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The Ukrainian Immigrant Who Sold WhatsApp to Facebook for $19.3B

Jan Koum is a Ukrainian-American billionaire businessman and computer engineer. He’s the co-founder and former CEO of WhatsApp, a mobile messaging app that was acquired by Facebook in 2014 for an absolutely mind boggling $19.3 billion.

Facebook paid $12 billion in stock and the rest in cash. What’s even more badass than the exit was the fact that Koum arranged for the $19 billion deal to be signed at the same welfare center he used to collect his welfare checks in his teens. Only this time, he drove there in his Porsche.

Jan moved to California from Ukraine when he was 16. As a young immigrant, Koum and his mother had to rely on food stamps. Koum became interested in programming and eventually landed a job at Yahoo! Where he worked for 9 years.

Then in January 2009, Koum bought an iPhone and realized that the then seven-month-old App Store was about to spawn a whole new industry for app creators.

WhatsApp was initially unpopular, but it quickly became one of the fastest growing apps on the market.  WhatsApp allows user to send messages, images, audio or video at a cost significantly less than texting.

The app gained a large user base. So large Facebook was monitoring the app for years obsessively. They were paranoid WhatsApp could eventually be a Facebook killer.

WATCH:

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Case Studies Personal Development Technology Wealth

Where’s My S@#&? Why Shipping Takes Soo Long Now…

90% of the world’s trade goods are transported by international shipping. Let that sink it.

When countries went into lockdown in early 2020, restrictions on peoples’ movements resulted in significant changes in consumption patterns.

An industry with an estimated 5,500 container vessels was caught off gaurd by the  COVID-19 lockdowns. Then, when Americans flush with stimulus checks embarked on a drunk binge spending spree a year later, there simple weren’t enough ships to meet the explosive demand.

Every able container ship was pulled into service in a scramble to reach U.S. consumers.

But with 40% of US imports going through southern Californian in LA, it had become common to see up to 70 ships just floating nearby waiting to offload the products we’ve been waiting for.

According to Peter Sands, chief analyst at Xeneta, a Norwegian analytics firm for the freight industry; “Everything is so out of its normal balance it will take more than a year for global logistics to unwind.”

As if things weren’t shitty enough, there’s also a container for Asian exporters. Those big ass steel boxes are returning to Asia at a rate of only one for every four arriving in the U.S.

The global supply chain network is on its knees. After a fall in shipping demand during the early days of the pandemic in 2020, a surge at the end of that year led to delays, port traffic jams, and blockages across the world. Now, containers are jammed up in ports due to rising demand and a continuing shortage of dockworkers and truckers.

Don’t look for any solutions coming soon, supply chain experts predict the to remain a backlog in shipping to American ports that could last into early 2023.

The logjam has sent shipping costs to record highs up 449%.

So what’s the solution?

The shipping industry is lobbying for local governments to increase spending on critical parts of the supply chain. Specifically ports, railways, warehouses, and roads in order to increase capacity and cope with ongoing demand.

 

WATCH:

For more information visit tylerhayzlett.com

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Best Practices Case Studies Personal Development Technology

How Amazon Quietly Built the Biggest Shipping Company on the Planet

When the world took a pause during the pandemic, Amazon quietly hired an extra 400,000 workers to deliver goods from its warehouses across the country, pushing its total employee count to 1.1 million people.

People hit the buy button on Amazon.com about 13 million times a day. That’s over 66 thousand orders per hour or 18.5 per second. Then like magic, the same day or 3 days later, those 13 million orders get delivered like clockwork.

Which begs the question, how the hell does Amazon fulfill that many orders?

As it turns out, Amazon’s fulfillment system is more complicated and convoluted that any logistics company on the planet. Operationally the company competes more with FedX and UPS than they do with retailers like Walmart or Target.

So there are definitely a few factors in Amazon’s business structure that allow the company to ship and deliver customer orders so damn effectively.

Compared to it’s competitors, Amazon’s supply chain and logistics operations are far more advanced. Amazon strategically builds fulfillment centers in or near urban cities to best reach as many customers as possible. They have over 180 fulfillment centers and continues to expand every year…

The reason Amazon’s can keeps their shipping cost low in comparison to competitors by taking over the entire supply chain including delivery.

This way, Amazon doesn’t have to pay third-party companies to manage their fulfillment.

WATCH:

For more information visit tylerhayzlett.com

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Accounting Best Practices Biography and History Culture Economics Entrepreneurship Industries Management Mergers & Acquisition News and Politics Personal Development Technology

Is Netflix Collapsing? The Numbers Are Alarming…

It goes without saying, Netflix has been dominated streaming videos like BlockBuster dominated movie rentals. However new players are catching up and giving the iconic brand a real run for their money.

In a shocking reveal, instead of achieving the target of adding 2 million new subscribers in Q1 2022 that it set for itself three months earlier, they ended up losing 200,000 subscribers…Ouch

This is the first time the company has net loss of subscribers.

This could just be the tip of the ice burg as Netflix is expecting to lose an additional 2 million more subscribers in the ongoing quarter. The market response was brutal. Netflix lost ¼ of its value as the stock price tanked 25% in 1 day.

Competition is cut throat with the emergence of Disney, Hulu, HBO, Paramount, Peacock, Apple and Amazon. This has presented a serious challenge now as people are ditching Netflix for those streaming services that are available at much more competitive prices (Netflix premium is up to $19.99/month which is almost double the competition).

Pricing be damned, the other problem plaguing Netflix is their competitors are reducing the pool size of originalHollywood content they got to pick from over the last decade.

TV and film companies have more options of providers to negotiate with.

 

WATCH:

 

For more information visit tylerhayzlett.com

Categories
Best Practices Case Studies Personal Development Technology

How Amazon Quietly Built the Biggest Shipping Company on the Planet

When the world took a pause during the pandemic, Amazon quietly hired an extra 400,000 workers to deliver goods from its warehouses across the country, pushing its total employee count to 1.1 million people.

People hit the buy button on Amazon.com about 13 million times a day. That’s over 66 thousand orders per hour or 18.5 per second. Then like magic, the same day or 3 days later, those 13 million orders get delivered like clockwork.

Which begs the question, how the hell does Amazon fulfill that many orders?

As it turns out, Amazon’s fulfillment system is more complicated and convoluted that any logistics company on the planet. Operationally the company competes more with FedX and UPS than they do with retailers like Walmart or Target.

So there are definitely a few factors in Amazon’s business structure that allow the company to ship and deliver customer orders so damn effectively.

Compared to it’s competitors, Amazon’s supply chain and logistics operations are far more advanced. Amazon strategically builds fulfillment centers in or near urban cities to best reach as many customers as possible. They have over 180 fulfillment centers and continues to expand every year…

The reason Amazon’s can keeps their shipping cost low in comparison to competitors by taking over the entire supply chain including delivery.

This way, Amazon doesn’t have to pay third-party companies to manage their fulfillment.

WATCH:

For more information visit tylerhayzlett.com

Categories
Accounting Best Practices Biography and History Culture Economics Entrepreneurship Industries Management Mergers & Acquisition News and Politics Personal Development Technology

Is Netflix Collapsing? The Numbers Are Alarming…

It goes without saying, Netflix has been dominated streaming videos like BlockBuster dominated movie rentals. However new players are catching up and giving the iconic brand a real run for their money.

In a shocking reveal, instead of achieving the target of adding 2 million new subscribers in Q1 2022 that it set for itself three months earlier, they ended up losing 200,000 subscribers…Ouch

This is the first time the company has net loss of subscribers.

This could just be the tip of the ice burg as Netflix is expecting to lose an additional 2 million more subscribers in the ongoing quarter. The market response was brutal. Netflix lost ¼ of its value as the stock price tanked 25% in 1 day.

Competition is cut throat with the emergence of Disney, Hulu, HBO, Paramount, Peacock, Apple and Amazon. This has presented a serious challenge now as people are ditching Netflix for those streaming services that are available at much more competitive prices (Netflix premium is up to $19.99/month which is almost double the competition).

Pricing be damned, the other problem plaguing Netflix is their competitors are reducing the pool size of originalHollywood content they got to pick from over the last decade.

TV and film companies have more options of providers to negotiate with.

 

WATCH:

 

For more information visit tylerhayzlett.com

Categories
Best Practices Entrepreneurship Marketing Personal Development Technology

The Top 10 Lessons We Learned Hosting Over 300 Virtual Events in One Year!

 

#1 It’s totally possible to create a close-knit community online!

Creating a digital community is easier now than ever before. We went from hosting 40 in-person conferences per year to 300+ digital events/year.

Crazy right? But it has been totally worth it.

Hosting consistent, recurring events meant our members would continually check in with each other, learn about each other, and be part of each other’s lives in ways that were never possible before.

We’ve had members join digital events while on vacation or even in the hospital!

Connecting with people has never been easier.

Virtual communities are a great way to engage your audience!

In March of 2020, C-Suite Network recognized the need for a weekly events to connect with one another, celebrate our successes, big or small, and discuss the unique challenges our businesses were going through.

That’s why we created an event series called C-Suite Celebrates to allow our community to celebrate their wins of the week either personally or professionally. Two years later, the event is still thriving with an amazing community of business leaders.

In fact, on May 6 we are celebrating the 100th anniversary of our digital networking Celebrates series.

If you’re interested in experiencing a digital networking event you can register for the event here.

Now on to number two!

 

#2 Be prepared to mute users and turn off videos!

Appoint someone to be on the ready to turn off anyone’s video and sound!

Here’s why… 

There’s always that one person who sounds like they are in a wind tunnel. Or the other one that thinks they are on mute and takes a personal call in front of the whole group (it happens)!

If you don’t have someone appointed to this role ahead of your event, you’ll just end up wasting a lot of precious time waiting for people to fumble themselves off mute.

 

#3 Make the events interactive -people want to interact not just sit there

The vast majority of the feedback we get from attendees is that they are craving to be part of the conversation. Not just listen to one.

Ask questions to the audience, acknowledge comments in the chat, offer break out rooms (Zoom has this feature).

Pick interesting or experienced speakers. Attention spans are small and there is a lot of noise competing for attention. An engaged audience always makes for a better event.

#4 There’s strength in numbers! The power of joint ventures

Don’t have a big list of people to invite? You don’t have to go at events alone. Find joint venture partners who are on a similar mission to compliment each others success.

For example, we partnered up with LeadHERship Global and others to add massive value to our joint communities not only by cross promoting each other, but joining forces to create more diverse events and subject matter expertise.

Joint ventures can be a great way to expand your influence and add value to audiences that otherwise may have not known about your brand.

#5 Engagement is the key performance indicator

Unlike in-person events where an attendee is immersed in your event experience, virtual events compete against at home or in-office distractions for your attendee’s attention.

That is why it’s even more important to focus on how you are engaging and interacting with your attendees.

Increasing your engagement during virtual events leads to stronger more meaningful connections and relationships between your attendees. Add surveys, polls and breakout rooms to allow people to dive deep on the topics that matter to them.

Give people a way to engage!

 

#6 Encourage people to interact and turn their cameras on

We have found that it’s considered rude to attend a networking event on mute with your camera off. You appear to not be engaged, which is a bad look for your brand.

You wouldn’t walk around a live event with blinders and a muzzle, would you? If so, why make the trip at all?

Remind people to turn their cameras on or call on people for feedback to make sure everyone gets a chance to be heard. Otherwise they may not come back or feel like a welcomed member of the group.

 

#7 It’s okay to let people see your personal side

It’s OK if your kids or pets show up on camera. (as long as they’re not being in appropriate).

We’ve seen the more personal side of brands and colleagues and most of us have gotten used to the small interruptions. In fact, they’re often welcomed.

So don’t shoo your six-year-old daughter from wandering into the conversation. Embrace her interest in what’s being discussed.

After all, she’s a future leader and it’s never too soon to get her connected and networking!

#8 Have a plan b if a falls through (life happens)

Be prepared for the event to NOT go according to plan. Life happens after all.

Have a plan b in case the speaker doesn’t show or they have technical issues and a backup on your side too.

Make sure your host has a topic they can deliver on in case your guest falls through or has technical difficulties.

 

#9 Come prepared with ice-breaker questions

Let’s face it, networking events can be a little awkward and scary to others (especially if you’re new to a group). That’s where we have found icebreakers to come in handy.

We found it empowering to ask questions like;

“Share your favorite picture on your phone right now and explain why it is.”

It helps to break the ice in a business setting and bring the conversion down to earth in a personal way before diving into the deep end on business issues.

Need help thinking of ice-breaker questions? There are hundreds of ideas, like these 62 event ice-breaker questions from eventmanagerblog.com.

Ice-breakers adds to the fun factor and sometimes even the corny sounding games get people interacting with it and each other. That’s what creates a memorable experience.

Having a prize wheel doesn’t hurt either!

#10 Cross train your team on technical tasks!

The most stressful part of hosting digital events is when you don’t know what you are doing from a technical level.

Have your team cross trained on hosting, running slides, monitoring registrations, creating breakout rooms (Yes, Zoom lets you do breakout rooms).

Sometimes it doesn’t matter how prepared you are, something comes up and its better that your team is empowered to step into different functions. Everyone should have basic understanding for the entire event process.

For more information visit tylerhayzlett.com

 

Categories
Best Practices Entrepreneurship Personal Development Technology

Corporate CPR: Interview with Dan Prince, Software Development Leader

Dan Prince is a life-long technologist and expert in the modern software development lifecycle.

He’s the founder and CEO of Illumisoft, a custom software development company that provides healthcare solutions with a human-centered approach. He’s also a team player that opts for simplicity over perfection, and people over processes. 

In our interview today, Dan and I discussed the importance of building strong relationships with clients in order to truly understand their needs. And with customer satisfaction as a key indicator of how effective your business processes are, Dan and his team always conduct an analysis at the end of projects in order to learn and grow from their experiences. 

Connect with Dan. 

Website

LinkedIn

Twitter

 

View the full episode here.

Categories
Growth Personal Development Technology

Should I Spy On My Child?

As the world becomes more technologically advanced, it’s getting easier than ever to invade each other’s privacy.

 

Features like location sharing combined with our phones’ ability to store every thought, post, or message we send make it possible to know what people are doing, thinking, or feeling at any given moment.

 

This gradual erosion of privacy has obvious implications for raising children—especially older kids and teenagers. Years ago, parents may have been able to glean information about their kids by eavesdropping on phone calls or searching their rooms. But nowadays, there’s a digital footprint for nearly everything.

Snooping on your kids can be tempting, especially when you feel out of the loop or have concerns about them, but is it ever an appropriate thing to do? Let’s talk about it.

 

What Feeds Parents’ Urge to Invade Their Children’s Privacy?

 

It’s natural for parents to worry about their kids. But there are times when those worries might feel more urgent. For example, maybe your teen seems more quiet or detached than usual, or they’ve started hanging out with a new group of friends who rub you the wrong way. You just wish they’d offer up more information so you could breathe a little easier.

 

Pexels Pixabay 159395

Nancy Darling, a psychology professor at Oberlin who has been studying adolescents for over 30 years, makes a distinction between routine disclosure and self-disclosure in parent/child relationships.

 

 

 

Routine disclosure covers the information that’s necessary for parents to do their jobs, like who their child will be with, where they’re going, and what time they’ll be home. On the other hand, self-disclosure covers less critical information, such as what a child talks about when they’re with friends.

 

The urge to invade privacy may appear when your child isn’t disclosing information in the way you feel is necessary.

 

But the reality is that parents and children are likely to disagree about what counts as a routine disclosure versus a self-disclosure. So it’s important to have an open dialogue with your kid so everyone is on the same page and can create shared boundaries and expectations.

 

You should both come to an agreement on what constitutes critical information and why you need to know it versus what your child can keep to themselves.

 

Including your child in these conversations gives them a sense of autonomy and choice and makes them less likely to feel that the questions you do ask are invading their privacy.

 

What Happens When Parents Invade Their Children’s Privacy? 

Once you’ve set boundaries and expectations together for what constitutes routine or self-disclosures, it’s important not to violate those boundaries. Unfortunately, invading your child’s privacy is one of the biggest parenting mistakes you can make.

 

Research has shown that invading a kid’s privacy will ultimately have a negative impact. When children feel their parents are overstepping, their response is often to lie or hide information.

 

The more your child hides information from you, the more you’ll feel compelled to overstep their boundaries. This cycle of distrust is unhealthy for your parent-child relationship and can potentially put your child in danger, since they’ll be less likely to disclose information when they really need help.

 

What Can Parents Do To Facilitate Trust with Their Children?

 

At the end of the day, one of the best things you can do for your relationship with your child is to build trust. Here are a few tips to create safe spaces that facilitate trust with kids:

 

Pexels Cottonbro 5082239
  • Keep private information private. Just because your child told you something, doesn’t mean you have the right to tell anyone else. Your child should feel secure in the fact that you respect their privacy.
  • Avoid punishment. If your kid fears that disclosing information will result in automatic punishment, they’ll feel less inclined to share that information with you, no matter how badly they might need your guidance.
  • Respect their autonomy. Kids as early as toddler age have a desire for autonomy. It’s never too early to start showing your child that you acknowledge and respect their need for independence. Practice backing off slightly when you can and paying attention to the boundaries they set.

The more you can show your child that they can trust you, the less you’ll have the urge to invade their privacy, and the more they’ll want to let you into their private lives.

 

Love and Blessings,

Katherine

 

P.S. If you’re looking for a supportive group of like-minded parents, I encourage you to join our private Facebook Group!

Categories
Culture Growth Health and Wellness Technology

How to Keep Your Kid’s Screen Time (and your sanity!) from Spiraling Out of Control

The scenario is all-too familiar.

You’re in an important Zoom meeting and need one gloriously uninterrupted hour to focus on work. Despite the fact that it’s 8 in the morning, you hand over the iPad to keep your kid entertained.

Or how about this one:

Your tween has stopped complaining that they’re bored and started spending all their free time scrolling on social media. It’s a struggle to get them to put down their phone at mealtimes.

Or even this:

You’re concerned about your child’s gaming habits. A hobby has become an obsession, and your kid seems to be gaming when you wake up in the morning and when you go to sleep at night. It’s getting harder to talk to them, and you wonder if their schoolwork is slipping.

I completely get it. Screen time is so easy and so entertaining. It’s designed to grab and hold our attention. And the longer we stay isolated and inside, the more time you and your kid are likely to spend in the glow of a phone, computer, tablet, or TV. It’s exhausting to keep antsy children occupied, especially when you’ve got work that needs to get done.

Is your family’s screen time spiraling out of control? How do you keep yourself from being overcome by guilt from allowing too much screen time? And how do we all keep our screens from destroying us mentally, emotionally, and even physically?

First, take a deep breath. Screens are not inherently evil, and you are not a bad parent for using them. You simply need to apply some conscious parenting to your family’s approach to screentime:

  1. Understand the media your kids use. You don’t have to feel like you’re making a deal with the devil every time you let your child use a screen. Instead of allowing devices to rule your life, take your power back by educating yourself about them. What shows/apps/websites/games do your children like to watch or use? Try to incorporate some educational and values-forming content in with the fun stuff and the fluff.
  2. Build-in interactive activities. Does your child love watching musicals? Schedule a family sing-a-long. Are they interested in drawing? Let them watch an art show and do some inspired drawing together afterward. You can even host a bake-off based on your favorite cooking show!
  3. Incorporate live face time. To encourage social interaction, suggest some online face time with relatives or friends. There are even apps out now that allow you to read a book with someone remotely.
  4. Structure hours. Work with your child, if they’re old enough for the discussion, to set reasonable and mutually agreed-to limits on screen time. Carve out time to go for a family walk or play some old-school board games. Try to build in electronic-free times and zones, especially around mealtimes and bedtimes.
  5. Make a co-parenting agreement. If you’re raising your kids with other caregivers, make sure you are all aware about screen time usage in each household. You may not implement the same schedules or limits, but keeping each other informed will eliminate confusion and foster effective communication.
  6. Model screen-free behavior. If you’re constantly scrolling or checking email, you can’t expect your kid to place much value on your warnings against screen time. Set guidelines for your family, not just for your kids — and make sure to adhere to the rules yourself!

As parents, we worry a lot about the issue of screen time and how too much of it might hurt our children. But at the end of the day, we have to realize that devices are just pieces of metal, and it’s up to us to use them for ill or for gain. As our children’s parents, what’s important is that we give them what a screen ultimately can’t: the love, attention, and support they need.

P.S. Gaming addiction is a very specific, and real, screentime concern. If you’re worried about your kid’s gaming habits, check out my free webinar with Cam Adair, founder of Game Quitters and a former video game addict.