He Is Transforming INDIAN Education System Ft. Scaler Founder Anshuman Singh - FO 19 | Raj Shamani

but that is the unfortunate piece that. like today the people who should be. teaching they should be the most. knowledgeable they should have done. things been there. and. oppos today's guest is one of the first. key members of Facebook messenger's. first ever group he's basically the. reason why Facebook Messenger was built. in the world he was living in the states. then moved to London office of Facebook. and he was the key integral people at at.

the London office as well he was living. his life but he left his cushy job all. that money he was making while working. at Facebook with the world's best. leaders and the founders why did he do. that he came back to India because he. realized that quality education in India. is really bad the situation right now is. really bad when it comes to engineer. specially now what is he doing in the. space what are the problems with Indian. education how is he solving those. problems what is he doing for the next. generation of entrepreneurs leaders and.

engineers in the country also we have. spoken about how he's helping these. creators these Engineers these people to. become and find out billion dollar ideas. of tomorrow he's basically making India. ready for the next Revolution so that we. can lead in the world so we spoken about. many things with the co-founder of. scaler Academy anaman Singh and also we. spoke about how somebody can find.

billion dollar ideas and if you already. have an idea how can you do or tweak. your business model in a way so that. your customers become your lifelong fans. keep watching this episode till the end. because you're going to learn not only. about what has happened in the past with. the job culture what is happening right. now in the Indian education system but. also how and what are the opportunities. present for you and me every common. person in the metaverse and web 3.0 so. that you and me can also become.

multi-millionaires of. Tomorrow the first question I have is. Mana that you work a lot you work till. 4:00 a.m. in the morning as well right. okay and a lot of people want to work. till 4:00 a.m. in the morning a lot of. people feel that hustle. culture but they can't do it because. they don't know how to get out of the. bed and do it actually I get very lazy. especially me and a lot of people I know. in my AUD audience as well as a constant. question how how to beat.

procrastination so how do you beat. procrastination actually parts so one. part is motivation I I'll maybe take an. example and and um phrase that and the. second part is discipline okay but like. primarily it is motivation motivation. dreaming hoping um there's an. experiment this which is called as the. drowning rat experiment okay um. scientist.

it was it's a very cruel experiment so I. don't endorse it but uh what they did. was they they. B and they started. measuring before these rats give up and. they drown um average came to around 15. minutes. okay then.

these guys picked up another Chua put it. in the um. bucket just before it was 15 minutes so. at the 14 minute. Mark they made it warm they give it very. very good food next day after 24 hours. they put it in the bucket. again guess how much time did it uh keep. fighting before giving up 60 hours 60. hours 14 minutes 15 minutes hours and.

the reason. was and that's actually true for all of. us in life as well right like if you. believe if you hope if you. dream so that is the first thing I mean. I do because there is a end goal that I. see.

so that is the first part first part is. you motivation you have a hope you have. a big dream which you're working towards. because and second part is discipline. second part is discipline. discipline if I'm today sitting to do. something I have Instagram to check I. have um YouTube to check. because there is LinkedIn to check maybe. somebody is sending me a message there. there's WhatsApp to check Messenger to.

check um you're so connected that it is. really really hard to focus and um. computer. science cont switching okay Contex. switching. is if it is a one it can do one work at. a. time let's say. Chows two different jobs.

this process of dumping and then picking. up the new thing and reading all the. context of the new thing takes a lot of. time yeah and if a CPU is context. switching multiple times the computer or. the laptop becomes really slow.

simp to get stuff done is like have. discipline create these Focus. slots this is not to. say that is I don't believe that ever. works you need to give yourself time as. well you need to give your family time. as well but make sure you have Focus. slots not doing everything at the same.

time yeah everything at the same time. computer SL yes it makes so much sense I. have a SIM I have a similar thing but I. never thought of it as a motivation and. discipline segregate but now I have. given a terminology for this I'm going. to use it so many times I'm I'm stealing. this from you so this is what I believed. okay I used to say that every human. being.

that's why he wakes up you know he works. really hard today to get the money to. get the security to get the life which. he believes in right. or so it's either aspiration or fear. these are the two reasons so that is why. so you need to associate your mind with. any one of them in order to get up and. work that is first and second which I. believe is the rule of one. thing consistent and you have to beat. procrastination for for long long period. of time in your life you need to follow.

rule of one thing in your life so every. morning you wake up what is that one. thing I want to accomplish so you do. that. first first you achieve that first thing. people usually wake up with 20 things in. their mind they end up doing nothing. right same thing but you made it very. clear like a Compu.

but now talking about the motivation. part right you have a motivation you. have a dream that is why you working so. hard and that dream is closely related. to the thing which we talked about in. our conversation before the podcast. started that Indian colleges sucks like. they they're bad right now the quality. education in our country lacks I mean. I'm not going to say that everything is. bad but most colleges most of it sucks. like it's bad in like why do you feel. there's a lack of quality education in. our country but reasons and like there's.

so many reasons where do I start so um. I'll maybe go Point by Point okay uh. first is the the auditing framework or. the regulatory. structure is a good step. but. 1970 you have to be physically. H.

uh everything is if you're for example a. coder you don't need to be in a lab Lab. your computer is your lab yeah in fact. even if you're a mechanical engineer. civil engineer a lot of simulations. happen online you don't need really. really it's not it's it's it has changed. the mode of working has changed but our. regulatory framework hasn't changed okay. so hence one is we behind there but that.

is again like a maybe a small reason the. there are larger reasons so the second. thing is unfortunately our society. doesn't believe in paying for education. that. muchers low. paid like teachers is the lowest paid. profession one of the lowest paid. profession which is unfortunate because. they should be highest paid right they. should be the highest RIT exactly like. um um if you look at the history of our. culture.

um again I probably shouldn't be talking. about cast but the people who would. teach people who were considered uh like. sacred because they they were very. knowledgeable they were the they held. the highest position in the society yes. uh but AB what teachers who are supposed. to be imparting knowledge because they. know the most uh if you don't pay them. well then obviously they'll go and find. other professions where they get paid. enough most colleges I'm not saying all. colleges and this is a by the way a.

phenomenon I saw in my own City lakau. there bunch of colleges there placement. season. plac. almost but that is the unfortunate piece. that like today the people who should be. teaching they should be the most. knowledgeable they should have done.

things been there. and opposite people who don't have any. other option they end up becoming. teachers instead of people who have been. at the highest place them becoming. teachers that being said I not saying. that this is happening at all colleges. most colleges some colleges and like in. general pattern wise. broken Medical. Science people who would teach were. people who were practitioners doctor.

hospital for example. hospital they are the ones also teaching. yeah so I am up to date with what is. happening in the outside world like. today I if I have to go and talk about. covid vaccine and vacine I know because. I I am there dealing with 20 patients. every day. um computer science and most. engineering professors. they don't go and do job they don't go.

and like write. code. probably science yeah though uh. structurally broken um I I believe that. there needs to be an element of practice. uh to any profession yes uh otherwise. practical. examples you might be very knowledgeable. you might be very um talented but if. there is an element of practice it just. makes you better at what you do um so.

that's the other piece that is broken I. think the fourth piece which is broken. uh uh is that most colleges today the. biggest fear that they have is ke how do. I make sure I'm following all. regulations set by AIC nobody is. thinking about Innovation curriculum. innovate how do I make sure my students. learn a lot how do we how do I get them. to experiment explore figure out.

uh so the the the habit of um I mean if. you look at the stanfords and the MIT of. the world there is a lot of innovation. going on in every single thing that they. do. yes unfortunately in most colleges that. culture hasn't picked up yet picked up. yet most probably because everybody is. just taking those check boxes. regulations. follow um all of that combined and and. there is one final piece which is what. has happened in in the industry right.

now is key. um the IT industry which is right now. the biggest industry it became the. biggest industry in the last 20 years or. so it exploded yeah 2001 2002. explosion everybody wanted to become. engineer yeah everybody hence was opting. for an engineering degree but you did.

not have. colleges when there is a gap in supply. and demand supply and demand then you. try to sort of create the demand and. hence a lot of colleges crept up. Basics but because there was demand they. were still getting people. enrolling um this the entire duration of. 2001 to 2020 there have been a lot of. hubs of colleges all throughout India uh. with very little substance in them yeah.

majority. colleges and happened because of the. supply demand mismatch but. combinations there's no one reason but. all of it has come together to sort of. it makes it makes a lot of sense because. so there was a joke in my college okay. and I'm from a BBA background not not. typically engineering background right. so we used to have a joke and there was. this one kid in our College he's he's. now like a very good entrepreneur doing. really good for himself he used to come.

in the class and he used to say. entrepreneurship. teacher how many times has he raised. funds how many times has he does he even. go to bank how many times does he. validate ideas or he checks up on. product Market fit like what is he doing. in his life we used to ask. and and everybody used to. think then we started asking this. question to everyone the finance. reachers the finance question questions. marketing teachers say marketing.

questions and no teacher had a relevant. experience they all say we have 15 years. of Industry experience in what they. don't talk about it what do they do they. don't so that's one of the broken things. and second when you talked about. Innovations right we were just talking. about like like right from the scratch. every Department of college is is like. 7s even today at a college I don't know. about your college but in my college we. have to make a DD.

Demand right from the admissions. ad I mean forget about other other. Innovations right and even before we go. to college we're talking about entrance. exam. 11 so I think the entire system is that. way broken right right what are you. views on that yeah I mean I've now been.

in my career for more than 10 years I. have not used a single concept of all of. the slogging that I did for two years to. to prepare for J broken in fact. like. broken. okay actually the real life is about. like facing problems and figuring out. solutions to those problems um but the. entire test prep Market which is.

J NE Med um that prepares us for topics. important and I will get really really. good marks in the in the final exam and. hence I will get into an IAT or uh an as. Etc and that's that's what my life goal. is that does not really prepare you for. what is going to happen in the real. world the real world wants you to think. the real world wants you to experiment. the real world want you to explore um.

the real world is just a collection of. problem statements that you you go and. solve well unfortunately um those years. of your lives are wasted because you're. preparing to get into and this is very. unique to India by the way um India or. China those are the two countries which. have this massive culture of test prep. and then finally. like to prepare for a test so that you. can go and do engineering yeah all of. your college sorry school education. aside I feel that's a big waste of.

talent um I hope it will get disrupted. someday you guys are there on the right. track probably but so for in real life. you need skills right right in real life. you need problem solving skills you need. XYZ skills in order to make money or in. order to work for the cause which you. really really care about right right how. can an average person start learning. skills and once they learn skills how do. they get opportunities from there yeah.

actually skills misused so um I can talk. about for example IT industry because. I'm very close to that um in the IT. industry a lot of people in fact like if. you look at most advertisement people. talk about learning tools say um coding. May there are programming languages so. C++ or Java or python these are tools. everybody's advertising C++ come here. I'll teach you Java I'll teach you. python Etc ET all of that but the truth.

is like if you look at a mechanic for. example. mechan scw maybe there is a tester of. electricity Etc but no mechanic says key. I am a screwdriver mechanic but in it. people say I am a python developer I'm a. Java developer that is fundamentally. broken again the real world doesn't say. doesn't care about the tool that you use. yeah the real world in the real world in. fact like what happens in most product. companies as well the large brands that. you see is you get a problem statement M.

you figure out what is the right tool. for the job and you go and solve that. job what is important for skills is that. you learn the art of learning yeah um. one of the things that at least happened. very early on in my life which I'm very. grateful for is I got hooked into uh. something called competitive programming. um which trained me to look at problem. statements I mean computer programming. is you just get essentially a lot of. various kind of problem statements and.

you have to use coding to figure out. solutions to those problem statements. now what language are you using Etc. doesn't matter doesn't not matter it's. inconsequential but if you do that a lot. of number of times then at least. behaviorally you expect to encounter. problem statements you're not uh afraid. of that and then you go and figure out a. solution that is actually what if you. see most top companies in the ecosystem. that is what they value as as well your.

problem solving skills your ability to. learn new technologies new tools as and. when required because they at the end of. the day are tools yeah a mechanic will. will be given a fan to go and repair he. would never be told here is a. screwdriver you are a screwdriver. mechanic now go and fix whatever you can. with the screwdriver. and and it it does make. sense at the end of the day you about. correct you don't.

care you don't give a correct. correct correct and that should be. promoted that is not being promoted. people are promoting the other side of. it right exactly exactly scw so so. that's the thing like which is which is. and people are falling for it yeah. people are falling for it I mean I can't. take names but but I mean look at most. brands you'll if you go and look at. their page their Pages would talk about. technology Big Data this that Etc said. I'll teach you all of that four big.

words which people don't know about and. like okay let's do this but is this this. also because all of a sudden there's a. boom in the demand of software. developers right software Engineers like. everybody's talking about tech Talent. Tech talent in fact I read some tweet is. a massive like deaon okay and the. founder of that company tweets that if. you are if you think you're considerably. a good Tech Talent come work for us. we'll pay you 20% more than what you're. getting already it's an offer for. everyone and read that tweet I was like.

I shocked. [Laughter]. like. 20% so why do you feel all of a sudden. there's such a huge demand for software. engineering so if I mean it was expected. but it wasn't expected that it would. happen so soon. essentially there is a term called. Industrial Revolution 5.0 I think 4.0 or. 5.0 I keep I keep getting confused but. um what it was happening was that every. single sector uh was getting was.

identifying what are my redundant tasks. or what are the things that I can. automate which will make me much. stronger for example the largest car. company today is Tesla Tesla is half car. company and half tech company more tech. company than more tech company than a. car company exactly right so uh that is. happening in every single sector like um. I I was in London for a year um there I. saw like two job functions automated. within the span of a year one was. um they have these tubes where there.

were these ticket counters where you go. and buy. tickets in in a matter of 3 months I saw. those ticket counters being replaced by. vending machines and the second was I. had a friend who was working for this. oil company and uh his job was that he. would I mean so there would be a feed of. or there was a video feed of um oil. pipelines pipeline. review because leaks are very expensive. in their context uh he told me team 50.

60 they've now reduced that team to. three people because now there are. systems that can do this monitoring and. they can flag maybe and then there's. this human who goes and. verify what happened post. is the speed of this happening got. really accelerated because every single. sector every single um uh industry. started to realize there is no other.

option than to go digital yeah right. like all for example entire e-commerce. everything shifted to online order yeah. you have to go to. school you have to study online right um. Even in our case like the the higher. education as well has to happen online. so everybody was forced to go digital to. think about digital ways to interact to. engage to build products on so because.

that happened now suddenly um Everybody. Needs software engineer every single. industry needs software Engineers now. there there are industries that are. building a software engineering lab. because uh they want to accelerate this. process and the effects of this you'll. see for the next 5 to 10 years and hence. there is suddenly this spike in demand. for software Engineers which you'll see. even increase a lot more going forward. will it increase or do you think because. there are everybody is focusing on. software developers or software.

Engineers it'll go down because there'll. be access. Supply um so it is to be honest like not. about the supply of people who can call. themselves software Engineers okay it is. typically the uh supply of quality. software Engineers the kind of software. Engineers which I told you right like I. can give you a problem statement in the. real world you can go and solve it. because that's that's the core of what. is happening in Industrial Revolution. 5.0 I will not tell you that Java use. pleas but rather here is a problem.

statement every single job function it. is I mean a lot of people come and tell. me. Unemployment uh it is the nature of job. function that is changing oil pipeline. case maybe while the number of people. went from 60 to three of people who are. monitoring this it created a lot of. other jobs which were software. engineering in nature now somebody had.

to go build these systems to monitor the. pipelines somebody had to keep improving. that and it was not one person but a. team of software Engineers so the nature. of jobs is changing and flux it will. keep changing for the next 10 years or. so now then it's a question of how. quickly are we producing very quality. software Engineers we're not producing. enough hence the the 20% blank hike or I. mean there are companies giving you free. Dubai trips uh. bikes and laptops IP everything come.

join this is what you're going to get. everything you're going to get but let's. say somebody who's listening to this. podcast and believes in that he has now. acquired certain skills and he's not. like a python developer or something but. he's a developer or he's somebody in. some different field right who feels. like I'm a hustler I can get things done. I'm a good guy how does that person who. has skilled himself enough or herself. enough how can they find opportunities. in today's world. what's the best way to do it so if you.

are skilled then opportunities is to be. honest the easier part. um I I know that I I'm sitting at a very. privileged position saying that the. opportunities is the easier part but. I'll tell you like why I say it's the. easier part there's one there are lot of. platforms that now enable companies and. people to get connected with each other. for example in the field of tech uh Tech. hiring there is uh noer there is insta. hire there is top hire uh a bunch of. these kind of platforms where inel list.

um you go and you can connect with. companies most probably like if you. apply to maybe 5 10 companies you'll get. one or two responses Y and you don't. really want that every single company. responds even if you get to interview at. one or two places you can crack that. that's that's that's awesome um the. second thing. is the fact that you're really really. good at um. software it's a super power in today's. world yep it is you can actually go and. build things on your own if you wanted.

to that is I mean if you look at a trend. today most CEOs of the top tech. companies um actually top companies most. top highest valued companies now it's no. more Tech it's all top companies all top. companies they they are people with. technical background in the past very. recently the CEO of Twitter um he was. the C of Twitter before yeah he was a. chief technology officer of Twitter. before to um the other thing that it. enables you to do is comp start comp.

start you you figure out a problem. around you things that you see are. broken you try to fix it with tech um so. there are enough jobs jobs are exploding. there are a bunch of platforms that help. you connect with jobs and more than. anything else like if you are one of. those who dream and who can create you. can go and create yeah so quickly like a. quick question is apart from being a. software developer apart being being a. tech Talent what do you feel are the top. three skills which are really in demand.

or which will keep going up in demand. because like when you're in college. right you're you're fresh you can you're. like that clay who can be molded in. anything which you want and you can. learn any any godamn skill which you. want to learn right so what are the top. three skills that somebody should learn. so that they can Safeguard in the future. and they can have this ability to solve. problem right I'm a little biased here I. mean so I would say that look I mean. coding is is necessary for everybody. like at least some some what if people. like us have no ground of coding I have. no future no I mean so there there are.

certain skills which are which are. always going to be Evergreen for example. marketing brand building those are those. are going to be basic needs for any. company Yeah the more companies start. the more that needs I mean there is more. noise and then there is more the need to. stand out and hence that is an evergreen. skill so marketing if you're good at. that if you're very creative um you have. a very safe future. [Laughter]. uh I believe like marketing uh the other.

thing that has been actually talked. about and now is picking up a little bit. of pace is um is I think just core at. the core being able to run or like know. the art of running a. business um now that is a very very. broad term but the art of running a. business is at the end of the day like. being able to take decisions which are. right most of the time um and and it is. also slowly evolving into a science. yeah strategic decision making yeah so.

some of it is domain relevance and then. some of it is is uh can be driven by. data and then like that is that is where. things like data science come into the. picture so analytics and data science. they're also going to to stay over so. first is brand marketing second is. analytics and data and third third is uh. and this is also very cliche very very. old profession but I again believe that. is always going to u to to live is is. sales sales okay hardcore sales hardcore.

sales yeah I mean typically most uh most. important skill for a company is now. that you've created value you've built. something that has value being able to. sell that to people now you could be. selling to people you could be selling. to Enterprises to companies but. eventually you have to go and sell it. yeah because that is what is going to. generate Revenue at the end of the day. um every company that you see in our. ecosystem today has a large marketing. function has a large sales function and. has a large Tech function yeah so hence. I say like you need to get really good.

at either Marketing sales or Big Data. because this is what his future is led. by after coding after aftering so this. was my backup option was right like I. keep talking to my dad and my dad says. that Tik Tok Instagram. ban yeah yeah if if YouTube gets banned. like what are you going to do what's. your backup option and I say a I already. running like couple of businesses that's. my backup option my dad said everything. gets shot what's your backup option I'm.

like I'm going to find out some startup. and tell them I'm going to do marketing. and branding for you that is the last. option I have so I get like a good sense. of security right. now people are like validating my idea. right now we're talking about jobs. talking about. opportunities you have worked with the. OG right like you have worked the the. dream entrepreneur which everybody take. examples of like you worked with zook. what was what was your biggest learning. while you were at Facebook uh While. You're Building at Facebook and working.

with the team of Mark zerber or. himself two learnings primarily one um. it does not matter how hard you work. what what you get I mean how much lines. of code you write how many meetings you. do at the end of the day all that. matters is what impact you made. eventually what you get. paid is a function of the amount of. wealth you generate M the wealth you. generate is a function of the impact you. create. so that was the first realization.

because when I joined Facebook I was. just a graduate out of college and at. that point like it was a lot about hey I. will here's a very cool problem. statement that I'm solving here's a very. cool Tech let me go and try that uh in. just 6 to 9 months I realized like. coolness is less important what is. important is what I'm doing what I'm. building what is that doing to the end. audience what kind of impact is it is. creating to the end users if the impact. is high eventually you'll you'll become. big asset big asset for every anybody.

right so the art of creating impact the. art of actually identifying where can I. create impact and continuously doing. that that's that's one very very. important skill the second thing that I. realized was and this is a sort of a. management principle at Facebook as well. is that people do their. best when you are able to clearly. identify what they are passionate about. and you're able to give them to do. something that that they really really. pass about so one of the things that for.

example Facebook had was that when you. join Facebook you're not allocated to a. team there is a 6 we boot camp okay. where you work with every single team in. in Facebook you go do something very. small with let's say photos team you go. do something very small with messages. Team you go do something very small with. Pages team you go explore and figure out. what you're really really interested in. you go come and tell us like what you're. really passionate about what do would. you like to do in the next six months. one year because when you give people. that Independence then people run they. Sprint because then they they want to.

actually I told you about the motivation. part right yeah this is cracking the. motiv this is like the classic. Management training kind of uh position. for six weeks they're just accelerating. the thing right like how big mnes have. two years of Mt program one year of. management training program they make. you work at different different organ uh. but this is happening in Tech at at at. Facebook so every single software. engineer gets to do that like for six. weeks and then you choose so that became.

clear to us as well like when even when. we are hiring it is important to. understand what what drives a person if. you're able to I mean skill alone is not. yeah if you are able to identify that. here is a person who's really interested. in let's say solving this kind of a. problem and you're able to put them to. solve that problem they'll do a. massively good job at it so you put so. for 6 weeks you leave them with multiple. people and then whoever is spending most. of the time at some place you automatic. Ally kind of know what he's doing and.

then what kind of impact is he making I. think what stood out for me in this. answer was that you said in at the end. of the day it's not about how hard you. work it's about how much impact you're. making or how much wealth you're. creating for the organization or for. yourself because that's that going to. Define how well you're going to do or. how big of an asset you become it's so. true most of the times we always hear. work hard work harder keep doing this. and work harder means like like run for. 20 hours a day I mean you know that's.

typically not with the example but. that's typically at like if you're a. coder write hundreds of cod lines every. goddamn minute then if you're a content. creator create like thousands of videos. every day like working hard is that but. working hard doesn't mean that at all. right I mean working hard alone is not. enough you have to make sure that you're. working hard with an objective in mind. that this is what I want to achieve and. here is the best place where I can put. all of my efforts. that's an interesting framework I think. this is going to stand out for me from.

this podcast okay so. what then you felt like you were. learning in Facebook Facebook is a dream. company why did you move to India then. like why did you come back here um you. were in States right yeah I was in. States uh for three years I was one year. in London setting up the Facebook London. office um I mean life was good life was. very comfortable because I'm sure there. will be many perks you a tech Talent one. of the four people who got hired from.

India so having fun companies like. Facebook Google they take they take. really really good care of you for. example even your laundry you don't have. to do oh they they they do your laundry. they pay for your food they they and. they have like really good food in the. office um in fact Google has this policy. that you don't no employee should have. to walk more than 100 actually 100 m or. 10 m to get food so you have a mini. cafeteria just like 10 20 M away away. from you from every desk wow wow and.

it's sted with chocolates and cashew. nuts and a bunch of other things right. so um tech companies are really good at. spoiling. you hence the demand that's why nobody. wants you like f it's so hard to get you. that they want they don't want you to. leave yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah I mean I. shouldn't be saying this but like most. of those companies are black holes. people go but they never leave then how. did you leave like why did you leave why. did you come back to yeah actually so. few things right one is um both me and.

abim Manu abanu is my co-founder we used. to we were like creators at heart we. would be even when we were in college uh. we created a couple of things one one. was this U we created this product. called duck which was uh a product which. where you could control your electrical. appliances from your laptop and it would. detect anomalies in patterns for example. if your AC is still running in the. afternoon but it's us usually not. running in the afternoon it was just. flag that maybe you did not intend to.

leave it open so um we did that we also. built. Anonymous um chatting Forum which we. realized was a bad. decision you had your own mini version. of Yahoo messenger or yeah it was uh um. less Yahoo messenger think of it more. like Gossip Girl as a product yeah um. which which we figured out like was a. lot of scandals and hence we shut it. down okay um but I mean because we.

always wanted to create something that. was uh that was something we wanted to. do anyhow um and the second thing is. like I based on the personal experiences. as well I felt that I mean we are a. family of Engineers my younger brothers. they're also Engineers okay so I felt. like that's that's something that. majority of India is doing and if it is. broken to the extent that we just. described um I did not even have a. solution in mind we just figured let's. let's go and fix it that's one problem.

statement to pick Let's solve for the. solution and we felt that we had made. enough money by then to be to to be able. to sustain ourselves for one fun two. years was like actually five six years. because you don't want to uh take. decisions for the companies which are. good for the short run you want to take. decisions which are good for the long. run if you're creating a company that. would Outlast you so um and we felt like. if we are at this problem statement for. long enough without giving up we'll. eventually figure out a solution we.

still figuring out a solution but but I. mean so so hence both me and ABI Manu we. we moved back to India we started we. initially started with um with the. thesis that maybe free content is the. way to solve it uh we were big fans of. dualingo so we tried almost creating. like a dualingo for programming uh it. was called interview. but what we realize over a period of. time is I mean there's so much more to. education content is exactly like books. yeah so you can create really awesome.

books but just because you have books. lying around does not mean that I'll. become. knowledgeable just because I have books. on surgeries in at my home I don't. become a surgeon yeah or at least I hope. I don't become a. surgeon so so books are one part of the. puzzle but content does not define. education content is hygiene education. is we realized and this was a learning. over the last six years or so content is. a lot more about motivation engagement. and addiction motivation engagement and.

addiction yeah I mean if you if you can. get somebody addicted like just for. example if you look at kids they adicted. to playing video games you don't have to. tell them that you go play video game. for two year two two hours now if you. leave them alone they'll probably play. video games for like 6 hours straight 7. hours straight right and uh if you can. get people to spend that amount of time. on. education the learning automatically. happens you'll falter you'll falter but. you'll eventually figure it out uh um so. so hence education is a lot more about.

how do I evoke that interest in you and. how do I make it super. interesting um if you look at most TV. shows that are most popular today. they're all lessons in history yeah Rome. is about Roman culture um Game of. Thrones is mythological but again like. kind of build out of culture of like. that people binge watch but nobody wants. to study that history book this just you. know like it's a game of addiction. engagement makes sense I this is so good.

I think this is going to be like a. guiding principle from me to create. content from here. off because it does make sense if you. are able. to if you're able to make somebody. addict to your content and make them sit. there for like 5 hours without you. asking them constantly to sit there. right I think you have done the job then. whatever you're talking whatever. teaching. you have the power to shape that. person's mind in a way maybe for good or.

bad like it's on you and that's a very. good thing to do it's it's crazy how you. think about that. particular you know I'm just I'm just. trying to think of like other examples. of how we can make this possible how we. can make this big and make it possible. at a scale where everybody and every. startup is doing this so that we change. like the the system as a narrative in. the country right right no actually.

there's a framework around this so. there's a book called hooked by Nal yeah. it talks about uh how do you create. these engagement Loops okay um which. gets people hooked for example if you. see Facebook as a website or Instagram. as a website it's a it's a website that. hooks you you get addicted to it right. like you it's almost becomes. involuntarily it becomes a pattern in. your behavior you have to click on that. app you have to scroll yeah you have to. look at stories they they've cracked the. game of Engagement they've cracked the.

game of keeping you hooked and it's a. it's a science there is an activation. point which is a notification coming to. you saying that this person has sent you. a message or this person has liked your. image that's the activation point and. then uh there is so there is uh the law. of. um it says unexpected returns or. something I mean basically you do. something and you don't know how much. return are you going to get for example. you create a video you don't know how. much how many views are you going to get. the more number of views you get that is.

that creates a dopamine effect very. similarly I create a post how many likes. am I I'm going to get I don't know how. many comments I'm going to get I don't. know but that creates that dopamine. effect I slowly start to crack it and. all of that creates this hook this cycle. education as well like it's a very. similar science um we feel good about. doing that so uh we we we've been on. this path like for the last six year. trying to crack this Loop what what. creates this Loop of people coming back. some of it is human element some of it. is product element some of it is content.

element so talking about talking about. science and building something worth. engaging right you you use the word. which it you at the end of the day the. goal is to build something build a. company which can Outlast you yeah right. what do you think are the three pillars. to build something which can Outlast. like how what are the three guiding. principles in a company which is getting. built to outlast Founders Outlast the. initiate set of team right right I think.

first is um just the framework that. whenever you take decisions of a company. um if you're building a company that is. that you're building for the short run. and you want an exit you want to sell it. you want to make quick Buck then all of. the decisions you take are good for the. short term right I might push somebody. to just buy my product yeah I might. blackmail somebody into buying my. product because it's giving me Revenue. right now right the growth figures right. now yeah but if you if you want to build.

a company for the long run it is okay to. take take decisions that are probably. bad for the shortterm they make your. Revenue. dip they they they're bad for the. shortterm but they're good for the long. term because you're building things that. will actually uh give you returns in the. longer run uh for example a lot of. Education companies if you look at um. they have very very high gross margin. what is the meaning of gross margin. essentially um if I let's say if you pay. me x amount for buying the product how.

much money am I spending in delivering. the product to you essentially what what. what kind of features and etc etc right. so most people don't spend a lot of. money here they spend most of their. money in sales and marketing yeah uh but. the thing is if you're building a. company for the longer run then you. spend most of your money here not on. sales and marketing you still spend some. money on Sal not as much as you do not. as much right uh because you know that. if people are really happy with this. part if people if you're creating a lot. of promoters in this part this will help.

you in the next 10 years might not help. you in the immediate immediate profit SL. Revenue Etc right so all of your. decision framework then becomes what is. good for me 10 years down the line yeah. not what is good for me in the next. month or next two months so that's. principle number one principle number. two is um if you're building a company. that you're going to be at it for like. next 10 years 20 years it should be. something that makes you happy okay the.

motivation part right I one feel very. passionately about the problem statement. and I feel I'm I'm I in internally feel. that I'm doing good for the world I'm. I'm adding something to the ecosystem or. whatever makes you happy right like it. just it just makes you happy yeah be it. whatever drives you but like if you're. going to do something for the next 10. years 20 years it should make you really. happy that that you're doing it uh. because like you can't be sad for like. 20 years right. that's that's what you're going to be. spending most of your life on yeah um as.

a third part so so that that's the. important bit and uh the third part is I. mean uh typically very very long-lasting. companies usually are driven by missions. because it is not you alone who's going. to be solving that problem there will be. people joining you on that journey and. hence storytelling and being Mission. driven actually motivates other people. to come and join you because then people. don't join you because you you're the. highest spare in the market yeah they. join you because they also believe in.

what you believe so uh if you are a. mission driven company if you've done a. good job at storytelling of why you're. doing what you're doing um then you'll. find a lot of people come along in the. journey to help you build what you're. trying to build and that is very. important I mean the company the the. term company means a collection of. people it does not say founder yeah it's. it's a company so the people around this. company they matter a lot. so those are the three things I believe. I mean obviously like it's my personal.

opinion now have a question on like on. this. okay why are you doing what you're doing. at scalo like what's your why what's. your mission right I mean um so started. with the fact that Tech education is. broken uh over a period of time we've. realized that education at least in the. higher education segment is is the most. productive years of a individual okay. like you you're spending your your I. mean you you you're probably 16 or 17.

when you start your college education. and then like you do it till you're 21. 22 this is when you have the highest. amount of. energy and unfortunately right now we're. wasting that. Capital if you multiply the number of. people by those number of years you're. wasting an immense amount of energy and. capital in the world yeah um what drives. us is that if we are able to do even a. 10% 20% job of fixing. it cumulatively that's a that's a heavy.

heavy amount of impact and uh there is a. study by Stanford that actually talks. about how education is directly. correlated to GDP of a Nation okay the. the more talented individuals you're. able to produce the more um skilled. individuals you're able to produce they. get together to build things it's I mean. there's a term called Zero Sum okay yeah. U what is zerm is that for example let's. say if I'm play playing a football match. if my team wins then your team has to.

lose hence it's a zero sum yeah if one. person wins the other person has to lose. for example test prep J for example is. also zero Z there are only these number. few others have to get rejected right so. if here are 5,000 people are getting. selected that means others have to get. rejected um our GDP and our ecosystem is. not zero some because I mean apart from. the existing jobs that are out there you. can create cre new jobs you can create. new companies because there're always. going to be inconveniences or problem.

statements to solve yeah everybody's. cribbing about how our government is bad. this is bad that is bad take that. problem statement solve it you'll create. a good company for yourself um so so. there's always going to be that and. hence like if you have people in the. ecosystem that are capable of picking a. problem statement and solving it they. they'll they'll keep adding to that more. and more it's not Zero Sum hence I mean. the the more those kind of people you. have the better the GDP look at Silicon.

Valley like Silicon Valley is just one. small state in the entire world has. probably the highest GDP in the world. higher GDP than India the the one. state wow but people because since the. beginning we have been playing zero some. game we have been brought up in that. environment that we still play Zero some. game even after we when we leave. education like school is a zero some. game like some people have to become. first. top. 10 right then there Tess prep which.

you're talking about so most of the. games which we have been playing races. football games all of that most of the. things which give us the initial set of. appreciation or sense of belongingness. or sense of Happiness are related to. zero some game yeah actually I'm sorry. like cut but there is this very. interesting incident I that happened I. was talking to this one gentleman he is. um he's 38 years old. he is now a manager in a big ID service. company and he was telling.

me he is reporting to me this is because. we have conditioned to think of zero. some game. [Music]. yeah and that is the problem that.

is like I am ahead of you in this game. right I'm bigger than you I'm better. than you and that's a constant need and. if we take this out lot of good can be. done yeah so we talked about things like. what is broken we talked about what's. your why we talked about how the future. is going to look like if we do if we. take out all of this obviously the GDP.

is going to go up impact is going to be. higher people are going to be much more. fulfilled and happier okay and this is a. question I ask everyone but since I know. you're like a hardcore Tech Guy before I. ask the last question I would have the. second last question what are your views. on metaverse or web 3.0 or where the. world is going ahead. now so um because you're you're. producing the talent like with your. startup right which technically like. half of them are going to work into. something like this and build a bigger. future as well sure sure sure I.

[Music]. mean you answer the why you answer the. necessity and then you answer okay this. is what can achieve it um so one of the. things for example time everybody was at. their home everybody is interacting on. Zoom or some kind of uh video app that. experience is still not at par with. let's say meeting physically the kind of. bond we would develop because we've met.

physically is very different from the. kind of bond we would develop if we were. on a zoom yeah right. and in fact like even there's a tweet by. Kunal sha where he says that one of the. biggest thing that most youngsters are. losing out in this kind of an. environment is ke if I'm sitting in an. office and there are two seniors. discussing a strategy I can listen onto. what they're discussing uh even though. I'm not sort of part of that.

conversation but just by listening to. that I I I can embe a lot of. learning because I mean in the virtual. world you're just very focused. conversations not very human we're not. used to that kind of conversations so. hence the problem. is I mean people in the US are talking. to people in India very very often. people in I'm talking to a bunch of. people in Europe Etc ET so how do we. solve this problem ke I can actually sit.

and observe I can I feel a a more. stronger Bond when I talk to you uh. that's the why and solve everybody is. trying to do different things one of the. approach one of the solution is. metaverse okay what if I have put on. this. headset and this headset controls most. of my senses essentially what I perceive. is a combination of five senses that I. have yeah if it can control most of my. sensus then it's as if I've been. transported into a new world in fact. there's a very good movie Ready Player.

one you should you should probably watch. it um I've been transported into this. world where I feel as if I'm sitting. here and I can look around and I can see. people around me I can tap on somebody's. shoulder and I can have a conversation. with them I can shake hands with them I. can do everything that I can do in a. physical world if I can replicate that. there there's a big if if I can. replicate that then it solves for a very. very important problem that now I can. mingle with people no matter where they. are I can be attending a concert yeah.

concert with like people from everywhere. in the in India just like who have put. on their headset and they they're. listening to the concert I'm sitting. beside somebody I'm just getting to know. them all of that happening organically. this is just solving for human. connections so that's the. why now how close do we get to that. solution is that solution going to be as. good as almost a physical um setup we. don't know but we are headed there I. mean the uh especially Oculus Etc The.

Quest 2 I was very recently playing. around with it it has made significant. amount of progress in that direction. again whether we'll be able to solve it. not solve it we don't know but this is a. big major leap in the human connection. setup it feels good it feels good to. play when you're having the headset but. it feels very annoying to wear it for. more than 30 minutes yeah so there's. still a lot to be done there but that's. the problem statement that they're. trying to solve yeah how do we get.

people from all around the world to feel. more connected to each other because. it's as if I'm I'm sitting beside you. and having this conversation I know you. more intimately yes um that's. metaverse web 3.0 um the I'll tell you. where it started from the why where it. started from and to be honest like I. don't know how much it's going to grow. but because there are there are few. personal opinions that I have there but. um but like where it started from was.

that currency currencies like let's say. INR or US Dollars Etc imagine today you. generate some amount of wealth let's say. you have a million dollars with you what. you would typically want is that today. with this million dollar I can go and. buy some XY Z amount of stuff yeah which. is called the purchasing power of this. capital I would want to make sure that. 10 years down the line this whatever. money I have has the same purchasing. power yep but it doesn't happen so. because there is inflation the the the. value of this Capital that reduces with.

time and currencies fluctuate if you for. example um there have been countries. that have had massive inflation hper. inflations Zimbabwe Zimbabwe in. Venezuela where all of the money that I. had would probably have zero value in in. in 10 years from now right so so there. is I mean for people who have wealth one. big problem statement is how do I make. sure that this asset that I own is safe.

okay uh and today it is not safe because. it is regulated by governments and hence. is very very dependent on that. government's. economy how that government performs and. their economy performs correct so hence. there was. uh hence Bitcoin was born which is how. do we make an a currency which is not. tied to a government's performance but. rather it is decentralized in nature um. no government controls it it's it's. controlled by the people and it is in. certain sense uh protected from.

inflation to a certain extent the. purchasing power Remains the Same yeah. um that was the problem statement with. which it started now there are merits to. having currency not regulated there are. merits to having currency it is. decentralized and hence it has been. adopted by various people um it is still. possible that cryptocurrency Etc can. become huge because if you look at. wealth wealth is controlled by very few. people yeah as long as you have buying. from them you have almost bought into a.

new formal new paradigm of. currency on the other hand web 3.0 or. blockchain is this another technology. where you we say that look even. Technologies should be decentralized for. example Facebook should be decentralized. which is there is no Facebook Authority. controlling Facebook it is People to. People yeah I mean I am having chat with. you no nobody needs to know even. Facebook does not need to know um I am.

searching for something on web Google. does not need to know it should be. decentralized between people while that. is a great concept makes a lot of sense. but in my opinion most products are. driven by distribution there has to be. somebody making sure a lot of people are. using Facebook yeah there should be. somebody making sure a lot of people are. using Google I'm still not clear on how. blockchain will solve or cross that. barrier for non-financial transaction. with Finance there seems to be a very. very direct fit again my personal.

opinion I'll get a lot of laack for this. because there are so many blockchain. Fanboys who come and start shouting at. me uh but I that's on first principles. that's where I see the Gap yeah U both. very exciting Technologies um but I mean. I don't know how they'll evolve right. now you're still not very bullish on any. of them you're waiting like you're. taking a third seat and observing what's. going to happen how it's going to get. evolved yeah I mean metaverse to some. extent um cryptocurrency to a large.

extent uh web 3.0 blockchain in other. aspects of the products still very. skeptical but I also feel most of the. times what's going to happen is uh like. when you have a decentralized finance. right let's say you send money to some. like a wrong address right now today. like you can call up HDFC and be like. hey what you know this is what I did can. you block my transaction right now can. when you do this and that there you. can't do that so that's also going to be.

like an essential problem because here. you you know that somebody there. responsible who can at least help me out. to do something or maybe reverse my. credit transaction do something about it. right right there there's nothing going. to be there so I think that's going to. be the big big big big problem when it. comes to trust and when when it becomes. mainstream but obviously every. technology has its own problems to solve. and they get solved over the time the. last question is I asked this to. everyone. is if you were not working at scalo H.

okay what do you think is the next big. opportunity in our country and where. would you be. working that's a very deep. question uh because if I if I ask people. where would you working they say oh in. tech only no no no yeah exactly if you. were not working in attech when do you. think is the next billion dollar. opportunity hm. I mean I'm I'm a person who's driven a. lot by first principles on first.

principles where you see problem around. yourself um and and typically like if. you're in a country like India you see. problems almost everywhere like there is. an opportunity everywhere uh for example. I mean and one good litmus test of where. big opportunities are you just look at. new open up the news channel and you see. like what are people most cribbing about. uh if it is the farm bills that people. are most cribbing about maybe there's an. opportunity that like Agri Tech is is is. a large opportunity to go and capture um.

if education is what most people are. cribbing about then education is where. is where you have the next opportunity. solution I don't know and I believe. again the same framework that if you're. at a problem statement for long enough. if you give it your all you'll. eventually figure out a solution. um so in my framework maybe just look at. the where wherever the most amount of. noise is what people are cribbing the. most about and so if this go if this. goes down like let's say if you want to. shut it down you want to get it out and. then that day you will open your news.

channel for 5 days straight and be like. okay. P talking that's a good framework that's. a good way to look at opportunities and. that's a good way to actually identify. thanks a lot for doing this thank you so. much I hope you enjoyed the conversation. as much as I did I did and I loved. couple of things like that stood out for. me I think it's not only for the. audience. but there are few things which I'm going. to take home and work on myself because.

I think you have you have few. philosophies of principles which you. follow which can help every content. creator every entrepreneur I mean. regardless of whether they're a coder or. or they're trying to build something in. at Tech it's going to help like a lot of. people because it makes sense it's no. rocket science I don't know why we never. thought about it but but it's so good. thank you so much for doing this thanks. for thank you for hosting me thank you. for hosting me thank you so much.