these universities to recruit from their graduate programs. So it's a roundabout way of saying, yeah, we're not a marriage, meritocratic at all and also merit can be bought the things that people use to demonstrate that they are meritorious is oftentimes rooted in financial investment so to simplify what you're saying is that if you're coming from a privileged background you are more prone to be successful for two main reasons the first one is because if you have enough funds then you have access to external different stimulus that would perhaps make you a better candidate.

34:24So you're going to acquire different skills that would make you look better when it comes to landing that ideal job in that very good company. And then the second one is that if you come from that privileged background, you might have access to a very elite network that can give you a direct access into that. Yeah, I mean, that's very simple to me. And that's just the way it is. I think it's important to say though, it's like, I'm very not, like a lot of my friends are privileged. They're great. you know i'm not against people are privileged in the same way i was born less privileged i had no influence over that it's the same way someone who was born privileged had no influence and like you shouldn't feel bad or guilty for being born into opportunity and having parents that will invest i'll do the same for my children right um and this is and also it's important to say that if you are born and raised in the presence of economic privilege that doesn't mean that you've lived a life in absence of hardship and tragedy you know you could have had parents that divorced when you were growing up yeah maybe a parent passed away you could have maybe had challenges in your own life right so that's not to say you've had an easy life also not so that you haven't worked hard because even if you have you know if you your parents did put you in all these actual activities which you can then cash in to get an elite education and then an elite job you still have to work hard to be good at it like you still have to invest the time so it's not to say you haven't worked hard you don't deserve it but i think it's what's oftentimes missing is the awareness of all the things that have gone into us that allow us to avail of opportunity right?

35:46It's this concept I kind of call privileged fragility, that in a meritocracy, it espouses the idea that everyone should deserve the winning that they have in your life, right? And so we almost fool ourselves to think, to almost negate or not even think about the privileges that have gone into what we have, because we want to be seen as meritorious, right? We want to be, we, that's why I call it privileged fragility, because when I say to someone, you've done really well in your life, and actually a lot of that's probably based on what your parents have done. People get quite defensive and I was like you can't take away my merit like I've worked for this and I do empathize and understand that I think people need to be I'm not here for privileged guilt I'm not here for making anyone feel bad about it at all and as I said anyone can suffer and go hard but I am here for privileged awareness because I think the more people can be aware of what's going into them that has no bearing of their own nothing to do with your talent potential but really does influence your outcomes I think the more people can be aware of that the more people will give back to others and then move kind of yeah move the needle forward I think right now there's an increment of global awareness when it comes to gender pay gap, for example, or racial inclusion within the workforce.

36:55Why do you think there's not enough awareness around this financial disparity in the workforce? it's a good question i can only say what i think i think so one thing i think is that gender and race is visible so it's like it's uh you can see the disparities of that literally as opposed as you can't necessarily although your socioeconomic background can be embodied by the way that you dress gesticulate your accent it's not a visible characteristic right i walk into a room and everyone's white or male i will know that instantly and that comes so so i feel like because they're visible characteristics, they just command more attention.

37:34I think in the last 10 or so years, there's been more work that, only recently, basically, there's been more work that really highlights the importance of socio-economic background or class. And that's now slowly starting to build more awareness. I'm very bullish on the next 10, 15, 20 years. This is going to be like the leading characteristic. Because actually, you know, I know rich people that are black that have not had any of the challenges that I've had by consequence of their social background. Actually, working class black professionals earn£6 ,000 less than privileged black professionals.

38:10So it's not like you sold things for black people, sold it for everyone. There's a class element that only through focusing on social ability will you solve. But I think, yeah, the visibility element of it, there's a lack of awareness. People aren't really aware. And that's where it's like people like myself role to spread that awareness, to be conduits from researchers like, you know, Daniel Laurison and Sam Friedman to the masses to raise that, to raise that awareness and motivate change. But yeah, those would be some of the, and I also think there's this element to mention around kind of like that privileged fragility where people, it really makes, it can be quite uncomfortable to really assess and think about some of the things that have got you to where you are to help your sex and realize that actually, a lot of it doesn't have to do with you.

38:53That's very uncomfortable for a lot of people. I can hand up and say I work really hard I'm very smart and I'm talented but I would not be where I am today if my mother did not move to London and I was then able to access all the opportunities that London provides and that could even just be like going into the city and seeing the skyscrapers and being inspired you know like that if I was mum came but she went up north I'm not exposed to these opportunities or situations so I don't or she didn't move at all if I was born in Nigeria I wouldn't be here but her moving here and raising us had nothing to do with me I didn't, you know, in the womb say, mom, move to London, you know, but I know it's had a big impact on my life.

39:31If I can be aware of that, someone who didn't come from much, I'm sure people that do have, you know, real privilege can be aware of, but I think it's uncomfortable people, so they don't even want to address it. Going back to your platform. So job referrals usually come from a place of trust. It usually involves three parties. Let's say yourself, which you are my friend. I am the person which is basically the connecting point. And then I have a friend who's perhaps a senior person in a given company. You trust you. I trust you. You trust me. And then my friend is also trusting me. So whoever I am introducing to him comes from a place of trust.

40:10Your solution doesn't mirror this because the candidate is sending effectively a video to show off his or her skills in order to impress the company. How do you tackle this? Yeah, it's a real question. so I say two main thoughts so how the platform works yes job seekers come on they submit video introductions while they're interested in a certain role their previous experience that makes them a good match written employees on the other side can do that and then determine if this person could be a good match but they will always have a call they are getting to speak and get to know each other before any referral decision can or will be made so it's not just video and sender some people might do that but 9 out of 10 people will get to know each other on a call or two before there is a referral.

40:52And actually people are speaking before there is even open roles in someone's company to either make a referral or just to build a relationship. And when a role does open, I've already spoken to her, I've already known you, I think you're a good match, then I'll refer you. That's how the process works for us. So there is a level of trust and familiarity that is built between both parties for that decision to be made. And then the other point would be that, I think there's a real misconception that a lot of job referrals are made on really deep relationships that are predicated on years of knowing each other.

41:20You've met them when you're a child or you've worked with them for however many years. Those referrals do exist and people do make them. But a lot of them are, this is a friend of a friend of a friend who I was recently introduced to. I met at a party or whatever, and they seem really cool. I've spoken to them once. I think they could be able to refer them in. I have unlimited referrals. I don't have a number of referrals I can make at my company. So if there's someone that I've spoken to, I've met them recently, they seem okay. Why not? Why not? So a lot of referrals today are still actually based on looser ties of connection.

41:53And I don't think people realize that as much. That's why platforms like Tangent are working. People get referred all the time. So it's like, how can you engineer trust rapidly for someone to feel confident in that? Because ultimately, I'm only the introducer, right? If I make the referral and that person gets to an interview, or even if they get the job and they've bombed the job, they're not even good at it. That's not on me. I made your introduction. They went through an entire hiring process. they're not good at the job there was like three or four touch points before they got hired that had nothing to do with me so it's okay you know and that's the way a lot of people think about it at least in tech I think in other industries like finance and more people a bit more or more reputation and so forth where the tech is not as deep that but in general a lot of referrals I mean I've made referrals with people that have sent me a message when I was at LinkedIn but even actually now LinkedIn have an alumni referral program so I can still make referrals to LinkedIn even though I don't work there someone sent me on LinkedIn and says there's a role that's open.

42:47I think I'll be good for it for X, Y, Z reasons. I'd love to have a chat with you to learn more. Like, I have that chat and they seem good. Like, why not?

42:59So the first months of operating a business, it can even be up to the first year or second year. You have no money, no clients or very little clients. It's hard to remain motivated. How do you, How do you stay motivated? How do I stay motivated? Like now or from the beginning of the journey? Since you started during the first year of operations. Yeah, so I think starting Tangent was quite a somewhat unique journey. So my company was incubated on this venture builder run by a company called Zinc, Zinc VC. So their venture builder is they recruit 70 people from around the world. You join their program as an individual.

43:45you actually find your co-founder on this program. It's almost like they call it Love Island meets The Apprentice. You go like day and kind of work with other people. And then at the end of the first six months, you find your co-founder. If you found one, you kind of pitch your idea to Zinc. And then they make investment decisions in some of those companies. And then they give you money to build the business. That was the first buck that you got? Exactly. So we've never had to put any of our own money in. We joined Zinc. For the first six months, they pay you a stipend. And then once you join their portfolio, that give you a little bit of money.

44:15Not a lot, not a lot. So they gave us like 65K. And we made that 65K last year. So we lived very frugally. And how did you live that year? Where did you live from? In the sense of, did you have any income? Were you basically living off your savings? No, so because Zinc gave us that. So once you join the portfolio, they gave us 65K. And that is what we use to pay ourselves, build the product, like the first version of the MVP, and et cetera to then fundraise You were able to extend the 65k to pay the founders and also build up the product? For one year Wow It was I actually don't know how we did that I don't know how we did that So we weren't paying ourselves much you know obviously as you can imagine and yeah so we got the money in like May, June 2022 and then we yes closed pretty much finished the fundraise in June of 2023 so by us paying using that money and we still had a little bit of money left there to be honest so we were frugal but fast that's what I say because you have to like make the money last, but also like move quickly to get traction to raise because it's not a lot of money.

45:18It'll run out eventually. And so in that time, we built a very janky MVP. We got like, you know, a good number of users on it. We made some initial proof of concept sales to some good companies and they made hires from us. And that will happen in like two and a half, three months. And then we use that traction to go and fundraise. So we started in January of 23. And then we pretty much had everything done by May. that year, so like four months intensely, because in the few months after that, we would run out of money, and then we would have had to put our own money in, to be honest, we could do that.

45:49But, so from the beginning to the start, we've never had to put our own money in. We had Zinc backing us, to be fair, which was really helpful. But yeah, it was, it wasn't easy. We were earning, yeah, 20, 22K, whatever. You know, and for me, I'm living at home, so it was easier. My co-founder has a mortgage and so forth, so it was really hard for him. He was basically in the red every month. he's very lucky he's got a supportive partner who she has a kind of high earning role so she could support him in that sense but yeah it was it was tough but that was the first year or at least from starting to fundraising now we pay ourselves a little bit more inspirational so you fundraised 65 ,000 and you utilised that money to pay you guys a little bit to survive and then the rest goes into product development yes let's fast forward to today how much money did you guys raise yeah so we closed We raised a pre-seed round.

46:41We raised$1.1 million in about four-ish months. Really, really strong round. I'm very proud of it. So, yeah. When you raised those 65K and you were basically living at the minimum standards, especially if you're living in London, I mean, living of very low income could be challenging. did you ever imagine that you would actually be able to raise a million yes i did i like i i could see how i didn't know how god knows how it was going to happen like you know for the first two months of the four fundraising it was very dark and we were just ongoing and making so many mistakes and i just felt that we could i just believed in myself i believed in the team i believe in the vision of what we're creating i know there's a massive opportunity here category defining business to be built.

47:34And we had good traction. Like I felt, I was proud of ourselves. Like my career friend Joe and I have never built businesses before, but he, you know, never built products. He managed to do it. He managed to get traction. I managed to set, you know, I was like, we can do this. So I didn't know how, but I believe that we could. I did. I did. I really did. Let's talk about your co-founder. One of the things that I'm starting to identify in young entrepreneurs is that most of them, if not all of them, they have a co-founder. It seems that this emotional support and perhaps in some aspects also financial support seems to be the right mix for a young mind to not quit.

48:11Because effectively, as you mentioned, the first months of operating any business, they're incredibly hard and you don't see the light at the end of the tunnel. And if you have someone that is next to you that is in that same state of mind, maybe you have one bad day, but he's having or she's having a good day. so that's how you're balancing each other and vice versa. Having said that, the relationship in between co-founders, in my opinion, is super, super important. It can set you up for success, but at the same time, it can set you up for failure. What do you think are the ingredients that are needed in the equation for you to have a successful co-founder relationship?

48:50Yeah, well, I'd love to get your thoughts on this because I know you also have a unique setting yourself. So some thoughts come to mind based on the experience because yeah, I'm single, I'm not in a relationship, but as I'm aware, it's just as much a relationship as any other relationship. Like you speak all the time, you're very working together all the time, it's intense. So I think a lot of the things that you'd probably put into a kind of normal romantic relationship, you'd almost have to also put into a co-founder one. So one is getting really good at communicating. We have team coaching now, which is just amazing.

49:26I think everyone should have a team coach. and that's really helped us align better on communication oftentimes with saying or doing or earlier in the days we could say or do something and have completely innocuous kind of intentions behind it but it can be received so differently from a different party and then that can you know build different types of emotions and reactions so effects of communication understanding how the respect different communication styles adapting them to meet the other party that's incredibly at least for us it's been incredibly important and team coaching has been really helpful for that.

50:00Sorry, parenthesis. What does a team coach exactly do? Can you give me specific examples? So I think a team coach is really helpful because it's kind of like what you want. A good one will be able to take like what you're looking for and help with that. So for us, it was like, you know, how can we work better together? At least we're in first and how can we communicate better, et cetera. But it might necessarily come from a place where we need to improve. It could be a place where we're in a good place. How do we continue to develop our kind of reach? So I think a good team coach will help you identify you.

50:32They won't give you the answers, but they'll help you identify the relevant solutions that you both need or three or however many co-founders there are to solve any challenges that you have or provide ideas to strengthen your relationship. But it's really about bringing you together as a cohesive team. Is this someone that comes into the business once a week or is it full-time in-house? No, no, no. So we have like a certain amount of sessions with her and we meet her generally once a month, once every two months around a topic or anything we want to talk about. It's just really helpful to have a third party who has no stake in the game.

51:05She's not siding him anymore. And she's receiving the information that we're both giving. And then she gives her kind of expert, you know, she's studied a lot in this opinion, almost just like a mirror, mirroring back what people are saying. Yeah, it's really helpful to have a third party who is non-biased, pay things back and allow you to hear what someone else is saying. At least for us, it's been really helpful. It's almost like therapy. In some ways, it's not exactly, because you're not talking about your childhood and stuff like that, right? You're not going deep to your traumas and stuff, but there are some parallels to that.

51:40And yeah, I just think having someone who is in the room, whose role is to help you work better and so forth, who is non-biased, right? It's not, I don't really care what idea or where it's come from anyone else and play things back to you. But sometimes you can hear something from someone else, interpret it completely differently. But then on that interpretation, you produce a certain reaction or set of actions that aren't even aligned to their intentions. I think there's a real difference between intention and impact. Someone can say something and it can affect you and that is the unequivocal impact.

52:13Oftentimes the intention behind that might not be malicious or not. And so getting time to tell how people communicate, what they mean by certain things, just bringing in a third party has been really helpful. So I think, yeah, communication is one thing as an important ingredient to a co-founder relationship. I think there has to be an agreed or a commensurate amount of work that goes into it. So if like, I'm going to say I'm working extremely hard and I'm like all these hours and your co-founder isn't, that's going to breed resentment, I think, because like it has to be a level of work ethic that you're both bringing, the same level of intensity, time, etc.

52:50et cetera, because then it feels equal, particularly if you're going for a 50-50 split, which we have. You know, if I feel that I'm giving more work and you're not all vice versa, that's not going to lead to an auspicious relationship. So those are two things I would say. And then like investing and it's something we could do better in actually is investing in a relationship outside of work, going for dinners, like chatting, getting to know each other, you know, a bit more personally. We do know each other a bit more personally, but we could do more like outside like dinners and so forth. I think that, just getting to know each other more and investing in a social relationship.

53:16I mean, those are some key elements from reflecting on our journey. How do you distribute responsibilities in between both of you? So for us, it's quite easy because we are quite different. I'm definitely more effervescent and gregarious and energetic and he's a bit more introverted, more blue, detailed, numbers-orientated. So it kind of split quite easily in the sense that the more external work that we do, be it hiring, fundraising, partnerships, sales, growth marketing that sits within me. Things that kind of orientate around working with other people and the more internal kind of assets or aspects of work, be it product development, legal, finance, operations, he leads on.

54:03So that's just a really easy way of working. Of course, we have visibility and we share over what different work that we're doing, but it allows us to kind of move really quickly without kind of getting into each other's respective lanes. Our coach actually helped us with this as well. and so that's how we kind of divide and conquer do you remember a big fight with your co-founder? I don't think we've had like a fight like we never like I'm never shouting at him and he's not shouting at me or anything like that but we've definitely had tense moments for sure I mean that's completely natural I'm sure you can probably talk to that as well I think it'll be unnatural I don't think you know someone well enough until you've had like amazing and fun times with them and also until you've had like issues with them because some people can be great even like in friendships right they can be great friends but they could be horrible like really nasty where they're not going I feel like you need to you need to have both before you know if this is someone that you can grow and do you know whatever with and so we've definitely had tense moments and you know it's not nice it's hard emotionally draining and so forth but I think it's normal um oftentimes it stems from like miscommunication and then like not correcting the communication and then like resentment can kind of like build um from what you think someone's done or whatever um so no arguments no definitely you know, fights.

55:16We're not really argumentative people, but we have definitely had some tense discussions and, you know, really uncomfortable conversations. I think if you can come at those moments with an open mindset, not to be right, but to learn and to grow, those moments of intensity can actually make you stronger. You know, if you're both mature about how you approach them as well. In our case, it definitely has. Like we've grown from the tense moments we've had because we come at it our way to what's going to be best for us, what's going to be best for the business, as opposed to I want to be right in this moment.

55:48In my case, my co-founder is my twin brother. So our relationship is multi-layer to say the least. True. Are you older or younger? I mean, it's my twin brother. So five minutes younger. Has that created like a difference, you think? Or is it just normal? No, not really, not at all. Luckily. I'll have to ask him and see what he says. But in the seven years that we've been working together, I've identified three things that in my opinion are super, super important when it comes to having a healthy relationship with your co-founder. Sure. The first one is trust. So I need to trust that he's doing the best that he can.

56:32Yeah, you're right. because perhaps my metrics, my way of quantifying what's best is not his. So I always need to think that he's doing his best. And the second one is teamwork. If he fails, it's not him failing. It's we are failing and vice versa. So it's not that perhaps, let's say, your co-founder and his business unit, which is more finance oriented or illegal, if he messes up, it's his fault. No, it's our fault. Yeah, sure. And then the third one is communication. You need to be able to feel comfortable enough to challenge an opinion from your co-founder in a very respectful and professional way, but having a very fluid communication, knowing that your co-founder has the luxury and the flexibility to not hold anything back.

57:21Because ultimately, yes, the co-founder relationship is very important, but the most important thing is that the business goes well. And if you're holding things back just because you don't want to hurt the other person or because you're not sure how the other person is going to take it, that would have an impact in the business in one way or another. Yeah, there's this really good book called The Five Temptations of a CEO. It's a really quick read, but it talks like the five things like CEOs, leaders, but you can say get wrong or do poorly. And one is popularity over accountability. And that's one that I struggle with the most.

57:54I'm a four I'm okay with, but like not, yeah, kind of wanting to avoid conflict or be liked so much so that you don't hold people to account. I think it's a core thing that I think CEOs or leaders have and definitely ties in with what you just mentioned. But yeah, I agree with all the things you said. I think as an entrepreneur, especially when you're building a startup, you get exposed to a lot of different emotions, feelings. One of them is fear, which I think is natural. No matter how self-confident you are, at some point you're going to feel fear and be fearful. I think this can be a very powerful emotion, but at the same time, it can be very dangerous.

58:36What is your biggest fear? What is my biggest fear?

58:43I mean, yeah, I probably agree with that. I think like I'm kind of like constantly scared and constantly anxious. I just want to live in a sort of kind of quasi anxious state. It's funny because sometimes it's like a real good, like stimulant and really propels me and sometimes it's like really debilitating and it kind of, you know, pulls you down.

59:08What's my biggest fear here? I mean, I feel like I want to say that, you know, kind of like, is this going to work kind of thing? But in some ways I'm not fearful of that because I will wield this into existence. Like, you know, I'm going to make it work. but like it's like maybe it's like how and when and yeah I think that's something it's really interesting almost at the same time it's like a fear of like how big will this be kind of thing and at the same time like knowing it will be big and then also believing that I have a big influence on how successful what we're building will be but yeah that's probably that's probably it's hard to think about one big fear because there's so many things like if I think about there's so many things happening in the business business that you need to learn about and improve more and optimize and almost have like fear or anxieties around all of them so i could probably get like tactical and agree about certain things but yeah it's a difficult one to answer i also think as i started off this conversation i am a perennial optimist so even if i am fearful of something or something is like incredibly hard i just still think i can there's a way there is a way you know in some well there's a way to solve all these things um and i just go it's just time really to figure that out a lot of founders they have the fear of failure do you get this type of fear i i would say maybe when i was younger kind of i think what i've come to learn as an entrepreneur in the fairly short amount of time i've been one is that actually and this is a big mindset shift for me is that success is and you'll probably agree is predicated on failure right so it's like to avoid failure is to um you know rob yourself of really core learnings that you need to then implement on and execute those learnings then grow and become successful and it's really interesting because growing up like you know as a you know the background i've come from like failure was was not an option you have to get good grades i did that you have to go to a good university did that you have to get good internships and a good job, did that.

1:01:17I was quite successful in all these things. So I wasn't failing. And actually, again, failing was really bad. You know, my mum would not accept it, to be honest. Like, you know, just do well, just succeed. And then when you come, so that's like what I've always known is just don't fail, just do well. And I've always kind of, you know, there's kind of millie failures in that. We all get rejections and stuff, but, you know, broadly do well. And then I get into being a founder and actually, you know, I spend a lot of, I'm quite fortunate to have a network of founders that are doing really well, I know a few rounds ahead of us who are doing well.

1:01:48And you learn that actually, again, success is predicated on failure. So you actually have to encourage failure. You have to encourage a culture of making mistakes. But again, it's really important about how you learn from those failures and learn from those mistakes to then execute on those learnings to then be successful. That's been a huge journey for me because I'm unlearning years of my life. And so, yes, failure is scary, but I've come to learn that it is a prerequisite for success. So you've got to have a healthy relationship with it. I completely agree with you. I think, first of all, you learn nothing from success.

1:02:26You learn everything from failure. And at the same time, I don't think that you can ever be successful if you've never failed. And I don't only refer to this when it comes to a business context. I think it's applicable to any aspect in life. I don't think you'll be able to appreciate a good friend if you've had a bad one. A good partner, boyfriend or girlfriend if you had a bad one, a good business. If you had a bad one, a good employee, a bad one, a good work colleague or a bad one. So I think all these smaller or bigger failures throughout your journey, if you're strong enough and you decide not to quit, they can set you up for the success that you deserve.

1:03:05But I think the key point is learning and not quitting. while failing, which is, as we both agreed, part of a successful journey. Yeah, I broadly agree with that. I think it requires a bit of a mindset shift for people that failure is predicated or success is predicated on failure. Yeah, and to attribute it to other parts of your life makes sense. Also, as a founder or co-founder, you are exposed to a lot of decision-making. So, for example, when I talk to my girlfriend, and she's asking me, so what are you doing today? And I said, baby, I'm making four very tough decisions. And then she's like, that's all?

1:03:44And I'm like, I wish there were less than four. No, yeah, yeah, yeah. But they're very high caliber decisions within the scope of my business because they would have an impact in one way or another. And when you make these decisions, sometimes you have this fear in your mind of succeeding or failing because I completely believe that failing is part of the journey, but ultimately you want to fail less than you're succeeding to keep that balance at least positive. Do you remember a moment in your journey where you had to make a very tough decision? And if so, walk me through that moment. Okay.

1:04:29So yeah, just to wrap up, I agree. I feel like most failures aren't fatal and most success is not permanent. so it's all fleeting really just gotta kind of like just go with it a tough decision like in life or on the entrepreneurial journey entrepreneurial um I would one that immediately comes to mind is probably I'm trying to think actually in the business has there been like a really big decision like I mean obviously I'd probably say like co-founding with Joe for example you've known your co-founder your entire life pretty much I think for most of your life you've known your co-founder I think so whereas I didn't know Joe existed you know three years ago and now we're like inextricably linked together because of we've planned this business and so these kind of venture talent builders talent investor programs are a new concept you know Zinc and there's a whole host of other companies that do it as well now but they're all based you know It's kind of like, as you were referring to a referral, you assume they're predicated on trust, right?

1:05:39A lot of the time, often, I think people with co-founder relationships are predicated on deep ties of knowing each other. And that definitely exists, but there are newer forms of connection that can lead to relationships. But it was a big decision on both parts, obviously, because of the fact that if we're going to start a business and register and fundraise and so forth, we have to be, we're in this together, right? And in some ways, it's harder to break up as a co-founder than it is as romantic partners when you look at the legalities in it. So it was a big decision to know that, one, does this person complement my skill sets?

1:06:15Is this person in it as deeply and intensely as I'm going to be? Do they bring no kind of complementary skills, so forth? And that was a big decision, I'm sure, on both parts. Again, primarily because I knew him through, the program is designed to help you get to know people intensely. But still, it's like at the time of committing to the business, it was like, I knew him six, seven, eight months. It's kind of crazy when you think about it. But I'd say that's one of the tougher decisions. Definitely the right one. Definitely, I can confidently say I got the best co-founder on this program. And I know he said the same.

1:06:56but yeah it was one that required a lot of thought because just like the ramifications if it didn't go well was just so severe a lot of these programs they are kind of laden with breakups right a lot of people that do meet on these programs then and we knew this going in even if you raise investment like you know from zinc or whatever there's so many breakups and so many companies on our program or our cohort that did break up you know so that's when you really kind of want to make sure that the person that you are kind of building this is the right decision. And so, yeah, that was a tough and deep consideration I had to make.

1:07:30When I started the business, my business, I thought that as an entrepreneur, if I wanted to be a successful co-founder, whenever I had to make a tough decision, these entrepreneurs, they always knew what was right. So you need to be very self-confident and see that the right decision is that one and not any other one and know that 100 % you need to choose that because it's so obvious because you're super smart and you need to be very smart to make that decision. And if you're not that smart, then you shouldn't be an entrepreneur. And that was putting a lot of like pressure on myself for no realistic reason.

1:08:06And then throughout the years, now it's been seven years since I founded the company, I realized that every hard decision, in fact, will never have a perfect fit for purpose answer. In most cases, more than one answer or more than one choice would be applicable. One of the things that I apply in my today decision making, especially if my decision is conflicting with my co-founders, which it happens. And if you're a twin brother, perhaps it happens more than in other relationships. But we ultimately pilot things, we test things. And I find that that is the most healthy way to identify if your decision is good or bad.

1:08:47if you can test something very quickly and cheaply, then that is already telling you keep going forward or pivot into your next idea or your next choice. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I agree, I agree. I think also like deciding on stuff, just being kind of mentioned it before, like, you know, failures aren't fatal, successes aren't permanent. I think it's also just having a, I think some of the things that I know will help us succeed is, one, I'm a very focused person and I'm very good at identifying what's the most important work, like rallying the company behind that work and it's like being quite brutal when I focus on that.

1:09:20And then the other is having a real learning mindset. I think as a founder, if you don't love learning and problem solving, you're really going to struggle with this because there's just so many problems and some things to learn. I think one of the things I was struggling with kind of earlier this year was feeling I couldn't make mistakes. All my decisions had to be perfect and I definitely couldn't make mistakes in front of the team because I'm the CEO. right and actually i've just been fair to myself and be like this is the first time i'm doing this i've never started a company before i've never you know i've had no experience in marketing for example but now pretty much all the growth comes from me i just have to learn it and actually to get to a point where you're just gonna have to work things up make mistakes and that's okay you're allowed to make mistakes and that little sentence there is one i have given me so much comfort because prior to you know let's say earlier this year i didn't feel like i could I had to do everything right.

1:10:11And that's just not the case. And so you can make a bad decision and that might have ramifications and that might have, you know, a certain impact on the business, but you're allowed to do that. What you're not allowed to do is to make that same mistake over and over again, make poor decisions over and over again. You need to learn from that decision that didn't go well and execute brilliantly on that so you never do it again. Especially into this environment, if not, you're out of business. The world is very competitive. Exactly. But I fundamentally agree with you. I think that your team in particular, they need to see you not as a superhero or a perfect person, but as a human.

1:10:45And as a human, you're allowed to make mistakes and you're allowed to learn. Having said that, I don't think it's a matter of perfection at all, but progression. And progression means you're allowed to make mistakes, but don't repeat the same mistakes. Exactly. The journey to success is not like this. It's more like this. You know, it's going up and down, but it's still trending up, right? It's not linear at all. and I think there's a lot of a piece on the team front is just wrap that up is that actually having everything doing everything perfect also to be seen as perfect I don't think that breeds a great culture because then your team are going to feel like they also have to be perfect and that might curtail their ability to want to make bold bets right to try things because if they don't feel that they can feel safe in an environment where they can make mistakes and the ramifications of that are, you know, fine, then they won't.

1:11:34I think everyone needs to feel safe enough to try things. Like we try things all the time that don't work, and that's fine, you know? But I've actually, there's a really important role that we as founders play on making mistakes and being open about that, because that will install, you know, or instill... Culture. A culture where people try and, you know, it's fine to make mistakes. And I actually learn again, that's really important. I absolutely agree with you. so you've built up this company I can already see that within a short time frame you have amounted a lot of lessons learned my god yeah yeah

1:12:14and all these things have led you to being nominated by Forbes so this year you've been awarded the Forbes 30 under 30 nomination what do you think of this do you feel special do you think do you feel different are you happy excited yeah actually quite a lot of things like so you know 25 year old gaz is very happy because when i did hand in my notice at linkedin and took that big salary you know reduction i had no idea this was not the plan you know i did not leave thinking that in a couple years i want to start my business just no it didn't so i had to really trust myself and obviously i was like i can talk about it now and the salary reduction but at the time it was i was horrified i was so scared because i've gone from not earning much money you know and living life that way to actually earning lots of money and i'm on this track and i am i am deciding to quit that and i have no idea if i ever get to this place level of income again ever i don't know i just don't and it was it was terrifying took me a while to make um that decision and obviously now i've passed for a couple years it's going well and by no way, I'm no way done.

1:13:26I'm only like a fraction of what we can be. So very much still on that journey. But to get recognized in this way, it's a massive validation for, you know, Gary four or five years ago, who was horrified, genuinely petrified to handle his notice and leave such an amazing company to do things like this. That feels good. In some other ways, it's funny because like, you know, you post this on Instagram or if you have that or, you know, whatever. and I think people just think you're rich and like you made it and I'm like, I'm not rich. You know, like this is, it's a nice, you know, kind of recognition and so forth.

1:14:00But it's like this weird thing because I think it's weird because you get it and you can tell me different, but you get it and it's nice. But you know, there's still so much work to do. It's not like I'm done because I'm on Forbes 30. It's nice and it can be leveraged, I think, in many ways to help the business. And I think that's what people don't think about. I see so many things online around where people paid to go on Forbes. I did not pay to get onto this, right? I think people don't really feel about the value. If you're smart, you can really use it in some incredible ways. So it's very validating.

1:14:29It's nice to be amongst great trailblazers like yourself and everybody else that's made onto the list. But, you know, in many ways, I'm not dying. There's still an incredible amount to do. And I think some people think that there's a perception thing. I think Forbes are incredible at branding. I think they are brilliant at it. Because really, it doesn't really mean anything, right? Like I didn't, being on the list, and unless you like leverage it in some ways, you know, from the day before and the day after, like nothing materially changed, right? But I find like, with a lot of like awards, I find the Forbes are brilliant at it.

1:15:03Great, because I'm now on the list, right? But they've created something that doesn't really mean anything, but because everyone else thinks it means something, it now then becomes something. If that makes sense. Like it's, being on the list, they haven't given me money. They haven't given me a house. They haven't given me anything. but everyone else who or a lot of people they didn't they gave me one oh jeez yeah no they gave me nothing nothing they gave me a little bio on a website because other people who aren't on the list and people aspire for it and so much and it is a great recognition I will not deny that it's created this perception of it being so a real strong asset that it has created itself to be one I just find that fascinating how they've done that and when I first got on it obviously it was great it kind of felt a bit weird but now I'm just leaning into it I'm leaning into the fact that people think it's this amazing thing it can be leveraged in many ways for hires, for customers, for whatever you can eat, I'm just going to lean into it in that sense but initially when I got into it, I was obviously really excited, I remember exactly where I was when I got it it was really funny, but it was kind of a fleeting moment because I just I was like, oh wait, wait, wait, I've got so much more work to do, and I just almost was like, on to the next thing, right so yeah, I think it's great I'm delighted to be on it and I think and I think Paul will say this as well it's really about the people and the people I'm going to meet at summits and for conversations like this and so forth that's the real value it's the network no you know that's what I think and the community I think that's what's the real value add rather than like just being listed somewhere I think it can benefit depending on the industry that you're working in to some people more than others but definitely there's some value to it more intangible than tangible, but definitely there is some value.

1:16:47Having said that, I think at the same time, because you are recognized as such a young age in this well-reputed, as you said, branded establishment, the spotlight is on you. So you are recognized right now as this successful young entrepreneur. So in a way, you could be seen as like, you know, these young Disney actors that they were super famous when they were kids, but then they did nothing else at least that we've seen with their careers and they're like oh yeah that's this actor that became very famous but then did nothing so you can also feel a little bit the pressure of well now I need to deliver even more because people are expecting that and to be honest in that sense I think it's a good thing I think some people might get these awards and feel like okay I'm done but for me it's like okay they recognize me and now I need to go and be exceptional because that's what people think and I'm grateful I'm happy to have more pressure to push me, that's fine.

1:17:46So yeah, I agree. I'm sure there's someone right now sitting at LinkedIn thinking that, well, you know, this guy, Gary, he used to be working here right next to me and he quit his job. He was getting this super great salary, took on this risk. And right now he built this company. He raised all this money. He has people working from him. He's running his own show and he gets listed in Forbes. So I'm sure that that person in LinkedIn might define you as successful. Sure, yeah.

1:18:19How would you define success? Yeah, I don't know if I would say I'm... I think I've had success years, right? I think undoubtedly I can say that I have. I don't know if I'm successful. I feel like success is something that you all self-actualize on it, right? Like, I have to be honest, Gary 10 years ago is so proud of Gary today. you know like you know if I go back to Gary it's just like you couldn't even imagine some of the things that a lot of my dreams I have I am living you know and things so that is so I'm successful in that sense but once you hear that I'm sure you're the same I think just a human condition you hit a certain target you're just kind of thinking you know unless you know if you're ambitious like we are you're just thinking what's next and so yeah it's like 10 years ago Gary would probably look at me and be like I'm successful but now as Gary I'm I don't think I'm because I know there's so much more I can do and so much more I can give and I'm not there yet.

1:19:13So I think the relationship I have of being successful is, I just think it's an iterative one. I actually think that's where it can be quite dangerous because you don't know when enough is and enough you are. So I think you have to create some sense of success, but I don't know if I'm there yet. The Gary of today, how would he define success? Yeah, good question. So I think Gary today would define success in a few ways. One is definitely for impact. Like, I just know I can touch the lives of millions and millions of people for the products and what we're building. And I want to be wealthy. I do not want to be poor again.

1:19:54I don't want my children to be poor. And that's just not going to happen. But I want to be wealthy knowing that I have contributed so positively to this world. and achieving that level of great wealth that I know that I can through the means of real positive systems change, you know, for the vehicle entrepreneurship,

1:20:14that'll make you very successful. Also, and then just to give back to my mom, my mom's made lots of sacrifices and I would love to spoil her. When I can do that like ubiquitously, then I'm quite successful. But yeah, impact, making a big systems change is what really would make me feel like I'm successful. So according to this definition, would you say you're successful today? No, because I haven't achieved the scale that I would like her to do it at. Really, it's because we've gotten people a job. And I can't remember the first person we got a job. I remember getting really emotional. I started crying.

1:20:44Like, you know, like she came onto the platform and met someone. You know, she was from low income in East London. She used to be a charity fundraiser on the streets. And now she's on a big salary and a career path. And it's like, I literally, I don't know. I couldn't, I don't know. I've never felt this way. I just got really emotional. So I'm welling up. so it really is important for me to have that and I want to have that to the nth degree I just feel like the world needs it, it's time and I don't know what that number will be but there will be a point where that's just happening and sustaining as well, there's an enduring impact and we're just not there yet, like I haven't achieved it on the scale that I know I can and so until I feel that I've done that I'm becoming successful, I'm not successful Gary, thank you so much for your honesty for coming this morning and sharing a little bit of your life.

1:21:36I believe that success can have a lot of different definitions. And it is this definition that allows you to motivate yourself and to wake up every morning and say, I'm going to carry on. I'm incredibly, incredibly inspired to see that your definition of success is collective. It's not individual. so you're going to be considered more successful when more people are helped for sure and and that i think is beyond inspirational and motivational and that if i can give you a personal feedback should give you enough boost and energy to wake up every morning to do what you do yeah thank you You know, I appreciate that.

1:22:23Thank you. Yeah, yeah. There's this saying that goes, you know, if I see far, if I see far, it's because I stand on the shoulders of the giants that have come before me. Like, I really want to be the giant with the shoulders that others stand on so they can see far. And when I can see that others are doing that, then I'll feel successful. I'll be rooting for you and for Tangent, your company, to keep making waves in the recruitment space. Thank you. Thanks so much for inviting me. Thank you, Gary.

1:22:52Thank you.