The Exchanges

Q I know you started this company in 2014 with your brother. Um, where'd the idea come from?

A Yeah, so my, it was my brother's idea. Both of us were born in Switzerland. We lived in Pakistan, Iran, the U.S., Came back to Switzerland. Our parents used to work in the humanitarian sector, so my father worked for, or served refugees for around 30 years, and we experienced a lot growing up. It was like quite a contradiction going skiing on the weekend in a, in a very affluent or privileged little bubble in Switzerland, whereas at the same time we'd go on summer vacation and, and give candy out to refugee kids who were our age, um, you know, 10, 11, and that, that really did shake us quite a bit, and throughout our upbringing we realized that we are where we are. I'm here Not because I'm smart, but because I was lucky. I was born, I could have been born two doors down, and that my life would have been very different. And I'm confident because of the experiences I had rather than because I'm innately able to do so. And that's really what pushed us to say, you know, we were lucky in this sense. What would happen if we were able to give those opportunities in terms of particularly experiences? So education is one thing, or traditional education is one thing, but particularly experiences to millions of youth around the world. What would happen? How can we change things? And that's where we thought, okay, it has to be mobile first, or it has to be a digital solution, and it has to…

AI assessment note: “it was my brother's idea... throughout our upbringing we realized that we are where we are”

Q you're looking for an opportunity, and you can't find one, What would you recommend a young person do who's graduating college or is just entering the workforce and is kind of trying out different potential career paths? I mean, is it a good time to just steer clear of the workforce for a while and get some more education, which in the U.S. means more debt? What do you think?

A Yeah, I think definitely trying is important, but this might just be an opportunity to start your own thing. You know, a lot of great companies came out of the last crisis because they just couldn't find jobs or that opportunity just wasn't there for a year. So maybe start one's own thing. It's never been easier to start a business. It's never been easier to try something new. So even if it doesn't work, that's incredible work experience. You know, when we talk to CHROs of some of the leading companies in the world, what are they looking for? Or what were they looking for before the crisis? And definitely after is that ability to be entrepreneurial, even if you're working for a fortune 500. So it can't hurt. Best case scenario, you build something amazing. Worst case scenario, you fail, and you take those skills, and you leverage those skills, and you keep your mind active. It's so important from a mental health perspective. Keep your mind active, and then apply them when the market comes back, which it will at one point. Another, um, opportunity, if, if maybe starting yourself isn't it, join some friends, or join, or reach out to small startups. Definitely, volunteer is an opportunity. There are a lot of NGOs, there are a lot of nonprofits that need help, or need support right now. Build up your work experience, gain some experience, like concrete, tangible work experience tha…

AI assessment note: “this might just be an opportunity to start your own thing.”

Q world. You've got offices in obviously Switzerland, the U.S., Germany, Serbia, the Philippines. I mean, you're growing. You've got presumably some cash runway. Um, but these are tough economic times. I mean, LinkedIn just laid off a thousand people. There are record numbers of people in the U.S. filing for unemployment. So first of all, how has your revenue been in your business been impacted by the global economic slowdown?

A Yeah. I mean, when it happened, I think the first week where we started to notice it was getting really serious. I remember it. The first thing we did was we, we had a board meeting and we talked about, okay, what's our cash situation and let's make sure we get through this, however long that may be, while maintaining the team for two reasons. One is like, you don't want to be on that downward death spiral, but also because we have, you know, the opportunity to have real impact in this time if we make the changes and adapt effectively, but we won't be able to do so if we don't have the team to do it. So we've actually hired, Over the past few months, and we've actually grown over the past few months, and we've adapted to do so. But the first week was really about scenario planning and getting through that. After that, we, we assumed the worst, but we ourselves decided, well, there's definitely going to be less demand for recruitment. There's definitely less hires, which hurts us, which hurts our users or our members. And we said, okay, how can we, how can we help? Because if they come on and there are no jobs, well, it's a, it's a very bad experience, but it's also, it's hurting us. So what we did was we put up We put together this program, Better Together and Other Challenges, where youth can really develop work experience. At the end of it, they get certificates that show tha…

AI assessment note: “definitely going to be less demand for recruitment... this is generating revenue for us.”

Q good chance you're going to graduate into a world with very few jobs. You know, a world that we haven't seen certainly since 2008, nine, and 10, but maybe far, far more challenging than that. What's your sense? I mean, what do you think? I mean, do you think that's, that's actually true, that that is likely to be the case for the next three, four, five, Years or more?

A Yeah, I think whether or not we go through a deep recession with mass unemployment, particularly for the youth, for the next three, four, five years, it's very probable that youth, at least in the short run, are to suffer. They're normally the last to be hired, the first to be fired, and that's justified for various reasons, including ethical. Like, oh, they have less commitments than, for example, someone with a few kids, but it is incredibly difficult, and the mental toil of, let's say, an eighteen-year-old who doesn't know what's coming up next, We need to be able to be resilient and we need to be able to learn how to learn and adapt because we just don't know what's going to happen. So there could be a second downturn. There could be a third downturn. It could be sustained downturns and us like across society, but in particular for the youth that we have an opportunity, they have an opportunity to take this and say, okay, it doesn't kill me. It might make me stronger. And I can learn from this and develop that resilience that five, six, 10 years from now, I'm able to deal with the next crisis in a more In a stronger way, because I'm going to have to do that. And some of the skills that need to be developed, in my, in my opinion, are entrepreneurial thinking, that ability to be flexible and resilient. We need to do more, though, beyond just the, these massive stimulus packag…

AI assessment note: “it's very probable that youth, at least in the short run, are to suffer.”