SPEAKER_00 0:00

People want to see what it's like to the 20-year-old founder's done. And so they had Stephen Bart involved at that point. I was sat in this kind of boardroom with Stephen, with the founders, with everyone. I was like, how can I build a personal brand? And he said folks every day. It's not going to be a kind of quick project. It's going to take a while because this is not only a business but a movement.

SPEAKER_02 0:23

Hi Max and welcome to the Build to Perform podcast. Thank you for coming on. Thank you for having me. Um want to dive straight in if you can just give us a bit about who you are and why you do what you do, please.

SPEAKER_00 0:34

Yeah, for sure. Uh I'm Max Jones. I'm 20 years old. I'm the founder of Zero Degrees, which is a network for young people that don't go to university. And I kind of started it just because I saw a massive issue of people, school leavers, that wanted to have other routes besides university. Yeah, there wasn't really any kind of structure around that. So I decided to quit my dream job to make it happen. And here I am today.

SPEAKER_02 0:58

You talk about your dream job, but I think for those who don't know you, um, it'd be good to probably just give a bit of background as to what that was and who Perfect Head are and kind of your role um at Perfect Head and the progression you made in a very short amount of time.

SPEAKER_00 1:15

Yeah, for sure. So I joined Perfect Head just out of school, so two weeks after my A levels. So I was 18 at the time and raring to go in kind of the world of business. Uh at the time they had seven employees, so I was number eight. And it were they had just gone on Dragon's Den, five offers, um, with Stephen Bartlett kind of taking their he was the main offer, so they took them. And from there it was it was kind of rapid growth, to be quite honest. It was I started as field sales within two months, I'll be promoted, and then kind of took the reins on the B2B kind of cafes, gyms, kind of all the independents, stocking, matcha, and cans, and there. So yeah, they are now one of the fastest growing businesses, and they are actually the fastest and largest valued business from Dragon's Den, which is awesome. So I was there for 18 months and decided to leave to kind of pursue my dream, which was helping school leavers land exciting roles in companies. Um, and yeah, did the B2B side manage to run a PL of six figures with no experience in just under I'd say 14 months, which was wicked.

SPEAKER_02 2:26

And just on the B2B side of things, I think for those who don't know or haven't been involved in that kind of world, obviously it's very quite a lot of the people who are listeners to this and watchers will be from a commercial real estate background, but that's kind of different worlds to what we're kind of used to. Kind of can you just explain kind of what what that role entails and the secret source in some respects, how you went from you know the field sales all the way to lead in such a short amount of time?

SPEAKER_00 2:56

Yeah, for sure. So it was essentially kind of outbounds, inbounds, just getting, for example, a case of 12 cans into an independent stocking from scratch, or even matcha as a powder into kind of any gym, cinema, any kind of independent that you think might have kind of a next level to it. So from there I would just outbound, get some inbounds as well because we had such good marketing and essentially just lead the customer through that process. So help them kind of choose what they need, get it from there, stock it, help them after that, because I think that was kind of the most important, especially with repeat purchase. Um, so kind of really nurture them on what they need, what's gonna be best for their business, and then they'll stock the drinks and also with the drinks in terms of powder, it was more what flavors are gonna work well for the place, is it their marketing kind of colours? Is that gonna work better with the different colour kind of flavours? So if they've got red branding, most likely a strawberry flavor is gonna look better with them, it's gonna look better on their Instagram, they're gonna get more views, they're gonna sell more. So it was kind of leading the whole process through there. Um, and yeah, I think that was kind of my main point was repeat purchase was kind of my main thing, was always take care of the customer, always deliver 120%. Brilliant.

SPEAKER_02 4:16

So um obviously you left school, left school, went straight into work. Um can you just explain kind of the external pressures, uh family, friends, etc., which may have influenced you there. I mean, it must have been you did well at school. Yeah. So saying you're not gonna go to university, I'm gonna go straight into a startup, uh, must have caught turned a few heads.

SPEAKER_00 4:41

Yeah, I've I mean my year I was so there's 150 people in my year, I was one of two that didn't go. Um so there's definitely a lot of lot of faces thinking, what are you doing? You know, uni is the route most people go down anyway. Um, and it's I think that was m largely for like the social aspect. And besides, I mean, I got I was predicted three C's, um, managed to get two A stars, a B, and another A star in like a certain project. So it was that kind of actually got more people thinking why you're not going. If you've got good A levels, you might as well go to like a top Russell group. I just I just know that firstly I'm dyslexic, um, and I know that actually working on the job is a hundred percent my my type of thing, and that kind of spot, yeah, quite quite a few people. I mean, a lot of people were happy for me thinking it's gonna be quite interesting to watch this, see what happens. Um, but also some people are thinking, sure, this is the right idea. I guess it comes from a place of like care thinking after me, but yeah, kind of had it in my head that I was just gonna do it. I said I'd do it, wanted to do it. Um, so yeah, no uni for that. And I mean my parents are very kind of supportive of that, um, and my brother as well, because he'd gone he'd gone through uni too. My sister actually didn't go. Um, so I kind of also had kind of best of both sides, and yeah, we thought personally for me of what I wanted to achieve, it would just be best to go for it. Nice.

SPEAKER_02 6:09

And with Perfect Head, had they been on Dragon's Den and in had you seen them on Dragon's Den when you applied?

SPEAKER_00 6:15

So it was uh that's when I was revising my levels, and I mean I was drinking copious amounts of only drinks anyway, and coffee, and that's when I was watching their pitch. It was like I think we were going through our mocks at the time, and I was just like, right, one last YouTube video, it popped up on YouTube, watched it, and I remember just seeing their energy. I was like, that's I for me so much more interesting than going to a lecture, whatever. And I'm a sociable guy, but even that was like right, that's what I can achieve. I'm gonna go do that.

SPEAKER_02 6:45

So excellent. And so was that always on your mind then from that point that they were gonna be who you you almost to the point of like manifestation, just like I will work for them, and yeah, well, three months later I was brilliant, and so they had Stephen Bart involved at that point, um, and obviously you've had some bit of mentoring, a bit of a challenge with OSC. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh, do you want to explain a bit about that as well?

SPEAKER_00 7:10

For sure, yeah. So I'd say two to three months into working at PT, um, I was, I mean, I was the youngest in the team, and he came in for an investment meeting on like a Friday evening. Must have been about I'd say four in the afternoon on Friday. And I've always I've always seen him as like a proper mentor and like such well, such an incredible guy doing incredible kind of mental things. So I wanted to stay behind, see if I could kind of meet him. Um, and they had a board meeting. It lasted about a couple of hours before they had like a toilet drinks break, and then my boss Shawnee, who actually didn't go to university either, and was always a large like mentor for me, uh, looked after me in the early days there. Um, said, Do you want to come in? Do you want to come into the boardroom? So suddenly I was sat in this kind of boardroom with Stephen, with the founders, with everyone, and then we got talking, and then after the meeting, there was like any questions. I was the youngest MJ, go forward, ask a question, and I'd kind of really prepped it in my mind of like what I was gonna say. Didn't think it was actually gonna happen. And he said, Um, yeah, he was like, Do anything for me, and I was like, How can I build a personal brand? I I love LinkedIn, I love the whole thing of it. I wanna, you know, there's I'm loving my job at the moment, but I need to kind of I want to build a personal brand, get a following behind me, and kind of share my story. And he said, post every day. Um, he was like, consistency is the biggest thing, but you're never gonna do that if there's nothing to go after, because there's if no one's holding you accountable, it's not gonna happen. So I essentially signed up to deal with him, which was post every day for an entire year on LinkedIn, uh, well, five days a week, not weekends. And if I did, he would fly me to LA, go behind the podcast. Um, so that was like a that was a big year because I I said yes, and I held myself accountable, and every day did a post. It started kind of sharing stories with different companies because I didn't want to just put out stuff that's just the same every day. Obviously, I've got a few stories, but I don't have a year's worth of them. So I would kind of share different companies, different brands, putting their stuff out there, built a bit of a following. I'd say halfway through the challenge, I noticed that it really helped my sales as well. Um, people on LinkedIn were saying, Oh, there's that guy that you know wears green all the time, is always always on LinkedIn trying to push the match a story, and then at trade shows you see people were getting involved saying, Oh, you're that guy, blah blah blah, love perfect head. Um, so yeah, it really had kind of a strong, well, strong momentum to it. And then, yeah, final day of the challenge, he connected with me, and that was kind of like the I was like, right, I've done it. And then since we've been in comms, obviously he's very busy, I'm very busy, so haven't got around to doing it, but it's 100% still on the cards, so yeah.

SPEAKER_02 10:01

I think what you're talking about there in terms of that consistency thing is and holding yourself trying to hold yourself accountable to it is really hard. I think I started on that the personal brand kind of exercise around September, I guess, last year, and it's really good, and then I got to December, and yeah, you've got young children and family, yeah, all sorts of pressures came there and it it dropped off. And actually, then to build yourself back up again for sure. Once you've you started to make progress and you've got yourself to a certain point, haven't you? Yeah, you're doing well, and then it goes back down to zero or goes back, yeah, and building yourself back up seems even harder.

SPEAKER_00 10:37

100%, yeah. And that was I remember there were some nights where I'd be I'd just like a whole day of work, gone to the gym, whole day of work, absolutely knackered, and then you remember you've got to do a post. And then that I mean, sometimes it was at three in the morning, I'd wake up and remember, or it would be waking up at five to remember to write it. And then actually, what I found interesting was through consistency, you get processes going. I'd say about it took me too long, actually. It's probably about eight months in. I decided that the way to go was go on a Sunday, prep five posts, schedule them, and just do it that way. Um, but I mean it took consistency to kind of get to that because sometimes I thought that would be better, sometimes I thought it wouldn't. Um, but yeah, no hundred percent consistency is beyond anything else, I think.

SPEAKER_02 11:23

You're almost a bad case study here, right? In the sense that you've built a personal brand and you left. Yeah. Um what I'd like to try and put into people and business owners, etc., is actually building encouraging your staff, encouraging them to build their own personal brand is actually amazing for the company, yeah. And really good. And yes, you might get some people that leave, but actually the difference that makes for you as a company in that in that time period is still worth it, and to be encouraging it to be helping with it. Um do you agree on kind of what what strengths and yeah benefits to a company do you think there are in terms of building that personal brand?

SPEAKER_00 12:00

Um I definitely thought it was a catalyst in terms of even younger people seeing it. Obviously, I was 18 at the time, and I was getting my friends drinking it, who then got their friends drinking it and their friends, and then you kind of see how a personal brand can. I mean, so early on, I didn't think it would have that much of an impact directly to the sales because I didn't know how like strong generating sales through platforms are. But seeing kind of, you know, some of the biggest accounts I got were going and seeing the founder, for example, at like a trade show and him going, Oh, MJ from LinkedIn, right? Uh, and then it's already kind of breaking down the barriers of that kind of relationship. You feel like you've kind of gone ahead of a step, which most people sending cold emails or whatever would be behind. Um, so I think the personal brand 100% pushed it forward, and yeah, I mean, so many people were getting contact saying, Why are you kind of leaving PT? Um, and it was just down to seeing the energy kind of from from the founders of they thought anything was capable, like possible, and they were capable of doing anything, and that's infectious, especially in like a startup world where you're young and you're absorbing everything like a sponge. I remember there was like a three-month period where I was I I need music to work, but I didn't didn't listen to music because I wanted to hear the ins and outs of what was going on, kind of get my toolbox, get all the kind of the tools in and absorb everything, listen to it, and that was so valuable, especially at such a young age and kind of an industry like that. So, yeah, a lot of people were concerned while I was leaving, kind of built this kind of personal brand, was smashing everything, absolutely loved it. And it all just stemmed of firstly seeing that I could do it, secondly, this desire to kind of just make change, and that's when I was like, right, I'm gonna make this leap, gonna go all out, gonna do it. It's not gonna be a kind of quick project, it's gonna take a while because this is not only a business but a movement, like ready to kind of take on it as an empire. So, yeah, that was January. So it's been a fair few months and it's going very strong, and yeah, best decision I made, hardest decision I've made, but best by my yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:06

I mean to go from a company which is obviously at that massive growth stage, yeah, to then going, no, I'm gonna do my own thing now. Yeah, like the uni thing, it must have your parents, family, friends, 100% all the time.

SPEAKER_00 14:21

Always uh going against the grain, you could say. Um, and yeah, again, people can tell, I'm sure it's from a place of trust. And I remember sitting down with the founders and they were so so supportive. They were like 100%, you know, I can see in your energy, seeing your willing to learn, desire to make change, everything. Um, so they were fully sort of like behind me, and um, yeah, still in contact with them because very good terms, and to see what they're doing now is immense, like it's awesome.

SPEAKER_02 14:49

So, yeah, and you talk about this mentoring piece as well, and I think we've talked about it when we we've talked separately on zero degrees as well. I think you've got a mentor working with you on that, and I think it's really really cool to hear you talk about that and actually being open about yeah, I'm I'm trying to build you know knowledge, I'm trying to pick knowledge from all these different areas and do that. Who who's mentoring you at the moment?

SPEAKER_00 15:14

So it's actually someone I met just I'd say about six months ago now. Um, we were just at like kind of a networking event and told him about it, and it was kind of like a mutual, I didn't really know him, but it was a friend of a friend, and through there, I think just the first interaction I could firstly see how passionate he was about zero degrees because it really stuck with him, and he even went to university um I'd say 15-20 years ago, and he was still like, I see why you're doing it. Secondly, he was saying how my passion really kind of sparked him on. Um, so yeah, since then I remember for the first weekend, it was just kind of just bouncing, like using as a soundboard, because I think that's so important. I don't have a co-founder as kind of running everything on your own when you're when you're young and you don't really know. Well, there's so much to learn out there, and there's so many aspects of it. And he always just said kind of just keep it simple, and that's when it kind of changed everything because you kind of see that doing everything is it's only gonna you know stem it out, and it's better to just keep it simple, scale, and sort the mission without all the extras.

SPEAKER_02 16:21

Yeah, and I think you're probably quite lucky in terms of your perfect head background. You're in a startup, you might have been doing B2B sales, but yeah, your job role probably didn't just stop there, did it? And yeah, yeah, yeah. Being in that startup environment probably allowed you to do lots of different things across a business rather than just that sales fit.

SPEAKER_00 16:41

And I think even through there, it was kind of you kind of see what strengths you also have in other kind of sections. For example, yeah, joined as sales, but you do you kind of do the samplings first of all, which you get talking to people, you then help with making a TikTok for social media, and you find that you're actually comfortable on camera. And it's that's stuff that you never kind of do anyway before. So, yeah, by kind of being in that startup world, um, because actually it's the third risk, I was offered a role at innocent instead of perfect head, and obviously perfect head had about seven people, like I said, innocent multi-million pound company. That was another risk. Um, so yeah, it's kind of this I kind of saw the wave sort of like opportunity, comfort's great, everyone loves comfort, but actually pushing yourself out there to go and do something and chase something else, and it's like having a stressful week. If you get to the end of it and push push the boat out, by the time you're at the end of it, you feel proud of yourself. So, yeah, by immersing yourself in all aspects of a startup was kind of like a I had to do it, I wanted to do it, and you yeah, you learn so much about yourself for sure.

SPEAKER_02 17:44

Yeah, and so founder at 20, yeah, and that comes with its own challenges. What's the being the biggest challenge you found about being uh a founder of a company?

SPEAKER_00 17:55

I'd say, well, firstly, being like holding yourself accountable for everything. Now, I'm I would say I'm very strong on that in a sense of I'm quite regimented in terms of like a routine and everything, like I'm up by five, I'm gymming, I'm I'm keeping that balance going. But I think firstly, and that's why mental is so important, is having that kind of knowing when you're kind of going too deep in a rabbit hole and you need to actually step back and think, is this adding value, or is this just kind of extra detail that's not going to move the needle? Um so that was kind of the main thing. It's it started, I think, for the stars of zero degrees, which was definitely important because the community is a massive part of it. But kind of organizing too many things and actually just keeping kind of like a few events going. Example, if there's two, three events, that's fine, but organizing 10, it's certainly gonna take up more time. And I found that I had to do that to kind of learn where I'm going now. Yeah, um, but yeah, I'd say like keeping everything getting too complex is definitely a massive kind of struggle, and then actually stepping back and just minimalizing things, just make sure the processes work and that they're scalable and they're actually gonna sort the problem that you're trying to figure out. Um, so yeah, I'd say that's the biggest problem, and so far, kind of keeping it all minimal's been a game changer.

SPEAKER_02 19:12

Nice. And so focusing in on zero degrees, I think for those who don't know much about zero degrees, the instant reaction could be how does that differ to an apprenticeship, for example, with school leavers, etc. Do you want to just explain kind of the difference and why that why you've applied that difference as well? Because I think that's really important.

SPEAKER_00 19:35

Yeah, for sure. So essentially with zero degrees, there's different types of people that can join. So it's a community as well as kind of a recruitment side to it. So if someone wanted to join and they're on an apprenticeship, or they were just from the age of about 18 to 25 and didn't go to uni previously, or they're going straight into work, so they can kind of join the main hub, which is like the community. So we do an event a month because that's one of the main problems, which was that you don't get to see other people on that same path. So actually, having these events and getting people together is such a big thing, and then on the second half of it is now the phase two, which was more like the recruitment side, which is connecting school leavers to entry-level jobs. Because I've talked to so many of you, I've got a lot of mates who have like been previous years and actually years above, and they've all said the same thing, which is apprenticeships are great, but actually just getting into a business from day one is almost just well, it's like an incubator, it's like the best way to learn for certain people. Um, and it's it was quite hard to do so, and that's why I thought I'm gonna kind of connect this bridge. So now got some great relationships on both sides of schools, helping people actually get education around what the alternatives are to university and apprenticeships. So I think apprenticeships are getting a lot more light on them now, but there's still other ways that like to get into work which people don't really know about. So that's kind of the main thing for zero degrees, you know.

SPEAKER_02 21:04

So I think we talked about it before. I think I I qualify in that time period as well to your mentor, it's probably left 15-20 years ago, uni now. Um, and if I was to do it again, I definitely wouldn't go down the university degree route for where I wanted to go in terms of career choice at that time. Um, if I knew that this this route, apprenticeship route or another route was available, yeah. I'd have gone, no, I'm gonna keep that money to myself, and I'm gonna go straight into work and learn on job and um do that. But I think one of the big pulls to university instill is is that social side, and I think that's one of the parts which zero degrees is there to solve is people have that fear of missing out of that social element, yeah, the culture which comes with that, and being able to backfill that whilst people are going through work is a really cool moment.

SPEAKER_00 21:58

Yeah, I mean that was the that's Was the first foundation for zero degrees let's just get this social going. So I think it was so I did weekly events, I did like a five-a-side football team, we did touch rugby, we did run clubs, we did coffees, and there's like three, four events a week, and that's when I found that actually by people coming in, all we were talking about was jobs, and how can like if people aren't comfortable in their current job, how can they easily find another job um without a degree on their CV? Things like that, and that's when actually by going through those events we realized that this job thing was a massive like a massive issue. Um, and it was always in my mind beforehand, but I never thought it would launch so fast. But the demand from seeing these people that said, like, we need help, we need I've got younger siblings who don't really want to go to university, so having something structured to be able to like come into from schools um was definitely important, so yeah. That's really cool.

SPEAKER_02 22:53

Do you think traditional roots are lit losing relevance? Or I think or just the price point of say going to university is so high now, right? Um whether that's now gonna even out to a mix to what it was probably about you know 40 years ago, I guess.

SPEAKER_00 23:14

Yeah, I think I think uni's great, especially I mean, then there's some like STEM subjects where it's 100% needed and it it most likely will be for a long, long time. But in certain areas, for example, in the business world, like marketing and sales, I think the best way to do it is to jump into it. So if you're getting in 50k of debt as opposed to earning a salary, getting experience, um, it seems like a no-brainer to me. And I think I've seen a lot of mates who have now dropped out of university, and the reason for that is they didn't have the pure kind of education of what routes there could be. So they've just gone there because it's the easy option. Um, and even most of them were on the fence beforehand, but that there was just no structure for them to actually think, right, I am gonna go this way. Um but they went to uni and within weeks and months they've dropped out and they've they've seen me and gone, I now see why you're doing this because it's such a big thing, and actually, yeah, that social aspect pulled me in. But if you'll bring it to this side as well as helping people get these jobs, it's yeah, it's a no-brainer. So, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:23

So, on that, how can employers attract and support you know the non-grad talent effectively?

SPEAKER_00 24:31

Yeah, so I think it's a sense of well, firstly, I'm I go to a lot of like networking events to kind of just talk to these employers and hear actually why, like kind of if a degree is necessary for them and if so, why? Um I mean a lot comes through LinkedIn, I'm quite public on there in terms of posting and say what I think. Um but yeah, a lot of them come through and they see that I think after a few questions they actually see that a degree isn't so necessary and it is just an old system. Um, and that's yeah, that's what I've seen so far. So I think yeah, a lot come through the posts and they see it, and that's how I then kind of educate them into you know why it might not be so necessary, and it's just kind of like an old kind of rule, but and how can they support that though?

SPEAKER_02 25:19

How can they the a founder of a business who's listening to this go okay we wanna we wanna diversify how we bring people into company, it doesn't all have to be through the uni the uni route. How do we support those non-uni um routes?

SPEAKER_00 25:34

Um I think being more open to kind of giving things a go, I think it's quite important. I think I've seen in quite a few circumstances just just letting it happen and then then being surprised by how talented these school leavers are and how hungry they are to kind of give it a go, try, get their foot in the door. Um so almost just like being more open to choice of it might not have you might have two CVs, one might have a degree, one might not. Why rule this one out just because there's a chance that they haven't gone to uni and you know, spent three years going to lectures and having some good fun? When actually this this one over here is leaving school and sacrificing all of that um to give this a go. So I think being more open to choice and just open like two ears, kind of just listen a little bit more and kind of yeah, see what happens.

SPEAKER_02 26:26

And I think we talked about it kind of off camera before, um, but in the commercial real estate world and you know, particularly building surveying, quantity surveying, those sort of areas, asset management, property management, typically the route required is you go to university, you do an RACS approved degree, you then leave university, you then go to a company, and you then you do your APC, you get chartered, um which is another kind of two years minimum. If you're like me as well, you're not very good at an interview process or uh getting put on the spot, and especially when you're young and under a lot of pressure, you can mess it up, 40% pass rates. That that process is very old school, right? Um and I think commercial real estate wants to and needs to change and innovate and modernise. And I think opening up their way of getting into industry and bringing more people into industry is a big challenge which they got at the moment, right? Yeah, they've we've got a very big issue where a lot of the industry who are chartered surveyors, for example, yeah, they're going to be retiring in the next few years and it leaves a big gap.

SPEAKER_01 27:40

Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_02 27:41

So I think there needs to be a way of modernising and changing the way in which we accept people into industry, yeah, like you're talking about to really you know attract the talent, which probably would be missing. And I think on that, what does government or other industries need to do? Because obviously you're you're working really hard on zero degrees, you can't change the entire world, you're changing it to a degree, right? Yeah. But how do they change it and help someone like yourself and other people who are school leavers to understand those routes exist other than university?

SPEAKER_00 28:21

Yeah, I almost think it's it just needs more limelight. I mean, for the voices that are kind of speaking out to it, like myself, more limelight and kind of just being like, yeah, more platforms to be able to say what you think and going to going to these networking things, it's almost like I think almost like more talks, and it's it's the awareness to start with, I think, anyway. For example, the other day I went to the um independent school show to go and talk to these kind of heav careers and talk to them and say, kind of, what's missing, how can I help? Um are the schools judged on how many of their leaders go into union? Yeah, I mean I was actually talking about the other day. Yeah, it's like um, yeah, some some schools I think it's you know, with all the kind of magazines that come out, and it's more like these schools have had 20% that go to Oxford or whatever. I think it's more like that stigma of not going, of not having a degree. Not having a degree doesn't mean that you're less qualified than anyone else in terms of life experience. I think that's the main thing. Um so I think when schools really actually listen to the change that it can make, and I think it's with a match of case studies. Um, one of my good mates joined as an SDR, has been promoted in three months and moved to a different country to go to the other team because he's such a high performer. And I think it's a matter of case studies when these schools are listening and actually see the change, they're seeing actually the whole stigma is so outdated, and they just need to kind of keep up and listen. And that's that's my mission as well going to these schools and saying kind of what I think there is out there and what I'm proving is out there and how it can benefit different types of different people, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 30:04

And one of the platforms which are really raising this is on LinkedIn, yeah. Um, and I'd say there's stigma, there's this viewpoint as well that people of certain generation look at what's happening at on LinkedIn now, and they're thinking it's not what LinkedIn's about, and gen people are utilising LinkedIn in a very different way, so kind of like Boomers and millennials are using it, and I think it'd be really cool to understand kind of from your perspective, how it's being used and how you know companies can start pivoting and taking advantage of that for one retaining talent but also hiring talent.

SPEAKER_00 30:47

Yeah, I think yeah, that's so true. And it was actually at the start of that challenge. I remember when I needed to post some content, and the only the only things on LinkedIn I was seeing is like I'm delighted to be announced that I'm getting and it was so formal, and obviously there was a bit of like a there was already people kind of posting like different things, like more photos, more something you'd see on Instagram, for example, and then videos came in, and then people were repurposing their TikToks onto LinkedIn, and I think yeah, it's definitely got a lot more informal, but I don't think that's a bad thing at all, and I've utilized it heavily in terms of my personal brand is I'm going for a walk and kind of videoing just my thoughts about zero degrees and how I think this week I've changed in terms of different goals and how they've worked and if they haven't worked and why, and it's I think it's the transparency of this new kind of informal it's informal kind of part of LinkedIn, which is letting businesses grow. I think it's the clarity, transparency of team members showing what it's like as well. I think I was quite big on that, and different employees from different companies that I spoke to in kind of the FMCG kind of sector was we were very public on we do this every Friday, like like the culture and like growing kind of internally, externally, it's yeah, it's so important. And I think in terms of hiring, it's kind of like a better spotlight for different individuals to kind of put themselves out there. That's what I did. That's how I got my first job was I did it on both LinkedIn and Instagram, but just putting myself out there saying why I should get it, and it's such a good platform, you know, it doesn't cost anything to post every day or whatever, just gives momentum, so yeah, it's a good limelight for sure.

SPEAKER_02 32:33

Yeah, and I think one thing which we're doing at Workman, which is really exciting, is we've just launched a creators club across the business, and so we've got people in different so we've got lots of different offices across the UK, but we also have accounts, we've got HR, we've got property management, building surveying, ESG, etc. So loads of different sectors within our um within our company, and what we're doing is having people from each one of those different parts of business being a creator, bringing up one having the opportunity to give one bit of content into the business stream each month as well. So 100% good for the company. We get more content, which is kind of more natural, more like organic kind of organic content, which is not so much oh fantastic, we've one one this building or whatever. Um, but you're seeing behind the scenes, you're seeing kind of what the role is in that specific part of the company, and I think that's going to be a really useful hiring tool for us going forward. Yeah. Creating that transparency um and putting it on LinkedIn and putting it on TikTok, etc. Yeah so I'm ri something which we're doing, which is really I think is really exciting and kind of aligns with what you're saying, is is that transparency, is that openness. And you know, I think I sometimes get questioned on kind of my LinkedIn side of things because I kind of talk about work, I talk about iBoss, I do thought leadership, but I also talk about home, children, yeah, personal, personal stuff, and it's like, does that belong there? Um, and I think going back to you and kind of how you're talking about you're getting sales via LinkedIn and soft openings to people when you're meeting them in person, yeah. I think that's really powerful, isn't it? Because actually what you've done is you've opened yourself up, you've created a relationship. You probably aren't really realising.

SPEAKER_00 34:31

And I think that's the beauty of it as well. Like, yeah, if you're in a call, you want to you want to know the person. That's why I used to uh one of my main tricks was kind of put a photo of me that lost my email because I'm quite a personable person, I really like getting to know people. And if you're doing a cold email, I mean, firstly, that's cold, but sec if you'll add a photo of you, just so you kind of at least know who's sending it. I thought that was massive, and that kind of converted my um my kind of outbound leads for sure. And I think just going back to LinkedIn in terms of utilising it, even what I've seen is I've to fuel the movement of what I'm trying to do, besides serial degrees' business area of it, even starting a series on the company page, which is just kind of highlighting different stories of different people who have not got a degree and a championing life, whether they've built something incredible or whether they're building essentially. Um and yeah, I think seeing the impressions on that and seeing people get behind it, and it's kind of building like a well, a again, another community and an alumni in it. Um, but yeah, the likes of Deborah Mead and Stephen Bartlett, Richard Branson, Jake Humphrey, that whole lot. It's like people go, Oh yeah, they're like me, they don't have a degree. Um, and it kind of builds that relationship as well. So yeah, and the Jake Humphrey thing that's opened up an opportunity for you as well, hasn't it? Yeah, so 100%, yeah, very exciting. Um tomorrow. Yeah. So it should be good. Behind the scenes uh performance. So that's exciting, isn't it? Yeah, and I think just seeing someone in the I mean that just shows also the power of LinkedIn, right? It's I did a post on him because he's a big role model for me, and he doesn't have a degree, and he has like a really cool story. And suddenly, through I don't know, a day of posting or whatever, I get I get an inbound that actually they'd love to invite me to go and see what it's like behind that, and then I'm seeing him in the flesh, which has been a goal for a while. I've loved that podcast for so so so long. Um, so yeah, it's exciting, and I think yeah, the world of podcasts, as you know, are gonna take over the world. So yeah, fingers crossed. So Gary Neville.

SPEAKER_02 36:39

Let's uh let's connect. Um I think yeah, I think yeah, you're right, and I think LinkedIn has been is so powerful, and there's a lot of people doing it right, but also some people can get it quite, I guess, wrong as well. And what are some of the kind of the you know, not mistakes? Because I I think everyone should shouldn't have that fear, right? Yeah, 100%. I think you should just get and post it, but um yeah, but kind of like what can where do you get wrong? Is it just lack of consistency? Is it just being too formal? What what is it?

SPEAKER_00 37:13

Yeah, I think what I found was it's almost so there's a nerve before, hence why that challenge was so mega for me is the nerve to post because you think what's someone gonna think about this? And it's like everyone has it. I don't I don't care if people say they don't, I know they do, like everyone has it. Uh how much shit did you get from your mates? Yeah, a lot. Um, I mean, still to this day. Yeah, so um it's all right, but it's I mean it's so important, and I think it's like one something that I stand by is kind of just does this add value? And I think it can add value in so many different ways. People want to see what it's like as a 20-year-old founder starting a business. I think well, I've I've heard people who've DM say it's so fascinating. Um, so that or goals this week. What do I want to do? What did I achieve? What didn't I achieve? Why didn't I achieve it? Um, updates. I went to this show, why I went, why it was why it was helpful. Um, or even to the personal branding side of things, like why I should have a personal brand, how I can keep keep it up, why consistency is key, why should I not use hashtags in this? It's like just if you're gonna write something, make sure that when you're actually writing it, someone can read it, and if they're not gonna have a takeaway from it, there's not much point. Even going to the zero degrees page ones, it's like I always try and get the proper inside scoop of it because everyone knows that Deborah Meadon's a dragon on dragon's den, but what what's she done that you don't know? Um, and I think that's what people find so fascinating, and I find it fascinating writing it myself. So I yeah, I think if you enjoy writing it, I'm sure that someone else is going to enjoy reading it.

SPEAKER_02 38:50

Yep, no, that's brilliant advice, and uh something which I I try to do, but it's like you're saying, it's um it's consistency, it's always finding something to talk about on a daily basis, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 39:05

And it's hard, I mean it took me a year to kind of even think that. I think that's the main thing is yeah, it took me a year of posting to actually look back and think what was there. I'd like I'd scroll back and I'd see some of the posts, and I met someone that was his job was he was like an awesome company about personal branding, and I bumped into him and I showed him my page, and this must have been like halfway through the kind of my challenge. And I've I felt embarrassed to show him some of the posts because I look at them and I was like, that just looks like a filler post. That doesn't have value, that's not a value. And then since I met him, his tips are just like drop the clickbait because I used to do like quite large clickbait, not clickbait, but kind of reel them in like a very strong hook to the point it doesn't even have that much context and it's not that far related, and it would get the views, it would get the likes, but it had no value. And I think the more value you add, the closer it is to kind of your profile. And if you're known as the person that just clickbaits all the time, no everyone's gonna get annoyed when they see your page, right? But if you're saying proper value in a certain niche, then people are always gonna see it and like it, so yeah, I think it's um getting rid of the ego metrics, right?

SPEAKER_02 40:07

I mean, obviously you've got fantastic ego metrics, so you're you're in a good space, but um it's getting rid of those ego metrics and actually going right, you know, might have had 2,000, 3,000 impressions on this post, but actually this impression one, this post which has got only 100, 200 impressions, actually that might have added value and brought in the cool people which you're trying to bring into your business. Exactly. Um so you don't need to worry about those and yeah, yeah, even those impressions.

SPEAKER_00 40:34

I mean, if it's getting 200 impressions and 10 likes is what it's higher engagement rates than chasing impressions and only getting 100 likes. So I think, yeah, that's 100%. No, very true. And it's I posted every day in the first 100 days, I don't think I got over 20 likes. Then you hit I I hit a thousand likes, and then the next day you get four likes. Then it's just like you just have to give it a bit of leeway and just keep going. And that's the that's the challenge I've now set is post on the zero degrees page every day because if you put the ego aside, it's like it's it's just worth it.

SPEAKER_02 41:07

Yeah, and how how do you find that? Um, I think quite a lot of the the the traditional advice would be company pages don't do that well, and um that's why personal brands are so powerful because you can talk, you can bring in those your company into it, and people are more likely to engage with the person, right? Yeah, for sure. So, but obviously, once again you're going against the grain a little bit and trying to do something a bit different.

SPEAKER_00 41:34

Yeah, I think it was because I had the page and I wasn't utilising it enough, and my personal brand, I think it grew, it's now at about 18,000. It is and it it was getting the likes, but I also thought it's a bit of a waste of time having this page. If I I might as well use it to share some sort of influence. So, whilst my personal brand is more of like the business side of it, that's more of the movement side. So I'm kind of now playing with two different horses in a race, and they've got this one, which is now every day, no matter what. I mean, it's less personal, so if I did have an ego, I still wouldn't mind because some of them get 10 likes. The one that Deborah meeting the other day got 600, the next one gets 10, then 15. And I don't, I really don't mind about that. Um, so having two, and you see that people are actually she reposted it, and it has my logo on the on the photo in the bottom right. So suddenly her 300,000 followers are seeing zero degrees in this nice pink with the like everyone's seeing it and it sees my branding. I think it's just a very clever way of sharing the movement and putting it out there, and yeah, it's like just utilising everything you have on the app is worth it.

SPEAKER_02 42:40

So, like I said, normally this is a very commercial real estate-based podcast, and I think we've there's a lot of value to what we've talked about in terms of people from the commercial real estate background learning from people from outside of our industry, outside of our sphere. I think it's it's great. Um, and one of the things which we often talk about is and how we close out normally is kind of big picture change for real estate. Obviously, we don't we're not going to talk about that. I think big picture change for getting into industries, and in this one we can talk about commercial real estate, but big picture, how do we change getting into industries from your point of view? It would be really cool to just finally finish on that, and then also how could how do you see you know school leaver to career? How how are we in a position now? Are we in a position where we need to evolve or revolutionize that approach?

SPEAKER_00 43:41

Yeah, no, definitely. I think in terms of like changing, it's well, I'm trying to make zero degrees as easy as possible for firstly a school lever to feel confident enough to think that's a that's a path, which which it is, and showing enough case studies and kind of providing enough credibility. For the employer to see that actually it's the it's again it's a fair route and it's just an extra route. It's not, I wouldn't say it's going against the grain anymore because it's getting more and more popular. So I think the biggest change is again at like awareness, and I'm seeing how the more that I'm putting out, the more people are starting to listen, and the more case studies that go out, the more that people are seeing that it actually is evolving like big time. You you even see in the news all these numbers of people are now starting to drop out of uni. People are deciding not to go before that, and that's I think just having the structure of zero degrees is the biggest change that's gonna kind of just make it easier as a choice.

SPEAKER_02 44:41

So do you think the current you know school leaver approach needs to revolutionize or or evolve?

SPEAKER_00 44:49

I think it needs to evolve in a sense of mindset of you know listening more. Like I said, my mission is to go into all these schools and educate them on why, like what's out there because I've lived there. I've I've in two years ago I was working in the other fastest growing startup in the UK. I've been there, I made a decision about the A levels two and a half years ago, and now that I've kind of got the gold and shown what what it's really like, it's kind of like just evolving the kind of mindset of yeah, let's let's take a listen. I think there's so much stuff that can stay, and like I said, uni's great, but just kind of be more open so they can really kind of see what is out there, and people like myself that are just trying to show it, just give us a chance just to get our foot in the door and really trying to help the situation.

SPEAKER_02 45:39

Well, thank you so much for appearing on uh Built to Perform podcast. Thank you for your time, really appreciate it. Some amazing insights, and I think we've touched on a fair few different subjects there, and we've we've heard a lot in terms of how how we can get people out of school and into into work in them in a in a way which is different to the standard expected route, right? We've also heard how you can take risks even if you you haven't come from a degree background as well. And actually, if you look at quite a lot of the entrepreneurs, and you've mentioned them on your zero degrees um LinkedIn page quite often recently, haven't you? They don't tend to have come from a university degree, or they at least dropped out from university, and quite often they've come with, like you said, dyslexia or you know, yeah, different ways of learning, and I think that's where I think the in all the industries need to improve is understanding that people don't learn in one way, and we've gotta we've gotta take that into account, and you know, commercial real estate is a really big one for that. Is we've got a very strict this is how you get into the industry, this is how you then progress, this is how you become chartered, this is how you move on. And actually, there are brilliant case studies of people who haven't taken that route, who've moved up in the industry really quickly, really well, and we need to spotlight those people, and you know, that's not putting down the RSCS, it's not putting down the getting chartered, it's just saying that there's other ways of doing it and being successful in those industries. Completely. Um, and I think what you're doing with serial degrees is really spotlighting that, and that's fantastic, appreciate it. And um, kind of what you've done in such a short amount of time in your career is incredibly impressive. So it's uh a massive congratulations on that, and looking forward to seeing how you take serial degrees forward and progress with that and whatever other ventures you probably end up doing. 100%. Thank you very much. Thank you very much.