Introduction
Ryan: Today, we are excited to bring you our TBR inaugural edition, where we will give you an insightful overview of our podcast. Hi, everyone. I’m Ryan Davies. I’m the host of the Tech Business Roundtable podcast. Really excited to be here. I love tech founders. I love the tech industry. I love learning from CEOs and high-level executives, people who have lived and breathed growing tech business, and they’re the ones who are out there changing the world, creating our future. You learn a lot more about me as our episode count continues to grow, and even when I get a chance to interview some of our listeners here. But I’m super excited today to be here with Naren, the founder of the tech Business Roundtable community and podcast. Naren. Welcome.
Naren: Hey Ryan. I’m glad we’re having this conversation, the inaugural podcast.
Ryan: I’m very excited as well. You and I have been friends for a while. You’re a close friend of mine. This fit is great; I love the tech world and entrepreneurial spirit. I know you’ve been a tech entrepreneur in health care and other areas for over 15 years. You run several companies and love creating companies, creating the future. You always tell me to pull the future towards you. That is exactly what the tech industry does: they have a vision that pulls it towards themselves so that other people can get a taste and a piece of that. But for those who don’t know your full background, tell us more about yourself and your journey.
Naren’s Background
Naren: Absolutely. Like most people, I started studying computer science in the tech industry. I don’t think many people in tech are from computer science, but that’s my background. So I graduated in 97 and worked for some companies, even in school, this is in Chicago. I then worked after school; I wanted to learn by working for others. So, I worked for large companies like Xerox and startups and medium-sized companies like software in Austin, Texas. This is one of those darlings back in 1999. It’s like a story where I guess the signing bonus is a BMW. Some of you may know this, depending on your age. So that’s how I got started. But then I realized the more I moved into middle management, like director or VP roles, I started butting heads. I was one of those unemployable people, but I didn’t know this then. I just spoke my mind. I said what I was thinking, and a lot of times, it got me in trouble. So I got fired four times in a row, like four consecutive jobs. And we just had a baby, and this was 20 years ago. And then I told my wife, I can’t do this again. I’ll get a job. That’s not the issue. But then I’ll get fired for the fifth time, and I’ll probably kind of go into some kind of depression. She said, I understand. So I said I needed to do something on my own. So that’s how it all started. So, going back, my daughter was born in 2022. So, I started this journey as a tech entrepreneur in December of 2002, approximately 21 years ago.
Ryan: You know, that’s exactly right; we have a great history, even Xerox, a common thread between us there with that one. But that’s a common story for many entrepreneurs: people who bounced around or had a vision and wanted to do it themselves and take on the world. And I know, again, you’ve done an amazing job with this, and now you have your newest venture, the tech business roundtable community. Why don’t you tell us a little bit about that and why you decided to create it?
Naren: Thank you, Ryan. Yes, it’s www.techbusinessroundtable.com. I’m sure, you know, sometimes you have these ideas you cannot get out of your mind; just keep coming back to you. And this is one of those things for me. Ryan, we are all working from home. So we have been a virtual company since 2004. So it’s 19 years. It’s the trend, and everybody is doing it now, but we embraced this right from day one. This idea of a global team, time zones don’t matter, cultures don’t matter, borders don’t matter. You hire the best people regardless of where they are. You still create the culture and community and do something amazing.
So I have been part of communities of tech entrepreneurs going back to 2005 – 2006, and many of them were in person and ended up meeting at a place. There are those communities where anybody can go and flow and barrier to entry in terms of cost. And then they don’t screen anything, they just advertise, and you can show up, and then there are those a little bit more exclusive, you pay 5 to 6 to 10,000 dollars depending on the community. And you meet once a month, once a quarter when they have an annual event. So those are the kinds of things that were there to foster these communities. I got a lot of value from the more curated community, where you had to pay a decent amount of money to be part of it because everybody there wanted to be there. But still, there were a lot of things that could be done differently. I didn’t like the idea that you can only learn from people living 30 miles around you. What about people who live 3000 miles around you? They also have ideas; they also have needs.
Naren: And also, I realized that businesses are different; running an e-commerce business is very different from running an accounting firm that is tech-enabled from a digital marketing firm that is tech-enabled. So there’s all these businesses and all these nuances. So why not build this huge tent of a global community with people from every sector, from consumer tech to small business and every other tech sector you can think of. But also where it feels like you are with a group of group-minded people. Let’s say all the consumer tech people can work together. All the people doing 1 to $3 million in revenue can work together because they have similar challenges and needs. So this idea of a global tent, a virtual tent where we can come together.
After COVID, people have changed how they think. In the old days, we felt we had to sit in front of somebody’s desk to talk to them and have a meaningful conversation. But many of us realize that after COVID, that’s optional; you can do as much, if not more, virtually because it also comes with its advantages. You’re not getting on a plane; you’re not wasting so much time before and after the meeting. But you can do it during the day. You can talk to seven people in 77 different places, thousands of miles away. All these things have changed the world we live in. So, I wanted to build this amazing community from the ground up. It’s like Abraham Lincoln said for the people by the people, right? It’s like for tech entrepreneurs, by tech entrepreneurs, a place where we can hang out, we can learn, we can share. The other thing I also realized is that people in tech love to help others. They love to give back. So, they don’t like holding back and keeping secrets. They share openly. They say, hey, this works for me in sales, and let me share that with anybody who’s interested and who might benefit from it.
Naren: I’ve seen that wane across the board over the last dozen-plus years. So I know this is right to happen. And, of course, the other option is to take a class at Harvard or one of those top business schools, but it’s not changing fast enough. You’re signing up a year ahead and attending that event; things change so much today. And also, we are learning more and more from our peers than from quote-unquote books or quote-unquote curricula. Why is the speed of change just getting faster and faster by the time they finish coming up with a book and the title and print it all up? Two years later, things have changed. It’s just a new world we live in, and I wanted to experiment and have this an ongoing experiment. We are constantly figuring this out and meeting the needs of tech entrepreneurs globally.
Ryan: It’s amazing. It’s a great vision for this, and you’re right. You know how, in this community, people don’t want to see others make the mistakes they made; they want to share their best practices. And it’s exactly as you said, this is about tech. It’s the fastest evolving thing that’s there. Like, look where we were not even a decade ago or even a year ago, but even a month or two ago in terms of some industries and what’s changed so rapidly to be able to have that at your fingertips and talk to your peers and other people who are again living and breathing the same things, it’s going to make a world of difference. And it’s funny you mentioned things like that. You get an idea that gets stuck in your head, and it doesn’t go away, and all I could think about for that is like, I’m not that entrepreneurial, I guess, as you are, because, for me, I think it’s more like frozen songs or baby shark. After all, you could tell that gets stuck in my head and doesn’t go away. So you’re a lot more productive with what’s stuck up there that I get to lately. But that’s fantastic. I want to talk a bit more about the members and the benefits they’ll get, but one of these days, I’m sure we’ll have another conversation about that in a podcast episode. But I want to dig in a little more about what you mentioned. You know, you’ve laid out a vision of what you expect to see and how people will take advantage of the roundtable’s benefits. But when people come to the tech business roundtable community, what kind of challenges are you hoping for and looking for these podcasts to address regardless of where anybody is on their business journey?
Challenges Tech Entrepreneurs Face
Naren: That’s a great question. I think one big lesson I got from being a tech entrepreneur is what it takes to go from zero to half a million is different from going from half a million to 2 million, different from going from 2 million to 5 million, different from going from 5 million to 20 million. So, you have to reinvent yourself; you have to reinvent your team; you have to reinvent how you look at the world and how you think about things. Every one of our co-hosts is a fellow tech entrepreneur. Most of our guests are tech entrepreneurs. So, why not learn from them? And again, it’s not just about looking at this person with a billion-dollar exit. Look at this person who tried four times, and this is what he learned. So it’s this idea of learning from each other, getting real practical tangible advice. That is not based on theory but has been tested in the marketplace. So it’s just having fun, and some communities are close-knit. So they help their current companies with the help of their former founders, but it’s close. It’s only for the people who are in that group. So why not make that for the world?
Naren: And there are tech entrepreneurs who want to build those billion-dollar companies and those who want to create a $10 million company and are happy. So there’s no, like, right or wrong answer on how to use tech or how to leverage tech to do something meaningful that you are passionate about. So that’s where I was coming from.
Ryan: I love it. And there’s so much value in not just celebrating the winners but celebrating the people who didn’t succeed as well. And that’s great. What will be brought to the table here and that I’m looking forward to talking to people about is exactly that: what were the mistakes we make in this society where we live on social media? And we always post great pictures on Instagram and tell the great stories on Facebook. But behind the scenes, you don’t see the five bins of laundry I’ve got over there or things like that, right? Like all these things are going on. It’s a lot like that in the business world, where sometimes people are a little scared to show where they’ve been and some roadblocks or obstacles. And I’m looking forward to having that as a big part of the community. Let’s talk about the actual podcast itself. There’s a concept of an edition of the Tech Business Roundtable podcast. But what do you mean by that? And what does a typical podcast look like in terms of length and everything that we could expect from that standpoint?
The Tech Business Roundtable Podcast
Naren: We’re going to break all the molds. So that’s what I’m going to say. So the podcast is free for everyone, like it’s for the whole world. As long as you think you are a tech entrepreneur or wanna be one, we hope you get value from the person running a $100 million company to somebody passionate and struggling to make that 1st 100,000. There will be an episode where you’ll get value, and the way we thought about it is two buckets. One is that’s where the editions come in. One type of edition is all about going deep. So, an e-commerce company and what they are dealing with differs from a tech-enabled service company. So, how do we add value to that e-commerce entrepreneur, founder, or CEO? The way we are going to do that is we’re going to have an edition called Tech TBR e-commerce edition.
So that’s all about nitty gritty details around e-commerce. Now, some of that may apply to you, and some of them may not. So, depending on who you are and what your interests are, you might listen to that episode; the title grabs your attention, or e-commerce grabs your attention, whatever it is. So we have 32 editions, as we call them, and the first bucket is like going deep into specific types of tech industries. The second bucket is what we call interest.
For example, every tech entrepreneur wants to learn about HR people hiring, firing, compensation, motivation, and leadership teams. So we will have a set of podcasts where we go deep into HR that’s all about educating and giving you the tools. So instead of taking an HR course or getting a degree at a famous university, now you get some real practical advice from people who have been there. A CEO could be a leader of an executive search firm that has worked with 300 companies, and they have something interesting to say because they have a lot of experience with the dos and don’ts. Another example of interest could be marketing sales, legal, taxes, and compliance; there are all these topics that you, as the CEO founder, must master to be successful as an entrepreneur. So either you’re going to learn from people just like you in the same segment of the tech industry, or you’re going to learn from people who have been there, done that, and overcome some of these common challenges that all tech entrepreneurs face. All of this is free. It’s going to be on the website techbusinessroundtable.com. It will be available on iTunes, Google Play, and anywhere you want. We’re also going to make it a video podcast. So, every single episode will have a video component, and we will share it and, of course, YouTube, Instagram, Linked In, TikTok, and Twitter. Some might be clips, and some might be the entire episode. We’re just going to have fun with it. Add value. That’s our focus.
Ryan: I love it. That great. So, people will hear and see a lot of me coming up. You get a bit from that perspective. Did you want to touch on any examples of specific additions beyond, like you said, the buckets? But I know you’re talking about not even just in health care, there’s, we’ve got, biotech, health tech, medical tech like there’s, about that granular level like you said, so that people can extract a lot of value for their time to listen to this podcast.
Naren: Absolutely. So, for example, one of the additions is enterprise software, and another is a small business, so software is a service. Still, for small businesses, another one is e-commerce, biotech, construction tech, and government tech. You should go on and on and on. So many of these in-depth conversations will be like a segment of the industry. And another example of interest, as I talked about marketing and, and, and so forth. Some other examples are venture studio incubators, late-stage venture capital, angel investing, early-stage venture capital, private equity, and influence. Are you applying the principles of influence on your products on your website and your processes? So there are all kinds of things you’ll get into and have fun with.
Ryan: I love it. And that’s great. It doesn’t matter where you are on your business journey; whether you’re looking for investors looking for support, you’ve got the vision. You’re trying to push it forward, or you’re through that stage, and you’re excelling, but you know, you’re looking for the next step. What’s the next stage? Like you said, at each stage, you have to reinvent yourself. And I think many entrepreneurs try to be a jack of all trades, but quite often, they’re a master of none, right? So this is, this is that ability to great. So how do I start to master the other areas maybe not, but at least kind of get a feel for it and know how not to make missteps and not to find all the information they’re looking for. So, we also talked about how people can access it and things like that. But how often are we looking to record the podcasts and make them available for the communities?
Frequency of Podcast Episodes
Naren: Yes, I mean, we’re going to start once a week, then we’re going to go once every two weeks. Eventually, I can see this happening every day or even twice daily. So remember, we have 32 editions. So once we are staffed, we will have a co-host. For example, we might have 2 to 4 co-hosts for the Fintech edition. So that way, we hear different voices and perspectives from our hosts. Because depending on your background, you will ask different questions and look at it differently. So we’re just going to have fun with it. So a typical podcast will have one host once a week, and it’s heavily produced; this is going to be like we’re going to learn from each other. You will have many people just like you doing the interviews and tons of people like you who will share their wisdom and experience, including their failures. So it will be like this community that’s growing, changing, and evolving daily, which will be powered by ekwa.Tech, the marketing company you and I are also working with, Ryan, will do the marketing, get the word out, and spread the gospel. So many people are getting access to and benefiting from all this content.
Seeking Co-Hosts and Interviewees
Ryan: Now, you probably got some people leaning in or listening a little closer when you said we’re looking for co-hosts, we’re looking for people to interview all of that type of thing. Let’s touch on that a bit, like what, who, who are you looking to interview? What kind of experiences are you looking to bring forward and to share, and how do people become a part of that?
Naren: Yeah, I mean, there are different buckets I can think of. One bucket is been there, done that, like a dear friend of mine, Allen Lau, who’s the co-founder of Wattpad. And this, a few years ago, sold the business for 800 plus million dollars, an amazing story. It became the standard in storytelling and writing stories, and when global hundreds of millions of users, it is a crazy success story, right? So, I learned from him and was able to walk his path with him. The dos the don’t the mistakes. What happened? How did you think about things often? We learn a lot. Why do smart people study history? Because you can learn a lot from the past. So, I like being able to walk in their shoes.
Another example is someone who’s, hands down, amazing at building sales teams because this particular entrepreneur, let’s say, the sales team from 0 to 40 people. He grew his revenues, New MRR from, let’s say, 10,000 MRR more every month to, let’s say, half a million MRR. How did he do that? How did she do that? What were the secrets? What were the things? What were the steps that made them, made that happen?
It could be an episode where we talk to people who are professionals, like executive search. So, someone who has hired or helped hire 300 senior C-level executives. What are some of the mistakes that founders or CEOs make when they’re building the executive team? What works? What doesn’t? So it will be all kinds of amazing conversations with people who have been there, done that. Of course, you can find these people, build relationships, get on their good side, and learn from them, or you can hear and learn from all these people. And I want this to become like a global encyclopedia. So it doesn’t mean that you’re going to listen to every episode, every word you pick, and choose what you want, what you’re interested in at the moment. So not only will this be like, you’re getting new ideas every single week, every single day, but also like you can go back, and that’s where the members come in. The 1st 1000 members don’t pay any fees, and we will keep the prices low. Even beyond that, they don’t pay any fees for the first year. So you get to experience it, you get to see it. So you’re going to have archives, you’re going to have resources, PDFs, all kinds of things to help you. So think of education for entrepreneurs, reimagine. So that’s part of what we think of when we think of members. Of course, we’ll talk about that later as to all the things we are thinking about for members. But for now, the podcast is one way we will create valuable knowledge from people who have been there and done that.
Ryan: Perfect. And so again, as the founder here, how lots of great plans, there’s a great vision behind this, fostering the community and raising that to the next level as we’ve talked about each kind of milestone that you’re looking to hit. How do you envision fostering these communities, bringing them together, and helping them to connect and share?
Naren: Yeah. So, regarding what we have, my background is in marketing, at least digital marketing. And I have a lot of experience in the space, and we already run a lot of communities. So, we know how to build communities. And, of course, it has been in health care, but we know a lot about communities, what people are looking for, and how to get people to help people. And so, a lot of that experience will help us a lot. And we’re going to experiment and try things like all entrepreneurs. If it works, we’re going to do more of it. If it doesn’t, we will analyze and say why it didn’t and make it work, or we will move on and do something else. Ultimately, I want to be mindful of what entrepreneurs want and what resonates with them instead of pushing things down their throats that they’re not interested in. I like to listen to a lot, paying attention to what’s happening and what people want.
Ryan: Perfect. Yeah, I know. And you know, we have these conversations all the time from those areas on how to build these tight-knit communities. And how to ensure people get these tangible step-by-step takeaways they can apply and use. It’s not some cryptic, you know, messaging or, stay tuned to learn more type of a thing. So I’m excited to continue on it and draw those out of people, but I’m going to, I’m going to give you one now. That’s not quite such a softball for you. We’ve discussed what tech entrepreneurs want to hear about these experiences and challenges. Exactly. We just talked about how we will share it in the community. You could give us an example of one of the experiences from your journey in the tech industry where something was a big challenge for you to overcome. Were you successful or not? What did that look like?
Naren: Yeah. An example I had to deal with is that you don’t have to be very process-dependent when running a smaller business. But as you start scaling at some point, let’s say 50 clients, whatever the number is, you can only know some things. You can’t handle everything. So many entrepreneurs don’t know how to make that transition, and many businesses go out of business. That’s why, at every stage, a million-dollar business, only 10% make it to that level. And so forth, it gets smaller and smaller and smaller, and they don’t make that transition. So that’s an example of something I struggled with, and I had to master, and I’m still mastering it. Then, as you grow even further, it’s about leadership teams and breaking things down into smaller businesses when you get into seven digits, eight digits, and so forth. All these areas or ceilings are holding us back. It could be a mindset, and maybe it’s things we don’t know. I mean, that’s the thing. We don’t know what we don’t know. So it’s being able to discover it. So I’m hoping that from this community, we will notice things that we didn’t think of because somebody else is facing the same challenge that we are facing, and we don’t know how to get through it because we don’t know the answer. We are missing something; they see it and figure out the answer. Now, we can, you know, piggyback on their success, and within the community, we’re going to have fireside chats, we’re going to have all kinds of things, webinars, masterminds, all sorts of things to go to the next level. It’s not just about one way of communication, like with the podcast, but rather it’s community, people helping people coming together, learning from each other, growing together,
Ryan, and that is a great example. It’s exactly; it again comes to mind things like, how often have we heard, whether it’s a business practice owner or somebody who’s an entrepreneur or a medical practice owner or my grandma with her recipes where they go, well, it’s all up here. That’s good enough. I got it right. And it’s like, well, that’s what we’re worth aiming to do is to take it from here and share it out so that everybody can kind of learn those processes and not have to, again, not make those missteps or not have any guesswork and, and all support. I am really excited about fostering this community and helping it grow. Again, I have another question for you. For tech entrepreneurs, the point of this is they’re looking for advice; they’re looking for guidance; they’re looking for, as you said, the growth hacks, the ways to do things regardless of where a listener is right now in their business journey. Do you have a top 2 or 3 pieces of advice you could share to help them today?
Three Pieces of Advice for Entrepreneurs
Naren: Oh, that’s great. There are three things I would like to share with our listeners today. Number one is to stick to witness. One thing I know about anyone still standing and hasn’t given up or folded is they don’t give up. They believe in something. They see the world differently, believe in that new way the world should exist, and then don’t give up; they stick with it. If you’re one of those people looking for success, in other words, I’m going to make X dollars, and that’s why I’m doing this. And the minute you don’t get it, you’ll quit. But if you’re focused on creating the new feature and being part of, like, making it happen, then you won’t quit. So that’s number one, stick to it and, and it’s a muscle, you have to develop it. And the more you do it, the better it gets. Of course, a 14-year-old, a 15-year-old, or somebody starting won’t have that muscle. So you have to develop it. Any other muscle? The second thing I want to share with our listeners is that Dale Carnegie said the world is full of grabbing and self-seeking people. The rare individual who focuses on helping others get what they want has no competition. So what he’s saying is if you are me, my goals, my numbers, you won’t succeed. But if you are all about visualizing the future and where the future is beneficial to whoever you’re trying to serve, your customers, your team, et cetera. And then you are focused on making that happen, whatever it takes, no questions asked, just sticking with it. Then, in the long term, you will be doing fine. So it’s that relentless focus on the future and creating their future. So it’s so focused on others and giving other people value. One rule of thumb I use is if I’m going to get paid a buck, I want to give ten bucks back. So, if they are getting $10, it’s fair for me to ask for a buck. In other words, give them much more value than you get from that relationship. Those are two of the big things that come to mind, and, finally, it’s about people. I like working on your people skills, listening, influencing, and inspiring. So it’s so this, it’s never-ending, constantly studying, learning like something doesn’t work. Don’t take it personally; I’d rather see it as “What can I learn from this”? How do I now apply it when something does work? Don’t get excited and just, you know, go to the beach for three days, say, hey, this is working, how do I celebrate it? But at the same time, leverage it so I can do more of it. These are some lessons I’d leave with our listeners, and I know you put me on the spot. So I didn’t think it through, but these are the things that just, you know, came to the top of my mind.
Ryan: No, I think that’s perfect. You know, I’m Sandler Sales certified. And that’s, that’s a big part of it. Is the dummy curve talking about how you get this burst of success at the start, and you go, well, this was easy, and then you hit that? Maybe I didn’t know what I was doing, and people didn’t stick to it. They don’t come back through the curve to come back up and learn, right? They don’t act vulnerable, they don’t ask questions, they don’t admit, they don’t understand something, they don’t ask for help. And that’s where this comes forward: don’t be a dummy. Come out of the curve. And grow yourself, your business, and everything. Whether it’s you personally or your business, the people around you, as you mentioned, provide value in all these things, but that’s a great message. And that’s perfect. You know, almost too close up on here, but I’d love to, again, ask you a question about what message you’d like to convey to our listeners to tune in regularly and become active in the community. You know, go through the process and join us here. Do you have any thoughts on that?
Naren: Absolutely. So, of course, visit techbusinessroundtable.com. We have venture capitalists, angel investors, founders, CEOs, and everything from a startup to a $50 million company. So we’re going to build different sub-communities within it. To apply the 1st 1000 members. We are waiving your fees for the first year. So that’s the first ask. The second task is, when you go to the tech business roundtable, you can see all of our podcasts and all of the episodes, and you will have links to our Instagram, our LinkedIn, and all the different ways we are connecting so slowly but surely start joining us on all these different ways. Let’s share a clip on LinkedIn with you. You could join our LinkedIn group or see a video on Twitter. So stay active, stay engaged, and join us, whether as a member, guest, or co-host. We are looking for close to 100 co-hosts because we will have 32 editions. So, you could be part of the movement. We want to build this movement, like I said, by tech entrepreneurs for tech entrepreneurs, of course, we will be including CEOs. So, you must be a founder, a CEO, or an angel investor. We see if you are somebody in the community helping these companies to be part of this. And we’ll vet everyone. So please don’t get offended if we don’t let you in. We want everyone to follow our guidelines. Like being honest, helping people, not trying to sell things, all of these guidelines. So, if you follow those guidelines, we will not kick you out. One of the reasons many communities don’t work is that the people running them don’t enforce the rules. So, it becomes like the lowest common denominator. So we hope to be different. So, if you are not, remind me that I said this and point it out to me, like when we are not living up to our ideals. So you know, let’s have some fun. We have a vision that we want this amazing for tech entrepreneurs by tech entrepreneurs. But at the same time, like anything new, any community has to be nurtured like a child. It has to be taken care of. So, please join us. We can nurture it and grow and make it better tomorrow than it is today.
Conclusion
Ryan: It’s amazing. Thank you, Naren, for your time today. What an absolute blast. I’m so excited. This was the Inaugural Tech Business Roundtable podcast to be a part of. I want to thank all of our listeners for listening and encouraging you. Again, as Naren said, join the community and reach out. We’d love to; I’d love to talk to you. I’d love to have you as a guest and a co-host and help me out here. Start to share that wealth of knowledge that everyone has and grow this community so that everybody can benefit and succeed and get that granular targeted information to help plan and take the next step in their entrepreneurial journey. Naren, thank you again. I appreciate your time today. Always a pleasure talking with you. Thank you.
Naren: Thank you, Ryan. Thanks so much, everyone. Thanks for listening, and I can’t wait to talk to you for the second edition of the Tech Business Roundtable podcast. Until then, take care, everybody.